The Sports Curmudgeon®

Like General MacArthur, I have returned; and I have with me this week’s version of “Tuesdays With The Sorries”. But just to change things up a bit, I’ll start with the NFL this week and move to the colleges later on. The Arizona Cardinals sought to avoid two consecutive trips from the west to the east coast involving long flights by staying east for a week and practicing away from home. Well, that worked out just swell as they surrendered 56 points and 6 TD passes to the Jets and Brett Favre in the second game of that stretch. Who knows; maybe the Cards would have been torched that badly in any event, but I don’t think that the club management will be looking to foot that bill for keeping everyone away from home for a week any time soon. Let’s call the Cardinals’ performance bleak.

The Denver Broncos lost to the Kansas City Chiefs by 2 TDs. Any team that loses to the Chiefs this year had a sorry week, but to lose to the Chiefs by 2 TDs is noteworthy in its sorriness. The Broncos’ defense should voluntarily forfeit a game check here allowing Damon Huard to complete 21 of 28 passes and allowing Larry Johnson to gain 198 yards rushing on 28 attempts. Let’s call the Broncos’ performance pathetic.

The St. Louis Rams led the Bills in the 4th quarter and managed to lose the game by 17 points. That’s sorry all by itself. Then, the club management compounded that shame by firing Scott Linehan as the head coach and replacing him with the defensive coordinator whose unit gave up all those 4th quarter points. Jim Haslett has already shown himself to be a mediocre head coach in the NFL; so even if this is a “step-up” for the Rams in terms of coaching, it isn’t a big step up. Rams’ ownership needs to sell the team as they are rumored to want to do and let someone else pay the money to hire some people who know football come in and try to rebuild the franchise from the ground up. The Rams are performance was blighted.

Rare though it may be, I want to include in “Tuesdays With The Sorries” one of the winning teams from last week by mentioning the Cleveland/Cincinnati game. One team had to prevail here; it was the Browns. Both teams stink in general and both teams stunk on Sunday. This was a CBS televised game in my viewing area so I checked it out while there were commercials on the FOX game; it was painful to watch; at its best moment, it came all the way up to “brutal”. I’ll label the performance of both the Browns and the Bengals as dismal.

In college football, nine of the top 25 teams lost over the weekend. It is easy to forgive two of these losses because they came to other teams in the top 25 who were ranked higher than the losing team. On the assumption that the poll voters have their heads external to the lower ends of their alimentary canals – I know, that’s a big assumption – those two losses were to be expected. But the others…

Oregon State beat formerly #1 USC. They beat them outright as 24-point underdogs. It wasn’t that long ago that I watched Penn State dismantle Oregon State hardly breaking a sweat. There are star players in terms of physical talent on the USC squad but the focus and the mental dedication to football by this team – and by the coaching staff – has to be in question. Let’s call USC’s performance barren.

Alabama (last ranked #8) beat formerly #3 Georgia. They beat the Bulldogs and they beat them convincingly. Georgia fans were upset when pre-season #1 Georgia moved down in the polls after lackluster wins earlier on; Alabama showed that Georgia is a good football team but has a long way to go to be considered the best in the country. Let’s call Georgia’s performance glum.

Ole Miss beat formerly #4 Florida by blocking an extra point try late in the game. Candidly, outside of the “Eli Manning years” at Ole Miss, it has been more than a few years since Ole Miss has been more than an SEC doormat. Maybe this means Ole Miss is re-emerging as a football power; maybe not. But they sure took care of business on the field last weekend. Let’s call Florida’s performance grim.

Michigan beat formerly #9 Wisconsin. The Badgers dominated the early going in the game but could not put the ball in the end zone. This was the classic case of the better team letting the lesser team hang around and start to believe it might actually pull the game out. And that is what Michigan did – with the help of Wisconsin continuing to play as if they had their collective thumbs up their collective butts. Let’s call Wisconsin’s performance dour.

Navy beat formerly #16 Wake Forest. Navy’s defense – particularly its pass defense – has been anything but robust this year. Nonetheless, Wake Forest had precisely zero points in the first half and managed only 17 for the game. Let’s call Wake Forest’s performance stark.

Maryland beat formerly #20 Clemson. This is the second bad defeat by Clemson this year. The Tigers were once ranked as high as #9 and have now been blown out by Alabama and lost to a truly mediocre Maryland team. Clemson and Wake Forest were thought to be the “gold standard” of the ACC; bringing to mind the rhetorical question posed by Chaucer:

“If gold rusts, what shall iron do?”

Let’s call Clemson’s performance austere.

Houston beat formerly #23 East Carolina. That makes a second loss for East Carolina who looked like a Cinderella team after Week 2. East Carolina probably then thought of themselves as making a major bowl game on New Year’s Day; now they should focus on the possibility of an appearance in the WAGARAB – Who Gives A Rat’s Ass Bowl. Let’s call East Carolina’s performance dreary.

Two other performances demand a passing mention here. Rice beat North Texas by 57 points. No one considers Rice to be one of the top 50 teams in the country; Rice may not make it into many top 75 lists. What does that say about North Texas?

Virginia lost to Duke by 4 TDs and scored only 3 points. How bad is that? That is go-sit-in-the-corner-and-hide-your-face-in-your-hands bad.

Finally, a comment from Greg Cote in the Miami Herald:

“The Dolphins cut kicker Jay Feely, who, among his parting shots, said the team ‘’lacked talent.'’ Gee, really, Jay? Ya think? Because that 1-15 season really didn’t give us any kind of clue!”

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

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If you are a fantasy baseball enthusiast, you might enjoy this fantasy. I just gave you the job of General Manager of a Major League baseball team. I now continue to wave my magic wand; and this winter, you will be offered a trade in which you receive Prince Fielder from the Brewers in exchange for a package of players that does not gut your current roster or your farm system. You do have to give up a package of prospects and a current player who has done time in the big leagues. Do you make the deal? What would be the length of the “long-term contract” that you would pre-negotiate with Fielder’s agent?

Fielder is young – he will turn 25 next year – and he is talented; there is no doubt that he can hit a baseball. At the same time, I would have more than a couple of reservations about Fielder as a person/teammate. His physical altercation with a teammate earlier this season may have demonstrated his burning desire to win; on the other hand, it may have demonstrated his lack of maturity and his lack of self-control. His bitter feud with his father, Cecil Fielder, may or may not be justified but Prince Fielder’s opening that feud to the public awareness with some less than classy comments was unnecessary and unappealing.

The “lack of self-control” issue also plays out in Prince Fielder’s abundant abdominal avoir du pois. If he expands any more, his butt will get its own zip code and his abdomen will have its own Congressthing. Players have “eaten themselves out of the league” before in baseball and in other sports. Might Prince Fielder be on the road to doing just that? Alternatively, is this just part of his genetic makeup taken from his very large male parental unit – the one that he really does not get along with?

OK, Mr. GM, you have the deal on your desk. You need to return the call just because that is the proper protocol. Do you make the deal?

Much has been made - - actually too much has been made - - about the ceremony at the last game in Yankee Stadium. I think that Jerry Greene of the Orlando Sentinel summed up much of the brouhaha succinctly and cogently:

“The Yankees hold their “good-bye stadium” party and don’t even mention former manager Joe Torre? Can you say “petty”?

“Of course they didn’t mention former pitcher Roger Clemens either, but they probably just misremembered.”

Vice-Presidential Candidate, Sarah Palin, gives her kids unusual names; she likes to run; so, she named one of her kids Track. She also has a kid named Trig, which would lead me to conclude that she likes math or is a huge fan of Roy Rogers. [Aside: If Trig had been twins, would they have been named Sine and Cosine?] Should the Mets’ bullpen coach adopt the idea of naming kids for activities relevant to his life, might I suggest Blown Save or Bombs Away as possibilities?

Syndicated columnist, Norman Chad, was pulling for a Rays - Marlins confrontation in the World Series. He wanted something different; he wanted a change; here is how he expressed that desire:

“I want to see a Red Sox-Mets World Series in the autumn like Robert Downey Jr. wants to see his parole officer in Cannes.”

Despite his thoughts on the matter, I bet the people in MLB who work with the TV networks would not want the Rays and the Marlins. They might have to go searching for their ratings with a magnifying glass.

Time for a Quick Quiz. No peeking; no Googling…

Name two of the four heavyweight boxing champions out there at the moment. You need not identify which of the “alphabet soup” organizational titles they hold; just name them.

NBA training camps open next week and the NY Knicks look as if they are starting out the season with the clear intention of leading the league in “what-are-they-thinking” moves. Be sure you are seated and remove any sharp objects from your hands at this point because you are likely to whack yourself between the eyes when you read the next item.

“Not only will Stephon Marbury be at training camp next Tuesday in Saratoga, but so will Allan Houston.” [NY Post]

I can understand Marbury; the Knicks owe him about $22M and they cannot trade him for a bag of ice. Therefore, as sour and poisonous as he might be, they do not have any real choice regarding what to do with him. Allan Houston is a different story entirely.

Allan Houston is now 37 years old. He last played in a real NBA game in 2005. He tried a comeback with the Knicks last year and lasted just long enough to be around for a single pre-season game. No one ever said that Allan Houston was a “bad-guy” or a “locker-room problem”; no one associated him with any of the managerial and societal dysfunctionalities of the Knicks organization. He is a good guy; he wears a white hat. He also cannot play any more; microfracture surgery on his leg took care of that three years ago.

I realize that the Knicks franchise is in a personnel bind but pitting Marbury versus Houston for a roster slot in their backcourt cannot provide relief for very long. This will not end well.

Dick Lynch was a defensive back for the NY Giants and a long-time broadcaster of Giants’ games. Dick Lynch died this week. In his college days, he played at Notre Dame and he is the man who scored the only TD in a 7-0 win for Notre Dame over Oklahoma in 1957. That loss broke the Sooners’ 47-game winning streak – a record that stands until now.

Finally, with the “debates” between the Presidential candidates about to happen, let me offer another observation from Jerry Greene in the Orlando Sentinel:

“And we leave you with this: Fathead.com now offers wall stickers in the likenesses of John McCain and Barack Obama. No, I’m not touching that.”

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

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Last week, the Mythical Picks were en fuego; the overall record was 13-6. If things go true to form, they will be en hielo this week.

The Over/Under Picks last weekend were 7-3 bringing the season totals for Over/Under Picks much closer to respectability. These picks are still under .500 at 10-12.

The Against the Spread Picks last weekend were 6-3 taking them to the gaudy level of 19-11 for the year. Despite the 63% success rate for these picks so far this year, there will be no “Bet The 401(k) Mortal Lock of the Millennium” pick this week.

No one should use anything here as the basis for making a wager on a football game this weekend. If you did that, you would be so stupid that you could not find a quarterback at a Manning Family picnic.

General Comments:

I read somewhere that 12 Green Bay Packers fans got to buy season tickets this year after spending “more than thirty years” on the waiting list. [Currently the waiting list for Packers’ season tix is more than 78,000.] So, I wonder how happy those folks were to be in Lambeau Field to witness the Cowboys first victory there - - ever.

One of the Internet sportsbooks now has posted proposition bets on when Raiders’ coach Lane Kiffen will be fired. Week 5 – next week – is a bye week for the Raiders and that is the “favorite” at the moment with odds of 9-5.

News Flash News Flash

This just in to Curmudgeon Central. The Raiders have announced that Lane Kiffen will start this weekend as coach of the team. The team denied reports that his headphones were also wired to deliver 50,000 volts from earpiece to earpiece just in case Al Davis got unhappy during the game. We now return you to your originally scheduled rant.

Actually, here is a scenario I would like to see play out with the Raiders this weekend. The team came out flat in the first half and the Chargers just blew their doors off to lead by 30 points at halftime. Knowing the bye week is coming, Al Davis made the decision to get a new coach sometime near the end of the first quarter, but he is so steamed at the halftime score that he fires Kiffen during the halftime. Instead of having one of the coordinators take over, Al Davis himself puts on the headphones and calls the game from upstairs. Were there any doubts as to who was in charge, that would squelch them. Were there any doubts about organizational dysfunctionality, that should squelch them.

Oh, by the way, if indeed Rob Ryan moves up to the position of head coach or interim head coach or head coach for the moment of the Raiders, he would immediately set a record for the head coach with the longest hair in NFL history. Every time I see him prowling on the sidelines, I want to call him Simba.

Oh by the way one more time, if indeed Rob Ryan becomes the head coach in Oakland, the probability that he will last their longer than John Madden’s tenure with the club is equivalent to the probability that Ralph Nader will be named CEO and Chairman of the Board for General Motors.

Last week’s loss by the Raiders to the Bills belongs squarely in the lap of Rob Ryan and the defense. Kiffen has already said that the Raiders defense was too passive in the loss to Denver in Week 1 and that Kiffen is not part of the process of developing a defensive game plan or part of calling the defenses. Well, the Raiders’ defense last weekend gave the game up. With 8 minutes to play, the Raiders led 16-7. After allowing a TD to make the score 16-14, the offense scored again to raise the lead to 23-14. Then the defense allowed 10 more points – bringing the 8-minute total in the fourth quarter to 17 points.

When you look at the sidelines during NFL games, most coaches are animated and “into the games”. However, there are a few stoics on the sidelines:

Tony Dungy and Dick Jauron look professorially inquisitive during the games. It is as if they are witnessing the enactment of a great mystery story and are seeking to process everything going on so they can get to the answer before everyone else.

Lovie Smith often looks confused on the sidelines. If he is witnessing the enactment of the same great mystery as Dungy and Jauron, he looks as if he isn’t getting all the clues.

Eric Mangini has a look on his face that says, “How the hell did that happen?”

Ken Whisenhunt just buries his face in his laminated note sheet probably to avoid having to confront what just happened.

Scott Linehan simply looks lost.

There are four 0-3 teams in the NFL who are just not going anywhere. Obviously, the coaches of those teams are feeling the heat to get better quickly lest they lose their jobs even before Lane Kiffen loses his. In some cases, getting fired might be a blessing:

Herm Edwards is an articulate and intelligent man who has a team in KC so deep in a rebuilding/reassessment process that he knows he will not win 4 games this year and may not win 4 next year either. The NFLPA needs a new Executive Director and it makes a lot of sense for that slot to be filled with a former player who has managerial experience. Herm Edwards would probably enjoy the negotiations in getting to a new CBA more than slogging through the muck and mire of this bad football team.

Rod Marinelli has suffered enough in Detroit. The team is solid at exactly one position - - wide receiver. Everywhere else, the team is average at best and usually below average when compared to the rest of the league. Rod Marinelli cannot win there without a magic wand.

Romeo Crennel caught a huge break last season. He played a weak schedule; and for the first 10 games of the year, Derek Anderson played like an emerging star. That made the Browns look like a team on the rise; they are not. In the offseason, the Browns gave Derek Anderson a $25M contract extension; that was a mistake then; it is an albatross around the neck of the franchise now. So far this year, Anderson has yet to throw for more than 170 yards in a game; he has completed less than 50% of his passes; he has 2 TDs and 5 INTs.

Marvin Lewis actually had the Bengals in the playoffs in 2005. Remember how the Bengals declared that there was a new pecking order in the AFC North and that the Bengals were the team to beat now. Well, that came unraveled quickly; everyone is now beating the Bengals. During the last few years, the Bengals’ offense kept them in games and won games while the defense just stunk. Now the offense has fallen on hard times and it’s hard to see where inspiration comes from on that team.

In the Bears’ offseason, Coach Lovie Smith declared that Mark Bradley was the team’s #1 wide receiver. That had to come as a surprise to lots of NFL fans who did not know Mark Bradley from Omar Bradley. It had to be an even bigger surprise to fantasy football geeks who knew off the top of their head that Mark Bradley had caught a total of six passes in 2007. [For the record, Omar Bradley caught no passes in 2007 because he had been dead for 26 years at that point.]

Well, three games into the 2008 season, the Bears cut Mark Bradley leaving them with Brandon Lloyd as their #1 wide receiver. Anyone who can make sense out of that should be hired immediately by one of the major news networks to explain and interpret the tsunami of words that will soon emanate from the Presidential “debates”.

Counting last year’s playoff run, the Giants have now won 12 consecutive road games. That’s impressive. However, it’s not close to the NFL record for consecutive road wins; the record is 21 held by the SF 49ers from 1988 – 1990. To put a perspective on that, if the Giants win all seven of their remaining road games this season – not a trivial undertaking at all considering they visit all three of their NFC East foes and Pittsburgh – they will have 19 road wins at that point and would need another run in the playoffs to break the record.

The Giants are off this week but they suspended Plaxico Burress for one game for a “violation of team rules”. That means Burress will miss next week’s game against Seattle and will not be allowed to be with the team for any activities leading up to that game. Unless the “violation of team rules” had something to do with molesting the owner’s household pets, look for Plax to be back with the team immediately after the Seattle game.

The Colts get their bye week now. They need it. Looking beyond the record showing that a typically fast starting team has already lost two games in September, the Colts have serious problems. I do not remember the circumstances where I first heard this line so I cannot give proper credit, but the Colts defense can’t stop a run in a pair of pantyhose. Bob Sanders is out for at least another month; Peyton Manning is clearly not as comfortable in the pocket as usual; with a struggling passing game and a makeshift OL, Joseph Addai looks like Joseph Flabeetz out there. I’m not ready to write the Colts off yet, but they do need to get better quickly.

Atlanta at Carolina – 6.5 (39.5): I know the Falcons are 2-1 but they have beaten the Lions and the Chiefs. I know that Michael Turner leads the NFL in rushing so far but he has run against the Lions and the Chiefs. Carolina is the better team and they are at home. I like the Panthers to win and cover here.

Denver – 9 at KC (47): What does this line say about the Denver defense when a game against the sorry-assed Chiefs has an OVER/UNDER line at 47? That is the second highest line of that type for the week. On the other hand, is this an indication that the Denver offense might take the game over the total all by itself? The Chiefs will not start Tyler Thigpen at QB this week; they return Damon Huard to the starting line-up; somehow, I find it very difficult to restrain a yawn at this moment. Underdogs at home can very tempting but I will avoid the temptation this time and take the Broncos to win and cover. By the way if you do want the Chiefs in this game, shop the line; you can find it at 10 points in a couple of places.

SF at New Orleans – 5.5 (48): The Saints defense is awful. Mike Martz has an offense in place that can move the ball on the ground and in the air. I don’t think the Niners are one of the NFL elite by any stretch of the imagination and that is what gives me pause about picking them on the road against a team that has the ability to score points in bunches. Nevertheless, I distrust the Saints defense more than I distrust the Niners on the road so I’ll take the Niners with the points here. I also like this game OVER.

Arizona at Jets – 1.5 (44.5): The Cardinals stayed on the East Coast after last Sunday’s loss in Washington to avoid two consecutive weeks of coast-to-coast travel. [The Patriots are probably looking at this to see how it works out because the Pats have this coming up twice later this season.] Neither team looked good last week but even accounting for the fact that the Jets played a superior opponent, the Jets looked the worse of the two. The last time the Cardinals beat the Jets, it was 1978 and Jimmy Carter was at the center of what he called a “national malaise” – a major component of which was that we had to listen to Jimmy Carter give State of the Union messages. Neither team has impressed me this season. I’m flipping a coin here and it says to take the game OVER.

Minnesota at Tennessee – 3 (36.5): Tennessee has allowed only 29 points in three games this year. Minnesota’s defense ain’t shabby either. Factoid: The Titans have never started a season with a 4-0 record going all the way back to their roots as the Houston Oilers in the old AFL. The Vikes are really bad in third down conversions; they are 13 for 41 on the year; last week with Gus Frerotte at the helm, they were 4 for 12 and that was an improvement. With Gus Frerotte and Kerry Collins under center here, the combined age of the starting quarterbacks is close to the amount of money AIG needed for its bailout. I like the Titans at home here so I’ll take them and lay the points. Purely on a hunch, I’ll also take this game to go UNDER.

Green Bay at Tampa Bay – 1.5 (43): This is the second best game of the week. I have never been enamored with Brian Griese at QB and I do not think that the Packers will allow him to throw 67 passes in the game without a sack. That is the luxury trip he had against the Bears last week. I agree this game will be close but I’ll take the Packers with the points because I think the Packers will win the game outright.

Houston at Jax – 7.5 (42.5): The Jags running game came to life last week when Taylor and Jones-Drew combined to run for 228 yards against the Colts. The Jags defense should have sufficient answers for the Houston offense - - except for the fact that Houston always overachieves against Jax. For the Jags, this is a “sandwich game”; last week they played and upset the Colts; next week they get the Steelers to pay a call; they could let down just a bit here. David Garrard is not playing the same mistake-free football that he showed for most of last year so I’ll go out on a limb and take the Texans with the points here.

Cleveland at Cincy – 3.5 (44.5): Clearly, the worst game of the week, nothing approaches the malodor emanating from this festering heap of garbage of a game. Neither team has a win this year, so both are “o-fers”. If you insist on digging through the pile of horsesh*t here to find the pony, Cincy did put up a fight last week against a top-tier opponent; in fact, all of the Cincy opponents this year remain undefeated at the moment. Cleveland has been just plain awful all season long. Do not bet on this game; do not watch this game. Only because I said I would make a pick in every game on the schedule will I suggest taking the Bengals at home laying the points and taking the game to go OVER.

San Diego – 7.5 at Oakland (45.5): The line on this game varies from 7.5 to 9 depending on the sportsbook you happen to be scanning at any given moment. I think this is a Chargers’ blowout so I’ll take the Chargers and lay the points. If you like the Raiders, you can get up to 9 points by shopping the line.

Proposition: Chargers win by 17 or more and Lane Kiffen is the coach 24 hours after the game is over. Yes + 250 No - 300

Proposition: Chargers win by 17 or more and Rob Ryan is on the staff of the Raiders 24 hours after the game is over. Yes -115 No -115

Proposition: Raiders win and Lane Kiffen coaches the team 2 weeks from now. Yes -115 No - 115.

Buffalo – 8 at St. Louis (42): If the Rams play this Sunday twice as good as they have in their first three games, they will still lose. If they play twice as good as before, they might – I said MIGHT – cover. Give me Buffalo and you can have the points here.

Washington at Dallas – 11.5 (45.5): This is the best game of the weekend. Since this is the last season for Texas Stadium, this is probably the last time the Redskins will go there to play the Cowboys. [It could happen in the NFC playoffs; I know that. But that’s not likely.] This is a rivalry game and the often play out much closer than they look on paper, but the disparity between these two teams on the field so far this year is very large. Dallas has beaten two of the best teams in the NFC – one of them handily; Washington has scratched out wins over New Orleans and Arizona. I think the Redskins will play with more emotion and Dallas will play with more talent. I want this game OVER.

Proposition: Terrell Owens has more than 100 yards receiving. Yes - 115 No - 115.

Philly – 3 at Chicago (40.5): Will Brian Westbrook be able to play near 100% efficiency? Will Donovan McNabb be able to play near 100% efficiency? Will the Bears allow the Eagles to throw the ball all day without recording a sack? [Brian Griese threw 67 passes last week and was sacked not a single time.] Will Devin Hester be able to play near 100% efficiency? There are way too many unknowns in this game to do a thorough analysis. At full strength, the Eagles are better than the Bears at full strength. Therefore, I’ll guess the injuries average out and take the Eagles and lay the points.

Baltimore at Pittsburgh – 5 (34.5): This game will feature defense and physicality. Some of the hits in this game would be sufficient to rearrange the molars on an ox. I know that Joe Flacco is 2-0 in his NFL starts but beating Cincy and Cleveland means he has not faced a top tier defense yet. Additionally, Flacco passed for only 129 yards in both games. Last week, the Eagles blitzed the Steelers into submission. Ravens coach John Harbaugh studied under Jim Johnson in Philly so there could be “more of the same” this week. Willie Parker is out of the game so the Steelers ground game – which was AWOL last week – might be only a distant memory in this one. Factoid: The Steelers have converted only 5 of their last 25 third-down situations. I think this game will be decided by which team makes fewer mistakes. Therefore, am I more comfortable riding with Joe Flacco or Ben Roethlisberger to avoid a late mistake? The game will be fun to watch but I would not wager on it for real. Mythically, I’ll take the Steelers at home and lay the points.

Good luck.

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

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You may recall that I said last week that I had a hunch that Ball State might just rise up and beat Indiana. Pardon me while I gloat; Ball State won by 22 points. Before the season started, Jason Whitlock - - a Ball State alum - - said they might be a sleeper team for the year. So far, so good. The Cardinals are 4-0.

I do not want anyone to misinterpret anything from that first paragraph. No one should use any information here to help them to decide to make a wager on any NCAA football game on this weekend or any other weekend. Moreover, no information here should be misconstrued as authoritative with regard to which side in a wager might be the winning side after the game results are final. Anyone doing that would be very dumb - - dumb enough to try this out as a pick-up line at a bar:

“Wanna go halfsies on a bastard child?”

General Comments:

Lots of folks have not been watching Tulsa this year but Tulsa has been blowing opponents away all year long. Granted they played bottom-feeders, UAB and North Texas, for the first two games and mediocre New Mexico in the third game. [Keep in mind that New Mexico did beat PAC-10 Arizona this year.] In those three games, Tulsa has scored 45 points once and 56 points twice. Their smallest margin of victory has been 23 points. Senior QB, David Johnson, has completed just under 70% of his passes so far this year for over 1200 yards with 15 TDs and 2 INTs. Tulsa’s next five games will be Central Arkansas, Rice, SMU, UTEP and Central Florida. If they win all of them, Tulsa will be 8-0 on November 1 when they pay a visit to Arkansas.

BYU shut out Wyoming last week 44-0 after shutting out UCLA the week before 59-0. I don’t care if they were playing Nevada Barber College and the College of Cardinals; two big shutouts like that in a row are impressive.

Northwestern is 4-0 top start the season; that is the first time they have done that since 1962. Last week they beat Ohio U 16-8. In the process, they blocked two field goal attempts and held Ohio U to 4 yards rushing for the game. Northwestern alums should be looking to put flexibility in their calendars in December because Northwestern looks like it may be heading to a bowl game this year.

The PAC-10 continues to melt down this year. Oregon lost to Boise State last weekend in Oregon and Arizona State got plastered by Georgia. After the Arizona State/Georgia game - - where Georgia held ASU to 4 yards rushing for the game - - here is what ASU Coach, Dennis Erickson had to say about his OL:

“It has to get better.”

Ya think???

USC will suffer mightily if it “goes to sleep” in a PAC-10 game this year and loses it. Remember, they did that against Stanford as a 41-point favorite last year. If they do that this year, they may get hammered – rightfully – in the polls.

Play a little “what if” here for a moment… What if BYU loses to TCU and then beats Utah. Alternatively, suppose Utah loses to TCU and then beats BYU. Oklahoma should beat TCU this week; that would give all three of those teams a loss. Fresno State has already lost; Eastern Carolina has already lost. So who might be the non-BCS conference “media darling” in December? Boise State? Tulsa? Ball State? If no minor program can emerge, that will mean the BCS conferences can just belly up to the money-trough one more time unimpeded…

West Virginia won 32 games in the last three seasons; no matter how you slice it, that is not bad. Now they are sitting on a two game losing streak. The luster is off the program; but if you look down the road, they have a “redemption game” in late October. If the Mountaineers can beat Auburn in October, they will have restored the program’s stature.

Hasn’t the expansion of the ACC worked out just swell? As mediocre as the PAC-10 is this year, the ACC is worse. In fact, I think the Big East is better than the ACC this year and I am not convinced that the ACC is better than C-USA this year.

Duke has been the football doormat in the ACC for a long while now. This year Duke is 2-1 losing only to undefeated Northwestern. This year Virginia looks as if it might be headed for “doormat” status in the conference. Duke and Virginia play this weekend.

Believe it or not, Duke started the week as a full touchdown favorite to beat Virginia. Duke has lost 10 or more games in each of the last three seasons. Moreover, if you look at Virginia’s schedule, there are no “patsies” left on the schedule. If Virginia loses here, they might go 1-11 for the season. Virginia coach, Al Groh, is a decent coach; but let’s just say that in the area of “charisma with fans and the media”, he has a few deficiencies. UVa is not a hotbed of football; if this season heads into the sewer, look for people in Charlottesville to abandon the program…

Paul Johnson left as the coach of Navy after last season to take his option offense to Georgia Tech. It seems to have taken hold there. Last week, Georgia Tech ran for 438 yards against Mississippi State whose defense held Auburn to 161 yards.

Last week, I said that Temple should never have had to play Penn State. The game was not in doubt after about the first 10 minutes. Here is the history of that “rivalry”. Temple actually won three of the first four games these schools played between 1931 and 1941. However, since 1941, Penn State is 33-0-1 against Temple and the Owls have not been within 17 points of the Lions in the last 14 contests.

Given the Notre Dame loss last weekend, some people said that Notre Dame had been exposed as a bad team. I think the schedule points to Notre Dame winning 6-8 games which will make them bowl eligible this year - - and I can’t imagine them turning down a bowl bid other than the Congressional Bowl. So, keep this in mind:

The last time Notre Dame won a bowl game was in 1993.

Notre Dame is no longer the University of Football In North America - - as Tony Kornheiser is wont to call it.

Perspective: Wake Forest is not a storied football program by any means but it has won 3 bowl games since 1993.

Georgia plays Alabama this weekend. That makes two weekends in a row where the SEC gives us a game between two Top 10 teams. Thank you to the SEC for this early season present…

One last thing here - - the Richmond Spiders are ranked #1 in Division 1-AA this week. Their only loss this year came to Division 1-A Virginia. Go Spidey…

The SHOEs:

Looking toward who may be involved in my imaginary tournament at the end of the year to determine the worst team in Division 1-A (call it the SHOE for the Steaming Heap Of Excrement), here are some teams that may have put themselves in consideration.

Last week Utah State beat Idaho by 25 points. Going into last weekend, both were strong contenders for the eight-team SHOE tournament. It looks as if Utah State is off the radar for the moment. However, Idaho is definitely there having also lost a game 70-0 earlier this year.

Florida International continues on its quest to be named Flopida International. To give you an idea of how feckless their offense is, they have only completed 40 of 86 passes this year for a total of 355 yards with zero TDs and 5 INTs.

Last week, New Mexico State beat UTEP by one point. Both were on the radar for the tournament; both should remain on the radar for the tournament.

SMU under June Jones figures eventually to try to win games by piling up points and hoping the defense can hold the opposition under 40. Well, the offense has not clicked yet and the SMU defense is bad. How bad, you ask? They are dead last in the nation surrendering just over 530 yards per game. In their last two games, SMU has lost by a combined score of 91-14.

Syracuse has been bad for the last two years and they may be worse than that this year. In the past two seasons, Syracuse was 3-20. Coach Greg Robinson’s three-year tenure at Syracuse shows them with an overall record in Big East games of 2-19. And this year, they may be even worse than before…

I am hesitant to put Rutgers on this watch-list just yet but they have started out 0-3; their QB took a swing at a teammate after last week’s loss; the coach did not discipline the QB. Rutgers has Morgan State coming up this weekend. If they lose to Morgan State at home, Rutgers will be prominent on the SHOE watch-list. If they eke out a win then by less than a TD, they will still probably go on the list…

The Ponderosas:

Last week the favorites covered 4 times out of 6 Ponderosa Spread games.

BYU, Penn State, TCU and Texas covered.

Missouri and South Florida did not cover.

That brings the record for favorites covering this year to 19-9-1.

This week we have 6 Ponderosa Spread Games

USC – 24.5 at Oregon State (51.5): Oregon State lost to Penn State earlier this year by a score of 45-14. USC is better than Penn State…

Army at Texas A&M – 28.5 (41.5): Army had two weeks to prepare for this game. Unless the NCAA allows them to deploy flamethrowers on the offensive and defensive lines, I do not think the extra week of preparation will matter at all. Texas A&M has already been disappointing this year. If they lose to a bottom-feeding Army team, the natives may ride new coach, Mike Sherman, out of town on a barbecue skewer.

Arkansas at Texas – 28 (59): Once upon a time, when Richard Nixon was President, this would have been a game between the #1 and the #2 teams in the country. The spread then would not have been 28 points…

Colorado State at Cal – 27 (59): I smell an OVER here…

UAB at South Carolina – 25 (48): If South Carolina gets their offense rolling, do not expect Steve Spurrier to take his foot off the gas. The South Carolina defense is very good; do not expect UAB to put up too many points here.

Mississippi State at LSU – 24 (38): Mississippi State can play defense so that’s a lot of points to spot an opponent - - even one that is as good as LSU. On the other hand, Mississippi State’s offense managed to get zero points against Auburn in a 3-2 loss and LSU’s defense could duplicate that accomplishment. No way I bet on this game.

Games of Interest:

SMU at Tulane – 18 (49): SMU cannot stop anyone; Tulane is not a powerhouse. That is the most polite analysis you will read anywhere about this sad sack football game. If you offered to pay my airfare to New Orleans and offered me a 50-yardline seat to this game, I would ask for a couple of “Ben Franklin portraits” too before giving the offer a moment’s consideration. The loser here takes a big step toward the SHOE tournament; the winner could get back into consideration given the likelihood of future blowouts. I suspect this game will go OVER.

Pitt – 15.5 at Syracuse (46.5): Pitt has a huge talent advantage, which they ought to parlay into a 3 TD win. But I would never lay more than 2 TDS on the road backing a Dave Wannstedt coached team…

Minnesota at Ohio State – 18 (46.5): Minnesota has won in Columbus exactly one time since 1965. Minnesota is 4-0 at the moment and has played exactly zero opponents who are any good. Ohio State should win here in a walk.

Memo to Ohio State: Beating these guys on a late field goal will drop you even further in the polls. If you really are a team worthy of being in the Top 10, you should win this game by at least 4 TDs.

Maryland at Clemson – 11 (48.5): Maryland is 3-1 having beaten no one important and having lost to Middle Tennessee State. The only team the Terps held under 24 points was Division 1-AA, Delaware. Clemson can pass and Maryland has a “less than spectacular” pass defense. Assuming that Clemson pays attention here, they should win and cover.

Memo to Clemson: The ACC stinks; you can still be the conference champion. Do you copy?

Virginia at Duke – 6.5 (44): Does the UVa football program sink to the ocean’s abyssal plain after this week? I think it will. Nevertheless, I would not bet on this game with your money. If Duke wins and goes to 3-1 on the season, it might cause as much giddiness in Durham as a bonfire with a ton of marijuana at the core of the blaze…

Kent State at Ball State – 18 (59.5): Just want to put this here so you keep Ball State in mind as a potential surprise team for the year. In addition to claiming Jason Whitlock as an alum, Ball State also gave us David Letterman.

Tennessee at Auburn – 6.5 (37.5): Both teams lost last week so one of them will have two SEC losses on the books by Sunday morning. Neither set of fans will be happy with that. Tennessee’s offense has been “challenged” this year and Auburn does play very good defense. On offense, recall that one of Auburn’s wins came in a 3-2 game against Mississippi State. If you do not like low scoring defensive football, do not tune in this game.

Colorado at Florida State – 7 (41.5): FSU managed all of one field goal with 7 turnovers and 12 penalties last week against Wake Forest. Colorado is 3-0 but has not exactly played a murderous schedule. This is another game shaping up as a defensive game. That makes the spread look fat and this an interesting UNDER bet.

Marshall at West Virginia – 14.5 (51.5): A long term reader of these rants – and a Marshall alum – said two weeks ago that this was the year Marshall would beat WVU. Granted WVU has lost two in a row but Marshall starts a freshman QB and the game is at WVU. On top of that, Marshall’s pass defense ranks 115th in the country so far this year. No way I take Marshall on the money line.

Fresno State – 6.5 at UCLA (46.5): There is no polite way to say this; UCLA has stunk so far this year. Yes, they beat Tennessee; they pulled a rabbit out of their collective asses that night; frankly, that is what they will need to do to win games this year. However, in order to pull that rabbit out of their collective asses, they need to remember to stick a rabbit in there before the game starts. Fresno State goes to LA and wins the game. When do you think it will be when UCLA finds it in their heart to travel to Fresno for a game? The Twelfth of Never?

Houston at East Carolina – 11 (56): If ECU wants to stay relevant as a potential BCS bowl game player, an eleven point win over Houston is not good enough…

Navy at Wake Forest – 16 (53.5): Sorry, but I have to root for Navy to lose their third game of the season here. Do not be surprised if Wake is flat for this game; they played Florida State last week and that has to be a “bigger game” in their minds than a date with Navy. I think this game will go OVER 53.5

Bowling Green – 3 at Wyoming (41): Who scheduled this game? Do not tell me anyone thinks this is going to blossom into one of the great intersectional rivalries in college football…

North Texas at Rice – 18 (69): Rice is not off the radar completely for the SHOE tournament so what might you conclude from the fact that they are 18 point favorites over North Texas?

Oregon – 21 at Washington State (58): Oregon lost at home to Boise State last week giving up 386 yards passing and 3 TDs through the air. In addition, they lost another QB in the process. Washington State beat Portland State last week and got a good performance from a freshman QB against Portland State. So WSU will now start that freshman against Oregon this week. Here is the stat that matters most. Washington State has given up 7.4 yards per rushing attempt this year - - and that includes a full game against Portland State. Look for Oregon to gain at least 250 yards on the ground in this game.

TCU at Oklahoma – 18.5 (56.5): OU is scoring 54.7 points per game this season; TCU has the #1 ranked defense in the nation so far this season. OU has won 20 straight at home; TCU was the last team to beat OU in Norman OK. This will be an excellent game! TCU will not “sneak up” on Oklahoma and the Sooners are a good football team. Given the TCU defense, this game looks like an UNDER to me.

Alabama at Georgia – 7 (44.5): The best game of the weekend is right here. Here is a stat I found astonishing. The last time Alabama beat Georgia was in 1995. Make this a venue call; Georgia wins and covers.

Va Tech at Nebraska – 7 (45.5): Two inconsistent teams with lots of question marks. Can someone explain to me why this game is getting national TV coverage? If Nebraska wins, they will have run the table on their non-conference opponents. I think they can win and cover here.

UCF – 5 at UTEP (53): The SHOE tournament selection committee will be paying close attention here.

Stanford at Washington – 4 (52.5): This game is about more than a single win or loss. Washington has not been good since Ty Willingham got there and time may be drawing short for him to show something positive on the field. So far in 2008, the Huskies are 0-3; later in their PAC-10 games, they have USC, Arizona State, Oregon and Cal. Even if they win everything else, they need one win against those four teams to become bowl eligible. They are actually favored in this game; they cannot lose it or it could get ugly in Seattle.

Good luck.

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

Comments(2)

NFL fans tend to get caught up in the results of a single weekend so thoroughly that they can miss the “broader perspective”, so let me try to offer some of that perspective here in the middle of a week. Let me begin by posing this question:

What is the worst football organization in the NFL now?

Note I did not say which is the worst team; which is the worst organization? Some candidates would have to be:

Cincinnati Bengals: Last playoff win was in 1990. Winning seasons are considered an endangered species in that city. This was the first team in the NFL to retain a bail bondsman for the squad.

Arizona Cardinals: Last time they won their division was in 1975; Gerald Ford was President then. Since 1948 – when Truman beat Dewey – they have won a total of one playoff game.

Having paid tribute to those monumentally bad organizations, I submit that they do not hold a candle to either the Detroit Lions or the Oakland Raiders in 2008. The story of the Raiders dysfunctionality plays itself out on the field and in the newspapers on a fairly regular basis. Reports are that the coach wants to be fired and is being somewhat obstinate and insubordinate so that he will be fired; that way he collects his salary and gets out of Dodge. Al Davis will not fire him and demands that the head coach keep a defensive coordinator that the head coach has no use for. Does Al Davis enjoy seeing his head coach “twist in the wind” [/Bob Haldeman] The team spent huge dollars to sign Tommy Kelly, DeAngelo Hall and Gibril Wilson to shore up the defense and the defense is still porous.

Al Davis was once a giant in the cosmos of pro football; he was the coach of the Raiders; he has been the motive force behind the great Raiders’ teams of the 70s and 80s; he was commissioner of the old AFL; he was a significant actor in the merger between the AFL and the NFL. But in 2008, I think Al Davis’ buggy has gone round the bend and the Raiders will not excel – except by dumb luck – until he is no longer in control of the franchise.

Having said all of the above, my personal pick for worst organization is the Detroit Lions. Since the merger of the NFL and the AFL, they have lost more games than any other franchise - - as of now, they are at 347 losses and counting. Since Matt Millen took over the GM role there, the Lions are 31-84; that means the average season for the Lions in his regime generates just over 4 wins per year. In that time, the Lions are 8-51 on the road.

Perhaps the Lions suffer from some curse associated with the letter “M”. The GM is Matt Millen; the three coaches he hired are named (Marty) Mornhinweg, Mariucci and Marinelli.

The Broncos are 3-0. If you deconstruct their season, you wonder if they are the team of destiny for 2008. After blowing out the Raiders in Week 1, they beat the Chargers on an infamous blown call by a referee and then beat the Saints when the Saints did not get an obvious offsides call late in the game and then missed a long field goal. The Broncos led both the Chargers and the Saints 21-3 and the Broncos defense turned into a defen-sieve letting both opponents back into the game. Drew Brees was 39-48 for 421 yards in the Saints’ game; total offense for the Saints was 502 yards. The Broncos’ secondary is giving up an average of more than 315 yards per game passing; that just will not suffice. Long ago, someone gave the Broncos’ defense the nickname, “Orange Crush”. If this defense keeps playing the way it has, I think it should be called “AIG” - - because they need help desperately.

The Tennessee Titans’ defense has given up only 29 points in their first three games. It’s not difficult to be 3-0 if all you need to do is score 11 points a game…

Not only did the Pats’ 21-game regular season winning streak end last weekend; that was the first time Matt Cassell started and lost a football game in more than eight years. The Pats had been in the AFC East lead – or shared the lead in that division – for 49 consecutive weeks until Sunday night. The Bills now have the lead in the AFC East.

After the Pats’ loss on Sunday, Rodney Harrison had this to say:

“You’ve got a bitter taste in your mouth. The only way to get rid of that bitterness is to come in and work hard. You get bitter and you get better.”

Is there any way to get this message through to the Lions, Rams and Chiefs?

The Washington Redskins have yet to commit a turnover in 2008. That portends well for the Redskins in 2008. However, the Skins have not been effective on third down; so far they have converted only 11 times out of 35 opportunities. That does not portend well for the Redskins in 2008.

The Giants’ defense is the unit that gets all the praise in NY. Well, the Giants’ offense ranks third in the NFL so far this year gaining 400 yards per game. Not bad.

Yes, Carson Palmer threw his first TD of the season last week in the third game of the season. However, the Bengals’ OL allowed him to be sacked six times in that game. On balance, this is not good.

The Steelers lost in Philly last weekend. The last time the Steelers won in Philly was in 1965. Lyndon Johnson was about to launch the War on Poverty then. The Steelers are a good running team but the Eagles’ defense held them to 33 yards on 19 carries - - do the math.

Do you realize that the Colts are 0-2 in their new playpen?

All four of the NFL’s “newbie-coaches” won last weekend.

Do not rush off to Google to answer this. What team leads the NFL in rushing after three games? It is the Atlanta Falcons averaging 203 yards per game. Before you stand in awe of that data, consider that they played the Lions and the Chiefs in two of those three games.

There were 21 penalties in the Vikings/Panthers game. Six of them were false starts on the Panthers. I think I know what one of the focus points for practice in the next couple of weeks should be in Carolina.

The Rams rank 31st in offense so far in 2008. Actually, that’s the good news for the team because they also rank 32nd - - dead last - - in defense so far in 2008. With all the focus on the Lane Kiffen situation in Oakland, there is little attention paid to just how poorly constructed and prepared this Rams team is. This is Year 3 for Scott Linehan in St. Louis and his record there is 11-24. That is not good by any measure, but what makes it worse is that the trend is downward; the Rams are 3-16 in their last 19 games.

Last summer the Rams signed Marc Bulger to a mega-deal - - 6 years/$65M. Next week, he will start the game on the bench wearing a baseball cap; Trent Green will play QB. While that should not be humorous in any way for Rams’ fans, it does demonstrate how the universe moves in circles. Trent Green was the Rams’ starting QB in 1999 when he suffered a knee injury and opened the door for Kurt Warner to play and to create “The Greatest Show On Turf”. When Warner was injured and ineffective, Bulger took over those duties and played well. Now Bulger is not getting it done and Trent Green comes back to St. Louis as the QB. Wheels within wheels …

The Rams have scored only 29 points in three games this year. That’s bad but the Browns are worse. They have only scored 26.

The Chiefs are bad; there is no doubt about that. Nonetheless, Tony Gonzales continues to play well. In three games, he has 15 catches and a TD. I wonder if he dreams at night about what he might do with a team that had a QB that was even marginally proficient and at least the threat of a downfield passing game. By the way, the Chiefs only average 4.1 yards per snap on offense this year. That is disastrously ineffective.

Finally, here is an observation from Greg Cote in the Miami Herald:

“Parting thought: An all-white jury has been seated for O.J. Simpson’s trial on kidnap and armed robbery charges. O.J.’s lawyers failed to seat their preferred jury, whose demographic consisted of older Buffalo Bills fans who stopped following current events around 1993.”

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

Comments(4)

It’s Tuesday so this must be Belgium? Not exactly. Here in Curmudgeon Central, Tuesday means it is time for “Tuesdays With The Sorries”…

Some of the sorry performances in college football from last weekend were not downright embarrassing – such as when Idaho lost 70-0 – but one that jumped out at me was the loss by East Carolina against NC State. East Carolina had upset VA Tech and then WVU before winning a close game at Tulane. They had climbed to #15 in the polls and had been identified as one of the teams that might get into one of the major BCS Bowl games in January. NC State enjoys no such esteem this year; still, ECU found a way to lose on Saturday. Their margin for error in terms of getting to a New Year’s Day game has just been consumed. If they continue to harbor any such aspirations, they will need to blow away everyone else on their schedule - - which they might do because the rest of their schedule is anything but fearsome.

Oregon was supposed to be #17 last Saturday. They lost to Boise State at Oregon. That is not good. What is worse is that Oregon allowed a redshirt freshman QB to throw for 386 yards as a way to lose the game. Bad.

Notre Dame was supposed to be “back” on the basis of two wins to start the season. Last weekend they lost to Michigan State; and in the process, they committed 3 turnovers, missed two field goals and allowed a Spartan running back to gain 201 yards. Not good.

Temple should never have had to play Penn State in the first place but the score of the game, 44-3, may not indicate just how lopsided the game was. Temple gained 16 yards rushing on 28 attempts; that is about 21 inches per carry. Throwing the ball was not all that effective either; they gained only 122 yards in the game. Meanwhile, Penn State gained over 500 yards on offense. Miserable.

Florida State lost to Wake Forest 13-3. Scoring only 3 points is bad enough but the Seminoles committed 7 turnovers and 12 penalties in the game. Horrible.

UCLA came off their 59-0 pasting at the hands of BYU and you might expect the team to have come out fighting. Forget it. They lost at home to Arizona - - a team that had just lost to New Mexico. Very bad.

Tennessee lost to Florida - - again. And this time they managed to score all of 6 points. Ugly.

Rutgers lost to Navy and while that is not a horrid thing to have happen to a team, Rutgers now opens the season at 0-3. In addition, after the QB tossed a late game INT, one of his teammates must have said something to him that was “less than supportive” and perhaps caused a bruise to his self-esteem because the QB took a swing at his teammate on the sidelines. Clearly, a sign of team spirit here. Awful.

Moving up a level to the NFL, the New England Patriots need to be on the list this week. Miami was a 12.5-point underdog in that game and they won the game by 25. Double-digit underdogs sometimes win, but I cannot recall a situation where they won by twice the “double-digit” spread against them. Ronnie Brown had a great day and if all you did was watch the highlights, you might think that is all that Miami did to win the game. Not so. Chad Pennington was 17-20 for 226 yards with no turnovers and no sacks. Very bad.

The Houston Texans suffered a “pancaking” at the hands of the Tennessee Titans. Matt Schaub was harassed into an embarrassing stat line of 17-37 for 188 yards with zero TDs and 3 INTs. Brutal.

The Chicago Bears led the Tampa Bay Bucs by 10 points with 6:38 to play. The Bears’ defense supposedly carries that team. The Bucs’ offense is not awesome. Nonetheless, the Bucs came back to tie the game and then win in OT. Brian Griese – the poster child for “Journeyman QB Status” – threw the ball 67 times in the game, completed 38 of the attempts for 407 yards against a “dominating defense”. Horrid.

The Cleveland Browns appear to be on the verge of demonstrating that their 10 wins last season was indeed a scheduling quirk. The Baltimore Ravens turned two of Derek Anderson’s INTs into touchdowns in less than a minute in the third quarter of the game. Anderson had a bad day but look at the protection he got and you might conclude that there was more blame to be shared there. Anderson was 14-37 on the day gaining 125 yards. He was sacked 4 times and threw 3 INTs. His passer rating was an embarrassing 22.9. Putrid.

Now we get to the usual suspects in “Tuesdays With The Sorries”. The Detroit Lions gave up 130 yards rushing to Frank Gore and 370 yards of offense to the 49ers. The Lions’ defense has given up 113 points so far this year; that puts them on a pace to give up 603 points for the season, which would surpass the NFL record for most points allowed in a season by 70 points. Awful.

The KC Chiefs started their third different QB in three games; I cannot recall any team ever doing that in the past. Rookie Tyler Thigpen started out the game 1-10 for minus-1 yards passing; his first completion for a gain was in the second quarter of the game. After that first completion for a gain, he threw his second INT of the day. He later threw another INT, which was returned for a TD by the Falcons. Shudder…

Not wanting to be left out, the St Louis Rams played their way into today’s rant. In the process, QB, Marc Bulger, was held to less than 200 yards passing for the third straight game this season. The previously winless Seattle Seahawks won comfortably 37-13. The Rams are 0-3; they are losing games by an average of almost 30 points this season. The Rams’ defense has been even more pathetic than the Lions’ defense mentioned above. The Rams are on pace to allow 618 points this season which would surpass the NFL record for most points allowed in a season by 85 points. Fetid.

Finally, here is a comment by Bears’ kicker, Robbie Gould, to the Chicago Tribune on the subject of what the final team cut downs meant. Remember this the next time you hear how a football team is like a family:

“There will be a lot more room on the plane.”

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

Comments(7)

In case you have been asleep for the entirety of the baseball season, they played the last game ever in Yankee Stadium yesterday. Forget that this is not the “House that Ruth built” – it has already been renovated once – and go along with the hype that this is the end of an era and an historic moment that one should savor and think upon seriously. OK, are you in “pondering mode” now? Fine. So, tell me why the geniuses that make up baseball schedules couldn’t figure out that the best way to end the life of this “historic baseball venue” – this shrine to the greatness of the past, this hallowed ground of the sport, this “you fill in your own hyperbolic paean here” – would be a series between the Yankees and the Red Sox?

It is not as if they could not shoehorn another Yanks/Sox series into the schedule here. They have one scheduled in Boston for next weekend. With only a minor bit of shuffling, that series could have been in NYC last weekend. Is anyone involved with MLB anywhere near as in tune with the history of the game as are the baseball poets who write about it?

The Milwaukee Brewers fired Ned Yost about a week ago. The team has not responded with an immediate upsurge in winning proving yet again that the players on the field are far more important with regard to winning than is the manager in the dugout. Pretend for a moment that you are an ardent Brewers’ fan. It appears as if the team will go thorough a monumental gagging in September for the second year in a row and could miss the playoffs yet again. On top of that, there is at least an even money chance that the Brewers could lose Ben Sheets and CC Sabathia to free agency this winter. As a Brewers’ fan, how excited will you be to “go to the hip” and pony up a large advance chunk of change to secure Brewers’ 20-game ticket plans next year?

Speaking of baseball managers, I find it interesting that the Yankees are mathematically eliminated from the AL playoffs this year while simultaneously Joe Torre is in a good position to make it to the NL playoffs this year with the Dodgers. I sure will want to hear from the Steinbrenner Brain-Trust again on how obvious it was that Joe Torre was the albatross around the neck of the Yankees’ franchise.

Joe Torre is on the ballot for the Hall of Fame this year for consideration by the Veterans’ Committee. Go and look up his stats; remember, he was a catcher; compare those stats to catchers not named Bench or Fisk or Berra. Now tell me why he is not already in the Hall of Fame as a player - - ignoring his run of playoffs and World Series wins with the Yankees.

Two other players up for consideration by the Veterans’ Committee that could easily be worthy of the Hall of Fame are Dick “Don’t Call Me Richie” Allen, and Luis Tiant. The other seven seem to me to belong in the Hall of Very Good Players not the Hall of Fame.

Assuming the Dodgers make the playoffs, the good news for Dodgers’ fans is that Vin Scully will travel with the team to wherever the playoffs take the Dodgers. The good news for fans like me is that he will only be on the radio in LA and not on any of the television productions meaning I will not have to listen to him.

The United States team won the Ryder Cup last weekend. That was the first US win since 1999 and it was the first time since 1999 that Tiger Woods did not play in the tournament. I wonder how the members of TWAS – the Tiger Woods Adoration Society – will rationalize that one. As Ricky Ricardo was wont to say, they have some “splainin’ to do.”

I heard someone on sports radio last week say that Roger Federer had a disappointing year in 2008. I guess the fact that he lost a few tournaments and matches was so stunning to this yakker that he projected “disappointment” onto Federer. I had to go and look this up because I do not keep track of tennis info very closely at all but I think that this is a summary of Roger Federer’s “disappointing” year in 2008.

Australian Open - - semifinalist

French Open - - lost in finals

Wimbledon - - Champion

US Open - - Champion

Olympics - - Gold Medal in doubles competition.

If that is a “disappointing season” then there cannot be very many contented men’s tennis players out there.

Speaking of men’s tennis, here is a commentary on the status of the sport from Greg Cote in the Miami Herald:

“Meanwhile, in tennis, the Davis Cup is going on, but not even Davis cares.”

The state of Missouri has two teams in the NFL - - the Rams and the Chiefs. Both teams appear to be strong contenders for the bottom rung of the ladder in their respective conferences. So, let me offer a proposition bet here for your consideration:

Total number of wins by Chiefs plus Rams in 2008 NFL season equals 6.5.

Over or Under?

Finally, here are two observations about MLB relief pitchers from Greg Cote in the Miami Herald:

“Isn’t it about time baseball named its disabled list in honor of Cubs pitcher Kerry Wood?”

“Once-trusted Marlins middle reliever Renyel Pinto also has been awful lately. A Pinto hasn’t exploded this badly since Ford Pintos had rupturing gas tanks in the early 1970s.”

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

Comments(11)

Overall, last week’s picks came out ahead but not by much. The good news was that Against The Spread, the picks were 8-3 making the ATS picks for the year a cumulative 13-8. That’s a 62% win record and you can hammer your local bookie with that kind of win percentage over the course of a season. Of course, this is only over two weeks and not over a season…

The Baltimore/Houston game was postponed because of Hurricane Ike; obviously, I will pick that game again when it is actually played out on the field.

The OVER/UNDER picks are a different story. Last week, totals picks were a pathetic 1-4 bringing the cumulative season record for Totals to 3-9. That is a win percentage of 25%; rest assured, your local bookie would go to church and light candles for you hourly if you had that kind of record with him over a season. Once again, this has only been two weeks and not an entire season.

Please notice that I am not crowing about my 62% documented win record against the number here and hinting that – for a fee of course – you might have access to my “premium grade picks” for the rest of the year. The reasons for that are simple; I do not have any confidence that I will maintain a 62% win percentage picking every game for the rest of the year and I do not have any “premium grade picks” to sell to you even if you were willing to pay for them. Beware of touts that use this kind of advertising and promotion.

There are some good handicappers out there who reliably show profits with their picks and money management strategies over the course of a season. The reason some of them are hard to find is that they do not scream out their successes on a daily/weekly basis. They go about their business quietly with their clients who have sought them out.

In no way should anyone use any information here as the basis for making a wager involving actual money. Doing that would make me think you are pretty stupid. How stupid? Well, I would probably think that the best way to raise your IQ would be to taser you about a dozen times.

General Comments:

Last Monday’s game (Dallas/Philly) drew an audience of 12.95-million homes in the US. That is the largest audience ever for a telecast on cable TV. That gives ESPN the top two cable-TV audiences in history; last year’s New England/Baltimore game had held the record until last Monday night.

For at least the last season and a half, I have been saying that Tarvaris Jackson was a detriment to the Vikings when he was on the field. That does not mean he is a bad person; it means that unless he somehow improves as a quarterback by the end of this season, he ought to be out of work. The Vikings demoted Jackson this week - - and it’s not as if they went to a highly rated rookie or an aging vet with possible HoF credentials to replace Jackson. Gus Frerotte will be the Vikings’ starting QB on Sunday. Frerotte has been in the league for a long time; he came to the Redskins in 1994 - - the same draft that brought them Heath Shuler. Frerotte’s career has been one of slightly better than average games mixed in with below average games. He rarely lights things up; he rarely stinks out the joint.

Jackson has completed 30 out of 59 passes so far this year for 288 yards. Given that the Vikings are a run-oriented team, that percentage of completions is simply unacceptable; they do not ask Jackson to hit bombs or deep outs to the sideline often; all he would have to do is complete about 62% of his short passes and he would be effective. Even worse, the Vikings have only converted 9 of 29 third-down attempts. For a run-oriented offense, those conversions are essential.

The KC Chiefs announced they will start Tyler Thigpen at QB this week. Actually, Thigpen was originally drafted by the Vikings out of Coastal Carolina in 2006. Coastal Carolina had winning seasons all four years that Thigpen was there; he played in 41 games and blossomed in his senior year with a 64% completion record and just less than 10 yards per pass attempt. Moving him into the starter role tells me that the Chiefs know that this team is going exactly nowhere this season and they want to find out if young players like Thigpen have sufficient skills to keep them around during the rebuilding process - - or if they have to continue to look for another QB.

Whilst thinking about NFL quarterbacking “issues”, I am reminded that at the end of two games Kyle Orton has thrown exactly zero TD passes for the Bears. The Bears next face Tampa Bay where pass defense is one of the team strengths. At some point, the Bears may find themselves in a situation similar to the Vikings. They will want to feature Matt Forte and the running game but they have to have some kind of passing threat to avoid facing overloaded defenses geared to have more people playing the run than there are blockers.

I do not want to hand all of the Bears’ offensive woes on Orton because he is not the alpha and the omega of the problems there. The OL is average at best; the wide receivers are sub-standard. The Bears have five WRs on their active roster as of this morning; if you can actually name all five, you have been studying fantasy football depth charts way too much. Nonetheless, the Bears need to get something going in the passing game one of these days.

The Colts have lost Bob Sanders to an ankle injury for a while. That will hurt Indy a lot because the Colts have looked less than awesome on offense so far this year. Maybe it’s nagging injuries; maybe it’s Father Time catching up with the Indy offense; maybe it’s bad biorhythms for the offensive players. The results are what they are; the Colts’ offense has been sputtering this year and that is about as pretty a picture as one can paint. Bob Sanders and Dwight Freeney are the two best players on the Colts’ defense; the team will lose half that combo for a while.

Perhaps fortunately for the Colts, they get the Jaguars this weekend and the Jags have not been offensive juggernauts so far this year. Then Indy gets a bye week. Then come Houston and Baltimore – neither of which are threats to score 35 points on any given Sunday. So, maybe the defense can rally and carry the Colts through this injury time or until the Colts’ offense shows itself to be something that bears a passing resemblance to the Colts’ offense of the past several seasons.

I read this stat somewhere and found it stunning:

In two games, the St. Louis Rams have yet to run a single play in the offensive red zone.

The Raiders signed DT, Tommie Kelly, to a contract that made him the highest paid DT in the history of the NFL when it was signed. That was unbelievable. Now, Tommie Kelly got picked up for DUI. Is there someone out there scripting all of this to make the Oakland Raiders seem even more clownish as an organization than they actually are?

NEWS FLASH - - NEWS FLASH

This just in to Curmudgeon Central. The Raiders have listed Coach Lane Kiffen as “questionable” for this Sunday’s game at Buffalo. We are working our sources to find out if the Raiders actually have a seat reserved for him on the shuttle bus to the airport. More news when it happens. Now back to your regularly scheduled rant…

I realize that NFL football players on average are not MENSA candidates and that many of them attended college - - but not college classes. Nonetheless, Bears’ special teams player, Brandon McGowan, lowered the bar of intellectual expectations after last week’s game. McGowan was flagged for two special teams penalties last week and one was for unnecessary roughness. After the game, McGowan explained that penalty happened because, “I just felt like hitting somebody.” Wow! Good thing he “just didn’t feel like taking a dump” at that particular moment of history. The FCC would have fined the network carrying that game big-time…

In case you had not noticed, the Packers with Aaron Rodgers at QB have scored 72 points in two games while the Jets with Brett Favre at QB have scored 30 in two games. Last weekend against the Pats, the Jets had a first down on the Pats 3 yardline; they ran the ball three straight times and then kicked a field goal. Excuse me, if you have a rookie or a sub-standard QB in there, I can understand three straight dives into the line but with Favre under center…???

Mythical Picks:

KC at Atlanta – 6 (36): Dig out your copy of Roget’s Thesaurus from your college days. You will need it to find enough adjectives that have meanings parallel to ugly, putrid and repulsive to describe this game. Show some pity for the TV crew – in front of and behind the cameras – that has to put this game on the air. You have the choice to watch something else or even do something productive like trimming your nostril hair; they have to pay attention to this game. Do not – I repeat NOT – bet on this game. For mythical purposes only, I will take the game OVER only because I think each team’s defense could give up a big play TD and that would account for almost half the points needed to take the game OVER.

Arizona at Washington – 3.5 (42): Kurt Warner has been reincarnated and the Cardinals offense is actually potent once again. Somewhere, Don Coryell is smiling. Washington’s offense was horrible against the very good Giants’ defense in Week 1 and then woke up against the decidedly mediocre Saints’ defense in Week 2. The Cards’ defense more resembles the Saints than the Giants. I think there will be points aplenty here so I want this game OVER.

Houston at Tennessee – 5 (39): Tennessee is a big team that relies on power football on both offense and defense. I think they can push the Texans around and I believe that Kerry Collins can minimize errors in the game. This game is always a rivalry game given where the Titans used to hang their jockstraps, but I do not think that rivalry factor can keep the Texans within a TD this weekend. I’ll take the Titans to win and cover.

Oakland at Buffalo – 9.5 (36): Will the real Oakland Raiders’ offense please stand up? I know they will not run the ball for 300 yards against Buffalo this week the way they did against KC last weekend, but can they run for 120? If they can muster a ground game, that might allow JaMarcus Russell to get something happening in the passing game. I do not think that is going to happen. Buffalo had a huge upset win last week and will have to avoid a letdown here against the Raiders. I like this game OVER - - but not a whole lot OVER. What are the odds that Al Davis and Lane Kiffen speak with each other on the charter flight home after the game? What are the odds that Kiffen is allowed on the plane? Those are bets worth considering here…

Tampa at Chicago – 3.5 (35): Start the chant now: “Dee-fense … Dee-fense…” Here are two offensively challenged teams who compound their offensive challenges by playing very conservative football. There should not be a lot of scoring here and a great proposition bet might be the OVER/UNDER on the number of punts in the game. At 17.5 punts, I would be tempted to take over… I like Tampa with the points here.

Carolina at Minnesota – 4 (38): Two very good defenses play against two offensively challenged teams. Despite the fact that I think I’m catching a whiff of panic in the QB-change decision in Minnesota, I think Gus Frerotte is a step up at QB for the Vikings. No matter; Carolina’s defense will make him earn every yard. Steve Smith returns from his team-imposed suspension for the Panthers this week; that can’t hurt. I’ll take the game UNDER and I’ll take the Panthers with the points.

Cincy at Giants – 14 (41.5): I picked Cincy to win the AFC North; that pick is looking about as good as day old potato salad that was left out in the sun. The Bengals have been just terrible for the first two weeks; they have not run the ball well (153 yards in 2 games); Carson Palmer has thrown zero TD passes and three INTs and earned a QB rating of 38.4; the defense has two fumble recoveries and no interceptions. The Giants should pick the Bengals’ defense apart but at some point the Bengals have to score a little bit - - don’t they? Maybe they score a bit here because the Giants are in “vacation mode” in their schedule - - Rams last week, Bengals here, bye week next week. I’ll take the game OVER - - for mythical purposes only.

Miami at New England – 12.5 (35.5): The Dolphins may be improved this year, but I’m not ready to take them on the road against a team like the Pats. The problem is that I will not be shocked to see the Pats’ defense hold the Dolphins to single digits on Sunday. That made me look at betting the total. The line there started at 34.5 and has risen a full point during the week. I’ll take the game OVER - hoping for at least 12 or 13 points from the Dolphins – but with little conviction.

New Orleans at Denver – 5.5 (50.5): Denver has been exciting on offense this year. Perhaps that has led you to miss the fact that the Broncos’ defense has given up more passing plays of 20+ yards than any other defense in the league. New Orleans spent the off-season trying to shore up its porous defense from last year; based on last week’s showing they still have a LOT of work to do there. Brandon Marshall will not catch 18 passes this week but keep an eye out for the “other WR” in Denver. His name is Eddie Royal and he could be a very good one. I’ll take the Broncos to win and cover here.

Detroit at SF – 4 (46): Last year Mike Martz and JT O’Sullivan were in Detroit. The Lions “eighty-sixed” both of them. Remembering that the Falcons and Matt Ryan – in his first NFL game ever – scored 42 points on the Lions’ defense, what might Martz and O’Sullivan do to the same defense? An interesting prop bet would be the total yards passing for the Niners; OVER/UNDER 355.5? I know the Lions need this game if their current “rebuilding program” is to be taken even marginally seriously. Nonetheless, I like this game OVER and I like the Niners to win and cover.

St. Louis at Seattle – 9.5 (44): As bad as some teams have played in the early going this year, the Rams have played worse. Seattle has had so many injuries at WR that they signed Koren Robinson as a free agent last week and traded for Joe Flabeetz because they need bodies at the position. Do they still have the rights to Steve Largent? St. Louis has shown against Philly and the Giants that their pass defense is a mirage; receivers run open out there about as often as John Madden slurps Brett Favre. If the Seahawks do not win this one big, they will be in for a very long season and a very high draft pick come April 2009. I’ll take Seattle to win and cover here.

Cleveland at Baltimore – 2 (38.5): Tampa and Chicago play the early game on Sunday; Cleveland and Baltimore play in the late time slot. Cleveland/Baltimore is another game with conservative and mediocre offenses going up against better than average defenses. If Cleveland loses here, you can declare their 10-win season in 2007 a fluke of weak scheduling. There could be upwards of 20 punts in this game for you aficionados of the kicking game. I want this game UNDER. And I want this game off the air in my viewing area.

Pittsburgh at Philly – 3.5 (45): Is this the best game of the weekend? If not, it is the second best. Pittsburgh has a good defense, a good running game and an accomplished quarterback – who may or may not have an injured shoulder depending on which report you choose to read last. Philly has been on fire offensively in the first two games. I think this game represents a change for the Eagles. I think it will be close and low scoring. I like the game UNDER and I like the Steelers with the points.

Jax at Indy – 5.5 (41.5): Before the season, I would have liked this game as the best one of the weekend. Neither team has played to form so far; the Jags are 0-2; if they come out of the gate at 0-3, they might have a hard time making the playoffs. The Jags need to run the ball a lot better than they have; in two games their total yards rushing is only 131 yards; the Jags often gain that in a single game. The OL needs to protect David Garrard better too; he has been sacked 9 times in two games. As mentioned above, Indy is now without one of their two best defensive players. If Jax is going to “get healthy” against a defense and start to run the ball the way they can, this is the defense for them to do it against. I’ll take the Jags with the points here.

Dallas – 3 at Green Bay (51.5): Is this the best game of the weekend? If not, it is the second best. Well, it is definitely the only game of the week where both teams are undefeated. In addition, the Cowboys are the only road favorite in the NFL this weekend. Last year, the regular season game between Dallas and Green Bay gave the Cowboys a tiebreaker in case the two teams met in the NFC Championship game. The Cowboys failed to advance there but could it be that this year’s Dallas/Green Bay game will provide a tiebreaker advantage in the playoffs? Here is something to consider about this rivalry. The Packers have lost nine straight games to the Cowboys in Dallas. The Cowboys have never - - as in not ever - - won a game at Lambeau Field. I foresee a boatload of points in this game and I see the game decided late in the 4th quarter. I’ll take the OVER here.

Jets at San Diego – 9 (44): Last season, the Chargers forced 3 turnovers per game and got themselves a bye in the playoffs. This year the Chargers force only 1 per game in the first two games and they have lost both of them. I have seen the Jets in both of their games; and even with Brett Favre at QB, that is not an offense that will impose itself on a good defense. Like the Jags, the Chargers have Super Bowl aspirations and an 0-3 start could put quite a crimp in them, especially if Denver wins again to take a three game early lead in the AFC West. This is wake-up call weekend for the Chargers. I’ll take the Chargers to win and cover.

Good luck.

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

Comments(4)

I purposely intended not to write about the truly bad call made by Ed Hochuli in last Sunday’s Chargers/Broncos game, which cost the Chargers a win. I thought that the six thousand replays of that error on TV from Sunday night until Monday noon would make everyone realize how bad the error was. I thought that the reports on Monday morning that Ed Hochuli had gone to Norv Turner to say he had blown the call and was sorry about it would have taken the air out of the story. I was wrong…

Earlier today and more than 96 hours after the fact, I was out running some errands and turned the radio on to the local sports radio station. The topic of conversation was Ed Hochuli and his error and how he has spent the week getting hate e-mail messages from people around the country for his mistake. I thought that was bizarre enough until the show host took a call from some goober who said that Ed Hochuli deserved every hate message that he got because:

1. He cost the Chargers a win and

2. Ed Hochuli is a horrible referee who makes bad calls in every game he officiates.

That caller made me realize that I had to say what I think about all of this. So let me tell you from whence I come on this matter; I refereed basketball for 37 years; I refereed other sports too but none nearly as much as basketball. For about 12 years, I helped with clinics that taught young people how to go about refereeing games. I never did anything nearly as important nor as widely seen as even the most meaningless NFL game, but I do know what it means to be an official in a sporting event.

When I taught those classes for novice referees, I always began by telling them that there are two kinds of referees in the world. There are those who have made mistakes and there are those who are just about to. I told them to rid themselves of the notion that they would be perfect; they would not. I told them they had to recognize their mistakes and use them to get better at officiating and that they should never – ever! – do a make-up call because that is just taking one mistake and piling it on top of the other.

Ed Hochuli made a mistake. He blew his whistle way too fast; he did not let his brain process thoroughly what his eyes saw; he knows he made a mistake; he acknowledges he made a mistake; he is remorseful for his mistake.

Ladies and gentlemen, what the hell else would you have the man do?

Yes, he cost the Chargers a win; and yes, that could come back to haunt them in the final weeks when playoff berths are being handed out. That is certainly not a situation that the Chargers or the NFL would want to see play itself out; it is certainly not what Ed Hochuli would want to happen either. This is not a reason to send this man hate e-mail messages. Remember folks, these are, after all, games; these are not life and death combat despite the hyperbole used to describe the games.

If you think Ed Hochuli is a horrible referee who makes bad calls in every game he officiates, then you must also believe that the NFL is a cauldron of conspiracies. Ed Hochuli has been a football official for decades; he has been in the NFL for almost two decades; every game done by every official is taped and then reviewed by other officials after the fact. If Ed Hochuli – or any other official – made bad calls in every game, that official would not continue in the employ of the NFL. Not only has Ed Hochuli continued to be in the employ of the NFL, he has been promoted over the years from one of the minor officials to the status of referee and crew chief. He is anything but a horrible official so he does not merit hate e-mail messages on that basis. And by the way, if that caller made an important error on his job and that error became widely known, would he think that he merited hate e-mail messages? Somehow, I doubt that.

On top of all of this, Ed Hochuli came forward and publicly admitted his error, assumed full responsibility for what he did and apologized to the people who were hurt by his error. Think about other figures in the sporting world who have been caught doing wrong things - - some of them criminally wrong things - - and ask yourself how many of them were nearly as forthright as Ed Hochuli was. Compare his behavior after the fact to Mark McGwire testifying before the Congress or Roger Clemens’ throwing his wife under the bus with regard to steroid use or any random athlete run in by the gendarmes for drug possession/usage or an athlete who is charged with spousal abuse. Tell me who the truly contrite person is here and why he is the person receiving e-male hate messages.

In addition to his apology to Norv Turner immediately after the game, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported that Ed Hochuli has responded to many e-mails from Chargers’ fans saying, “I failed miserably.” On that one play and in that one situation he is absolutely correct; he failed miserably. Nevertheless, that does not make him a failure and it does not make him a person of evil who deserves hate messages. What’s next? A few death threats?

What Tim Donaghy did was evil and attacked the integrity of his sport. What Ed Hochuli did was blow a call. If you need me or anyone else to explain to you why one of those people is a significantly worse person than the other, then I doubt you would ever understand what I was trying to explain.

The very next caller on that sports radio show I tuned in to suggested that Ed Hochuli should be fired by the NFL for that call. Remember, every game is reviewed on tape. If the standard becomes that officials will be fired for making a bad call as a result of a human error, there will be no officials left to do the games. [There are two types of referees – those who have made mistakes and those who are just about to.] Moreover, here is something that fanboys all over the country need to recognize:

Without officials, there would be no NFL football games.

I want to leave you with a few comments from sports columnists regarding the ways that sports figures explain away their wrongdoings/bad decisions/errors of judgment and the way it ought to be done. Then go back and review what Ed Hochuli has done since the moment of his really bad call:

“Every baseball player who apologizes without explaining what he’s apologizing for should then apologize for his apology.” [Scott Ostler, San Francisco Chronicle]

“Roger Clemens, under a steroids cloud, seen as a liar and accused of multiple affairs, including one with a 15-year-old girl, issued a generic apology for unspecified mistakes. You know things are going bad for a ballplayer when he even whiffs on the apology.” [Greg Cote, Miami Herald]

“Brad Miller is suspended five games for some kind of failed drug test and says, ‘I want to apologize to my family, teammates, fans and the entire Kings’ organization.’ Why do these apology statements always wind up sounding like Oscar acceptance speeches?” [Scott Ostler, San Francisco Chronicle]

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

Comments(3)

Earlier this week, I talked about some of the sorry-assed performances of last weekend. There just cannot be that many more of them coming, can there? Because I want to put at least a couple of positive things into these rants, I want to follow the Linfield College Wildcats through the season. Linfield College has the longest streak of winning seasons for any sport in North America. They have been winners for each of the last 53 years; Dwight David Eisenhower was President of the United States the last time they had a sub-.500 season.

Linfield lost their first game this season to Hardin-Simmons by a score of 29-22. They had the lead late in the fourth quarter, but Hardin-Simmons rallied to win the game late. That was an away game in Abilene Texas. The Wildcats have a week off before they host Southern Oregon next weekend. They are 0-1 at the moment; they only have 9 games on the schedule; they cannot afford another loss next week.

I do not want to lose my edge here by rooting for Linfield to continue its streak, so another thing I will try to do is to identify the worst teams in Division 1-A college football. There are 119 schools playing football at that level so finding the absolute worst one is not an easy proposition. Let me offer some contenders:

Idaho and Utah State are both bad football teams - - and they play each other this weekend. At least we ought to have an idea of who is the lesser power in this match up. Idaho has already lost one game 70-0 this year; Utah State has lost 12 of its last 13 home games.

North Texas, SMU and UTEP all look pretty bad. They are in the same “neighborhood”. If only they played each other, we might be able to sort out the worst of this lot.

North Texas plays Florida International later this year. FIU is pretty miserable too.

In fact, North Texas plays FIU, La-Lafayette and La-Monroe on successive weekends. That, folks, is Sun Belt Conference football for you. If you live near a Sun Belt school, you need to give thanks that you have the opportunity to watch real football on TV.

Do not leave Army, Syracuse, UAB or New Mexico State out of this conversation.

As the season unfolds, I will evolve an eight-team tournament – hypothetical of course – where teams would play and the winner is eliminated. Actually, the winner gets to go home and stop embarrassing itself on the field until a final game where one team would be identified as the Steaming Heap Of Excrement (SHOE) for 2008.

I want to be sure that anyone reading these Mythical Picks for the first time understands that they do not purport themselves to be authoritative. Anyone using any information herein as the basis for deciding to make a real wager on a football game – or worse yet to choose which side of a wagering proposition to support with real money – would be very dumb. How dumb, you say? Well, such a person just might name his pet zebra, Spot.

General Comments:

Last year, Michigan lost its first two games and the long-knives came out for Lloyd Carr’s scalp. Michigan then beat Notre Dame and went on to a pretty good season capped off with a bowl game win over Florida. Carr is gone and after a lot of soap opera nonsense, Rich Rodriguez is at the helm in Ann Arbor. Well, Michigan is once again 1-2 after its first three games but it got its lunch handed to it by Notre Dame last weekend. I believe the “new Michigan” turned the ball over six times last weekend; that’s an improvement! Please recall that was the same Notre Dame team that had to rally to beat San Diego State just a week before it clobbered Michigan. Somewhere, Lloyd Carr has his feet up on an ottoman relaxing with a refreshing adult beverage and smiling to himself about just how insightful his critics actually are…

I said last week that the Iowa/Iowa State games tend to be a lot closer on the field than they appear to be on paper. Once again, the game was close when many expected a blowout.

Duke beat Navy last weekend giving the Midshipmen their second loss of the year. I continue to root for Navy to be “bowl-ineligible” just to see the Congressional Bowl folks have to scramble at the end to find an available team to play the ninth place finisher in the ACC - - assuming that team gets 6 wins on the season. Next year, that bowl organizing committee will be in full “contingency planning mode” if current plans stay in place. For now, Army is supposed to be the host team for that mid-December bowl game in DC; Army may struggle to amass 6 wins total this year and next…

After the massive beat-down that BYU put on UCLA last Saturday, you have to think that BYU has a legitimate shot to be undefeated on November 22 when it plays Utah in one of the great rivalry games in the country. In addition, Utah has gotten past Michigan already and that seemed to be a big hurdle for them going into the season. Still ahead are games with Air Force (in Colorado Springs) and against Oregon State and TCU (both at home). Could it be that both of these teams will be undefeated when they meet? What an exclamation point that would be on that rivalry game… Oh, and if that were the case, the winner there would probably be a BCS party-crasher this season.

That last paragraph is not meant to demean East Carolina’s chances to be a BCS party-crasher. Their two opening wins against VaTech and WVU are impressive credentials indeed. ECU almost lost a “trap game” to Tulane last weekend [Tulane may make it to the SHOE Tournament by the end of the year.] but came back to win the game. ECU has North Carolina State this week; that is a winnable game for them.

Moreover, that raises the interesting question of why can’t there be more than one BCS party-crasher…? Oh, yeah, I forgot; it’s the money involved…

Fresno State probably had visions of being the BCS party-crasher this year but they lost a defensive battle to Wisconsin last weekend in Fresno so they may be out of the picture now.

Temple is an improved football team this year. It has lost twice but one was in OT in a monsoon and the other was because they gave up a Hail Mary TD pass with no time left in the game. Those two losses came at the hands of Buffalo and UConn. This week Temple travels to State College, PA to play Penn State. Temple is improved - - but not that much. In the last two games Temple and Penn State have played, the cumulative score is 78-0. To be clear, Temple is on the short end of that score.

Texas is at home against Rice this weekend. The last time Rice won at Texas was in 1965. The schools have met 38 times in the past; Texas has prevailed 37 times. I think there is a trend here…

Kansas lost to South Florida last weekend on a field goal in the final seconds of play. Kansas was one of last year’s Cinderella teams and I said before that it would be interesting to see if they caught lightening in a bottle last year of if they were announcing themselves as an emergent football program. This loss may be hard for them to overcome because part of their gaudy record last year might be attributed to a scheduling quirk. Last year, Kansas did not play Oklahoma, Texas or Texas Tech from the Big-12 South Division and they played no one nearly as good as South Florida out-of-conference. It would not be impossible for Kansas to lose four games in the Big-12 this year…

Some of the SEC “fanboys” are trying to argue that the SEC is so deep in really good teams that the BCS mavens might consider putting two SEC teams in the Championship Game. First of all, that is not going to happen; secondly, I think the SEC champion may have 2 losses at the end of the year given the teams they will have to play. For now, there are five SEC teams in the Top 10; that will not stay that way, but it does give you an idea how strong the SEC is.

Understand: I have no objection to putting two teams from one conference in a championship game. I seem to recall Villanova beating Georgetown in one of those championship match ups once upon a time…

Now retired DT, Warren Sapp, had harsh words for Florida coach, Urban Meyer after Meyer kicked a field goal in the final minute of a game against Miami when Florida was already up by 20 points. Sapp called Meyer a “classless dirtbag”. Remember the old playground adage that it takes one to know one? I recall Sapp being ejected from an NFL game after three or four unsportsmanlike conduct penalties in a single game. I think that was last year but it might have been two seasons ago. I also recall him almost starting a brawl during warm-ups when he went skipping through the other team’s calisthenics lines. And of course, those teams at Miami that Sapp played on never ran up a score on good old Vegetative State University - - did they?

Ponderosas:

The favorites went 6-2-1 last weekend in Ponderosa Spread Games. That makes the favorites in those games 15-7-1 for the season.

Favorites that covered were Alabama, Missouri, Nebraska, Penn State, Tennessee, Utah.

Favorites that did not cover were Illinois, LSU.

Texas Tech/SMU was a push. The spread was 36; the score was 43-7.

This week we have 6 Ponderosa Spread Games:

Temple at Penn State – 28 (55): Doubt this will be an interesting game for more than 20 minutes.

Buffalo at Missouri – 34 (71): Mizzou should score early and often here.

Wyoming at BYU – 28 (52): If you believe BYU will suffer a letdown after shellacking UCLA by 59 last weekend, take the points here. If you believe BYU is really one of the best teams in college football this year and can stay focused after that kind of a big win, lay the points here. Wyoming is a pretty ordinary team.

South Florida – 28.5 at Florida International (55.5): USF may be the best team in the Big East; they are certainly one of the top teams there. FIU may be the worst team in the country.

Rice at Texas – 30 (68): Rice will probably score 17-20 points here. In that case, can Texas score about 50 to beat the total? Rice’s defense is about that bad so taking this game OVER is not impossible.

TCU – 24 at SMU (51): Given the SMU offensive propensity to throw the ball all over the field and given the SMU defensive propensity to stop nothing, this is another game that could easily go OVER the total.

Games of Interest:

Troy at Ohio State – 21 (46.5): Actually, this game is not all that interesting except for the fact that it is not a Ponderosa Spread Game. After the USC debacle, the oddsmakers must feel there will be less interest in the public betting on Ohio State as a huge favorite. I would have predicted that this game would have been at 27 or 28 points a couple of weeks ago.

West Virginia – 3 at Colorado (56.5): Will the real WVU team please stand up? While we are at it, will the real Colorado team please stand up too? The only consistent thing about these teams so far seems to be that their defenses are not very good. So, if you must play a game with two inconsistent teams, take this one OVER.

Ohio at Northwestern – 10.5 (51.5): If Northwestern wins here, they will be 4-0.

Iowa at Pitt – 1 (41.5): Both teams have been disappointing so far. The loser of this game will spend a miserable week hearing from their fan base.

Alabama – 10 at Arkansas (46.5): Clearly one of the best games of the week; both teams are undefeated. This game begins a nightmarish schedule stretch for Arkansas. Their next three SEC foes are Alabama, Florida and Auburn (all in the top-Ten this week). Sandwiched into those three games is a trip to Texas (currently #7 in the country). Arkansas has not protected its QB all that well giving up 8 sacks to the likes of La-Monroe and Western Illinois. Alabama might get 8 sacks all by themselves. Alabama is probably 10 points better than Arkansas, but laying 10 points on the road in the SEC is not a success strategy.

Florida – 7.5 at Tennessee (51.5): Tim Tebow gets all the ink for Florida but the Gators’ defense has only allowed 13 points this year. Granted, the opponents have been Hawaii and Miami, but still… That half-point on top of the TD is not something I like here, but I think Florida can with this game by double digits.

Rutgers – 6 at Navy (60): Navy’s defense has not been very good so far this year; they give up yards and points. So far, opponents have averaged 325 yards per game passing against Navy. I like Rutgers to win and cover here and I like this game to go OVER.

Ball State at Indiana – 3.5 (60): Just a hunch here, but I like Ball State with the points.

LSU – 3 at Auburn (38): That total is a low one for an NFL game; for a college game, it is one of the lowest numbers I can recall. And I think the oddsmakers have it right. The LSU defense has looked really good against mediocre competition so far, but the Auburn offense has been miserable. This game will be won late; it will be low scoring; so, I’ll take Auburn with the points here. This is the best game of the weekend.

Georgia – 7.5 at Arizona State (50.5): This would have been a contender for the “best game of the weekend” label but ASU gagged away a win last week at home against UNLV. This is the first time Georgia has played an out-of-conference game outside the state of Georgia in 13 years. If they lose on Saturday, whoever made that scheduling decision will be looking for work. Remember less than a month ago, Georgia was considered the best football team in the country; now, they are playing a team that just lost to UNLV. I think Georgia has too much going for it here; I think they will win and cover.

VaTech at UNC – 2.5 (54.5): I said before the season started that UNC might be a breakout team this season. So far, they have been really good. At the same time, this is not the same caliber of team that VaTech has fielded recently so I think UNC at home can win and cover here.

Northeastern at Syracuse (no lines): Here we have a Division 1-AA team (Northeastern) which is not anywhere near dominant at that level playing a Division 1-AA team masquerading as a Division 1-A team (Syracuse). Syracuse has lost three games by an average of 25 points. This game will be “avert your eyes awful”.

Akron – 10.5 at Army (48): Here are a couple of bottom-feeders playing each other. Nevertheless, recall that Akron traveled to Syracuse (see description of Syracuse just above) and beat the Orange by 14 points. Army is not 3.5 points better than Syracuse, is it? Of course you should not wager on a horrid game like this, but if you do, lay the points.

Idaho at Utah State – 4.5 (63.5): Remember, Idaho has already suffered a shut-out once this year. Utah State has lost 12 of its last 13 home games. So, how can the total for this game be so high and how can Utah State give points away? This is a bottom-feeder game. Keep an eye on the score only to see which team will sink to the bottom of the Division 1-A rankings and get into the mythical SHOE Tournament.

Mew Mexico State at UTEP – 7 (58): Two more of the bottom-feeders playing each other in this one. Stay away from the betting windows on this one.

By the way, there is no line on the Texas Tech/UMass game but here is something to watch. Texas Tech can and does score a lot of points - - and they have been known to keep their foot on the gas pedal even when the outcome of a game is no longer in doubt. UMass is a Division 1-AA team stepping waay up in class. So far this year, UMASS has allowed 94 points to Holy Cross and James Madison. Texas Tech should comfortably make it into the 60s in this game and maybe into the 70s. Why was this game booked in the first place?

There is also no line on Washington State/Portland State this week. Washington State fans should be sad about that because given how awful the Cougars have looked so far, this would be the only game where Washington State would give points all year.

Good luck

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

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