The Sports Curmudgeon

Somewhere, Carrie Nation is smiling. I had considered another way to open this commentary, but thought that it would be below the normally low levels of good taste demonstrated here to say the somewhere Carrie Nation is buying Josh Hancock a drink at the Celestial Café. Whatever. Hancock’s death while driving drunk and over the speed limit while on his cell phone and not wearing his seat belt has caused more than a few major league baseball teams to curtail the presence of beer/alcoholic beverages in their clubhouses. Those actions ignore the fact that Hancock got blitzed somewhere other than in the team clubhouse - - but facts rarely get in the way of politically correct PR-driven decisions. Carrie Nation loved all of that but she must be bordering on orgasmic over the latest news…

Roger Goodell has sent a letter to all 32 NFL teams – owners, GMs, head coaches, team presidents, team executives and any other pooh-bahs with official sounding titles – telling them that henceforth the teams may no longer serve alcohol at any team function or on any bus ride or plane trip or at practice or at office facilities. The NFL has had a locker-room ban for a while now, but it has just been expanded. And Goodell’s letter says that the rule applies not only to players, but it also applies to owners, coaches and guests of the team. How politically correct is that? The people that this policy applies to are all adults and alcohol is a legal beverage in the US at the moment; but the NFL is applying its “we know better what is best for you” stance to teams and their guests. I can’t wait to see what happens to the first NFL owner who serves a glass of vintage Pouilly-Montrachet to his guests in his owners’ box whilst they all watch a Monday night football game. Give me a bleeping break! Nothing will happen…

The Christmas parties at NFL team facilities just got a whole lot more dull, no? And by the way, what will the Commish do when Conference Champions pour champagne over each other in their locker rooms and swig from those bottles on TV in violation of his policy? Will they be banned from the Super Bowl? I don’t think so…

Here is a sentence from Goodell’s letter as cited by the AP in its report on this matter:

“I believe that no constructive purpose is served by clubs continuing to make alcoholic beverages available, and that doing so imposes significant and unnecessary risks to the league, its players and others.”

The NFLPA and its Players Advisory Council signed off on this action. The days of personal accountability for one’s actions seem to be long gone and long expired. RIP…

Remember the good old days of the XFL when it was easy to poke fun at Vince McMahon as the guru of the league? The XFL had lots of things wrong with it and most of the media took great pleasure in pouring dirt on its grave. I always thought that much of the criticism came from their dislike of and distrust of one Vincent K. McMahon. But, I don’t read minds so I’ll never know for sure…

But now there is a rumor that a new pro football league will be forming under the aegis of – hold your breath here – Mark Cuban. That’s right, the guy who already knows how to remake the NBA even though David Stern won’t listen is thinking about launching a pro football league along with a bunch of other billionaires who can’t find an NFL franchise to buy. They are going to play on Friday nights – competing directly with high school football in much of the USA. Cuban wrote in his blog that the NFL “wants and needs competition”. Say what? There are plenty of corporate remains of entities that have provided that competition that the NFL so dearly wants/needs. Here’s something else Cuban had to say in an e-mail to the AP and reported by the AP:

“We think there is more demand for pro football than supply.”

That may or may not be true but there is an adjective missing here. There is more demand for “NFL-quality” pro football than supply. Now the real question is how closely this new league can imitate the quality level of NFL games…

Here is the real success niche for Cuban and his fellow billionaires – in case they are willing to take free advice from someone who has followed sports for longer than most of them have been exchanging oxygen in the Earth’s biosphere. The NFL really does need a “minor league system” that can provide emergency talent to teams in the NFL on an “as needed basis”. If you can find a way to play your games and have them tied into an NFL developmental/talent storage model, your league might just work. Other than that, I would offer the words of two folks to potential owners of teams in this new league:

1. The best way to become a millionaire is to be a billionaire and to start your own airline. [Richard Branson]

2. Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it. [George Santayana]

In recent months, Cuban and Donald Trump have been in a public war of words. Trump said something to the effect that it has to be easy for someone to become a billionaire if a goof such as Mark Cuban could do it. Cuban fired back some snide remarks about Trump branding everything except his hair-do. What is the billionaire equivalent to a “cat-fight”? But I really have to wonder if Cuban’s desire to form a new league and make it successful to any degree isn’t motivated by the fact that Trump was one of the owners of the now defunct USFL. Could this be a case of two billionaires trying to see whose is bigger than the other’s? Quel gaspillage!!

In yesterday’s Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Gene Collier had a column about what it must be like to be Roger Goodell these days. This is a must read column.

Finally, Greg Cote had this observation in the Miami Herald related to some of the things that have to be on Roger Goodell’s mind these days:

“It has gotten this bad. I thought I just saw a bumper sticker that read, ‘Honk If You’ve Shared a Cell With a Cincinnati Bengal’.”

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

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Over the weekend, I grazed through the channels on the TV and stopped to watch a bit of the golf tournament. After hearing about all the rain in Texas earlier in the week, I was wondering if the caddies were using pontoon boats and if the players needed flotation devices. They didn’t. But what I did notice as I watched the tournament come to its conclusion is that the folks playing in that PGA event didn’t seem to be having very much fun.

I have friends and relatives who love to play golf and who look for opportunities to schedule portions of their life in order to be able to play golf. When they speak of golf, they speak of it in terms of enjoyment and relaxation; they use a tone of voice that indicates that they had a good time while they played their rounds of golf. Looking at the “combatants” over the weekend, they looked as happy as the folks did on the Bataan Death March. I don’t get it.

The winner of that tournament was going to cash a check for about $1M; while that would certainly put pressure on the players to do well, every person who played on Sunday would get a check with at least five integers preceding the decimal point. For most of the previous week, these guys had to have been staying in a Crowne Plaza Hotel – since that was the sponsor of the tournament – and my guess is they got a rate that you and I would not get if we walked up to the counter unannounced. Local car dealerships gave them a courtesy car – as happens at just about every PGA stop along the way. So the only thing they were out of pocket for would be meals and “adult beverages” for a few days. And these guys were scowling and frowning and shaking their heads as if they just learned that they were being sued for everything they are worth? Sorry, I don’t get it…

Often, I am angry with athletes who need to read a prepared statement in order to “apologize” for some misdeed or to explain their side of some kind of controversy. My first reaction is usually that they should just step up to a microphone and say what a normal and civilized person ought to say under the circumstances. I now have a situation that explains why prepared statements are needed…

Recall that I told you about Elijah Dukes of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. After he allegedly threatened the life of his wife and his two children and she sought a restraining order to keep him away from her, his reaction was that he didn’t have time to talk about it, he had a video game to finish. Clearly, that’s not good. However, yesterday, Elijah Dukes stepped to a microphone to speak about the situation after having several days to cool down and to put things in perspective. I would have expected him to say that the safety of his wife and children is his paramount concern or that this was a time of family stress and that he was committed to making it work out constructively or that he really needed time out from under the microscope of the press in order to put his life – and the lives of his family – back in order. Those would have been nice things to say. But Elijah Dukes stepped to the microphone and said that he wanted to apologize to “the organization [the Devil Rays] for sticking with me in a situation like this.”

Say what? Later in a prepared statement, he said that he misspoke because he was nervous and then went on to say that he wanted to apologize to his family, and teammates and the organization for the distraction that this whole matter has created.” That’s a poor excuse for an apology – the kind of thing I’ve come to expect from prepared statements – but it beats what Dukes said on his own. Later he must have been asked if the booing of the fans bothered him, he said he couldn’t tell if they were saying “boo” or “Dukes”. That’s a funny line in the Peyton Manning/Master Card commercial when he tells the movers they aren’t booing they’re saying “mooo-vers”; it isn’t even close to humorous here.

I’ve not had a whole lot to say about the Michael Vick situation for the same reason that I tried not to comment on the infamous “Duke Lacrosse” situation while investigations were proceeding. The allegations here are pretty awful; the leaks of information to the press are pretty awful; the behaviors of the investigators/prosecutors are more than bit strange. This case has lots of similarities to the “Duke Lacrosse” fiasco.

The latest is that a court in Surry County, VA issued a warrant to search the property that Michael Vick used to own to search for as many as 30 dog carcasses that may be buried on the property; and since the warrant was obtained by the Virginian-Pilot, we know it also authorized a search of “all outbuildings which have blood covered wood floors or walls … [for] any and all evidence contributing to dog fighting and animal cruelty.” Now that’s pretty harsh indeed. But that warrant remains unexecuted supposedly because the prosecutor doesn’t like the wording in the warrant.

Folks, I get the sense that Inspector Clouseau would be an upgrade in terms of the investigation and case management processes here.

Also, over the weekend, there was a major pay-per-view event put on by Ultimate Fighting Championship. The main event lasted less than two minutes; now the debate is whether or not UFC is about to replace boxing as the “guilty pleasure” of sports fans. Since boxing has sunk to a level where it is almost indistinguishable from pro rasslin’ in terms of credibility, I’m not so sure that UFC shouldn’t aim higher on the sporting spectrum. Nevertheless, syndicated columnist Norman Chad put some of this in perspective recently:

“Here’s my problem with Ultimate Fighting. If nobody dies, how ultimate is it?”

Here’s a public service announcement for you. Tomorrow will be a Blue Moon; the moon will be full and the previous full moon was on 2 May. Now you have 24 hours to go and search your old music collection for that album by the Marcels…

Finally, Scott Ostler had this comment in the San Francisco Chronicle regarding the Michael Vick investigation:

“Innocent or guilty, all I know is that Vick is fetching his own pipe and slippers these days.”

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

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In response to yesterday’s rant about five things I can do without in the world of sports, a friend sent me a note saying that he could easily do without smarmy sports agents. I have to admit that there are a few agents out there who seem always to be representing clients embroiled in the midst of controversy or caught in the midst of some form of anti-social behavior. I can do without folks like that and I was thinking about adding them to my list until my mind got stuck on something that I just don’t understand about sports agents.

For the most part, agents are attorneys; they certainly act like attorneys when they negotiate contracts for clients and negotiate endorsement deals. I want to focus on that large fraction of sports agents who are actual attorneys and who are admitted to the bar in multiple states. I thought that attorneys were bound by very strict ethical canons regarding the solicitation of clients and it sure seems to me that sports agents solicit clients in ways that a real estate attorney would not/could not. So, how do those attorneys/sports agents manage not to run afoul of the ethics rules here?

And while we are at it, the top shelf sports agents represent multiple clients and there have to be times when two clients could benefit from acquiring one available job. How can one agent represent these two clients fully and aggressively when achieving success for one demands that the second client fail to get the position? Again, it seems to me that the ethical canons of the profession charge attorneys to avoid such situations and to represent only one client in such a situation.

Maybe someone can explain to me how all this works sometime…

The last time I heard about Quincy Carter, he had been arrested in the Dallas-Fort Worth area and was bailed out of jail by Randy Galloway – a columnist for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram and local radio host. Carter’s NFL career was in the toilet, but like every ex-athlete, he hoped that he’d be able to resurrect that career. To that end, Carter signed on to play for the Shreveport Battlewings in Arena Football League #2. I read a report over the weekend that Carter has been suspended by the team for missing team meetings. According to the Battlewings’ website, the other QB on the team is named Gary Cooper – no, not the one from High Noon.

One of the cable channels in this area telecast a program hosted by Stephon Marbury. No, I don’t now why; they just did. Marbury was interviewing Randy Moss on the program and Moss said that he still had no idea why he was traded from the Vikings to the Raiders; no one has ever explained it to him. Well, I think it’s sad for a young man to go the rest of his life with that kind of uncertainty and misunderstanding hanging over his head and so I’ll take a stab at trying to come up with a plausible explanation.

1. You embarrassed the Vikings’ organization with the “fake mooning incident” in Green Bay and by trying to make a traffic control officer into a hood ornament.

2. You quit on your teammates leaving the sidelines before time had run out on the clock.

3. You announced to the world that you did not – and would not – play hard on every play.

4. You were a generalized pain-in-the-ass.

I hope that helps…

Speaking tangentially about the Vikings, the team this year is an enigma. They have a good defense; they have a good offensive linie; and they have two good RBs. In essence, they will be adding two first round picks to the squad this year because last year’s first round pick - Chad Greenway - never played a down for them after blowing out a knee on special teams in the first Exhibition Game. Some folks are already saying they could be one of this year’s “sleeper teams”. But they also have the most precarious QB situation in the NFL. Tarvaris Jackson is listed at the starter; based on what we’ve seen so far, Jackson has all upside and no downside because he hasn’t achieved much of anything so far. I guess he could get worse if he started tripping over his own shoelaces on every other snap, but that’s about what it would take. Behind him at QB are Brooks Bollinger and Tyler Thigpen. Like I said, the Vikings are an enigma…

Here is Reason Number 3,478,226 that the NCAA is useless. That entity just completed a 16-year study and determined that the highest rates of injury in collegiate sports are in football and men’s hockey. Slow down there, Hoss, and let me catch my breath here. It took 16 years to figure out that more people get hurt in violent collision sports like football and hockey than in bowling or tennis or swimming. Give me some time here to try to get my brain around that concept…

Sylvester Stallone entered a guilty plea to bringing several dozen vials of human-growth hormone into Australia. Stallone also apologized saying that he was not aware that he had violated any laws in so doing but that he accepted responsibility for his actions. Based on Rocky VI, I think it is safe to say that human-growth hormone is not something that artificially augments one’s acting capabilities…

Finally, an observation from Scott Ostler in the San Francisco Chronicle:

“After watching Kirilenko for five games, I have an irresistible urge to get my lawnmower sharpened.”

For me, when I see Kirilenko on the court, I suspect that Stevie Wonder has opened a barbershop in Salt Lake City.

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

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You already know the concept of adding by subtracting. It works in algebra; it works in real life; it certainly works in sports. Well, I was musing over the weekend about how the sporting world might be better off with the subtraction of a few misguided people and/or things and decided to try to focus in on five things in sports today that do not add to my enjoyment of sports. I think the sporting cosmos would be better off without them.

Two of the “things” have to do with baseball and so, in no particular order I give you:

The First Thing I Can Do Without: The salary-be-damned goofball teams in MLB who make a mockery of the game with the rosters they seek to compile. There are a few teams in this category; but clearly, the most serious offender is the New York Yankees. Starting the season, they had already outspent – for their major league roster only – every other team in baseball by more than the Tampa Bay Devil Rays will spend on their entire roster for all of this year and probably for half of next year too. For the month of April, the team stunk and so they decided to solve that problem by paying Roger Clemens a jillion dollars to pitch for them whenever he feels like it and it simultaneously happens to be convenient for him to show up wherever the Yankees will play that day. The Yankees ownership pushes the front office and the field manager and then has to spend money like a drunken sailor to try to keep the team from disappearing from the baseball landscape. And now the owner has the gall to say that the GM is on the hook for this season - - as if the GM were really an independent actor/thinker within the structure of the team and as if an independent actor/thinker might actually be tolerated within the structure of the team. Steroids are a black mark on the game of baseball; the profligate salary structure of a few teams – led by the New York Yankees – is an even blacker mark.

The Second Thing I Can Do Without: The designated hitter has been an annoyance since the day it was implemented and now, it really needs to go away. The knee-jerk reaction by DH-enthusiasts to that suggestion is to say that it is not exciting to watch a pitcher bat for himself because most pitchers are hugely inept at the plate. And truth be told, watching the really bad hitting pitchers at the plate is about as enjoyable as oral surgery. Nevertheless, I find it even less appealing to watch some superannuated player who would embarrass himself and his family and most of humanity if he had to play the field every day in the lineup. The only position he has a prayer of playing is “batter” and the designated hitter rule enables that situation to obtain. I think baseball players – people, who can actually play a position on the field and then step into the batter’s box and swing the bat – should play baseball. And if it is so bad to watch inept pitchers at the plate, how come it isn’t equally bad to watch “good field/no hit” shortstops play the game?

One of the entries on my list turns out to be a person. He’s not an evil person; he’s just sufficiently annoying that he diminishes my enjoyment of the game he tries to lead and so I give you:

The Third Thing I Can Do Without: And that would be David Stern. As I said, this is not an evil man with devilish intentions; he is simply annoying to the max. Tony Kornheiser has correctly identified the fact that David Stern always thinks he’s the smartest person in the room. Who knows; maybe he is? But it is time that David Stern stopped allowing people to continue in the deluded belief that David Stern saved professional basketball. He didn’t. Julius Erving, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird and Michael Jordan did that. David Stern presides over a league so filled with spoiled brats and anti-social thugs that he had to impose a dress code on a bunch of nominally professional adults. His smug and literal interpretation of draconian rule instituted to make thuggery a serious offense in the league led to the suspension of Amare Stoudamire and Boris Diaw in the best playoff match-up of the year. The Spurs should vote him a full share of their championship bonuses if they win it all; David Stern was the Spurs second most valuable person in that series.

And by the way, David Stern demonstrates his belief that he’s the smartest person in the room whenever he talks about the glorious times the NBA experiences now. Horse Hockey!! Attendance is down in at least 40% of the cities; regular season TV ratings were down; in the last couple of weeks, nine consecutive NBA telecasts showed ratings declines from the equivalent games last year; the overall playoff ratings on TNT are down 13% while the ratings on ESPN and ABC are down 19% and 20% respectively. That means that David Stern’s healthy league that has never seen better times is not only failing to draw new fans; it isn’t even holding onto its hard-core fans.

The NCAA football bowl games and the ways in which teams are selected to appear in bowl games are so stupid that it sends me to Roget’s Thesaurus to come up with new adjectives to describe those things. “Senseless”, “moronic”, “retarded” and “preposterous” are the only ones I can come up with by myself… And so:

The Fourth Thing I Can Do Without: The myriad college bowl games, the BCS and the polls that put teams into those myriad meaningless games. To fill out the dance cards for all of these meaningless games, it is not uncommon to find two teams playing each other with 6-6 or 7-5 records and both having losing records within their conferences. I can’t imagine changing any trivial happenstance of my life to make sure I tune into a game like that. Even the alums from South Flatulence State and Nowhere A&M don’t care enough to show up at that kind of game in any numbers. Therefore, I can’t imagine why any company would pay money to have its “brand” associated with a useless encounter of this type. But the bowl games do find sponsors out there; I wonder when there will be a shareholders revolt over that. Some of those games deserve to be sponsored by Fleet Enemas, but the folks at Fleet are smart enough to keep their money in their pockets.

And I hope I don’t have to spend any great time convincing you that the polls that determine the teams to get into the “prestige bowl games” and the BCS processes are all worthless. Who votes in the polls? Sportswriters, former players/coaches, broadcasters and active coaches, that’s who. Now tell me how many of them take the time from what they actually do for a living to sit down and watch all – as in each and every one – of the games played by the teams they think are the 15 best teams in the nation every week in order to make an informed decision in their voting. I’ll tell you how many do that - - NONE OF THEM. And they shouldn’t because they have lives to lead with far more important things to do – such as pick the lint balls off their underwear as it comes out of the dryer.

In order to keep my list from growing beyond five things, I had to restrain myself from getting into a lather over commonplace annoyances in sports such as the NCAA or any of the goofs who run the anti-doping authorities around the world or the various Olympic Committees around the world. Once I got past those things, I focused on the final entry here:

The Fifth Thing I Can Do Without: Needless entertainment at sporting events – particularly at baseball games. We don’t need to hear the glee club from one of the suburban middle schools sing the National Anthem before a game. The major reason for that is that middle school glee clubs – by and large – stink. You could have a bunch of trained seals play the anthem on bicycle horns and it would be as good as the glee club – and probably more entertaining. And we don’t need C-List celebrities out there in the seventh inning to sing God Bless America. As a corollary, any C-List celeb performing this act should be subject to 30-days in jail if they don’t know the words. The same goes for dolts who show up at the park to sing Take Me Out To The Ball Game and who don’t know the words. I think everyone can do without those fools for a 30-day stretch. If teams feel the need to have a live hominid perform these musical interludes – instead of an instrumental rendition or a recorded rendition – the teams should assemble a roster of half a dozen local performers who have the talent to perform these acts and then rotate among those talented performers.

And if you think I’m picking on baseball games here, don’t even get me started on the abjectly awful and hugely moronic halftime shows during the Super Bowl…

That’s it; that’s my list; I’m sticking to it.

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

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There are two items from baseball that demand comment today. You may recall a couple of days ago that I said that Clinton Portis was a fool for talking about Michael Vick and dogfighting when he didn’t have to. And then what he said was outrageous on its own merits. Well, despite those comments, Portis looks like Plato when compared to recent allegations against Elijah Dukes.

Dukes is a 22-year-old outfielder with the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. He’s been starting recently since Rocco Baldelli went on the DL. At the moment, he’s only hitting .231, but he does have 8 HR in 130 at bats. On the assumption that 22-year-old players tend to improve, Dukes would seem to have a future in the game. Cue Stephen A. Smith: HOW-EVAH…

Dukes’ wife has twice sought a restraining order to keep him away from her and her children in the past month. She alleges that Dukes has threatened to kill her and her children; she says Dukes sent a photo of a handgun to her cell phone; she played a voice mail that she alleges came from Dukes saying she was a “dead dawg” and “your kids too”. There was an AP report that Dukes and his wife had an angry encounter at the school where she is a teacher and that she sought the intervention of the principal to maintain order. Another report said that Dukes has fathered five children by four different women – recall he is only 22 years old so he certainly is on his way toward “Shawn Kemp status” in terms of fertility – and another report alleges he has threatened at least one of these other women too.

Clearly, all of that behavior is sufficiently anti-social that it might endanger the career of a guy only hitting .231 and that behavior is such that it could land Dukes in the hoosegow for a period of time. Leaving threatening voice mails and sending threatening photos via cell phones compounds the stupidity of threatening the life of your wife and children. But Dukes went an extra mile and took his anti-social attitude to new heights. The St. Petersburg Times asked him what he had to say for himself in light of these allegations. Instead of declaring his innocence or expressing sorrow for his wife and children or avowing that the safety of his wife and children are paramount to him or even issuing the standard no comment on advice of counsel, here’s what Dukes had to say:

“I’m just going to play ball, that’s it. I’ve got to go. I’ve got a video game to finish.”

Like I said, Clinton Portis sounds like Plato by comparison…

Since I referred to Clinton Portis and his remarks a few days ago, there is a delicious irony involved in that situation that hasn’t bubbled up yet. I’m surprised that the Political Correctness Police haven’t jumped on it. After Portis’ unnecessary comments and Chris Samuels’ giggling at them, the Washington Redskins found it necessary to issue a statement saying that the organization did not associate itself with nor did it condone such insensitive and offensive remarks regarding dogfighting. Good for them. However, the Washington Redskins organization has been accused of being insensitive and offensive by dint of the organization’s name for quite a while now. I’m surprised that the Native American activists and the “People Primed To Exhibit Righteous Indignation At The Drop Of A Hat” have not jumped all over that one.

The second baseball related issue relates to the death of Cardinals’ pitcher Josh Hancock. Hancock’s father has filed a lawsuit for unspecified damages against Mike Shannon’s restaurant in St. Louis, the manager of that restaurant, the towing company whose truck Hancock ran into, the tow truck driver and the guy whose stalled car on the Interstate was being assisted by the tow truck and the tow truck driver. The suit alleges that Hancock spent over 3 hours in Shannon’s restaurant after playing a day game where Hancock was “a regular” and for the entire time he was there, he was “handed drinks”. The suit alleges that the driver of the stalled car was negligent because he didn’t get his vehicle off the road and away from traffic and that the tow truck was on the scene for “an exorbitant amount of time” without removing the stalled vehicle. The attorney representing Hancock’s father said that other defendants might be named at a later date.

According to police reports of the incident, Hancock had a BAC nearly twice the legal limit when he plowed into the tow truck. Oh, and there was marijuana in his car too. And he was speeding. And he wasn’t wearing a seat belt. And he was on his cell phone.

I guess the other defendants who might be named later could include the seat belt manufacturer because they weren’t designed to secure the driver automatically and the car manufacturer for designing a vehicle that could attain speeds in excess of the speed limit and the cell phone manufacturer and the cell phone carrier for providing the distraction and the local marijuana merchant who provided that illegal substance to Josh Hancock. Hell, why not sue Spiderman while you’re at it? If he hadn’t been so wrapped up in confronting some fictional super-villain, he could have been at the scene and used his spider powers to prevent the accident…

Look, Josh Hancock’s death was a tragedy. Looking at the actions of a bunch of baseball teams in removing alcohol from their clubhouses, one might think that Hancock got buzzed in the clubhouse and then met his demise; but this lawsuit would seem to change that perception. This suit is an example of a current mindset that no one is responsible for bad thing that might happen to him or her; someone else is always at fault. Things could obviously have worked out for the better for Josh Hancock and his family here, but the person who was driving drunk and speeding while talking on his cell phone without a seat belt was the one and only Josh Hancock.

Here’s a public service announcement. Today begins the Week Of Solidarity With The People Of Non Self-Governing Territories. Some of those folks might take solace in the knowledge that they don’t have to deal with a government they elected full of goofs such as the ones currently in the White House and the Congress… I’m beginning to feel as one with those folks already.

Finally, a comment from Scott Ostler in the San Francisco Chronicle:

“Terrell Owens likes the new laid-back attitude of the Cowboys’ new coach Wade Phillips. But there will be a tough transition for T.O. to deal with. He’ll have a whole new playbook to not learn.”

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

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I’ve mentioned several times here that the sport of horseracing is in severe decline and that the NHL is in danger of falling off the radar screen in terms of a major sport in the US. Yesterday, T.J. Simers summed this entire matter up in two short paragraphs in his column in the LA Times:

“So to show everyone where hockey rates in this country, NBC switched from a playoff hockey overtime to another dying sport – horse racing, and chose to broadcast the Preakness pre-race chatter.

“No such problem Tuesday night. Versus was going to stick with the Ducks and Red Wings no matter what – before switching over to this week’s episode of “The crazy things you can do with strawberries.”

Speaking of sports that aspire to benign indifference among the sporting public – as opposed to outright scorn – did you realize that the WNBA season had begun? It has but maybe we should not spread the word too much because it might annoy many of the sports fans in the US. I surfed through one of the games the other night – Sacramento was playing someone else – and immediately noted the empty seats all over the arena. That would never happen here in the DC area where the Washington Mystics have an immensely successful – if not hugely profitable – promotional strategy in place. The Mystics seem to believe that their “Buy None/Get One Free” strategy for distributing tickets will build them a fan base. I never did complete my studies for an MBA, so I’m not sure I fully comprehend the subtleties of the business model here. What I do know is that it hasn’t worked – in terms of building a fan base – for the past ten years or so, but you have to give these things time…

WNBA teams lose money; that’s virtually axiomatic. And they lose money even with a very tight salary structure. According to an AP story, the first four players in this year’s WNBA draft will earn $43,200 this year; picks five through eight will make $39,950 this year; all the other first round picks will make $35,640 this year. The league minimum salary is $32,000 and the highest salary in the league is set at $93,000. Even at those levels, teams rarely break even in the WNBA. That tells me that even though the product on the court is interesting – if not compelling – there just isn’t a significant audience out there willing to spend money to see the games or time on the couch watching the games.

The NFL owners have indeed awarded the 2011 Super Bowl to Dallas in their new stadium. It took several rounds of voting to arrive at that decision; but after Glendale Arizona was eliminated from consideration, Dallas won out over Indianapolis by a 17-15 vote. Here’s some math for you. The stadium will seat 95,000 folks for the Super Bowl; and by 2011, the projected face value of a ticket will be $900. That comes out to an $85.5M revenue stream just from general admission. On top of that, there will be over 300 luxury suites that can be had for the day. The Dallas presentation to the owners did not specify the prices that could be charged for those puppies, but you can bet it will more than “three easy payments of $39.95”.

As a point of reference, the largest Super Bowl crowd in history was in 1980 at the Rose Bowl; they put almost 104,000 fannies in seats for that game. But tickets then had a face value of $30 so the revenue from ticket sales was only about $3M. In case you didn’t major in economics, let me assure you that the projected ticket revenue for 2011 is significantly higher than the ticket revenue from 1980 even when you adjust for inflation.

The NFL seems to have an interesting formula going for it. If you are a city in a “southern clime” where February weather tends to be gentle, and if you also build a new stadium, then you get a Super Bowl in your city. In northern parts of the country, you have to build a new stadium with a dome to get a Super Bowl. That formula has now worked itself out in Atlanta, Detroit, Glendale (AZ), Houston, Jacksonville, Miami and Tampa. Indianapolis may have lost out in this particular situation but since the Colts will be playing in a new domed stadium starting in 2008, look for Indy to host a Super Bowl sometime soon.

I have to admit that I was unhappy to see that an NFL team did not draft Chris Leak (QB from Florida). I had hoped to see the headline:

Bruisers Surprise Everyone
Take Leak In Third Round

The defending World Series champion St. Louis Cardinals are struggling this year; they’re not hitting all that well and their pitching has been disastrous. The Cardinals stooped so far as to claim Todd Wellemeyer on waivers from the KC Royals – not a team known for stellar pitching depth. Wellemeyer has appeared in 13 games this season in relief and has an ERA of 9.68. In addition, even though we are not yet through the first third of the season, the Cards have two pitchers who project to 20 losses or more for the year. Kip Wells is 1-8 at the moment with an ERA of 6.75 and Anthony Reyes in 0-7 with an ERA of 5.85. I think the appropriate comment here is “Yowza!”

Last year, the players on the Texas Rangers chafed under the micromanagement of Buck Showalter and the front office eased Showalter out the door. Ron Washington replaced him; Washington had never managed before and that seemed a bit strange given that the GM in Texas is a guy who is very new to the GM position and who had never been a senior baseball exec before. Well, those players who felt put upon last year have responded to all of this by going deep into the tank. The team batting average is about .250 and the team ERA is over 5.0; no matter how you look at those numbers, they just stink! The Rangers are last in the AL West and are already 10 games behind the division leader. Their season is over; the roster needs to be blown up and maybe – just maybe – the owner needs to pay a bit more attention to the folks running his baseball team instead of worrying about the European soccer team he also owns.

Speaking of stinking, the Phillies are closing in on an ignominious mark. Sometime soon, they will lose their 10,000th game in franchise history. Bill Conlin in the Philadelphia Daily News decided to pick the all-time worst Phillies team (since 1943). This is a “must read” column.

Finally, Greg Cote had this comment in the Miami Herald:

“A Brewers fan has formed peeyourpantsforthebrewers.com, and thousands have signed up, pledging to pee their pants if the team finally makes the playoffs. Would I ever do something like that? Depends.”

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

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There have been some classic statements made by people that have come back to haunt them in the future such as Al Gore “inventing the Internet”. That makes for a useful punch line once in a while but does not make the former Vice President out to be a person whose fundamental humanity should be in question. The worst of these kinds of statements seems to come from someone in situations where no comment at all is needed. Remember Marge Schott saying that in the beginning Hitler wasn’t all that bad but that he got carried away? That’s monumentally stupid to begin with; it calls into question either Schott’s fundamental humanity and/or her possession of an intellect greater than a rutabaga; and there really wasn’t any reason for the owner of a baseball team to be talking about politics, history or Adolf Hitler in the first place.

At this moment, we have an analog to Marge Schott in the sporting world. Clinton Portis found a reason to run his yap about a subject that he obviously should have dodged and called into question his fundamental humanity and/or his possession of an intellect greater than a rutabaga. In an interview with a TV station in the Tidewater area of Virginia (WAVY-TV), Portis talked about Michael Vick and his “situation” wherein investigators are looking into allegations of dogfighting at a house that Vick owned – but did not live in – near Smithfield Virginia. Here’s what Portis told the station:

“I don’t know if he was fighting dogs or not. But it’s his property; it’s his dogs. If that’s what he wants to do, do it.”

Meanwhile, teammate Chris Samuels was giggling about all this as the interview proceeded. Samuels even joked that Portis ought to watch Animal Planet if he didn’t already.

Portis seems to think that one can do in one’s home whatever it is that he wants to do. I guess that means that all spousal abuse is fine and dandy with him so long as it happens in the home. Building bombs and planning an assault on a local church/synagogue – maybe even Redskins’ Park? - would be just fine with him too so long as one did it in one’s basement. In case Portis hasn’t caught the drift here, let’s be blunt. There are certain activities that society and the legislatures that society elects deem to be sufficiently anti-social that they are NOT acceptable activities even when carried out in the privacy of one’s home. And dogfighting happens to be one of them.

I am not – under any circumstances – a PETA advocate. Most of the PETA activities are annoyingly feckless. But dogfighting, cockfighting, and bear baiting are useless endeavors that have been deemed to be criminal in just about every state in the US. [I’m sure there is a state or two that has no law on the books banning these activities and I’ll hear from an animal-fighting advocate to correct me on that issue.] And because these activities are deemed to be criminal, they should not be tolerated even if practiced in the privacy of a home. Oh, and in case Chris Samuels hasn’t figured it out either, this is not a subject to giggle about.

Any time you do something that puts your name on a list where Marge Schott is also on the list, you haven’t done yourself proud. Got that?

Another NFL story floating around out there is that the Bears will be using Devin Hester on offense this year – in addition to his kick-off and punt return duties. This is being heralded as a potentially great thing to open up the Bears’ offense. I have to see this to believe that it will work. Hester is a speed merchant; there’s no doubt about that. But the history of football is that guys who are really fast become corner backs if they can’t catch the football all that well; if they can catch, they become game-breaking wide receivers. Hester has been a cornerback – and by all accounts not a great one – all of his career.

Yes, he can fly. But there is a history lesson that fans need to recall before getting carried away here. There was a track athlete named Frank Budd back in the 1960s; he ran the 100-yard dash faster than Bob Hayes. He was signed to a contract by the Eagles in the mid-60s and lasted one year there; he then signed with the Redskins and lasted one year there. He could run like a deer; the problem was that he couldn’t catch the ball any better than your average eight-point buck. Frank Budd was faster than Devin Hester but he only lasted 2 seasons and his cumulative stats were:

27 games – 10 receptions – 1 TD.

Call me a skeptic about Devin Hester being an offensive force majeure in the NFL. I’m not saying it can’t happen but I need to be convinced with evidence…

Speaking of sprinters who can fly, the Tampa Bay Bucs worked out Justin Gatlin a couple of weeks ago. Because I don’t follow track and field nearly as closely as I used to, I believe that Gatlin is a former world record holder in the 100m dash with a time under 9.8 seconds. He also won an Olympic gold medal in 2004. That’s the good news; the bad news is that he is in the midst of a long-term ban from track and field competition for doping/steroid use; the ban is long enough that it probably amounts to a lifetime ban for a sprinter. Can someone explain to me how someone already “convicted” and punished for using performance-enhancing techniques can try out for an NFL team without immediately running afoul of the “substance-abuse policy”? And to show you how deferential the media are towards the NFL, imagine the hue and cry that would be created if MLB worked out an already convicted “performance-enhancing substance user”.

Jim Armstrong of the Denver Post noted that Detroit Red Wings had failed to sell out any of their first eight home games in the Stanley Cup Playoffs. His reaction was:

“If Detroit is Hockeytown, then Anchorage is the Bikini Capital of the World.”

Along those lines, here’s a Quick Quiz:

How long will it be until the NHL is a 16-team league?

Or, will it implode directly to a 12-team league?

Here’s a quick public service announcement for everyone. May is National Barbecue Month and May is also National Egg Month. I don’t have any recipes to share with you for barbecued eggs but maybe you can talk among yourselves and come up with an appropriate celebration activity.

Finally, here’s Scott Ostler in the San Francisco Chronicle on the Brett Favre tizzy when the Packers did not acquire Randy Moss:

“Brett Favre, the ultimate team guy in sports, was desperate to hook up with an over-the-hill, overpaid wide receiver who won’t block, won’t practice, won’t go over the middle, won’t take any responsibility, won’t assume any leadership and won’t pretend to be part of any team he’s part of. Maybe Favre knows something the Raiders don’t.”

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

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Yesterday, I got an e-mail message from a young man who has been reading these rants ever since they went on the Internet in 2001. He is a big sports fan and a devoted follower of Major League Soccer. Let me summarize his lengthy note to me:

1. MLS is on the rise. Notwithstanding the failure of the old NASL, MLS is poised to be profitable for the first time in its existence this year.

2. When MLS played in cavernous football venues, the 50,000 empty seats looked awful on TV. Now, more than half the MLS teams play in “soccer-specific venues” that are smaller; and at the moment, many MLS teams average higher attendance than the NBA or NHL teams in the same cities.

3. MLS talent is improving across the board. The signing of “still-in-his-prime” David Beckham opens up many business opportunities for the league.

4. With Americans gaining ownership of Premiere League teams in England, the expansion of soccer into North America will be enhanced.

5. Toronto is an expansion MLS team and is sold out for the entire season.

Other than his point about David Beckham, I tend to agree with him here; MLS is healthier now than it has been in the past. The rise of new “soccer-specific venues” is important for the league not only because it allows them to televise games and not have the viewer distracted by all the empty seats. These “soccer-specific venues” lets MLS clubs develop revenue streams from parking and concessions and memorabilia sales and the like sharing only with the local officials from whom they lease the stadium. And it can allow them to engage in community activities and soccer development activities much more readily because they control the schedule of usage for the facility.

Another significant positive move for MLS is that they now have a much more diverse ownership base. There was a time when six of the teams – half the league at the time – were owned by the same person. The fact that one never heard any cries of collusion or game-fixing or assertions of any other kinds of shenanigans can be attributed simply to the level of disinterest in MLS at the time. Imagine if one person owned half the franchises in the NBA; now imagine the uproar that would happen if three of the teams owned by the same person engaged in one of those multi-player/multi-team swaps. The conspiracy cries would be heard from border to border. MLS avoided that in the past and needs to move to assure that each team has independent ownership in the near future.

MLS is on the rise and needs to maintain an image of integrity while it continues to grow. And the David Beckham signing demonstrates the point here. First of all, there is some doubt about whether or not Beckham is still in his prime. Surely, he can still play at a level where he should be a stand-out in MLS, but that was also true of Pele when he came to the Cosmos in the old NASL. Pele was still better than just about any other player in the NASL but he was a shadow of what Pele used to be. MLS must be careful to market David Beckham for what he is on the field and not what he used to be in 2002.

And that whole $250M contract for David Beckham was handled with a bit of “Enron accounting”. It took a while until it became clear that MLS was not paying him $250M to play soccer although one surely got that kind of impression when the news was rolled out.

One other thing about David Beckham’s arrival in MLS is spotty. Teams have played 45 games as of this morning and Beckham hasn’t played in any of them yet. I don’t recall in the euphoria of the announcement of his arrival in MLS or the rush to sell tickets that anyone said that he’d be showing up late for the season by a lot. MLS has some history of sidling up right next the line of “bait and switch” in the past and needs to avoid any repeat of that in the present. For those who don’t recall, the arrival of Freddy Adu to DC United was a much heralded event and the DC United club put on a full court press to sell tickets to see Freddy (then 14 years old) play against the pros. The only problem was that he sat on the bench for most of every game for whatever reason. Adu is no longer in DC – I believe he was sent to the team in Salt Lake City – and is a non-factor in terms of league marketing strategy now that he is all of 18 years old.

The joining of MLS and ESPN is a major plus for the league. Unlike the NHL whose TV fortunes are tied to a cable network that is as easily found as a leprechaun, MLS will get a ratings push and probably an attendance boost from the promotional efforts of ESPN. You can carp about ESPN practices and pick apart many of their programs, but no one can doubt their doggedness in promoting the stuff on their networks. This is going to help MLS in the short run and presumably in the long run.

Even though I react less than fully positively to the ESPN campaign on behalf of MLS, it is probably effective with a younger demographic toward which it seems to be aimed. The theme is that “You are a fan (of soccer and MLS); you just don’t know it yet.” Well, excuse me, Sparky. I’ve been a sports fan for more than 50 years now and I’m perfectly capable of knowing what I am a fan of and what I am not a fan of. To some extent, that campaign might – I said might – turn off some sports fans whose reaction is that they have not been a fan of soccer for the last umpty-doodle years and resent being told that they don’t know what they like and don’t like. Whatever.

It seems to me that MLS has grown up to a large degree. The marketing of soccer in the US in the past has simply not worked. NASL spent itself into oblivion on big name foreign players who could no longer play all that well. The women’s pro soccer league was founded on the notion that because millions of parents took their little girls to play soccer on weekends, those parents would spend money to take their little girls to watch other parents’ children kick a ball around a field. That was the essence of the business model for that league and – surprise, SURPRISE!! – that league collapsed under its own weight even with Women’s World Cup Champion players on the field. MLS started out promoting soccer on the basis that US men were about to burst onto the international soccer scene and soccer would then necessarily become as big here as it is everywhere else. Nice thought, but not based in reality. Now, MLS seems to be marketing the game and a few of the recognizable players on a major sports outlet and that could just make the league a player in terms of sporting attention in the US.

I doubt I’ll ever see soccer in the US with a following equivalent to that of European nations or fans with similar passions. But my longtime reader is correct; soccer is healthier now in the US than it has ever been.

Finally, here’s a note from Bernie Lincicome in the Rocky Mountain News that seems perfectly appropriate in light of the commentary above:

“Reports that French World Cup star Zinedine Zidane will follow English heartthrob David Beckham to the United States and Major League Soccer are being discounted by soccer authorities.

“ ‘Everyone knows that Zidane does not follow anybody’ an insider said. ‘He goes head first.’ “

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

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I think I’ve made it clear in the past that I admire the creativity of many minor league baseball teams with regard to their promotional activities. There are two interesting ones coming up later this season that carry on this tradition of creativity. In August this year, the Portland Beavers are going to poke fun at baseball teams that give away bobblehead dolls. They’ll do that by giving away bobblehead dolls – but not just any bobblehead dolls. The Beavers have found three men aaround the country named Bob L. Head and fans will vote online regarding which man will have his likeness on the bobblehead doll to be given away on that night. It will officially be Bob L. Head night and the winner will also toss out the ceremonial first pitch. Clever.

Meanwhile in Las Vegas, the 51s will also do a bobble head promotional night in August featuring John Kruk, who played a couple of seasons in Las Vegas in the 1980s. Supposedly, the team considered giving away a modified bobblehead doll in honor of Kruk – one where the head was fixed but the gut bobbled around. If you’ve seen Kruk on ESPN lately in his role as a studio analyst, you know that would be a useful portrayal of his physique. But that was a bit more complicated than the promotional event seemed to warrant and so the Las Vegas 51s will go with the standard bobblehead doll.

In recent weeks there had been some more than predictable whining about the “unfairness” of interleague play in baseball since it produces unbalanced schedules and some teams get easier draws in the other league than do others. And to the folks who think they have discovered something there that is worthy of complaint, let me inform them that Paris is in France. Of course the schedule is unbalanced; even within each league, the schedule is unbalanced and it’s been that way for years. And by definition, every unbalanced schedule will produce a situation where one team has an easier schedule than some other team.

I believe it was Chipper Jones who complained that the Braves have to play the Yankees and the Red Sox every year and that gave the Braves a tougher road to travel than other teams. Sounds good on paper until you look at the Yankees this year. Yes, they have a $200M payroll, but the Yankees are 4 games under .500 with more than 25% of the season under their belt. At the moment, the Yankees are exactly 1.5 games ahead of the “less than fearsome” Tampa Bay Devil Rays. So as this first spate if interleague games goes by, it should not be such a daunting task to have the Yankees on the schedule.

And for the record, I just don’t believe that the Yankees are losing at the moment because Joe Torre has forgotten how to manage a baseball team. I think this particular Yankees’ team is just not very good. Their starting pitching is old and inconsistent; the middle relief pitching is decent but not great and Mariano Rivera as a closer has been a shadow of his former self. It’s the end of May and I believe Rivera has three saves. Yesterday, he pitched the ninth inning starting with a 5 run-lead; he gave up a solo home run and took 27 pitches to get the side out. That’s not the form Yankee fans are used to seeing from Rivera… Oh, and the Yankees seem to be “feast or famine” at the plate. They’ll go out and score 10 runs two games in a row and then go five games without scoring more than three. This is not Joe Torre’s doing.

ESPN is chronicling the next coming of Roger Clemens about as ardently as the major networks are chronicling the movements of the announced and potential Presidential candidates for 2008. Under no circumstances would I even hint that Roger Clemens is an ordinary pitcher; he is certainly more than that. Nevertheless, I’m not sure that he’s the answer for this Yankees’ pitching staff particularly if the Yankees’ bats don’t come to life soon. I think I’ve counted correctly; last year Roger Clemens made 19 starts for the Houston Astros; he went six full innings or more only 6 times. If he matches that kind of pitching this year, he’ll be turning over games to a mediocre bullpen and an “iffy” closer to get nine or more outs on a typical night. Yes, he’ll probably hold the opposing team down so that the game will be close at that point, but unless the Yankee bats can provide a cushion here, I’m not sure this will translate to wins every fifth day for the team.

Another story swirling around the Yankees is the possibility that A-Rod may opt out of his contract and become a free agent before the contract is over. The corollary to all that is that the Yankees may look to trade him sometime this season particularly if the team is not close to the playoffs. The favorite destination for A-Rod is the Chicago Cubs because the thinking goes that the Yankees would prefer to trade him out of the AL. I have no idea if any of that will happen and will waste no synapses pondering the hidden meanings of statements made by the Yankees’ front office. But I will say that A-Rod would do well to go to the Cubbies; it should help his baseball résumé a bit. The thing that A-Rod seems not to do well is hit in October in the playoffs; by going to the Cubs, he will avoid that problem because the Cubs don’t participate in the playoffs in October…

Speaking of the Cubbies, the team has the highest payroll (just over $100M) in the NL Central by a wide margin. The Cubs have three players (Lee, Soriano and Marquis) who will make this year just about what the entire Pittsburgh Pirates team will make. Nevertheless, the Cubs still have a huge hole in the team out in the bullpen. After last week’s “come-from-ahead loss” to the Mets where the Cubs gave up five runs in the ninth inning, the Cubs’ bullpen was a combined 2-11 with 8 blown saves. Ouch!

When the season opened, the Twins had Sir Sidney Ponson in their starting rotation. They seem to have given up on that stratagem after Sir Sidney lost five games in seven starts and amassed an ERA of 6.93. The Twins released Ponson who has had exactly one winning season in his 10 years in the major leagues. Any team that signs him is showing desperation.

Meanwhile, in Seattle Jeff Weaver has also pitched himself out of the starting rotation. You may recall that Weaver was one of the major contributors to the Cardinals’ run to the World Series championship last year and he signed with the Mariners in the off season. Weaver started six games in Seattle; he lost all six of them; he lasted a total of 22 innings in those six starts; his ERA for those six outings was 14.32. Folks, there are batting practice pitchers out there that can compile lower ERAs than that. So, how did this happen? How did he go from “playoff hero” to “pitching zero” so quickly? Let Tigers’ infielder, Brandon Inge, cut to the core of the matter and explain it:

“It’s an easy difference. He pitched well then, not so well today.”

Slow down there man, I need some time to ponder the depth of that analysis. OK, I think I’ve got it now…

Finally, Greg Cote had this observation in the Miami Herald regarding the Marlins’ pitching staff:

“The Marlins traded closer Jorge Julio. Sunshine Network will air a retrospective on Julio’s Marlins highlights tonight from 8 p.m. to 8:01.”

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

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If you had a career batting average of .500, you’d be a certified mortal lock as a first ballot Hall of Fame inductee. However, an NFL Commissioner with a “batting average” for good ideas at the .500 level might just be asked to leave the position after a few years. If various reports are accurate, NFL Commissioner, Roger Goodell, is in the process of dealing with two “new ideas’ at the moment and he’s got one good one and one bad one. Because today is Friday and I’m looking forward to a nice weekend, I am feeling awash in the milk of human kindness at the moment. So, I’ll start with the “good idea”.

According to a report on ESPN.com and commentary by Jim Rome, the NFL is considering reducing the amount of time that teams have to make their draft selections on draft day. When teams are “on the clock” in the first round of the draft, the proposal calls for the new time limit to be 10 minutes instead of the current 15 minutes. Here’s a short description of how I feel about that idea; the spokesthing for this idea should be Tony the Tiger because this idea is “GrrrEAT!”

After teams have digested scouting reports and combine analyses and personal interviews and mock war room scenario enactments, why do those teams need 15 more minutes to make their pick? In fact, you could ask why they need as many as 10 more minutes, but that time reduction would