The Sports Curmudgeon®

To say that some of the elite athletes in the sporting world are pampered should not be a surprise to most folks. In addition, the thought that an elite athlete might be in a situation where they were not allowed to do as they please and that situation might be annoying to that athlete should not be a surprise. Nonetheless, when one sees an example, it still causes one to shake one’s head.

At Wimbledon this year, they have a new rule. I have no idea why they made such a rule, but the folks running the tournament made it. Players may not bring food into the locker room. Oh, the horror of it all… Fruit and health bars are available to the players but no “outside food” in the locker rooms. Serena Williams called the rule “unfair”, which seems like a very strange characterization to me. If the rule is applied to everyone, then how might it be “unfair”. In her blog, Serena Williams also wrote:

“Like, do they really expect me or any other player to actually walk outside all the way to the player’s lounge? That is time not spent well, and I value my time.”

Much of adulthood is about adapting to circumstances and making choices relative to one’s actions. If the way to get food to nibble on means walking “all the way to the player’s lounge” then indeed that is what “they” expect the players to do - - assuming that the players choose to eat some food. The alternative choice is to stay in the locker room and do whatever other things one might accomplish there with the player’s valuable time. But that means choosing not to eat some food. I suspect the tournament organizers recognize this situation for what it is and that they think it serves some constructive purpose from their standpoint.

As I said, I have no idea why they made such a rule; it may or may not be a necessary one; I don’t know. I do know that the rule is absolutely fair in the sense that it applies equally to everyone. Moreover, I now know that even the most minor imposition - - such as this one - - can cause an elite athlete to complain; thereby showing how coddled they are.

Recently, a report on Yahoo said that Rangers’ outfielder, Marlon Byrd, was taking nutritional supplements on the advice of Victor Conte and has been for more than a year. Byrd confirmed that report. At first blush, you would have to think that this situation has far too many ways to go south for Byrd and for the Rangers. However, Byrd fleshed out the story saying that Conte is advising him on what he needs to eat and what he needs to use as nutritional supplements and that all of the supplements are approved by the National Sanitation Foundation, which is designated by MLB to provide the list of banned substances. Byrd told the Dallas press:

“I’m tired of going in GNC and taking chances. That’s not fair to us. Everything is approved by MLB. Everything has to be NSF-approved for us to take. Everything I take, he [Conte] sends to MLB.”

Indeed, if that is the whole story, Marlon Byrd is doing a very smart thing here. Unfortunately for Byrd, Victor Conte’s name will forever conjure up steroid use by baseball players.

The Cubs are an underachieving bunch. As of this morning, they are a game under .500 and sit in fourth place in a mediocre NL Central Division. Stress is building in Cubbie-land. Recently, manager Lou Piniella told outfielder Milton Bradley to take off his uniform and go home in the midst of a game. As “Sweet Lou” followed Bradley to the locker room, there are reports he called Bradley a “piece of [excrement]”. Carlos Zambrano screwed up a pitchout; threw the ball past the catcher and allowed a run to score from third base. He reacted to his own screw up by throwing at the next batter almost igniting a brawl. Is the ever-volatile Lou Piniella really the guy to get this train back on the track? Here is Steve Rosenbloom’s assessment in the Rosenblog on the Chicago Tribune website:

“The Cubs are in chaos. They look abysmal. They can’t play baseball. Forget the distractions of a manager kicking his own player out of the park with a pottymouth insult and the whining about visiting clubhouse leaks. It wouldn’t happen or matter if they could play baseball. But they can’t play baseball right now.

“This has surpassed messy, hit atrocious and is headed for disaster.”

Looking at the baseball standings as of this morning, the Florida Marlins are at .500 and are in second place in the floundering NL East. That is good news. Looking at baseball attendance figures for 2009, the Marlins’ attendance is up 22.2% compared to last year. That too is good news. However, even with that increase in attendance this year, the Florida Marlins have the lowest attendance in all of MLB; they play at home to an average crowd this year of only 17,603. The politicos in Miami and Florida approved a new stadium for the Marlins; but with that kind of attendance/fan interest, you really have to ponder the long-term viability of a franchise there.

Scott Ostler obviously heard reports of Evander Holyfield’s financial woes and offered this analysis in the SF Chronicle:

“Holyfield is so desperate, he might have to fight José Canseco.

As of January 2011, the Rose Bowl game will leave network TV and migrate to ESPN. The network also has rights to other BCS bowl games starting in 2011. A network executive explained how happy ESPN is to acquire the rights to all these games and said:

“Fans will welcome ESPN’s all-encompassing approach, and the additional opportunities and value resulting from our multi-platform presentation will benefit the college football community and our business partners.”

Allow me to translate that one for you:

“ESPN will promote and cross-promote these games so much that fans teeth will begin to itch every time a football bowl game is mentioned. The benefits to the college football community come from the fans expenditures on products that sponsor these games; the benefits to the ESPN business partners comes from the fans expenditures on products that sponsor these games; the fans are paying the bills for the massive hype-job that will be coming their way.”

Finally, an observation from Greg Cote in the Miami Herald, which provides us with yet another insight into the mind and the life of an elite athlete:

“Immediately after the reports of Michael Jackson’s death, Bengal Chad OchoCinco, on Twitter, called it ‘just as sad as 9/11.’ I’m not saying we abolish Twitter. I’m saying we ban Chad Ocho Cinco.”

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

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I had the opportunity to watch yesterday’s USA/Brazil soccer game in the presence of two avid and knowledgeable soccer fans - - parents of a collegiate level player. When Clint Dempsey scored to put the US up 1-0, we agreed that would not be enough for the US to win; when Landon Donovan then made the score 2-0 and when the US defense seemed capable of thwarting the swarming offense that Brazil threw at them, we thought that if the US could hold that lead until halftime, they had a real shot to win the game.

However, when Brazil scored its first goal inside the first minute of the second half, the mood in the room darkened significantly. Then, when there was a 10 or 12-minute span of play where the ball was constantly in the US defensive end of the field, we kinda sorta knew that it was going to take a few miracle saves by the US goalkeeper to hold onto this lead. By then, we had pretty much given up the thought that the US was going to go on offense sufficiently to add a third goal. The US goalkeeper, Tim Howard, indeed made a couple of miraculous saves but even those were not sufficient. The result from yesterday showed that the US men’s soccer team is a good one and indeed may be on the verge of joining other traditional soccer nations as a “tough out” in any international competition.

The US team will face an interesting challenge in early August when they travel to Mexico for a CONCACAF game. The US beat Mexico earlier this year here in the US. The men’s soccer team has – to put it mildly – not had great success playing in Mexico; their cumulative record there is zero wins in twenty-three games. But a team capable of beating Spain and playing Brazil as tough as they did away from home should be considered capable of a road win in Mexico - - no?

Having said all of the above, I am not ready to pronounce the sport of soccer as “having burst onto the US sporting scene”. I do not think it has done that; frankly, I don’t think it is about to do that. Call me jaded; call me a nattering nabob of negativity; call me anything except late for dinner; even a US victory over Brazil yesterday would not have made soccer a top shelf sport in the US in 2009.

I was here and interested in soccer when Pele came to the US to take the North American Soccer League to the top of US sports. Courtesy of an old friend who worked for the NASL, I got to see a championship game from midfield seats in the upper deck of RFK Stadium. I was here when the orgasmic prose came from the soccer poets about how more kids were playing soccer than baseball in the US and how when they grew up soccer would dominate the scene. As I recall, those odes were rather common back in the early 1980s. Few if any of the soccer poets have recast those odes as the elegies they should have been in the first place. I was here when the US Women’s soccer team won the World Cup and Brandi Chastain’s sports bra became the sports bra seen round the world. I was here for the David Beckham scam – a con of such a proportion that you would have thought P.T. Barnum had been reincarnated.

Soccer remains a niche sport in the US. That is not a bad thing nor is it a good thing. It is reality. According to reports, all of the MLS teams playing in soccer-only venues instead of hugely expensive and cavernous football stadiums are operating in the black. There continue to be millions of kids who play youth soccer. More people are watching soccer on TV – particularly the international matches involving the lead up to next year’s World Cup. That is the state of soccer in the US and it is not a bad state to be sure. What US soccer does not need is another outpouring of baseless praise and rosy scenario projections suggesting that the NFL will be overwhelmed here in the US by soccer interest sometime in the next decade. To anyone poised to pen such nonsense, I have three words for you:

Not … Gonna … Happen!

While watching yesterday’s Confederations Cup Final, I kept marveling at how good soccer is as a TV watching experience. There are no commercial interruptions; there are few if any annoying on-screen graphics; there is a judicious use of replay so most of what you are seeing is the live action of the game. As a viewer-from-the-couch, soccer is “good TV” - - and that got me to thinking about sports that are “bad TV”. And that brought to mind immediately the sport of golf.

It takes PGA Tour players almost 4 hours to complete a round; in those 4 hours, their ball is actually in play - - moving relative to the earth - - for about 2.5 minutes. That is not riveting TV and so I began to think about how golf could make a rule change here and there to make it more interesting on TV. Please note, I don’t think any or all of these rule changes would make golf a better game; I think they would make it better on TV…

First of all, there needs to be a shot clock for golf. Hey, it works for the NBA and for college basketball. So, give each golfer 24 seconds from the time he walks within 15 feet of his ball to hit the ball or lose a stroke. It is not compelling TV to watch Tiger Woods take more than two minutes to line up a putt. Hit the damned ball…

Taking a lead from the NHL, maybe golf should allow fighting - - with the stipulation of course that no clubs can be used in the altercations lest that appear far too unseemly and ungentlemanly.

The PGA needs to outlaw caddies. If these guys are the best golfers in the world, let them figure out the distances to the pin for themselves and let them line up their own puts - - in 24 seconds or less of course. If these finely honed athletes cannot carry their own bags, let them pull them on a carrier. It would please me no end to see the golfers use golf carts but the golf goofs still cannot bring themselves to think about that after Casey Martin publicly cleaned their clocks over that issue…

Here is a rule most TV viewers would vote for. The PGA should ban for life from any tournament gallery any person who yells “You da man…” or “Get in the hole…” as soon as a ball is struck. These folks have to be among the most annoying assclowns on the planet. Here is Scott Ostler of the SF Chronicle on the subject:

“About that annoying gallery guy who follows Tiger Woods. When that guy dies and they’re about to lower the coffin, will someone shout, ‘Get in the hole!’?”

I also think that spectator cheering should be allowed during the matches. After all, the ball is sitting perfectly still for the best players in the world to strike. It isn’t like a baseball player trying to hit a 100 mph slider. Think of all the productive man-hours that would be generated if the PGA did not require volunteers to come out to hold up “Silence” signs at every hole for every player. And the good news here is that the basic rules of golf would preclude any goofs from showing up with a “D” and a “Fence” to start a chant of “Dee- Fence…”

Finally, the PGA needs to hire fashion consultants - - or wardrobe mavens. Some of the players look like clowns on TV. Once again, allow me to offer a comment by Scott Ostler to make my point:

“The white belt will never make a comeback, but you have to admire the courage of PGA golfers for trying.”

Finally, since I have cribbed liberally from Scott Ostler’s observations today, let me close with one more of his observations about a sport that might need some changes of its own:

“If you’re a spectator at a NASCAR race and a driver lands in your lap, do you have to throw him back? Carl Edwards didn’t quite make it into the cheap seats at Talladega, but the radio account of Edwards’ oopsie probably went like this: ‘And there’s a souvenir transmission for some lucky fan!’ “

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

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In addition to yesterday’s NBA trade of Shaq to Cleveland, which got all the publicity, there were other trades. Perhaps the oddest was the Wizards sending Etan Thomas (mediocre) and Darius Songalia (mediocre) and Olekisy Pecherov (who’s he?) and the #5 overall pick in last night’s draft to Minnesota for Randy Foye (mediocre) and Mike Miller (best of the five current NBA players involved in this swap). That trade gave the Timberwolves 4 picks in the first round of the draft. I sure thought that this was the prelude to something big…

Well, if it is going to be “big” it is going to have to wait because the Timberwolves spent the fifth pick and the sixth pick and the eighteenth pick last night on three point guards. That is right; they took Ricky Rubio, Jonny Flynn and Ty Lawson; they cannot put all of them on the floor at the same time…

In another set of NBA moves/trades, the Spurs acquired Richard Jefferson from the Bucks. Jefferson has a huge contract and has not been performing at the “huge contract level” for the last season or two. But the Spurs only needed to give up Bruce Bowen (37 years old) and Kurt Thomas (mediocre) and Fabricio Oberto (who?) to acquire Jefferson. That seems lopsided but it gets worse if you believe the rumors.

The Bucks are expected to release Bowen to save money and offer a buyout to Thomas. That would make the trade Richard Jefferson for Fabricio Oberto but it goes on from there. The Bucks shipped Oberto to the Pistons for Amir Johnson (he is four years in the league straight from high school; suffice it to say he is not one of the success stories people cite when they say high school kids should be allowed to jump directly to the NBA). In that trade, the Pistons are then expected to waive Oberto to save money.

If indeed everything happens as rumored here, the Spurs could have Jefferson and then resign which – if any – of the three players they traded to Milwaukee they might want back. The only logical conclusion for me is that the Bucks really and truly wanted to rid themselves of Richard Jefferson…

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported yesterday that Evander Holyfield is facing foreclosure on his mansion (109 room house sitting on 235 acres) because the mortgage holder is calling in the $10M loan on the property. Holyfield has a smaller house also in Georgia and it too is facing foreclosure and an auction to satisfy the mortgage on it. The paper reported that the mansion is probably worth about $20M and that it costs Holyfield about $1M a year just to maintain it.

The paper estimated that Holyfield made $248M in his boxing career but a couple of divorces and child support payments of more than $500K per year have taken their toll on his assets.

Given this situation, can another heavyweight comeback bout or title shot against one of the unknown heavyweight “champs” of the moment be all that far away?

John Daly is back on the golf scene. He has stopped drinking - - again - - and has lost a reported 65 points. That’s right; Daly lost the equivalent of a third grader. HIs banishment from the PGA Tour and the sponsor exemptions that the Tour brought his way put his financial circumstances in peril - - maybe even greater peril than Evander Holyfield faces now. Daly estimates he has lost $50-60M gambling and he has been divorced four times. In a Pro-Am event once, he hit his tee shot off of a beer can; the golf goofs who run the PGA Tour did not use that to sign up a sponsor for the Pro-Ams on the rest of the Tour card; the golf goofs sanctioned Daly. Oh by the way, this is not his first emergence from rehab; the previous stints there had no lasting effect.

However, Daly played overseas this Spring in the Italian Open and he was at the Masters – albeit not playing – and selling tee shirts and autographs out of his RV parked proximal to Augusta National. He is in Europe again playing in the BMW Invitational in Munich and then heads to Scotland to be part of the British Open. He won the British Open once before; imagine if he wins it again now…

Horse racing is in trouble nationwide; the sport needs these two bits of news about as much as Michael Vick needs a DWI arrest as he tries to maneuver to be reinstated as eligible to play in the NFL:

1. The owner of Rachael Alexander says that he will not allow his horse to participate in the Breeders’ Cup at Santa Anita this year because she would have to race on a synthetic track there. The owner says he will not run his horse “on plastic”. Many were looking to see Rachael Alexander take on Zenyatta – last year’s Ladies Classic winner and a mare who is undefeated in 10 races lifetime. The showdown won’t happen at what is supposed to be the confrontation of all the best horses in training…

2. The AP reports that a veterinarian has been barred from the track and is under investigation on an allegation that he used a handgun to euthanize a horse at Philadelphia Park. If true, that would violate industry standards; horses are normally euthanized with an overdose of barbiturates not lead poisoning wherein 180 grains of lead enter the left hear and exit the right ear. It would also violate track rules, which prohibit the carrying of guns on the track grounds except for security folks. When all of this is settled, please expect to hear from PETA and from the “Barbaro idolizers”. They will have nothing good to say in this matter - - and for once, they would be perfectly correct in their bleatings.

Since I mentioned John Daly and his return to golf above, here are three points made by Frank Fitzpatrick in the Philadelphia Inquirer about the July issue of Golf Magazine:

“I’d stop missing four-footers if I’d only stand up straight, rotate my elbows inward, rest them on my rib cage, tilt forward from the hips, and rest the putter directly beneath my eyes. Great, but I’m going to need a memory course to remember all that.”

“I already know how to “Erase a Bad Ballstriking Day.” Bring your own pencil.”

“Boo Weekley’s 3-wood is a Cleveland Launcher, 15-inch, Aldila VooDoo XVS8 graphite shaft, X-flex 42.75-degree graphite. I think Harry Vardon played the same club.”

If you do not get the Harry Vardon reference, Google is your friend…

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

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Shaquille O’Neal will join forces with LeBron James in Cleveland next year. On paper, that would seem to alter the league dynamics and the balance of power. After all, when Shaq was in Miami with Dwayne Wade, that was good enough to bring a championship to South Florida; and LeBron James would seem to bring everything to the party that D-Wade does… I don’t doubt that the Cavs have helped themselves via this trade because they didn’t give up anything to acquire Shaq. Consider:

Ben Wallace: For those of you who think that Shaq’s best days are behind him, think about Ben Wallace.

Sasha Pavlovic: To be polite, I’d say he has been disappointing to date. To be less kind, I’d say he should be renamed Pavlovian because he’s been a dog.

Second round draft pick: Most NBA second round picks wind up in the D-League.

However, I am not yet ready to concede that the Cavs will be a juggernaut in 2009/2010 and that they will roll through the playoffs. Here is what I will concede, however.

If the Cavs start slowly next year and find themselves at or near .500 in mid-December, they will give themselves a new coach for Christmas. This trade is a table setting for a championship and nothing less.

Here is one area where the Cavaliers are unquestionably at or near the top of the NBA - - the combined age of their centers. Ilgauskas is 34 years old; Shaq is 37 years old.

Meanwhile, CBSsports.com reports that there is another NBA trade percolating. This trade is almost the antithesis of the Shaq-to-Cleveland deal. In this rumored trade, two lowly teams seem to be interested in exchanging pieces that just do not matter. The report has it that:

The Knicks will part with Quentin Richardson. I doubt that will cause great weeping and gnashing of teeth amongst the folks calling into WFAN in NYC.

The Grizzlies will part with Darko Milicic. Supposedly, his contract expires at the end of this year and that creates more cap room for the Knicks in what fans expect will be a spending frenzy next summer.

You will excuse me for failing to try to delve into the subtleties and the impending front office machinations these two organizations have planned next. Given the recent trading history of these two teams, it will be unusual for either one to come out on top in this deal.

I need to reset the background for this next item. Unless you live in the Dallas area or are a member of the “Chicken Fried Nation” as Randy Galloway of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram likes to refer to Dallas sports fans, you probably have not been following the kerfuffle about whether or not Tony Romo has received some tough-love from the Cowboys’ offensive coordinator about getting in better shape or not. In the Dallas papers, this has been kind of a big deal. The latest head-shaker comes from Tony Romo himself who said:

“I’ve been coached the same since I’ve been here. There’s no different style or way. I mean, if you need to be coached to be good or great, then you’re probably not going to be good or great.” 

Excuse me. The coaching provided by Bill Parcells is the same as the coaching provided by Wade Phillips? One of the monikers hung on Wade Phillips by Jennifer Engel in the Star-Telegram is “Coach Cupcake”. No one ever thought Bill Parcells was a “cupcake”; some may have thought he might have chowed down a few too many cupcakes in the past, but no one thought he was a cupcake.

I also don’t get the assertion that Romo makes about the lack of importance of coaching to become “good or great”. Consider:

Michael Jordan’s greatness came to the fore when he teamed up with Phil Jackson as his coach.

Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson have swing coaches.

The top tennis pros have coaches too – and the coaches attend most of the key matches. There are even rules in tennis to limit “coaching” during matches.

Gymnasts and track and field athletes all have coaches. If the ones who become great would have done so without the coaching, why did they waste all of that money and put up with all of the coaches’ nonsense?

In a shocking development, the US men’s soccer team beat Spain in the Confederations Cup. Spain was ranked #1 in the world by FIFA at the time. The last time the Spanish team had lost an international match was in November 2006; since that game, they had been undefeated in 35 matches and had won outright their last 15 matches in a row. The final score was 2-0 - - a comfortable margin in international soccer. You would have to credit US goaltending to a large extent for this win; Spain had 22 shots on goal while the US only managed 9. On Sunday, the US team will be in the finals of the Confederations Cup against the winner of the Brazil/South Africa match. I never saw that as a possibility…

Finally, here is an observation from Dwight Perry in the Seattle Times:

“Ex-NFL quarterback Bernie Kosar filed for bankruptcy protection last week, citing debts of $1.5 million to the Browns, $3 million to his ex-wife and $9 million for real estate loans.

“Football historians immediately declared it the mother of all three-and-outs.”

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

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First, I need to correct an error from a couple of days ago. I said then that my math had the Red Sox record at 306-194 during their 500-game sellout streak. The “Houston gentleman” who is a font of sports stats sent along the following e-mail:

“Going back to May 15, 2003 when the Red Sox streak began, they are 327-173 according to an AP article.”

I suspect the reference to the AP article is there at least in part to make me feel better about my math errors. I am also sure that he has this information in some database that he maintains just because…

The big baseball news is that Donald Fehr has announced that he will step down as the head of the MLBPA before the start of the next baseball season. Tell the truth; are you going to miss his highly entertaining presence at news conferences and Congressional hearings in the future? I shall not. Many people think that Donald Fehr is a towering figure in the sporting world who has made things better as a result of his actions. I agree that he is a towering figure; and in a sense, he has been hugely successful representing his “clients” – the baseball players. I have never thought – nor do I think now in the afterglow of his retirement announcement – that he has made things better.

Financially, the baseball players have thrived under Donald Fehr’s leadership; there is no question about it. The average salary in baseball has risen about 1000% in the last 25 years. Would that a similar situation had obtained with me for the final 25 years of my career… In that dimension, Donald Fehr was supremely successful and beneficial to his clients. A cynic might say that the fact that Donald Fehr’s recompense was tied to the average salary of a baseball player explains his seeming monomaniacal focus on that aspect of his job to the exclusion of most others. But perhaps that hypothetical cynic is indeed a realist…

Outside his singularly outstanding area of success – compensation for the players – Donald Fehr was an obstructionist. You can blame a lot of people for averting their eyes as steroid use - - an illegal practice since the substances being used were illegal substances - - crept into baseball and spread like soft butter throughout the game. Nonetheless, as soon as someone began to suggest testing the players, it was Donald Fehr who came up with the argument that it would be an invasion of their privacy for the players to subject themselves to testing. That same stance is still in vogue when it comes to blood testing which is why there is no testing for human growth hormone at this time. Know that such an argument is fabricated; there are jobs/professions in the US where employees can be tested randomly for drugs as a condition of their employment. I once had such a job…

Maybe the fact that steroids got players bigger contracts and that put more money in the Fehr checking account came into play there? I don’t know; I don’t read minds. I do know that with his obstructionism he delayed testing several years, which maintained a workplace for his clients that was more dangerous to their long-term health than it had to be. Continued steroid use outside of a physician’s supervision can really damage a human organism. Donald Fehr caused that situation to obtain and to flourish longer than it needed to.

Let me get a couple other things out on the table here. The infamous list of 104 players who failed drug tests in 2003 that was never to be made public resided with the MLBPA. If it was indeed the MLBPA’s sworn duty to maintain the anonymity and privacy of those 104 members of the MLBPA, then it was the union that failed. If Donald Fehr is to receive accolades for advancing union causes, he needs to take a major shot for this debacle.

Oh, and by the way, it was Donald Fehr - - NOT Bud Selig - - who “cancelled the 1994 World Series”. It was the players who walked out on the season in the middle of 1994; the owners did not lock them out. It was the players who did not return to work in time for a World Series. Donald Fehr made that happen; it was in his power to avoid that happenstance; he led the union in such a way that there was no World Series.

Nepotism seems not to bother Donald Fehr all that much either. His brother has been one of the “day-to-day negotiators” of the last two CBAs with the owners. I doubt that DeMaurice Smith’s son is the CFO for the NFL Players Union…

I had hoped that one day Donald Fehr might have to resign under some kind of cloud of impropriety because I wanted to use as the headline for that day’s rant, “Fehr Strikes Out”. That won’t happen now. Too bad. So allow me to reiterate something that I have said before about Donald Fehr and his sidekick, Gene Orza:

Fehr and Orza are – indisputably – four letter words.

Recall a few years ago when the NCAA political correctness tribunal decided that the College of William and Mary would be allowed to retain its nickname – The Tribe – but that it had to change its logo because it had two feathers depicted on the logo that might offend someone somewhere. As a result, the school is in the process of coming up with a new mascot to go along with a new logo and it is hard for a mascot – singular – to be a tribe – plural. There have been several hundred suggestions made to the College President; one of the suggestions is a spear of asparagus. That would be a good idea since that would not offend any vegans anywhere. It would also be a good mascot because they could dress him/her up as a spear and have the costume designed such that the asparagus had a cheese sauce on it. With William and Mary’s colors being green and gold, that would look right.

In case you aren’t buying any of that, neither am I. Having an asparagus spear as a mascot is no better than having an animated flake of dandruff as a mascot.

Finally, Scott Ostler posed a series of rhetorical questions in a recent column in the SF Chronicle: [I really like the last one…]

“We can put a man on the moon, so why can’t the man be Jose Canseco?”

“If A-Rod is suffering from exhaustion, where’s his cousin?”

“If a winning team helps build community spirit and morale in hard times, shouldn’t a lousy team be declared a menace to society?”

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

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Ralph Waldo Emerson said that one gets to paradise “…by the stairway of surprise.” Given some of the surprising events in the sporting cosmos in the past few days, it looks as if it will be a long climb indeed to paradise.

The first surprise came over the weekend when the US men’s soccer team made it into the semi-finals of the Confederations Cup in South Africa. After having lost its first two games to Italy and to Brazil and looking over-matched in those two games, the only chance the US team had to advance was that they had to beat Egypt by a minimum of three goals AND Italy had to lose to Brazil by three goals. I don’t know what that parlay ticket would have paid out in Las Vegas, but a $100 parlay ticket with those two events would have returned a hefty four figure sum - - because both things happened.

Brazil’s win over Italy was decisive - - except that the teams played relatively evenly for about 80 of the 90 minutes in the match. Egypt played as if half the team had refrigerators strapped to their backs. The US team was faster and more aggressive than the Egyptians from the get-go; that was not the pre-game common wisdom.

The US team’s reward is a semi-final match up against Spain. The Spanish team is currently ranked #1 in the world; the Spanish team is undefeated in its last 35 international matches. Brazil and Italy are ranked third and fourth in the world at the moment and both teams dominated the American squad. So, maybe someone needs to think about slipping some Quaaludes into the Spanish team’s water bottles if the next game is going to be meaningful?

Speaking of soccer and surprises, UEFA – the Union of European Football Associations – suspended a Chelsea striker, Didier Drogba, for four games. They decided that he was guilty of a “…vulgar rant at a referee.” YOWZA !! Can you imagine if anyone in the NBA thought of suspending LeBron or Kobe for four games for their rants regarding referees and officiating decisions? My guess is that you would see Kobe and LeBron on the court less than two dozen times a year. And if that were the case, ticket sales all over the NBA would plummet like a stone - - explaining why that will never happen here…

Another surprise came from golf’s US Open. Turning for home after 54 holes played in segments between the deluges, the co-leaders were Rickey Barnes and Lucas Glover. Prior to last weekend, I could not have picked those two guys out of a group photo with the cast of The Muppet Show. Of course, Dan Jenkins was covering the US Open; and here is what he had to say about the weather conditions and the course conditions early on:

“There’s so much water on the 18th hole that Michael Phelps couldn’t par it.”

Here is another surprise - - in the form of a Quick Quiz:

Going into last night’s MLB games, which team in the National League would be the wild-card team in the playoffs if the season ended then?

The answer is the San Francisco Giants - - and they had a better record than the Phillies who are the leaders in the NL East. Nonetheless, Dodger fans need not worry; the Giants are a full 8 games behind the Dodgers. For the Dodgers to miss the playoffs, someone would have to show up for batting practice at Chavez Ravine with an AK-47 and spray rounds for a full 5 minutes before anyone could stop him.

Notwithstanding the Dodgers’ position in the NL West, let me reiterate something I wrote here about a month ago. When I do get to see the Giants play on TV – a late night game here on the East Coast – I have really become a fan of Pablo Sandoval. Going into last night’s game, he was hitting .338 with 8 homeruns and 33 RBIs and an OPS in excess of .900. Because many of the Giants’ games on TV are late games in the Eastern and Central time zones, some fans may never have had the chance to see Sandoval play more than a time or two. He is only 23 years old and he is worth staying up late just to see him play.

Speaking of surprises, what would be the over/under on the date for the next revelation of a name from the 2003 list of MLB players who flunked a test for performance enhancing drugs? Remember, there are still more than 100 mystery names on that list. Suppose I set the date at July 28 - - a couple of days before the trading deadline… Over or under?

Speaking of surprises, CC Sabathia left a game in the second inning last weekend with what has been described as “biceps tendonitis”. This is a surprise because of Sabathia’s history. Since his arrival in MLB in 2001, Sabathia has always been a reliable starter. Only one time has he started less than 30 games in a season - - and in 2006 he started 28 games. In addition, he has always been good for about 200 innings in a season. This man does not miss starts; this might be a very interesting story to follow for the rest of the baseball season.

Syndicated columnist, Norman Chad, wrote a great column this week; that is not a surprise because the vast majority of his columns are at least very good. He wrote about some of the summer activities planned by organizations that are scouting and evaluating middle-school athletes in football. On the basis of reports from these folks, Chad already has one guy penciled inn as a Top 5 pick in the NFL draft in 2017… This is a column that should be read in its entirety; it is that good.

Finally, here is an observation from Dan Daly in the Washington Times on the occasion of Pudge Rodriguez breaking Carlton Fisk’s record for most games caught in MLB:

“The 32,425 fans at Rangers Ballpark, his old stomping grounds, gave him a crouching ovation.”

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

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Manny Ramirez remains on baseball’s suspended list through July 3. Maybe I’m just dense, but I would think that a “suspension” through July 3 would mean that he would not be able to play baseball for any US professional teams associated with MLB until then. He could certainly play at a local park; he could play at a family picnic, he could play in a baseball league in New Zealand; but he would not be allowed to play in MLB or anything associated with MLB. Clearly, I just don’t get it…

Manny Ramirez will start playing this week for a Dodgers’ Triple-A farm team, the Albuquerque Isotopes. The rationale behind this is that he needs this opportunity to prepare so that he will be ready to play for the Dodgers as of 3 July. Sorry, but I take a different view here. He is on a 50-game suspension – not a trivial penalty for a non-trivial transgression of the rules of baseball – and it ought to be his burden to stay in shape/find someone to pitch serious batting practice to him/get himself ready for his return to the Dodgers. Why is he permitted to play for a minor league team when any of the other players on the Isotopes would be suspended and not allowed to play anywhere if they failed the same drug test?

Speaking of failed drug tests, here is a quote from a column by Nick Canepa of the San Diego Union-Tribune attributed to San Diego Padres’ closer, Heath Bell regarding the Padres’ prospects for the rest of the season:

“We’re not out of the wild-card race and the Dodgers can’t play this way forever. We’re lying in the weeds.”

Based on that quote, I suggest that MLB should be testing Bell for hallucinogens sometime soon…

The Boston Red Sox celebrated their 500th consecutive sold-out game last week. There are a lot of factors that have contributed to that streak - - some very good teams, a stadium that is a baseball shrine, a stadium that is hardly cavernous, a dedicated fan base. What is somewhat surprising is that the economic slump has not interfered with ticket sales in any significant way. By the way, the Red Sox record during those 500 sold-out games was 306 -194 - - assuming my math is correct.

You have probably read about Bryce Harper – the 16-year-old high school baseball phenom who will get his GED and then leave high school to focus on playing baseball. He will be going to junior college next year and then in June 2010 he will be eligible for the MLB Draft. Obviously, he is doing this with de minimis the approval of his parents if not their orchestration. I hope this works out for Bryce Harper because the comparisons to Michelle Wie as a teenage phenom who flamed out will follow him around if this does not work out. Clearly, following the Michelle Wie path to athletic success over the later teenage years is not where Bryce Harper needs to go. Bonne chance, Bryce Harper.

By now, you must know about the latest negative event in the life of Ryan Leaf. A warrant for his arrest was issued in Texas based on an arrest for breaking and entering there - - allegedly to acquire prescription painkillers. Leaf was in Canada for some reason and was arrested by a border guard when he returned to the US. That led Dwight Perry to say in the Seattle Times:

“Further proof that old football habits die hard: Ryan Leaf gets intercepted at the border.”

On the same topic, Bob Molinaro had this item in the Hampton Roads Virginian Pilot:

“Down and out: There have probably been worse busts than Ryan Leaf, but none come quickly to mind.”

Molinaro’s comment started me thinking about some of the sports world’s monumental busts and after a few minutes of rumination, I came up with this list:

Tony Mandarich
Darko Milicic
LaRue Martin
Sam Bowie
Rick Mirer
Tim Couch
Akili Smith
Brian Bosworth
Reggie Bush - - too soon to tell?

And of course, if one is making a list of monumental busts everywhere, one cannot possibly leave out the name of:

Morganna the Kissing Bandit.

According to reports last week, Bernie Kosar filed for bankruptcy. It was not all that long ago that Cleveland Browns’ fans wanted Bernie Kosar to be a significant part of the ownership of the resurrected Browns’ franchise. Seemingly, there were two reasons for that desire:

A. He was not part of the Lerner family.

B. He had a reputation as a shrewd and astute businessman.

Well, at least the first condition continues to obtain… According to the court filings, Kosar owes the Browns $1.5M, his ex-wife $3M and a bank $9M on some real estate deals that have not worked out. Given that debt burden, one would suspect that Kosar will have to restrict some of his discretionary expenses. I guess that is yet another reason not to contemplate a weekend at Bernie’s.

Finally, since I used a Dwight Perry line above, allow me to close today with another one from the Seattle Times:

“Sleep, according to a new University of California study, is nature’s way of:

“a) Resetting the magnetic north of your emotional compass.

“b) Killing eight hours when there isn’t a Nats doubleheader.”

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

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Kevin McHale is out as the coach of the Minnesota Timberwolves. Someone in the Minneapolis press corps found this out because Kevin Love “tweeted it”; and when the press contacted the team, the team had no comment at that moment. How low rent is that? The Wolves demoted McHale from the GM position and put him on the bench after the team fired Randy Wittman as coach in December. McHale went 20-43 with the team that he had assembled as the GM. Normally, I would say that an interim coach who had inherited such a flawed squad should not be accountable for a bad record like that; but in this case, it was coach McHale who lost with GM McHale’s players…

Kevin McHale was the person responsible for drafting Kevin Garnett in Minnesota. That should put a big “plus” on his ledger. However, he is also the exec in Minnesota who traded Ray Allen for Stephon Marbury (oops) and who traded Brandon Roy for Randy Foye (oops again). Then he traded Kevin Garnett to Boston…

I expect that we might hear from the conspiracy theorists out there rather quickly in the event that Kevin McHale immediately gets a job with the NBA office. Clearly and unequivocally, that would “prove” that David Stern was behind the deal to send KG to Boston to revive that franchise and put it at the top of the NBA again. Ergo, now that McHale is out of a job, the league is taking care of him. I do not believe that for a moment but I would not be surprised to hear it.

By the way, out in Las Vegas some sports books have future bets available on which team will win the NBA Championship in 2010. The Timberwolves are listed at 100-1. Excuse me, but is someone in Las Vegas allergic to four digit numbers? That is probably one of the worst sucker bets of the year.

The question of the week seems to be whether or not Phil Jackson will return to coach the Lakers next year.

Memo to Phil Jackson:

Please do not make yourself into a taller version of Brett Favre. Take your time; make your decision; announce it; do whatever you need to do in light of what your decision is.

Thank you in advance.

Maurice Clarett has petitioned the Ohio Parole Board seeking an early release from prison. In case you forgot, Clarett is serving 42 months in jail for a holdup in Columbus, Ohio and a subsequent car chase resulting in police finding loaded guns in his vehicle. His attorney in this matter submitted to the Parole Board that Clarett has an opportunity to play football in the NFL, the Arena League or the Canadian Football League if he is released now such that he can be in shape to join a team.

Obviously, the attorney here is hoping that there are no football aficionados on the Ohio Parole Board because Maurice Clarett has no more chance of playing in the NFL this year than my father does - - and my father has been dead for ten years. In addition, the Arena League has suspended operations for this season hoping that it might reincarnate itself next year. In addition, the CFL might be problematic given the Canadian government tends not to like to admit known felons to their country merely for the purpose of playing sports. Other than that…

Brandon Jennings chose not to go to a year of college while waiting to become eligible for the NBA Draft; instead, he went to Italy and played for a professional team in Rome. As more players choose to skip that “one-and-done year” of college, some folks try to justify that the young man will learn more by living in a foreign country than he would by living in a dorm at a college where he is not going to attend many classes. That may be true, but the increment may be only marginally greater. Dan Steinberg of the Washington Post interviewed Jennings and here are two insights he gathered from that interview:

Jennings said it was tough to live abroad and one reason was that they did not have a dryer and had to hang out their wet clothes to dry.

Jennings said another obstacle he had to overcome was the lack of availability of fast food in Rome. Specifically, he said that he missed Panda Express the most.

I have no comment on the incredible hardship that hanging out clothes to dry might impose on a person; that thought is too much to bear. However, this kid spent a year in Italy and said that he missed the food at Panda Express? I do not care how great a basketball player he might ever be, this guy is not going to cross over and become the next Food Network celebrity chef!

Let me pose a rhetorical question here:

How many folks who wrote columns averring that last year was Donovan McNabb’s final season with the Eagles will write another column now and fess up that they were merely wildly speculating back then in order to fill up space?

My guess is that very, very few of those folks will do that. My guess here is based on the low percentage of folks who reamed out everyone associated with the Houston Texans organization for taking Mario Williams with the overall #1 pick a couple of years ago and passing on that “sure-fire Hall of Fame running back”, Reggie Bush. Not a lot of “My Bad columns” have followed.

Let me pose another rhetorical question here in the form of a Quick Quiz. Which of these three things brings with it the greatest measure of tedium?

A. The two-week ramp up to the Super Bowl

B. NCAA “bracketology” nonsense that starts before Christmas.

C. NFL Mock Drafts that start a year in advance of the real draft.

Finally, with the US Open happening this weekend, let me close with two quotes from the late John Updike who was enamored with golf:

“Golf appeals to the idiot in us and the child. Just how childlike golf players become is proven by their frequent inability to count past five.”

“All it takes for a golfer to attain his happiness is a fence rail to throw his coat on, and a target somewhere over the rise.”

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

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Today I am not going to pretend to be a legal analyst; trust me, I have no aspirations to be the next Nancy Grace. I just want to go through a layman’s thought process regarding the recent revelation by the NY Times that Sammy Sosa was one of the players who tested positive for Performance Enhancing Drugs in 2003. Based on some of the “wing-nut comments” on a bunch of websites that carry the works of real sportswriters, there are lots of folks out there who see sinister behavior in all of this; and of course, each commenter has his/her favorite sinister character who is responsible for “the leak”. My problem here is that there are too many potential sources for “the leak” to make anything more than a guess at this time as to “the source”.

The list of players who failed this test was supposed to be confidential; only the number was ever to be released; but someone failed to destroy the list itself. Then as Federal prosecutors homed in on BALCO prosecutions, they filed a discovery motion to seize records at one of the labs that performed the test analyses. Federal agents seized computers there and – evidently – the list with the names still present was in memory. Oops!

Nevertheless, what this means is that there are myriad folks who have had access to that list – or to parts of that list – since the time that computer provided evidence to the investigators/prosecutors. Consider:

The folks at the lab who didn’t erase the file in the first place might have a paper copy somewhere.

The agents who first found that list in memory could easily have printed out a copy or two.

Those agents’ supervisors may have seen the list in paper form or on a computer screen.

Surely, prosecutors and the staff for the prosecutors would have had access to the list. By this point, it had to have been committed to paper form somewhwere, no?

Various judges, their clerks and court staff members where BALCO cases have been heard could have had access to the list in paper or electronic form.

Lawyers for various defendants – and their staffs – probably have seen the list. Surely, they have seen parts of the list.

The MLBPA has sued to restrict the use of the list by prosecutors in Federal Court. Even if MLBPA once destroyed their copy of the list, they have surely seen it subsequently.

MLB officials surely saw the list back in 2003. Even if they honorably destroyed their copies back then, I presume that some folks there have seen the list since then or some have reconstructed parts of the list.

At least one agent – Scott Boras – knows that one of his clients – A-Rod – is on the list. We know that is the case because A-Rod admitted he was on the list. Sosa’s agent now knows that his client is allegedly on the list. Agents for other players under investigation probably also know their clients are under investigation – meaning those clients are on the list. Agents share information so at least a few of them know at least parts of the list. Agents have assistants and associates…

Surely, that is not an exhaustive rendition of who has had access to the list over the last six years. A person skilled in legal research would probably find at least a dozen other “nodes” in the path that such evidence might take and describe other kinds of folks who have seen all or part of the list. And so, it is far too early to speculate as to the source of the info that found its way to the NY Times. Stay tuned…

It is not, however, too early to consider the possibility that Sammy Sosa might face perjury charges for his testimony to the Congress. Nevertheless, if such charges are to happen, the Feds had better shake a leg. According to my layman’s search, the statute of limitations for a perjury charge is five years; Sosa – along with McGwire, Palmiero and Schilling – appeared before Congress in the Spring of 2005. That means the Feds have about nine or ten months to get themselves organized and to get an indictment and to start perjury proceedings. Based on the glacial pace of previous activities in this entire investigation – BALCO inquiries started back in 2001 or 2002 as I recall – it is not a cinch that they could have an indictment in hand before the clock runs out. I do not know if there is the legal equivalent of a “time-out” here…

Staying on the jurisprudence trail today, WR, Donte Stallworth pled guilty to DUI manslaughter and was sentenced this week. He will spend 30 days in jail and two years under house arrest and then eight years of probation; he will also do 1000 hours of community service and he has reached a financial settlement with the family of the man who died in this incident. According to reports, the leniency shown here in terms of his time in jail is because he cooperated with the authorities, took responsibility for his actions and reached a settlement with the victim’s family.

Notwithstanding all of those mitigating factors, all of which are positive and should be given strong consideration in a sentencing decision, consider that Stallworth will spend 30 days in jail for an incident where a human life was lost. Compare that to the time that Michael Vick spent in jail where no human life was lost.

I do not want to get into any arguments with the “doggy people” here. I am NOT justifying in any way what Michael Vick did; it was heinous. Michael Vick also did anything but cooperate with the authorities and he lied about the dogfighting enterprise for months. He deserved every moment of his jail time - - and maybe even more. Nevertheless, he spent about a year in jail where Donte Stallworth will spend 30 days in jail. Given the victims in the two cases, that seems incongruent to me.

Meanwhile in NYC, the Plaxico Burress case adjourned for a few months meaning that there is no way he will be tried on his gun possession case until after this year’s NFL season is over. If anyone thinks that is an accidental happenstance, he/she would also probably need an operating manual to use a screwdriver. The next thing you will be reading is that Burress – along with his lawyer(s) of course – will seek a meeting with Roger Goodell to determine his eligibility to play in the NFL this season and to argue that the Commissioner not exact any suspension until after the legal processes have run their course.

When you do read about that meeting, try not to think that Burress is asking the Commish to give him another shot.

Finally, here is an item from Greg Cote in the Miami Herald about another athlete who has been involved with the legal system:

“The Dolphins signed undrafted offensive lineman J.D. Quinn, whose college career included three DUI stops and his team being made to vacate eight victories because he accepted unearned money from a car dealership. Otherwise — good kid!”

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

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The NY Times reported yesterday that Sammy Sosa was one of the players who tested positive for performance enhancing drugs back in 2003. They cite the source of that info as lawyers who refused to be identified since the documents are under a court seal. This list of players who tested positive is the same one that had A-Rod’s name on it.

Recently, Sammy Sosa said he was going to retire and calmly wait to be elected to the Hall of Fame. I had my doubts then; if this proves accurate, he will not be getting in while he is still alive.

In addition, Sosa may have a much larger problem here. In 2005, he testified at that famous Congressional hearing – the one where Mark McGwire said he did not want to talk about the past and Rafael Palmiero wagged his finger at the Congressthings and said he never took PEDs and then tested positive about a month later. That’s the one where Sosa suddenly forgot how to speak English and had his lawyer speak for him. Nevertheless, he was sworn in and he said he had never taken PEDs, had never broken the law and had clean tests in 2004. Well, if the NY Times reports are true, it might seem as though he had not been telling the Congressthings “…the whole truth and nothing but the truth.”

Maybe Sosa and Roger Clemens can see if they can get a discounted rate on a combined plea deal regarding perjury indictments? Just a thought…

Recently, there was a minor kerfuffle regarding Raul Ibanez and PEDs. A blogger suggested that Ibanez – having an outstanding year in Philly at age 37 – might be “taking something”. Ibanez was not pleased and lashed out. I will give you a note from Brad Rock of the Deseret Morning News to fill in the story:

“Philadelphia Phillies slugger Raul Ibanez is outraged at a blog posting that suggested he uses steroids. He told the Philadelphia Inquirer he’ll stake his bank account on his innocence.

” ‘You can have my urine, my hair, my blood, my stool — anything you can test. I’ll give you back every dime I’ve ever made,’ he said.

“Um, thanks for the offer, but for most of us, an autograph will do.”

Elsewhere in the National League, the Cubs had to stand around and watch Milton Bradley catch a fly ball in right field and then throw the ball into the stands - - with only two men out in the inning. The Cubs should have expected Bradley to have run-ins with umpires and get himself disciplined for that; he has done that. The Cubs should have expected Bradley to get injured; he has done that. On the positive side, the Cubs should have expected him to hit and to drive in runs; he has not done that. In addition, the Cubs should have expected him to be able to count the number of outs in each inning; he has not done that.

By the way, the Cubs could have had Raul Ibanez this winter instead of Bradley for about the same money and the same contract duration. Go check the stats for these guys and ask which team got the better off-season deal…

Greg Cote of the Miami Herald had an interesting view of a Yankees’ draft selection:

“The Yankees selected Dolphins rookie quarterback Pat White in the 48th round of the draft. After not winning a World Series since 2000 and being 0-8 against the nemesis Red Sox this year, apparently the desperate Yankees are converting to the Wildcat offense.”

A couple of days ago, I suggested that the NBA Finals format of 2-3-2 might be something to change since NBA Finals have not gone 7 games all that often recently. The only one I could remember was the “John Starks Game”. A reader comment on the blog pointed out the Spurs/Pistons series went 7 games in 2005. Via e-mail, I heard from a gentleman in Houston who is a font of sports statistics and history. He has done sports blogging and a bit of sportswriting and some sports radio; he is also – I presume – a judge of good whiskey. Here is the deal on the NBA Finals based on the e-mail from him:

In 1985, the NBA went to the 2-3-2 format for its final series. In the 25 years since then, there have been only 3 series to go 7 games (1988, 1994 and 2005). That is 12% of the series for those keeping score at home.

From 1947 through 1984, the NBA Finals format was 2-2-1-1-1. In those 38 years, the final series went to 7 games 13 times. That is 34% for those keeping score at home.

Here is shocking news. Michele Wie did not even qualify for the US Women’s Open this year. She has been in previous US Women’s Open tournaments but has never won. This week, she did not even make the cut to tee off there. Wie is 19 years old; that is awfully young to be over the hill but the fact of the matter is that it has been quite a while since she has actually won a golf tournament against real players and not high school kids from Hawaii. Wake me when she does win a “big girl tournament”; that will be news…

The NHL sort of won a preliminary victory in the Phoenix Coyotes bankruptcy case when the judge invalidated Jim Balsillie’s $212M offer to buy the team because it had a June 29 deadline on the offer and the judge said that the case was too complex to be finished by then. The NHL sort of lost a point too when the judge ruled that the league had already approved Balsillie as an owner back when he tried to buy the Penguins and move them to Canada and that their claim that he was not an approved buyer for the team was nonsense. If nothing changes here, the NHL – the Coyotes largest creditor – will need to find a buyer for the team who will pay something near $212M or the league will take a financial hit relative to the offer that Balsillie put on the table and then that buyer will need to find a way to turn a profit on the team while it is in Phoenix. Good luck on that!

Finally, here is another observation from Greg Cote of the Miami Herald regarding the US Olympic Committee:

“U.S. gold medalists in wrestling at the 2012 Summer Games will get a $250,000 bonus. Remember when we got to at least pretend the Olympics were about amateurism?”

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

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