Me Talk Athlete

QB Me Please

2012-01-23T14:35:00.000-08:00

There is a future in Washington because Blaine Gabbert is not part of it. Thankfully the collective brain of the Shannys did not stake their reputation on the rookie quarterback. If the the Redskins got one thing and one thing only really right this past season it was the trade down when Gabbert was staring at them in the face. Had the Redskins selected Gabbert it is reasonable to think this is what would have happened: Rex signs elsewhere because he knows he can't be the starter-is likely more portly wherever that is. Beck stays because Gosh darn it, he keeps telling himself in the mirror that one day people will like him. Skins bring in Jake Delhomme or Jeff Garcia or someone with an AARP card just in case Gabbert can only remember the first word of every play in the huddle and just says-"You go long, you do something cool."
Gabbert starts opening day because the fans never had to watch Beck "lead" the player run lockout practices and not unlike the Marty straw hat trend, blonde mullets become all the rage in DC.

And the rest would be predictable. The record might be the same but the offense is woeful, incapable of hitting a deep pass, not like that was happening anyway. But then the reality would set in. It's Heath Shuler all over again. He can't play. We are committed and the young pieces we have will want to flee ASAP.

Which leads us to an off-season of possibility and Gabbert free. So, with that as a backdrop, it's time to take a look at the men who could very well be, the next person Team Shanny stakes their reputation on..

1) Andrew Luck. Huge long shot considering the Colts should take him at number one. But did you see the Hannah Storm-JIm Irsay interview? They appeared to have just left an Applebees Happy Hour. So maybe, Irsay gets convinced that he should trade out and that means we are in. No one and I mean no one makes more trades involving overcompensation then the Redskins. So we'll mortgage our future and our grandchildren's future but we'll have Luck.
Probability: 2%

2) RG3. This guy might fall in the Redskins lap at 6 which would be nothing short miraculous. But all the league miracles appear to have gone to Denver and San Francisco, so I'll assume it won't be that easy. So these are the choices, pay the premium to hop Cleveland to ensure he doesn't get selected by the Browns at 4. That means going as high as 2 with the Rams or 3 with the Niners, neither of which figure to be interested in the Heisman winner. What's the price tag on that move? You know the Rams and Vikings are sleeping well knowing the drool worthy call from Washington is coming.
Probability: 23%

3) Draft another quarterback. Ryan Tannehill or 29 year old Brandon Weeden or that sleestack Osweiller or maybe Nick Foles. Will Mike Shanihan be the coach when he's in year 2? You already know the answer to that.
Probability: 24% as one may be drafted and not expected to start immediately.

4) John Beck and Rex Grossman: One is coming back if for no other reason that you can't clean house at the quarterback position. They both know the Shanny system-although some could debate that and are mildly effective in it-see aging wide receiver core showing glimpses of effectiveness. Plus, and this is what ole Rex is banking on- they don't get the guy they want in the draft (Damn you Matt Barkley), they don't land a Peyton Manning or Drew Brees (more on them below) and they think better of paying out the wazoo for a potential one hit wonder (see Matt Flynn). What choice do they have? Are they both back? No. We the people of Redskins nation demand in this election year at least one new quarterback. Yes We Can. Might we stomach one of them coming back? We have no choice so yeah, I guess we can. If we have to.
Probability : 83% that one returns

5) Drew Brees. In our dreams. He doesn't have a deal in New Orleans and of course worst case scenario would be franchised if it gets that far. He wants to stay. They want to keep him and there haven't been any natural calamities that would make him yearn to bring our community together.
Probability: 0.1%

6) Peyton Manning. At risk of causing another mini firestorm by discussing this again (behold the power of Bram's twitter), this is still in play. Rob Lowe can go screw himself. Manning will not be a Colt as of March. Being that he has yet to retire, we should assume that he is going to play if his body lets him. So lets get the minutiae out of the way, who is the most likely team to overpay for his services? Redskins. Who would succumb to any and all demands Peyton might make? Ding Ding Ding. Redskins. If Peyton said Cooper Manning is the new assistant GM, guess who'd be the new assistant GM? There are a million reasons why the Redskins shouldn't do this, but that's never stopped them before although I do think in general the Shanny/Allen brain trust isn't as trigger happy. Speaking of trigger happy, I liken the Redskins mindset in February to that of Plaxico Burress at nightclubs. They never mean to shoot themselves in the leg and are completely unaware of what the ramifications are of doing so.
Still, you and I both know if Peyton is in play and the NERVE DAMAGE in his neck doesn't deter them from doing so, the Redskins will be all in. Will Peyton want to be in a division where he has to face his brother twice a year? I'd think not. But what if the Redskins are the only ones offering him some stupid contract and no one else is flinching?
Probability: 65% assuming Peyton can throw a football with his right arm. We might even take him with one good appendage.

7) Matt Flynn. Be Afraid. Be very afraid. He was a long shot to even make the Packers roster in 2007 being the second quarterback they selected that year (Brian Brohm was a second round pick-which tells you how confident they were in A Rodg at the time). He was the MVP of the BCS title game for LSU, the lone season that he was the Tigers starter. Consider that for a moment as well, this isn't USC. Sure Tom Brady was overlooked at Michigan. Sure Kurt Warner was bagging groceries. But lets not turn him into the little engine that could be great just yet. In the Packers finale, he broke single game franchise records which is nothing short of insane considering the season Rodgers had and the legacy that is Brett Favre. So Flynn picked the right time to make himself a butt load of money. And the Packers are helping his cause even more by hinting they might franchise him. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Ooh ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Whooooo that is a good one. Lets not forget that the week after Flynn domination, the Saints tore the Lions another new a-hole but that's not important right now. Because of the void of experienced quarterbacks (if you deem him that) available on the market, Flynn is the embodiment of the Trojan Horse. My sources say he's not the Skins guy. Others say he is.
Probability: 40%

8) Alex Smith. I don't know how the 49ers got to the NFC title game by largely ignoring their wide receivers. Honestly Flynn would fit in perfectly with them. Maybe Les Miles should join as an assistant to Jim Harbaugh. Smith did do a few things really well, few turnovers, showed toughness and exemplified resiliency. Joe Flacco hears some cat calls and he grows out a Taxi Driver mustache. Smith put on a gasoline shirt and told everyone he doesn't care what they've thought about him for 6 years. 6. So he is mentally tough. I'd guess the Niners are inclined to keep him. I'd also guess they won't break the bank for him considering in an offensive league, they didn't exactly go west coast on everyone. They cannot think they will be +28 in turnovers again and the playoffs showed just how fragile they were. Divisional week they needed 5 Saints turnovers to barely beat New Orleans at home. Against the Giants, two bad bounces on punt return did them in. There finally was a market correction on their ability to get the ball to bounce their way and because of it, they got bounced. So if someone gets their eye on Alex, he might leave. I don't sense the Skins perceive him as a splashy move.
Probability: 5.6%

9) Colt McCoy. If the Browns select RG3, McCoy is as good as gone from Cleveland. Maybe because his name is Daniel and they called him Colt or maybe because he got engaged at the movies or something stupid like that or maybe because he looks like a eagle scout, I just never thought he'd make a good NFL QB. This position ignores what he did in college which is unfair. Until Kellen Moore came along and played for a dominant program who plays nobody-McCoy was the winningest QB in the history of division one. Doesn't that have to mean something when you are talking about handing over a mint to Matt Flynn? And while he didn't make everyone in Cleveland remember, um, best I can come up with is Bernie Kozar, he wasn't bad. If it is me, I'm kicking those tires and seeing if he can be molded into the Shanny system. Here's what I know, he'll listen, he's respectful, he'll try to lead and he is mobile enough for all the waggles etc. I vote for Colt to get a look and maybe be part of a summer competition. I've voiced this before and had cyber tomatoes thrown at me. Whatever. That's my position and I'm sticking with it.
Probability: 12%

10) Vince Young. I only want this to happen so the fake Vince Young can cause more mischief in DC.
Probability: 0%

11) Matt Moore. The Dolphins were 0-3 by the time he started his first game this year. The next four games were all losses too, at the Jets, Giants and Chargers-none of which they'd have been favored in and a home loss to Denver- you'll recall that was the first Tebow miracle. The Dolphins went 6-3 from there. Moore had a passer rating over 122 three times, 99 against Dallas on Thanksgiving and 98 against New England where he staked his team to a 17 point lead on the road. In 2009 when he started 7 games for Carolina-he threw 2 interceptions and had a quarterback rating just under 100. I'm not seeing stars here but (and maybe this is because I just watched Moneyball the other day) I am seeing value. Matt Moore might be better then we think. He won't inspire confidence in the fan base. He won't morph into Aaron Rodgers. But he might be a quarterback who gets it and handles an offense that say drafts a Justin Blackmon. I like Matt Moore enough to say, he's an upgrade from Rex and under Shanihan, might be pretty good.
Probability: 36%

12) Mark Sanchez. If Peyton goes to play for the Jets as the New Yorkers ASSUME will happen then Sanchez will get moved. Here's what we know. Santonio Holmes is going nowhere (so said Woody Johnson). The Jets aren't sure that Sanchez is the right guy for them (so said Woody Johnson) and thanks to the lack of drafting and money spent on free agents in previous years, the Jets know the window for their team to vie for a title is small. They might be willing to move Sanchez for a song and if that is the case, I'd jump on that immediately. Plus, Dan Snyder loved Sanchez coming out and was hoping to move up to get him. I would do this in a second.
Probability 50%

The way to go: Get Mark Sanchez for the right trade, say swapping positions in the first round or giving up a second. If the Jets come to their senses, sign Matt Moore. If RG3 falls into your lap at the draft, then it sucks to be Matt Moore. But this means you don't have to take your pants off to trade up for Griffin. If Moore stays in Miami (which assume won't be the case since I'd think Joe Philbin's first move os to bring Flynn to Miami) then lets talk with Cleveland about their plan for Colt McCoy before and after the draft.
And as usual, pray the football Gods smile on this franchise. They did in Denver. They did in San Francisco so since they've taken a shine to the oldies but goodies from the 80's and 90's, maybe it's the Redskins turn.

Glass Joe Flacco

2012-01-19T11:03:00.000-08:00

Have you ever seen the documentary "Scared Straight?" In 1978, Director Arnold Shapiro took a group of tennage criminals into one of the most feared prisons on Earth to speak with some of the "lifers." A drug dealer, a counterfeiter, a mafia informant, an arsonist and a gang member met the teens in a room inside Rahway and wasted no time berating them explaining in graphic detail what will happen to them when they end up inside.
Needless to say, when a gang member decsribes in detail what he and his friends are going to do to your ass, you listen, and cry, a lot. On camera, the teens saw their future and were "scared straight." Now I'm not going to bother telling you what happened in their lives following the making of this film-it doesn't matter. The point of this is the Ravens have done the opposite to their quarterback Joe Flacco-he's scared stiff and that's why the Patriots are going to be playing for another championship.
The Ravens defense has owned the locker room for 15 years, ever since Ray Lewis starting scaring his teammates staright about how his game will be played. No quarterback was ever good enough for Ray and his "lifers." Chris Redman, Tony Banks, Kyle Boller, even Brian Billick for that matter never really measured up to Ray's standard. Honestly, none of them really deserved it anyway. Even the one quarterback who played on a title team in Baltimore was part of a regular season streak that included 6 straight games without an offensive touchdown. But because the Ravens defense saved Trent Dilfer's hide and won anyway, the perception that defense and defense only wins championships was birthed.
Along comes Joe Flacco who has a mild demeanor-perfect in that he's not going to take any of the limelight away from Ray or T-Sizzle or Rex Ryan or Ed Reed (more on him later) or Bart Scott or Rex Ryan who whoever was part of this clan. And in Flacco, the defense got exactly what they needed, a guy who was less a liability and, gasp, might actually win you a game if the defense had an off day.
All Flacco has done in his 4 year career is go 5-3 in the playoffs, 4 of those wins on the road. He's also been part of 44 regular season wins which is the most of any quarterback in the first four years of his career ever. EVER. Which is what has made the criticism that Flacco has faced so alarming. Because Ray and his co-horts haven't scared the media straight, they've in turn left Flacco in the prison yard by himself and his sphincter has been shrinking by the week.
The Steelers spent the lockout ridiculing Flacco. Baltimore kind of defended him. But if you read between the lines, the word out of Ravens camp was the Steelers (who'd knocked Baltimore out of the playoffs the year before) would be defeated without mentioning the aid of Flacco. The suggestion was clear, eh-he's good enough.
By mid-season, Flacco was publicly grousing about the fact that Baltimore's winsssss-aah over Pittsburgh took second fiddle to the growing media fascination with Tim Tebow. Now in fairness, Flacco wasn't the only one complaining about the inordinate amount of coverage to a player who literaly needed miracles to win games. But he was the only quarterback who seemed to have taken it personally. So lets start to add up the defects that would lead to his playoff and quite possibly permanent mental breakdown. Steelers roast Flacco in pre-season. Flacco beats Steelers-few think he has little to do with it including the media who make little to no deal out of it only to start fawning over the the Denver messiah who lets be honest doesn't even compare in the same stratosphere as the original Denver messiah.
This all came to a head last week when Flacco openly admitted he knew how the media, the world, even the guy in the mirror felt about him. He "joked" that if the Ravens won the Super Bowl that he believes no one would give him any credit for it. True, but only if he played like a liability which is EXACTLY WHAT HE DID against Houston and exascerbated it by growing out some facial hair reminiscent of Police Academy's Blue Oyster Bar. Flacco turned out to be prophetic. Barely beating a team with a rookie third string quarterback who turned the ball over numerous times and spotted you a 17-3 lead will do the trick.
So then Ed Reed played the role of the Rahway arsonist. He goes on radio and says not only did Flacco look shaky (no shit) but he also appeared to not have a grasp of the Ravens offense. Nevermind the fact that Flacco hasn't missed the playoffs in his four years in Baltimore and lest we remind Ed that Flacco has won more games in his young career then ANY other quarterback at this point in his career, no, he just looks lost. What a teammate.
So when Joe Flacco thinks about who he is playing this weekend, don't you think his inferiority complex will be so large that he might take a snap and immediately fall into the fetal position?
Does anyone think Alex Smith would have pulled off what he did a week ago if his team had spent the season claiming he was a mental midget? Eli Manning lives the New York beast year in and year out. Winning a Super Bowl didn't stop that drumbeat after the Giants missed two straight postseasons. But when one of his "guys" Tiki Barber attacked him-prior to the Super Bowl season, his teammates jumped to his defense. Who's defending Flacco? Not Ray. Not Ed. Terrell Suggs was at least smart enough to throw some water on the fire. Suggs offered the strongest comments in support of Flacco-and most noticeably the only ones. Apparently the offensive players on this team are so scared to speak their comments didn't register a blip on the radar. Where's the O-line on this? Where's Anquan Boldin or Ray Rice or John Harbaugh?
The Ravens have allowed their defense to run the prison and to their credit they have won a lot. But if the goal is to win championships, PLURAL, it's time they stopped scaring their quarterback straight and screaming down the doubters. That is of course if it's not too late. If there is one thing I know about Tom Brady and Bill Belichick, it's that if they sense the other guy is injured, they'll jump him like a lame zebra. The Ravens have two days to get Flacco to believe that he can be a champion, to erase the season of doubt that obviously persists in his head. Otherwise, they can blame Flacco all they want for falling short again but it's their prison mentality that ultimately should be where the fault is placed. Getting Flacco a razor might help too. Looking like a champion helps.

Was it ever Ok to refer to anyone as "Gaybirds?"

2012-01-17T06:53:00.000-08:00

Gaybirds. There's a putdown you never hear anymore, especially from an elected official. Does Charles Mainor call his colleagues "Fairymen?" Just for fun, lets let Charles do the roll call for the day just to see what he comes up with the entire Assembly.

http://www.nj.com/hudson/index.ssf/2012/01/jersey_city_assemblyman_apolog.html

Does Peyton Make Sense in Washington?

2012-01-13T13:21:00.000-08:00

Yes. No. Maybe. All of the above..

Lets get the minutiae out of the way and assume Peyton Manning is released by the Colts before they have to make the balloon payment in early March. And lets assume the Redskins will pay the price to acquire him. I'm sure you need no proof of past decision making to suggest the Redskins will become frugal on this one.
And with all of that taken as givens, we can do a pro-con list of why he would or would not make sense for the Redskins.

Pro--
1) When he last played he was still Peyton Manning-4000+ yard season, winning a division-again.
2) It turns out that the team he was playing with the LeBron-less Cavaliers so arguments that he couldn't transform the Redskins inept offense are illogical.
3) He's Peyton freaking Manning. He'll make everyone better. He'll take the pressure off the coach, the owner, everyone. He competes.
4) We'll bring his center Jeff Saturday with him. Considering we need a center,it's 2 for 1..
5) Rex Grossman can eat as much as he wants this summer, not our problem.
6) Mike Shanahan. Professional coach who has won before with an iconic quarterback.
7) Crowds come back to Fed Ex Field. Seriously, what marketing campaign can the team possibly come up with if Rex is still the quarterback?

Cons--
1) I'm not sure he can lift his right arm over his head.
2) Nerve damage in his neck. NERVE DAMAGE.
3) He'd have to play his brother twice a season. We all know Archie likes to manufacture the scenarios by which his boys play. This doesn't smell like one that he'd be interested in being a part of, especially when it is proven the organization Eli plays for has a MUCH better track record then Peytons.
4) Mike Shanahan. Wouldn't this merely be viewed as a survivalist move to attempt to retain his job? Why grow and develop a quarterback when we can just bring in Peyton? So much for the rebuilding project.
5) How many 36 year old quarterbacks go to a new team and actually win the Super Bowl?
6) JPP, DeMarcus Ware and Babin. Life in the NFC East sucks for immobile quarterbacks with NERVE DAMAGE.

My opinion: This is not the right move in the short or long term, only will stunt the development of the young pieces they are supposed to be building with. By the time Orakpo and Kerrigan and some of the young O pieces are ready to contend, Peyton will either be retired or maimed. But knowing the Redskins and knowing my sources, if they can make it happen, they are going to make it happen. So, lets warm up to it and hope for the best even though that position has been beyond fruitless.

The Cowboys are Stupid and No one Noticed

2011-12-26T14:20:00.000-08:00

It's Christmas Morning and my gift was a revelation. The Dallas Cowboys blew their playoff plan B and didn't even know it. They openly admitted their idiocy following a home loss to "the dream is dead" Eagles. Only they didn't realize their enormous mistake. And for some reason, neither did the ever growing pool of sports scrutinizers.

Tony Romo injured his hand during the game. At around the same time, it had become clear that Dallas could not win the NFC East by defeating Philadelphia thanks to the Giants win over the Jets. So the division would come down to a winner takes all in week 17 regardless of how the Cowboys fared. Thus it appeared the decisions from there forward were easy to make. Don't bother asking what the Romo X-Rays revealed, he's not coming back in no matter what. Felix Jones had been nursing a sore hamstring. Sit him so he can saddle up for the one that matters most.
Jason Garrett revealed that the team had a plan set in motion through the week largely dependent on what happened between the Jets and Giants. The message rang loud and clear: if the Giants lost, Dallas would go all in against Philly. If the Giants won, they'd treat the game like the pre-season. It made sense. Except for one huge oversight. If the goal is to get into the playoffs any way possible, the Cowboys blew an opportunity they didn't realize they still had.

Garrett and the Cowboys miscalculated their own postseason possibilities. Once the Giants won, the only thing that was certain was the Eagles were eliminated from postseason contention. Had the Cowboys known that winning the game was still relevant to them, would they have done something different? Is it possible that the Cowboys organizationally didn't know that regardless of the Jets-Giants result, Dallas's wild card hopes hinged on a win? The answer clearly is Yes.

With Detroit beating San Diego, only one wild card spot remained in play being that the Cowboys lost to the Lions earlier in the season. But the Cowboys didn't play the Falcons. And being that Atlanta had two games left, conceivably if the Cowboys had beaten Philadelphia and the Falcons lost their last two in the regular season, even a Dallas loss to the Giants would not have eliminated them from postseason contention. In fact, with a win over the Eagles, Dallas would have ended up with a better conference record then Atlanta should that entire scenario play out (Falcons lose 2, Dallas goes 1-1 with a loss to the Giants). Conference record is what determines the wild card tiebreak between teams who did not play one another in the regular season. Dallas's, under that scenario would have ended up being better then Atlanta's..

I can only guess that because so much attention was placed on the scenarios by which the NFC East were to be determined, that Dallas didn't bother to find out every scenario by which they could qualify for the playoffs. With New Orleans still fighting for a bye, it's not the least bit far fetched for the Cowboys to believe Atlanta would lose on Monday Night. Now of course the Falcons would have to lose twice and their finale is against the coldest team in football Tampa Bay, but the game is going to be played and to suggest anything in the NFL is out of the realm of possibility is being ignorant to the parity of this league. Thanks to Dallas inexplicably having no knowledge of this, now Atlanta can lose their final 2 games and back in to the postseason anyway.

What amazes me most about this revelation is (and I'm not trying to brag here but...) it appeared when I showed up to work Christmas morning even we at ESPN didn't know it. It wasn't publicized very well. And when I brought it up during our meetings, it didn't seem to dawn on everyone that the Cowboys had just made one of the most miscalculated moves in NFL history. They eliminated themselves from wild card contention. Now Romo may not have been able to return regardless of prognosis and the Eagles may have won even if he did. And of course if Dallas beats the Giants, they're in anyway. But who throws away any opportunity to make the postseason and then somehow avoids the criticism that goes along with that asinine decision?

Dallas media, I'm looking at you..

Revisiting Sam the Redskin

2011-12-22T07:37:00.000-08:00

Fact: The Rams suck. Fact: The Colts suck too but they don't suck as bad as the Rams. Possibility: The Rams and Colts both end up with 2 wins and thus the top pick in the draft goes to St. Louis. Theory: The Rams will try to trade both Sam Bradford and the top pick and figure out which deal is in the best interest of their franchise. Liklihood: The deals for Luck will be better then for Bradford for two reasons: Thanks to the new CBA-Luck's deal won't cost anything close to what the Rams paid to get Bradford and while Bradford was considered a possible franchise quarterback, pundits are describing Luck as once in a generation.

So lets say the Rams decide what's in the best interest for them is to move Bradford and select Luck, should the Redskins go after Sam?

That's where this gets very interesting. Sam Bradford has Native American heritage. So, would he openly object to playing for a team called the Redskins? If he didn't openly object to playing for a team called the Redskins, would native American activist groups (none of which come to mind as having the ability of being heard but that's not important right now) come forward to admonish Bradford for not openly objecting for playing for a team called the Redskins?

Do the Redskins like a quarterback who has won little and been hurt a lot? I don't know. Do they think he has a bigger upside then Rex/Beck? If they didn't, the nation should openly object to Mike Shanihan coaching the Redskins.

Maybe the better question is: Do the Redskins want to pursue Sam Bradford?

Bill Belichick is Screwing With All of Us

2010-10-25T17:47:00.001-07:00

If my football team had a 5 foot 5 inch white running back from some godforsaken college in the panhandle of Nebraska, I'd consider ending my relationship with the sport. I know what would happen if my team had a 5 foot 5 inch white running back: He'd have 3 carries for minus 2 yards and then he would spontaneously combust and for the rest of eternity every conversation about my football team would include, "Hey remember that 5 foot 5 inch white guy you had playing running back who exploded into a thousand pieces." And I'd say, "Yes I do."
But this doesn't happen to Bill Belichick. No sir. He sent a former first round pick Laurence Maroney to Denver for a bag of peanuts and replaced him with a 5 foot 5 inch white running back. And the Patriots are 5 and 1, their most recent wins are against two teams who were in the playoffs a year ago.
Well that's it. He's gone too far. Ever since Spygate cast some doubt over the validity of the most recent dynasty in the league, Belichick has gone football postal. But his manifesto has manifested itself in an entirely different psychosis. Bill Belichick is fucking with the NFL and the world for that matter. And he's so freaking good, he's winning anyway. (Note: We will discuss "The Jesus Factor" later, just know I am not ignoring the fact that a deity is his quarterback)
It became clear to me on Monday Night Football when the Patriots had scored every conceivable way in a win over the Dolphins that Belichick had just checkmated the league. Some guy named Brandon Tate returned a kickoff for a touchdown. The aforementioned tiny white guy scored a touchdown. Wang Chung blocked two kicks then returned a pick for a score. And Arrington (not LaVar, JJ, Jill or any Arrington with a Wikipedia page) returned a blocked field goal attempt for a score. Those who stuck around saw the murky veneer of Belichick finally crack. He was hugging his players, well, all of them except Randy Moss who didn't have a catch. Moss was a few hours away from being traded.
Here is what has happened since September, the Pats demanded their best offensive lineman apologize publicly to the organization for carrying on about a contract all summer before allowing him to sign a new contract. Logan Mankins hasn't played yet. Their next best offensive lineman and their best defensive lineman both suffered season ending injuries. Their most talented running back and the one player who represents a true playmaker were both traded. And the Patriots are 5 and 1.
The San Diego Chargers have statistically the best offense and defense in the NFL, and they are 2 and 5. This past week when New England played them in their stadium, New England announced this laughable starting lineup: 6 rookies, including a 7th round draft pick and 3 second year players who'd spent the majority of their first year on someone else's practice squad. They had 38 total yards at half, and a ten point lead. Even for Norv, that's a new one.
How did this all come about? One can only guess, but Belichick seemed on the cusp of a psychological split from the get go. The dude is winning games while wearing a hoodie popularized by the Emperor of the Dark Side, if the Emperor might kick it with a glass of Frangelico. Yet after winning 3 Super Bowls with a former 6th round draft pick as his quarterback, it appeared as if he'd solidified his place in history as the Lombardi of his time. Instead he's painted as an unlikable cheater. For the record, I have no issue with someone videotaping what's happening during a game and I'm still confused about exactly what the Patriots did wrong, but I'm in the minority.
From that point forward, Belichick seems to have had a split with reality. A few years back it became clear that the Patriots were going to try to break every record in the book. I attended a mid-season win over the Redskins were they were consistently going for it in the second half on fourth downs up by 30 plus points. They came about a minute away from the only 19 and 0 season.
Now, Belichick has decided to go the complete opposite direction. He's trying to win with an inept team. It's ingenious really. Best receiver? Screw it, trade him to Team Sext. Best running back? Have fun playing for a team that gives up 59 to the Raiders. Mankins? Kneel before Zod. Miniscule white running back? Gimme gimme gimme. What is everyone going to say if New England wins with this cast of characters? They are going to have say what everyone knows, no one has the game figured out better then that guy.
Now, in all fairness, if Tom Brady pulled a Mankins or a Moss or a Maroney, I think Bill might not exactly react the same way. Two days before the season opener, Brady was involved in a serious car accident. Two days later he lit up Cincinnati. So his cover was officially blown, Tom Brady is not of our species.
But Brady is like the Avatar who lets the humans control the tree. And Belichick is running a crazy tree these days.

Product Placement

2010-10-23T20:04:00.000-07:00

I expected big giant sponsored magnums of Ginger Ale to be squirting all over the Rangers locker room. How could Schwepps miss out on the greatest free marketing opening since prohibition? Texas sprays Josh Hamilton with Ginger Ale because they think if he even smells booze, he might go run off to Tijuana instead of showing up for game one of the World Series. This was widely publicized after the ALDS win. So if I owned a Ginger Ale company, I might want to smell the golden beverage my marketing director is drinking. How could they miss that? When was the last memorable Ginger Ale campaign? I'm going with never.

I might have to start a new company, one that product places in sporting events. Look closely, the openings are everywhere. Why is the Rally Monkey not a staple of Halloween in Southern California?
Where is the Victoria's Secret "Aubrey Huff Line of Panties for Real Men." Huff has gone Bull Durham in recent weeks, admitting he busted a slump by going with garters. Mock it all you want, but how Frederick's of Hollywood failed to capitalize on getting their name associated with that freak show is beyond me.

When was the last time shoe polish was cool? They can't even get a sniff on Mad Men, that's how bad it is. But here is this whack job who is closing out game after game for a would be first time baseball champion in San Francisco. So why doesn't Brian Wilson have a crate of Kiwi polish in his locker? Kiwi show polish, the official shoe polish of the beard of the Giants closer.

I recently spoke to some marketing director of Head and Shoulders shampoo on the air after they insured Troy Palumalu's hair. The light bulb went on for me at question two when I actually asked, "What could possibly happen to his hair that would justify insurance?" The woman said something to the effect of: "Blah Blah Blah, Head and Shoulders, Blah Blah Blah, Troy Palumalu's Hair, blah blah blah, Head and Shoulders." Now this woman deserved a raise, and she could celebrate her lack of dandruff and ingenious marketing maneuver with a tall glass of high priced ginger ale.

The Rent is Too Damn High

2010-10-20T19:53:00.000-07:00

No sir, the price of your T-shirts is too Damn high. The New York gubernatorial debate got derailed by Jimmy McMullen, the infamous voice of "The Rent is Too Damn High" party.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4o-TeMHys0

I found this idea fascinating. On a website appearing as if it was designed by the former creators of Techmo Bowl, "The Rent is Too Damn High" party claims it could create 3-6 million jobs if elected. Million. That of course would lead to more people having less to complain about including the rent, which may no longer be "too Damn high." And if the rent is too damn affordable, then what would the purpose be of having that party around for? Could they then immediately change their name to "That Lexus is too damn High" party?

If you are like me and just like screaming "The Rent is Too Damn High" even though I don't pay rent nor think it's too damn anything, then you are probably willing to buy an official "Rent is Too Damn High" party T-shirt. And thankfully, it is being offered in old school Black and White, for $18. So let me see if I understand this right, the rent is too damn high, but a T-shirt I could buy at a Manhattan street fair for four times less isn't. Those prices are too damn high..

But that's not the point. Crazy people running for office reminds me of how special it is to be an American. No one in that gubernatorial race will receive more free attention over the next 48 hours then "The Rent is Too Damn High Guy," unless you take a quick look at who else is on the ballot for the top seat in the state.

Kristen Davis is running for a group called the "Anti-Prohibition" party. Anyone with any political background would know that Prohibition in political parlance refers to the decision to ban alcohol back in the early part of the 20th century thus maybe naming your party after it might cause some confusion. So they couldn't come up with another way to describe their platform which is to legalize just about everything from pot to gay marriage to casino gambling. Now while degenerates are often not the most reliable grassroots base, the representative is certainly attention getting. Her name is Kristen Davis and she's the madame who set up the former Governor with prostitutes.
This is like Octomom being nominated to the Supreme Court or Balloon Boy named to the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

And yet Kristen, who might as well be Jenna Jamison's sister has failed to garner any attention for her candidacy. Yet here is the man with the handlebar mustache screaming "The Rent is Too Damn High" and landing himself on Wolf Blitzer's radar.

This has been a life altering revelation for me. People have been saying this to me for years, but I relented. But now more then ever, I believe it to be true; I actually think I need to come up with a catch phrase. And then I need to brainwash my impending loyal fan base into believing we wield some form of imaginary power.

But I'm stuck. Boo Yah is out. Fine meats and cheeses, copyrighted. I can't even just let out some bizarre wail or I'll be likened to Howard Dean.
Plus what party would I run: The "PSL's are Too Damn High" party? Can I even refer to anything as "Too Damn" anything?

I need an epiphany. But it will happen because this blog is "Too Damn Free" and I need to fleece someone..

Head Job

2010-10-18T19:35:00.000-07:00

For the love of God, please stop discussing concussions.. The game I love is going to be ruined if we don't stop stumping for people who have had concussions.
Football is violent. The possibility of getting injured is high, very very high.This is not a surprise to the people who sign on the line that is dotted. It's like being diagnosed with a peanut allergy but sucking down some Skippy anyway. Is it the grocery store's fault that you put yourself at risk? If you choose to live by the fourth fairway on a public golf course, then forget owning any glass patio furniture. It's called implied risk.
I just finished watching a commercial for UFC 12765 (or whatever they are up to). Does anyone think: Please don't let them hit each other in the face, this might cause a disruption of their future relationship with their grandchildren?
Look people, the reality is if you play professional football, you will suffer an injury. If you play it long enough, you will probably suffer an incurable injury, such as: chronic (insert joint here) pain, blurred vision, cankles, post stress disorder, scurvy, jock itch, and crazy eye.
This all goes with the territory. You know what you are getting into. You'd have to be completely moronic to not understand the liability. There's a reason why the insurance premiums on these guys are just a little less then a private first class in Afghanistan. So with all that said, I'm done with hearing about concussions and how terrible they are.
I know how terrible they are, just as Nascar drivers know how terrible it is to go upside down at 220 MPH, but they still show up the next week for a Nationwide race for crying out loud. Baseball players get plunked in the head with a 90 mile per hour heater and they are back in the lineup and only on the rarist of the rare occasions showing signs of even slightly being in fear of taking some seams to the eyeball again.
I understand there are a lot of ramifications of suffering a number of head traumas. We have been educated to the sad tales of NFL players getting severely depressed, early onset of Alzheimers and worse. I get it. And I appreciate science doing it's best to learn about how and why these things are occurring in the brains of the players. But for crying out loud, the world didn't stop having sex when AIDS showed up, we just educated people to how to do it safer, and reality is, nothing is fool proof.
The point is this, what can the NFL do about this other then ban head hits. And when I say ban, I mean, long suspensions. But what would the end game be there? What's next: no tackling around the knees because of potential walking disorders in later life? How about just eliminate tackling. Flag Football seems to be very popular these days, just do that.
The Romans didn't stop the lions from eating the gladiators. Baseball still uses wood bats, one of which impaled a person this year. Hockey still has skates as sharp as a meat slicer and uses frozen rubber that can be propelled at bazooka like speeds. Soccer players still don't wear shin guards.
We fill the stadiums because we like the game. The players who play this game understand the risks. So one of two things has to happen: 1) The equipment needs to get better causing fewer injuries. Better-less bulky knee braces that help stabilization without reducing foot speed. Helmets that have a air bags in them that release upon impact. OR 2) The players agree to a clause that states the understood risk associated with having this for a profession and agree to accept whatever the negotiated pension will be (certain to be higher due to all the negative publicity of the players left behind)..
For the love of football, please please please, don't let the players demand they be shrink wrapped before every game to avoid getting paper cuts.

Cigar Guy Revealed

2010-10-11T17:37:00.000-07:00

Good news Tiger, we've turned the page. Of all the photos taken of you over the last year, the most recent classic snapped at the Ryder Cup features the most interesting gallery member in the world.. The image of a golf ball caught mid flight off the club of the famous golfer ever got trumped by a bizarre patron. Who was this Cigar Guy? The world needed to know..
He arguably went viral faster then the dude in Alabama who talked about how he was going to find the man who tried to rape his sister on a local newscast (the latest example of anything can be funny).. You Tube Antoine Dodson if you have no idea what I'm talking about. Do it now.
But the London Mail found him. How you go about finding a person this anonymous should remind everyone how persistent the press can ultimately be. We gonna Find you. We gonna find you.
The paper scored the exclusive, revealing the true identity of cigar man. 30 year old Londoner Rupesh Shingadia. Fittingly, he has a vague profession, investment analyst. The highlights are this: He lives with his parents, he was dressed as Miguel Angel Jiminez, originally he was going to wear some trousers reminiscent of what Ian Poulter might don but thought that would have been an aesthetic mistake, and he won't say Yes to to any of the numerous marriage proposals he's received because "I want them to love for me for other reasons then being cigar guy."
I must digress as this is yet another example of bizarre female behavior that I'll never quite understand or embrace. I was watching "Maury" the other day and the debate was whether a wedding would still be on "if he didn't sleep with my best friend." The proof came in the form of panties, found in "Chris's" car. Chris explained this away by announcing on national television that those panties weren't "Holly's" friends panties, they were her mothers. A fact that was confirmed after a DNA test was run on the panties!!!!! And Holly reacted with a huge sense of relief that her fiance was not sleeping with her friend. Now rational people like myself sat staring at the screen jaw firmly dropped wondering why nobody asked the most important question of all: Why would Chris be in possession of Holly's Mom's panties? Under what circumstances would Mom have needed to remove her panties in anyone's car let alone her future son in law's? But there the happy couple were, Holly crying tears of relief and Chris standing up, pointing to the crowd who minutes earlier booed his entrance- pointing and yelling, "I told Ya'll. I toooollldddd ya'll."
Anyway, back to Cigar Guy.. So our producers facebooked him today. I know. And we got into contact with him inviting him to join us on TV to discuss his meteoric rise into the conscious of the weirdos. And he declined, citing his image. He actually told us it might hurt his image. Exact words. What image could he possibly be referring to? The one where he dresses up as a drunk Pauly from Rocky? Or maybe it's the investment analyst who lives with his parents which makes me wonder exactly which investments he's analyzing, so I don't pick those.

For your consideration: Justine Henin in a bizarre singing/dancing performance from Belgium. The Belgians apparently have very low standards, but then again I was watching Dancing with the Stars again so who am I to talk.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZgiphQhY6SE&feature=player_embedded

Warning: Kids Can Get Hooked on Nascar

2010-10-10T18:33:00.000-07:00

It never occurred to me that my 1 year old girl might end up refusing to ride in any car other then a Ford, but the tale I was told last night suggested if I don't watch her carefully, it's possible she might. Nascar has a Barney-esque effect on some children. And that frightens me to the core.
My friend Lee had a 5 year old boy who knows the brand name of the material that's used to cover support beams before the exterior is finished on new home builds. It's not because the kid has an interest in siding, but the company happens to be one of the sponsors of one of the drivers he likes. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but come on, it's beyond weird. This kid would rather play with Dupont paint then a Transformer because of Jeff Gordon.
It was a few drinks in, so I can't quite recall how the conversation turned to Nascar and it's growing presence inside a family who belongs to a Jewish country club in Connecticut. But once there, I was locked in.
It all started with the Pixar flick "Cars." Harmless enough you'd think; the Lion King spawned interest in the safari, Aladdin forced us all to explain that 99 percent of bottles don't have genies living inside of them and that of the 1 percent, none are as friendly as Robin Williams. Cars seemed run of the mill in terms of the lingering after-effects of the adolescent mind. What's the worse thing that could happen with Cars: The child thinks your ride is akin to the Hillbilly Truck? Maybe he gets into matchbox cars which thankfully have remained remarkably inexpensive to collect.
But "Cars" is the reason this five year old knows what a restrictor plate is and why he'll argue the merits of it. This kid knows about drafting and is the only human on the planet who can explain the Chase points system.
How did it go from a digitally animated film about Cars (not Nascar mind you) to wanting to spend vacation in Talladega? Marketing and product placement. The kid likes cars. He particularly liked the cars that went fast in the movie and wanted to get some as collector items. It was a subsequent visit to a toy store that sealed the deal. At one end of the aisle was the shelves stacked with toys created from anything that spent more then 2 seconds on screen. Four feet down the aisle, an interesting decision: Ask Mom for the car painted in Lowes blue or Home Depot orange. This apparently was fascinating. Could he grab the vehicle that had the words "Monkey Butt" on it?
What came next was a curiosity. The numbers. The colors. The names. Who were these people with these fancy cars? And then came the mistake: Dad explains that this is Nascar and it's not a cartoon. They get home, and Dad proves it by tuning in a race.
Lee proceeds to tell me the kid is now a junkie. Can't get enough of it. If you ask him where Darlington is, he can point to it on a map without even blinking.
I don't have a problem with Nascar in the same way I don't have a problem with swim meets. But I won't be pushing competitive swimming on my daughter because I don't want to take her to the 5 AM practices nor do I wish to officiate the 6 hour swim events she'd be a part of. I like the Daytona 500 as much as the next guy, but having to choose between watching the Redskins play the Cowboys and deal with a tantrum or just flipping over to race five of the Chase is something I can't live with.

Meet Little Favre

2010-10-08T12:53:00.000-07:00

Men are stupid. All men. Including me. I by no means am exempting myself from the mistakes of my sexual past. There was that streaking phase that began the day I thought it would be funny to jump on my neighbors new white car while nude and covered in mud. My housemates and I once held an event called "Grope Night."
But the only record of these events are, well, right here, and of course the imaginations of those who took part.
Call me old fashioned, but I never pictured text messaging as a venue to send photos of my penis. In fact, I can't think of a single recipient in my life who would welcome that. But maybe I'm the conservative fuddy duddy who doesn't understand courtship in 2010, because everywhere I look (on the internet at least) are streams of pictures of junk.
Text messages are kind of like traditional mail to me. I still get excited to go to the mailbox everyday hoping for some special correspondence. But for the most part, it's just bills for services I rarely use or advertisements for services I'll consider but hopefully am smart enough to realize I'll utilize less..
Text messages are similar. The one from our scheduling department makes me cringe before I open it. I know the news will probably make me rearrange my life. Friend texts are typically great summations of a moment worth sharing and there is something redeemable about this.
Now, I have never been the recipient of a text that included a naked photo, male or female, so I'm certainly not going to portend to be an expert on this. But, it would seem to me to be quite short-sighted (not pun intended) to assume that anyone, even a regular partner would hope to receive this type of message.
In fact, there are almost no scenarios in which opening something up to reveal a penis would be attractive. Prior to the advent of text messaging, did people send pictures of their penis via Fed Ex? I won't eat a piece of the cake that is shaped in the form of genitalia.
Call me old fashioned, but I like my courtship to be confusing. This penis pic stuff is just too straight forward for me. While readily admitting that my inherent shyness in this department always kept me from finding out just how many conquers I may have amassed, there is something sweet about beating around the bush, not sending a picture of one.
Furthermore, since everyone I know has a blog of some sort, to think sending a dick pic wouldn't pop up on some search on some search engine is flatly asinine, especially when you happen to be the most famous quarterback in the world.
Plus, if you know how to actually photograph yourself and attach it to a text message, then you understand what Twitter is. The idea that you would send anything to a stranger that revealing is akin to driving down the wrong side of the highway waving a 40 of Old E out your window.
It also places you in an interesting category, you are either the type of person who A) Sends pictures of your penis to strangers or B) Not the type of person who sends pictures of your penis to strangers. There is no in between here. Would you believe anyone if they said, "I only sent one picture of my penis to one person, It was a mistake." Right, and Alberto Contador won the Tour de France because he ate tainted meat, once.
Now, I reserve the right to be really wrong here. If sending dick pics are not only an acceptable form of courtship, but encouraged, then let me be the first to say: What's your cell number?

http://deadspin.com/5658206/brett-favres-cellphone-seduction-of-jenn-sterger?skyline=true&s=i

Hi.. I'm Back.. So are the Yankees, Deal with it

2010-10-07T18:41:00.000-07:00

I have officially been in Connecticut too long. This revelation has nothing to do with my acceptance of boredom as the typical way to pass through a week. My style remains largely the same, classic disheveled. My food tastes have gone unaltered, like, how could we be so close to New York and have no access to good sushi or deli.
No- it's my sports world that has been shaken to the core, and I just can't return to the blogosphere without admitting my revelation. I'm not asking for understanding. I'm not asking for you to agree with me. I'm admitting this because I have to get this off my chest. OK, here goes.
I don't MIND the Yankees. I don't like them per se, but I understand their way of thinking now. And I don't dislike them per se. There, I said it..
Baseball remains the sports world's lone bastion of Capitalism. You can spend whatever you want, however you want. Some teams take the bail outs, and others like the Yankees keep dumping cash into hedge funds regardless of what Jim Cramer might be crying about. They spend freely and they win. Now their fans pay dearly for this, as in most bi-weekly paychecks wouldn't cover a family of four in the good seats, but hey this is America. We can't all drive Range Rovers and live in the Central Park Penthouses. But at least the Yankees return the favor. They don't just put on a show, they make it rain, Pac-Man style..
All they are saying is, some guy in liederhosen sliding into a puddle of beer just isn't a party anymore. Not in New York at least. So how can you not respect it?
In the end, and this is something I thought I'd never believe, but: I don't mind if the Yankees win. They certainly paid for it. And yu know what, I believe you should get what you pay for.
I know, it's crazy.

Where is Dan Snyder and what have you done with him?

2010-03-13T06:58:00.000-08:00

There's no salary cap. Did someone get the memo to Dan Snyder that he could sign every available free agent for any amount of money and there is nothing crotchety old Ralph Wilson could do about it?
Instead Julius Peppers is in Chicago and we signed Artis Hicks.
Dear Bruce Allen: Where are you hiding Dan Snyder and who is the impostor you have pretending to enjoy being a frugal spender this off-season?

Of all the years for Snyder to finally change his stripes, how ironic is it that it's the year where there are no holds barred? The reason we are at this juncture of football uncertainty is because of owners like Dan who changed how the free agent game was played. For more then a decade, the first phone call any agent for any player should have made was to Washington. Failing to gauge their interest would be a firable offense. No one paid like Dan.. Just ask Deion, or Mark Carrier, or Bruce Smith or Jeff George or Antwaan Randle-El, or Jeremiah Trotter or Albert Haynesworth or, well you get the point.
Now suddenly, in a situation where Dan can tell everyone else to go screw themselves, he's tightening the purse strings?

Hey, anyone who knows anything about how a team is built has been begging for this day to come. First we get an actual professional general manager to start making short and long term personnel decisions. Then we hire a professional coach (by my count Snyder is actually 3-5 on that front). Now these two combine to convince Dan that he need not break the bank in a year where breaking the bank isn't just allowed, it was expected. It seemed to be a huge win.

The headlines 24 hours into free agency wasn't who the team had a midnight snack at Olives with, but who got a coach seat out of town. Randle-El was a classic Redskins pick up, above average but well over payed. I'll blame the team for not utilizing his various talents, i.e.- how could this team never copycat any wildcat formations with this guy on the team, but still he vastly underperformed at the one thing I figured him to be extremely proficient at, punt returns.
Rock Cartwright is a nice guy who'd made a living by caring on a team who's heart was in question on a year to year basis. But this is not about having nice guys on the team, see Larry Johnson.
Randy Thomas is a casualty of the NFL. Too bad, good guy, tremendous player, injured constantly.

Now while I'm ecstatic that the new regime sliced this roster to send a message that 4 and 12 is patently absurd, truth is, the Skins needed to spend in this free agency period, and as of right now, are striking out. If all goes to plan, Larry Johnson is a part time running back. Artis Hicks figures to be a stop gap on their line that as of now has no viable tackle. And the guy who will be a nose tackle who's name I can't pronounce makes me wonder what this team plans to do with Big Albert. Mock Haynesworth to your hearts content, when motivated and healthy (two ifs that can change by the hour), he's the most electric defensive tackle in football. And I might be alone here, but I think his criticisms of the team and his teammates were warranted. Sure it would have made a bigger impact he had not been eating a twinkie at the time when he was doing the interviews, but check the tape of the D Hall sideline issues, there was one Redskin coming to his teammate's defense, Big Albert.

I feel strange right now. I've been waiting for this day to come for more then a decade. Professional men helping our owner spend his money correctly. And yet, I look up and down this roster and wonder, couldn't we have gotten Reggie Brown for a song. We could have done better then 3rd and 4th round picks for Anquan Boldin right? Why aren't the veteran quarterbacks that are out there not taking a visit to DC? Does our most prominent signing of the off-season need to be of the craphead variety (although I guess I have no choice but to take LJ at his word that he's "changed" and is playing for his "dream team.")
Getting used by Chad Clifton to up the Packers price, man that was a new one. It wasn't that long ago that when the Skins got you in the building, you didn't leave without a contract let alone come in with ulterior motives.

See here's the score as I see it right now... Hiring Bruce Allen and Mike Shanihan gives Snyder an early 14-nothing lead. Having the guts to shed some dead weight equals a pick six. 21-nothing Skins. Failing to find a suitable tackle, any tackle equals touchdown everyone else, 21-7. Whiffing on the receivers and more viable-less risky producers at running back is a knock on them too, 21-21.
Not going hog wild in free agency is hopeful. Needing to go a little more hog wild based on roster holes makes me wonder if the plan was to show the fans this organization has a plan, be damned if the plan isn't exactly the route to building a competitive team.
The Skins haven't been suckered into trading for Mike Vick or Brady Quinn yet so that's good. They also haven't committed to taking the best offensive tackle available with pick number 4 in the draft, which to me is a no brainer. Sorry Jimmy Claussen, not interested.

It's a new era with a new regime and a new path in an uncertain NFL. I like it. I don't like it. I'm confused.

The Lama Weighs In

2010-02-22T11:38:00.000-08:00

We found someone on the planet who does not know who Tiger Woods is. Does not know what Tiger Woods does. Does not know what Tiger Woods did. And did not care that Tiger Woods spoke.
How ironic that our world would stop to learn only one item about Tiger Woods, he's Buddhist. And the leader of the religion has no idea about his birdies or Birdies.
In what was described as a "brief interview," the Dalai Lma was asked what he thought of Tiger Woods mea culpa and the Dalai Lama's response was: "Who is Tiger Woods?"

Yes, who is Tiger Woods? That's what we're trying to figure out too. Even he doesn't know who he is anymore. He said he lost his sense of entitlement, as if anyone in the modern era is entitled to bang every woman on the planet. He's not Secretariat.

The Dalai Lama doesn't hook up with the waitress at Perkins and he's the Dalai Lama.

Now I'm not the Dalai Lama and truth is, I don't care how many women Tiger Woods does it with. However, when you are placed on a Dalai Lama sized pedestal, then there is an expectation of a modicum of morality.
I on the side of the argument that Woods did owe the nation an explanation for his actions in the same way Bill Clinton, John Edwards, Mark Sanford, Elliot Spitzer owed an explanation for their actions. We as a collective public decided to put our faith in Woods as a man. And when he betrayed that faith, he owed us an apology. In America, you can't sell us a bill of goods.
Now if the Buick ads showed Woods cruisin' Daytona Beach, picking up a biker chick and railing her in the backseat, well then, I'd say, you get what you pay for. But the "I am Tiger Woods" ads never depicted the golfer hanging out with the Vikings on the booze cruise holding a double sided Kong Dong. Just as John Edwards campaign pitch wasn't, "Get R Done!"

It actually was refreshing to hear that the Dalai Lama had no idea who Woods was. On some level, it might be enlightening to him that people of influence haven't wasted their time on a golfer.

Ooh yeah, he's a golfer. And the sooner he goes back to being a golfer the better. This whole thing changes nothing about whether he can be an effective champion. It's just golf. What he can't be however is anyone of true influence, not until he lives up to the tenets he preached a few days ago. At least until we find the next Octomom.

The Angry Olympic Fan

2010-02-17T07:10:00.000-08:00

Four years ago I attended the now infamous Lindsey Jacobellis gaffe that cost her a gold medal in the Snowboard Cross. I knew she fell. I knew she blew a big lead. And I knew this was horrifically embarrassing for her, but I was completely unaware at that moment that she was showboating. Considering this was the first (and until yesterday) only Snowboard cross race I'd ever seen, I had no idea that she was pulling a Deion. I thought she was supposed to do tricks after jumps.

And thus the uproar over her second Olympic flame out makes me laugh out loud. Reporters who are covering the games don't know a "switch stance" from a "fakie" (for the record-I googled "Snowboard trick terminology" and these were the first two items under that Wikipedia category). So, their efforts to be profoundly aghast at Jacobellis failing to even qualify for the final is laughable.
These are the same people who have a problem with Sadie winning Best in Show. Unless Sal Masekela is writing for the New York Times, honestly, I don't care what their NBA reporter thinks of her goof.

In the same regard, I can't seem to put my finger on why America loves to hate Johnny Weir. Truth is, he's the best thing to happen to mens figure skating since we openly discussed the health of Scott Hamltion's nut sack.

Activists are mad that Weir would dare to wear fur during his routines. Manly men are throwing epithets at their TV screens when Weir enters the ice wearing something from the Amy Adams closet on the set of "Enchanted."

Hello people, he's a figure skater and he is unapologetically effeminate. What do you want him to wear, hunting gear? Maybe he should dress a bear with his skate and wear the pelt for his long format routine.
He's a freaking figure skater, doesn't that by definition make him the gayest athlete in America? I for one want my male figure skaters to be gay. Among things many gay men are extremely proficient at: style, grace, music selection, the flare for the dramatic, and figure skating.

And I like when the US wins gold medals, even if the winner doesn't look or act anything like me. Our greatest attribute is we can (but rarely do) root for anyone in the red white and blue. Our country's pride ultimately supersedes our lame prejudices. Even the most staunch racist wouldn't dare root for the Chinese at this moment. Given the choice in Alabama: Johnny Weir or a Communist, begrudgingly Alabama overwhelmingly goes with Weir.

If Johnny Weir falls short of the gold, the only person who is actually affected by this is Johnny Weir. Truth is, he raised the bar for figure skating as a performance art. Wheaties might not put him on their box, but Grape Nuts would think about it!
And as for Jacobellis, I think her quote following a second Olympic flame out was apropos, "It's not the end of the world for me. I It's unfortunate that the rest of the world only sees this race and the one four years ago. I guess I don't have a great track record with the general public."
She couldn't have hit this more on the head. OK, she screwed up in Torino, although the public needed a semi-sober Snowboarder to explain it to us. And OK, she muffed it up in the Vancouver games too which means her name and gold medal will never be in the same sentence, but who cares? Even if she won, you are still not going to watch a snowboard cross race nor learn what the "Canadian Bacon" trick is.

These athletes work their asses off for four years to get the chance to define themselves. If they should happen to not end up a champion, it doesn't mean they've disappointed us. Here we are, a nation of lummoxes sifting through our Doritos and Twinkies upset that Lindsey Jacobellis hit a gate on her qualifying run in an event we don't even understand the rules of. Good God, has it come to that?
You want to be mad about something in the Olympic games, be mad at the USOC for the games the Dream Team lost or the inability to find 20 hockey players in this country that can have a chance at competing without being deemed Miracle Workers. But don't be mad at the competitive jump roper or figure skater or dog musher or snowboarder.
In the words of Rodney King, "Can't we all just get along?"

Who Will America Root For Next?

2010-02-15T18:06:00.000-08:00

Here's why George W Bush sucks, because he had no choice but to root against the Saints. When Katrina hit the Bayou, his advisers asked him what he planned to do about New Orleans. His response: Who Dat?
I could never quite figure out why Bush didn't frantically try to salvage New Orleans. It's like he didn't want to admit that he liked college girls who drink grain alcohol and showed their breasts. They always said Bush was the type of President "I'd want to have a beer with." Really? Name one drinking buddy who has said to you, "You know what, that New Orleans is lame."

I'm a sucker for the good story. The city that always showed me a good time thus in terms of karma, they deserved a title, a reason to throw themselves a party for once. Especially after a natural disaster threatened to ruin it forever.
Rarely does the "Team of Destiny" actually realize destiny, unless Peyton Manning is on the "Team of utter disappointment."
So while the FEMA offices and a small quadrant of Indiana rooted for the Colts, it was nice to know that this country can and will rally around a good cause.

In most cases, I like my losers to always be losers. The thought of watching the Clippers hold a victory parade is laughable because no one would show up. It would look like the OJ chase.

In most cases I like my winners to be winners. I have a distinct disdain for the sport of baseball because of the Yankees. And at the same time, their existence as a true evil makes the sport palatable. I need to hate them.

For one fall however, I rooted for the Yankees. I don't hate New York. I love New York. And when those jackholes attacked that city, I wanted to the Yankees to be a beacon of our power. There was nothing more unifying to me in 2001 then to see Yankee Stadium celebrate a World Series title. It was a sign our our resolve.

And a week ago I rooted for the Saints because I wanted those people to know that their plight wasn't forgotten. The overwhelming Saints support was endearing, it was the Y2K version of a bra burning. Here was the country, shunning the perfect pitch man Peyton for the Saints and it was for one reason and one reason only. This country never agreed with the policies that were carried out after Katrina. We embraced New Orleans in the same fashion that we embraced New York.

So who is next? The country was able to rally around the Yankees and the Saints. But they didn't give a crap about the Rays or the Cardinals. Tampa's a fun place but a tsunami didn't wipe out Gasparilla.

And nothing good or bad has ever happened in Phoenix. For a mega winner or a mega loser to get Spike Lee to wear their gear (Yes he was on the field pre-Super Bowl wearing a Saints hat and beads), there has to be something bigger going on.
With that, here are the candidates for the next team for Paris Hilton to deem "Hot."

1) The Detroit Lions..

They are astronomically bad and their city is slowly turning into a set for the remake of Mad Max. If Gran Torino is even the least bit realistic, I wouldn't show much as speed through the city of Detroit. It's sad because we INVENTED cars. Belgians still make awesome beer. Japan still has the best sushi. Why did we think the Hummer was a good idea and laugh at the idea of a Prius?

2) The Cleveland Cavaliers, assuming LeBron leaves. Once in a lifetime you get a wunderkind who ends up playing for the hometown team. I'm assuming that he is carried into practice on a golden chariot, but even so, even he one day will wake up and go, Cleveland sucks. There are two things to see in Cleveland, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and LeBron. If he leaves, I'm praying they somehow get somebody to get in his way of title after title.

3) Any team Brett Favre plays for next season. Because if he wins a Super Bowl, he will retire. His presence is about as annoying as OctoMom and Balloon Boy these days. It's so much drama for no reason at all.

4) The Portland Trail Blazers. Admit it, you know Boogie Nights was a great movie. That's going to be some kind of party when Greg Oden gets a ring.

As for the teams I can't ever imagine America rooting for:

1) The Philadelphia Eagles.

Their fans throw raw meat at nuns. They cheered when Michael Irvin suffered a career ending injury. They booed Santa Claus. Their general disposition is objectionable.

2) The LA Clippers. Why?

3) The Nashville Predators, Columbus Blue Jackets, and Atlanta Thrashers. Please Gary Bettman, please contract. Please Please Please Please Please.

4) The Colorado Rockies. Over the last 3 years, they have pulled off two of the most remarkable runs in baseball history and no one cares. Spike Lee does not care. If that doesn't tell you everything you need to know, I don't know what does.

Not a Super Review

2010-02-08T07:06:00.000-08:00

I'm happy for the Saints. I'm sad for me and you and everyone not associated with screaming "Who Dat?" every two minutes. I don't know any other way to say this but the Super Bowl broadcast sucked beyond belief. And I mean the entire thing: from the disturbing Doritos ads to the lack of any drama whatsoever, this one was remarkably lame.

Here are the silly/stupid/asinine/boring moments from the CBS telecast of Super Bowl 44:

1) James Brown actually converses with the E Trade baby. I was in a bar during the AFC title game when this happened the first time and I remember saying, "I might be crazy but I think James Brown is talking to the E Trade baby." Two days later, I needed to make sure I saw what I thought I saw, so I googled it and sure enough, at the end of the segment he actually said, "Nice talking to you E Trade baby!"
I admire James Brown, which is why I can't believe he didn't tell CBS to shove that idea up their collective asses. What's next, Bill Cowher becomes an Avatar?

2) Since we are on the discussion of poorly placed products, the 5 open Pizza Hut pizzas on the set with the crew was horrific because no one was actually eating any of it. This only works in my mind if someone is allowed to shout: "I love the Slut!"

3) Shannon Sharpe was asked what his favorite "Who" song was and with that he started singing live on national television. William Hung was laughing. And it went on from about 30 seconds, which might as well had been an eternity. It was the one moment where I said, "Please God, go back to the E Trade baby."

4) Carrie Underwood is tone deaf.

5) Brian Waters was given the prestigious "Walter Payton Man of the Year Award." This is for excellence in the community. But Waters, appearing to be in near tears wasn't allowed to speak after being presented the award. 3 seconds into the applause from the crowd for his efforts, the announcer blurts out "Time to go over to Queen Latifah!"

6) There is better audio in a 1970's Kung Fu movie then what ran during the Colts introductions. Only deaf people knew what they were saying.

7) I'm starting to get the feeling Jim Nantz doesn't read the newspaper. How could we go the entire Super Bowl broadcast without any mention of the 9th Ward or Hurricane Katrina? I'm fairly certain he had no idea what exactly winning the Super Bowl meant to that city. This should come as no surprise considering two weeks ago during the AFC Title game broadcast, he referred to the devastated island nation of "Haitia."

8) So Nantz has no sense of big picture and what this means to a devastated area of our country. A redemptive moment for them. And the control room doesn't either. How could we never see a scene on Bourbon Street throughout the entire game, in particular, when the decisive pick six happened?

9) Not once during the telecast did the Colts controversial decision to not go for 16 and 0 come up. Since the only reason the Colts pulled their starters was to effectively have a better shot to win a title, how this decision was not mocked or at the very least discussed is beyond me.

10) I never saw a shot of Eli, Archie, Kim Kardashian, The Mayor of New Orleans, Emeril, Bill Polian, anybody for that matter who had any connection to the players on the field and the gravity of this game.

11) In the same regard, the Colts, a likable team with a quarterback with roots to the team he was playing against never got discussed as the villain in this Super Bowl. Peyton Manning, Mr. Sony/Oreo/name that company was the guy who was going to ruin the party. How did they miss that one?

Put items 7 through 11 together and it makes me wonder if they even had a production meeting before kickoff.

12) Phil Simms called for the Saints to start blitzing Peyton Manning. Then when New Orleans picked off Manning for a game decisive touchdown without blitzing, Simms started wasting time trying to explain himself and ultimately came up with the theory that when you are wrong doing one thing you just try another and if that works you go with it!

13) Simms screamed "INCOMPLETE," during the initial replay of the Lance Moore 2 point conversion when in Super Slow Mo, it appeared as if there was a decent chance of a reversal on the call. While I think the Super slo Mo is a bit deceiving in that it took milliseconds for Moore to gain control before it was kicked out of his hands so constituting possession is arguable, what was clear was Simms beyond jumped the gun.

14) When the Colts failed to score on their last ditch effort inside the Saints 5 with under 2 minutes to play, Nantz had his "Do You Believe in Miracles" Moment, but instead summarily told us that the play was incomplete and the Saints would take over on downs. This is the Super Bowl donkey. This is the time to actually show some emotion, make a call for the ages.

15) I'm sorry but someone has to shake up the set or Dan/Boomer/Shannon/Cowher. None of them say anything with any kind of pertinence. Cowher only praised Sean Payton's guts, gave us no coaching insight into how the Saints held the Colts to 7 points over the last 3 quarters or how either team successfully kept the two most explosive offenses in the league devoid of big plays down the field. Shannon was still thinking about singing Baba O'Reilly. Dan and Boomer are fighting to say something, anything. And JB just keeps screaming about "His guys!" which includes the E Trade baby.

16) The lack of any definitive camera angle to show if the Saints actually recovered the on side kick or showed just how crazy the scrum became is laughable.

Now there were some nice moments of course. Roger Daltry can still pull off the scream in "Who Are You." The stage for The Who set was phenomenal. While I'd prefer someone a little more up to date, hearing an entire stadium sing along with the chorus was memorable.
Queen Latifah was epic.
Bill Cowher's piece with Plaxico Burress actually had some emotion to it.
What was the controversy over the Tim Tebow ad? Why aren't more people angry about the trend of showing men in briefs. As for the ads as a whole, the only one that was memorable was Casual Friday, but I don't even remember what the ad was for.

And finally and most importantly the Saints won, which was a good thing too. Who Dat!

Not Everyone Should Dance

2010-02-01T16:39:00.000-08:00

The Big Ten has 11 basketball teams. 7 of them were in the NCAA tournament a season ago. 7.. Seeeeveeeennn.. 7 teams from the Big East were in the tournament as well, and that conference considered itself screwed.
And now, if the NCAA gets it's way, (and considering even the President can't legislate them out of their maniacal bullshit), every Big Ten team with a winning record could be in. All of them.
What the NCAA is about to do is to mess with perfection and I for one won't stand for it. The NIT contract ends this season, and thus brackets are about to expand, to 96 teams. Get ready to set your printer to the rarely used legal sized selection, because you are going to need the space.
How ironic is it that the same group of University Presidents have no issue with EXTENDING the playoffs in basketball, but a playoff in football, well that's just crazy talk.

I love the NCAA tournament. For a month, the seedy underbelly of the sport doesn't matter because Wright State might just beat Kentucky. I don't even know where Wright State is located. I've never met anyone who even applied to Wright State. But when that team beats Kentucky, I get a sensation that is borders on halucination. And they are going to fuck that up.

More is not always better. Hockey in Columbus is stupid.
Year 8 of American Idol, really? Have you ever bought one of the albums of any of the previous winners?

What's NBC's next move: having Jay Leno do Sunday Night Football with Frank and Kathi Lee Gifford?

Vampire programming. Why are we so into vampires and since when did some of them become young, friendly sex pots?

M Night Shamalan films. The last one I saw was about trees getting pissed off at humans and systematically killing them. Do you want to know how Mark Wahlberg figured this out? Someone in his biology class told him it was possible. No offense, but that premise is lamer then most porn.

Are we about to embark on February discussions of which Sun Belt team deserves an at large bid more, Arkansas Little Rock or South Alabama? I for one refuse. What happens to championship week when that game between Cornell and Lafayette only determines which team gets a 16 seed and which one gets a 24 seed? And here is the worst part, all those Cinderella's that we have come to know and love are going to be weeded out before they ever get their shot at the big boys.

America is a great country but man do we have a way of screwing up a good thing. Detroit is a freaking shithole, how the hell did that happen? We INVENTED the automobile.
What happened when Coca-Cola thought it was time to stop creating the greatest soda in the history of man? it was a a revolt the protestors of the Vietnam War would have been proud of.

We have 2 and a half sporting events that all women give us a free pass on. The Super Bowl, based on the party and the advertisements. And the NCAA Tournament because even your Mom does a bracket and picked Iona because she thought it sounded better then Western Kentucky. Then for a week she throws in "Iona" into her normal conversation, i.e. "I went to the grocery store and asked them if they had any Iona's near the Oreo's."
The Kentucky Derby is a winner to, if you take her to Louisville and get her a hat. Trust me, you'll thank me later. Otherwise, you can always sell it as worth watching because it lasts 2 minutes and it involves horseys!

But in 2010, not only is the NCAA about to ruin the greatest thing ever, the NFL is following suit. Do you understand what is about to happen to our glorious football league. An uncapped season. It's going to hurt, bad. Every team with a bad contract, and that means every team will dump these players because it won't affect their cap, because the cap doesn't exist. The Roy E Williams of the world will be let go. So will guys like LaDanian Tomlinson. The market will be flooded and spendthrifts like Dan Snyder and Jerry Jones will be at the front of the cattle auction. They are going to be like the Shieks at the yearling sale: "5 trillion rubies for the Brandon Marshall."
So for one season, parity will be for the Cincinnati's and Tampa Bays of the world. Those with the fat wallets and uncontrollable urge to buy buy buy will produce power punched teams. Imagine a practice squad consisting of Anquan Boldin and Matt Forte and you'll get the picture.

Is 2010 the Chinese Year of Killing the Golden Goose?
The Dance and the League both eyeing changes that could threaten their very existence at the top of the pantheon of American sports.
There was a time when boxing and horse racing were among the most important sports in this country. To think that times don't change is akin to putting your head in the sand, just ask Bud Selig. Snowboarding is about to be shown in prime time during the Olympics.
Maybe I'm a fuddy duddy, but I like my NFL being unpredictable and I love the NCAA tournament being the one true home to the dream of the little guy. If there is a sporting God (the players all seem to have no problem referencing him in victory), then let us all pray that he is benevolent and sends the Presidents a sign. The field of 65 is already 1 too many!

White Men Still Cannot Jump

2010-01-29T04:11:00.000-08:00

There is a dingleberry who lives in Georgia who thinks now's the time to turn back the clock on progress. And his target is the game of basketball. Sick of seeing games littered with "crotch grabbing" negroes who might "flip you off," Don Lewis told reporters the "All-American Basketball League," will consist of 12 all-white teams. Ironically, the All-American basketball league is not inclusive of All Americans.

The goal according to Lewis is to provide a league that consists of good "fundamental" basketball minus the hystrionics. What he basically is saying is dunking sucks, as does the cross-over, a fast break, anyone touching the ball above the rim, or passing the ball to a Black person.

Lewis went on and on about how he is not a racist and how this not about separation, just putting together a basketball team of the guys who were constantly picked last and were always on the "shirts" team. And despite his asinine view of how this would be perceived, lets take him at face value and assume he's more dumb then bigot. So what is better when it is all White?

Girl fights are better when the participants are both white. Neither knows how to fight, the screeching is sublime and the loser never plots a revenge, just becomes a social outcast.
Late night Talk show wars are better when all the participants are white. I'm including Arsenio in this discussion, he's an honorary white guy after mainstreaming the term "dog pound." It was always telling that the dog pound was filled with white geeks. Dave and Jay and Conan can get as personal as they want without fearing the political outcry of being insensitive and all we want to do right now is watch them eat each other alive.
Earth Wind and Fire concerts or any former famous Black group that no longer interests Black people.
Frisbee Golf. Croquet. Lawn Darts. Scooter races. No one but white people find any of these things the slightest bit interesting.

Back to basketball, lets say for a moment that all Don Lewis is trying to do (misguided of course) is to promote a more family friendly version of the game. How sad that all he sees when he watches the NBA is Gilbert Arenas pointing a gun at his teammate and Ron Artest attacking a fan. Or maybe he's just a racist.

Year of the Moron

2010-01-26T06:51:00.000-08:00

While it may never truly be out of style to be a Manhattanite, certainly there are times when NYC isn't exactly the bastion of intelligence and grace. We have officially entered that time: the Year of the Moron.

It's hard to be a Jets fan, which is why their behavior as a whole is particularly abhorrent. My friend "Cuz," life long Jets fan travelled to San Diego to watch the their upset of the Chargers. The one photo we received from his experience came from the parking lot where a woman, on top of a Jets fan shoulders, was lifting her shift to reveal her breasts. What was most noticeable was the expression on her face, she appeared to be growling.
It's like the 45+ year old who goes to a Bon Jovi concert now and pulls up her shirt. I can count on my hands the times that I said, "Man I wish that woman didn't just show me her tits."

The men surrounding the topless growler were all in green Jets jerseys. Half of them appeared not to be paying attention.
Anyone who has ever been party to free breast viewings knows, it's typically a rare treat. A treat that often forces one of three reactions, A) Where's my camera? (Fun lovers) B) Some form of male howl (For the lack of not knowing what else to do) C) A grope attempt (for the criminals among us).
This group of men seemed nonplussed about it. Here they were in San Diego, in a public parking lot watching a growling woman show off her breasts, and half of them seemed more interested in the state of the keg of Natty Light.
There is only one reason that could be possible. They've seen it before. They've seen it often. In fact, this is considered normal behavior. Which makes you wonder, had the Jets won the AFC title, how many closet morons would have let their inner Jets come out for all of Manhattan to see? And would it have been considered cool?

I had Jets fever last week. I don't like the Jets. I don't like New York teams. But there is something fun about a perennial loser suddenly getting all uppity. Rex Ryan sounds off on anyone in his way. And there is nothing more attractive in sports then the team who talks trash and backs it up. The breast flashing used to be the only perk of going to a Jets game. Now, it's just the tailgating.

I don't know why anyone would be a Jets fan. In a town of two teams, there always has to be a second fiddle. Some will never get out of the other team's shadow, i.e. the Mets, Nets, Clippers and White Sox. If I was a New York sports fan, the last thing I would do is hitch my wagon to the town loser.
Had the Jets beaten Indy, get this, their coach and quarterback would have won the most playoff games of any coach and quarterback in franchise history, 3.
With a record like that, it's no wonder these people have taken to anti-social behavior. They should all be forced to attend "Jets Anonymous Meetings."
"Hi, my name is Louie and I'm a Jets fan. "
"Hi. Louie."
"One time I shot a bottle rocket out of my ass to show my support for Kellen Clemens over Chad Pennington."
"It's OK Louie. We've all been there."

Cuz once attended a Jets game in Miami, alone, in a NY Bryan Cox jersey. Cuz is not a liar nor exaggerator, thus I believe what he said he did in the stands that day actually happened. At some point, while inebriated, alone in a hostile stadium, he stood up and shouted "Suck My.." And then pointed to the name on the back of his jersey.

Do you have any idea what was about to be unleashed on New York City had the Jets won the AFC title? For once, it was going to be cool to be a Jets fan. But Jets fans are not cool. They are social outcasts who's stubbornness as children forced them to choose the wrong franchise to get behind. It's like saying "I think Pepsi is better then Coke and there is nothing you can do to change my mind!"
All of those years of frustration would be on display. All those closet Jets fans would show up to work wearing their Mark Gastineau jerseys conducting fart contests. Grown men hanging out of the windows of office buildings on a Tuesday afternoon starting impromptu cheers of J-E-T-S Jets Jets Jets.
Woman pulling down their green panties to moon cops. Your boss shows up dressed as Rex Ryan and claims being thin is so 2008."Dirty Sanchez" becomes a rally cry.

It would have been an abomination of humanity.

In any normal NFL off-season, I'd suggest to you that this is only the beginning, because truth is, it looks like the Jets have the makings of team that could be a tough out for years to come, but with the cap situation in flux, there is no telling what the league will look like heading into 2010. Maybe the Pats reload after the market gets flooded with free agents. Maybe the Redskins and Cowboys become the Yankees of football and buy up the best teams.
It would all make sense considering the Jets luck that the one year that it appears as if they have a dynasty in the making is the one year where everything in the league is about to change, including the definitive prospect of a lock out in 2011.

All this also seems to fit in perfectly with the timing of the popularity of the MTV show, "Jersey Shore." New York has long had to fight off the image that everyone in the city was a self proclaimed "guido." New York, land of high finance and high fashion often gets depicted more often as a bastion of morons. "Jersey Shore" has put that stereotype in a time warp, and it's not going to change anytime soon.
One character actually goes by the name, "The Situation." What do that even mean?
He has a "wing-man" named Pauly D who must use an entire tube of $5 CVS hair gel to get his style set. It's like a greasy version of the Max Headroom look.

The entire cast speaks English on a fourth grade level. Their standard for success in life appears to be fornicating with as many of their friends as possible. The sickest part is, this show took off when one of the woman was sucker punched in a bar, by a man. Full closed fist punch right in the jaw. It was unreal.

So the people of Jersey are once again stereotyped as imbeciles. And the streets of Manhattan are littered with loud and proud Jets fanatics.
I can't believe I'm saying this, but New York was so much better off when outsiders pictured the scene like something out of "Sex and the City." I miss Carrie Bradshaw because right now New York is turning into a bunch of retarded Terry Bradshaws.

IN and OUT for 2010

2010-01-25T16:37:00.000-08:00

The list begins...

In: Mark Sanchez getting ass in NYC OUT: A-Rod getting ass in NYC

IN: Jersey Shore OUT: Jersey Shore People on the Jersey Shore now can't tell people they are from the Jersey Shore. The stereotype fall out of these morons gaining fame will last decades..

IN: Drooling over the prospect of landing LeBron OUT: All sense of reality

IN: Shaniland OUT: Children of the Zorn

IN: The Big O OUT: Agent Zero

IN: Snooki OUT: Balloon Boy

IN: Jason Campbell OUT: Jason Campbell IN: Jason Campbell OUT: Jason Campbell

IN: Lady Gaga OUT: Zenyatta

IN: Politicians talking sports OUT: Politicians getting more ass then Mark Sanchez

IN: Golf galleries, meow.. Ever seen a women in stilletos at the John Deere Classic before? OUT: Golf as we knew it..

IN: Double entendre regarding "nailing a birdie" and "rescue wood" OUT: Wondering what Tiger finds so fascinating about the color red..

IN: Tony Dungy OUT: Coaches who lock players in a shed

IN: More steroid apologies OUT: Lame excuses why someone would use them

IN: Al Davis (Just a hunch, there's something about his creepiness that is cool) OUT: Robert Kraft (The downfall begins)

I'm not done here.. More to come..

Here's to Peyton Losing!

2010-01-22T04:20:00.000-08:00

Far be it from me to insinuate that I enjoy the abominable behavior that will be unleashed on the sports for the next two weeks, but it's better then the other choice. I'd rather deal with Jets pandamania then the most boring best team in the history of sports.
Thankfully the Colts did pull their starters in week 16, otherwise we all know we'd be sitting here wondering if going for the first ever undefeated season since the schedule expanded was anything less then a bore to them.
Did you see Peyton Manning's press conference the other day? The guy gave away more football information while speaking Mandarin in a Sony commercial. I kid you not that he answered every question by starting with this line, "I really can't answer that." He wasn't being asked to find Osama Bin Laden or cure cancer, he was asked about the Jets, who've been solved 7 times already this season.

I hate boring. And in sports boring should constitute a finable offense. This is entertainment, yet the Colts have taken all the fun out of it. It's like discussing whether James Taylor is among the greatest musicians of all time. Maybe he is, but God, who wants to even think about it?

It means (huge gasp) I have to root for the Jets. I want a Super Bowl with a storyline and if the Colts are involved with their nondescript coach, nondescript town and now nondescript Peyton, just shoot me. Tila Tequila won't be able to get a rise out of this team on Super Bowl media day. These aren't the Colts. These are the Dolts.

Rex Ryan's tenure in New York probably won't last long. Bravado of this sort only flies when you are winning. Jim Fassel famously pushed his poker chips to the middle of the table and his all in bet paid off in a Giants Super Bowl run. A couple of years later, he was gone because he continued to go all in and everyone else was holding aces. For now, Ryan's team is buying in. And unlike his dad, there seems to be less mean-spiritedness of comments. And then there is this little helpful nugget, his opponents are obliging him by either A) pulling their starters in meaningless games allowing them to get unquantifable wins or B)choosing to be coached by Norv Turner, nuff said.
Are the Jets a good team? Yes. Are they a Super Bowl team? In the age old words of Ochocinco, C'mon son! But at least they are interesting. And truthfully, I think everyone can see that if the Patriots are now a shell of what they used to be, the door has been swung wide open for the Jets to be an annual contender should Mark Sanchez prove he can actually play.

I'm rooting for the Saints because I want New Orleans to have a party for themselves. They have been throwing them for everyone else for decades. Those people are owed a reason to be proud of themselves. If it's Minnesota, well, like it or not, we get the incredible storyline of Brett Favre playing for a title at 40. Jared Allen is fun, Adrian Peterson is interesting. The fact the Chilly has been emasculated by his quarterback is outrageously hilarious. Either way, the NFC will provide someone to be interested in.

But if the Dolts win the AFC, book me a room in a nearby hospice. It's going to be an excruciating two weeks of listening to the NFL's version of elevator music.

Hell Hath Frozen Over

2010-01-15T07:13:00.000-08:00

The Super Bowl is being played tomorrow in New Orleans. The Super Bowl of the forsaken. Anyone else find it strange that the two most exciting teams in football reside in New Orleans and Arizona?
Never had the Saints owned the top seed in the NFC, until this year. Never had the Cardinals won back to back playoff games in any of the three cities they played in since the 1940's until a season ago.

The toughest out in sports is arguably the Arizona Cardinals. Consider who they have beaten and who they nearly beat in the span of 12 months. We used to look at that bird and assume a bye. Arizona was where a career went to die. Emmitt Smith has placed the end of his tenure there in the deep reaches of his subconcious.
This was a franchise who provided only one certainty on a weekly basis, their home games would be blacked out. And for good reason.

Don't laugh New Orleans. The Superdome wasn't exactly a hub for Mardi Gras. Up until Drew Bress showed up, this franchise's greatest moment was a half footed kicker's 63 yarder. They stunk. They stunk so bad, the perpetually inebriated fan base knew they stunk. They wore bags to the games, called them the 'Aints.
Can you believe they had the man who procreated Peyton and Eli and failed to even sniff the Super Bowl?

But here we are, the Saints appear not only to be the best ticket in sports, but have taken over the moniker of America's team. Who's more inspiring, Romo in Cabo or Saint Drew saving his beleaguered city? And yet, whoever wins this game figures not to be the favorite in the NFC title game, not with a Favre-a-palooza or the over-hyped Boys involved.

Now, I'm not sure I like the idea of the losers being the bullies. Do I want Boise State to play for a nationla title, NO! Do I want Blake Griffin to turn the Clippers into a more pertinent franchise then the Lakers, NO! Do I want the Royals to compete with the Yankees, NO!
The beauty and the shame of the NFL is truithfully anyone can win. And it shows in how players view teams. Kurt Warner went to Arizona for a chance. One of the greatest winners in the history of the game chose them. Terrell Owens signed with the Bills. Pete Carroll took over the Seahawks. Tampa Bay changed the way the NFL plays defense.

Do you think LeBron is going to sign with Oklahoma City? Please. Will Albert Pujols ink a deal with the Pirates? Never. The NFL is proof that anything can happen. Never more exemplfied then the Cardinals and Saints playing each other in what could be the most intriguing playoff game this season. The Saints and Cardinals, not too long ago, that was beyond unthinkable.

You Broke My Heart Gilbert

2010-01-05T15:57:00.000-08:00

As a fan of sport I am apt to have man crushes. And I fell hard for Gilbert Arenas. What wasn't to like? The guy handed his jersey to a fan after every game. Every point he scored led to money donated to local schools. He was weird but not weird like Stephen Jackson or Ron Artest weird. He blogged and the words didn't stink of weed. And most importantly, he smiled. After years of watching the stars of the league scare me into appreciating their talents or (in the case of the Wizards franchise) just plain suck, Gilbert had me at hello.

I have secretly loved the NBA for years. I repressed those feelings and shoved them to the darkest regions of my brain because I grew up with Abe's team. A team that gave consideration to the name "SeaDogs" in the competition to rename the Bullets. (Now that Abe is gone, I had hoped Uncle Ted would rename the team the Bullets as it rightfully belonged, but that appears out of the question now)
They traded Rasheed Wallace for Rod Strickland, Chris Webber for Mitch Richmond, made Juwan Howard the most overpaid player in the history of sport, marketed the circus of Mugsy and Georghe as family entertainment (clowns are less frightening then Muresan) and in general sucked the way going on a "vacation" to Daytona Beach sucks.
No sports fan is more scorned then the NBA fan who finds himself in the lottery every year, and losing that too.

And then came Gilbert. He kidded us into believing that he flipped a coin over which free agent deal he'd take, play for this team, or play for a team just as sucky. He became Agent Zero overnight and I fell for it. The Wizards were in the playoffs which was unthinkable on it's own right and the team won a playoff series for the first time since I can remember. It was euphoric.

The idea that he had four firearms is patently absurd. I understand that we have the right to carry a firearm, but why would Captain quirky need four guns? Does he really think he's Agent Zero?
Then, to bring them to the arena and store them in his locker. Um, why would he do that? Hello, the President of the United States came to a game last year. The idea that four weapons were at the disposal of anyone with access to the locker room (and trust me, it's more people then you'd think) is frightening.
And then he expected us to laugh right along with him when it came out that on some level, he pulled the guns out, showed them to a teammate and "joked" that he should pick one for their standoff over an exhorbitant gambling debt.

I have little experience with gun tales, but I don't think belly busting laughter would follow this story: So, I owed Javarris more money then most people make in a year when he rivered me on the plane last night. I decided I wasn't going to pay so I pulled out four guns I was keeping in my locker in an arena that houses upwards of 20 thousand people on good nights and said, pick the one we should have a duel with. And he told me he had his own gun. Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha.

Gilbert, you broke my heart. The league is going to have to suspend you. The team is going to have to decide if it's OK for the guy who brought guns into the workplace to receive 120 million dollars over the next five years. And the Feds have to determine if they need to make an example of you.

Now please tell me Ovechkin doesn't have a missile launcher hidden in the penalty box because I've been eyeing that crazy Russian from afar for some time now..

I'm no longer committed

2010-01-04T05:15:00.000-08:00

Let me rephrase, I'm still committed, just no longer committed. My fandom was tested this year in a way it never has before. Thus this past Redskins season (Thank God it's over) felt like a prison term. I was condemned to watching the Washington Redskins play once a week for a period of four months!

The beginning of the end always starts at the beginning. Joe Gibbs did the Redskins no favors by retiring when he did because few viable coaching replacements were available at the time. That being the case, Dan Snyder and Gregg Williams should have put their dicks and the measuring tape away for a minute to realize they were the best match possible considering the circumstances. And in the defense of Williams, had Gibbs told Snyder he'd be foolish to let him walk, maybe this team wouldn't be where it is right now. Maybe.
Certainly, it wouldn't have driven us all to the brink of insanity.
So Jim Zorn, hired to be Jim Fassel's offensive coordinator, gets the job because Fassel (the only viable option left, remember when the Redskins announced Steve Spagnuolo "wasn't ready to be a head coach") got roundly booed by the public. For some reason, the Washington faithful picked up a giant gong and spoke loudly and clearly, this guy won't be running our show. And Dan listened, and got burned for it. If Fassel was the head coach maybe this team wouldn't be where it is right now. Maybe.

Zorn goes 6 and 2, Jason Campbell shows mild improvement and since popular belief is no one and I mean no one is given a fair shake in just one season, Snyder's hands are tied for the second year of Zorn.
And now for the list of occurrences that drove me to my recent fall visit to Shady Acres.

1) Redskins decide to pursue Jay Cutler offering multiple first round picks despite even the mere hint of disappointment with Jason Campbell.
2) Campbell meets with team, is assured now that Cutler is a Bear, that he is safe through the season.
3) Five minutes later, Redskins text Mark Sanchez that they love him, have always loved him and plan to dump Campbell the second they draft him. This goes public.
4) Campbell starts to resemble the wife of Mark Sanford.
5) John Riggins questions Clinton Portis's sexuality and ability.
6) Redskins don't draft Sanchez, fortunately Brian Orakpo falls into their lap, still seem disappointed.
7) Jim Zorn has to pretend the Redskins like their quarterback. Campbell is mind freaked.
8) Vaunted season ticket waiting list turns out to be a hoax. Redskins sue Grandma for he failure to pay for club seats. Ticket office accused of being scalpers.
9) Redskins lose to Lions. Nearly lose to Rams and Buccaneers at home, do fall to Chiefs.
9A) Some player I have never heard of rips the fans for booing the team after a loss.
10) Redskins hire Sherm Lewis from bingo hall to "consult."
11) Next day he's calling plays although he'd never spoken to any of the players or knows the terminology involved.
12) Head coach is told he is not allowed to even relay in plays.
13) It turns out three different people call plays during the course of a game. No one on the team can actually explain the system.
14) 100 million dollar man says the system, which has produced a top ten defense, but as usual, a non playmaking defense, "kills the players."
15) Defensive coordinator, who refuses to talk to the media, tries to bench the player, is overruled.
16) The assistant on the defense who does talk to the media refuses to answer one question, "Did you already interview for the Redskins coaching job?" Man, talk about a turncoat. One of Zorn's assistants interviewed for his job about a month before he was actually fired.
17) Jerry Gray deludes himself into thinking he might actually get the job when the team had ample opportunity mid season to fire Zorn and give him the post on an interim basis.
18) Fritz Pollard Alliance actually thinks this constitutes adherence to the Rooney Rule.

I've blocked out 15 other bizarre happenings. It's the only reason why I've kept my football sanity. But now it's over. Zorn is out. Vinny is somewhere out of sight and the team has a real GM and a real coach forthcoming. I'm not getting off my meds until this new regime shows they have some autonomy. But with no cap coming in 2010 and some football people in line to decide how to help Snyder spend accordingly, I'm feeling like euphoria might actually be a possibility again. But then again, I already admitted that I've gone insane.

RIP Washington Times, King George

2009-12-30T09:32:00.000-08:00

Some years back I walked into Redskins Park carrying an entire radio studio. OK, so it was like two duffel bags full of equipment and note pads and various other sundries to allow me to speak via the airwaves. Tucked under my right arm was that day's edition of the Washington Post, the bible of political coverage for the world, and for my purposes, the only thing that mattered in terms of credibility to my employers. (I can't tell you how many times as a Redskins reporter for a sports radio station that my information was treated as not quite the gospel until it was written by one of THEIR writers on one of THEIR pages, not that I harbor any ill will, just saying)

Anyway, Jody Foldesy and I went to college together, he like me was a neophyte Redskins reporter which led us to strike an immediate kinship. We referred to Skins fans who spent every day at training camp (yes there are a few of them) as "Trekkies," (Not mocking, you see I'm one too! Live Long and Prosper Zorn) Foldesy wrote for the Washington Times. While we never spoke of the issue of the Post being perceived as the 10,000 pound gorilla over local sporting coverage, we both must have felt the same way. There's no other way to explain why he said what he said to me that October afternoon.

Sick of seeing me walk in every morning, sit down at whatever space I could muster and peruse the Post for their tidbits on the team, he lashed out, "Dude, I am buying you a subscription to my paper. You might want to see what's being said in there too." He was right. I only scanned the Times on line, and truth be told, anything they reported in the eyes of my bosses was just as much subject to review for credibility as anything I offered up.
But I knew better, just as the reporters at the Park respected my fact finding and opinion making, I knew that Jody and David Elfin and Rick Snider and Ryan O'Halloran and Mark Zuckerman and Dan Daly and Thom Loverro (and forgive me if I am blatantly forgetting to mention someone) were just as plugged into the team as myself or any of the Post writers. Sure it did not have the gravitas of the Post, but for pure fact finding and thought provoking opinion, it was every bit as valuable.

So I took Jody up on his offer (not forcing him to pay of course) and subscribed to the Times to be certain I was reading what everybody was saying. If I still lived in Washington, I'd be heartbroken to know there is no reason for me to flip through those pages any longer. Sometimes less is not more.

Apparently the Washington Times is going to stop producing sports for good. It's not a surprise, the San Francisco Chronicle and Boston Globe are the Washington Posts of their town and they are barely surviving. The Rocky Mountain news, arguably on equal footing with the Denver Post stopped production earlier this year. Printing Presses are about to become relics, amusement for some museum someday, same as the record player and steamboat.

In a city where debate is valued, an important voice is being silenced. What is going to replace this void is the media behemoth. Soon, more and more coverage of Washington teams will be provided by people who, gasp, are not in Washington. ESPN certainly will offer an ESPN DC site sooner rather then later. Comcast SportsNet already does, but when Comcast and NBC merge, it's possible the local affiliate may merge into a bigger conglomerate.
This is not a terrible thing for the Washington sports fan, but it's not a good thing either. There is no substitute for forming the relationships with the people who are part of the organizations to get to the types of stories and coverage our town deserves. I'm in the minority of chatters who talk on a national level who believe Washington is a GOOD sports town. But I'm from there and I'm biased.
The Washington Times believed that too. Their columnists spent decades there, in the case of their lead Redskins reporter, spanning both of Joe Gibbs tenures. Dave Fay was an extremely well regarded hockey voice before his passing. And the Times often had more experienced people covering the second most important sport in the city, college basketball.

As we head into a new decade, I'd like to raise my glass to my friends at the Times who fought the good fight and made a difference in the way Washington Sports fans thought.

***********************************************

I need to say something about the passing of King George.. Apologies for not sharing this sooner, but I do have one specific memory I'd like to share..
I really only knew George on a cursory level having never worked for him. And truth was, we did not cross paths very often. I wanted to pick his brain for some advice the last couple of years I worked in Washington, but that unfortunately never happened.. Needless to say having grown up in the suburbs of DC, he and Glenn Brenner were two of the reasons I wanted to be a sportscaster.. So here is my one George Michael story..

Back when I was in High School in the late 80's, Channel 4 was producing a series called "4 wishes" where every day on the news for one week, 5 different wishes would be granted. Apparently, so many people wrote in saying they wanted to be on the news, one of the pieces was about the cattle call of local fans young and old to come on the set and pretend to be Jim-Doreen-Bob and George. I was chosen as one of the sportscasters..
If I remember right, there was a room full of people who were trotted out for their 3 minutes on the set reading from the teleprompter. Luckily, I was one of the few who made the cut and were included in the piece on the broadcast.
I wish I still had this tape, but back then, TIVO was a figment of our imagination.
The only thing I distinctly remember was showing a highlight that included Pistons forward Bill Lambier and being genuinely excited about all of this.
It was at the end of that highlight where Lambier hit a game winning shot at the buzzer when George emerged from behind me and now with both of us on camera he said (and I'm paraphrasing, but it's close) "Get this kid off the air, he's too good!"

Second to losing my virginity, that was the single greatest moment of my teen years. And I'll never forget it. And we'll never forget George. It's odd to be where I am knowing he was one of the pioneers of the industry, a true visionary. I'm actually glad I never did work with him, because I prefer to have the opinion I have of him, icon who motivated me more then he could ever have known..

We'll miss you George..

It's Chilly for Caldy

2009-12-27T17:03:00.000-08:00

Has there ever been a more uncertain time for the NFL favorites? When Norv Turner appears to be the most stabile coach with a bye in hand, Vegas might as well take every playoff game off the board.

The second Drew Brees came out and used the word "destiny" and "Saints" in the same sentence, you knew karma would punch that franchise in the gut.. New Orleans is a town of Yin and Yang.. For every peep for beads comes a puke in public.

Brad Childress is a flaming moron. He practically stalked Brett Favre, became his personal driver, and now at 11 and 3 thinks benching him is prudent. I don't know who's dumber, Chilly or the Balloon Boy's Dad.

But this week's ultimate winner of the coveted "Bonehead" award goes to the nondescript Jim Caldwell. I personally don't understand the ongoing debate of whether to go for an undefeated season or not. People know who Mercury Morris is, nuff said. Why wouldn't you want to be the first team to go 19 and 0? A 15 and 1 team is just as likely to lose as a 16 and 0 team. You are the favorite either way and it's the playoffs, the pressure is equally on both teams.
The only rational conclusion to what Jim Caldwell did on Sunday is that he's scared of history. He doesn't want to be that guy. He wouldn't have thrown the tea in Boston Harbor. He would have sat out signing the Declaration of Independence.
He's afraid to have a bullseye on his back. For some reason, he deluded himself into thinking being 16 and 0 would be a bad thing. Why else would you pull Peyton and crew up 5 points in the third quarter of a home game against a desperate yet talented team? Why play your guys at all if this was the game plan?

What if Thomas Jefferson decided he only wanted Louisiana and let the French keep Texas when making that purchase?
What if Michael Jackson said, "You know what, this glove is just too gay for me."
What if Bono wasn't soooo sanctimonious.
What if Obama told us, "Maybe we can!"
What if John Kennedy demanded, "Ask not what you can do for your country, ask what your country can do for you."
What if Sully said, "Screw it, were going down."

Jim Caldwell joined the litany of followers. He listened to the throbbing brain a chatters who somehow think psychologically the Colts are better off having lost a game.
And in the end, he got the worst kind of psychological conundrum ever conceived. When the Colts were playing with their starters, they weren't losing. Now they have to reconcile that mind fuck.

******************************************************************************

Just a quick thought on the patently absurd hype production the Mayweather-Pacquaio camps are trying to thrust on everybody. I don't buy this lawsuit crap for a second.
Manny said he was slandered. What boxer hasn't been slandered? That's how the sport is marketed.
It was suggested that Jack Johnson was intrigued by the idea of raping white women.
Max Schmelling was unfairly characterized as Third Reich.
Ali called his opponents, ugly, stupid, and gorilla esque.
Tyson said he'd fornicate with his opponents and eat their children and suggested Allah would be into all of it.
Now Floyd asserts Manny does the juice.

Nothing is sacred in that sport. And it shouldn't be. It's the only sport where if someone pisses you off enough, you can literally break their face in half.
So Manny and Floyd, cut the crap. You already are going to get the biggest gate ever, no need to try to pull this People's Court mockery.

Ciao Vincenze

2009-12-17T13:57:00.000-08:00

Vinny Cerrato couldn't pronounce my name when we first started encountering one another. Amazingly, this didn't prevent him from conducting numerous interviews with me during the early days of his tenure as the Redskins, uh, something. You see, he may have called me "Blink," once or twice, but I never knew what his job description was.

Vinny Cerrato was ridiculed by the fans because they assumed him to be the face of their proud franchise's dive into mediocrity. But that's like saying Kevin Eubanks is the reason Jay Leno's show is failing in prime time. Or Oprah is retiring from network TV because Gayle is taking her down.
Those who know, and trust me I know, the critical decisions this franchise made may have been executed by Cerrato, but they weren't his brainchild.

I want this to be the one nice piece written about Cerrato, because he deserves it. Let me list for you the Redskins first round picks of the Dan Snyder tenure in order: LaVar Arrington, Chris Samuels, Rod Gardner, Patrick Ramsey, Sean Taylor, Carlos Rogers, Jason Campbell, Laron Landry, Brian Orakpo.
OK, so the Redskins had a terrible falling out with LaVar. Do you blame this on Vinny?
Rod Gardner was selected by Marty Schottenheimer after he fired Cerrato, thus that pick is not on Vinny's watch.
Patrick Ramsey is debatable as to who wanted him most, but remember the Redskins traded down three times acquiring a bevvy of picks before selecting him. Sure he didn't work out, but the spot they got him under the circumstances was not horrific, and lets be honest, Steve Spurrier shell shocked the kid.
Rogers and Campbell were all Joe Gibbs. While Gibbs would often credit Vinny for his support, during this period of time, the bottom line was Gibbs was calling all the major shots.
Of the pure Vinny selections, can you argue with the selections of Arrington, Samuels, Landry or Orakpo?

I'm not confusing Cerrato with Bill Polian here. For every second round pick of Ladell Betts, there were the deals for TJ Duckett and Brandon Lloyd (Gibbs was around for both by the way). And for every 7th round snag of Rock Cartwright, there were, well, no other 7th round picks who has amounted to anything.
And the treating of picks as if they were burning a hole in their pocket was astounding examples of bad management. But again, how much of this is on Cerrato?
Cerrato didn't hire any of the coaches he worked with. Dan Snyder did.
Cerrato didn't put together deals like the Clinton Portis-Champ Bailey blockbusters. Dan Snyder and Joe Gibbs did.
Cerrato didn't tell Snyder his plan in year one was to sign Bruce Smith, Mark Carrier, Jeff George and Deion Sanders.
Indeed Cerrato executed these deals, but to think he masterminded any of them is naive. He was a front office executive who was merely a front for the real deal brokers of this organization.

Bruce Allen brings a sense of calm to the front office thanks his genetics and thanks his his actual title, general manager. Dan Snyder never pretended that Cerrato held that position, otherwise, he would have referred to him that way. This man has the job title, now we'll see if he indeed has the traditional GM decision making power.

I had a good relationship with Vinny. He helped me understand the thinking behind the team even I outwardly suggested I didn't agree with it. And considering he rarely was the impetus behind the decisions, that's quite a statement. Cerrato answered the questions Snyder wouldn't giving off a false impression. Cerrato shouldn't have been the public face of the personnel department, because he wasn't nor was he good at it. Vinny was a terrible PR representative. His reasoning was rarely communicated in a clear and effective method. Compound that with the issue of defending decisions that made little to no sense, in particular, how Jim Zorn got the job as head coach, it only lessened his credibility.

Vinny is a football man. He knows the draft. He understands how to work under the most unique of NFL circumstances. And now he's the fall guy after the gig was finally up. The fans turned on Snyder and despite his obvious trust in Cerrato as his public front, he knew the time had come for him to spend his money where it should have gone years ago, into the pocket of a qualified GM who can teach him how to spend wisely from here forward. Vinny was never in position to be that person for Snyder, or was never strong enough to demand that the direction of the franchise be shifted. In that regard he failed. And if the Redskins do turn it around, Snyder will be painted as a free spender who finally learned the lesson of how to build a winner. And Cerrato will go down in lore as the face of their mediocrity and ineptitude. It isn't fair and it isn't right, but it is a perception that Redskins fans will sop up hoping that this team has finally begun to resemble a stabile productive successful franchise the town not only craves but deserves.

Please Tell me there is a sex tape

2009-12-07T08:02:00.000-08:00

Not that I'd watch it, I just want to know if it's existence.
At that key moment, Tiger screams out, "Fore!"

This is the greatest thing to happen to golf ever. By far. Bar none. Before Tigers tales started being told, the top 3 controversial golf moments in no particular order were: Jean Van de Velde's epic choke at the British Open, Fuzzy Zoeller joking that Tiger's first Masters dinner would consist of fried chicken and watermelon, and John Daly hanging out at Hooters.

Now the most recognizable name in the sport's history is a philanderer to the nth degree! Do you know what this means? Golf is new. Golf is fresh and in the words of Paris Hilton, golf is hot.
Have you ever seen the people who patronize a normal golf tournament? White men in Dockers wearing visors and golf shoes (for effect I suppose). Not anymore. Expect Lindsay Lohan to be sipping Cosmos at the John Deere Classic next year.

Imagine what this means. Women in high heels walking the courses. Imagine the amount of divots. The PGA Tour can stop searching for primary sponsors for their troubled tournaments. Here comes Botox and Viagra to the rescue. Cougars will be circulating by the main clubhouse hoping Tiger comes out for a post round nightcap.
And to think how angry Tiger got when the photographers snapped photos during his back swing. At least they didn't catch him while he was nailing a birdie!

I'm surprised about the extent of which his infidelity reaches, not because of his wherewithal to bed women (he is among the most famous people in the world, and certainly the richest). I'm surprised because I thought he was a geek. Of all the adjectives to describe Tiger Woods, ladies man was not the first thing that comes to mind.
Picturing Michael Jordan this way isn't. Picturing Tom Brady this way isn't. Picturing A-Rod this way isn't. Picturing David Beckham this way isn't. All married, all ridiculously famous. All strikingly good looking. And all having that obvious effect on women and not shy about making sure everyone knows it. If any were involved in a similar type of adulterous firestorm, I'd wonder what took so long? Not Woods though.
I liken this to finding out Peyton Manning has a thing for threesomes with Amy Winehouse and Grace Jones.

Woods and Manning are immensely popular athletes and widely (until a week ago at least) considered geekish. They both have goofy smiles. They both are handsome, but not hot.
Manning does commercials for Oreos, Brady does ads for Ralph Lauren. There's a difference.

Woods does not come off as stylish (although his chosen sport offers little in terms of flexibility in that regard).Still, he looks better in a baseball cap. Other examples of this phenomenon, are Tony LaRussa and Larry the Cable Guy.
He does not come off as a particularly funny person, no one's interviews are more dry and guarded. Has there ever been a moment when you were watching this guy on TV and your wife turned to you and said, "You know what? That Tiger Woods is hot."
It's because he's not hot. He's just a really good golfer. And he comes off as someone with the social skills of Bill Belichick with a dash of Bob Knight's surliness. And That guy rarely if ever has pick up lines.

Look, say what you want about Bill Clinton but the idea of him picking up chicks doesn't seems foreign does it? What about Tiger Woods wearing a red golf shirt approaching a group of women and trying to strike up a conversation. How does that go?
Anything short of "Hi I'm Tiger Woods and I'm rich and famous, want to do it in the Presidential Suite?," feels contrived. Does Tiger Woods really have game? Somehow I doubt it.
Only in recent years did he have the appearance of someone who wasn't bulimic. He was a remarkably spindly chap with a big goofy smile that made me wonder if he had his teeth capped. And his voice, it's a lot closer to Pee Wee Herman then it is to Barry White. This is not the man who exudes attraction.

He wasn't dating famous women before Elin, otherwise we'd have known about it. He wasn't dating ridiculously hot women like his wife otherwise we'd have known about it.. I wouldn't be surprised if he never had a girlfriend before her. To be that good at golf, your weekends are spent getting out of the rough, not getting off in it.
Now, the picture certainly is different. Maybe we underestimated him. Or maybe he finally won enough that he decided to have a life outside of golf, absurdly choosing to do so after he married the hot Nordic nanny. And, well he's Tiger Woods. That apparently can get him a lot of places.

But this thing has gotten weirder by the minute. There is a porn star now linked to Woods. A PORN STAR. It's one thing when you are hooking up with some woman who linked to your profession in some way. It's another thing entirely that Tiger Woods wanted to be introduced to a PORN STAR. It means Tiger watches porn and has favorites! Who does he hire to make the call to her agent! How do you contact a porn star? He's a sick sicky sick sick sicky sick.

When Clinton went down, we got a new viewpoint of what the action on Capitol Hill is like. Now the Eliot Spitzers and Mark Sanfords of the world are less shock value stories, more punch lines to the extent famous geeks will go to get their groove on. Spitzer pays outrageous fees to sleep with a whore. Someone needed to introduce him to Craigslist. Sanford is flying to South America to see "his girlfriend." Now that is sheer insanity.
"Where are you going honey?"
"Um, for a really long walk, don't wait up."
"Have fun!"
"Gracias. I mean thanks."

What's going to be interesting is to see how the rest of the golf world plays this shot. Man if I am Steve Stricker today, I'm getting a publicist and a hair cut. Your time has come golfers. Kenny Perry, Angel Cabrera even Vijay Singh has a shot at some prime tail.
Tiger has actually done golf a favor, he's taken it out of the closet. It's like some kind of sexual revolution. Sergio Garcia is going to be dating Penelope Cruz. John Daly will be humping Octomom. Camilo Villegas will be vacationing in Pago Pago taking Kaballah with Madonna.
Someone is the marketing wing of the PBA needs to get Norm Duke a date with Kate Gosselin stat.

From here forward, your wife or girlfriend may even look at the weekend warriors differently. They may want you to go play golf. Suddenly, hitting a Titleist is an aphrodisiac.
It's a whole new world. Jack Nicklaus can keep his stinking records. Tiger changed the game, forever.

Rescue Club

2009-11-30T18:13:00.000-08:00

Tiger Woods is not pressing charges against his hot wife. The hot wife isn't pressing charges against Tiger Woods. And the rich guy who called 911 didn't see anything other then his rich neighbor post tree swipe. So why would the police attempt to interview the golfer three times about a one car accident that affected no one but Tiger Woods?

It appears as if the police in hoity toity Florida have nothing to do with their free time. It doesn't take a detective to know that this accident doesn't add up to a whoopsee, but truth be told, this has gone beyond their business and it's high time someone stuck up for the Tiger here.

Yes Woods should have said something, anything really. "My baby needed some diapers. I had a Big Mac attack. I like to putt at night." Follow up any of these reasonable excuses with a smile and laugh it off as "one of the goofiest things I've ever done," and it's case closed. Barney Miller and the rest of the crew would have gone back to investigating curfew issues at the local nursing home. But because Tiger curtly told everyone to suck it, now the consumers of everything Octomom are frothing for information assuming Hot Elin is the real life version of the bride from "So I married an Ax Murderer."
And they should be. Come on, the whole thing is so preposterous. Woods somehow hits a fire hydrant and a tree going under 30 miles per hour. Elin gives the term "rescue club" a new definition busting the back windshield pulling her woozy Woody to safety. This all without either of them suffering any flesh wounds from being pulled through broken glass.

That said, the law prohibits enforcement officials from literally morphing into paparazzi. Somebody is bucking for a promotion in the Windermere police academy it seems. Find out Elin went Ike Turner with a 3 wood after reading of rumors of the Tiger wagging his tail outside the marriage. But they are getting to the point of overstepping their bounds here. The accident happened in front of his property. It affected no one but he and his family and I suppose an arbor day enthusiast who's dog liked to pee on that hydrant. Attempting to attain a warrant of Woods's medical records to try to pull a CSI and figure out if his facial injuries were caused by a steering wheel or a Callaway Big Bertha is a bit Us Weekly if you ask me.
While Tiger went about this the worst way possible, he does have the law on his side here even if the law wants to try to stare down the stare down king.

Wieeeeeeeeee!

2009-11-16T07:13:00.000-08:00

"It's definitely off my back. I think that hopefully life will be a lot better." Michelle Wie, yesterday.

No one cares about the LPGA which is what astounds me over the ridicule levied at Michelle Wie. She was a golfing phenom swallowed up by the media because she decided prematurely that she would be better served playing with boys then girls.

Ten years ago, Wie qualified for a USGA event. She was ten. Two years later, she played in her first LPGA tournament. She was a tour de force. By 15, she was supposed to make Annika her biatch. And by 20, she would be paired up with Tiger on Sunday strolls at the Masters. Only the flawed logic never seemed to give pause to anyone. No one stopped to think that maybe a ten year old girl would have a hard time keeping up with Phil Mickelson. A ten year old girl probably couldn't beat me in skee ball if she practiced every day. The idea that Wie would be Tiger's Arnie was patently absurd. But here we were, lapping it up like imbeciles who believe in the tooth fairy.

Now Michelle got some bad advice. Her parents, handlers, money hounding "representatives" knew the media had bought into her as some kind of golfing alien who'd change the way we looked at the sport forever. And they decided if they didn't cash in immediately, they'd likely be leaving a lot of dough on the LPGA fairways. Truth was, if she went out on the women's tour, which nobody cares about, and didn't have a 10 stroke lead heading into every Sunday, then their sales pitch would be less likely to be believed. So they went for it, to the detriment of her best interests.

Now Wie is rich for a 20 year old. Rich based on hype. But not unlike the first round quarterback who gets sacked 75 times in his rookie season, or the pitcher who gets sucked under a bizarre set of rules that limit when and how often he should pitch, she was broken. Ironically, it took her nearly 10 years since that debut to actually win an event, against women no less.

And there was the quote that spoke volumes. "Hopefully life will be better." How sad. Money likely isn't an issue for her unless she was fleeced by her "representatives," and considering they were manipulating a pre-teen girl, that's a possibility. In sports, confidence is everything. And that quote tells you exactly how much she had left. She won to get everyone off her back. When you don't live up to the hype you created, the fall can be ugly. Her parents were stupid. Her game isn't that good. This was a fraud.
Imagine, being told you are letting EVERYONE down at age 15 because you couldn't qualify for a PGA Tour event. It's like telling the homecoming queen in Steubenville Ohio that she should model for Guess Jeans then spending fashion week wiping off the tomatoes thrown at her during her walks down the runway.

She won her first LPGA event yesterday. No one knows this today because Bill Belichick lost his mind last night and we care about that. Even Brandon Jennings scoring 55 points for a irrelevant NBA franchise will make more headlines today.
No one cares about the LPGA. But for a day they should. We owe it to Michelle Wie to pay attention and applaud her for her accomplishment. It is really hard to win a professional golf tournament, especially by age 20.
It isn't even about the money or the trophy. It's about getting her dignity back, which should have never been taken from her in the first place.

****************************************************************************************

I submit that we need more old people in sports. Old people don't care. They say what's on their mind. They have strange ideas for the future and they've decided that manners are for idiots trying impress suckers.
Titans owner Bud Adams has had a long season. His team started 0 and 6. He had to publicly question one of the best coaches in the league. He had to force that coach, likely against his will, to put in a quarterback who has shown the mental stability of Michelle Wie.
Now his team is winning again. Sure at 3-6, they probably are not going to get to the playoffs. They have zero shot of making a miraculous run to win their division and it turns out Jacksonville and Houston don't want to just roll over for them. So it's the little victories he'll have to be satisfied with. And in those little victories comes the bizarre reaction of an old man who has lost control of his better judgement.

Go to You Tube, type in "Bud Adams Bills." And there he is caught by some videophone giving the Bills two middle fingers. Waving them around as if he's sticking it to the man. Now if only someone could have caught the reaction of Ralph Wilson. What was that crazy old coot doing? Was he mooning the Titans sideline? Maybe he was giving the old two armed F You salute. Maybe he was squeezing his nipples up against a glass partition. Who knows. If Bud went with the Bird, we can only guess what Ralph and old Al in Oakland will be doing next.

Excuse of the Week

2009-11-11T17:40:00.000-08:00

Diuretics are used to force the rate of urination. They are often prescribed for patients who suffer from heart and kidney issues. And they are abused by bulimics.
I don't know any bulimic football players. And ones with heart and kidney issues typically don't end up staying in the NFL for very long if they get there at all.
Which is why immediate stringent suspensions are handed down to players who have been caught because apparently they can also be used to mask the use of performance enhancing drugs.

So as you might imagine, those caught using diuretics have to come up with some humdingers to attempt to avoid league punishment.. What Eagles corner Joselio Hanson came up with might be the lamest excuse since the advent of the "dog ate my homework."

Hanson was given a four game suspension by the league after he gave what was described as misleading assertions as to why they were found in his system. Keep in mind the failed test happened 11 months ago. In all that time, all Hanson could come up with was Chinese food. That's right, he says he took a diuretic because he ate Chinese food.

Hanson's lawyer told the Associated Press that after Hanson "felt bloated" after he ate some Chinese food, took a pill that "turned out to be a diuretic."
And there in lies the stupidest excuse ever created.
So he ate some Chinese Food and had a tummy ache. And presumably someone said, "here take this pill, it will make you feel better." Then he takes a General Tso piss and feels all better?
Lets assume that he offered the diuretic from someone. Why would that person give him a diuretic for this? Who takes a pill without knowing what it is?
11 months to think about this and the best he could up with with was he ate some bad kung pao.

Cry Me an Agassi

2009-11-08T17:03:00.001-08:00

Boo hoo hoo hoo. I didn't like tennis and I was in a bad relationship with a super model. Boo hoo hoo hoo hoo.. And I did drugs with my friends while I was rich in my 20's. Boo hoo hoo hoo.

Holy crap, what a crock of &*%$. I'm watching Andre Agassi spill his guts on 60 Minutes. His eyes are welling up after Katie Couric asked him how he feels about Martina Navratilova criticizing him for lying about his use of crystal meth. He wants compassion for lying about drug use to professional sports investigators. And then he said his story is inspirational. (OK, the stuff about his prep school in a crappy Vegas neighborhood is on now and I'm starting to feel bad that I'm criticizing him, but I'm on a roll and I can't stop now)

Andre Agassi is mad that his father turned his childhood into a tennis POW camp. He's embarrassed that his highly lucrative "Image is Everything," campaign was a sham. It turns out that his hair wasn't real, an interesting subject for Chris Rock to check out when he invariably does "Good Hair 2: Where the White Women are at!" Agassi had a weave because he was going bald at 17, which makes sense considering he was waking up with night sweats from dreaming about Bjorn Borg in drag.

Let me see if I have this straight... Playing tennis at the highest of levels garnering millions upon millions dollars and ultimately marrying a world wide heartthrob is depressing? So depressing you turned to smack? If this guy needs Zoloft then God help us all.
Lets take each of these "hardships" one by one. His Dad made him play tennis too much. And? Sure his father turned out to be the Mussolini of tennis, but who's Dad didn't make them do something that they found obtuse? Some Dads like Nascar, imagine that %$#^. Being told you can only buy a Chevy or being forced to change your Dad's oil every 3 months? Now that would make me angry.

So he did drugs. And? Rich person with no real job falls into year of drug use. Golly, I've never heard anything like that before. I thought all of my sports heroes were clean. Who'd have thunk it?

As for the hair thing. Now I actually do really want to know more about that. Somehow he made himself believe that he needed to get a weave made. Sounds like someone who might be interested in crystal meth.
Where do young white men go to get a weave? Who specializes in that? Is this more common then I know? Was Hulk Hogan's hair real? Is the entire 80's glam rock scene a complete sham?

As for the "hatred of tennis." Really? Then, why did he play it for so long? And why does he remain an ambassador for the sport? When Roger Federer broke Pete Sampras's all time grand slam singles titles crowns, he was in attendance. I don't know about you, but when I loathe something, I typically stop doing it. It's like he's some kind of tennis-masochist, only he wants sympathy for it. Here's reality Andre, tennis made you a quint-trillionaire. Maybe biting the hand that has fed you grapes while fanning you isn't the smartest of moves. Did Caesar say "You know what, Rome sucks. All these old decrepit buildings, who needs it?" No, he didn't do that.

Andre wants us to feel sorry for him because he was in a bad marriage with Brooke Shields. Umm, OK. Hotness shouldn't be a factor when discussing matters of the heart, but can we at least make mention of the fact that the idea of doing it with Brooke Shields every day seems to be a pretty good perk. Putting that aside, (I wonder what she looks like in your average Target nightie) I can understand that he got married too young, (do you think she ever blurted out, Image is everything while they were doing it?) and sometimes you make mistakes, (Did you ever see the Blue Lagoon, man that was AWESOME!), and you learn from those boobies.

Now he's married to Steffi Graf who turns out to be hot. So, Andre, shut your face dude because eventually not every smoking hot famous woman will be interested in marrying a meth head wearing a weave. As an aside, on "The Wire," they actually had to cast the role of "Meth Head in a Weave," but for some reason I don't think they were looking for someone who looked like Andre Agassi.

Agassi lied about his drug use to tennis officials and avoided a suspension. Ooooh, busted. Rafael Palmeiro lied to Congress. Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds lied to the FBI. In the grand scheme of liars in sports, he isn't even in the top 10. Trust me, the last thing anyone cares about is whether the tennis tribunal knows the truth Andre.

The thing I just can't figure out is why he wrote this book. He doesn't need the money. He doesn't need the respect for what he has accomplished personally or professionally. The only thing that makes sense is he is one of the most attention needy people on the face of the planet. Sniff sniff.

Zoo York My Ass

2009-11-02T18:20:00.000-08:00

I don't hate baseball, but I really don't like it. Let me rephrase, I enjoy going to a baseball game or two particularly when it involves two teams who actually are financially trying to win. But in the summer when the other sports are on layaway, my wife gets me to watch "Brothers and Sisters" over the Rangers-Tigers series every time, all the time.
That said, how could any true sports fan turn down the opportunity to witness a World Series game in person at Yankee Stadium featuring to historical franchises? I couldn't. And therefore I did, and like the MLS Cup, I probably won't return. It's off my list forever and it wasn't particularly memorable.

It's game 2 at the new Yankee Stadium against Pedro. Freaking Pedro. The guy who became the ultimate foil for the Yankees. One of the prime poster children of the end of the Boston curse. He wrestled a 72 year old bench coach. He was a Met. And he uses Soul Glo. I couldn't ask for anything more. As of this summer, he received cursory interest in his wares. The Phillies were about the only team willing to offer a pittance to bring him back. And then suddenly, he's starting game two of the World Series?

The Yankees lost game one, i.e. they had to win, i.e. I expected the Zoo to be at it's best. The assumption was that this was the best or worst (depending on your perspective) place to witness a game of this magnitude. This is American sports history and I was going to live it, in section 119 down the left field line, row 24.

But it was wrong, all wrong. My train pulled up to the Yankee Stadium stop 5 minutes before the first pitch. I always perceive New Yorkers as brazenly pushy. There was no fight to get out the door of the train first. In fact, I saw one man in a worn Yankees cap stick out his arm offering to allow a woman to get off first. I had a friend waiting for me, therefore I felt the need to move quickly. But when I texted him about my whereabouts and that I'd "see him a minute," he texted back, "Take your time!"

Take your time? Seriously. Where am I, Kansas City? He told me to meet him at the Hard Rock Cafe in front of the Stadium. I'm rushing past the old Yankee Stadium, at this point, still erected but draped over. The streets are littered with people but the scalpers are few and far between, quite obviously nobody was tailgating at all, and the numerous passers by seemed uninterested in the fact that the game had started. I heard not one "Lets go Yankees" cheer, or anything resembling the utterances of people who live and die by the outcome of these moments.

There was my buddy texting someone, casually sipping a foreign bottled beer. Hundreds of people were in this bar. They were watching the game on television. That's right, ticketed Yankee fans chose to sit in a Hard Rock Cafe instead of their seats at Game two of the World Series.

We walked inside. It's awe inspiring. And clean. And calm. Very calm. I saw any number of what I thought were extremely brave Phillies fans walking around openly in Red "P" hats. No one said a word to them. Even in the mens room, often the genesis of some of the more vile chants ever created, not a single peep. Did someone say "Hey fag, I bet Chase Utley likes it in the ass." or "Ryan Howard is a *^&$ing *&^hole." Nope. It was more like, "Hello, Kind sir, I am finished with my urination, this WC is available for your usage. Thank you kindly for your patience."

I saw an entire row of people eating sushi. Yeah, you read that correctly. I saw a row of 40-50 something men eating Tuna Rolls at a baseball game. One even asked another if he could spare some of his pickled ginger. There were people watching a man carve some of the finest looking chops and ribs in a window. My friend tells me you can buy it here and take it home with you! Who goes to a baseball game for the butcher? Can you imagine missing that incredible two out rally because you wanted to hand pick a porterhouse?
Next to the butcher shop is a line for steak sandwiches by the same local company that I am told are so incredible, we have to get them. But the line is so long, I'm advised we should wait until the 5th inning or later when it slows down. People will wait two innings to get this sandwich. That's right, they went into the stadium and spent a quarter of the game waiting in line to get a sandwich.

When the Yankees got a hit, the fans cheered. When the Phillies got a hit, the fans sighed. A Home run by Matsui brought everyone to their feet. And then they sat down again to finish sipping their cava and ensuring the beluga caviar didn't fall off their rice paper thin crackers.

It was at some point in the 7th of a run one run game when what I was thinking was finally verbalized by a man wearing a Mattingly jersey, "What is wrong with you people, this is the $#@%ing World Series. Stand up you $%#@ retards!" Most people laughed. Some just ignored him. I for one, wondered what the hell is going on here and why isn't anyone joining this deranged freak?
Who are these people and what have they done with Jeffrey Maier? Since when did the Yankees fans go wine and cheese on us?

True story, we finally got that steak sandwich thing. Perfectly baked round roll with a stunning helping of reasonably spiced, medium rare London broil. My friend was right, this was beyond worth the wait. Two bites into this thing was when Matsui goes yard and the one time the entire row stood up in unison and accidentally, my friend's neighbor knocked his entire sandwich into the air landing on the concrete next to his feet.
He's upset, leers at the guy who obviously knew he knocked the sandwich but was trying to pretend he didn't realize it. One thing leads to another and we are involved in a full on New York moment. Both suddenly had thick Italian accents. They are calling each other "guy". The accidentor saying to the accidentee, "What do you want me to do about it guy?"
"How about you get me a replacement sandwich guy?"
And this went on for about 20 more seconds before detente and in New York fashion, no true resolution. Two people who now morbidly hate each other are rooting for the same thing in front of them. But this is New York, you get wronged 15 times a day here, you learn to let it go. Only this one didn't get let go.
After my friend left to go to the bathroom, the guy who accidentally knocked over his sandwich leaned over to me, and in perfect, no accented grammatical English apologized to me for the "mishap" and offered to buy him a new sandwich, if "I would be so kind as to tell him where I got it."
That's right, he did the right thing. By the end of the game, these two were were BFF discussing how Mariano is just soooo perfect and Jeter should really be allowed to "bang" anyone he wants to because of all the joy he'd brought them through the years. It was as Hallmark as Yankee Stadium gets.

The game ends. They have "New York New York" playing on loop through the speaker system. No Phillies fans are being mocked. No drunken Yankees fans are being dragged out by the police. One man actually went after a fan who had dropped their used ticket stub knowing that person would probably want to keep it as a memento.

This was nothing like what I expected. I went to this thing with no real rooting interest. Philly versus New York, it's like the Republicans facing the Religious Right Republicans! I went for the sake of saying I went to a Phillies-Yankees World Series and it was amazing. Only it wasn't.
What I was expecting was the electricity that supposedly defines this place. What I got was the same level of excitement as when the lettuce wraps show up to my table at PF Changs.

No parole for the Z man

2009-10-23T05:59:00.000-07:00

Congrats Jim.. You get to stay until December.
Congrats Redskins fans, this nightmare isn't going to end..

The Redskins latest coaching conundrum might just fall into the category of cruel and unusual punishment. The Redskins wanted Steve Spurrier to pan out. His ineffectiveness was a byproduct of his own penchant to desire tee times over schematic film viewing. Marty and Dan started off trading straw hats. Three weeks later they were at each other's throat and an 0 and 5 start cemented that no matter what Marty did (and he did fix it, with Tony Banks mind you) he was out.
History has repeated itself in this case though. 10 years after his bizarre dumping of Norv Turner while the Redskins remained in playoff contention for Terry "If the owner tells me to move the couch, I move the couch" Robiskie, here was are again with the prominent voice in the locker room having been publicly neutered.

The silly part is Jim Zorn is seemingly well liked in the locker room. He's not an overbearing personality. And we've yet to hear one player come out and openly blame the team's struggles on him. In fact, we've heard more players blame Snyder before blaming Zorn (which is a one way ticket out of town). But Zorn has been reduced to Dan's best friend, and not in a human to human style of relationship.

He can call himself the head coach, but he's working within the confines of an electric fence. He can't even override the play calling of the new offensive coordinator. What head coach can't change a play if he doesn't like it? All Zorn seemingly can do is decide whether to go for it on a fourth down, challenge a play or call a timeout and unless any of those three scenarios play a role in any particular game, to be honest, I don't even see the need for him to address questions from the media anymore. He has no power to answer those either. Prime example: Jason Campbell.
Monday, Zorn said he had not made up his mind about who was going to start the Monday Night game against Philadelphia. Same evening, it leaks that the choice is Jason Campbell. It's safe to say Zorn was told about this too.

What else could the Skins do to embarrass their hand picked head coach? I suppose they could tell him he is no longer needed on the sideline and hand him a pair of binoculars and a ticket in section 412.

I feel empathy for Zorn. In a town of politicians, it isn't hard to figure out what is going on here. The problem is the ruling party not only nominated this man as their Obama, they went to great lengths to promise great things from Him. Yes we can! Now they have turned on him. It's like the Republican party blaming George Bush for the lack of WMD's. No we can't!

I had no issue with Sherm Lewis being asked to oversee the offense. Zorn's offense stinks. Now is it his fault that he has the fourth best quarterback/offensive line/receiving core in the NFC East? No. But at the very least Zorn was hired for one reason and one reason only, make Campbell a viable quarterback. Thus, the receivers should have benefitted from an improved quarterback, or so the theory goes. Peyton Manning is having an MVP year throwing the ball ot Austin Collie and Pierre Garcon for crying out loud. I think I'd take Santana and ARE over that duo. And Campbell is not better. So is that at Zorn's doorstep? For the sake of not turning him into Pollyanna, for whatever reason, Jason has not improved. Now the mind-freak executed this off-season and the lack of even a cursory phone call about a contract extension for their quarterback didn't help either. But in terms of Zorn's production as a quarterbacks coach, he gets an F on this one.
Now asking Lewis to take over the play calling when he hasn't so much as met some of the players is patently absurd. If they score on the Eagles, will the Fed Ex crowd shout in unison: "Bingo!"
Are the plays going to be relayed in as "N 72" or "I-15."

Now that this PR disaster has turned into a full on avalanche of criticism over the handling of this mess, the Skins finally tried to put an end to the dicussion of their perceived ineptitude, by announcing Zorn is safe through 2009. And yet again, they chose wrong. The blue hair in the Bingo parlor just slapped her forehead again.
This coach has been stripped of his power, attempted to be publicly embarrassed into quitting, and now he's got the backing of the organization? That's not logical. The best scenario for everyone involved was to let Zorn go and start the process for finding the next Redskins head coach. Zorn may not be head coaching material, but to publicly flog him like this is above and beyond. It's Chinese water torture for everyone involved.

And there is another way history is repeating itself in this organization. Amazingly, Zorn and Norv have been turned into martyrs. No one sheds any tears for them as their tenures end because winning with them was always a futile endeavor, but neither deserved how that tenure ended and in turn became sympathetic figures. Now how backwards is that? You know you are messed up when you feel bad for the coach that nobody believes in because you know deep down, while they are a problem, they aren't the biggest problem or even the root of the problem.

Balloon Boy Rules..

2009-10-20T19:05:00.000-07:00

We're back America!
No more cash for clunkers or discussion of AIG bonuses. When the news cycle revolves around the preposterous notion that a boy might have floated away in a homemade balloon, only to find out this was a horribly concocted hoax, then my friends, all is well in this world.

If we aren't stalking the heads of the major car makers, but rather trying to get a snap shot of Lindsay Lohan's crotch, then our way of life is winning.
And so the fact that the balloon boy incident made headlines and potentially carries serious criminal charges tells me that America is ready to be America again.
The fascination over Jon and Kate was the initial sign that our recession was over. But the balloon boy takes the cake.

I respect Wolf Blitzer. I respect him so much I was actually feeling pain witnessing him have to conduct an hour long exclusive interview with balloon boy and his family the night we learned that balloon boy wasn't in fact in the balloon. Therefore, at this juncture the story isn't actually a story, but more a funny tale you might tell an acquaintance thinking it would impress when all it indeed achieves is freaking them out.

For those of you who hid under a rock over the weekend.. A Colorado family calls the Federal Aviation Administration to tell them a homemade balloon that appears to resemble a giant jiffy pop bag had floated away with a small boy potentially inside. For hours, every major network turned this into the OJ chase. The balloon landed, the boy wasn't inside. A manhunt ensued to look for the boy assuming he'd fallen out somewhere along the way. Turns out, balloon boy wasn't in the balloon, he was in the attic, hiding, scared about the repercussions of accidentally releasing the balloon. Then according to him, he played in the attic, took a nap and scoure dthe internet for news on Octomom and Jon Gosselin's potential relationship for all we know.

The interview was absurd. It was held in the family's living room. 3 kids ranging from 6-11 years old sandwiched in between both parents. No one really had anything to say, but Wolf is trying his hardest asking question after question, promising new details from the family following each brutal commercial break.
The kids began to get bored. Asked when he saw his brother Falcon come down from where he was hiding, Branford quipped, "Awesome."
The middle boy who hadn't said a word for 30 minutes started putting his head in his lap. When he sat back up, it didn't take long for him to start making faces at the camera, all ignored by Wolf and his family. These weren't the type of faces that a kid sneaks behind his parents back. No he was shaking his head violently side to side with his tongue hanging out so that it uncontrollably flung from one end of his mouth to the other.
When CNN came back from one of the commercial breaks, the balloon boy was missing again. No one seemed unnerved by the fact that Falcon might be in another balloon, for real this time.

Now we all know what happened from there. There they were getting chased by the paparazzi while they shopped at WalMart after pulling off a media hoax. What I couldn't quite understand was when everyone realized the boy wasn't in the balloon, that indeed the balloon would have been unable to fly had he been in it, why anyone actually cared anymore.
It's like saying my dog found a portal to travel through time only that I don't have a dog nor did he find a portal to travel through time. So why would anyone interview me after that? It wasn't news.

Now I don't care what happens from here. I don't condone the idiotic actions of this attention whore Dad. I feel bad for the balloon boy who has to live his life as the balloon boy. Imagine trying to get laid under those circumstances. But the pencil pushers can deal with what to do with the people who are responsible.
I feel free now. We're talking about the balloon boy. We're not talking about Gitmo/Foreclosures/Unemployment/Wall Street Sharks/GM/George Bush/Swine Flu and Jim Zorn. Well, almost all of those.
How did America get it's groove back? Balloon boy, that's how.

The BigWigs of Horse Racing owe me $1000

2009-10-19T20:20:00.000-07:00

I did go to the Redskins game, I just can't bring myself to speak about it yet..

I am enthralled with balloon boy, I just got home late tonight and need to sleep.. That's for tomorrow..
For now, I have to tell you about what happened to me at the Cracked Claw, Urbana, Maryland, on Friday at around 5:00PM.. It was nothing short of robbery..

I like horse racing. Deal with it. Some people's Dad's played catch with their sons. Some took them fishing. Mine showed me how to read the the Daily Racing Form. Considering my success rate at the track over the course of my 30 plus years betting, maybe he didn't show me how to read it correctly, but that's another story for another day..

For those not familiar with the Pick Six, let me explain why this is the holy grail of handicapping. The Pick Six is a bet where you have to select 6 consecutive winning horses. Six. It takes 25% skill and 75% luck. Some of the greatest handicappers in the world can't hit this thing. You see, on a typical race card at a typical track, there is at least one race that featured 10 runners who have never raced before. Or there is 14 horses in a maiden race, meaning, none of them have ever won. I don't care if all of the trainers took you into a dark room and told you exactly who to bet on, you'd still have a better chance hitting the lottery.
Often times the pick six has what the tracks call a carryover, meaning no one has hit the thing for a couple of days. That carryover can reach the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Professional handicappers can't hit this thing.

Which is what made Friday so special. We got to the Claw early that day. Too early. Like 45 minutes away from post time at any major track. Here's another fact about handicappers, they are not patient. They need the action, immediately. So taking my time ordering lunch was not going to do the trick. I was itchy. The A.D.D was kicking in like a poison ivy rash.
So I started looking at the program for Belmont Park. Decent horses, good jockeys, well known trainers. It's not Kentucky or California, but it appears to not be rigged either.
It was pouring there. On the simulcast from Belmont, they were announcing upwards of 5 scratches per race. And then it hit me.. I have 45 minutes until the first race. Why not peruse what is left of the field as put together a haphazard pick six?

I selected two horses in four of the six races. I went with 1 horse in the other two. No margin for error in either one of those. That's adds up to a $32 dollar bet. I didn't just win the first two races, my horse won by a mile, which considering the track conditions was bizarre. The third race of the pick six, I had the favorite and a 4-1 shot the 14. This was a 5 furlong race, a sprint, and from the outside post, it's extremely unlikely the 14 ever wins let alone on a track in this condition. But when that horse had a stretch run that would have made Secretariat blush, I started the believe the stars were aligning.

The fifth race featured one of the two races where I went with only one horse. I'm so angry at myself at this juncture. Had I known I'd be in this spot, I would have put the whole field in it, hope for a longshot and start making my plans for how I'm gonna write this thing off..
And in typical horse racing fashion, my heart figured to be broken, when my horse, the 4-5 favorite crawled out of the gate and was at the back of the pack making the one and only turn. But alas, the Gods were smiling on me. Lemon Punch appeared to have had heroin spiked into his ass at that moment. This horse was farting rocket fuel. In the mud, it ran by the field like they were standing still. I'm 5 for 5. And I have 2 horses in a seven horse field for the pot of gold.

My two horses include a heavy favorite ridden by Ramon Dominguez. He's a great jockey. He's in the triple crown races. He doesn't lose when he's riding the cadillac. For good measure, I have the second favorite on the board, the 8 horse at 4-1. Only one of the other 5 horses are even below 10 to 1. So convinced I'm going to win, Milty (my father) is collecting losing tickets to help me write off my take when I meet the tax man come next spring.

The minutes before this race felt like hours. This was it. I've been looking at the Form since I was seven. I was owed this moment. All those heart breaking moments: I didn't have the 40-1 horse who came in third, the time the jockey fell off the 25-1 horse one furlong from the finish line, etc.

They got in the gate. I'm now completely vocal. I'm pacing back and forth demanding that Dominguez wins this race considering how many times I'd bet on his horse just because he was the jockey.
They break and it couldn't be a more perfect start. The 8 horse, the longer shot on my ticket shoots out and is pacing the field. He stretches the lead as they make the turn. He's 3 lengths clear of everyone and the only horse making a move is the one ridden by Dominguez.
It was glorious. I'm going to win, it's all a matter of which one it is going to be. Dominguez puts the thing in cruise control. It's not even in doubt. And I'm the King of the world. I'm Leo on the Titanic baby. I have validated the inner workings of the mathematical side of my brain. And for once, I was lucky. Really freaking lucky.

What I didn't know was what it was going to pay. $1000, $10000, $1000000, who the hell knows. I'm picturing bringing it back in small denominations and throwing it on the bed and jumping in it.

I went to the window. I'm announcing to the teller that I don't think he has enough cash in his drawer to pay me. He's happy for me. They all are when someone hits big. He runs the ticket and the first thing I see is a 2. It's at least 2 thousand. I think.
The problem was, there was only 3 numbers before the decimal point. $296.20 to be exact.

As it turned out, there was no carryover. And apparently, I wasn't the only person to hit this pick six. It Might be the worst payout of a pick six in the history of the sport.

I always hear those poker players on TV say it's about the bracelet and not about the money. BS, why did they start playing poker, for gaudy jewelry? Please.
I like handicapping, but I want to win money, not for a pat on the back for picking the right animal on that particular day. I want the cash. To win less then 300 dollars on the toughest bet in the sport is like being mounted by Fusiachi Pegasus.

You horse racing people owe me $1000 now..

Dan will Win One Day, I promise..

2009-10-14T17:17:00.000-07:00

Look people, stop your freaking whining. Dan Snyder is not going to sell the Redskins. He also is not going to play a passive role in their football operations. We need to find a more constructive way of communicating with the owner of the Redskins. This "lets go to Ashbrun carrying Bill Polian on a red carpet" crap is not going to work. Boycotts won't work either, unless you are a shortsighted nincumpoop. You waited 35 years to get tickets, now you are going to give them back because Dan Snyder picked a huckleberry as their head coach. Smart, real smart.

I'll be the first to tell you that ye olde burgundy and gold has problems. It's the same problems they have had for a decade, no different then the problems they had under Joe Gibbs only it's exacerbated by the fact that they have a coach who is in over his head. This year is no different then any other year, except without proper leadership from the coaching staff, they don't stand a chance. This thing is a house of cards, has been from day one of Snyder's tenure. So stop your whining, it's time to figure out a better way to communicate with the man.

The Redskins treat draft picks like they are burning a hole in their pocket. Thus, they rarely have a glut of young talent and without a glut of young talent, they have severe depth issues on particular units in any given year. This year, it's the offensive line. Years past it was the defensive line (still may be despite Haynesworth). This hasn't changed.
This team rarely rewards it's own and is always searching for players to "upgrade" them. Thus, you want to blame the Jason Campbell disaster on Jim Zorn, go for it, but you know it's not true. Campbell was Gibbs's baby, just like Mark Brunnel. And this off-seasons' mind-freak was courtesy the front office, not Jim Zorn. Zorn was caught in the crossfire and was left to deal with the post traumatic stress disorder the team placed on it's "franchise" quarterback. By the way, for future notice, when a professional football team lets a starting quarterback go into a contract year without even making a phone call to his agent to start negotiations on an extension, then you ought to get the hint.

The communication from the top of this organization has been nothing short of retardation. I like Vinny Cerrato (I know he is an easy target) and I think when it comes to the draft, he's very capable. But he should not have a radio show, especially when the team is 2 and 3 after playing the easiest schedule in the history of football. He has not mastered the art of the message. And as the lone spokesman for the ownership of this team, that's a problem.
Snyder doesn't talk. He knows whatever he says will not be portrayed positively unless he says what everyone wants to hear, A) I'm selling the team to a public trust, good luck running a professional franchise you selfish bunch of know it alls! or B) I have made enough costly mistakes on this roster to know I need help in terms of choosing the players that represent this franchise, and thus I am going to make Scott Pioli/Bill Polian/Ozzie Newsome/Insert your personal favorite GM here-- the new President of Football Operations. And this person will have final say on every move and this person will have an unlimited budget within the constraints of the cap.
Keep dreaming. It's not going to happen. Thus my point, we need to find the right person. Who is the person who can teach Snyder about the construction of a football franchise? Who can mentor him in handling the media in a logical way? Who can ensure the right coach will be on the sideline and ensure that coach will not be undermined?
I know who it is. I know who has the right amount of gravitas minus the desire for the spotlight to turn this team back into a winning one. But I won't reveal that name now.

In the end, I am only dissapointed in one thing Joe Gibbs did in his second tenure as head coach. He did not line up the right successor. Maybe it should have been Gregg Williams. Maybe. Certainly Gibbs didn't feel that way, otherwise he would have publicly proclaimed Williams as the right candidate and Snyder would have had little choice but to listen to Gibbs. He had for four years, why would he have altered that course at that point. But Gibbs didn't do that, so in some form, Gibbs is responsible for the hiring of Zorn. He obviously didn't tell Snyder he was making a mistake. He let this happen. He washed his hands of the team the second he decided he'd had enough. And yet Gibbs still has a role of advisor on this team. In what capacity? Have you heard a thing from him regarding football since he retired?

Snyder respects Sonny Jurgensen. And why not. He's one of the best performers the organization has ever known. He's been fiercely loyal to the team and the town since his retirement and he knows football. He'll tell you he wouldn't know how nor want to run a team, but he understands the most vital role to anything, it's chemistry. Jurgensen knows when the room is right and when the room is all wrong. In Jurgensen, Snyder trusts. In Gibbs, Snyder trusts. These two examples shouldn't be dismissed. Dan Snyder can trust someone to help with decisions. It just has to be a special person.

If Ruppert Murdoch wanted to start the Fox Kids Network, do you think that would work out? Where would the scantily clad woman of the religious right fit into Mr. Rogers neighborhood? Do you get what I am saying here. Dan needs to find the right venue to get the desired result. Neophyte coach with little public backbone equals train accident.
Bottom line is this. Snyder wants to win, and that's the most important thing. When free agency begins, no one beats Dan. With the right advice, imagine that level of power. Dan trusts few, but does trust. During the Gibbs era, Snyder was not as unpredictable as years past.

The point is, the person who has his ear must be a very strong person who can work with someone who can't settle for anything less then immediate satisfaction. Someone who understands how to talk to the media. Someone who knows how to align a locker room when things don't go as planned. Someone who can institute a style of play that has a track record.
That person is on NBC right now. That person is Tony Dungy. And he doesn't have to coach the team. He sold the Eagles on Michael Vick. He turned Tampa Bay into a winner, with Shaun King and Brad Johnson (remember him) as his quarterbacks. He defined defense then went to Indianapolis and let the machine that was already working properly continue to do what it does. He never asked for the limelight in either place. And he wouldn't ask for it here. If the Redskins win under Dungy's advice, he'd give the credit to whoever his hand picked coach is, the players and of course the owner. And that's what we need, someone who can make Dan look like he made all the decisions and got them all right.
We need Tony Dungy to take a very active role in reshaping this organization immediately.

Rush to Judgment

2009-10-12T17:37:00.000-07:00

Michael Vick signed a 2 year multi million dollar contract to play quarterback for the Philadelphia Eagles and the league sat back and didn't say a word. In fact, they'll sell you a jersey that fits a dog with the number 7 on the back and the name "Vick."
Not one player seems to be willing to take issue with this. Not one owner seems to be openly decrying the actions of the league. But God forbid Rush Limbaugh owns a football team, that would be the sign of the Apocalypse.

The players union is actually openly telling it's players to publicly discourage the possible sale of the Rams to a group including the Conservative Talk show host. And they are, in force. Some are actually suggesting they would refuse to play for the Rams. Well, isn't that rich. The players union did not take a stand against Vick, Pac Man Jones, Chris Henry, Travis Henry, Plaxico Burress or Tank Johnson, which in order 1) killed dogs for sport, 2) beat up strippers for sport, 3) beat up kids for sport, 4) fathered kids in 4 different states then ran drugs through some of them and 5) shot self in leg after bringing a loaded unlicensed gun into a crowded nightclub and left the safety off.
These people are OK, but the Right leaning talker is bad.

Do I want the Rams to hold anti-Obama rallies? No.
Am I interested in chillin at the Religious Right tailgating bash? Uh, No.
Do I think Jesus will actually will the Rams to victories? Not so much, but I'm willing give that the benefit of the doubt.
Will it be weird when Larry Craig is hanging out in the Edward Jones Dome bathrooms? Yes.
Will I tune in for Sarah Palin's exclusive interview with Rams legend Joe Namath? You betcha! I'll even supply the vodka and hope for ole Willy to announce that he "wants to kiss you." Then she'll explain how she can see Cuba from the press box of the Dolphins Stadium.
Will it be fun to listen to the man on the street interviews in St. Louis over whether they'll listen to Al Sahrpton and boycott the Rams? I'll be the one whipping out the Public Enemy CD (Call me Radio Braheem).

Serena Williams just told a lineswoman at the US Open that she would shove a tennis ball down her throat and kill her. No one seems perturbed that she owns a piece of the Dolphins. Al Davis refuses to let his coach bench JaMarcus Russell, if that's not complete insanity I don't know what is. Could Rush Limbaugh truly be anymore burdensome on the league then Jerry Jones?

The overwhelming complaint about Limbaugh is that he is perceived a racist. The major incident revolves around Limbaugh being forced to resign from ESPN's pre-game show after he suggested on air that the media overhypes Donovan McNabb because he's Black and they want a Black quarterback to succeed. My guess is if you took a straw poll of Black quarterbacks, they'd probably be more apt to believe that the standard for them is much higher then their white counterparts, thus his theory is patently absurd. He in fact didn't say anything racist, he was suggesting the media was going out of it's way to prove they weren't prejudiced, it's just that his argument was weak. It wasn't a racist statement, it was an uninformed one.
Now as for the quotes trotted out attributed to him where he suggests slavery wasn't all bad, well, I'm not going to go to bat for him on that. He'll need to talk his way out of that one. Still, if uttering stupid sentences disqualifies you from purchasing a business, we'd all be Communists.

Now I'm no proponent of anything he says or does. In fact, ever since President Obama took office, all these righties have seemingly completely lost touch with reality. Which is what seems so fitting that Limbaugh and his army of believers would buy into the Rams, the conservatives appear set to lock onto another loser.

Oh, don't me wrong, I wouldn't let Rush watch a game with me let alone support him as my owner for my team, I just can't believe how many hippocrites exist pretending the league is holier then Limbaugh.

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I haven't been to any youth soccer games since I was playing in them. I remember the Moms with the oranges, the over-zealous Dad who made my teammate cry and the lesson learned by thinking I'd be better off without shin guards. What I don't remember is the crowd of people wearing snuggies as that infomercial would suggest. Sure snuggies didn't exist in the early 1980's on the not so well manicured fields of Montgomery County Maryland, but that's not the point. I don't remember a band of parents all dressed as monks.
I don't have an issue per se with the snuggie, but to portray it as something no gaggle of parents can do without is a bit presumptuous.
Lets be honest, the only thing holding anyone back from buying a snuggie is the fact that you look remarkably stupid in it. Now I'm certain I'll be incapable of avoiding embarrassment of my daughter when she begins taking part in social situations, but I beg the parents of the world to consider how lame wearing a snuggie in public is. I won't be caught dead in it. Seriously, if I am dying, do not under any circumstances put me in a snuggie for fear I might actually be caught dead in it.

On another snuggie note, is it possible that the monks of the world could unite and file a class action suit against the makers of the wearable blanket? If there were trademarks in 200 BC, the monks would have listed the snuggie and birkenstocks as their creations. Somewhere in Tibet, a group of monks were all sitting on a mountain, conversing by meditation and all slapped their foreheads at the same time when they got wind of just how lucrative the snuggie is.

Lets Define Humbling

2009-10-07T16:24:00.000-07:00

Michael Crabtree is a piece of work. No wonder he slipped down to the bottom of the top ten on draft day. He spent six months trying to convince the 49ers that they picked him in the top five and thus should pay him accordingly. To that, Mike Singletary simply pulled down his pants and showed him the full moon.
Now either Crabtree's agent was finished fronting him money to have his caviar lunches, or the receiver himself started to realize that next year when the draft came again, most GM's would wonder if they were in for the same issue come the time to talk turkey. So he wisened up and settled for the multi-million dollar deal that he was fortunate enough to still have on the table.
But what this did not do is humble him. That he made clear.

Michael Crabtree said during his introductory press conference that "I am not humble, but the holdout was a humbling experience." What the hell does that mean?
Lets define the word humbling: To understand your shortcomings.
By saying you are not humble after enduring a humbling experience leads me to believe he has absolutely no idea what a cognitive thought feels like. So how could someone who suffers from delusions understand anything, particularly their shortcomings.

Those must have been some incredible negotiations. The Niners offer Crabtree a contract that slots him between the 9th and 11th overall picks. He counters with one that's worth what the top five players got. They tell him he wasn't picked fifth. He tells them that's not his problem. They tell him that even if they agreed and wanted to pay him like a top five pick, they can't because it would throw the entire system of rookie money out of whack ruining the terrible system already in place. Crabtree then explains to them why he was actually picked fifth. They tell him that he wasn't because they were there and have video proof of the draft, Mel Kiper and all. He tells them Mel Kiper had him number one on his big board. They tell him to sign the contract and take all the millions of dollars in front of him. He says he wants to be forever known as Lord Crabtree and demands a scepter to be part of his signing bonus. Mike Singletary pulls down his pants. Crabtree starts speaking in tongues. Singletary offers to arm wrestle Crabtree, winner gets anything he wants. Crabtree calls Jerry Rice a pansy.
And it goes like this for six months until someone finally told Crabtree that at some point the 49ers seriously won't give him the 20+ million they had planned to and non rich people end up working for a living.

Now if all of this wasn't weird enough, MC Hammer accompanied Crabtree to San Francisco when the parties decided to send each other smoke signals to get a deal done. I'm not making that up. Now the reports in the Bay Area say Hammer had no role in the final negotiations, he just was there for support. Ummm, OK. Was Crabtree practicing his Crab-Walk should this whole football thing fall apart?
I'm not sure this relationship could have started off worse. I suppose Crabtree could have had The Ying Yang Twins negotiate for him or demand more money then God, which is a lot.

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You want a humbling experience? How about thinking drinking a case of beer in one day is too much of an infringement on your personal rights.
There is a new rule in Australia that has been implemented that forces fans to "limit" their personal consumption to 24 cans of beer or mixed drinks in one 24 hour period. Apparently race fans have been drinking far more then that at events and it's caused any number of issues.
This flabbergasts me. The implementation of this rule would suggest that a large percentage of fans who do drink at these events drink in excess of that amount. I'm not sure what would happen to me if I drank 24 cans of beer in a 24 hour period because I actually don't think I could do it. I think I would A) throw up on myself B) Pass out in a parking lot C) Get Arrested or D) All of the above, before I ever even got close to the 24 hour can limit.
The mere fact that 24 is perceived as too little for some people have piqued my interest in the tolerance levels of Aussies.
I went to college, we drank a lot of alcohol. I have never in my life seen someone drink 24 mixed drinks in a 24 hour period. I would think I'd attending their funeral. If nothing else, they'd get a catheter and once you've lived through waking up with a catheter, you never attempt to to put yourself in that position ever again.
I know some raging alcoholics. I asked them about drinking 24 beers in one day. And while it seemed like a "fun challenge," none figured they could pull it off. And they drink for sport.

To actually consume that much alcohol, I would assume I'd have to sleep off some of it. So lets say I get up at 6AM, start drinking as we make our way to the race. I'm completely sober to start the day so lets be generous and say I drink 6 beers over the next 2 hours. Unless I eat, I will be tipsy by this point. The next 3 beers will go slower but I'll get them down. At this point, I've probably urinated 6 times, I'm definitely feeling full and completely uninterested in drinking more. The next 3 beers are dangerous. I'm either going to toss my cookies, get wild eyed and scare the ladies or I might pass out. Now unless some five-six hours go by of uninterrupted sleep, I can't imagine I'd want to wake up and start the process all over again. But assuming the pavement was comfortable enough to get some good REM's, I could see possibly drinking 24 beers in 24 hours. But I'd really have to give that the college try and certainly exceeding it would be a near impossibility. The next two days of my life would be pure hell.
These Aussies, they are freaking amazing.

Is there anything really left to say

2009-09-28T19:05:00.000-07:00

Santana Moss said that the better team lost yesterday. Jim Zorn said his team is getting better. And I am the Dalai Lama..

If there was ever a time that a football team should have been allowed to not speak to the press ever again, it was yesterday. What could the Redskins possibly say, "Yeah but on the bright side we have been practicing the hook and ladder! And it doesn't work in practice either but it's cool right?"

The immediate reaction to losing to the worst team in the history of mankind feels like it should be anger. But I don't feel that and I submit to you that many Redskins fans might not feel that way. Why should anyone be surprised this happened? The stats were laughable. How many times in the history of the Lions franchise has that team scored a touchdown on a 99 yard drive? Maybe never. How many times have the Lions held an opponent to zero rushing yards in a half? Maybe zero.

Lets face some facts here, the Redskins have the fourth best coach in their own division. Don't bother arguing the case for Wade Phillips, he's been to the playoffs with three different teams. And besides, I doubt Wade would go with the halfback option on 3rd and goal at the 5 or decline a penalty that would have set up a near 50 yard field goal to give the opponent another 3rd down. They have the fourth best quarterback in their own division. And that is not meant as a criticism of Jason Campbell.
The Redskins have the fourth best offensive line in their own division. They also have the fourth best receiving core in their own division and that includes the Cowboys minus TO.
I would have thought their defense was among the best in the conference until the Lions walked up and down the field on them yesterday. Thems the facts people.

Now back to the matter at hand, if I hear one more person say, "They can bounce back from this, look at their schedule, Tampa Bay and Kansas City are coming to Fed Ex!" Who thinks the Redskins are better then either one of those teams? All bets are off after you lose to the Lions..

What this teams lacks and has lacked for a long period of time is leadership. Joe Gibbs and his arcane offense protected his and their deficiencies. At least he was accountable and at least he meant business. Who exactly is the leader of this team now? It certainly isn't the coach or the team wouldn't have lost to the Lions. It isn't Clinton Portis or Jason Campbell or Fred Smoot or Chris Cooley or Chris Samuels or Phillip Daniels or Carlos Rogers. If anyone it's London Fletcher and while I appreciate his efforts, he's no Ray Lewis. Who gets up in his teammates faces when it's 19-14 at Detroit in the 4th quarter of a must drive. Nobody. Nobody does. Check out the sideline shots, it's nobody.
Who gives the halftime speech for this team, Rock Cartwright?

One day Dan Snyder is going to not only buy a talented player to play for this team, but someone who wants to win more then he does.
There is reason to be angry on this day. There is also reason to be numb.

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I saw a commercial the other day for Dish Network which wonders out loud why you would pay $300 for the NFL Sunday Ticket when you could just order their service and pay nothing extra!
Is this honestly the best advertising campaign they could come up with? Just don't buy the Sunday ticket?
Just in case you don't follow, here is what they are offering. 100 football games each season including all the local broadcasts of all your favorite home teams. You can get that with any cable program. What they offering to you is the ESPN/NFL Network/NBC package of games plus anything that is locally on the CBS or FOX networks in your region, for no extra charge! Which is what you can get with any television service other then DirecTV.

All these people are saying is we have nothing original to offer you and we are trying to trick you into thinking you'll get more football by signing on with us even though every service offers this product.

This has been your friendly PSA-Public Stupidity announcement.

You can thank me Sunday at 4PM

2009-09-23T16:43:00.000-07:00

Dear Redskins Fans (Dimwits),

I plan on taking full credit for motivating the Washington Redskins to not be THAT team. I won't score a touchdown. I won't even be in Detroit. But I'll be watching closely to see the power of ridicule at work.

Someone is going to lose to the Lions. That franchise will not go winless until the end of time. And because the Redskins were booed off their home field despite a win, and they happen to be the next team in line for a trip to Motown, well, the record has started spinning inside the heads of some of the pundits, maybe they are the ones.

It was the Sonny-Zorn showdown in the locker room after the Rams win that really stood out. Here's a Hall of Famer, a legend of the organization with the first interview after the game live on Redskins Radio basically telling the coach one of his calls was moronic, so moronic, he would have called timeout and told him to shove his halfback pass up his ass. It was brazen and it was shocking. And it was perfect.

It takes one phone call to turn that tiny piece of tape into a talking point. I told a producer I wanted to get a copy of that interview and do a segment on the Redskins and the reaction to Sonny/booing fans/crazy twittering inactive linebackers/Zorn's wacky play calling/inept offense/you get the point. After it was generously sent by the Skins network, a few other producers agreed it was an interesting topic and suddenly this thing is plastered all over the networks, plural. That wasn't my goal. But that's how it worked out. And there it was, for the world to hear on the airwaves of the worldwide leader. It wasn't manufactured, it was the real deal. And it was fresh meat for the pundits to eat up. So here we are on a Wednesday where anyone who's anyone in the world of sports jibber jabber is wondering now if the Skins are ripe for the picking. Are they going to be THAT team?

All that has to happen is one player having seen the discussion. One Redskin to know that there is firm belief that their team is so bad they are going to lose to the Lions. If that ridicule doesn't make these players play hard, then nothing will.

So when the Redskins win a game they should win that right now seems very much in doubt, just remember what your friendly covert in Connecticut did for you. Just send the game ball care of Me.

You can thank me later.

Dimwits

2009-09-22T17:19:00.000-07:00

Hey Dimwits, how freaking dare you boo us? We beat the Rams people. The Rams. They are from St. Louis where they tailgate with Clydesdales.

Robert Henson is a low round draft pick who made the Washington Redskins roster. Certainly that is an accomplishment, one he should be proud of. It does not however mean that he has any particular level of intelligence.
Robert Henson knows how to use Twitter which means he knows how to operate a computer, can navigate the internet and is capable of writing in sentence form. But that does not necessarily mean he's any smarter then a 5th grader.
Robert Henson in fact is the dumbest athlete in an industry celebrated for brawn not brains.

For months I found the NFL twitter policy laughable. When the Chargers fined Antonio Cromartie for complaining about the food in training camp, it was time for someone to scream out loud, "If the egg salad is off limits, then what isn't?"
But for every inane tweet comes the bombshell Henson dropped on the home fan base in effect calling them "dimwits" for booing the Redskins after they won.

Now he has a point. The Redskins won the football game. Sure the final score was 9-7. Sure they concocted some of the most dimwitted play calls this side of the mighty Mississip. Sure if style points mattered, they would have been the freak show ridiculed by Simon Cowell before the curtain was ever raised. But this is none of those things. This is football. This is a team that might suck, but that doesn't mean they are playing shirts and Skins.
So, in the defense of Henson, booing the winner is a little off putting.

What Henson fails to recognize is the customer service aspect of such a jab. He's an employee of a company that is by any measure, a entertainment company. This company wants to make it's customers happy. And calling the customers dimwits is certainly no way to accomplish that. But someone as dumb as Henson would never understand that. I'm not even sure I believe he came up with the word dimwit himself.

But it was his next tweet that really shed a light on his stupidity. He suggested people who work the 9 to 5 shift at McDonalds have no idea what they are booing and thus have no right. The insinuation is the entire crowd at Fed Ex Field is a bunch of fry guys. I'm going to ignore the obvious insinuation about people who work in the fast food industry. Truth is, we all make fun of burger flippers. But the mere idea that someone who works for a living and spends their money on Redskins tickets only to boo them when they don't perform to a level that is generally accepted by the majority of fans in attendance is a "dimwit."

Here's my hope. That Robert Henson finds himself out of the NFL soon. Because when he has to interview at McDonalds, he'll soon find out he doesn't even have the qualifications to work there.

Cotton Candy Crazies

2009-09-21T07:18:00.000-07:00

Have you ever felt scared at the county fair? I haven't yet. But I'll have to take into consideration who might be spending the day at the fair before I ever go again. In the state of Washington, criminally insane people use the county fair as a field trip. That's right, people who killed but were deemed incapable of understanding why they did it or the ramifications for their actions could very well be the impatient person in line for cotton candy.

The other day my family and I went to "The Big E." It's an enormous exposition in southern Massachusetts. Think a mile worth of gluttony. Everything there is fried including the oreos and mushrooms. There are pig races. And there are showrooms full of overpriced but certainly inventive products, like the styrofoam kitchen curtain kit. It was 100 dollars worth of uniquely cut styrofoam so you can "make your own" window coverings.
Let me not suggest I didn't have a good time, on the contrary. I ate bad pizza, tried numerous free samples of cheese, shared a bag of fried oreos and saw live llamas and swine. All in all, it was worth the 15 buck admission price. But then, that night, I read a story that made me think twice about ever entering a county fair ever again. Crazed killer escapes at Washington state county, massive manhunt is on.

Some criminally insane mental institution takes their patients as a group to the county fair for a "field trip." And one of the patients, a man who's "demons" are well documented by the doctors treating him got away from the crowd and wasn't found until 3 days later, 3 counties away, presumably looking for another county fair. Listen, I'm not into law enforcement, but I'd like to think that taking a group of criminally insane people to the fair is akin to giving a fat kid a box of fried oreos and telling him he can't eat them.

What could go wrong here? Hmm, gee, let me think. Lets say you are on the farris wheel and the ride stops at it's highest point. At that moment, you find out the person sharing the pod with you thinks this vessel will be taking him back to his home planet of Rotzing! And, his people have determined that bringing "Humans for evaluation" would make him a hero among his kind.
You are in line to get some funnel cakes when the man in front of you believes the powdered sugar placed on top of the treat was a terrorist threat. He then takes the funnel cake cart hostage.
That lady on the Clydesdale racing toward the exits... She isn't part of the show.

I don't really want to tell you why Phillip Paul was so dangerous. It isn't the point to know what his crimes were. The only pertinent information is he killed in 1987, 22 years later not one person quoted in any publication including his current doctors and siblings believe he was fit to be put out in public let alone at a fair with thousands of people frolicking. One of his doctors told one paper he was scared to be alone in the room with him. His brother described him as "not in a good mental place."
Who's the genius who says, you know what will make everyone feel better, a trip to the county fair where thousands of innocent victims await!

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Just a quick thought on the Redskins-Rams game yesterday. I know what happened at the end of the game worked out, however someone needs to explain to Jim Zorn that field goals are worth 3 points and that a 5 point lead is better then a 2 point lead..
Going for it on fourth and 1 at the 20+yard line with 3 plus minutes on the clock, that's risky. Going for it on 4th and 1 inside the five with 2 minutes to go is pure absurdity. It's called unnecessary risk. If Zorn was so in belief that his defense would bail him out regardless of the outcome of that play (and certainly they did) then why not entrust a 5 point lead to them instead of a two point lead? One mistake, one big play, one anything, and we are wondering what kind of moron lets a crappy team steal a 10-9 win on the road with no timeouts left.
Now comes the absolute worst game ever scheduled in Redskins history. There is absolutely nothing to gain from beating the Lions on the road. The Skins are supposed to win. But after yet another uninspiring performance, certainly there is reason to believe the Skins are going to be THE team that gives the Lions their first win since 2007. And if that happens, Zorn will be kayaking out of town before you know it.

Jay Vargas is My Hero

2009-09-16T17:28:00.000-07:00

What would you do if you won the lottery? I never really thought about that question because of how so infrequently I actually play the lottery. And to be honest, if I did win, I'm not sure I'd actually be good at living a life of Bling Bling. Would I get my ears pierced and wear 4 carat diamond studs? Maybe. Would I buy an island? In theory it's a good idea but when would I go there? I'm not going to live on a deserted island if I'm rich. Maybe I'd get a yacht. But for some reason I don't picture actually living like Tom Vu (3 stars to those of you who know who Tom Vu is). Do you just walk into places and announce you are rich? I'm not sure how it even works.

Don't get me wrong, I want to be rich. I want to be able to "make it rain" and not think of it as the most asinine night of my life. I fancy telling strangers that I am independently wealthy. I like the idea of paying a premium for ringside seats to a heavyweight title fight at the MGM Grand. But when 50 million dollars falls into your lap, there is only so much Dom you can drink before you realize that you are merely an imbecile with means. Eventually, I'll be MC Hammer, except no one will know who I am. What kind of legacy is that?

But everything changed when I learned of Jay Vargas. Jay Vargas is the greatest lottery winner of all time. He's going to blow all his money before he turns 30, but it's going to be worth it.
Vargas won the Powerball at age 19. How sick is that? If I won the lottery at age 19 I may have bought the rights to the Cheech and Chong film collection.
Not this guy. Jay Vargas packed up and moved to Tampa because that's apparently where a lot of wrestlers live. He likes wrestling. He likes it so much he has decided to start his own wrestling show. Wrestlicious!
He's the host, J.V. Rich, pretending to live the "Cribs" life. He's a mansion living rapper who is surrounded by ladies and always "spending money like crazy."

The premise is tried and true. Wrestling with real juiced up trash talking wrestlers interspersed with bikini photo shoots clad in a "variety of skin tight outfits." He already signed "The Mouth of the South" Jimmy Hart to appear in the first episode.
Sold!
That said, he does plan to add some sketch comedy and this is where this thing will ultimately fail. There's no amount of money that actually makes you funny.

But consider what the next couple of years are going to be like before the well runs dry. He's going to "interview" his version of the fly girls. He's going to determine who his champion is going to be and choreograph the death defying tricks. He's going to play the role of Vince McMahon which means he can do anything. And when I say anything I mean anything, just ask Vince McMahon. Did I mention the girls, in Tampa?

Will this compete with WWE? No. Will this be the next Chappelle show? No. Will the girls even be hot? Maybe. But come on, you have to tip your hat to this guy. If this isn't the greatest waste of lottery winnings ever I don't know what is. Because when it is all said and done, it's the perfect book turned screenplay to make his reality and even better reality and give him more money then he could have ever dreamed of.
Jay Vargas, you are my hero.

Ooh Canada.. Ooh London..

2009-09-08T13:16:00.000-07:00

About a week ago I got a good chuckle at the quote from the guy who makes the personnel decisions for the CFL's Winnipeg Blue Bombers. He called signing PacMan Jones the biggest thing to happen to his team in a decade. Not coincidentally, it was going to be the biggest thing to hit the Winnipeg strip clubs too. I got a feeling those hosers don't usually make it rain.
What's the second biggest thing to happen to them in a decade? 50 cent beer night eh?

Then a day later, the Blue Bombers announced they weren't actually signing PacMan Jones. So the biggest thing to happen to this team in a decade was 24 hours of internal indecision over whether PacMan Jones deserved a contract. That's pathetic. That would be like me saying the best night of my life was when I watched a "Facts of Life" marathon.

What happened a week later astounds me. No one has taken notice of this now that the sporting world is aware of A) a CFL team discussed signing PacMan Jones and B) that team is known as the Winnipeg Blue Bombers.
It turns out their coach is a complete crackpot. The kind we'd eventually make Coors Light commericals out of. Only this guy isn't screaming about "crowing their ass," or "playing to WIN the game." This guy is calling a section of the country he coaches in a crotch.

Mike Kelly told the Vncouver Sun he wishes he never refered to Saskatchewan as the crotch of Canada. Can you imagine Lane Kiffin refering to Auburn and Alabama as "the butt plug of the SEC!" What do you think would happen? There is no way you can survive that type of comment, it's beyond demeaning.

Kelly was at an off-season fan forum when he was asked about a number of personnel acquisitions from the Saskatchewan Roughriders (crotch) and the Edminton Eskimos (cold crotch). He blurted out, "We kind of raided the toothless, green, watermelon-helmet-wearing people from the crotch of Canada." I'll pause to let you read that quote again..

"We Kind of Raided the toothless, green, watermelon-helmet-wearing people from the crotch of Canada."

I don't even know where to begin. I don't know what green refers to unless he's just referring to them as stupid. Toothless typically does the trick for that insinuation. I've rarely met a a smart toothless person.
But watermelon-helmet-wearing takes the cake. I don't know what he is referring to but it makes me giggle..

Meantime, this dude is playing a game in Saskatchewan this weekend. Can you freaking imagine? They wrote in the paper that they expect people to dump beer on him. EXPECT it. Like that's normal behavior there and completely warranted. So some watermelon-helmet-wearing toothless fruitcake is going to buy a case of beer with the explicit purpose of going to a football game and throwing it on the opposing head coach as if this is a completely normal thing to do. Man, screw American sports, I'm moving to Canada. We get happy when our athletes tweets such yarns as "Child Please!"

As for the whole crotch line, Kelly did explain that he was merely repeating a crack made by a Winnipeg fan who kept calling Saskatchewan a crotch. Good excuse.
But the icing to this little CFL diddy is the dateline in the paper: Regina.

***********************************************************

From the this is not news but sensationalized garbage file comes a phenominal headline out of the Daily Star in London..
"Squeeze on Lardies at Olympic Stadium"

Their "source" for the story can't possibly be real, but this person contends that because all of Great Britain is getting enormously fat, the Olympic committee considered purchasing oversized seating at their new Olympic stadium. Instead, they shot down the idea and went with "standard seating."

So this paper described the IOC's decision to purchase "standard seating" for their new stadium as a referendum against fat people.
I don't know how British people could be fat in the first place. have you ever tried their food? There is a reason why there are no famous British restauarants here. Their version of fine dining consists of a hard boiled egg pickled with a side of lake trout. No wonder they drink, a lot.

I can name that contract in 3 words...

2009-09-03T17:58:00.000-07:00

It took the Washington Redskins less time to negotiate a contract with Albert Haynesworth then it took me to determine if I needed the extended warranty on my used SUV. Anyone who has ever negotiated a contract for anything knows there is no need for the NFL to actually investigate whether the Redskins tampered with Haynesworth, they know it's impossible for the Redskins to not have.
But this really isn't about the Redskins or that particular deal. Every year NFL free agency opens with a litany of players signing within in 4 minutes of teams technically being allowed to even speak to their representation. How does that work, is there an auctioneer?
"I got Albert Haynesworth.. Haynesworth Haynesworth. Lets start the bidding at 50 million dollars.. 50 million dollars from the old man in a black jump suit. Do I hear 75 million? 75 million dollars for the Titan?
"100 million dollars!"
"I've got 100 million dollars. Do I hear 105 million? Going once, twice, sold, to the little man in the front."

What exactly is the NFL investigating? It's impossible to merely read a standard NFL contract in less then a half hour. Now try adding the weight clauses, workout clauses, roster bonuses, pro bowl bonuses, MVP bonuses, and whatever else might be in Albert's contract.
Here's the best part, Haynesworth conceivably never met anyone on the Redskins staff. How stupid must we be to believe that?
Do you buy a car without meeting with the salesman? You wish. Would you book the site of your wedding reception without even going there and physically seeing it? Not if you want to have a chance at not getting divorced.
How about this one, lets say you are being relocated for work and you need to purchase a house in an area you have never been to, would you actually negotiate the sale without ever seeing the house or the street it's on?
Now throw in the fact that this deal is worth 100 million dollars. You might want to proof read that deal first.

I've negotiated contracts for my services before. I had no real leverage, had no signing bonus, nor any special parameters unusual from the standard deals my employer offers. My deal did not get done 18 minutes after we started talking. It took weeks.

Again, this isn't about the Redskins. They certainly aren't the only team who pull off these miraculous agreements. Maybe it's time for the NFL to stop investigating tampering and start investigating how to change how free agency works.

****************************************************************************************

I keep seeing commercials for some company that asks me to text them a question, any question. And for 99 cents, they promise to text me back the answer. The fact that I've seen this numerous times tells me this company is making a lot of money doing this. TV advertising isn't cheap.
Every time I think we've finally hit rock bottom for stupidity (see: interest in anything Britney does, Octomom, the multi million dollar industry based on the whereabouts of talentless couple Jon and Kate and their 8 kids), America finds a new low.

One of these commercials found out if there "is a stupider mascot then some aardvark." You don't need to pay someone 99 cents to get that answer.. One word dum dums: Google. In 5 seconds I found the UC Santa Cruz Banana slugs. That was without even trying.

So, if you know any idiots out there who want the answer to any question, I'll give them a deal. For 89 cents, cash only, I'll gladly answer your burning questions on this blog..
You could ask: "Why do people like Nascar?" or "Where do horny girls hang out?" Now I don't know the answer to either one of those, but I can promise you, for 89 cents, I'll come up with something. Just like those a-holes.

Are we talking about practice?

2009-08-31T18:12:00.000-07:00

What was Rich Rodriguez crying about? Today should have been a good day for the Michigan Wolverines. His team might have looked like a bunch of pansies last year, but the truth was, they weren't. They were worked harder then the child labor of Nike! So again, I ask the question, what was Rich Rodriguez crying about?

Michigan was not accused of accepting athletes who didn't take their SAT's. They aren't being accused of blood doping. This scandal is a good scandal. This scandal is about getting better the old fashioned way, indentured servitude. How can anyone cry over being labeled a guy who made his team watch too much film? No one was suggesting the practices were dangerous or anything like that. He just expected his team to make football their lives. And if they didn't want to make football their lives, there are plenty of scholarships available at Indiana, good luck.

This is not something to hang your head in shame over. This is not something to get all weepy about. This was Rich Rodriguez's moment to stand up and tell the people of Ann Arbor "We are hell bent and determined to never let what happened last year happen again." But he didn't do that. He cried.

Where is Allen Iverson when you need him? If ever his counsel was needed before Rich Rodriguez went public, it was today. Because, indeed, they were talking about practice. Not a game. Practice.
When Iverson was confronted by Sixers reporters about his disdain for practice, he let loose. Why would the NBA scoring leader actually need to justify his practice habits?
For Rodriguez, the door was swung wide open for him to cherry pick this lay-up and do something memorable, stick up for himself and this program. He could have said, "We practice hard here. We take preparation seriously. Some of our former players thought we practiced too hard but everything we did was within the rules and was for the sake of making this school proud. Now Go F Yourself."
But no, he cried. In between his lip quivering, he intimated that his players were like budding flowers of the spring or some BS like that.

On the scale of collegiate scandals, this one was tame, on par with Alabama giving free books to students. But Nick Saban didn't cry when the NCAA sanctioned the Tide. Bobby Bowden didn't cry when the NCAA told him he was going to have 14 football games stricken from the record books over an academic scandal. John Calipari didn't cry when Memphis was forced to vacate a 38 win Final Four season. Neither did the people who are actually still at Memphis. Rick Pintio didn't cry when we found out he had sex with a deranged woman in the booth at a Louisville restaurant while his assistant coach was "hanging out."
I'm sorry, but this Michigan thing is not a big enough deal to actually cry about.

There has to be more to it. Rich Rod knows he just can't afford any bumps in the road. Rodriguez is already being ridiculed for the remarkably asinine decision to play 3 different quarterbacks in the Wolverines season opener. There is no more less inspiring message then to say we can't even establish who the 3rd best quarterback is.
But most importantly, the Big House is undergoing a massive renovation. He knows what's coming. The scoreboard better resemble the Michigan of old or there is going to be a faction of alumni who spent millions of dollars on a stadium face lift that want someone from the old family to fix the problem on the field. Infractions of any sort + losing + crying coach = relative of Bo Schembechler's phone ringing soon.

The bottom line is Michigan is going to get in trouble for trying hard to be good. How stupid is that? And the new coach is going to get run out of town because his ex players didn't like how hard he worked them, all in the name of keeping the tradition of winning going. How lame is that?
I'm sorry but I have a hard time believing that a team that posted a season with more losses then any other Michigan team in school history would actually have the gaul to suggest they worked too hard.
If I am Rich Rodriguez today, I'm mad. I'm so pissed I'm lining my team up and asking for all the pansies who think they prepare too much to take their pads off and walk off the field. My bet is not one of those players take him up on that offer.
But that's not Rich Rodriguez. He's Sad Sally. And my guess is soon is he's really going to have something to cry about.

The GG and Pineapple Po Po

2009-08-25T20:02:00.000-07:00

Now I have heard it all. People are actually upset that Michael Vick had a Grey Goose and Pineapple at an airport. But they are OK with him working with the local animal shelter. What is wrong with you people? I cannot believe I actually have to defend Michael Vick.

This is precisely the problem with having Vick on your team and precisely the reason why I am so glad my team didn't sign him. It's headlines like this that are going to follow him wherever he goes and whatever he does.
Does anyone think for a second that while Vick was ordering the Grey Goose and Pineapple that he stopped and thought to himself, "Hmmm, maybe I shouldn't be doing this?" No. Of course not. Why would he? He's not flying the plane right?

Michael Vick was not arrested, convicted and jailed for an offense with alcohol. So, unless he's taking a dog for a walk, his sobriety is no more at issue then yours or mine. But because he bred, fought, bet on and murdered dogs, suddenly he can't do anything that anyone would find unseemly. And apparently vodka and canned pineapple juice fit into the vague description of unseemly. Dear America: You have a double standard.

So let me see if I understand this, Michael Vick has every right to get an 8 million dollar job playing a sport that banks on the public's purchasing power, but he can't order a drink at an airport pub? Meantime, everyone is eagerly awaiting Vick's work in Philadelphia that will revolutionize the rights of animals.
That's right, people think Vick has to work with innocent puppies but cannot under any circumstances have a cocktail. What kind of deluded thinking is that? You want the guy around dogs, but you don't want him around booze? Hello, how is he going to get through all those days picking up poo poo in parks if he can't have a cold one later that night? Do you think he's going to enjoy rubbing a chocolate lab on it's belly? Hello, in Michael Vick's world, that is the definition of Miller Time.
It's amazing, no one ever says, "Hey that sex offender just got out, I have a great idea, lets have him work with orphans! But one sip of Frangelico and it's off."

The case has been shoved down my throat for weeks now. Vick deserves every right to work because he paid his debt to society. What a crock of crap. Sure he deserves the right to work, it does not mean a professional football team HAS to give him a job. They could have said no without infringing on anything that is inalienably his. One is a right and one is a privilege and unless as a requirement of his parole Vick is prohibited from drinking, then it is more his right to order GG and Pine in an airport then it is to play football. The bartender cannot turn Vick down, the Eagles could have.

For the sake of the Eagles, the NFL, Vick and the entire sporting public who pay attention to this nonsense on a daily basis, I think we should establish what conduct Vick can take part in and what he cannot.

1) I'm sorry, but if I see Vick holding a leash of any sort for any reason, I'm calling the cops. Except if it is used to pull Donovan McNabb back into the Eagles facility before he starts whimpering to the media about (you fill in previous McNabb complaint: T.O., got sick in Super Bowl, Black quarterback profiling, Chunky Soup)
2) Vick can do IT. He just can't do it doggie style, too much confusion over the possible double entendre.
3) Vick cannot brutalize kittens. Same rules apply. He can however be a wildcat.

Mr. Lucky

2009-08-18T15:58:00.000-07:00

I have a friend that enjoys going to the track with me every so often. He knows that I know that he is going to win. He knows that I know that if he shares the information with me on how he wins he will lose. It's called karma. You see, he doesn't have a system. He just gets lucky. He's the guy who boxes four horses in the Superfecta and hits it. You have to go 4 for 4 to win a Superfecta. If the field has five horses in it, I will lose. If the field has 14 horses in it and my friend has been losing throughout the day, he will hit it. It's uncanny.

But in living and watching the coverage of Brett Favre over the last couple of years, I have to wonder, what exactly defines lucky? Is Brett Favre lucky or good? Nothing about last season suggests he is going to do anything that will help the Vikings win a Super Bowl, in fact you could argue he makes them worse, especially if his right arm is indeed about to literally fall off. But if his right arm did indeed actually fall off in an NFL football game, people would refer to him as the luckiest player alive. What better way to actually go out? Or in the case of Favre, he'd probably make a comeback with the Bengals next season as a lefty.

Is Brett Favre lucky? It's an interesting question. His lawn mowing tendencies aren't being covered because he's a pariah who makes it rain. He's being stalked because we can't let him go. He's Jack Swift and we, the collective football fans of the universe, just can't quit him.
But why? He won one championship. This guy doesn't even resemble that guy who won that ring. What exactly are we holding onto here?
There feels like a John Daly esque quality here. Like because he's white, used to drink, is sensitive, suffered with substance abuse and just seems to enjoy playing that makes him attractive. But somehow I think he knows that I know that this makes him attractive. And like my buddy who hits superfectas, it won't work for me. If I wore a dirty truckers hat, had addiction issues, and couldn't even promise I'd be able to perform the job, I doubt I'd get 12 million dollars, let alone an interview with Rachel Nichols.
Emmitt Smith was way over the hill when he went to Arizona. He was treated well by the press, by all accounts was a good teammate who played with passion. Yet when he showed up at Cardinals camp, the reaction was more pure sadness. Like, how could he do this to himself? When Jerry Rice was told he'd be the fourth receiver in Denver, we just prayed he'd let it go. But in neither case did people literally stake out their houses. Is Brett Favre lucky because we still care?

******************************************************************

Maybe Michael Vick is Mr. Lucky. How many convicted felons do you know that get 8 million dollar jobs fresh out of prison? Bernie Madoff wouldn't even be given that opportunity.
The more I think about this notion that Donovan McNabb was the one lobbying to bring Vick to Philadelphia, the more it makes sense. Short of winning a Super Bowl, McNabb is being perceived as a failure in Philadelphia. No pro bowl quarterback has ever been vilified the way McNabb has.
So here is McNabb with this rare opportunity to not only look like a team player (which he may be anyway) but at the same time has someone playing his position who comparatively makes him look like Mother Theresa.
How could even the most cold hearted Philadelphia fan actually say a bad word about McNabb now? Can someone actually say, "You know what, I think we'd be better off with Michael Vick." Not if that person ever wants to kiss a girl.

********************************************************************

Or maybe Keith Acton is Mr. Lucky. He's an assistant coach with the Maple Leafs and earlier this month, he won nearly 100,000 dollars playing the lottery.
I'm sorry, but if you are lucky enough to be part of a professional sports franchise in that type of capacity for any length of time, I believe you already have lived some form of charmed life. To take advantage of that level of karma is criminal.

Hi, I Slept with a Girl Last Night, now Censor Me

2009-08-11T20:01:00.000-07:00

We are embarking on an enlightening time. The era of filtered news is over. Newspapers sadly are dying. They'd already been replaced by the internet. Which is quickly being replaced by social networks. Everyone who is anyone has a website, and hipsters have found a way to use Twitter. Never before has the interviewee held the power of information more in the palm of their hands.
But this has created a new frontier, a wild west of information and nobody knows what to do about it, especially those who will fail at trying to control it.

Teams and athletic departments want to offer more access to the players, but they can't control what they might say. And the immediacy of their comments has led to the public relations problem that in turn has teams and companies turning almost Communist. The subjectivity of what is considered offensive and not simply free speech is alarming.
I wrote last week about Antonio Cromartie getting fined for complaining about the food at training camp. Now the egg salad is off limits.
Players have blogs, home grown reality shows and twitter accounts where new media wars have been hatched. And policies are being enacted by the day. The mere right to communicate freely and of open mind is in danger in this sporting world. It's because no one is controlling the message. And if you don't have the media to blame, then what.
In turn, those who want to quell the freedom of speech their employees should retain, can't seem to build the Berlin Wall fast enough. George Bush might be out of office, but the Patriot Act is alive and well in the sports world.

The latest comes from the University of Colorado where a cornerback by the name of Ben Burney was offered the opportunity to blog for the site CUBUFFS.com. He was asked to give a personal account of what life as a collegiate football player is like.
Entry number one, the sacrifices that are made now that summer camp has begun. The rules change. Classes are set, Practices are set. Study Hall is set. Curfew is set. With the rules, come the spoils, let us not lose sight of that, but his point was, life does get altered for the privilege of playing Big 12 ball. Most notably, sleeping with women regularly.

It was called "The Sad Goodbye." It started with Burney's description of waking up next to a woman, discussing how strong a libido he has and how tough it is to put some of the, eh hem, extracurriculars aside for the sake of the team.
Exactly what he said was not published on the site. When Burney went to his blog, he found out that it had been edited. Furthermore, Burney was told he no longer would be blogging for the site. The assumption here is the athletic department thought he would write about practice and games only.

Yet the amazing part is, if Burney wrote about depth charts, camp battles, new formations, who thinks Dan Hawkins is a dweeb, what the mascot actually smells like, reliving tales of the kicker who "wasn't just a girl, she wasn't any good," then he'd have lost his blog as well.

The story in the Colorado Daily doesn't suggest that Burney was graphic in the description of his final night before camp either. CUBUFFS.com sounds like it would be a good name for a soft core porn site, but it's not. Had he made allusions to playing with his "rocky mountain oysters," I think we'd all understand the necessity to shut the blog down. But that doesn't appear to have happened either.

So the post was clean, but apparently not in the spirit of what the site was interested in disseminating. And if Burney related any inside material about the team, the coaches would have certainly objected. Which leads me to this, what did CUBUFFS.com want him to write about?

Blog Post Day One Buffs Summer Camp: I woke up, I went to the field. I put on my pads and helmet. We stretched. Then we ran this crazy play that is going to fool (delete team name) when we play them on (delete date). There was this (delete gender) watching us while we practiced and I thought maybe I would ask her if (delete gender) wanted to (delete activity) when we were done. Tomorrow I am going to do the exact same thing I did today because that's what (delete name of person coercing this blog) told me to say.

Big surprise, college kid slept with person of opposite sex. Big surprise, college kid doesn't like regimented schedule. Biggest surprise, University of Colorado would actually censor those thoughts. I thought this was a environment of higher education.

It's funny, as much as the sports world and it's participants portend to despite the press, the truth is, the media at least edited the majority of the things they learned. Reporters homogenized it for them, and they didn't even realize it.
The only question I have is if they had such a big problem with Burney's blog and intended on removing it from their web pages, why did they print the first entry?

Give Me 20 cents or I'll kill you

2009-08-11T06:17:00.000-07:00

We all have them. Stories from the back seat of a cab gone wrong. And because large quantities of alcohol are almost certainly involved in the most bizarre of tales, I believe it is entirely possible that Patrick Kane beat up a cab driver over 20 cents. And at the same time I find it nearly implausible that a millionaire hockey star would resort to fighting with a cab driver over 20 cents.
That's right, we are talking about 20 cents here. This is a serious 20 cents. 20 cents that might cost Kane his freedom. Lawyers are speaking publicly about the fare Kane did or did not pay and what may have happened when he found out the driver didn't have 20 cents to make change.
Did Kane and his cohort choke the can driver over 20 cents? Did he punch him in the face over 20 cents? I know it sounds ridiculous, but truth is, if you have cab experience, you know anything is possible.

Example one, college at American University. You'd think having three passengers in his cab following a night of drinking (he picked us up at a bar and we were sloppy) would be plenty. But no, this cab driver decided to pick up another passenger while we on our way back to the dorms. There is reason why you pay a premium to take a cab instead of the bus. No strangers.
But this driver picked up this man wearing a suit and obviously going home from work. Now if I am him, I think the last thing I'm going to do is get into the cab with three drunk college students, but hey to each his own.
IN DC at the time, there was a zone system instituted for cabs. There were no meters. As a customer, you had to know which zones ended where to know if you were being charged the correct rate. It was maddening. You'd never pay the same amount twice unless you'd done the same trip over and over and knew exactly what the cost should be.
As the driver was obviously going in the direction of the home of the man we just picked up, we started complaining about how many zones we would have to pay for when we eventually got back to our dorm. It didn't matter the explanation, we assumed we were screwed.
The man was seated in the back seat, drivers side window. I was in the middle. My friend Andy was to my right and our other friend Orrin was in the front.
Obviously annoyed by our insistence that somehow, someway we were going to get hosed on the fare, the man finally blurted out something (I just don't remember what it was). To three drunk frat brothers this is a bad move. This opened the door for us to start incessantly bothering him. For the next 5 minutes (which felt like an hour) we discussed his clothing, why he would live in such a crappy neighborhood, why he was going home alone and his general disposition which didn't agree with us.
He stopped playing along quickly. But he got fed up when Andy asked him where he worked.
"Mars."
"How many zones is that?"
The next thing you know this guy has lunged across me trying to hit my friend. Have you ever see what it looks like when four people in the same car try to grab and pull each other off one another at the same time?
This all could have ben avoided if the driver just drove us home and stopped pretending he was riving a bus.

Example 2) The wife and I were on our way out to dinner downtown in DC. A cab driver picks us up. You never know what type of driver you have until you are in the car. This guy had a death wish.
About 20 seconds into the ride after we ran a red light and swerved around a car with it's hazards on at a brisk cruising speed of 50 MPH. At this point, the wife and I figured we better start praying.
It was his line of "I like drive and drink," that really got us scared.

Example 3) Tobe and Cuz were in a NY cab. These are two of the nicest people you'll ever come across until you cross them, and then they can litterally be your worst nightmare. They don't care about you or your possessions. And they'd been out and drinking. It was a gas fire just waiting for a match. All I know is they didn't agree with the fare, got into an argument and next thing you know, one of them was running down the street holding the meter that he'd just pulled out of the cab driver's dashboard. This could have been about 20 cents.

Example 4) In a NY cab, me and three friends are driving down 5th Avenue when we rear end another cab. It was significant. There was damage but fortunately no one was hurt. The other driver gets out of his car to survey the damage and talk to the cabbie. We get out of the cab and start walking away, this isn't our problem. The driver stops the meter and asks us to pay for the fare. When we look at him like he's lost his mind he starts chasing us down 5th Avenue. The other driver starts yelling, "Where are you going, you hit my car." We had to run at least 3 blocks before he realized we were not going to pay anything.

Do you see what I am saying here.

So for anyone to immediately refute the notion that 20 cents change could be the start of a federal case against Kane, think again.

Vitamins Will Never Be Steroids

2009-08-09T06:24:00.000-07:00

Technically, if you believe Big Papi, Rashard Lewis made the exact same mistake the Red Sox slugger did. And Lewis did it 5 months ago, not six years ago. Yet amazingly, no one gives a crap that Lewis may have taken performance enhancing drugs during the Magic's run to the Finals. But bring up baseball in 2003, and the sports world unites to gather their torches.

Lewis was suspended by the NBA for 10 games for failing a league mandated drug test and he was not caught smoking weed. He immediately apologized, took responsibility, and even laughed it off telling the Orlando Sentinel, "Look how skinny I am, do I look like I take steroids?"
Lewis says he didn't start taking the "supplements" until the end of the season. For argument's sake, lets say he's not being completely honest. He's hiding behind those spindly legs as proof that he could not have been on roids. The suggestion he's making is that because in two months his body didn't morph from Screech to Lou Ferrigno then he can't be guilty.
I'm no expert on steroids but that's not how it works. Ask Barry Bonds. He got bigger, but this isn't the Nutty Professor, it didn't happen in a matter of seconds. And thus just because Lewis runs around on toothpicks doesn't mean he wasn't looking for a short cut during the post season. It just means he probably wasn't habitual.

With that in consideration, David Ortiz had an easy out. If we are so willing to call a failed drug test, "a mistake in judgment" or a "misguided purchase at the local GNC", then he missed a crucial opportunity. Why not just say, "Look how fat I was, did I look like I was on steroids?" In our world, steroid users also don't take the appearance of Jabba the Hut.
But in the end, Ortiz (sans apology) used the same excuse as Lewis, only one upped with the notion that the wild wild pharmacies of the Dominican Republic may have screwed him. There is no FDA overseeing what the Dominicans are peddling, so there certainly is a gray area for players to hide behind.
But Ortiz went a step further. He also blamed the use of vitamins for the possible test failure. If I take a Flintstones Daily I will not fail a drug test. If I take a zinc pill, I will not fail a drug test. If my Doctor says you need more Vitamin D in your diet, I will consume one without fear that my random work drug test will not come up clean. Vitamins will never be confused for steroids. Note to all future cheaters caught, vitamins is too lame an excuse to even bother trying to use.

How this type of news is handled is key. Lewis did it the right way, the perfect way. He immediately addressed it, took full responsibility, explained what happened, promised to never let it happen again and didn't insinuate that some vague drug maker on some Carribean island needs to share some of the blame.
Ortiz told reporters he needed to get some information about why he failed a drug test before he could speak about it. Now to be fair, Lewis was alerted by the league of the issue and was given time to craft his response to reporters. Ortiz's name leaked and the New York Times wasn't about to tell baseball about the issue before they addressed it with Ortiz. So he was caught off guard. But remember, this supposedly happened six years ago.

This however is where things get tricky. Alex Rodriguez was supposedly alerted to his failed drug test as early as 2004. It's not too much of a reach to suggest that if A-Rod knew, then the other players on the list knew too. For Ortiz to claim he was blindsided by this doesn't pass the smell test.
And when pressed on the crux of the issue, Ortiz was at a loss for words. The first question he faced following his statement regarding the reasons behind his failed drug test asked him specifically why he didn't just say it was supplements that provided a "false positive" a week ago. He didn't need legal advice to say that, we presume he would know that since he had just finished saying he never purchased or used steroids. Did he need to be reminded of this fact?
He didn't answer that question, only to say the week was very confusing for him. Which made it all the more confusing for us.

I do find it interesting that a failed drug test from 2003 warrants Vietnam War esque coverage of baseball players. Rashard Lewis was a key component of a team that just reached the NBA Finals and he failed a drug test 5 months ago. Yet no one seems to care. What does that mean?
We love to punish baseball for their preponderance of lies? We like basketball players better then baseball players? Or maybe it's the continued effort by everyone in the sport of baseball to rationalize how their vaunted stats became meaningless that angers us so much. And to that end, nothing has changed. The union head didn't apologize yesterday for yet another star landing on a list of drug users. No Michael Weiner blamed the messenger. Dear Dum Dum: It's not the crime, it's the cover up. It's time for baseball to come clean and do what they should have done 10 years ago, just apologize, take responsibility and offer two for one hot dog night.

Eat Me

2009-08-05T19:51:00.000-07:00

That's it. They've gone too far. You just cannot fine someone for saying that the meatballs sucked. I'm sorry, but the NFL (North Korean Football League) needs to step off.

Chargers cornerback Antonio Cromartie was docked $2500 bucks for insinuating on Twitter that because the food at the team's training camp was so bad, it's one of the reasons they didn't make the Super Bowl.
It's called a joke people. It's called sarcasm. And if the team could step back and stop taking themselves sooooo seriously for just one second, they'd realize that. But no. They want Cromartie to speak, they just want to put the words in his mouth.

If I am Antonio Cromartie today, I am refusing to do interviews. Obviously, anything and evrything that could possibly be uttered could be perceived as a negative and therefore constitute a fine.
"How was practice today Antonio?"
"Great until I slipped on a blade of grass. The field was a little wet." Fined, $3500 dollars for suggesting the grounds crew weren't doing their best to ensure the teams safety.

But Antonio can't refuse to do interviews. He'd get fined for that too. So he has to suck it up, eat that gruel they are putting in front of him and making sure every word that comes out of his mouth is so carefully crafted as to not offend anyone who has ever watched a football game.

Who cares what Cromartie thinks of the food? Was Bobby Flay the chef at Chargers training camp? Are they coming out with a cookbook entitled, "All Charged Up and Eatin!?"
The food probably does suck. Since when are we not allowed to have an opinion about what we are forced to shove down our throats?
Here's the problem with Twitter, you can't accurately express tone. Raise your hand if you think Cromartie actually believes that the food at training camp had anything to do with the Chargers success last season. Exactly. Had Cromartie ended his tweet with the Ochocinco signature sign off of "Child please," maybe the Chargers would have realized he was just making a funny.
Did he hurt someone's feelings? Maybe. But that would depend where the food was coming from. If it's LT's Momma is making lunch for everyone, then he needs to make amends. But assuming some catering service has been hired to put together the cheapest healthy options available, I'm going to believe the food probably blows.

There is a freedom of speech issue that could be explored here, but truth is I'm not your huckleberry to get into that kind of detail. I just needs to be pointed out. And it's an issue the players union might want to discuss. On the one hand players are fined if they don't talk to the press. On the other, they are fined for talking about the egg salad. What exactly can they talk about without risk of being docked pay?

I used to joke with some friends about a certian player on a certain college basketball team that I followed. No matter what question you asked him, he answered it the exact same way.
"How did you guys win that game tonight?
"We just worked hard, we played our game and we got the win."
"What do you think of coach's new strategy?
"He makes us work hard so we play our game and we get the win."
"What planet are you from?
"I'm from the planet of people who work hard, play their game and get the win."

I'm starting to think he was on to something. Because if you can't talk turkey, you might as well not say anything at all.

Bye Bye Becks, We Barely Knew Ya

2009-08-02T18:36:00.000-07:00

Fine, I'll admit it. I bought a LA Galaxy jersey after David Beckham was signed to join the MLS. It said Herbal Life on the front, and that had something to do with it. But more importantly, and I can admit this, I just got caught up in the wave. It was my 8 year old girl-Miley Cyrus moment I guess.
The crazy part is how little attention I did and still do pay attention to professional soccer. And that's mainly because Beckham hasn't even moved the meter a centimeter since coming to the good old U S of A. And I suppose at the time, I was certain he would.

How could he not? It's been said that during the Japan World Cup, a 24 hour Beckham channel was among the highest rated networks among female viewers. They watched him sleep, for hours. Any other forum and that's called stalking. But this guy had so many Asian peppers, it was a successful business model.
Truth is, no human can find this man unattractive. Americans love a good British accent, he's got that too. And for the guys out there, he gives us Posh Spice. She's hot in that good old fashioned American way of bulimia. How could this not work? We pay top dollar for pictures of Britney's cooter, how could this couple not turn soccer into a disco for the new millenium?
Freaking Tom Cruise was showing up to Galaxy games.

The initial assertions were the MLS paid him a contract that was worth more then any team in the league. There has been a ton of debate over how much money Beckham is in actuality receiving, but certainly his placement in LA wasn't by accident. He was supposed to be a star, not just on the field but in endorsement deals, acting gigs, general paparazzi fodder. And here's the crazy part, none of that happened.

Why did the Enquirer not stake out Becks every move? Why wasn't someone hiding at the beach to take topless photos of Posh and her not real housewives of Malibu? What did we want from him, a three some with Lindsay Lohan? Becks to be accused of being a pedophile?
Freaking Tom Cruise stopped going to Galaxy games. The feel good story of the MLS now is the fact that the Seattle Sounders are averaging 30 thousand fans a game. Drew Carey is a bigger deal in American soccer then David Beckham.

The writing was on the wall. Beckham couldn't get a cameo in Paul Blart Mall Cop. He's not doing any ads, even for underwear. And I defy you to introduce me to one person who's actually watched an entire Galaxy game start to finish. It's like a comet destroyed the city of Kinshasa and astronomers failed to even bother to find out why. Soccer's supernova landed in the place where stars are built and no one seemed to notice. He's like the kind of hot chick who will need to do some soft core porn before anyone would take her acting career seriously.

But apparently there was one thing he could do to get noticed, say he's had enough and he wants to go home. And for this, he's getting attention, the kind he has always hoped to avoid. In their wildest dreams, the MLS could never have pictured Beckham turning into the sport's pariah. He was supposed to be the Justin Timberlake of soccer, women would show up at soccer games wearing Dolce and Gabbana heels. Instead, his games have turned more south central then Sunset Boulevard.

Not that anyone in the world gives a crap what Landon Donovan thinks, but he is the US's best player and he did say Beckham blows as a teammate. Big surprise. What did anyone expect, that he'd enjoy playing on a "soccer field" in Salt Lake City that says "Utes" written into the penalty box?
All 15 fans that LA has hate him, to the point that they were jumping out of the stands to challenge him to a fight. Becks might want to check out Watts while he's in LA and then maybe think twice about calling out the fans there. Guess what ese, you ain't in Milan anymore.

The bottom line is we still don't care about soccer. Beckham figures there won't be American football stadiums filled with soccer fans simply because he makes the women of the world wet, so he's hunting for whoever in Europe will take him back. Who can blame him really? It's where he can be a star for as long as he can still play. And the tabloids give a crap about whether Posh and Sporty are making nice nice there.
But despite this logic, there is one thing about American culture that Becks is learning about the hard way, we love to hate. We may not give a crap about your game or you for that matter, but you don't turn your back on us. You can make as much cash as you want here boss, but take that for granted and you'll pay.
In this country, we tell the world to bring us their tired, their poor, their hungry, their Beckhams. We don't promise a hit at the box office. And when we give up that kind of cash, we expect full service. FULL SERVICE.
Nice knowing ya dude. Cherry O!

Thank God We Didn't Get That Pussy

2009-07-30T16:51:00.000-07:00

And to think I was actually hoping the Redskins would pull it off and get Jay Cutler. We'd be the ones with a pussy for a quarterback.

Receiver Bobby Wade, now a Viking, formerly a Bear appeared on a Minneapolis radio station recently. He told the host that he ran into Brian Urlacher in Las Vegas and the Bears linebacker told him Jay Cutler was a pussy.
Bobby Wade is not T.O. Bobby Wade didn't change his last name to uno nueve. I've never heard Bobby Wade speak before and there is reason for that, he doesn't warrant the air time (well maybe he does now). So, unless this is the type of joke Bobby Wade pulls on his teammates regularly and we just never knew it, I actually believe him.

The Bears opened camp today with Lovie Smith spending a good deal of his press conference addressing the pussy comments. Unfortunately, he never used the word pussy, but we knew what he was talking about. That's right, on day one of training camp, somebody asked the coach of the Bears how he feels about his star linebacker calling the quarterback they just traded the future of the franchise for, a pussy.

The Chicago papers say Cutler and Urlacher have already had to be separated this off-season. Why? Is Cutler the new hot chick in school? Does Brian grit on him when they walk by each other in the training room? If Urlacher had hair, would they pull on each others hair? Are there going to be cliques in the Bears locker room?
It sounds to me like there are no pussies there, just a bunch of teenage girls.

What never seemed to make any sense was Denver's immediate willingness to trade Cutler. Most teams who draft a quarterback in the first round, then watch that player throw for over 4500 yards in his second season as starter on a team that had 58 different guys play running back would anoint him King of the County. Not in Denver. First order of business for Josh McDaniels was to replace him. Amazing, you'd think the one thing the owner and GM would tell their new coach is, "there is an untouchable on this roster, that quarterback with the rocket arm." But they didn't do that. Why?
They didn't pull what the Cardinals did to Anquan Boldin or what the Panthers did to Julius Peppers or what the Bengals did to Ochocinco. They didn't let time heal the wounds, they got a great deal and moved him seemingly unfazed by the notion that they just replaced Jay Cutler with Kyle Orton.
There can only be one conclusion, Cutler is in fact a pussy. Or he might just be a dick. He might be a dick who is also a pussy.

Lets not turn Brian Urlacher into some kind of saint here. But I am going to suggest to you that I believe Urlacher knows a pussy when he sees a pussy. Some guys just have that sixth sense of knowing when another male is certain to recoil under pressure. And I believe Urlacher should come out and own up and tell the world, "This Jay Cutler guy is the biggest pussy in the world. But he's our quarterback and there is no rule about pussies not be allowed to win the Super Bowl. So if he goes out and wins the Super Bowl I will take it all back and call him a man. Now if you all will excuse me, I am going to arm wrestle a gorilla and choose which model I will copulate with this evening."

And to think the Redskins were so close to getting this guy. You know who is not a pussy, Jason Campbell. Cutler hears the Broncos might replace him and he loses his cookies. He got all hormonal.
Campbell hears the Redskins are not only trying to get that pussy, they want this other pussy from USC who as of a month before the draft, most people figured was too short/slow/lack of arm strength/something.
Here's what Campbell did, he showed up at Redskin Park and worked out. The team virtually lied to him following the Cutler debacle saying now that Cutler was a Bear, that they were recommitted to him. When that turned out not to be true, what did Campbell do? He showed up at Redskin park and worked out.
That is not the sign of a pussy. That's a man who for better or worse knows his career hinges on what happens this season. For some, getting told you are not "our guy," is the most motivating thing you can ever hear. And for some it can reveal you as the pussy you truly are.
Thank you Chicago. You saved us from being the Eliot Spitzer of football, overpaying for pussy.

Now that is some Amazin BS

2009-07-28T03:25:00.000-07:00

I don't know Adam Rubin. I don't know Omar Minaya. But I know what happened during what should have been a routine dismissal of a member of the Mets front office was wrong, so wrong, it might have to cost the general manager his job.

It had been reported that a Mets front office executive Tony Bernazard was erratic in his behavior with team officials and in particular one of the minor league affiliates. Apparently he took off his shirt during one clubhouse meeting in Double A ball and challenged some of the players to a fight. Brad Pitt he is not. Reality this was. Tabloid fodder it became. Fired he is.
Sports certainly is a different business model and different workplace environment that most office settings. What's acceptable in this workplace and what's not is a very fine line.
Mike Singletary mooned his players during halftime of one of his first games as the team's interim coach. He got an extension this off-season probably because the team had improved since he replaced Mike Nolan.
The Mets spent a lot of money on a team that has fallen on it's face. This is not the time or place for anyone to have to deal with explaining away the actions of someone who could be perceived as completely insane. It's safe to say Minaya knew about Bernazard's WWE moment long before Rubin reported it, he just chose not to take action about it. There is an old adage in sports, winning cures everything. It's how Singletary could be perceived as motivational and Bernazard as off his rocker.

During the press conference yesterday to discuss the Mets decision to fire Bernazard, Minaya hit on two main points: 1) the team's HR department was looking into the Bernzard situation long before the reports hit the newsstands. Whether that is true or not, it doesn't matter, the Mets have to cover their bases and look as if they weren't surprised to read about this type of behavior in a newspaper. And 2) Adam Rubin had discussed jobs in baseball with Omar Minaya in the past. The insinuation is obvious. The problem for Minaya is, the only way that this is relevant is if the two had worked together to get Bernzard fired so Rubin could replace him. Which, obviously was not the case.

Defaming the reporter. I've seen this tactic before, never quite on this level though. So exactly what was Minaya insinuating here, that Rubin believed that by outing Bernazard, he could get the man fired and then swoop in and take that position? Obviously that wasn't the case. By publicly outing Rubin, it's quite obvious Minaya has no intention of ever hiring Rubin, in fact I think we could go so far as to say he actually hates Rubin and wouldn't want to share a cup of coffee with the man. Which could only mean one thing, the two never actually were in concert with one another with the conspiracy Minaya insinuates motivated the initial Bernzard reports. If there was no agreement by these two, then how could Rubin have thought this was his way into a baseball front office?

But this is New York, and a good soap opera is good for business. So Rubin now had to hold an impromptu presser himself where he admitted: A) He is interested in a career in baseball and he had been counseled on some level by Mets owner Fred Wilpon of how to chase that dream and B) He might have to find another career now being that his coverage of the team is compromised. How can he have an off record conversation with Minaya ever again?

I covered a team for 8 years. It's a unique experience that if done well can be fulfilling and at times like that, infuriating. I never had a run in as public as that with someone I covered, but I had more then my fair share of arguments over one of my reports with a coach or player or front office executive. Heck, I even got into it with a trainer once over the report of a minor injury to a receiver that was buried on the depth chart. Talk about a waste of everyone's time.
Reality is, (and I never lost sight of this) is that the team on the whole does not like the reporters. We are annoying. We are constantly questioning them and we don't take a day off. And our jobs don't change, good times or bad. It can be a great ride when the team is on a win streak or heading to the playoffs. It can be a disaster when a season is all but decided by you've got a quarter of the games to go. It can be brutal when you are reporting that an executive is going to lose his job, or has been, in the case of the Rubin story, extremely inappropriate. I never took pride in being the person to bring that type of news to the public first, but I understood it was my job to find that out. And I never did it with the intention of impressing the team.

See, that's where Minaya is mistaken. Why would he even think for a second that by reporting the Bernazard story, Rubin would consider himself more ingratiated with the Mets? How would this story reflect positively on his candidacy to be in the Mets front office? If anything, if Rubin were to be hired after a story like that, it would be perceived that there indeed was some form of coercion between Minaya and Rubin. How would anyone trust Rubin that he wouldn't leak stories about them to the media if he were then hired?
I'm going to assume Minaya was just mad at the stories and how they reflected on his leadership in the midst of a terrible season. It's deluded thinking, but I suppose plausible when you are trying to find someone to blame other then yourself. Still, it's as unacceptable as Bernazard's behavior and in some ways worse. Bernzard ripped underlings and minor league ball players in his franchise. He was a bad boss. Minaya went after the motives of someone who does not work directly for him or for that matter even with him. Without a true public apology, this is a fireable offense.

And lets say Minaya's job is in jeopardy. Would it be OK for him to ask Rubin or some of the people over at SNY their advice about getting a TV gig? And if Minaya criticized one of the TV analysts of his team's games for something that was said during the telecast, could that then be used against him publicly as a form of conspiracy to get that person's job?

I don't find anything wrong with Adam Rubin making it known that he has interest in one day working in a front office. His reporting obviously wasn't corrupted otherwise he might have sat on the Bernzard story.
What's wrong with asking someone you come into contact with about their job, how they got it, and if it was something you might be interested in down the road, what steps you take to try and get one yourself? Nothing as long as you remain focussed on what your job is now. And in the case of Rubin, without question he was. It's Minaya who might need to learn a thing or two about the press if he has an ideas of finding a second career in media after the Mets boot him out of Queens.

Gorilla loses to Zebra, Race Car Driving Meth Head

2009-07-24T17:06:00.000-07:00

Why get malaria shots and unload a month's salary to see an African rhinoceros when you can easily go on safari in Kansas? Yes Kansas. It's the land where a Gorilla met a Zebra and the Zebra won.
A Pittsburg State (No I've never heard of it) football player is going to miss all of next season thanks to a run in with one of his four (I'm assuming here) pet zebra. Yes, some dude in Kansas has four zebra. Ooh, and in case you were wondering, Pittsburg State's mascot is a gorilla.

The story out of Kansas is 6 foot 2 inch 225 pound Joe Windscheffel had "to move 3 female and one male zebra to paint a fence along a pasture line." When Windscheffel attempted to do so, the male got pissed, charged him, bit him on the forearm, would not let go, and dragged him until two farm hands came along and were able to free him. Windscheffel suffered a compound fracture and thus, won't be able to be a Gorilla.

Are Zebra legal in the United States? There are some things I've never seen in person. I've never seen a clay tennis court which is why I'm never surprised that we suck at the French Open. I've never seen an actual pyramid either. I just assumed I needed to go to far away places to actually witness these wonders. Zebra are included. The only thing I have ever seen a zebra do is run from a pack of lions, on television, in Africa. So if there are zebra in Kansas, are their lions? Is there a fricking giraffe running around Kansas City? Do aboriginal tribes threaten the safety of Kansas State University?

If my daughter said to me that she wanted to have a pony and nothing in the world will ever make her smile again until she rides her own pony, I'd probably attempt to get it for her. But I don't think it's easy to purchase a pony. There isn't a pony shop. You probably have to go to a breeder. You probably have to get the thing shots. You probably have to get it licensed. Animal control probably wants to know ho you intend to feed, bathe and generally take care of the pony.
Is there even a division of our government that deals with zebra ownership?

I'm assuming Windscheffel didn't kidnap the zebra from Africa and bring them back with him on a boat. So where in the world did he find a zebra? Why does he want a zebra? This dude has four wild zebra on some farm. What do you get from a zebra except ringworm or in this case, a broken arm? And I thought Michael Vick was crazy.

What else does Windscheffel have on this farm, leopards? I would love to sit down with Windscheffel and have him explain what happened.
"So I was mindin my own business when Hoffluffler told me to get the bucket of paint because the fence needed a do over. I told him them zebra are acting a little crazy eyed. He says 'Windscheffel, get your lazy behind out by the fence and shoo them zebra away.' So I let a couple of the gazelle loose to try to distract them but they weren't leaving the fence. So I pushed one of the little crappers, but I must have touched Milo's (that's what he calls the male one) girlfriend because he started digging his hoof into the dirt and made a bee line for my arm. I tried to throw the paint in his eye but I missed and that crapper just hung on for dear life. I don't know where I would have ended up if it weren't for Hofflufler and Dingpoppal."

True fact: Windscheffel was red-shirted from the Gorillas last year because of an achilles injury. What happened? Did he get on the wrong side of a gila monster from Iowa?

*******************************************************************

I really don't like Nascar. I just can't relate to it I guess. When I watch coverage of the sport, they always let us take a listen to the discussions between the driver and his crew chief, which I'd probably find extremely interesting if I had any clue what they were talking about. "The exhaust rotor of the flim flam is too hot," some BS like that.

I don't have a preference between Ford or Chevy. I don't like being surrounded by extremely loud noises for hours at a time. And well, the fans, lets just say they don't exactly have the best reputation for being intelligent. But who am I to laugh, I don't know how to change my oil.

But there is one story that I am completely enthralled with and can't wait to get updates on. Nascar driver Jeremy Mayfield has been labeled a meth head by the sport and is banned indefinitely. Methamphetamine + Nascar driver = catastrophe. The mere idea that someone would want to drive any car on meth is astonishing. But this suggests death wish.
This guy Mayfield is fighting this in federal court, but even after winning an injunction that allowed him to race until the case was cleared up, sponsors were running away from this dude like he's OJ.

Can you imagine, "driving the number 28 Viagra Car, Jeremy Mayfield!" The dude is sweating through his fire-retardant suit. He's shaking. He can't stop talking about this time he dropped a five dollar bill down a sewer or when he ate an entire box of unmixed Aunt Jemima pancake powder. Instead of listening to his crew chief during the race, he's got Gwar blasting through his headset. Some skinny shirtless man with dirt marks on his jeans and only one shoe is sleeping in the back seat.
What does he do after the race? Huff the Gas can?

Meth is one of those drugs that scared the crap out of me enough that I would never had considered even trying it. Anything that can and is made in someone's bath tub is out. It's why I don't drink moonshine either.

I'll give Mayfield the benefit of the doubt, because I'd like to think that no one is that reckless with their lives. But for a second just consider the possibility that this guy did a 500 mile race high on crank. Eat your heart out Hunter S Thompson.

Old Man Brit, The Fake Reality of TO and Poo Poo

2009-07-21T16:32:00.000-07:00

It was the 72nd and should have been final hole of the British Open.. I'm watching this in my parents living room with my brother-in-law Rick (huge golfer), his father Mike (huger golfer), his wife Brenda (hugest golfer) and Ben, the guy who dates my niece. Tom Watson is sizing up his second shot at the par four.. He pars he wins. Mind you I haven't seen a second of the coverage throughout the weekend, A) because they tee off at 4 in the morning and I don't do drugs and B) I was too busy. I am finding as I get older and expanding my family, some sporting events fall into the category of can misses.
But I was aware that a 59 year old was trying to go wire to wire and well, we were at the wire. Watson could not have hit this shot better, an 8 iron from like 180 or something like that. If the green wasn't made of some form of concrete, he would at the very least had been able to putt out. Mike bet us all a buck he wouldn't get up and down.

My life isn't going to tangibly change one way or another with any result in any sporting event (another life lesson), but still I root for oddities. I liked it when George Foreman, more Stay Puft Marshmallow man then evil Ali nemesis won the Heavyweight title at 45. I pay attention when David Eckstein is up at the plate in a clutch situation during the playoffs. I enjoy it when anyone beats the Yankees. I want any horse to win the Triple Crown. So when Tom Watson's fate was tugging at the heart strings..

I hadn't seen Tom Watson attempt a chip or, as he decided in this particular case, putt with the ball in the short and curlies in, well, forever. So I couldn't actually make a rational decision whether Watson's game included this trick. I just bet the buck because I wanted it to happen. Of course he blew it by the hole then acted as if he wanted absolutely nothing to do with the championship saving putt, walking out of it like someone was about to push him over. Mike was right, Tom didn't have the guts to pull off something as big as this.

What I loved was the reaction to the result. He either "choked," or "got tired." Lets take both of these theories one at a time.
He "choked." Technically, it wasn't a choke. He couldn't have hit the second shot better, the golfing Gods just decided to put him in a near impossible up and down situation. Now sure, we can argue over his decision to putt from off the green into an uphill pin. And it was quite obvious he was not comfortable in the slightest bit when eyeing an 8 footer down hill for the win. And the wheels completely came off during the 4 hole playoff with Stewart Cink (it's hard to lose by 6 shots in that situation). So sure, if you must call this a choke, it was a choke. Not Van de Veldian and not Norman at the Masters, but certainly he gave away a golden opportunity.
The question is whether there is a statute of limitations of how old you can be for it to be a choke. I'd argue that the other 140+ golfers who played this event choked. Shouldn't they be embarrassed that a man who likely can't even be competitive on the Senior Tour whooped them up for four straight days? If Watson choked, every single one of them choked too.

The "he got tired" theory is my personal favorite. Now I'm not 59, so I've yet to have personal experience with that age, but I'm going to guess that you don't become narcoleptic. Sure, playing a round of golf isn't as easy as it used to be, but I have a hard time believing that Watson was secretly hoping he could take a nap on the bunker off the 18th green. This dude was so pumped with adrenaline, he crushed an 8 iron about 180 yards. I've never hit my 8 iron more then 140. Stop laughing.
So is the theory that he got tired in that instant? I know old people, and the old people I know don't just pass out at any moment's notice. I am going to assume Watson didn't need any Viagra during this past week the way he was going.

He lost. Call it a choke if you have to. Call it a senior moment if you are a dimwit. Or maybe you should call it a great performance by someone who by any stretch of the imagination defied logic.

*************************************************

I have to discuss Terrell Owens reality show for a moment. I like Terrell Owens. I like showmen. I never quite figured out what the disdain over Owens was about. OK, so he probably told his dum dum teammates to step their games up. He's the best athlete on the team and he's never won a thing. He's pissed about that and has every right to be. Like it or not, he is that good.

But his reality show embodied everything that likely makes him an implausibly bad teammate. He knows he's a diva, and honestly I'm not sure there could be any true beef with that. He's openly vain. Furthermore, what is obvious here is football is so secondary now, it's patently false for him to even pretend that he cares about the NFL.
1) If this was reality, then I'm living on Mars. The premise of this first episode was for his team of PR lackeys to get Owens to focus on his future, like what he's going to do when teams like the Bills stop calling. But the existence of this show proves he's already thought about that. He has a reality show. It's the second television show he's been a part of that aired in the last week. Being on a reality show is still being on a show and whether anyone wants to believe this or not, work goes into that. Thus, Owens next career has already begun. Therefore, the entire premise of the program is absurd.
2) Owens never explained how the Bills deal got done. He discussed it in passing as if it's just something that came up, weeeeee. He tossed the catch phrase, "I'm going to bring the heat to Buffalo," too many times not to know that this was scripted. The reaction from his friends was asinine. No offense Bills fans, but if I were in T.O.'s inner circle, when he revealed that he was going to play for the Bills, I might have begun laughing out loud or punched him in the face, or anything completely opposite from the reaction he got on the show which was obviously a scripted cheer from his girls, "T.O. in the snow!"
3) And this goes back to point one, mere days after signing a deal with the Bills, Owens is easily convinced he needs to move to Los Angeles. Shouldn't he want to ingratiate himself with the people paying him millions of dollars to play football for ONE season? No, there isn't even a casual mention of him going to the team. Instead, he is paraded around LA and given a house to rent for a "few months to figure some things out." Which he obviously already has.
4)And then there were the can;t possibly be true situations. He bangs the "real estate agent" who shows him the rented house. Every club goer from his first night out in LA somehow gets back to his place for an after party. And, T.O.'s ex fiancee who he admittedly cheated on before they broke up is suddenly available and eager to have a reconciliation meeting in her house filmed. What next, we find out that his shit literally does not stink?
5) Every other scene is filmed with him topless. That actually might be real.

Let me be frank. I like T.O.. I think he's good for the game. He's not a guy who gets in trouble with the law. There is nothing wrong with celebrities in football as long as they can back it all up. But his show was just that, a show, and I'm not fooled for a second. You shouldn't be either. He's T.O. He's not Hef.

********************************************************

Speaking of shit stinking. At the worldwide leader today, we were trying to find the right words to describe the story of the day: Broken sewer line cause massive excrement release under UGA stadium and into the nearby river. If that's not an omen I don't know what is.
Apparently poop is an unacceptable term for the airwaves of ESPN News. Yes poop. A three year old can say it, but I can't. Honestly, the words we did use when relaying the story: dung, excrement, feces all seem much worse to me. Feces is such an ugly word. If you say "I stepped in poo," I might crinkle my nose, and make a sad face then wag my finger under my nostrils to make the universal sign for stinky.
Now if you say, "I stepped in feces," well that has an entirely different conotation. Like you better get hosed down by Hazmat or we can't be friends ever again.
Still, poo was outlawed and excrement was OK.. I did slip in "the situation was not rectified as of last evening," which only drew the laughter of one astute producer.

The story goes that a sewage line that runs "between the hedges" busted and crap started pouring out into a river. The local environmental group hadn't classified it yet, but it was possible it was be deemed a "major spill," meaning more then 10 thousand gallons of dung would have poured into the river having run under the stadium. 10 thousand gallons of shit. That's like your toilet overflowing for 8 straight weeks with poop up to the ceiling.
It was such a massive clean up, workers couldn't get it under control by the end of the night yesterday so they erected a temporary dam to collect all the feces. Holy Crap!
The Zeta Beta Tau's will forever refer to this night as "the new definition of hazing."

But the best part for me was reading that because the spill hadn't yet been classified, it was someone's job to do that calculation. Someone had to literraly survey the fountain of shit and determine if there were 5000 gallons of crap, 8000 gallons of dung, 15000 gallons of cow pie. What qualifies you to count shit leaks? Do you go to school for this? Is this an experiment that could be conducted by the UGA department of environmentalism-dung studies? How would one go about calculating how much poop went in the river? With a dip stick?
Can you imagine being the spouse of this person? "Honey, I'm home. What's for dinner?"
"Meatloaf sweetie, how was your day?"
"It was crazy, I was knee deep in the crap from 30 thousand college students. It was so deep, I almost sunk into it. It was warm and squishy. The entire river is full of crap now. Wow the meatloaf looks great!"

In response UGA has raised the ticket prices of their seats for the upcoming season that were not "at one point covered in poo poo."

An Open Letter to the First Fan

2009-07-15T16:30:00.000-07:00

Stan the Man handed the ball to Barack the Obamanitor for the regal first pitch of the all star game last night. It was said that the President took all of 18 hours to respond to a invitation to be the ceremonial pitch tosser.This guy eats this stuff up. He'll do freaking anything!
Kim Jong IL has been waiting weeks for a response from Obama to come see the North Korean national pastime, scaring the Taiwainese with nuclear missile tests that he affectionately calls, Incinerationball.

As someone who takes sports too seriously myself, I am not going to point out the 8 trillion other things a President should probably be doing other then reading Mr. Roto's mailbag, but hey when you are fixing the car crisis by snapping your fingers, you probably deserve a little break to sure up your fantasy rotation?

Here are just some of the things the First Fan has done since his campaign got hot. Obama invited Andy Katz to the White House to fill out a bracket accurately picking the eventual national champion on what appeared to be inside information regarding the uncertain toe of point guard Ty Lawson. Was the secret service surveying the Tar Heels practices?

During the campaign he was asked about his beloved White Sox chances in the divisional round against Tampa. His response: concern about the back end of the bullpen. George W Bush doesn't know how to spell bullpen and he owned a baseball team.

Those Bernie Madoffs of sport were grilled for the first time publicly when Obama launched a congressional investigation into the BCS and their so called "great system to determine a national champion." Politicians telling off BCS conference commissioners, it was impossible to quantify who was actually more full of shit. But the good news is for the sake of stimulus, the EPA got some grant money to look into how to eliminate the preponderance of gas bags.

All of us sports fans have the list. The things we have to witness first hand before we die. I need to get ringside seats to a heavyweight title fight in Vegas. I have to see a game at Wrigley and Fenway. Obama seems intent on not just scratching off some sports wishes, he's looking at this as an opportunity. It's like he woke up one day, realized he was the President, and decided he can do whatever he wants and no one can stop him.. It's like he wants to have an array of stories to tell his buds when he is out of office. They'll be in a bar reliving his days in the Oval Office and instead of talking about that time he stared down Putin, he'll be like, "remember that time when I called Bill Belichick on the sideline phone during the fourth quarter of a tied game with the Colts and told him to pull of the ole Statue of liberty play? Man that was crazy."

Things I wouldn't be surprised to see Obama do in the next 3 plus years: 1) Anoint himself the chair umpire for the US Open Finals 2) Ride Rachel Alexandra 3) Usurp the Yankees under the statue of eminent domain 4) Make Brock Lesner fight him one handed 5) Engrave his name onto the Stanley Cup 6) Write into law that Notre Dame is longer allowed to be on national television every week 7) Nominate LeBron for the vacancy on the Supreme Court 8) Go clubbin with A Rod! 9) Date Madonna 10) Deport Ichiro 11) Levy trade sanctions against Brazil on the eve of the World Cup 12) Ride shotgun with Danica, use imaginary break pedal.

Truth is, this is a great thing. Someone who cares as much about the integrity and importance of our games as we do. So here's to President Obama righting some of the wrongs, making sports pure again.
Here's my sports wish list..

1) Don't let illegal steroid use be merely punished by the embarrassment of publicity. It is ILLEGAL. I thought we were in a drug war. It means Miguel Tejada can get a whole different meaning of what a shot of B-12 in the rear signifies. We arrest drug smugglers right? Then what is the difference between major leaguers who bring in illegal substances across the border? Arrest them. That might send a message.

2) In that regard, enact a lawsuit against the major leagues on behalf of all fans. Every person who has attended at least 10 baseball games in their lives will receive 2 tickets to one game in the best seats in the house of their favorite team as reparations for turning a blind eye to the drug problem of the sport and negating everything those vaunted stats ever meant.

3) Make unions have some moral responsibility. Is it the job of player representatives to tell star players when they should be expected to be drug tested? In the HBO show "The Wire," those people are known as the lookouts. How could people in such a position believe that this was morally acceptable behavior?

4) Make hockey take a deal to be on either ESPN or Fox Sports Net. Don't let it commit suicide, not with such bright stars available for all our viewing pleasure. Treat Gary Bettman as if he is not competent to stand trial.

5) Deem the personal seat license illegal. Otherwise, the personal seat license fee legally makes the fan a part owner of the team. You want me to purchase a part of the building? Then I deserve the right to share in the proceeds of the team profits and sale of merchandise on premises.

6) I wasn't kidding about Notre Dame football. Do us all a favor and find something wrong with that contract with NBC. Time for a separation of Church and football at least until the Irish are actually relevant again.

7) Sell Beckham to AC Milan, use proceeds to fund the all new General Motors. Do you see what these soccer players are going for these days?. And he's a cute one too! That's got to be worth a little somethin somethin.

8) Make William Clay Ford make a choice, run Lions or make cars. He obviously can't do both.

9) Invite Al Davis to special trip to Bermuda Triangle.

10) Force baseball to a have a salary floor. Telling a team they can't spend as much as they want on their team seems outdated (as much as I like capped leagues), even un-American. But there can be something said for teams who don't try to financially compete. You don't wanna pay, you become a minor league franchise.

11) Take the decision out of the teams hands regarding criminally negligent athletes. If you are found guilty or plead guilty to any felony, you forfeit your right to play professional sports. You want these guys to be role models, force them to be.

And most importantly...

12) Keep doing what you are doing. We all have jobs and use sports as a way to escape from the daily rigors of real life. The President shouldn't be expected to be held to any other standard. Just make sure that when the shit does hit the fan, we don't hear that you were unavailable because "that Bengals-Saints overtime game was crunk."

I've got plenty more, but 12 should suffice for his first year in office. All this public policy mumbo jumbo seems to be a snap for this Prez.

Bear wants Hoagie, punches man in face

2009-07-12T17:53:00.000-07:00

I've always been fascinated by the "Strange But True" blurbs that run in many publications. I'd like to meet the 102 year old lady working at the same Fish and Chips shop since 1928. I'd like to know what living with the dog that has the world's loudest bark is like.
This past weekend, my buddies J Mill, Bill Mill, Bloom and Crain et all could not stop talking about the greatest (at least for now) strange but true story we'd ever heard. The tale of the New Jersey man who got cold cocked by a bear.

The story reads that an unsuspecting man was in front of his house, "unpacking the back of his car," when a hungry bear came up to him and punched him in the face. Then the bear took the man's Italian sandwich before fleeing the scene. What the bear did not appreciate was the lettuce and tomato on the sandwich.. That was left behind.

My friends and I were trying our best to figure out how this went down. Did the Bear tip toe up to the man while he was hunched over in the back of his car and tap him on the shoulder before punching him out? Did the bear just come charging out of the woods and do one of those running punches like Mike Tyson in his heyday? Did the bear know that on Wednesdays, this guy gets a hoagie and hoagies are something that are hard to come by if you are a bear?

Did the bear throw the lettuce and tomatoes on the guy while he was lying on the ground? Did the bear actually peel apart the bread to see if (god forbid) this idiot put vegetables on the sandwich? Did he make a face at the guy after he realized he put lettuce and tomato on an Italian sandwich? Had the bear been casing this guy for some time? Did he know this was the day he'd clean out his car and bring home an Italian sandwich? Did he stand over the man like Muhammad Ali and wail in bear speak, "You just got knocked the f%#$ out!"
Where did this bear learn to punch? Do bears normally do that? I'm no bear expert, but every mauling I've ever read about never insinuated that the bear got into a boxing stance.

The possibilities were endless. What amazes me is there is a picture of the man who was cold cocked by a bear. And one TV station got an exclusive interview with him. I didn't see this, only read the account of the tale, but I was told the entire left side of his face was black and blue. If I am that guy, the last thing I am going to do is get interviewed by Action News 10. What purpose does it serve to admit that you were the guy who got punched in the face by a bear over an Italian hoagie?

This guy is going to have to move. Everywhere he goes, people are going to ask him about the incident. He goes into the post office and says, "Can I get a roll of stamps?" And the person responds, "Hey aren't you the guy who got punched in the face by a bear? Would you like these special Yellowstone National Park stamps?"
He walks into a grocery store, places his items on the counter and the guy at the register says, "Getting salami, don't you think that's a bit risky considering a bear punched you in the face and took your Italian meats?"
He pulls up to the gas station and asks the attendant to "Fill er up?" And the attendant says "Who do you think can punch harder, the bear or LeRoy?" LeRoy is at the other pump flexing and growling at the man.

For the rest of his life, every new person he comes into contact with will at some point have to be told the story. How do you craft that to make it sound cool? "So this bear came out of the woods, punched me in the face, took my Italian sandwich and threw the tomatoes on me. But I told that bear if it wanted to ever eat another Italian sandwich again, it better run because I don't take s%#@ from anyone, especially bears. And it ran, fast." The other person is no longer interested in being friends.

We've all had horrifically embarrassing things happen to us. One time a seagull plastered me square on the chest with some dung while I was at the beach sun tanning. OK, it's not the worst thing, but it's certainly the only thing I'm admitting to publicly. Imagine being the guy who got punched in the face by a bear.

The Dunk Police

2009-07-09T18:25:00.000-07:00

Since when did Nike become a band of covert operatives? The story reads that representatives of the shoe company approached two cameramen who were taping a pick up basketball game at a summer camp and forced them to turn over the tapes. What was on this video, the hiding places of the WMD's?

The issue: LeBron James had been dunked on. Not by Kobe or Dwayne Wade or Dwight Howard. No, it was a college student. And apparently if we were to see this, our entire world would change. Armageddon would commence. We'd have to build 1950's style bomb shelters and hide underground for the rest of eternity. God forbid we see the King look human.

It was a pick up basketball game. The unspeakable event took place early on and according to the perpetrator, Xavier sophomore Jordan Crawford, "no one thought anything of it." But afterward, it was all the rage. Two videographers may or may not have actually caught this on tape. Regardless, the Nike police were having nothing of it, explaining that they had broken a rule of media access and forced them to turn over the tapes.

Confiscate the tapes? Who's running this camp, the KGB? Now I'm no legal expert here but I do believe the tapes are solely the property of the accredited reporter. No one is claiming these two men weren't allowed to be there nor were they not allowed to shoot some portions of the camp. But apparently, the taping of the pick up game was against camp policy. The important thing to remember here is that when the dunk occurred, NO ONE thought anything of it.
Apparently, It took a while for everyone to understand the gravity of that video. If this gets out, it would be LeBron's Zabruder tape.
When LeBron got dunked on, his head went back, and to the left. Back and to the left.

What do the Nike police look like? I picture them like the agents of the Matrix. We can only hope that one of the cameramen is named Mister Anderson. They are specialists, operatives who've been cross trained. They definitely have ear pieces. Their directions come from someone located in an underground lair in Eugene Oregon known as the Swoosher King. And they do it all in pristine condition original Air Jordans.

The story insinuates that James may have himself conferred with the Nike police. It may have been at his behest that the Zapruder Dunk tapes were held under lock and key. This part is somewhat unbelievable. While LeBron has carefully crafted an image, he has had plenty of moments of self-deprecation. He allowed himself to be the Bert to Kobe's Ernie in Nike's puppet ads. Amazingly, the shoe company felt those ads were less destructive to the aura of LeBron then seeing him get dunked on in a pick up game.

Nike then released a statement explaining their actions. It was straight from the school of the Iraqi interior, so illogically reasoned, it felt like a parody from an issue of the Onion. It was longer then this blog post. The general point it was trying to make was these infidels broke the media rules of the camp and therefore they had to pay a price.
Let me put this as bluntly as I can, while I have no problem if Lindsay Lohan goes Tonya Harding on a member of the papparazzi who just clicked shots of her coochie as she tried to get out of a limo, she can't legally take the guys camera and film.
So, Nike had no right to confiscate anything. They certainly had the right to take away these guys credentials and ban them from the event.

The funny part is, lets just say Nike releases this video. There is no way it will live up to what I'm imagining must have taken place. For them to hide the tape forever, this dunk must be the most memorable dunk in the history of dunking.
I can see it, Jordan Crwaford is coming up on the wing. LeBron has a decision to make, stop the ball or take a chance for a steal. He realizes he's too far under the basket to do either. He's defenseless so he lunges toward the point guard who dishes to Crawford. Crawford then leaps from the 3 point line, continuing to move his legs in a running motion while suspended in the air. The whole thing actaully happens in slow motion. Crawford then steps on LeBron's shoulders with both feet before propelling himself into a mid air summersault that ends with two full 360 cannonball rotations ripping the rim off of the backboard upon his descent. The hoop ends up twirling around LeBron's neck. The shattered glass resembles LeBron's pregame chalk clap.

The And 1 crew never dreamed of this possibility. Globetrotter fans would have passed out in delirium. You can't even call this a dunk, it needs to be classified by it's own term. The Big LeBronski. He got Donkey Konged. Something.

It's the only explanation as to why we aren't allowed to be witnesses to that.

Affair McNair

2009-07-07T15:34:00.000-07:00

I remember when I was in high school, those stupid record label warnings were created to try to warn parents that (fill in the blank) rap group was going to corrupt your beautiful blossom child with gutter talk of "tappin that ass," or "smoking a phatty."
Two Live Crew's music would have been ignored as pointless and sophomoric had it not been for the crusade against indecency. But instead, they were made into overnight sensations when singing "Me So Horny" on a stage was treated as a capital crime in Florida. Never mind the fact that the "Me So Horny" clip was used from a movie that was nominated for an Oscar, for writing.

It was Tipper Gore, wife of Vice President Al Gore who spearheaded the "Rated X music" campaign. She won, the labels were put on CD's! Only it couldn't prevent anyone from buying the albums and made N.W.A.'s "Straight Outta Compton" a must have for suburbanites, even if none of us would ever dare to F the Police.
In time, "Me So Horny" seemed like nursery rhymes. Rap went hard core while Gore had the second highest position in the world. Funny how Tipper never bothered when she had such a stage to even mention how annoyed she must have been about how regularly "Bitches and Ho's" were being referenced during this new wave of music.
We were desensitized. Even Tipper probably had a Tupac album in her 6 disc changer. Anyone who'd ever followed the history of modern music knew this is what was coming. Ever heard of the Beatles? Or Elvis? Or Footloose? Or Yanni? If that's not offensive, I don't know what is.

How does this apply to the sad facts surrounding the murder of former MVP quarterback Steve McNair? Simply, in the same vain, we apparently have become desensitized to overarching theme of this case, infidelity with a teenager.
There is a cold conclusion to make here: Had Steve McNair not been dating a 20 year old woman and spending more time with his wife and four children, certainly this would not have happened. But lets not be naive enough to oversimplify this situation. None of us know what the situation or understanding between he and his wife was. No one knows how virtuous McNair's feelings were for his 20 year old girlfriend. And as of the time I'm writing this, the police haven't classified the nature of which she died. Certainly, a murder-suicide constitutes a different emotion over their demise then a professional hit.

But lets discuss the possibility McNair was killed by his girlfriend. He was riding in a vehicle with her just days prior where she was pulled over for driving while under the influence (and it wasn't alcohol). Was he a user with her? He bought her this car for her birthday. Did he not know she was high when he got into the passenger seat? No one knows, but it certainly begs the question of how much did he enable this girlfriend of his and how reckless he was in her presence.
The girl had bought the handgun found at the murder scene two days prior to the killings. Now we don't know if that gun was used in the crime (as of now) and we may never know if she was the one who pulled the trigger.
But if she did, does that at all taint your feelings about the man? What would drive her to kill him herself? Was it something McNair said or did? Did he simply place his marriage in danger of ruin by openly dating a person with mental issues? Either scenario does not paint a pristine picture of McNair.

Let me extremely clear here. I'm no self righteous, never made a mistake, live on a higher moral ground pundit. Far from it. Nor am I predisposing whatever ills were cast upon the McNair family by their straying father. Again, I don't know the situation and won't pretend to understand it.
What, however, has heightened my attention to this is the casual dismissal by everyone I've come across regarding how McNair will be perceived in the aftermath of his death. "What about his heart on the field?" They say. "What about his toughness. What about his loyalty to his team? What about his background, going from Alcorn State to the NFL, he was a one of a kind."
All valid points about McNair as a player. His abilities certainly aren't in debate. The question is where does blatant indiscretion come into the equation?

He vacationed with this girl. Quotes from her cousin suggest he'd been introduced to her family as a potential husband. Yet he was married and hadn't filed for divorce. He bought her a car. There are pictures on TMZ of him skydiving with her. This wasn't the Governor of South Carolina flying to some far off land to get his groove back. This was one of the most recognizable figures in a smallish town flaunting his infidelity openly.

The Governor of South Carolina has barely made headlines a mere couple of weeks following his admissions of a long distance love affair potentially paid for on the states dime. The truth is, this has happened so many times to public figures, it's not even news any more. So much so, I bet half of you reading this can't remember his name. And as of right now, he isn't even out of office.
John Edwards cheated on his wife while she was undergoing chemotherapy. This guy was running for President not more then two years earlier using his wife's struggles as a boon to his campaign hopes.

Elliot Spitzer got kicked out of the Governor's office in New York but at least what he did truly constituted an illegal act. Add to the fact that he played morality card too many times not to have been forced to leave.
Bill Clinton never left office early despite having an affair with an intern IN the White House.
Penthouse publisher Larry Flynt was the only honest man in politics, knowing how much infidelity existed on Capitol Hill, he threatened to publish tales of other politicians indiscretions if they continued to carry the torches to Pennsylvania Ave.
I find it so ironic that Tipper was part of such a White House.

It has become so commonplace in our society that the fact that McNair was seriously dating a 20 year old woman so openly in a town that idolized him has become the secondary issue behind the murders. He's being treated a pure victim. Which, unless the police tell us otherwise, he is. But there has to be some caveat here right? It can't be as simple as "That chick was just plain crazy."

Tales of athletes with numerous children by different mothers is appalling yet not even deemed worthy of 15 seconds of airtime any longer. Adultery is technically a crime but it certainly is decriminalized. Ever heard of a man being arrested for being unfaithful? Imagine the overcrowding issue in the nation's prisons if Cheaters were prosecuted. Reality TV might have never existed.

What's most alarming is when the conversation regarding his legacy comes up (which it invariably has since the news of his murder), few want to address a very fair question: Did we really know who this guy was? And if we are going to treat him with reverence for his athletic ability, then where do his blatant personal indiscretions get factored into that eulogy? It opens the door to this larger social issue. Is cheating considered wrong enough to make it the focal point of a discussion of someone's character?

I don't know the answers to any of this. All I know is this is disturbing on every level possible. A young man so talented taken from us at 36. A man who by many accounts was strongly active in the communities of Nashville and his home in Mississippi. His grit on the football field is worthy of Hall of Fame consideration.
But the way his life ended isn't one of those so called cautionary tales, it is a study in the attempt to define a larger then life figure. While it is my and many others jobs to wrap a succinct bow on this story and put it into simple perspective, that in my view is not currently possible. And just like the music debate of the 80's, the most interesting part of this seems to be the idea of the affair becoming a secondary issue. When did that not become a big deal?

I watched a guy steal carved turkey

2009-07-02T16:10:00.000-07:00

His face is burned into my memory. I'd never seen him before, but if a sketch artist asked me to describe him, I could. Ooh yes, I could. This wasn't your ordinary crime, and I'll never forget that I witnessed it.
I saw a man steal carved turkey during the rush hour at the ESPN cafe.
If the poultry police brought me to a perp lineup, I'd be able to pick this sinister criminal out. I'd point my finger and yell with furious fervor, "It's him. He's the man you're looking for. He stole the turkey!"

I'd never met this person before. But it's possible, we'll work together. The only question is whether he knows that I know. The crime was poorly thought out, but executed with precision. It was brazen. It was like Jesse James robbing a bank in broad daylight and the police watching him walk right on out cash in hand. Only this was about turkey and how one goes about swindling it.

I like turkey day at the Cafe. The large hand carved breasts are cooked perfectly. All the typical accoutrements are there, instant mashed potatoes, a cranberry relish, mac and cheese, rolls. It's Thanksgiving in July, if your family decided to do it on the cheap. Still, it's a better alternative to the flavorless pizza or outlandish "chalupa" station. Taco Bell would be mortified. But this turkey day would be like no turkey day I've ever been a part of.

There was nobody waiting for turkey, a shocking development. Typically this is among the most coveted of food selections. But it was Chicken Parmesan Day around the corner at the deli counter. ESPN'ers treat Chicken Parm day like it's a Phish concert. So it may have gone overlooked that fresh carved turkey was available without any line. Only one person was there, turkey in hand, gathering his sides.

It took a moment for the server to get to me. The turkey man is in charge of the grill and therefore is handling an array of short order selections. So I waited and it was at this moment that I caught a glance of my fellow turkey compadre. I like to make some form of social contact with the people who choose to eat the same thing as me. Don't you feel some form of kinship for the person who proudly orders the banana cream pie or a Makers and Ginger? Well I do, OK?

First I noticed the green beans, neatly stacked on the second half of the recyclable container that held the turkey. That seemed normal. But the meat slices were oddly stacked right on top of one another. I had one of those 70's TV commercial flashback moments were you make a gesture of pondering and think out loud, "I've never seen the server stack the meat slices right on top of one another like that before."
Next he went for the potatoes. And he began to put them directly on top of the meat carefully ensuring they did not mix with the beans. As a believer in the school of 'All dinner items are to be separated by a comfortable margin,' I also found this odd. They could touch the turkey but couldn't touch the beans. That's a new strain of ADD. I ended up making the same finger to chin motion and once again thought out loud, "I've never seen anyone actually put the potatoes directly on top of the turkey."

But my amazement suddenly became skepticism. He was taking an alarming amount of potatoes. Enough for 8 Irish kids on St. Patty's Day. After spoonful number 7, I couldn't take my eyes off of this. Did this person think you could get high freebasing instant potatoes? Is he sharing this with someone? If he is, do they like the meat to be hidden underneath a mound of potatoes?

And then it became clear. He started smoothing over the potatoes certain to make sure you could not see even a glimpse of meat. The gravy was merely the gravy on this caper. There was no way this was above board. He had to be planning to steal the turkey. But why? How? What if he gets caught? How ridiculous will that look having to explain to your superior that the cafe detained you for stealing carved meat? What are you going to tell you parents? I lost my job at ESPN for stealing 4 dollars worth of turkey?

Or maybe he's weird and we don't have a food kinship. Maybe this person plans on paying for the turkey no one can see. Maybe he can't eat turkey unless it is chewed with potatoes simultaneously at an 8 to 1 potato to meat ratio. Maybe his parents did this at his Thanksgiving. Maybe they spent Christmas putting presents under the tree in the backyard claiming initially that this is what the Bible said to do, only to use the global warming excuse once it became hip. Or maybe he likes potatoes more then Pookie likes crack.

By this point the turkey carver had hit the highest level of frustration with me. It must have been the 7th time he said, "SIR, YOUR TURKEY SIR," demanding I take the container from his outstretched arm. Amazingly, the suspect hadn't noticed that my lunch distraction was because I was on to him. He was focussed on the task at hand and not giving off the slightest hint of what he was attempting to get away with. He'd done this before.

I had to know. Was he really going to risk the consequences of getting caught stealing turkey by actually trying to steal turkey? He was already in line, 3 deep from the front of the register, it means I had 2 minutes tops to get within earshot of the transaction. I'm hoping someone uses a credit card to pay, it would add 15-20 precious seconds. I scanned the room. No one seemed on to him. There was the producer who was making a salad complaining about every ingredient he put in it, "Uuch, carrots are juliened, I hate juliened carrots. Uuch, beets, my mother always forced me to eat beets and then my tongue would turn purple."
There was the cute intern contemplating if anyone will notice if she purchases a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos.
There was one of my bosses saying important things to important people.
No one and I mean no one saw this. And it was right in front of their eyes.

I felt like Sherlock Holmes if Sherlock Holmes bothered to solve crimes that wouldn't be eligible for a spot on Judge Joe Brown. The next few seconds were a blur. Like a cheetah, I had gathered two pieces of white bread, flung some cranberries on top, charged across the room to grab the last peach/white tea and got in line, just two spots behind the suspect and just at the moment he was ready to tell the woman at the register what he is having.

I never understood the clearly marked bold print sign in front of every register that always seemed so inappropriate to me. It reads, "HAVE ALL CONTAINERS OPEN FOR THE CASHIER. THANK YOU." That lack of trust was alarming. People lie so often about what they were having that the Cafe had to make a doctrine forcing you to have your lunch visually inspected? Apparently, this ain't the first time someone would try to steal turkey. Enforcing this rule meant the cashier had to specifically ask someone to open their container. Do they just know who looks suspicious? "Look at him, does he look like the type of person who'd have a grilled chicken sandwich WITHOUT cheese. I know there is cheese in there."
It's like when you get randomly pulled out of the security line at the airport. Do I look like someone who might be stealing turkey? Isn't that some form of cafe discrimination?

I leaned over the shoulder of the person in front of me in an attempt to catch what he was saying and see if he'd actually take the risk of opening his container. This was unnerving for that customer. We all know that any kind of movement simulating an attempt to either get in front of or pressure them to move faster is bad line manners. The message was sent loud and clear with the huff I got in response so I recoiled. I didn't hear what was said and I wasn't sure if he opened his container or not. I was going to miss the pay off. What kind of stake out was this? How could I call myself an investigative reporter? The good news is I don't, but that's not the point.

I only had one last option. Panicked I would never know the truth, it came to me. I stepped out of line and made a gesture as if I had forgotten something. Then I took one step forward toward the register and did a sweeping crane move of my neck to do a full survey of the cafe appearing as if I was looking for something. And there it was. The dollar amount clear as day on the register. $2.16. The turkey by itself cost more then that. He only admitted to the beans and the potatoes, and even went so far as to not even admit to the large serving of potatoes otherwise we would have been bordering on 3 bucks pal. The nerve.

I watched him slowly gather his utensils and napkins and walk out into freedom. It was the perfect fowl crime. I learned something today. There's a life lesson in there somewhere. It just hasn't become clear exactly what it is. I need Phil Jackson to help explain it.

Yesterday I interviewed Kurt Warner and the guy who won the hot dog eating contest last year. And yet that wasn't nearly as spine tingling as the case of the stolen turkey breast.

Put that in your Vuvuzela and smoke it

2009-06-29T05:08:00.000-07:00

In a story shifting scene from "The Devil wears Prada," Meryl Streep's Miranda character explains in mocking fashion to her naive assistant Andy (Anne Hathaway) the difference between near identical turquoise belts made by different name designers. Andy giggled as Miranda had trouble choosing which belt the dense model would wear for the magazine's photo shoot. Miranda sharpened her glean through $1000 dollar sunglasses and broke it down ghetto style. Andy was wearing a typical Gap cartigan, a style that made it into her lower middle class hands after high fashion had done away with the look and hue. So, in a way, Andy was trying to be fashionable even if she didn't know it. Miranda's fictional fashion magazine decided for her what she'd wear long before it even became affordable to the paupers of the world.
The next day, Andy shows up in Stewart Wetzman heels and a smart Chanel suit. She got served!

I couldn't help but think of this moment while I was watching the Confederation's Cup Final between the US and Brazil. Why do we as United States sports fans mock soccer? All other team sport came after soccer and all import some element of the game. American football uses consistent tactical breaks to see up choreographed strikes, basketball emphasizes the idea of space and skill mismatches allowing for the stars to operate within the context of a team. Baseball and soccer are both boring and hockey and soccer are the exact same game except one is played on ice.

Yet there we were in the ESPN news room, in my opinion, the epicenter of sports television locked onto the US-Brazil match. Guffaws after Tim Howard saves and wild outbursts after the Americans took a two goal lead proved that at least for this day, soccer ruled the sporting universe. You see, in our world, the Devil wears mouse ears. Like Miranda, ESPN decides which sports are important and at least for a day, something called the Confederation's Cup was that choice. In turn, the MLS is this example's version of the Gap. If you end up giving America's pro soccer league a chance, it's because we told you to. Oddly enough, one of the stars of the US team on this very day was a man who plays for the Crew. Not J Crew.

With the ESPN newsroom on board, the merits of argument began. Did the US give away a would be historic win? Or was the blown 2 goal lead more in line with what we do to other countries in international basketball? We may lose here or there, but in general our Dream Team is going to embarrass you.
And then came the most important question of the day. What the hell is that incessant buzzing?

Turns out the South African soccer fans all addicted to the use of the Vuvuzela, a plastic horn that when used properly can give the Shofar a run for it's money for most annoying sounds. As far as I know, the Shofar (A rams horn blown during the Jewish High holidays) is not used by Israeli fans at sporting events in unison. Otherwise, I'd assume rams would be an endangered species. The Vuvuzela however is a must have in South Africa. And when blown in unison, the sound I heard was a constant swarm of wasps. Others like the LA Times called it "a herd of flatulent elephants." Either way, it's among the most annoying noises sports has ever accepted.

So here we are in the ESPN News room, home of sports BROADCASTING discussing the merits of turning down the sound on the televisions in protest to the Vuvuzela. In the end, that would be blasphemy so we sucked it up. But the constant room commentary on the match never got too far away from the background noise.
"What a great pass, he probably could have finished there wasn't someone screeching in his ear."
"Do South Africans have an overwhelming population of deaf people?"
"Man I thought just watching soccer was torturous, but this takes it to a whole new level."

I, on the other hand found it soothing. Having an infant in the house, I've gotten accustomed to the use of static noise to help soothe her when she gets ready for sleep. The Vuvuzela was a little more intense, but once you've gotten used to the noise from Poltergeist as a sleep agent, a few plastic horns during a soccer match was actually quite comforting. But I was in the minority here. The outrage to the Vuvuzela ranged from mere annoyance to the potential for commitments to nut houses. This was not a good day to have a bipolar producer.

But it turns out on this day, even ESPN was behind the curve of this sporting controversy. The merits of banning the Vuvuzela have been in debate. And with the sporting planet truly watching next summer when the World Cup begins play in South Africa, a decision must be made. Will FIFA determine the Vuvuzela is so annoying it will ruin their showcase event.
Defenders in South Africa are already suggesting a ban would infringe on their freedom of speech. Or in this case, a freedom of screech.

It got me thinking, have there been bans of popular fan items in the past? And the answer is yes. The Beach ball is seemingly harmless fun while it bounces around section 124, but once it hits the playing field, the game has to be delayed while an outfielder attempts, often in futile fashion, to pop it.
The Air Horn. You only have had to experience the surprise air horn exposure by your over-zealous row mate to know why this had to go. The Redskins got a nondescript first down on a typical September Sunday when the guy wearing the Dave Butz jersey whipped out the air horn and unloaded it 3 inches from my right ear. He got a cheer, I saw an ENT. Imagine 90,000 people with air horns. Dogs would march out of the county in unison.

It also got me thinking, maybe there are some more things that need to be banned. Like Thunder Sticks.
Thunder Sticks are a bad idea. Give two inflatable objects to all fans and implore them to bang them together at all times. What could go wrong?
Other then noise, everything. There's the kids who turns on his neighbors, the poor sight lines in the most expensive seats and this realty, the fact that no one has missed a free throw because of them.

In the same vain, the spinning wheels that have become so popular behind baskets. These were used by hypnotists in the 60's. What if this thing actually makes fans believe they had a good time at a Clippers game. "I loved it, it was much better then Cats. I'm going to see it again and again."*

The Wave. Haven't we had enough of this anyway? In fairness, it does deserve it's place in the pantheon of greatest multi fan cheers with 1) row of fans each wearing one painted letter on their fat bellies 2) whistling at tennis players over complaining 3) The guy at the Jets games who gets up on his buddies shoulders and leads a J-E-T-S cheer.
But it's time is up. I actually refuse to partake in the wave hoping my one protest will put a ripple in this inane activity. We don't jitterbug anymore, we don't use Diesel gas and we certainly don't do the wave.

Eagles fans, with the lone exception of at Eagles home games. Between throwing raw meat at nuns, removing the wheels of a vehicle in a stadium parking lot because the license plate was from Maryland, and an overall poor attitude that surprisingly is infectious, these people are a complete menace to society. They should be banned from any and all away Eagles games, and arrested if they attempt to enter any game not involving the Eagles at all.

Jumbo hot dogs. The decision to buy the jumbo hot dog isn't made out of hunger. It's not the only food item available. But it is the worst food food item available. Considering I likely am blazingly drunk by this point of the game, watching someone eat an oversized wiener slathered in condiments (I have particular disdain for relish) makes me want to vomit.

The Canadian National Anthem. Is this really necessary to air when the Orioles play the Blue Jays? How many of the Blue Jays are actually from Canada? Out of respect for the empire, Toronto must still play the Star Spangled banner before all home games. They can choose whether they want to play the Canadian National Anthem in their own park. You can thank me later Canada.

All that said, there are some merits to the Vuvuzela. Some people are so dumb, they don't know how to use it. According to one report, many of the plastic horns were brought back to store amid claims they were defective. Turns out, the users didn't know how to blow hard enough to make the noise. I would imagine the cost of a ticket to see the Confederation's Cup isn't cheap. How someone who can't figure out how to use a kazoo was able to garner the money needed to gain entry to a world class soccer event is beyond me. But then again, people passed out from excitement when the King of Pop took the stage, even though they bought a ticket to his concert meaning they had to know he was actually going to take the stage.

Plus, here we are all high and mighty claiming this device is ruining the game experience while the Nationwide Nascar race is on the next monitor over. People who go to Nascar races wear those giant headphones employed by the grounds crew at a busy airport. How is that an enjoyable experience?
"What do you think of ZOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM ride?"
"WHAAATTTT?"
"WHAT DO YOU THINK OF ZZZZZZZOOOOMMMIIIINNNNNNNNGGGGGGGG RIDE?"
"I"D LOVE A JUMBO HOT DOG. GET ME SOME ZOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMM HOMES."
"I AIN"T NO GAY."
"ZZZZZOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMM NOBODY YOU'RE GAY BECAUSE THEY FROWN ON THAT HERE."

In the end what will be telling is this. If the Vuvuzela makes it's way to a Seattle Sounders game, it will be because making a stadium sound like a wind tunnel full of bats is hip. And it won't be by accident. As Miranda might put it, this fate had already been decided for us.

*Check out this SNL goodie from the past.. You'll love it.. It is much better then Cats and you'll want to watch it again and again

The Wrath of Khan

2009-06-27T06:25:00.000-07:00

Among the most reoccurring fan delusions is the belief that they could run their team better then the person currently in that position. Everyone is a GM. Ignore the fact that without experience, the average person couldn't figure out how to work the fry machine, there remains an inate feeling that because we watch sports closely, how hard could it actually be to pick the right players. Isn't it obvious that Peyton Manning is good and Ryan Leaf is bad?

I covered a team ridiculed by it's fervent fan base. The Redskins over payed free agents, lacked team chemistry due to an annual drooling over everyone's else's players and treat draft picks like they are confederate currency. Discussion of a coup de tat of the front office was a failsafe segment for my daily radio shows. Nothing going on in the world? Lets open the phone lines and discuss Adam Archuleta!
But having been behind those scenes enough to get a better understanding of how their team is actually built, to simplify it as one bad decision here, one bad decision there is naive. It's like blaming the CEO for the failure of financial institutions. How uninformed must one be to believe one person (exception: Bernie Madoff) is the reason AIG/Lehman Bros/IndyMac failed. And on a much smaller scale, the one general manager can't be the one person to blame.

That said, every so often a general manager comes along so in above his head, you can't help but believe that the average fan with delusional aspirations could indeed do a better job. Was it the 4th straight year Matt Millen used a top ten pick on a wide receiver that gave it away or was it any of the other absurd moves he made?

Today's case subject is Minnesota Timberwolves GM David Kahn. Now the jury is out because he just assumed the role not more then a couple of months back, but early reviews suggest Minnesota could easily slip into the pantheon of sports most laughable franchises.

Exhibit A) He cans Kevin McHale despite improved play by a young completely outmatched team. McHale had a close relationship with draftee Kevin Love, the one piece of the future there. And the unified team protest over this decision was nothing short of alarming.
Now in fairness to Kahn, he was replacing McHale as chief decision maker. Should McHale have stayed in this lesser capacity, (even if he was the best choice to remain as coach) the prospect of Kahn being undermined in his decisions was possible. And lets not kid ourselves, McHale gave Kevin Garnett to Boston. His legacy as a GM will be defined by this decision.

Exhibit B) Come draft night, the team had yet to replace McHale as coach. Now here is where things start to become curious. Because exhibit C will suggest that there is a distinct plan in place as to the style of play the Timberwolves plan to implement, yet without a coach in place, you wonder if whoever takes that job will be forced into a brainwashing of whatever revolutionary plan Kahn is scheming. Because what happened draft night is simply illogical.

Exhibit C) Minnesota would shape the 2009 draft. They moved Mike Miller and Randy Foye to Washington for the 5th overall pick and a host of players the Wizards wanted off their books. It made Kahn the big swinging dick in the room. 4 first round picks, two in the top 6. You want to deal, you have to go through Minnesota. The only problem was outside of top pick Blake Griffin, anyone who knows anything about drafts called this one one of the weakest in years. Even the Clippers were certain not to be naive enough to take any bait to trade out of the top selection.
Still, Kahn had room to maneuver, yet in the end was unable to accomplish anything but confuse the basketball world.
I was on the air the other day when we ran Chad Ford's 8 millionth mock draft and I couldn't help but notice his decision to earmark Tyreke Evans and Stephen Curry as his choices as the 5th and 6th pick, both to Minnesota. I think I screeched something to the tune of, "Well, that's not going to happen. The only way that goes down is if they are dealing one of the two picks." Turns out I was wrong. Ford was wrong. Those in favor of logical reasoning was wrong.

Not only did Kahn select point guards with the 5th and 6th overall pick, he skipped over Curry and selected Syracuse guard Johnny Flynn. Curry figures to play point guard, but certainly might be best served as a two. His best attribute is his shooting. If you are going to go the route of selecting two players who play the same position, wouldn't it make more sense to take one that actually is versatile?
The Globetrotters don't play two point guards at the same time. 8 year old rec league teams don't play two point guards at the same time for fear of someone gettin up in someone's bizness. Now lets say the T-Wolves just selected Magic Johnson and Bob Cousy. I still don't know how it would work, but at least they'd have taken two freakish talents. But they didn't.
And the one that might be the revolutionary talent, Ricky Rubio is already having cold feet about going to Minneapolis, no pun intended.

Ricky Rubio's Dad told a Spanish newspaper five seconds after he was drafted by the Timberwolves that his son might play in Spain two more years. Five minutes after that Donnie Walsh tells the New York media he plans to call Minnesota to see if they'll trade Rubio. Ten bucks says if the Knicks picked Rubio, Dad would have bought tickets to see Les Miserables for the night before the season opener.
And so it begins. Rubio knows Minneapolis ain't Madrid. And at 18 with millions coming from someone at some point, why bother suiting up for a team without a coach meantime walking into a scenario where in all liklihood he's fighting just to be the starter. Rubio has all the leverage, a fact that likely was the reasoning behind him not going 3 to Okalhoma City or 4 to Sacramento. They knew this was coming. Balls in your court now Kahn.

We all know how this is going to play out. Rubio is going to threaten to stay in Spain unless he gets dealt. Because the T-Wolves have Flynn, they can afford to make that move but in the end they'll have had four four first round picks and netted not one impact player! Meantime, Ty Lawson (taken at 18 by Minnesota) might have been the best of the three choices and they gave him away without even considering the alternative. Curry, who they passed over, turns out to be a productive player. Rubio stars on a big stage. Flynn plays on a bad team that doesn't get better and Kahn's penis shrivels back into his pelvis. It ain't swinging any more..

Joe got Bucked

2009-06-22T15:32:00.000-07:00

There are three different types of sports broadcasters.
1) Crazy geeks that know every stat about every team (including Arena Football, cricket rankings, history of Pilot Pen Tennis tournament). They are remarkable savants who arguably have no lives. The ones who have figured out how to disseminate this information in an entertaining manner however become wildly successful cottage industries, see Mel Kiper Junior.
2) Mr. Mail it in. You don't need to have worked in TV or radio to know who these people are. They are typically quite attractive, certainly smooth on air, but when you hear them speak, you know that everyone coming out of their mouths have been force fed to them by someone who actually knows what they are talking about.
3) The Sports renaissance man. The dreamer. They know who Andy Warhol is and who John Coltrane was. They believe in their heart of hearts that if just given the chance, they won't be reading WNBA highlights, they'll be rivaling Jimmy Kimmel.

I live in that alternate third universe. I scoff at the big business in quoting the Octomom, yet realize the pool I'm swimming in is not exactly going to be discussed by the Harvard review. We guppies swim to the T.O. housing search chum.
Among the successful group 3 sportscasters, Craig Kilborn, Keith Olbermann, Tony Kornhesier, Howard Cosell, Bryant Gumbel, Bob Costas (although he rarely steps completely out of sports nor goes for late night laughs)..

Joe Buck tried to cook in a hot kitchen and got burned. And it is this example that dreamers like myself loathe.
I was watching some HBO program prior to the debut of his new talk show billed as a mix of sports and entertainment and must have had a particular look on my face because my wife immediately chimed in, "Are you jealous he got this? You have talked about doing something like this forever."
Yes and No. I'm not delusional. I want to be as popular as Joe Buck to get this type of opportunity, but I'm fully aware that only 24 people follow me on Twitter. There is one thing however I was not and no one should be jealous of in the least bit. Joe went for it on live television. Letterman doesn't go live. Conan doesn't go live.
Here is Joe Buck, talk show neophyte showing off his pimples without putting on any Oxy-10. And he's not calling a Vikings-Texans game. This is very unfamiliar territory. Buck fancies himself a Chris Rock and gosh darn it, he's going to go for laughs. And, honestly, his show bombed. The planned bits fell on their face. His monologue was monotonous. Buck does not have comedic timing so his jokes fell flat, and appeared as if they weren't written by professionals.
His interview gets were top rate. But truthfully, anyone could have asked Brett Favre 10 questions about whether he was going to actually play for the Vikings.

Everything changed when Buck lined it up for his final guest segment of the night. Scheduled roundtable, the guy who plays Joe Biden on SNL, actor Paul Rudd, and Howard Stern sidekick Artie Lange. By now you already know what happened. Lange rhetorically asked if Joe Buck perused I suck cock dot com after Buck admitted he likes to check out TMZ. It all went downhill from there.

Lange certainly torpedoed the segment. The hijacking happened for any number of reasons, A) (as a Howard Stern fan I'm aware of) Lange's recent dive into a life of heroin addiction and (if you take their show at face value) his recent rehab and withdrawal. Lets not kid ourselves, screwing Joe Buck isn't the strangest thing a drug addict will have been accused of doing. B) The easiest way for a comedian to get some quick free press is to piss on someone else's forum. Artie claims ignorance to this and seems almost aghast at the attention it brought. And, somehow, I actually believe he didn't concoct this. He was recently on heroin, lets not turn him into a diabolical schemer. C) Artie was just trying to be funny, and in doing so, went in the direction he's accustomed to. Buck admitted that he didn't have a prior relationship to Lange.

So Joe Buck in his first show attempting to do comedy asked a heavyweight to get into the ring with him, on LIVE television. Truthfully, what happened is his fault.
Lange ripped Buck's show. Buck's show sucked. That's not arguable. Now whether Lange owed Buck a more respectful way of expressing that opinion is what's in debate. Lange obviously is a sports fan, so lets say Lange is invited into the Fox booth for the NFC title game and given the open mike. Now lets assume he embarasses himself. Is Joe Buck within his rights to ridicule Lange in front of America at this point?

So what have we learned today. Having Artie on your show is not a bad thing, just make sure it's taped and have one thing that's funnier then him on before he appears. That can't be that hard. Ooh, and Joe Buck should probably stick to calling Brewers games. Turns out he's a category one.

Europe Rules!

2009-06-18T17:44:00.000-07:00

They sold Kaka for 130 million pounds/euros/lira/shekels. Now if they can sell Kaka for some ungodly sum, then what is Kobe worth? (That is the single greatest sentence I have ever written to this date)

I ask for the purpose of this discussion that if you are like me and have a hard time saying Kaka without thinking about Kaka, that you just try. Try hard not to be a seven year old. Kaka is a soccer player. And truth is, that's funnier.

Apparently Kaka is a rediculously good soccer player. He goes by one name. Only entertainers of grandure and athletes of the most prominence reach that form of legendary status. There's Kobe, Magic, LeBron, Cher, Madonna, Bono. And apparently, there is Kaka.

They say everyone has a price. Kaka's is 130 million whatevers. That's not to diminish the value. It's an absurd sum, I just can't bother trying to figure out how much it actually is. And here's the best part. That's what one team paid another team just for his contractual rights. We haven't even gotten to his contract yet. Think about this for a moment. When Jeffrey Loria bought the Florida Marlins back in 2002, he paid 158 million dollars. Forbe's estimated the value 5 years later to be 143 million because the team had failed to secure a new stadium. The right to have the negotiating rights to Kaka cost as much as a two time World Series champion.
And we scoff at soccer. Their stars are worth more then our teams!

The most popular sport in the world allows it's leagues and team to do business in this manner. So why don't we? Lets cut this 'We signed an NFL free agent to a 100 million dollar contract six minutes after free agency began even though we weren't supposed to be talking with their agent until six minutes ago' crap out. Or if lightning actually strikes the Clippers and Blake Griffin becomes everything everyone expects of him, then why don;t we just let Donald Sterling do what his heart of hearts desires, sell him to a different team. And why not just skip the stupid formality of actually wondering where CC Sabbathia or Alex Rodriguez or Mark Texiera might sign when their contracts come up. Gee, I wonder who's going to get them? Let the Indians sell CC.
This in turn would force the owners to be truly accountable. They want public money for a publicly built stadium, then give the buying public what they want, an open checkbook.
Why not? Think of the possibilities. T.O. wouldn't be sold for popcorn. Crazy Chad Ochocinco might though.
Consider the ability of the lesser markets who fleece the right owner for the right player and what that added revenue might mean for their shrewd general manager. Screw the cap. Screw free agency. Lets make this a true free market sports system. It is the American way.

That other little thing they do that makes me get goose bumps is an issue for another day. Earning your way in and out of the top leagues. If you suck, you can get shipped into an inferior league! Wouldn't we all be better off not having to pay any attention to the Memphis Grizzlies? Of course, they could always spend some money and play their way out of the D-League.

Headline of the day: Homos leads Egypt over Italy.

Kobification

2009-06-15T07:52:00.000-07:00

In fairness to Kobe Bryant, never has any other star basketball player been forced to win a 4th title to solidify his so called greatness. But then again, Magic never demanded Kareem be banished. And MJ never said Scottie was too much in his spotlight.
For seven years, America (me included) has rooted against Kobe Bryant for one simple reason, his ego was revolting.

It appears as if Kobe pretended to be Michael Jordan so much as a child, he has fooled himself into believing he is him. From the mannerisms, to his ego, to his pattern of speech, to his lack of interest in being behind anything of political merit, Kobe is MJ, only underwear companies don't feel like he's the safe face of their company.
The marketing of the greatest champion of the post MJ era has been stunted for obvious reasons: 1) rape charges 2) ugly break up with Shaq. And for not so obvious reasons: complete pain in the rear end.

The league and advertisers however are at a crossroads now though. The truth is, the sporting world wants nothing more then a Kobe versus LeBron epic Finals match-up and so on some level, everyone is rooting for him to win. Nike was so certain it was going to happen, they started making those low end puppet commercials that now seem only to demean LeBron. Kobe is slick and cool, LeBron is stuck playing ping pong with an annoying kid. He's the 21st century personification of the Bert character from Sesame Street. Bert always came in second.
Vitamin Water has made interesting yet nonsensical ads comparing Kobe and LeBron perpetuating the current NBA argument, who's the better player. Various quotes make the case for both and then for some reason, there is a lame attempt to explain why both are so good, "They get their vitamins." Did they need an advertising department to come up with that pitch? That could have had a fill in the blank portion at the end. Kobe and LeBron are great, everyone knows it. But who's better? That debate rages for another day, but there is one thing have in common that makes them great: 1) Vitamin Water 2) They wear boxer-briefs 3) They both drive Chevy Cobalts (hurry up GM, get in while you still have cars) 4) They like Frutistas from Taco Bell 5) They know Drama..
This is now.. How far we have come.

In the annals of great American warfare, Kobe versus Shaq has risen above the Spanish-American War coming in 6th behind World Wars 1 and 2, Vietnam, Korea, and Brad Pitt versus Jennifer Aniston.
Shaq, being everyone's favorite goofy giant was masterful through this. Behind the scenes, there is no way that Shaq could have been an innocent bystander to the Kobe bus that ran him over. Truth was, Shaq got fat in the off-season and obviously could have given a crap about the regular season. Shaq was getting older and considering the two stars were needling each other at every turn, the Lakers had to make a choice. Shaq was certainly no innocent in that, but because the media enjoyed Shaq's ability to turn it into light fodder for the tabloids, Kobe was left playing the role as villain. Shaq goes to karaoke bars unannounced and would freestyle raps asking how Kobe thinks his ass tastes. From just about anyone else, this would be considered deplorable behavior. From Shaq, it's kitschy.
After three titles with no end in sight, it was perceived that Kobe decided it was time to show the world he didn't need Shaq. And thus began the media's quest to make sure Kobe had to win again to live up to this legacy he wanted to build. The me me and only me legacy.

Phil Jackson had won 9 championships, 6 with the MJ Bulls teams and 3 with the Shaq-Kobe Lakers. He never wrote a book about how MJ was cancerous to his teams. But that's exactly what he did with Kobe Bryant. Phil Jackson, the so called zen master, a man who compartmentalizes his feelings and rarely is caught divulging anything that can't be second guessed as mere motivation. Sure, he used to push Kobe's and Shaq's buttons when they played together, but that was all in the name of winning. When he had time to think about it, and apparently Phil thinks a lot, he buried Kobe as an un-coachable egotist. This from a man who is emoting the school of thought that if you have nothing good to say, don't say anything at all.
It's still amazing that Phil returned to the Lakers and that Kobe accepted him back. Considering how the Shaq war went, it was safe to say that Kobe is the super power of that relationship. It's like Reagan and Gorbechev meeting at a Moscow bar to have some belly laughs over that silly cold war thing.

There are two things that you never want to be accused of: being a racist or a rapist. No one really knows what happened in that Colorado hotel with the receptionist. All Kobe admits to was consensual sex. And the case never got to the bombastic point where the girl told her side of the story. Still, the insinuation remains. Unless the victim turns out to be an unadulterated fraud (not the case in this particular instance), this is an event that no one's reputation can survive without always carrying a blemish.
Further tarnishing the legend of Kobe was his discussion with investigators that he should "do what Shaq does and pay these women off." No explanation is necessitated here to explain why Kobe fell out of favor. The oldest code in the book is guy code and he broke it big time. The worst part of it was, Shaq had nothing to do with this particular thing, why his name even came up is nonsensical other then to believe that Kobe thought telling the police something about Shaq would get him in their good favor and make this whole thing go away. Instead it blew up in his face.

In the aftermath of all of these events, Kobe Bryant, inarguably one of the greatest players to ever lace them up has been debated. And because of his choices, the media decided to make him prove his worth all over again. He had to win without Shaq. Throw the Daddy out like he's garbage, fine prove you can do this without him. It's funny that no one ever says Dwayne Wade is a good player who can't win without Shaq. And if Shaq ends up in Cleveland and LeBron wins, I doubt anyone is going to say LeBron needs to prove he can win a title without Shaq.
Great teams have great players. Magic might be the face of the 80's Lakers titles, but he wouldn't have won without Kareem or Worthy or Byron Scott. Larry Bird wouldn't have won without McHale or Parrish or DJ. And it's safe to say MJ wouldn't have won without Scottie. The whole idea that great players win championships alone is asinine.

So here is Kobe, finally at the pinnacle again. He's watching his reputation like a hawk. Just watch his interviews, they are short and almost never revealing unless they are about his on court demeanor.
He somehow finagled Spike Lee to do a documentary about him. The premise had nothing to do with his life off the court, even though it's the only thing that is of remote interest. I know Kobe is a smart talented basketball player. What I want to know now is whether he has matured into being a man.
Kobe obviously doesn't mind the national advertising debate of who's better, he or LeBron. And LeBron even more surprisingly doesn't mind being linked to Kobe. In a way, it's the Kings own admission that Kobe is his NBA hill to climb.

When the game ends, the cameras always capture Kobe hugging and kissing his family. There appears to be genuine joy for this moment. Quite obviously, the team, the league and Kobe are very aware of the message this sends. This is no accident that Kobe's family greet him while the national television cameras capture the moment

On the day after Kobe fufilled his own prophecy of winning a title with two different sets of teammates, namely the latest version without one of the greatest centers of all time, the pertinent question is are you Kobified? Can you and do you see him in a rarified light, not just a winner on the court, but one worth emulating off of it?
Career track one was: Egoist, Adulterer, Winner.
Career track two is: Devoted teammate, Family man, Winner.
The Sports historians have a debate for the ages.

The Favre Chronicles

2009-06-10T19:55:00.000-07:00

It's like George Washington cutting down the cherry tree. It's the biggest myth in sports. Can we just stop with the utter nonsense that Brett Favre "is perfectly content cutting his massive lawn for the rest of his life." No one and I say no one is forcing the league to drag them out kicking and screaming more then Brett Favre. And I think there is a case to be made that he is certifiably insane.

Fact: The man poured his heart out to Greta Van Susterin. Here's the lineup Greta Van Susterin has this week: Monday- OctoMom gets parking ticket at grocery store for using spot assigned for "mothers-to be." Is this fair? Tuesday-- What other septuplets think of Jon and Kate. Would they want them as parents? Wednesday-- Dr. Phil and Britany Spears agree to mud wrestle. Thursday-- Lindsay Lohan isn't wearing underwear again and we've got pictures to prove it. Friday-- Brett Favre tells all.
What, Nancy Grace was busy?

Fact: Not once since all this Vikings nonsense started has Favre spoken to anyone, even Greta meaning only one thing, he's coming back, he just hasn't decided when he thinks it would be best to do so. So, forget the fact that Minnesota has been practicing for the last two months, Favre hasn't bothered to even address the issue other then to have his agent patently lie about his intentions. Brett had shoulder surgery, so what says Bus Cook, he's got so many leaves to bag. The Vikings flew to Mississippi to meet with Favre, Bus Cook spins this as Brad Childress likes vacationing in the Delta and eating southern food with his white friends. Brad's favorite movie happens to be Black Snake Moan.

Fact: Favre wants to play for the Vikings. Now I have heard many ex-players in recent weeks who ended their careers with other teams consistently making the point that we (dumb media who know nothing about ever putting on a uniform) need to understand that having the ability to play is fleeting and you should take advantage of every opportunity you can until your body literally won't let you do it any longer. And, well, they have a point. But vindictiveness belongs to the reporters, not to the players. Make no mistake, Favre wants to play for the Vikings for one reason and one reason only. There just is one issue, when did the Paxkers actually wrong him. They offered him 25 million dollars to not play for New York. Can you freaking imagine? If you don't make a fool of yourself, we'll pay you handsomely. You know who didn't get a deal like that? Everyone.
I saw a HBO piece once that followed a group of Packers fans who make an annual pilgrimage to Kiln Mississippi (home of Favre) to help the community in any way they can in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. These people never met Brett Favre, most never been south of Iowa and know nothing about any person in that town. They just felt the need to do it because that town produced a person of such a grandure, they just felt karma dictated this mission.
And now Favre wants to play for one of his team's two biggest rivals so that he can make some kind of point. When he plays at Lambeau and throws a touchdown and those fans boo him at this moment, will it dawn on him that biting the hands that fed you for all those wonderful years might have been a an enormous lapse in judgment?
After being annointed as the poster child of everything good with the NFL and immortalized in Green Bay, he wants to stick it to the people who've made him iconic. It's like Jesus telling his followers he's converted to Islam.

Most guys going through a mid life crisis date a 20 something or buy a Porsche. Brett Favre does everything in his power to ruin his legacy.
And what if things fall apart in Minnesota like they did in New York. Lets say he's throwing five interceptions in a must win December game where Adrian Peterson gets 8 carries. Has he turned himself into the butt of a joke?
He's going to be playing for a coach who is already now known by everyone in the league as an abject liar. Everyone knows Favre wants to play for Minnesota and everyone knows Minnesota wants Favre to play for them. For Childress to say anything to the contrary (and he's doing this every time he opens his mouth) is like that Jon Lovitz pathological liar skit. "Brett Favre is in Minneapolis because he wants to go to a Prince concert. Yeah, that's the ticket."

The Vikings are Favre's Monica Lewinsky. Bill Clinton was a terrific President who will always have an asterisk next to his record. Ended the conflict in Bosnia, put a cigar in an intern's coochie. Balanced the budget, left spooge on a chubby girl's dress.
Bottom line is Favre will always be remembered as a great quarterback. But this has the makings of Bozo running over a group of kindergardeners with a mini vehicle. Whenever someone puts themselves in an inexplicable position like this, it makes you wonder, how far over the cockoo's nest has he gone.
Brett, for the sake of your good name, don't do this. Play for the Redskins. It's Greta approved.

Tweet Tweet

2009-06-08T07:11:00.000-07:00

Over at ye olde ESPN, we have an ever growing list of confirmed Twitter accounts of famous athletes. While I firmly believe Twitter will be soooo 2009 in the very near future, the fact is we are still in 2009, and this technology has some marketability.
Truth is though, does anyone actually care what Charlie Villanueva thinks about the Jonas Brothers? Bad example, but you get what I mean.
The list I'd be more interested in is the ever increasing one of fake Twitter accounts. Their postings are soooo timeless.

For example, Dolphins quarterback Chad Pennington told the Miami Herald that he intends to put out a press release explaining that he wants nothing to do with social networking. If he only had a Twitter account, he could settle this much more efficiently. Press releases are soooooo 1993.
So far though, the fake Chad posts have been harmless, allusions to he and Dancing with the Stars champ Jason Taylor "waltzing the night away." Or another one that suggested Bill Parcells thinks he's working out too hard.
On the other end of the spectrum, Ben Roethisberger had to announce he isn't suffering from a form of skin cancer as the fake Big Ben suggested.
A fake Tony LaRussa recently opined after a series loss to the Cubs, "lost 2 out of 3 but we made it out of Chicago without a drunk driving incident or a dead pitcher." An incensed LaRussa is suing Twitter claiming emotional distress. Legally, he probably doesn't have a leg to stand on, no drunk pun intended. Mockery is one of the truest American art forms, otherwise John Madden would own the rights to Frank TV.
Certainly, the Fake Ben and Fake LaRussa accounts failed the morality test. The hard fast rule is, if you are going to pose as someone else, then the posts need to at the very least be mildly amusing. Skin cancer is not funny, nor is the death of young athletes.

When I was in Washington, two of my favorite blog sites involved mocking local athletes. The Wizznuttz who created an actual "I Fu%@ed Bram Weinstein" teddy bear (at last check, none ever sold) wrote a Kwame Brown song by Michael Jordan. One of the lyrics went something like this, "Kwame. My sweet Kwame. You are my everything. Now I'm the first to admit, that you shoot the rock like ----."
Or there was the fake Todd Collins blog that chronicled the life of the perennial back-up quarterback. It described wild hootenannies involving complicated mixed drinks and hot tub parties in Oakland. That was until Jason Campbell got hurt, and he became the Redskins starter. Then fake Todd Collins turned into an ego maniac. All good clean fun in line with our Constitutional rights.

With Twitter, the pressure is really on. You have 140 characters to make your point and make it good.. Which of course, got me thinking..

For fake Terrell Owens, how about something like: "Buffalo seems like the perfect place for me to finally come out of the closet. I'm finally ready to love me some me."
For fake Guy Junker (Pittsburgh sports radio host and the impetus for even having this conversation. I don't have the time or energy to explain the entire story, it was a had to be there moment): "Troy Palumalu is an illegal alien!" 2) "Mario Lemieux is a degenerate gambler." or my personal favorite, "Terry Bradshaw grew up in polygamy."
For fake Shaq: "Can we all just agree on one thing? Kobe is an ---hole."
For fake Norv Turner: "Listen, hey, uh, we give it LT, then wait, hey, again, we are a good team."
For fake John Madden: "Want to know what my days are like now? When I go Boom!, the toilet gets stopped up."
For fake Calvin Borel: "Ching chong chong, mammy pappy, happy day for me, win lots of pony races."
For fake Pac Man Jones: "At da club. Makin it sprinkle. Need cash."
For fake Michael Vick: "Come here boy. Come here boy. That's a good boy. What a good boy you are."
For fake George Steinbrenner: "Who wants to ride the Steinbrenner baloney pony?" Or "Bruce Springsteen is the boss? My ass."
For fake Tony Romo: "Jessica told me I needed to start acting more like a star and less like Ashlee. So I told T.O. to cut it out. Just cut it out."
For fake Donovan McNabb: "F'ing Jamie Moyer. These meatheads love some old dude who throws 62 miles per hour when all I do is bust my hump every year with no help trying to bring this town a winner. And they give Jamie Moyer a standing ovation, un-freaking real."
For fake Brett Favre: "Why does everyone keep thinking I love cutting my lawn so much it's all I ever want to do. I'm not retarded."
For fake Lance Armstrong: "Man those French take bike racing seriously. If this was the Tour de Wisconsin, they'd probably give us steroids at the switchbacks."
For fake Zack Grienke: "Midwestern girls are easy."
For fake Washington Nationals team twitter account: "Cum see the Nassionals fite the Pyrites Wensday Nite at Natinals Park!"

Now that's a start.. We'll revisit before Twitter becomes a joke of yesteryear. We all know it can't last. Because the biggest issue with Twitter is this, every time I'm about to get my point across I run out of

The Belmont Stakes

2009-06-05T18:06:00.000-07:00

Anyone who knows me knows I love horse racing, but what I have found through the years is I that I actually only really enjoy handicapping the race. Watching always ends in me being dissapointed. So since, the race remains hours away, I offer my thoughts on the race that should under no circumstances be used to make any kind of wager. I know nothing.

For some reason I want to see a triple crown winner. I don't know why. It's not going to change my life in any tangible form. It's not like I can say I've been rooting for Smarty Jones for ever, truth is we are only introduced to these animals a few months in advance of the Derby and no one has any clue which one will win at Churchill Downs, so we have to have a courtship for two weeks heading to the Preakness in the hopes that we'll witness horse racing history.

What I certainly don't want to see is a jockey who has the gaul to stick it to that tradition. He jumps off a Derby winner to ride a different mount in Baltimore? Had Mine That Bird won at the Preakness, I would have rooted for him fervently at Belmont just to think about what Borel might have to wrestle with for the rest of his life, why the %$#^ he would actually get off the Derby winner who had a legitimate shot at a Triple Crown. It's asinine.

But Borel has turned out to be the smartest cookie in the jar this spring. He's ridden two winners, one a phenominal filly, answering the question of whether he did the right thing at Pimlico. But now that Rachel Alexandra is out of the Belmont, Borel is back on the Bird staring down the bizarre footnote. And for reasons I can't explain, I just don't want it to happen. It's all gutteral. I don't want Kobe to win a title without Shaq. I don't know why, I just don't. I like it when Tom Brady beats Peyton Manning. I don't like either the Patriots or the Colts, it's just my leanings. And I don't want Calvin Borel to be bandied about as the greatest jockey ever. It's not that I dislike the man, I just don't want to have to think about it.

Maybe the reason is the back story. Some find the rags (litterally) to riches (sort of) life of Borel inspiring. I don't. Every stereotype of poor boy born into nothing applies. Lets play word association.. You say: "Big Brown." Borel says: "What I did in my mammies front lawn."
He is not Jerry Bailey or the Shoe. Someone who the sport could market as THE icon. He comes off as the character from the Simpsons who "loses Tic Tac Toe to a chicken."
That said, in fairness to Calvin, when he's on any horse in any race, I don't discount him. He's good, real good. Certainly I respect his craft.

So while I hoped for Funny Cide or Big Brown or Real Quiet or Smarty Jones to do it, to win the Triple Crown, I just can't bring myself to get behind this guy on this run. The Triple Crown is won by an animal, not a human. If this happens, I'm going to have to explain to every horse racing novice for the rest of my life why this happened. It's like when I lived in Nebraska and people found out I was Jewish. I'd never really thought that hard about the meaning of circumcisions before.

So being that I watched history fall short year after year after year, the liklihood is Mine That Bird does not win the Belmont and thus, I'm betting that he won't. But, he probably hits the board because the pace figures to be slow and he won't have to overcome a rediculous deficit to be there.
I'm giving three horses a legit shot at beating him.. Dunkirk-- some jackass paid like 4 million dollars for this horse at the annual yearling sale (when the young horses of certain bloodlines are paraded and sold into racedom). This horse might be Curlin, the lightly raced by most talented animal in the field. Curlin finally reared his head in the Belmont the year he enterred the Derby with the horsey hype. Dunkirk also may be the biggest dud in the history of American racing. I call him the ultimate wild card.
Charitable Man-- He's got the best times of the any horse in the field including Mine That Bird. He gets in front at the right time, it's likely Calvin can't catch him.. But "the right time" is the key here. Make your move too quick and you find out just how big those turns are and how long that stretch is at Belmont. This really is a marathon, not a race. And with no obvious rabbitt setting the pace, managing the move is the key to this race..
Chocolate Candy-- In these major stakes races, the truth is 90% of the horses can win. Only a couple of delusional rich people enter woefully overestimated mounts in the field, see Miner's Escape in this race. So finding a horse with a shot with odds isn't hard and that's what makes these races the most fun. You'd never get 15-1 on a horse with an obvious pedigree of ability to win at that level in any other race on any other day. The Breeder's Cup is a full race card of handicapping boners.
Candy was good at Santa Anita falling to Pioneer of the Nile which turned out to be a true contender. The Derby race was a mess but such is the case in a 19 horse field. The trip makes the ride, and Candy's trip sucked.. Pretty good closer and on the rail with no one expected to bolt into his position and box him in, I'd like to think he has a shot at a nice trip here. So that's my shot..
Plus, as a bonus, Jenny Craig owns the horse. Yes, that Jenny Craig. I would love to be watching the telecast and see a cutaway of some woman who can't fit in her luxury box sucking on bons bons revealing the truth, Jenny Craig makes Rosie O'Donnell look like Kate Moss. It would be fabulous for her to have to explain why she named a horse after a food item that turns her clients into chubbies.

Now, without further adieu, the bet.. The odds on Dunkirk aren't high enough for me to warrant taking the shot on him to win.. So I am going to do a trifecta with Charitable Man (the speed) and Chocolate Candy (the odds) on top, pair them Mine That Bird, Dunkirk and Brave Victory to come in some order second and third.. Hope Candy takes it and I hit big..

Let me see your papers Horsey

2009-06-03T17:06:00.000-07:00

Hey Hey, it's the story of the day..

If Calvin Borel was asked to look at a line-up of thoroughbred horses, upon first glance, would he know which one was Mine That Bird? The answer is probably, but there is enough doubt to suggest that an imposter could be used at any time.
That is until I learned of the horse police. You want to run in the big race, you better have your papers Horsey. Identification papers are issued for all race horses. Here's what they duly note: identifiable markings and the tattoo number that is burned into the inner lip of the animal. Yes they tattoo horses lips and no the horse people aren't worried about what the reaction might be should that little tidbit fall into the laps of animal rights folks. The dressed up midgits whipping the animals I'm sure is enough ammunition to make their case.
But back to the point, this weekend's Belmont Stakes could have been thrown for a historical loop. Thieves robbed the trainer for the Derby champ of these papers. Police will suggest they went missing along with a GPS from a vehicle parked on the Churchill Downs property today.
Without these papers, no horse is allowed to run in a race. Which is why trainer Chip Woolley lost his mind while at a press luncheon in New York upon knowledge they were among the items taken. Without the proper ID, Mine That Bird can't be verified and despite any visual evidence to the contrary, say showing Belmont officials zoomed in footage of Mine That Bird winning the Derby, no papers no race.
As it turns out, these papers are easier to get duplicated then a human birth certificate and apparently can be done in a little more then an hour. New pics were taken, the markings were identified by a, uh hmm, horse handler, and all the pertinent prior race information is easily cross referenced. Problem solved.
Except for one little problem. What doesn't make sense is why someone would steal these papers unless they knew exactly what they were looking for. Woolley's truck was burglurized, shattered window. Stolen were two things, a GPS, hardly an item worth risking jail for these days. You can get an old Garmin off EBAY for like 50 bucks. The only other thing taken, Mine That Bird's identification papers, which according to Woolley, he didn't realize were missing until he "reached up to get them," meaning they were likely in the driver's side rearview mirror. Only an idiot smashes someone's window to steal paperwork stashed above a windshield unless they know exactly what that paperwork is. And honestly, only an idiot leaves them there in the first place. That's like saying I put my daughter's social security card in the spokes of a bicycle.
Imagine for a moment what diaboloical plot could be hatched upon having this information. Now you know exactly what this horse looks like down to the areas of discoloration of the skin and of course, the all important tattoo number. So let me go back to my first premise for a moment. Over 100 thousand horse racing fans will descend on Belmont Park this weekend. If a horse that merely looked like Mine That Bird walked onto the track, would anyone even notice it wasn't the real thing?
Mine That Bird has run two rediculous races in the first two legs of the Triple Crown. The jockeys have forced the horse to stay as far back of the pack as possible, almost to the point where you'd wonder if they were trying to lose. Then, as they turn for home, Mine That Bird appears as if he is the heroin overdosing Uma Thurman character from Pulp Fiction when John Travolta stabs her in the chest with a needle full of adrenaline.
If Mine That Bird doesn't respond this time, someone should have the dubious honor of checking the most important identifiable part of this pony, his scrotum. Mine That Bird is a gelding.

Headline of the Day from ESPN News Wires: "Soccer--Kaka, future unknown."

You can't make this stuff up..

Sanchez Hysteria

2009-04-24T05:33:00.000-07:00

Can someone explain why Detroit doesn't want Mark Sanchez? Everyone else does..
Here we are 24 hours from the NFL draft and not one report involves anyone making any kind of move to land Georgia's Matthew Stafford.. Not the Redskins or Browns or Jets or Broncos or Seahawks or even the Rams.. No one wants to take Stafford, except the Lions which says probably everything you need to know..
But the assumption is that the lack of interest to move up to get Stafford has more to do with what you'd have to pay him.. Yet no one seems to have an issue with the notion that Sanchez could go as high as four. It means the difference between the two contracts in terms of cap space and investment would be nominal at best.

The Browns would be willing to deal Brady Quinn if they take Sanchez at five. The Redskins can't stand Jason Campbell so much, they are willing to take whatever they can get for him if they move all the way to four to land the USC quarterback. The Jets haven't had a quarterback they believe in since the 80's.. They want in. The Broncos lost their minds earlier this off-season dealing away a franchise quarterback and now seem on the verge of compunding that mistake by dealing the extra pick they got to land Sanchez. This is what the rumormill is churning out..
All this despite the one person who knows Sanchez best openly questioning whether he was even ready for this. It was so awkward, Pete Carroll staring down the emdia at Sanchez's press conference in January saying in no uncertain terms that the quarterback just flat out would have been better off playing in college one more year..

Now back to Stafford.. Mel Kiper Junior says if for some reason the Lions (who are picking a player based on whether a contract is signed, not who they may deem the actual best prospect) don't take Stafford, the Rams might take him by default. While logic dictates neither the Lions nor Rams have any clue what they are doing if this is how it would play out, it is noteworthy to mention the Rams have never once suggested that Sanchez is a possibility.. So the Lions say it's Stafford or no quarterback. The Rams say it's Stafford or no quarterback.. But everyone else seems to think it's Sanchez over Stafford..
It just seems odd that everyone is willing to take on Sanchez at the wrong price while no one wants to touch Stafford at the right price.

April 19-- Hi, my name is Crazypants, can I coach your team?

2009-04-19T19:24:00.000-07:00

Maybe after he's done being President, Barack Obama will become Mayor of Bismarck.
Does Yo Yo Ma consider an offer to become the conductor of the greater Cincinnati symphony orchestra?
Not unless he's lost his marbles. And for that very reason alone, I am 100 percent convinced that Isiah Thomas is certifiably insane for even considering coaching at Florida International University, let alone taking the job.
Who is his agent, Phil Spector?
How does that phone call go? "Hi, this is Mr. You've-Never-Heard-of-me from an institution that has a basketball team that has never won anything ever.. We'd like for you to coach our team.. What do you think?"
Isiah Thomas: "That depends, do you have any good taco places. I love tacos. (Sounds of paint being huffed in background)"
Mr. YNHOM: "We need you to know that we are restricted by the ammount of money we can offer you..."
Isiah Thomas: "I will be paid in grass clippings. And the athletic department will be banned from the use of real voo-doo dolls. The mighty Zultan bequeaths his blessing."

Isiah Thomas shouldn't be allowed to walk onto the campus of Florida International University without a complete psych work-up.
Two time NBA champion, Hall of Famer, part owner of the Raptors, coach of the Pacers, President and coach of the Knicks, to head coach at FIU.. Does this sound like someone who has all his faculties in tact? Do you think the judge in the sexual harrassment suit is rethinking whether he was fit to stand trial?

For the sake of argument, lets assume this was the best opportunity Thomas had been offered. Still, why take it? He never went to Florida International University so there is no alumni connection. The school has no history of any athletic success and plays in a conference that has no national publicity. And, they couldn't possibly afford to pay him a salary even close to commensorate to what he has become accustomed to.
On every level, by any standard of logic, this makes absolutely no sense. And yet there he was being introduced as the Golden Pathers head coach announcing he'd be willing to work the first year for free.

I've only met one certifiably crazy person in my life. A man who showed up to a DUI hearing intoxicated. A man who spent months in rehab and upon the very day of his release, flew to New York, rented a lavish car (a Lamboghini if I recall correctly), drove it to one of the roughest neighborhoods in the city and bought crack cocaine. The car was subsequently stolen.
He's a big sports fan and coincidentally lives in south Florida so when I asked him what he thought of the Isiah Thomas hiring, he said, "I'm not alone."

I keep hearing people ask questions like, "What will he tell the parents of his recruits about what happened in New York."I think the better question is, "Who are you and what have you done with Isiah Thomas?"
This is meant as no disrespect to FIU, a fine institution I'm sure, but Alan Greenspan isn't teaching business classes at Talladega Community College. If nothing else, the school pulled off a miracle hiring a man of Thomas's stature. They have nothing to lose unless Thomas's coaching techniques include public pagan rituals in the quad.
But at this point, I'd believe anything is possible.