The Sports Curmudgeon

There is an adage that bad things happen in threes.  If there is truth in that aphorism, then a few folks in the sports world need to be on guard.  Here is the deal:

1. About 6 months ago, the Executive Director of the NFLPA had to resign his position after an internal investigation revealed that he had used union funds to pay for at least one visit to a strip club.  Not only a misappropriation of funds, but that was also skeezy behavior.
2. Last week, the Executive Director of the MLBPA had to resign his position after an internal investigation revealed that some union funds were unaccounted for and that he had an “inappropriate relationship” with a union employee who was also his wife’s sister.  Not only a potential misappropriation of funds, but that is also skeezy behavior squared.

So, if bad things happen in threes, the Executive Directors of the unions representing players in major American sports need to mind their “Ps” and “Qs” carefully.  No one should want to be the third entry on that trend line …

Moving on …  The Cincinnati men’s basketball team has a mediocre record so far this season; overall, the Bearcats are 15-12 with a 7-7 record in the Big 12; they have a winning streak going of 4 games.  Why is that noteworthy, you ask?

• A couple of weeks ago, Cincy went to play K-State in Manhattan KS and won by 30 points.  K-State coach, Jerome Tang, called out his players for “dogging it” and the AD fired Coach Tang.
• Last weekend, Cincy went to play Kansas in Lawrence, KS and won by 16 points outscoring the Jayhawks 48-34 in the second half.  Kansas coach, Bill Self, could not have been happy about that result, but he made no derogatory comments after the game and remains the head basketball coach at Kansas.
• Here is my conclusion:
  • • Cincy needs to find a way to play more games in the state of Kansas.

Switching gears …  Thinking about Bill Self as the basketball coach at Kansas reminds me of the stability that has surrounded that position over the years.  These days, people like to point to the Pittsburgh Steelers as the paragon of coaching stability; the Steelers will have only their fourth coach since 1969 once the 2026 season kicks off in about 6 months.  However, please recall these data:

• Kansas has been playing college basketball since 1898.  The first coach there was Dr. James Naismith who is credited with inventing the game of basketball.
• In the 127 seasons since Dr. Naismith was the coach, Kansas has had a total of 8 head coaches.
• When considering long-tenured coaches, “Phog” Allen was the coach at Kansas for a total of 37 seasons – – broken into two stretches.

Perhaps, that is why the arena at the University of Kansas is called “Allen Fieldhouse” …

Allen Fieldhouse has a reputation as being one of the loudest and most difficult places for a visiting team to play at.  The facility opened in 1955, and Kansas has won more than 90% of its games in that arena.  Jay Bilas, who is one of ESPN’s most prominent college basketball analysts, does not adhere to the concept that Allen Fieldhouse as a facility has much to do with that winning record.  As Bilas has said on at least two occasions that I have heard, the reason teams have such a problem winning at Allen Fieldhouse is that they always have to play Kansas when they go there.

Next up …  ESPN announced a big change in their programming schedule recently.  For years, ESPN has had a MLB game on Sunday nights, but the network opted out of its deal with MLB and will replace “Sunday Night Baseball” with “Women’s Sports Sunday” starting in June which will feature WNBA games and NWSL games.  That seems to me to be an interesting calculation on the part of ESPN.  Obviously, they will pay less for the rights to WNBA and NWSL games; the network’s costs will be reduced.  I think it is also likely that the audience for “Women’s Sports Sundays” will be smaller than they were for MLB games probably leading to reduced revenues from advertisers.

Baseball fans need not go into mourning there.  When ESPN dropped Sunday Night Baseball games, NBC picked up the rights and will air the games there and on Peacock.  Here is the way the new schedule is going to open:

• On Peacock only, the first game will be March 29^th featuring the Guardians at the Mariners.
• On NBC and Peacock simultaneously, the first game will be on April 12^th featuring the Guardians at the Braves.

Finally, here is a piece of advice from Henny Youngman:

“If you’re going to do something tonight that you’ll be sorry for tomorrow morning, sleep late.”

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

According to a report in today’s Washington Post, NBA Commissioner, Adam Silver, will explore “every possible remedy” to rid the NBA of blatant tanking.  Let me take this moment to welcome Commissioner Silver to Planet Earth where this blight on the sport he is entrusted to preserve and grow has been evident to every life form here in a higher state of advance than antediluvian pond slime.  And since he is looking for possible remedies, let me toss out a few for him to consider.  [Aside: Yeah, right!]

• Remedy One:  No draft picks can be traded.  Once a draft order for a season is determined, all teams will draft in that order, and draftees will stay with the “parent club” for some period of time – – say 3 years.
• Remedy Two:  If Remedy One is too drastic, then eliminate draft pick protection when picks for future drafts are traded.
• Remedy Three:  No team may draft in the Top 5 more than once every three or four years.
• Remedy Four:  Eliminate the lottery advantage for posting a bad record by giving each team one ping pong ball in the lottery and determining the draft order for the whole league with that lottery.
• Remedy Five:  Eliminate the draft.  Put the name of 60 players on ping pong balls in one hopper and two balls each for every NBA team in another hopper.  Draw a ball from each hopper and that team gets that player no matter the record of the team or the needs of that team.  And then, Remedy One would apply to that player staying with that team for a specific period of time.
• Remedy Six:  Eliminate the lottery entirely.  Give the picks to the teams in the reverse order of their record – – but not just the record from the current year.  Make it the cumulative record for the last three or four years.  That will not eliminate tanking in the current year, but it should reduce it.  Combine Remedy Six with either Remedy One or Remedy Two above and tanking should be further minimized.

And while I am at it, let me offer up a “Remedy” that should not be considered under any circumstances.  The college football and basketball championships are determined at the outset to include only certain teams, and both use a Selection Committee to pick the potential champions.  The NBA might consider this as a possible remedy, but it is a bad idea.  I know that people like Mark Cuban think that anytime people are talking about the NBA, it is a good thing for the NBA.  And Selection Committees produce lots of debate and focus on their actions.  [Aside: If you are tempted to subscribe to the theory that all publicity and attention is a good thing, ask yourself how that worked out for the Archdiocese of Boston.]

Nonetheless, there are too many fountains of conspiracy theories in such a system.  Imagine for a moment that the NY Knicks and the New Orleans Pelicans have the same lousy record at the end of a season – – say 12-70 for example.  And if the Selection Committee chose to give the higher draft pick to the Knicks, imagine the outcry about “fixing” that would emerge.  References to the “frozen envelope” would inundate the Internet.  The justification for any and all conspiracy theories in that area would be money; the Knicks will draw more eyeballs when they are good than the Pelicans will and more eyeballs means more TV ratings which means more revenues which means …

• Memo To Commissioner Silver:  No “Selection Committees” please!

This is a serious problem, and it is not going to go away on its own.  It is bad enough when the players show pure disdain for the fans who pay their freight by being “healthy scratches” in games just because they played the night before.  There are no rules that are going to cure that problem; until and unless there is a mass “attitude adjustment” among players that minimizes their own sense of entitlement to their “load management”, the NBA will just have to deal with it.  However, there must be some sort of sanction in place to prevent teams from refusing to try to win games by sitting out starters for half a game or by playing the guys at the end of the bench for 40 minutes each in a game.

It is that second pimple on the NBA’s butt that needs addressing because certain teams are currently incentivized to lose games in the current environment instead of trying to win them.  If a player were to perform intentionally below his capability in order to cash a bet or have his second-cousin cash a bet, the fans and the league would do anything to put a stop to that behavior.  Meanwhile, that is exactly what teams are doing when they are tanking – – except the bet they hope to cash is in that upcoming draft lottery.  That is why the current system needs to disincentivize the way the NBA Draft order is determined.

A former colleague used to say that things had to get “real broken” before there was any real energy around making changes for the better.  In my opinion, the NBA tanking situation has reached the point of being “real broken”.

Finally, here is some advice for Commissioner Silver from author Margaret Wheatley:

“Too many problem-solving sessions become battlegrounds where decisions are made based on power rather than intelligence.”

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

Today is one of those “almost-but-not-quite” days on the sports calendar:

• MLB Spring Training games have not quite started yet.
• The NBA is not quite to the part of the season that is interesting.
• The NHL is on hiatus while the Winter Olympics plod along.
• College basketball is not quite ready for the excitement of March Madness.
• And …
• The NFL Free Agency season is not quite open for business.

However, there are some NFL players who are slated to be free agents this year who should attract interest among several teams and among NFL observers.  Rarely is a kicker in that set of NFL players but that is not the case this year; Brandon Aubrey will be a restricted free agent this year and Brandon Aubrey’s combination of range and accuracy could be transformative for a team’s offense and its offensive strategy.

As a restricted free agent, the Cowboys always have the final say about keeping Aubrey because they can choose to match any deal that his agent might forge with any of the other 31 teams in the league, but that could become difficult for the Cowboys if Jerry Jones treats his roster building in the same way that he has done it recently.  Jones has a very expensive QB on the team; CeeDee Lamb has a big deal on the books; George Pickens is also a Cowboys free agent and an unrestricted one at that.  If Jones does not act first – – something he has not done recently regarding free agents or potential free agents – – he could find himself in a bind to pay Brandon Aubrey what another team might offer.  That could be an interesting wrinkle for the upcoming NFL free agency hootenanny.

I am not going to pretend to know the entirety of the free agent list for 2026, but there are eight more impending free agents who will either get a nice deal with their current team before the feeding frenzy begins or they could be in demand.  Here is my list:

1. Nakobe Dean – LB:  It seemed to me that he was wherever the ball was on more than half the plays for the Eagles last season.
2. Romeo Doubs – WR:  The Packers got plenty of clutch plays from Doubs in games that I saw last year.  He will be 26 years old at the start of next season.
3. Breece Hall – RB:  He is possibly the best offensive player on the Jets.  However, the Jets unloaded their two best defensive players in the middle of last season; so, do they have a plan for Breece Hall?
4. Trey Hendrickson – DE:  Yes, he is 31 years old; and yes, he missed 10 games last year.  Also, he has been to the Pro Bowl 4 times and has had double-digit sacks in 4 different seasons.
5. Daniel Jones – QB:  Did he demonstrate that – like Sam Darnold – he is a late-bloomer?  How might that torn Achilles tendon factor into the negotiations?
6. Aaron Rodgers – QB:  He will find a way to have his name in the narrative at least for a while.
7. Bobby Wagner – LB:  Father Time is catching up with him, but he still made 143 tackles last year and has made 2000 tackles in his 14-year career.  Also, he has missed only 9 games in 14 seasons.
8. Kenneth Walker III – RB:  At the ripe old age of 25, he is the reigning Super Bowl MVP.

One other NFL note is out there during this “almost-but-not-quite” sports season.  The Seattle Seahawks are officially for sale.  Those stories circulated in the days leading up to the Super Bowl but were denied by the team.  That had to be nonsense and rhetorical legerdemain because when owner Paul Allen died almost 10 years ago, his estate had the team put in a trust with specific orders to sell the team and liquidate assets for the trust.  It had to happen; the question was not if but when.

Now we know that “when” is as soon as someone steps forward and makes a bid that the trustees will accept in exchange for the team.  The last franchise drew $6.1B as its selling price; that was the Washington Commanders deal which ushered out Danny Boy Snyder from the roster of NFL owners.  There is an interesting aspect to the inevitable “sales price” for the Seahawks:

• Paul Allen’s sister, Jody Allen, is the executrix for the trust.  As such, she has a fiduciary duty to maximize the value of the asset that the trust puts up for sale.
• Danny Boy Snyder had an incentive to get as much for the Commanders as he possibly could, but he did not have a legal responsibility to do so.  Jody Allen does.

So, suppose I set up a prop bet here.

• OVER/UNDER the sales price for the Seahawks at $7.7B

I’ll take the OVER…

Finally, this from George Carlin:

“Inside every cynical person, there is a disappointed idealist.”

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

I am not a big fan of most sports in the Winter Olympics, but I watched some of the skiing and some of the luge runs over the last couple of days.  In the course of that viewing, my mind somehow flashed back to football games and one of the announcing idioms that I find “less than informative”; I thought to myself that any football color analyst who says that a running back “runs downhill” should be banned from NFL games and forced to do announcing for ski runs or luge events.  Now that is what one means when talking about “running downhill”.

Moving on …  I saw an announcement yesterday that Sacramento State will join the MAC – – the Mid-American Conference – – as a “football only member”.  There is no reason to point out the geographical contradiction created there; after all, the Atlantic Coast Conference now embraces Stanford and Cal as bona fide conference members.  However, that union of Sacramento State and the MAC does make me wonder about something else.

Let me be polite and say that MAC football is a lower-echelon entity in the cosmos of college football.  Late in the season, MAC games move to weeknights to provide programming filler for ESPN; and if bother to tune in to one of those broadcasts, you will often see a game where every crowd shot – – and there are few of them to be sure – – reveals that virtually no one is there watching the game live.  There are no home fans to speak of, and you can probably count the number of visiting fans without exhausting the double digits.

Now, into that cauldron of nonchalance, Sacramento State and the MAC will create a situation where:

• Every conference game for Sac State will require a flight of more than 2000 miles for one team.
• When Sac State and UMass play, the flight will be more than 2500 miles.

So, why might this happen?  Well, the MAC is losing a football member starting next year when Northern Illinois joins the Mountain West Conference.  [Aside: Yes, I know; another example of the lack of geographical awareness at the college level in the US.].  And Sacramento State is moving up from Division 1-AA to Division 1-A in football and needs a conference to join.  Given this decision to hook up with the MAC, I can only assume that the newly reconstituted PAC-12 and/or the Mountain West politely told Sac State to take their business elsewhere.

Another football program moving up to Division 1-A football next season will be North Dakota St.  The Bison have been a powerhouse at the Division 1-AA level for at least the last decade and have been the Division 1-AA national champions ten times with the last title coming in 2024.   North Dakota St. will join the Mountain West conference which needs new blood because several of its teams are leaving to join the reincarnated PAC-12.  Last year, Delaware and Missouri St. jumped up to Division 1-A and both had winning seasons and a bowl appearance after a season of C-USA football.  The Mountain West is probably a tad stronger than C-USA, and it will be interesting to see how North Dakota St fares at that level.

One of the big rivalries in Division 1-AA football has been North Dakota St versus South Dakota State – – the Bison versus the Jackrabbits.  I have not been able to find a link to the schedule for either school this morning; so, I don’t know if that rivalry will be discontinued based on the Bison leveling up to the Mountain West.  In many of the conference realignment situations over the past 5 years or so, lots of schools have found ways to carry on their big rivalry games; however, not many of them involved an opponent down at the Division 1-AA level.  We shall see …

And speaking of college football for next season, let me comment on reports related to a Texas high school QB named Miles Teodecki.  He was on a State high school championship team in 2024 and was recruited by teams including K-State, BYU, James Madison and USF.  According to a report in The Athletic last week, Miles Teodecki chose to go to the University of Pennsylvania.  For the record, that is NOT Penn St.; the University of Pennsylvania is an Ivy League school not a Division 1-A Power 5 Conference.  I am sure that Miles Teodecki is not the first high school football player to choose the Ivy League over a Power 5 school, but I do suspect that if such players held a reunion, they would not need to rent out Madison Square Garden for the event.

Finally, this from Dorothy Parker:

“I don’t know much about being a millionaire, but I’ll bet I’d be darling at it.”

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

Earlier this week, I wrote about NBA teams in “tanking-mode”.  I said then that the situation was bleak but as I looked into team status a bit more, I think this can get even uglier this year.  Two of the “bad teams” that are not trying to win at all costs are the Jazz and the Wizards.  Both of those teams owe draft picks to other teams to fill out trades, and both teams have their outgoing picks “top eight protected”.  Come March/April, both teams will be motivated to lose enough games to assure that they are in the “top eight” of the Draft order for 2026 and that could lead to some outrageous on-court actions and decisions.

Circle March 5^th and March 25^th on your calendar.  The Jazz visit the Wizards on March 5^th, and the Wizards visit the Jazz on March 25^th.  Make a note to do anything short of self-immolation in place of watching those upcoming tank-a-palooza games.

Moving on …  Recall that Cleveland Guardians’ pitcher Emmanual Classe stands accused of rigging pitches in games to allow gamblers to collect on in-game bets.  In the original set of charges, Classe was accused of doing that on 9 specific pitch instances in MLB games.  Well, it might be worse than that.  In recently unsealed court records in this case, prosecutors say the investigation is ongoing and Classe’s attorney said there may be “at least or in excess of 250 pitches in which bets were placed.”

Player props and in-game bets make these sorts of scandals far more likely, and I am not sure how they can be avoided because they are so profitable for the sportsbooks even accounting for manipulated results.

Switching gears …  Just about every observer seems to think that MLB and the MLBPA are on a collision course for a rancorous set of circumstances.  In a recent article in The Athletic Evan Drellich wonders if President Trump might seek to intervene.  The President has buzzed into and out of the sports world during his time in office and specifically in the MLB world where he championed the idea of reinstating Pete Rose so that there might be a vote up or down for Rose to be in the Hall of Fame.  There are thousands of permutations on the opinions people hold for or against President Trump and/or Pete Rose; I have no interest in getting into the weeds on all of them.  But this might be an interesting venue for a self-described dealmaker to help forge a deal between two combatants.

There is also an interesting historical angle here.  In 1994, the MLBPA went on strike on August 12^th and that resulted in the World Series being canceled.  The President at the time was Bill Clinton and he could have invoked the Taft Hartley Act which would have provided an 80-day “cooling off period” where the players would go back to work while negotiations and mediations happened in parallel.  Eight days starting on August 12^th would have yielded a World Series in 1994.  This might get interesting…

Here is a link to an interesting piece in The Athletic on all this …

Next up …  Rumors related to Maxx Crosby and AJ Brown continue to circulate and it depends on the day of the week as to whether the rumors have either player being traded or staying with their team.  Here is a thought:

• Why not Maxx Crosby for AJ Brown even up?
• The Eagles can use an edge rusher and – – Lord knows – – the Raiders can use a top-shelf wide receiver.

Why not …?  Justin Verlander will be 43 years old next week; he was drafted into the Tigers’ organization in 2004 and joined the major league squad in 2006.  Now for his 21^st season in MLB he has signed a 1-year contract with the Tigers for $13M.  Verlander has not been the dominant Cy Young candidate over the past several seasons, but his career ERA is 3.32 having pitched almost 3600 innings.

This must be a “labor of love” for Verlander because it is hard to imagine that he needs the money.  According to Spotrac.com, Justin Verlander has earned $409,254,888 in career earnings.  Thomas Wolfe wrote, “You can’t go home again”; Justin Verlander is out to try to prove Wolfe wrong.

Finally, since I mentioned President Clinton above, let me close with one of his observations about the presidency:

“Being president is like running a cemetery: you’ve got a lot of people under you and nobody’s listening.”

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

With the NFL in the background for a moment or two, MLB and the NBA can step forward into the sports spotlight for a while.  And the two sports arrive at this opening in the fans’ attention with bad news.  For baseball, there has been an ongoing trial of Yasiel Puig related to gambling violations; that trial ended last week, and Puig was found guilty and could face as much as 20 years in prison.

The charges in the case include obstruction of justice and lying to Federal investigators in matters dealing with a gambling ring.  The case has been ongoing for quite a while; Puig is alleged to have begun his gambling activities as far back as 2019 and in 2022, Puig initially agreed to a plea deal where he would have been fined more than $50K and given probation in exchange for a guilty plea; but he revoked that agreement before it went in front of a judge – – so here we are.  The evidence presented at trial points to Puig betting on sports but not on baseball; so that is why he has not been banned by MLB.  According to evidence presented at trial, Puig placed around 900 bets – – and ran up a gambling debt of $300K – – with a bookie who was involved with an illegal betting ring.

A key element of Puig’s defense was that English is not Puig’s native language and that his lack of understanding of English made him confused as he answered the investigators’ questions.  That sort of argument held up in MLB’s consideration of the Shohei Ohtani gambling matter; his interpreter was able to hide all those gambling losses from Ohtani due to language barriers.  Obviously, that argument did not carry the day for Yasiel Puig.  His attorney said they planned to “file post-trial motions” which I guess means they think the defense was wronged somehow in the trial.  The actions involved here go back six of seven years so what’s another year or two added on now?

Meanwhile, over in the NBA, the sport can step out of the shadow of the NFL which has prevented much fan focus since the NBA season began in late October 2025.  However, as it does so, it presents fans with about a half-dozen teams that are clearly tanking and not trying to win games.

• The Utah Jazz lost a game where none of the Jazz starters played in the fourth quarter.
• The Washington Wizards traded for Trae Young and Anthony Davis in the last couple of weeks and have shut down both players for the season.
• The Sacramento Kings have lost 13 games in a row.

And tonight, the Kings will play the Jazz in Utah in what might be hugely entertaining just to see who can tank better.

The obvious prize for tanking in the NBA is to get as good a representation in the draft lottery as possible because basketball is the sport where a single star player can make the greatest impact on team fortunes.  And until and unless the NBA comes to grip with that reality, this situation will come about next year as it has this year and in the past.  It is bad enough watching NBA games where the players on the floor are not giving 100% effort on every play; it is worse to see the subs on those teams on the court while the starters – – nominally the players the league wants to market to the fans – – sitting on the bench twiddling their thumbs.

How might the NBA resolve this recurring pustule on its visage?

• No team can be in the draft lottery two years in a row – – or maybe three years in a row?
• Have the 10 teams that are not in the playoffs set up in a bracket where the winner of that “bracket tournament” gets the #1 pick despite the regular season record?  [Aside: If this happens, watch players like Trae Young and Anthony Davis have miraculous healing events take place in April.]
• It’s a shame there is no easy way to set up relegation out of the NBA and into something like the G-League because that would solve the problem very quickly.

Notwithstanding all the above, there is hope.  Pitchers and catchers have been making their way to Florida and Arizona and Spring Training games will begin in about 2 weeks.  Yes, I know that there will be loads of formulaic coverage of Training Camps and that much of the reporting from there is of no consequence, but Spring Training leads to Opening Day and that is always a welcome occurrence on the US sports calendar.  Just a heads-up there:

• March 25:  Opening Night.  One standalone game Yankees at Giants
• March 26:  Opening Day.  Fourteen games that day as the other 28 teams get rolling.

Finally, here is an observation by Samuel L. Jackson:

“Anybody who tells you money can’t buy happiness never had any.”

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