Prior to Manchester United’s 2-1 home defeat of Wolfsburg F.C. in the Champions League earlier today, paying customers at Old Trafford were greeted with programme notes from United manager Alex Ferguson (above), reassuring them they’d made a prudent investment. Portions of those notes were quoted and placed in proper context by the Guardian’s Fiver duo of Barry Glendenning and Rob Smythe, who helpfully characterize Fergie as “a traditionalist who has been in love with Europe’s premier club competition ever since he sneaked into Hampden for Real Madrid’s 7-3 win over Eintracht Frankfurt in 1960.”
“I do not agree the preliminaries are meaningless and simply a money-making exercise,” he said, as a group of hired heavies lifted his new 98-inch plasma on to the wall brackets in the Dave and Paramount Comedy Channel room of his humble 302-up, 302-down abode. “The group system is a league. All sports competitions have a starting point that includes the minnows, from the FA Cup to Wimbledon in tennis, or the Open in golf.
“You can’t start with the FA Cup final, or Wimbledon final and cut out the competitive build-up. When you put it like that, it is nonsense of course. But that has not prevented a spate of recent criticism and accusations of the game exploiting the fans,” he continued, pouring a bottle of Cristal down the sink because one of his team of butlers had served it at 3.141 degrees centigrade rather than the requested 3.142. None of Ferg’s comments, of course, explain why – if it’s not about money – the competitive build-up could not be the early rounds of an unseeded knockout.
Don’t quote to me studies that say Tebow can play. Don’t waste your time, or mine. Every time an expert conducts a new study on concussions, it discovers that the old study and the previous experts were wrong — that the recovery time after a concussion is longer than anyone used to think. And right now, experts think it takes at least two weeks to recover well enough from a concussion to resume normal activity.
Do you think playing quarterback in two weeks against the enormous and fast LSU defense qualifies as “normal activity”?
Urban Meyer has the chance, the obligation, to be a good man. He needs to ignore Tebow when Tebow says he’s ready, because that’s what players say. They say they’re ready. And he needs to ignore the doctors when the doctors speculate Tebow is ready, because that’s all doctors can do on concussion recovery. They speculate. And you know what? The health of a human being is too important to be left to speculation and wishful thinking.
With Cleveland having announced the termination of Eric Wedge earlier today, the MLB Death Watch turns to Orioles skipper Dave Trembley, who’s compiled a brutal 20-49 mark in the O’s last 69 games. “Trembley,” writes the Baltimore Sun’s Kevin Cowherd, “reminds you of a guy in a knife fight and all he has to defend himself is a swizzle stick…he didn’t have the weapons to compete in the dock-brawl that is the American League East. And everyone knows it.” Change a few of the names and you might confuse Cowherd’s column for an autopsy on another hopelessly overmatched manager whose team gave up on him months ago.
This is a team that desperately needs to inject a winning attitude into its young players before they get beaten down and develop the same 1,000-yard stare as some of the veterans.
This is a team that needs to show its dwindling and dispirited fan base that it won’t settle for the kind of ugly baseball it has seen the past two months.
And that has to start with a fresh face in the manager’s office.
Let’s face it: The Orioles hit rock bottom with this collapse. It’s going to leave a bad enough taste in the players’ mouths in the offseason as it is.
To go into a new season with the same guy calling the shots would be unthinkable.
You don’t have to be Chris Harvard to know a brain-rattling career playing football might lead to significant quality-of-life issues further down the road. But when the NFL has steadfastly denied a correlation between their high-impact, contact sport and brain dysfunction, it’s an awfully big deal when a new study commissioned by the league reportedly shows former players are far more susceptible to Alzheimer’s than the rest of the population. All the more reason for John Kitna (above) to never retire, then.
From the New York Times’ Allan Schwartz, who’s been doggedly pursuing this story for the last few years.
“This is a game-changer — the whole debate, the ball’s now in the N.F.L.’s court,” said Dr. Julian Bailes, the chairman of the department of neurosurgery at the West Virginia University School of Medicine, and a former team physician for the Pittsburgh Steelers whose research found similar links four years ago. “They always say, ‘We’re going to do our own studies.’ And now they have.”
Sean Morey, an Arizona Cardinals player who has been vocal in supporting research in this area, said: “This is about more than us — it’s about the high school kid in 2011 who might not die on the field because he ignored the risks of concussions.”
All rates appear small. But if they are accurate, they would have arresting real-life effects when applied across a population as large as living N.F.L. retirees. A normal rate of cognitive disease among N.F.L. retirees age 50 and above (of whom there are about 4,000) would result in 48 of them having the condition; the rate in the Michigan study would lead to 244. Among retirees ages 30 through 49 (of whom there are about 3,000), the normal rate cited by the Michigan researchers would yield about 3 men experiencing problems; the rate reported among N.F.L. retirees leads to an estimate of 57.
So the Michigan findings suggest that although 50 N.F.L. retirees would be expected to have dementia or memory-related disease, the actual number could be more like 300. This would not prove causation in any individual case, but it would support a connection between pro football careers and heightened prevalence of later-life cognitive decline that the league has long disputed.
The Michigan researchers found that 6.1 percent of players age 50 and above reported that they had received a dementia-related diagnosis, five times higher than the cited national average, 1.2 percent. Players ages 30 through 49 showed a rate of 1.9 percent, or 19 times that of the national average, 0.1 percent.
There’s considerable outcry around the globe over the United States’ attempts to extradite Roman Polanski, but Your Kid’s Not Going Pro’s Bob Cook refuses to join the chorus in support of the former Mr. Sharon Tate. “if someone who committed a crime like Polanski’s was found to have slipped through the background-check cracks and was now coaching your child’s team, or your niece’s team, or was your local Catholic priest/soccer coach,” wonders Cook, “would you say, ‘Eh, he’s brilliant, it was a long time ago — let him coach.’ Or would you say, ‘How in the FUCKITY FUCK FUCK did this league let him near children?’” Well, it depends. Would he autograph my copy of “Knife In The Water”?
Bob, you say, Roman Polanski, one of the great directors of our time, is never going to waste his life teaching soccer to 6-year-olds in the suburbs. And, Bob, you say, Polanski has long proven himself no threat to society — he doesn’t start romantic relationships with 15-year-old actresses anymore. And, Bob, you say, the man had a hard life, full of tragedy.
But the fact remains that if this were Roman Polanski, pipefitter, instead of Roman Polanski, filmmaker, legally speaking this would not be a guy who gets petitions on his behalf. He would be the kind of guy parents take up a petition against to get him to stop coaching the girls’ field hockey team. Are we parents overprotective about having this kind of person around? You bet. But I’m sure Martin Scorsese, one of the backers of the Free Roman Polanski petition, would shudder a little if he ever thought someone who plied a 13-year-old with champagne and Quaaludes, and forced himself upon her, was coaching his kids’ teams.
Even though I’ve more or less given up on what used to be my favorite NBA team — and have seen my alternate favorites announce that they’ll be bringing Blake Griffin off the bench in favor of a guy who looks like an extra from the recent remake of The Hills Have Eyes — I still get excited for this time of year, basketball-wise. There’s still a sense of hope in most clubhouses, Eddy Curry might be under three-bills, the professional curmudgeons haven’t had time to declare themselves “disgusted” yet (although the Lakers wearing Manny Ramirez wigs on media day will surely give Bill Plaschke something to mash his keypad about), and players patiently explain to the assembled media what they did in the offseason.
Usually, this means tattoos. Yeah, Matt Bonner became a Canadian citizen and Kevin Durant kicked his flaccid raps in that goofy Nike Hyperize commercial, but for the most part: tattoos. Last fall around this time, Stephen Jackson broke down his brilliant offseason ink, and it made me glad. It’s like the old back-to-school feeling, except there are no tests or grades (so it’s like Bob Huggins-era Cincinnati) and everyone’s really overstated and immature and on their own shit (so it’s like Oak Hill Academy). And so, of course, DeShawn Stevenson of the Wizards shows up at media day with a bunch of goofy tattoos. This post by John Taylor of the Washington Times — one of the very best Moonie-run papers on this coast — features photos of all three. They are, in order, a tattoo of Abraham Lincoln on Stevenson’s adam’s apple, a stylized fissure running down the top of his forehead (”because I don’t crack,” Stevenson, um, explained) and a backwards “P,” in the Pittsburgh Pirates font, on his cheekbone. Good times, right?
Well, the P being backwards is weird. But the P being there at all — especially given the Fresno-born Stevenson (above) explaining that it’s there in honor of the Pittsburgh Pirates, which he claims as his favorite baseball team — is kind of jarring. “There’s no reason the ‘P’ has to be backward,” Bethlehem Shoals writes at The Sporting News. “I call gang sign,” he adds. I’m not sure what else to call it, personally, and the gang-sign thing makes more sense than… well, how do you get a tattoo backwards, and what’s up with the giant 5’s around Abe Lincoln’s face? Pardon me while I get all esoteric on you:
Stevenson’s Lincoln tattoo is bordered on both sides by the number five, which — like the stylized Pittsburgh P — is pure, familiar Bloods gang semaphore. (I know this from wikipedia, obviously). There are explanations for all that on the other side of that link, but it all goes back to ultra-arcane, byzantinely corny secret-society street gang stylistics. Whether this is just Stevenson being a doofus and getting a bunch of tattoos because he can’t think of anything else to do and me being (a devastatingly handsome masculine version of) Tipper Gore or not, I don’t know. I mean, Abraham Lincoln is on the five-dollar bill, after all, and maybe that’s the only reason why D-Steve thought to put those huge fives on both sides of his neck.
But if Stevenson really did just get a bunch of gang tattoos on his face and neck, that would… really have been fucking stupid of him. At least J.R. Smith can just take down his Twitter page when it gets too five-poppin’ for the Nuggets. Stevenson’s going to have to walk around explaining that the thing on his cheek isn’t a stylized, over-angular “9,” but rather his un-erasable statement of for-lyfe fealty to one of the most deservedly loathed organizations in the world. Or a botched salute to the Andy Van Slyke/Barry Bonds Pirates of the early ’90s. Either way: even Stephen Jackson thinks this isn’t a good look. Thanks to Brendan Flynn and Sid Kapstenel for the links.
But ain’t much that we can do
Except pour brew throughout the crew to make sure we all remember you
And believe me it hurts
To see the boy you broke bread with six feet in the dirt
— Geto Boys, “Six Feet Deep”
“The increasingly ritualized practice of baseball teams spraying and/or consuming bubbly after every postseason achievement has gotten as stale as the carpeting in the Yankees’ plush new clubhouse after Sunday’s deluge,” opined Newsday’s Neil Best in the wake of the Yankees’ clinching the AL East title. A morning later, after the Angels had captured the AL West crown with a boozy salute to drunk-driving victim Nick Adenhart (above), the O.C. Register’s Jeff Miller took a curious approach, both amplifying Best’s remarks (”these volume-10, mosh-pit, brain-cell holocausts have run their course. Baseball doesn’t need any more swim goggles, not this early in the achievement process”) while hailing the tribute to Adenhart as “an act of inclusion, a blind and unadulterated embrace of a lost teammate.”
If you thought they were disrespecting him in their revelry, you didn’t see any of the Angels who approached his locker late Monday night – music still pounding and suds still exploding – and bowed their heads in prayer.
You know, Adenhart even appears in some photos of the clinching party. When a group of Angels returned to the field after the game, they headed toward the warning track in center.
Once there, they pounded their fists on the No. 34 insignia and emptied even more beers over Adenhart’s likeness that has been on that wall since his death.
Then they did something really cool. They stopped, turned around and posed, arms wrapped around shoulders, championship ballcaps askew, untucked T-shirts dripping, hair mopping and smiled for the cameras.
Hovering just above the raucous group, visible, if just barely in some frames, was the face of Nick Adenhart, the forever Angel.
Now that’s a team picture.
The sentiment’s noble enough, I just hope all of those guys took cabs home.
After Newsday’s Alan Hahn had done his best to prepare us for a slim, trim, chisled Eddy Curry Supression Ring, Knicks Media Day resulted in what can safely be called varied reports about the fitness of New York’s lumbering underachiever.
For the first time in years, Curry will take the basketball court with a healthy, well-conditioned body and a relatively clear psyche.- Howard Beck, New York Times
Curry, whose season was a complete waste last year, is also expected to make his preseason debut against New Jersey. He’s lost about 40 pounds but he still looks huge and his conditioning leaves a lot to be desired. Both Walsh and D’Antoni admitted that Curry needs to get in better shape.
If Curry plays well he would increase his trade value and thus the Knicks could clear additional cap space to sign a second superstar to join LeBron. (Until LeBron re-signs with Cleveland we’re assuming that he’s coming.) If Curry plays well he could also opt out of his contract and score a lucrative deal during the off-season. It’s a win-win for Curry and the Knicks…but only if he’s stops overeating and improves his fitness. – Frank Isola, New York Daily News
With Atlanta having won 15 of their 17, who can begrudge the Rockies from taking advantage of every possible break as they cling to their Wild Card berth? “”Greatest. Catch. Ever,” was how Colorado outfielder Carlos Gonzalez described a diving grab / game-ending double play pulled by off by Bambi-killer Clint Barmes to conclude Sunday’s 4-3 victory over St. Louis. But you’ve got to hand it to those folks in Denver ; though they never found Jon Benet Ramsey’s killer, they have raised serious doubts about whether Barmes fielded the ball cleanly, as the Post’s Troy E. Renck explains.
Photos taken by The Denver Post and a spectator in the right-field stands at Coors Field during Sunday’s dramatic 4-3 victory over the Cardinals reveal that second baseman Clint Barmes bobbled the final popup, with one picture showing the baseball on the outfield grass. Barmes rolled on the grass, jumped to his feet and fired to first to double off Albert Pujols to end the game.
But did he catch the ball?
“Only me and Barmes know the truth. It’s the same as (Matt) Holliday touching home plate,” outfielder Ryan Spilborghs said Monday of the controversial slide that clinched the Rockies’ 2007 playoff berth. “It’s better that. it’s (mysterious).”
Barmes could not be reached Monday, but said after Sunday’s game, “It all happened so fast. . . . I think as I was going down it hit my glove and then it went across my body or something. I don’t know. I know I came up with it in my bare hand.”
Quizzed about the play by Renck, SS/ethicist Troy Tulowitzki responded with “who cares now, we won.” Bill McCartney couldn’t have put it any better.
Or more to the point, in the aftermath of Wayne Gretzky bailing on the Phoenix Coyotes last week — with the fiscally challenged franchise about to start the season — the Globe & Mail’s Bruce Dowbiggin points out the Great One received a smidgeon of criticism (most notably from G&M colleague Paul Blair and caring-sharing clotheshorse Don Cherry), no. 99’s iconic status remained secure in several spots.
Gretzky has traditionally received the benefit of the doubt from the media pack thanks to his marvellous career and pleasant demeanour with reporters. Even when he was snared in the Rick Tocchet gambling scandal heading into the 2006 Olympic competition, the NHL legend caught a large break from many in the fourth estate. (One overtaxed Gretzky loyalist called the gambling allegations a “crucifixion”.) Thursday was no exception as many leapt to Gretzky’s defence. Nick Kypreos on The Fan 590’s Hockey Central ripped the NHL for leaving Gretzky on an island while the Coyotes’ bankruptcy drama unfolded. Veteran broadcaster Darren Pang tried to soften Gretzky’s unexplained absence from training camp: “It has bothered and hurt Wayne Gretzky that he has not been at camp.”
Others said he deserved an exemption from criticism based on his contributions to the business in America. “The pot-shots and the gratuitous illegal hits … on Wayne Gretzky right now have been ridiculous,” TSN’s Pierre McGuire said. “No man has done more in terms of reaching out and trying to build the game in the NHL than Gretzky.”
Yet, after the revelations of his huge compensation – $8-million (U.S.) a year – and then the absence from the Coyotes’ training camp, few in Phoenix shed tears as he headed off into the sunset. East Valley Tribune columnist Scott Bordow said Gretzky’s “association with the Phoenix Coyotes was a complete and utter disaster.”
I know some of you dig Fantasy Football, but last time I checked, there were no points awarded for starting the dangerously delusional. In the wake of Oakland’s 23-3 loss at home to Denver yesterday, the Tribune’s Jerry McDonald sneered, “if it is truly Rich Gannon’s mission in life to say negative things about the Raiders, they rewarded their former MVP with a smorgasboard of material for the show he does for Sirius Satellite Radio.” No material more damning than the miserable showing of former no. 1 draft JaMarcus Russell (above), whose postgame comments revealed (take your pick) either a stunning surplus of confidence or residence on Planet I-Don’t-Give-A-Fuck.
Believe it or not, Russell has actually had a worse passer rating than Sunday’s 22.6, bottoming out at 19.0 in last year’s 24-0 loss to Atlanta. He weathered the postgame scrutiny as he usually does, with a calm, easy manner, a half-smile that suggests he knows there are better days ahead.
And you wonder if Russell knows something you don’t know or simply has no grip on reality.
He threw two first-quarter interceptions that led to 10 points, and afterward neither play was his fault. On the first, Heyward-Bey’s feet were tangled with a defender while Russell was throwing out of the end zone, with Renaldo Hill getting the interception.
On the second, Russell said a defender turned Heyward-Bey back in, resulting in a gift to Andre Goodman.
“I try to play with no regrets and I think I did,” Russell said. “Other than that, we just didn’t show up on certain downs. We’ll continue on. The road is not over. There are a few more games to play, I think, and we’ll just continue to go out there.”
Russell wasn’t crestfallen, nor was he inspiring or particularly troubled by the boos.
“I know that the guys in my locker room are behind me,” Russell said. “When the fans get to that, it’s kind of where they seem like they’re fed up. But again, until you come out and play like I know we should and get back on track it will be a different story.”
No Artest, No Yao, No T-Mac, no problem, not with this sort of civic pride. Look for the Knicks to produce a similar pre-season video once Cablevision’s Human Resources Dept. signs off on having having a little guy crawl around MSG cubicles.
A pair of consecutive losses to in-state rivals would be cause enough for concern at Texas Tech, but the media have become painfully aware of late there’s dissension amongst MIke Leach’s ranks. As such, the former offensive genius has banned his charges from entering the public-discourse minefield known as Twitter, as Lubbock Online’s Adam Zubavich explains :
“The policy is nothing football related outside of football,” Leach said Monday during his weekly news conference. “Any way you look at it, little Twitter things that relate to football is a violation of team rules. If somebody plays for us, they don’t have a Twitter account.”
Leach said players’ Facebook accounts will be monitored to make sure they don’t disclose sensitive team information.
All-American offensive lineman Brandon Carter and fellow senior Marlon Williams, the Red Raiders’ leading tackler this season from his linebacker position, both expressed disappointment with Tech’s 2-2 start. On Sunday afternoon, Williams also wrote, “Wondering why I’m still in this meeting room when the head coach can’t even be on time to his on (sic) meeting.”
When asked Monday on the Big 12 teleconference about Williams’ comments, Leach said: “Anybody that’s a malcontent doesn’t stay around here very long, because we’ve got a pretty good line of recruits that are fully willing to replace him. Insterestingly enough, he doesn’t have a Twitter page anymore.”
Leach called Twitter “stupid to begin with,” and said college football players get enough attention as it is.
“If they don’t get enough attention, I’ve got graduate assistants and student assistants that’ll sit there and listen to them embellish stories and talk and tell them how great they are all they want. They don’t need Twitter.”
Food and architecture critic Jonathan Meades’ recent BBC 4 series “Off Kilter” concluded with the narrator’s journey through what the Beeb describes as “towns only known from football coupons.” The Guardian’s Martin Kellner found the grim 3rd episode, “a stunning film, but one unlikely to be streamed on visitscotland.com.”
Where there was a choice between focusing on a row of wheelie bins in an urban wasteland or a troupe of bonnie tartan-clad Scottish lassies skipping through a field of bluebells, guess which Meades chose. In fact, the only tartan that appeared anywhere in the film illustrated a typical Meades diatribe against the 50 million Scots who live elsewhere, whom he called “lachrymose believers in this land of tartan shortbread, mail order cabers and bagpipe glens”. Their beef with the English he dismissed as “a 200-year-old PR stunt, the world’s longest-running exercise in victimhood”.
Over archive footage of fierce pit-head picketing Meades talked of “the human cost of efficiency, and adherence to the bottom line”, and “tens of thousands rationalised into involuntary idleness”. Fife, he said, was where we see “the social and environmental effects of the initially attritional and consequently violent coiffeur clash between the free-trading ideological helmet modelled by iron steel girder Margaret from Finchley and the smug warm-over worn by King Arthur of Stalindale, South Yorkshire”.
The programme was full of fine fancy writing like this – like Michael Moore with wit. Comparing Scotland’s part-time footballers with their counterparts in England’s top division, he characterised the Premier Leaguers as “a bespoke cast of gladiatorial yob-gods, wag-roasting Croesus kids, who once a week descend from their Parnassian blingsteads to run around for 90 golden minutes of bravura vanity”. I cannot remember when I have enjoyed a TV programme more but I doubt there will be much dancing in the streets of Raith.
(head coaches generally don’t wear helmets, but it might be time for Jim Zorn to break from tradition)
If the Lions chose to celebrate yesterday’s 19-14 defeat of the Redskins by returning to Ford Field to high-five long suffering Detroit fans, how might they mark, say reaching .500? Individual backrubs? Fellatio doesn’t seem out of the question if the Lions could pull off a a miraculous playoff berth this season, and I don’t wanna guess what might happen if Detroit made it all the way to their first Super Bowl — though an orgy scene / human sacrifice scene not unlike those depicted in Season Two of “True Blood” (with former GM Matt Millen in the role of Sam Merlotte) comes to mind. Where the Redskins are concerned, however, ESPN.com’s Matt Mosely writes of their embattled head coach, “it’s easy to second-guess Jim Zorn on his decision to go for it on fourth-and-goal from the Lions’ 1-yard line early in the game, mainly because it didn’t work”. Sadder still, Fred Smoot tells the Washington Post’s Tom Bosely, “We can right the ship. The Lions did it.” When they’re looking to the 1 win -in-their-last-19 games Lions for inspiration, it’s an appropriate time to question the Redskins’ psyche, as Boswell does unflinchingly.
They may have to fight through an incredible amount of self-delusion about the talent level on their team. This week, Clinton Portis said he thought the Redskins had the most talent in the NFL. Comments like that have been common in the Redskins’ locker room for the past 10 years — regardless of all available evidence. Not only is the view tolerated at Redskins Park, it is encouraged and marketed. Where does this fallacy arise? In the owner’s suite, where the price of players is equated with their performance?
Most perplexed of all at day’s end was Coach Jim Zorn, who didn’t seem to grasp, entirely, that his two dubious burn-the-book decisions in the first quarter had cost the Redskins at least seven points — more than the ultimate margin of defeat.
Zorn decided against a short field goal, then was stopped on fourth and one at the Lions goal line. Then, just minutes later, he accepted a penalty, allowing the Lions to replay third down — a classic tempt-fate tactic. Detroit, instead of being forced to try a 50-yard field goal, converted the third and 13 and eventually completed a 99-yard touchdown drive.
“I didn’t think we’d be denied” at the 1, Zorn said. “I thought, ‘No way they can drive 99 yards on us.’ I didn’t believe that would happen.”
In the first quarter, most coaches go by percentages, not prophecy.
Sunday’s 4-2 defeat of Boston marked the Yankees’ 100th victory of the 2009 season, clinching the AL East crown, prompting the Journal News’ Peter Abraham to whip out an uncanny Frank Cashen impersonation (”It’s always the young guys — and oddly those didn’t have much to do with it — who celebrate the most”). Prior to Joe Girardi’s first pennant winning party as a manager being overshadowed by the Giants and Jets, TBS’ David Wells (above) warned the New York Post’s Justin Terranova the Yankees’ new home fortress might cost them big-time.
“The Yankees lose some advantage because that ball flies out for everybody,” Wells said. “It’s a new park and the road teams are just as comfortable as the Yankees are. It used to be a death valley out there in center, now it’s a joke.”
“Those fans are putting them on a plateau and they expect them to win,” Wells said. “The team spent $200 million, we spent a lot of money to support you. You guys have to win and if not you are going to hear about it.”
Indeed, Boomer has a point. Having only won 55 out of a possible 78 home games, the Yankees have clearly struggled in The House Randy Levine Built. And besides, an 81 game home schedule is far too small a sample size from which to project what might happen in October,
“More than ever,” insists MLB.com’s Barry M. Bloom, “the Dodgers need some continuity and G.M. Ned Colletti will provide them that if he’s given a long-term deal.” Thus, along with eulogizing Mary Travers and quoting Bob Dylan’s “Blownin’ In The Wind” in its entirety, Bloom argues LA’s third post-season appearance in 4 seasons demands a contract extension
The Dodgers have a mutual option on a contract for the 2010 season. Colletti probably will not come back unless he is offered a multi-year deal. There’s no reason to blame him. At 93-63, these Dodgers will finish with the club’s best record since 1988, the last year it won the World Series. Last year, Colletti’s team, playing within the blush of the Manny Ramirez acquisition, went to the National League Championship Series for the first time since that 94-win, championship season. They lost in five games to the Phillies.
This is the type of progression that management has to love after adding a guy who had never been a GM prior to his hiring by the Dodgers after a disastrous 71-91, 2005 season. Coming a year after they made the playoffs for the first time since 1996, that season of internal conflict cost GM Paul DePodesta and manager Jim Tracy their jobs. And perhaps that’s way it should have been.
Actually, I’m not sure what the arguments are against it. He spent too much money on Jason Schmidt, who came up with a bad arm? He took a chance on Andruw Jones? With the Dodgers trying to save money, Colletti acquired Ramirez from the Red Sox in ‘08 and Jon Garland from the D-backs last month and both opposing teams paid the balance of their contracts. One should offset the other.
One should offset the other? Schmidt was signed to a 3-year, $47 million deal. Garland’s remaining ‘09 salary at the time of his acquisition by LA was $1.2 million. That Colletti’s experienced modest success in baseball’s weakest division is hard to argue with, but it shouldn’t be necessary for him to ghostwrite Bloom’s blog, nor should he take much credit for a ‘06 Wild Card berth that was accomplished with a roster largely assembled by DePodesta.
There’s at least a half dozen jews in the greater Austin area, and I’m confident all of them will be attending tomorrow night’s Air Traffic Controllers show. Joined by guest drummer J.J. Ruiz, whose guitar playing is well known to fans of Naw Dude, Wild America and the Teeners, Sunday’s ATC set is especially geared to commemorate Yom Kippur 2009, as the following actvities will be prohibited on the venue premises :
1. No eating and drinking
2. No wearing of leather shoes
3. No bathing or washing
4. No anointing oneself with perfumes or lotions
5. No marital relations
After sundown on Monday, as is the ATC custom, we’ll all go out for Chinese. Heck, I’m open minded. Even Tebow’s invited!
The matter of El Hadji Diouf being accused of racially abusing an Everton ballboy was noted in this space a few days ago, and perhaps mindful of the difficulty in oppressing a cultural/economic majority, the Guardian’s Dara O’Brien writes, “bananas are pretty traceable. They tend to leave a trail of bananas. And there seem to have been precious few bananas lying round. But this doesn’t mean calling somebody “white boy” is a racist slur.”
For too long the fact that we’re roughly 90% of the population (2001 census) has disguised just how oppressed we whites really are. When he allegedly said “white boy”, well it just reminded me of all those other times people called me “white boy” just to put me down, just to make me, and the other 55 million white people in the UK, feel small.
No, of course not. If you’re white, you just don’t get a go at being the victim of racism. Did that ballboy go home and cry when he was called “white boy”? He didn’t. The phrase carries no power at all. What’s the insult? He might as well have said “Tall boy!”, or “You with the blue eyes!” for all the pain it was going to cause.
For people who complain that it’s unfair that white people can’t be slurred the way black people can, well, life’s just tough isn’t it?
“Rodney Harrison Spars With Kerry Rhodes on Twitter” read the headline on Gang Green Nation earlier this week, as former Patriots icon turned TV talking head Rodney Harrison (above) allegedly turned to the latest nu media craze to blast the Jets’ safety with such zingers as “you talk big for someone who has yet to even win in the playoffs you think you will ever accomplish what i accomplished?” Alas, after Rhodes replied with “u crossed line. and i never talk smack u started it. i kno u respect my game! Tweet it!”, we now learn via The Sporting Blog’s Michael Tunison that Rhodes has been provoked by, well, someoone who isn’t Rodney Harrison. Not sure if ESPN’s Adam Schefter is familiar with the handiwork of
Konrad Kujau, but everyone should be aware the Twitter account “adolf88″ is probably phony, too.
Considering how widely reported the spat was between Rhodes and Harrison, how was the real identity behind the feed first discovered by a self-admission from the imposter? When the Twitter battle was being mentioned during NFL pregame shows last week, how did no one at NBC bother to ask Harrison about his supposed involvement in the back-and-forth?
Adam Schefter, meanwhile, the one who took pains to stoke the Rhodes-Harrison Twitter fight, has been mostly critical of the imposter, but stopped short of acknowledging his own credulity in believing it was Harrison without checking to see if it actually was the former Patriot.
It’s not really fair to compare the end-stage Al Davis Oakland Raiders to Kim Jong-Il’s North Korea, right? I mean, both are just kind of belligerently and flubbily doing their own things without regard for the rest of the world’s opinion, both are favorites of people who dress up like they’re in Gwar (note: check to see if this is true about NK before posting), both answer dissent with blustering, ham-fisted conspiratorial un-reason, and both are kind of pariahs in their respective scenes, but… there’s a question of scale. I’m aware of that. I guess my perspective is just off after reading this report from the San Francisco Chronicle’s David White on the Raiders’ attempt to ban CBS commentator and former Raiders QB Rich Gannon (above) from (first) the broadcast booth and (then, after that didn’t work) pre-game production meetings for this Sunday’s game against the Broncos. The Raiders did this for… well, really petty and vindictive and hard-to-understand and generally crazy reasons, but also ones that classily and totally reasonably invoke 9/11:
Telling Gannon to stay away from team headquarters is a new wrinkle that may not be enforceable. League policy says teams must make the head coach and players available to the network television crew for production meetings.
“It is not permitted under league policy regarding cooperation with our network partners,” NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said when asked if the Raiders could ban Gannon from the production meetings…
“He’s attacked us on a regular basis since becoming a member of the media,” Raiders exec John Herrera said. “After affording him the opportunity to establish a career here, he has since gone on to attack us in a way that’s totally unacceptable.”
Herrera quoted Gannon as saying in several interviews they should just “blow up the building and start over” in Oakland. Team officials took that as literally as they did figuratively, and told Gannon as much before last season’s home game against the Chiefs.
“We think in a post 9/11 world, that’s not a very proper thing to say,” Herrera said. “It’s uncalled for. He seems to be a guy who can’t get over the fact that he played the worst Super Bowl game in the history of the game and he wants to blame everybody but himself. I guess it’s our fault he threw five interceptions.”
Van Buren Elementary fourth-grader Nathan Johns thought his teacher was kidding when he instructed him to go to the bathroom and turn his Yankees T-shirt inside out.
The blue shirt read “New York No. 52” on the front and “Sabathia” for the New York Yankees’ pitcher CC Sabathia, on the back.
“ I thought to myself ‘Is he serious or is he kidding,’” said Nate, 9, a student in Peter Addabbo’s fourth-grade class. “But he had this look like he wasn’t kidding at all.”
Nate complied, and said he was later told to wear it that way until dismissal. At lunch, Nate said the fifth-graders made fun of him because he wearing his shirt inside out.
.“Just because my teacher doesn’t like the Yankees I should still have the right to wear a Yankees shirt,” Nate said Thursday after school. The teacher has Boston Red Sox paraphernalia all over the classroom on display, he said.
Baldwinsville Schools Superintendent Jeanne Dangle said Friday morning the district is conducting an investigation into the incident, and has told the parents she will get back to them on the issue in a few days.
I can understand trying to tell the kids that CC’s a poor role model in these fitness-conscious times, but what’s up with the Red Sox shrine in a Syracuse classroom? Sure, I had my own rumpus room in Austin, TX decorated with game-worn Matt Ginter and Terry Blocker jerseys, but I never asked anyone to remove a Yanks or Phillies hat or anything.
“Perhaps ESPNBoston.com’s newest business partnership will not prove to be a colossal conflict of interest in the long run,” opines the Boston Globe’s Chad Finn. “But upon first glance, that’s precisely what it appears to be.”
ESPNBoston.com, which became the second of ESPN’s planned network of city-specific sites to launch Sept. 14, is using Kraft Sports Group as its local advertising sales agent for the site. SportsBusiness Daily was the first to report news of the partnership on Thursday.
Kraft Sports Group is a holding company founded by Patriots owner Robert Kraft (above, far left) in 1998, four years after he purchased the NFL franchise. Along with the Patriots, Kraft owns the Revolution of Major League Soccer as well as Gillette Stadium, the venue for both teams’ home games.
Given that a significant amount of ESPNBoston.com’s coverage is dedicated to the Patriots, and a smaller amount to the Revolution, the partnership is beginning on dubious journalistic ground.
ESPN’s general strategy with its localized websites is to launch in cities where it already owns and operates an ESPN Radio station, then have the station’s staff coordinate ad sales for the website. Such was the case when ESPN Chicago launched in April.
While the ESPN mother ship has not been reluctant to criticize the franchise – it was relentless in its reporting and speculating during the “SpyGate’’ controversy of 2007 – the situation bears monitoring to see whether ESPNBoston.com’s curious new bedfellow has an effect on its reporting of potentially unflattering Patriots news.
Though it’s a bit early days to accuse ESPNBoston of lacking integrity, Finn would be remiss not to raise the points above. He’s equally remiss, however, in failing to disclose (even if it’s old fuckin’ news) the Globe’s parent company, The New York Times, holds a minority stake in the Boston Red Sox. Though I can’t think of an example of the Globe covering anything up to curry favor with John Henry, Larry Lucchino or Tom Werner, a number of shots have been taken by Globe writers at former players who’ve ended up on ownership’s shit list for one reason or another. Heck, the team almost lost a General Manager a few years ago over what seemed like a victorious power play on the part of Lucchino, successfully (for a while, anyway) engineered with the help of the CHB.
(Sentinels head coach Ted Cottrell reacts to learning he’s not obliged to use Razor Shines as his offensive coordinator)
Not only is Fred & Jeff Wilpon’s Glittering Monument to Avarice & Greed available for mass weddings, flea markets and rock concerts, but a Mets press release breathlessly announces the return of professional football to Flushing this October. OK, it’s just the UFL, but technically, as long as the players receive compensation, they’ve lost their amateur status and can no longer entertain thoughts of playing for their local community colleges. Here’s some highlights from an e-mail I received earlier today from Amazins sales exec William “Bill” Ianniciello
The United Football League debuts this fall with the promise of exciting, traditional football played by talented professional athletes, including the rising stars of tomorrow, and an entertaining game experience. In its “Premiere” Season, the fledgling UFL will field four teams – the New York Sentinels, Florida Tuskers, Las Vegas Locomotives and California Redwoods.
In the first-ever pro football game at Citi Field, the New York Sentinels will host the Las Vegas Locomotives on Wednesday, November 4 at 7 p.m. As a Mets Season Ticket or Plan Holder, we are pleased to offer you an exclusive opportunity to purchase tickets for the November 4 game at 20 percent price discounts, with per-ticket fees waived, before sales to the general public. With this special offer, your ticket prices start at just $16.
For the Sentinels, led by head coach Ted Cottrell, this will be their only 2009 appearance at Citi Field. Please note that, for this game, all premium Citi Field club spaces will be open and accessible for your enjoyment.
OK, now I’m confused. Dazzled though I am by the star power of Ted Cottrell (what, Ray Handley didn’t return their call?) is this the UFL’s Premiere Season, or is, y’know, their “Premiere” season? But well played, Mr. Ianniciello. With the Giants and Jets off to terrific starts, you’ve got to pull out all the stops, and what could prove more enticing than the opportunity to roam around Citi Field’s Acela Dining Hall without fear of being pummeled for violating the dress code?
Perhaps operating under the delusion B.J. Ryan came to Toronto to pitch relief on a pro bono basis, Blue Jays GM J.P. Ricciardi responds to calls for his head by essentially telling the Canadian Press that his resigning or being fired would solve nothing. From the Candian Press :
“Let me make this clear: It doesn’t matter if J.P. Ricciardi is the GM, or Joe Blow is the GM. Two years from now, five years from now, seven years from now, the reality that we face in Toronto is the division is not going to change,” Ricciardi said in an interview this week. “The Red Sox and Yankees are not going away. If the Yankees want to, they can take their payroll to $300 million.
“The biggest thing that people forget is that when Toronto won the World Series, they had the highest payroll in baseball. There’s a direct equivalent to that. If we’re going to play in the big man’s division, and we’re not going to spend that money, it’s going to be really hard for us to compete with those teams.”
“I don’t wake up every day and say, `Oh my God, I’m holding on,”‘ said Ricciardi. “That’s working in fear and I’ve never done anything in fear. I’m proud of what we’ve done here and if it’s not good enough, it’s not good enough. There’s too many good things going on here that we made good decisions on to shake my confidence.
“I get this feeling that people are dying for me to lose my job, they think my world is going to come crashing down. I’m not built like that.”
The uncredited CP reporter cites “the vast inequities” in the AL East, a circumstance that didn’t stop the ‘08 Tampa Rays from advancing to the World Series (with a payroll substantially less than Toronto’s). If playing in the same division as Boston and New York is an unfair competitve disadvantage, how does that compare to signing Alex Rios to a guaranteed $70 million contract? Or signing A.J. Burnett to a contract that allowed him to opt out of the deal after 3 years? Were John Gibbons and Cito Gaston each appointed as manager because other candidates were offered more money to work for New York or Boston? It seems the Jays should at least manage consistent 3rd place finishes before anyone takes Ricciardi’s poorhouse claims seriously.
Given University of Tennessee Men’s basketball coach Bruce Pearl credit where due ; these days, it’s pretty tough to come up with a remark controversial enough to keep Lane Kiffin out of the newspaper. The Tennessean collected the following remarks from Pearl yesterday at an Knoxville banquet.
Pearl was one of the featured speakers at a kickoff for charity fundraiser among TVA employees.
He took questions from the crowd. One person asked him about his three new players this year.
“I’ve got a tough job. I’ve got to put these guys from different worlds together, right? I’ve got guys from Chicago, Detroit. I’m talking about the hood! And I’ve got guys from Grainger County, where they wear the hood!” Pearl said. After a pause, he added, “That wasn’t part of the script.”
Later, Pearl issued a written statement, apologizing if anyone was offended by the joke, which he called inappropriate.
He doesn’t strike me as the dominant force that Pedro was during his statistical peak. Don’t get me wrong, Greinke pitched very effectively but he was not the unhittable beast on the mound that Pedro or Clemens (or even Johan Santana) were during their reign of dominance.
He only gave up two hits in 6 innings but struggled with his command and, with 5 strikeouts, it’s not like he was punching tickets up and down the Red Sox lineup.
This is about all the Sporting Blog’s Chris Littman can take, noting, “that intangible ‘How Jim Rice Feels’ column was somehow left out on Baseball Reference.”
I humored Rice and looked up Moret. In his playing days, he was two inches taller and about 20 lbs. lighter than Greinke. At no point did Moret approach Greinke’s strikeout numbers from this season. In fact, his best year, 1974, he had 111 to go with 79 walks. Is that a K/BB ratio that looks anything like what Greinke is sporting this season?
But look, Rice saying he was unimpressed by Greinke based solely on one start that was one of his most average of the year is like saying you were unimpressed by The Roots on a night Questlove didn’t play drums.
I’m not sure if I get the analogies — Littman’s or Rice’s. For starter’s Greinke’s had some personal issues, but he’s never been, as far as I can tell, in a Moret-esque state of locker room catatonia (though anyone who had to put up with Buddy Bell’s flatulence might’ve blacked out once or twice). As for Jim Ed, though it’s tempting to say he oughta keep a low profile from here on out, better that he gives his honest opinions, first hand impressions (ie. exactly what Sullivan Tire is paying for!) than merely allows today’s ballplayers to slide by on reputation. I’m not sure how you’d keep a job talking or writing about (American League) baseball without having seen Greinke pitch several times this season, but if anyone can manage to do so, it oughta be the former Fenway Franks spokesperson. |
And Questlove’s perfectly alright. But he’s no Chuck Biscuits. (The Sporting Blog link culled from Repoz and Baseball Think Factory)
Kings Island Amusement Park’s Halloween Haunt features skeletal renditions of various celebrities, including Heath Ledger surrounded by pill bottles, Farrah Fawcett in her iconic red tank top, pitchman Billy Mays, and a pajama-clad Michael Jackson.
“You’re gonna see Ted Kennedy, Ed McMahon, and there’s still other ones yet to be placed,” Kings Island spokesman Don Helbig told Cincinatti NBC affiliate WLWT.
The fright-fest at the Ohio park also contained a depiction of slain NFL quarterback Steve McNair and his mistress Sahel Kazemi – an exhibit that has since been pulled from the display, Fanhouse.com reports.
The scene contained a skeleton representing McNair, wearing his NFL jersey, sat on a couch, with a lingerie-clad skeleton representing Kazemi sprawled across his lap. The display also featured a Titans helmet with the top blown off, Fanhouse.com reports, and a gun at the skeletons’ feet.
It really is shocking stuff. Isn’t Heath Ledger considered old news?
Philadelphia closer Brad Lidge blew his 11th save of the season last night, sucking up a storm in a 7-6 loss to the Marlins that could only add to Charlie Manuel’s anxiety with the post-season looming. The Sports Hernia has helpfully uncovered an alternative take on Lidge’s latest disaster, so enjoy it while you can before those killjoys at MLB Advanced Media quash a passionate man’s grieving process.
Wednesday’s 5-2 loss to Atlanta was the Mets’ 13th in their last 16 games, the club’s midseason flirtation’s with .500 a distant memory in what Newsday’s David Lennon projects will be the Amazins’ worst campaign since finishing 66-95 in 2003. Though GM Omar Minaya (above) and manager Jerry Manuel have received (qualified) votes of confidence from ownership, Lennon suggests the noose around the former’s neck has begun to tighten.
Ramon Peña, a Minaya confidant who was in charge of the Mets’ operations in Latin America, is the second of the team’s high command to lose their jobs in the past two months after Tony Bernazard, the vice president for player development, was axed on July 27. Bernazard was removed for his embarrassing behavior, which reportedly involved challenging minor-leaguers to fights and berating other team officials in public.
As for Peña, a person familiar with the situation said Wednesday that his firing was the result of both poor performance and questionable conduct. When asked to elaborate, the person said, “There can’t be any more Tony Bernazards.”
But just as Bernazard was close with Minaya and COO Jeff Wilpon, Peña also was tight with the GM, though it ultimately was Minaya’s decision to fire him – under some pressure from ownership.
The Wilpons have been simmering behind the scenes about the Mets’ terrible performance this season and this week’s firing of Peña is the first of what is expected to be a bigger housecleaning within the organization.
Diouf alleged he had been the subject of racist abuse at Goodison in an interview given on Tuesday, claiming: “People threw bananas at me, and the referee told me he would report this to the police.” He also described as “nonsense” the allegation he made a racist remark to a ballboy.
The Blackburn forward made his complaint after the final whistle on Sunday and police, together with Everton stewards, immediately commenced a search of the playing surface where the alleged incident occurred plus the seating areas in the Lower Bullens Road Stand and Gwladys Street. No bananas were found in the search and no pictures have emerged that would support Diouf’s claims.
Former ESPN football analyst Sean Salisbury recently left Dallas radio outlet 105.3 The Fan, an incident yours truly headlined with “It Is Possible To Lose A Broadcasting Job Without Sending A Single MMS Of Your Cock”. Said unwieldy headline was of course, inspired by earlier allegations Salibury had sent phone-cam pics of his penis to “numerous, uncomfortable women”. A subsequent Deadspin post on the end of Salisbury’s tenure in Big D suggested more “cellphone hijinx” were to blame, a claim the former QB’s representative angrily denied.
Fast forward a week later, and S.S. has engaged Deadspin editor A.J. Daulerio in the most ill-advised offensive since The Bay Of Pigs. In a series of rambling e-mail missives, each including the signature line, “sent from my iPhone”, Salisbury insists “ur guys lies and carelessness about CBS and espn stories has not only ruined my reputation but has cost me jobs so prepare urself for a lawsuit so big I will own deadspin.” Much as I love to think Salisbury as Deadspin owner/publisher would result in, y’know, more than 2 links a year to CSTB, I’m gonna guess the mooted legal action is about as likely to scare Daulerio and Nick Denton as Sean’s threat to publish a book entitled, “espn exposed. The truth inside the r rated company” has Disney executives quaking in their boots.
Further messages from Salisbury are equal parts delusional (”u guys are about to revitalize my career and bank account”) and vengeful (”so you know I got some pics and smut on you that are gonna give you a taste of how it feels”). Stadium Insider is amongst those who’ve had enough of the car crash, tweeting, “it was newsworthy when he showed people his thing. It was newsworthy when he got fired multiple times….But now it has gotten to a point where the constant updates need to stop and someone needs to provide help for a mental breakdown of a human.” I’m not sure I agree — there’s clearly a time and place for this kind of outburst, though I don’t know if Salisbury is registered to comment at Deadspin.
It’s football season at US Cellular. Lethargy has settled in. The scent of Jim Thome’s butch wax has long since dissipated from the locker room. Mark Buehrle’s post-perfect-game season lay in perfect ruins. Scott Linebrink is learning how to look for jobs on Craigslist, Jose Contreras has been pawned off on mountain rustics, the search for Bartolo Colon has been called off, and Bobby Jenks has been shut down for the year after injury to his calf. 2009 is so over, I can’t even bring myself to extract the Bobby / veal joke from the above.
The veteran is trying to survive, trying to show that he’s not washed up at 35. And realistically, he now knows that this is his last homestand on the team he won a World Series with.
“I’m not concerned about that,” Dye said about his fate now being all but sealed. “Whatever happens is going to happen. At this point you just want to try and get into a somewhat of a little bit of a groove before the season is over. Go into the offseason and see what happens.
“I’ve never struggled like this before, never had a whole half that has been nothing. Over the course of a career, I think that’s pretty good. The five years I’ve been here I’ve had five pretty good years, and it just so happened that I struggled here at the end, we were fighting to get into the playoffs, and it’s just the way it is.”
The struggling Dye was out of the starting lineup on Tuesday, unable to change the .168 second half he’s had with just five homers and 19 RBI. A second half he has no explanation for.
“I have no clue,” Dye said. “I put in the work and sometimes it doesn’t work out. There’s nothing wrong with the mechanics. When you struggle, the pitches you should hit you foul off. The pitches you take normally when you feel good they’re balls, they’re strikes now. When you struggle everything goes wrong. This second half it just didn’t happen.”
Somewhere in the bowels of University of Chicago, – perhaps down the hallway from where Milton Friedman’s skull is ritually bathed in the blood of infants – Nate Silver and the PECOTA crew are getting an early jump sharpening their knives for the inevitable prediction of doom for the 2010 Pale Hose. Last half of ‘09 notwithstanding, I bet a Dyeless lineup only justifies the doomsaying, if Alex Rios at this years’s numbers is supposed to pick up the slack.
How eager would you be to watch a Peter McNeely/Mike Tyson rematch? Ever thought it would be fun to watch Lawrence Taylor chase Joe Theismann around a parking lot…in 2009? If so, you might be one a handful of persons impressed with the initiative of Utah Flash owner Brandt Anderson, who’d like Michael Jordan and Byron Russell to settle their recent pissing match with a game of one-on-one.
I will personally donate $100,00 to charity in the name of the winner. We can do it during the half time of the Utah Flash home opener on December 7th. $100,000 in cash for a 15 minute pickup game. MJ even you can’t say no to that.
Our venue is the perfect place for this challenge because it brings BRuss back to Utah and Michael Jordan has a home just outside of Park City (I have seen his Carolina Blue Jump Man plane on the runway at Million Air in SLC) so it is convenient for both guys. Not to mention that it would be sacrilegious to have this take place anywhere outside of Utah.
Think about the benefits for the two of them. BRuss wants some vindication and MJ puts that fire we have always seen to the test by lacing them up one more time in a casual ‘all for charity’ event.
Lorne Michaels was unavailable for comment.
Though the demolition of Detroit’s Tiger Stadium continued through Monday, the above YouToob clip, posted on Saturday the 19th, is in it’s own way, scarier than seeing Jimmy Leyland in a wifebeater and boxers.
(Tom Hicks and Nolan Ryan, shown in happier days, ie. before the former began sleeping in his car)
Before the Fort Worth Star-Telegram’s Jennifer Floyd Engel is accused of trolling ala Mike De Silva, she’d like to point out “Rangers fans have been paying for fireworks and dollar hot dog night for nearly a decade. And now they finally have a season that genuinely generates legit hope for next season and they have no idea where this team is going.” To wit, the notion the financially hamstrung Texas Rangers might soon be under the control of Major League Baseball ala the final days of the Montreal Expos, continues to gain traction, and Ms. Floyd-Engel merely asked someone at MLB’s office who was in charge of the ballclub. The reply? “Pat Courtney”
After exhaustive Google research, I learned that Pat Courtney is Major League Baseball’s vice president of public relations. This obviously is an important man and certainly he’d have answers for scared and confused Rangers fans desperately wanting to know what this off-season may bring for this team.
Tom Hicks is normally the man to call on such matters, but what is the point nowadays? Everybody knows The Texas Rangers are at least partially funded by and possibly run by MLB, with someone named Pat Courtney apparently being a go-to guy.
Mr. Courtney never called back Monday, likely gagged like everybody else about this Rangers business. All joking aside, though, what I want to ask Courtney, and his boss, is who is running the Texas Rangers and thereby in charge of big decisions facing them?
Who sets the Rangers’ budget for 2010? Who decides what free agents the Rangers can or cannot pursue? Who decides whether ticket prices will be increased?
Are the Rangers going to try to re-sign Marlon Byrd? Who makes the call about an extension on Josh Hamilton? Is there an MLB-imposed ceiling on this like there apparently was for Matt Purke?
While this was supposed to be a game to garner attention and gauge the level of interest and success the Islanders might enjoy in a new market, all that takes a backseat now to the action back at the zoning hearing in NY.
From the hockey perspective there is not much to do from Kansas City but focus on the upcoming game. While several Islanders expressed a desire for not only a new building, but one that would allow the team to remain on Long Island, all that is out of their hands.
That said, it was hard not to admire the new, sparkling gem of a facility like the Sprint Center and dream about one day playing in a new place of their own. Snow, Gordon, and a bunch of players and staff members got the grand tour and were blown away by the beautiful, new venue. Even the visitor’s locker room is monstrous and opulent compared to their digs back at the Coliseum.
I’m not sure if there’s ever been an instance where a professional team that abandoned the New York metropolitan market for the midwest. Far be it for me to advise a successful businessman like Mr. Wang how to run an NHL franchise, but it might make sense to canvas door to door in Hempstead, if only to reassure lapsed fans that Mike Milbury has absolutely nothing to do with the team.
If there’s any parallel between charitable efforts and Fernando Tatis’ prior career resurrection, can we conclude that he must’ve done something very selfish prior to the start of the 2009 season? On the bright side, if you work for a religious organization and need access to a member of the New York Mets, it seems the club’s public relations department will do everything in their power to help you out.
Of all the possible scenarios that might’ve resulted in Flavio Briatore divesting himself of interests in Queens Park Rangers, not once did I consider the likelihood that a Formula One ban would come to bear on the former Renault boss’ soccer interests. But no one should look a gift horse in the mouth, as the Daily Mail explains :
The disciplinary action, imposed on Briatore for instructing a driver to deliberately crash, appears to put him in direct violation of the League’s ‘fit and proper person test’.
The test stipulates that an owner, prospective owner or director of a club should not be ’subject to a ban from a sports governing body relating to the administration of their sport.’
A Football League spokesman said: ‘The Football League chairman, Lord Mawhinney, has today written to the FIA to request further details of its decision.
‘Thereafter, the League will consider its position on the matter.’
Robert Henson (above) is describted by the Washington Post’s Dan Steinberg as “a mostly unknown reserve linebacker for the Washington Redskins, a first-year player who had never played in an NFL game and was best known for being the son-in-law of television pastor T.D. Jakes.” Steinz might well have added, “a football equivalent to Johnny Burger King-hating Keith Foulke.”
A few hours after Washington’s unsightly 9-7 win against the St. Louis Rams, Henson had taken up an online battle against a segment of disgruntled Redskins fans, calling them disloyal “dim-wits” who “work 9 to 5 at McDonalds.”
Almost immediately, Henson became one of the anti-heroes of a game he had watched from the sideline, doused with criticism and insults on sports-talk radio shows and Internet message boards. And by Monday afternoon, Henson sheepishly exited the team’s Ashburn training facility, accompanied by several team spokesmen, to apologize for a Twitter-enabled diatribe against fans that provided him his first moment of NFL fame.
“All you fake half hearted Skins fan can . . . I won’t go there, but I dislike you very strongly, don’t come to Fed Ex to boo dim wits!!” he wrote shortly after the game ended, a message that would have been seen by his 1,200 or so Twitter followers. As fans quickly responded with disgust — including an editor from the sports Web site SB Nation and a radio host from 106.7 The Fan — Henson kept typing.
“No I didn’t play but I still made more than you in a year and you’d [gladly] switch spots with me in a second,” Henson wrote during a string of responses. “I was talking to the fans [who] said the crazy stuff, I’m use [to heckling] but I’ve never been booed in my own stadium. Again that was for the half hearted but if everyone wants to jump in come on. The question is who are you to say you know what’s best for the team and you work 9 to 5 at Mcdonalds [sic]. You don’t wanna follow me anymore then fine but we play for you and win lose or draw we represent you!! My guy on the Rams said they never got booed even when they didn’t win a game.”
I think even the most dimwitted Mickey D’s employee can tell an alleged offensive genius like Jim Zorn might be hitting the bricks soon, particularly with the likes of Mike Shanahan and Bill Cowher mulling their respective next moves.
The news devastated Giants officials, who have invested significant time and money in the 19-year-old first baseman. Villalona’s $2.1 million bonus was a franchise record when the Giants signed him in 2006. He was considered one of baseball’s elite power-hitting prospects, and his signing signaled a shift in priorities to rebuild the farm system.
Villalona wasn’t with the San Jose Giants when they won the California League championship Saturday night. He hasn’t played since suffering a torn quadriceps July 5, and he had left San Jose shortly afterward to do rehab work at the Giants’ minor league facility in Scottsdale, Ariz.
Dominican police told the Associated Press that Villalona turned himself in 12 hours after Mario Felix de Jesus Velete was fatally shot at a bar Saturday night in the coastal city of La Romana. Villalona will appear in court today and could face up to 20 years in prison.
What is disturbing is that, with the exception of the final five minutes of the game against the Bills, the offense that was supposed to overwhelm all others has been underwhelming. As Brady tries to work his way back into a comfortable state of mind he has had predictable struggles. He had them against the Bills for all but the final five minutes and he had them all day Sunday, primarily because he was under constant pressure.
Although Brady was never sacked, he was hurried seven times and pressured many more. His offense missed Wes Welker, who has been nursing a sore knee, and Randy Moss, who disappeared in a cocoon of coverage spun by Jets cornerback Darrelle Revis.
After the game, Moss claimed he was double-covered all day. Revis said he was in man coverage all day. No wonder Moss couldn’t get open. He was seeing double.
Were this just an offensive problem one would be less concerned but for two straight weeks the defense has played worse in the second half than the first.
This was a problem against the Bills and an insurmountable one against the Jets, who rang up 197 yards and 13 points in the second half to 57 yards and a field goal in the first. Worse, the first two quarterbacks they’ve faced, Trent Edwards and rookie Mark Sanchez, finished with passer ratings of 114.1 and 101.1. It is unlikely the last game either plays this season will be the Pro Bowl.
Houston fired manager Cecil Cooper earlier today, appointing former Round Rock Express skipper Dave Clark interim manager for the season’s final 13 games. The Chronicle’s Richard Justice accuses Drayton McLane and Ed Wade of having “waited until a season had been lost to make a move they should have made months ago”, and The Crawfish Boxes’ Dying Quall concurs, opining, “just don’t care that we fired Coop. I would have a month ago. I would have jumped for joy and swung from rafters shouting the good news, but it’s too late.”
Does this really do anything for the team itself? I doubt it. Wade and McLane have watched the magical point in the season where firing their manager could perhaps help the team rally to glory weeks ago. The front office has also now sunk a few million with the contract extension they offered him in April.
This just feels like a symptom of the greater issue that plagues this franchise: a complete lack of willingness to be bold.
When REM made their network TV debut in 1983, David Letterman asked “who else is from Athens?” to which Mike Mills helpfully replied, “Herschel Walker”. Who’d have guessed that more than a quarter century later, the Bulldog standout (and centerpiece of one of the most lopsided trades in professional sports history) would be planning his mixed martial arts debut? MMA Fanhouse’s Ariel Helman reports Walker has signed an agreement with Strikeforce and will begin training with an eye towards making a 2010 competitive debut.
“This isn’t a publicity stunt or a gimmick,” Strikeforce director of communications Mike Afromowitz said. “Herschel Walker has tremendous athleticism, and he has always shown that off the gridiron. He’s accomplished a lot in his life and in the world of sports. His accomplishments speak for themselves, and we hope that his athleticism can transition into a successful MMA career.”
Although Walker is known for his football career, he does have a sixth-degree black belt in taekwondo and competed in the 1992 Winter Olympics in the two-man bobsled, finishing seventh.
In November 2007, Walker announced on HDNet’s Inside MMA that he would appear on a MMA reality show with Jose Canseco and other former professional athletes, however, the show never made it past the pre-production stages.
“I’ve been training for several years. I would play college football games on Saturday and then compete in martial arts tournaments on Sunday after church I’m now looking forward to opening up another chapter in my life and to competing in MMA,” Walker said via press release.
I’ve little doubt Walker is a more credible multi-sport athlete than say, Mark Gastineau or Ed “Too Tall” Jones. But unless Strikeforce plans to introduce a senior circuit (or, more likely, Walker is matched with questionable opponents) this sounds like a maiming-in-the-making.
[Pictured L-R: Cub GM Jim Hendry asking Milton Bradley to return the hat and jersey by Monday.]
The Cubs closed their season against the Cardinals Sunday night in Stl with a 6-3 win, but started the day with news of Milton Bradley’s season-ending suspension for public comments. After pulling himself from the line-up on Saturday an hour before game time with a sore knee, Bradley and Bruce Miles of the Chicago Daily Herald had the following exchange:
Bradley claimed to have no opinion on where he bats – “In the lineup,” he said of his preferred spot – and the only time he became expansive at all was when he was asked if he had enjoyed his first season in Chicago.
“Not really,” he said. “It’s just not a positive environment. I need a stable, healthy, enjoyable environment. There’s too many people everywhere in your face with a microphone asking the same questions repeatedly. Everything is just bashing you. You got out there and you play harder than anybody on the field and never get credit for it. It’s just negativity.
“And you understand why they haven’t won in 100 years here, because it’s negative. It’s what it is.”
Asked whether he was talking about the fans, the media or even the Cubs organization, he replied: “It’s everything. It’s everybody.”
Whatever caused that tantrum, it was matched by a harangue of insincere grandstanding from Jim Hendry who said the following to Cub beat reporter Carrie Muskat:
“There have been a lot of issues that we’ve lived with during the year,” Hendry said Sunday, “but the last few days became too much for me to tolerate, to be honest with you. I’m not going to let our great fans become an excuse, I’m not going to tolerate not answering questions from the media respectfully. Whether you feel like talking or not, it’s part of our jobs. I’m not going to allow disrespect to other people in that locker room and uniformed personnel.
“The only real negativity here is his own production.”
True, Bradley’s claim to work harder than anyone else is petty. The Tribune also points to other reasons for suspending Bradley, in that his contract makes him cheaper to dump by 8 million in his third season if he’s not healthy (and one wonders if that includes his suspension heavy past). But, really, Jim, it’s all in his head, even after a local columnist labelled him a “nutbag?” I started this season ranting about the media sandbagging of Milton Bradley in which journalists (and Steven Rosenbloom) jumped on the signing of MB as a major mistake. Why was it a mistake? They argued that Wrigley fans were some of the most obnoxious in baseball and some of its most vocally racist. The debate was over how Bradley could deal with them, not IF Cub fans were racist or IF they were well known louts. I don’t recall Hendry outraged about the holiness of Cub fans then. My own thought, then and now, was that Hendry and Cub management should be tossing racist/idiot fans out of the park and that Bradley shouldn’t have to keep his mouth shut about it. 2009 ends as it began regarding Milton Bradley, with Cub management and the Chi sporting press wishing he’d just make their job easier and shut up.
I’m no apologist for his season. Bradley being right about Wrigley fans and the press doesn’t win games. He thinks he worked harder than anyone else? Well, he’s had crazier years with better numbers. 2009 ends with him hitting .257 with 12 HRs and 40 RBIs. It doesn’t change the ugliness at Wrigley or Jim Hendry’s grandstanding, but it makes clear that the Cubs are certainly not going to change any of that for him or anyone else. The Cubs obnoxious fan base wins again. Milton Bradley and every Cub should keep in mind that the first statue built outside Wrigley was for Harry Caray, not Ernie Banks.
Carrie Muskat found several Cubs who offered a much more sincere version of the ups and downs of playing with Bradley here, altho there seems to be some willful denial on Ryan Dempster’s part about the careers of Dusty Baker, LaTroy Hawkins, and Jacques Jones at Wrigley – or the fact that Torii Hunter has made public his no-trade clause to Wrigely because of racist fans:
“It’s unfortunate,” Dempster said. “I think everybody’s going to want to point fingers in different directions and try to put the blame somewhere on what the reasons are and all different things.
“At the end of the day, he was provided a great opportunity to come over here and be a part of a really great organization with a lot of really good guys, and it just didn’t seem to make him happy, anything. Maybe this is a little bit of a wakeup call for him and he can realize how good a gig we have ….
“It became one of those things,” Dempster said, “where you see him putting the blame on everybody else, and sometimes you have to look in the mirror and realize that maybe the biggest part of the problem is yourself and wanting to be there and wanting to play every day and wanting to have some fun. It didn’t seem like he wanted to have very much fun, even from Spring Training.”
Persons who’ve paid close attention to the New York Mets in 2009 (and somehow managed not to poke their own eyes out) might be surprised to learn there’s another club in the National League even more offensively challenged. Well, 4 clubs actually, but for the purposes of this post, we’ll consider an actual post-season contender. Occasional Kung Fu Panda-heroics aside, San Francisco have scored just 598 runs this season, good enough to be ranked 26th out of all MLB teams. Despite this scant run support for a stellar pitching staff, the Giants enter play today 3.5 games behind the Rockies, but with a keen eye on the punchless lineup, the San Francisco Examiner’s Glenn Dickey (above) would like to hold the architect, General Manager Brian Sabean, fully accountable. “Bringing back veterans who are on their last legs is Sabean’s pattern…he should be fired because he’s put together an unbalanced team that won’t make the playoffs this year or next.”
In center field, Aaron Rowand got a five-year contract for $60 million before last season, apparently on the basis of his 2007 year in Philadelphia, where he hit .309 with 27 home runs while playing in a powerful lineup and with half a season in the Phillies’ bandbox park. In almost two full seasons in San Francisco, he’s hit the same number of home runs combined. Last year, he hit .271. This year, he’s hitting .265. And the Giants are stuck with him for another three seasons.
In 2005, Randy Winn (above) came to the Giants from the Mariners and had the best half-season of his career, probably because he had switched leagues and the pitchers didn’t know him. Sabean signed him to a contract extension that was high enough to make him untradeable. Winn has been a solid outfielder and good hitter without the power you expect from a corner outfielder. He’s regressed seriously this year, so the Giants can finally lose that contract.
The middle of the infield is another problem. Sabean jumped at Edgar Renteria and signed him to a two-year contract at $18.5 million. A scouting report in midseason noted that Renteria was the worst starting shortstop in the league at going to his left, and he isn’t any better going to his right. He’s lost bat speed, too. A lifetime .290 hitter who hit .332 as recently as two years ago, he’s hitting just .250. He’s probably a year from retirement but he’ll take advantage of Sabean’s generosity next season.
Tomorrow, Shafi-Schellierni is scheduled to be sentenced to more time after pleading guilty to drunken driving in Nassau County.
“She’s a pure con artist,” said George Giotsas, a Connecticut caterer who claims she bilked him out of $10,000 by ordering a huge barbecue spread to Yankee Stadium — even though she’d lied about working for the team.
In 1991, she befriended Met ex-pitcher and current announcer Ron Darling, and that led to work with other athletes. Darling called the former model “Nostradamus with a better body.”
Her circle of friends and clients include Derek Jeter and Britney Spears — and she’s even advised athletes to sit out games when she has intuited they’d be injured.
If Shafi-Schellierni really possesses such psychic abilities, shouldn’t Omar Minaya have at least considered her as a viable replacement for Tony Bernazard?
A penalty equalizer from Matt Taylor spared Bolton from a 1-0 loss to Stoke City yesterday, with a listless first half showing by Wanderers earning considerable groans from those in attendance at the Reebok Stadium. “It does not get through to me as I’ve had it two years,” insists Bolton manager Gary Megson, adding, however, “It does not help the players one bit.” VitalFootballCo begins packing Megson’s bags for him, opining, “after Sam Allardyce`s big-I-am routine and Sammy Lee`s spluttering, Megson`s interviews were welcomed initially. Now he bears the weary countenance of an undertaker, trying to explain why the hearse has gone missing.”
Megson didn`t just fall into the trap laid by the interviewer. He leapt into it, with both feet, and arms raised shouting ‘wahey!` as he went.
Not that it`s the first time he`s suffered from foot-in-mouth syndrome. The Ginger One described fans as ‘pathetic` at Blackburn in January and then had to clarify that his remarks were intended only for those who had barracked him. This was at odds with his earlier statement that he regarded criticism as ‘water off a duck`s back.` Tony Pulis doesn`t believe that.
As we said at the time, his services should have been dispensed with at the end of last season, with thanks for the work he`s done in stabilising the club. By then it was clear that the best Bolton could hope for under his tenure was to grub about just above the relegation places, playing a style of football that saps the will to live.
Yahoo Sports’ Michael Silver has done comprehensive work in chroncling the extent to which Browns head coach Eric Mangini — he of the 23-27 career record — has alientated Cleveland veterans and rookies alike with a maniacal approach that borders on the Belichickian. Except, of course, the Hooded Casanova has a slightly more glittering resume. On Saturday, Silver shares another report of Mangini continuing to hone his people skills
One player was fined $1,701 (the maximum allowed under the CBA) because he failed to pay for a $3 bottle of water he’d consumed at a hotel while the team was on the road. Gee, if the Browns keep losing and some guys on the team stop playing hard for this guy, I wonder why that’ll be?
On top of that, you have to wonder about Cleveland as a destination for future free agents. About the nicest thing I can say about Mangini is that during his Jets tenure, he at least had the dignity to refrain from calling season ticket holders during dinner. Seriously, given the price of Gang Green season tickets, what percentage of those holding ducats for tomorrow’s game against New England do you think had forgotten about it or were contemplating other plans?
The Mets are currently scoreless against the Nationals’ John Lannan, whose 1981 killing served as inspiration for the Meatmen’s “One Down, Three To Go”. From the looks of things on MLB.TV, Citi Field is mostly empty, a development that could only be of interest to the most culturally unaware of New Yorkers. Or, if you prefer, New York Times sports editor Tom Jolly, who finds the cheap & easy availability of Mets tickets more worthy of coverage than what actually happened during a Major League baseball game. Jerry Manuel’s thoughts on the performance of Mike Pelfrey were considered surplus to requirements, though the Times’ David Waldstein did manage to get the manager to say “it’s a little too intimate, right now. We like the bigger crowds. You can hear them too clearly” regarding last night’s turnout.
One voice he could not hear was that of Michelle Velasquez, a New Jersey resident who was given four tickets ($100 each) to Friday night’s game, in addition to an $18 parking pass. She and her husband had plans with another couple. Sure, they could have all come to the game, but instead they decided on dinner in Manhattan. Velasquez tried to sell the tickets and the pass for $200 on Craigslist, but as of 5 p.m. she had not come close to getting rid of them.
“I got two calls,” she told a reporter who responded to her ad. “One from a guy who was going to buy them but backed out, and you.”
One who did not back out was Anthony Rasile, a court clerk from Howard Beach, Queens. Although a Yankee fan, Rasile received free tickets from his daughter and thought it would be a chance to get his first look at Citi Field. He said he liked certain aspects of the new park a lot.
“I noticed the beers are $2.50 cheaper than at Yankee Stadium,” he said.
But for 18-year-old Matt Bass, the game itself, not a cold beverage, was a welcome diversion. A week ago, Bass, a Westchester resident, heard these dreaded words from his girlfriend of a year: “It’s not working out.” So his father, his uncle and a cousin bought tickets and took him out to the ballgame.
Dressed in a black No. 57 Johan Santana shirt, the melancholy Bass stood at the railing behind the field-level seats behind third base before the game and motioned to the Mets’ dugout. “They’re killing me,” he said.
It’s hard to decide which is more desperate, adding insult to injury for Mr. Bass (dumped…and a Mets fan) or the notion of Waldstein being encouraged to harass women via Craigslist. Parking pass or not, however, anyone asking $50 per ticket to see a ballgame played between two teams who are combined 67 games under .500 oughta be institutionalized or indicted. But enough about Fred and Jeff Wilpon, Ms. Velazquez seems a bit out of touch, too.
Ordinarily, I wouldn’t endorse the harassment of retired sportsmen via social networking platforms, but when the athlete in question is the newly Tweeting Roger Clemens, I’m willing to make a big exception.
Unsatisfied with The Rocket dropping such science as “”Thx to all the guys in NICKELBACK,” NY Baseball Digest’s Mike Silva couldn’t resist an opportunity to engage in one-to-one conversation with a sure-thing Hall Of Famer (if there’s such an institution for pathological liars).
Since Clemens, and these are his words (via a spokesman), “is as direct and honest in his communications on Twitter as he is face to face” I decided to give him my form of direct and honest communication. After all, I pride myself on being equally direct and honest on twitter as I am in person. With that, I asked Clemens the following question:
@rogerclemens So Rocket when are you going to admit you threw at Piazza? Dont you think what happens to you is poetic justice for that act?
I didn’t expect a response since Clemens either lies or avoids the topic since it happened in 2000, but I was wrong. Here was his response:
rogerclemens @NYBD once again WEE-WAH
So there you have it folks, the intelligent discourse by the “direct and honest” former Cy Young Award WInner. How great would it be to see Piazza getting his plaque in 2013 and Clemens sitting home? Maybe we could give us some direct and honest “tweeting” of Mike’s acceptance speech. Hopefully he won’t throw his laptop at the TV because he thought it was a baseball.
If the reportage of Murray Chass and Jeff Pearlman have much traction, I’m not super confident that Piazza’s being honored in 2013. Unless, of course, Silva meant the Guitar Center Hollwood Rockwalk, and their induction proceedings generally aren’t televised.
Or, if you prefer, an homage to Diana Ross’ “Muscles”. Having already taken a bold stand against peers “who like to dress up like little girls”, Ron Artest’s new beefcake video wins the YouToob triple crown for simultaneous offenses against fitness, fashion and hip-hop.
Following an unreserved goal celebration on the part of Vida defender Brayan Beckeles and midfielder Orlin Peralta, 101GreatGoals.com reported “with homophobia rife in football and the players’ reputations at stake, the pair have been forced to go on the record to deny that they actually sucked face with one another, arguing that the angle of the picture distorted the real image of the pair actually kissing on the cheek.” Seems a bit unneccesary to disavow a nice affectionate moment, particuarly as no one complains when the left side of the Yankee infield does it.
So what did newly ensconced Tennessee head coach Lane Kiffin (shown above, all freaky and geeky) think was going to come of his repeated baiting of Florida’s Urban Meyer? In the words of Belly Of The Beast, Monte’s kin spent the offseason “poking a sleeping Kodiak bear who, in addition to razor sharp claws and teeth, is also armed with Tomahawk missiles, an arsenal of F5 tornados and a fire-breathing, giant dragon. And that’s just on offense.” On a weekend when Kiffin would do well to concentrate on making sure QB Jonathan Crompton isn’t beaten to death by his own teammates, he’s forced to turn down the rhetoric prior to Saturday’s clash with no. 1 ranked Florida, an event that causes the Tennessean’s David Climer to remind us, “Meyer harbored no ill will against Kiffin’s predecessor, Phillip Fulmer. And he beat UT by a combined 63 points in the last two years with Fulmer on the opposing sideline. Meyer is an equal opportunity destroyer.”
Some of Kiffin’s more pointed comments were printed out and posted around the Florida football training facilities last spring. The Gators managed to maintain focus on opening opponents Charleston Southern and Troy long enough to win by a combined 118-9. Now they have switched their full attention to UT.
It probably is not in UT’s best interest that Florida superstar quarterback Tim Tebow enters the game harboring a grudge. He is still unhappy about Kiffin’s suggestion that Meyer cheated in the recruitment of prospect Nu’Keese Richardson last winter.
If this were a spelling bee, Florida would try to run it up. In the SEC, you take no prisoners.
Although he is conceding nothing, Kiffin has spent the last few days telling everybody how great Florida is. He makes it sound like UT is going into a sword fight with a butter knife.
“I would think they’re maybe the most talented defense to ever play and maybe the best quarterback to ever play college football,” he said.
