The Sports Curmudgeon®

The last time Ohio State won the national basketball championship, they had a young man coming off the bench for them named Bob Knight. That’s how long it has been. And it will be at least another year for Ohio State because they were clowned last night by Florida in the final game of the tournament. There were no excuses; Greg Oden played the whole game – save for a brief breather in the first half; Mike Conley played the whole game – save for a brief breather in the first half; they didn’t have a bevy of players in foul trouble all game long. Their problem – plain and simple – boiled down to two really basic things:

1. Florida hit their three point shots and Ohio State missed their three point shots.

2. While Mike Conley is the quickest player on either team, Florida is faster and quicker than Ohio State at every other match up.

So, it’s time to look forward to next season in college basketball and I have this queasy feeling that the dawning of the OJ Mayo Era is upon us and it might not be all that wonderful. I sure hope that OJ Mayo is more palatable/loveable as a sports celebrity than the “other OJ”, but that’s not a given at the moment. So far we know that OJ Mayo has bumped a referee during a game, been arrested for marijuana possession, decided to go to USC but refused to give the coach his cell phone number and has been associated with a USC booster who has been tied to at least one other USC player who had been suspended. I hope none of this is a prelude to a bad scene next year…

Baseball season has begun. The NL led off with a re-match of last year’s championship series; the Mets and Cardinals squared off in the first game/series of the year. The AL obviously doesn’t think that is anything important because the Tigers and the A’s won’t cross paths until 30 July. It’s not a given that both – or even either – team will see that series as an important one by that time of the season.

Baseball season began here in DC yesterday. This town that had been aching for baseball for 35 years must be on the verge of having its fill of the Nationals. For opening day with the temperature in the low 70s and a bright sun in the sky, the Nats were unable to sell out the stadium. In fact, if the announced attendance is actually the turnstile count for the day, 10% of the seats were empty. Remember, this will be the last time the Nats have an opening day in RFK Stadium; it should have been a sell-out. The Nationals have a chance to stink in epic proportion this year; and if they do, the crowds will melt away like Frosty the Snowman. Those players on the squad who were on the Expos in those final years in Montreal may experience flashbacks.

In Chicago, the Cubs will start the season with Kerry Wood on the DL. This is Wood’s 10th year in the NL and he’s averaging more than one DL appearance per season; it’s now his 11th residency there. There have been stories that Wood’s natural pitching mechanics put a strain on his arm and that there have been repeated attempts to alter those mechanics, but he either cannot or will not implement those changes on a continuing basis. Add that strain to the fact that in high school he once started both games in a double header and the fact that he threw 120 pitches or more in eight of his first 18 starts with the Cubbies. I think the medical term for his arm troubles would be “chronic”, but I’ll leave that to the medics for a final determination.

And speaking of pitchers with “troubled pasts”, the Minnesota Twins found a place in their rotation for Sir Sidney Ponson. I’m still trying to come up with a way that is a good thing for the Twins…

Anyway, this is the time of year when baseball fans just about everywhere can look at the season ahead with great optimism - - unless of course those fans are in KC, Tampa, Pittsburgh, Washington or Miami.

If you check out www.JoseCanseco.com, you will learn that you may be lucky enough to win a day with José Canseco and you may get to win one of his baseball memorabilia treasures and – be still my fluttering heart – the whole day will be captured on videotape as part of a new “reality show” starring José. The idea is to come up with something “imaginative and outrageous” as a way to spend that day.

As you might expect, I shan’t be entering that sweepstakes because the only outrageous thing I could suggest to do for the day is to spend some quality time with José and his various syringes in a lavatory stall. That won’t make for compelling TV nor is it my idea of a fun way to kill time. But if you’re interested, the website will let you know how to enter the contest. I’d wish you good luck; but in this case, good luck means you’ll not get that call from José.

The story of the ESPN changes in the MNF booth just won’t go away. As Gregg Drinnan pointed out in the Kamloops Daily News, Joe Theismann has five more years on his deal at $2M a year so he’s not about to do something hasty and quit the gig. He might take a buy-out and go looking elsewhere, but he’s not about to just quit. Supposedly, Theismann was offered a job as a college football analyst at ESPN but turned down that assignment. Man, if ever there were a good reason to make college football games shorter, the thought of that motor-mouth in the booth on a weekly basis has to be one of the best. By the way, if ESPN is willing to make changes in the people who cover college football, is there any way that Mark May might be reassigned sometime this summer?

The biggest uncertainty for MNF viewers next year will be:

Who is going to point out all the obvious things to the viewing audience all night long?

Greg Cote summed up most of the sentiment with regard to the MNF changes in the Miami Herald over the weekend:

“ESPN bounced Joe Theismann from its Monday Night Football booth. Theismann said he was ‘stunned and confused.’ Let me clear up some of that confusion, Joe. YOU ANNOY PEOPLE!”

In Alberta Junior Hockey, the Fort Saskatchewan Traders have a woman as their goalie. Her name is Shannon Szabados; she’s 21 years old; her record is 39-8-4 this year and her goals against average is just over 2 goals per game. This isn’t some peewee league; this is one of the Canadian junior hockey leagues that provide talent to the NHL; more than a dozen alums of the Traders have played in the NHL since the team was formed in 1975. I wonder if any NHL team might give Szabados a chance?

Finally, Steve Rosenbloom of the Chicago Tribune had this slant on the Washington Nationals:

“The Nationals are looking at naming rights for their new stadium. I’ve seen that roster, and I’m thinking, ’62 Mets Field.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports…