Blog Posts For Tag: Sports

The World Series is finishing up with the Yanks up 3 games to 1. The NFL season is about halfway through and just about every team still has a shot at the playoffs. The college football season has just a few weeks over, meaning it is time for the BCS standings to screw a deserving team over and start the annual clamor for a playoff system. In the midst of all this the NHL and NBA seasons have started.

This could definitely be a World Series the country could get behind. On one side there are the New York Yankees, the most hated team in baseball trying to win its first title since the 20th Century. On the other side are the Philadelphia Phillies, the defending champions trying to start a dynasty of their own. On both sides there are insanely passionate sports fans that could leave 108 miles worth of blood and guts between New Yankee Stadium in the Bronx and Citizens Bank Park in Philly.

After six weeks of the 2009 NFL season it is just about to start seriously listening to those early MVP murmurs. The field is going to be dominated by quarterbacks with eight starters posting a quarterback rating in the triple digits, lacking running backs with just one back averaging more than 100 yards a game, and unfairly biased against defensive players because an assisted tackle is simply so much less sexy than anything a running back can do.

The NFL is entering a new era when quarterbacks have more fantasy value than running backs, home field is not that big of a deal (the home team only wins 54 percent of the time this season), and parity has dissipated as nine of the 32 teams in the league have either no losses or no wins. Yes this is a new age in the league and there are seven football seals that have been broken this season to put an end to everything we knew about football.

No Bears, no Packers, no Saints, no Chargers oh my! What will Week 5 behold without two of the classic football franchises and what may be the NFL’s best football team. We can do without the Chargers until the last five or six weeks since that is when they start playing for real and making there annual improbable playoff run. This week definitely has some interesting match ups, but there are plenty of blowouts on the horizon to boost the fantasy numbers.

After three weeks of NFL football all the preconceptions from the 2008 season have been washed away and replaced by new beliefs. Some of these new revelations are not that ludicrous, for instance the Jets look like they will actually be a good team this season and may challenge the New England Patriots for AFC East supremacy. Most of these developments are just trends that will fade in the next couple of weeks though. Five of those most bizarre trends are listed below.

The first week of football is great for two reasons. The first is that you get to watch 10-plus hours of football. I know I woke up at 7:00 in the morning because I was so freaking giddy to sit on the couch for 10 hours. It somehow seems ridiculous that I could get so excited to play an invalid for the day. The second reason is that suddenly you have real stats to compare and make educated guesses and bets for Week 2. Below are my guesses, with scores compiled by some miraculous mental operation that takes into account stats, injuries, the latest Vegas lines, and useless emotional allegiances.

Is it too early to use Halloween sayings in September? Well, five pound bags of candy imaginable have been out on the shelves since August so I guess not, especially when that simple turn of phrase so perfectly embodies the NFL preseason. Should fans expect what transpires on the field in the four-game preseason to become any sort of a reality during the long 16-game regular season? Is this a trick or a treat? What are we supposed to expect from these preseason trends?

The National League, also known as Quadruple A baseball, looks like they will have few surprises as the final 50 or so games dwindle down in this awful August heat. Most of the divisions look pretty set no matter what the standings say about a team nipping at their heals. The only real question is who will win the Wild Card spot?

If you have doubts over my brazen predictions lets go through the three divisions first and clear the air.

Baseball has passed the 100-game mark, the trade deadline has come and gone, and the All Star game has once again ended in the American League’s favor. Now its time to deconstruct the American League and decide which teams have a chance and which teams are destined to fall apart

This weekend’s Hall of Fame induction ceremony, which honored former Boston Red Sox right fielder Jim Rice, former Oakland A’s and New York Yankees outfielder Rickey Henderson, and former Yankees and Cleveland Indians second baseman Joe Gordon, came and passed with some tears, some humor, and, of course, some controversy. While some may lament spoiling a moment that is meant to celebrate baseball with continued strife, perhaps it is best to discuss these larger issues when so many are listening. The two subjects that were discussed, or at least mentioned on ESPN and in newspapers across the country, were the Pete Rose and steroids.

The All Star game has passed, the pennant race has officially begun, and the trade deadline (July 31) is fast approaching. Any team with a chance to win their division or compete for the wild card is looking for ways to improve their chances, while any team that is more than 10 games out is looking to deal the soon-to-be free agents for some young arms and position players with potential.

As of the MLB standings right now, five American League teams are facing double digit deficits in the standings and truly have no hope of qualifying for even a Little League regional final and one AL team has already called it quits despite being just 9.5 games back (the most exciting thing for Blue Jays fans the rest of the season will be waiting to see who they get for Roy Halladay). The rest of the teams have some chance for the division crown or a wild card spot. These teams could all use something to shore up their chances and what follows is a quick grocery list of wants and needs for those remaining nine American League teams.

The first half of the baseball season is over and after Tuesday night’s All Star game the pennant race really begins. Well, as the pennant race begins, so must the quest for the MVP award and like the first place teams in each division, certain players already have a huge advantage.

It now less than a month until the All Star teams are announced, something I realized this weekend when I received a ballot at my baseball game of the season. I looked at the ballot and realized that I really did not have a clue who to vote for (even though I get to vote 25 times according to the MLB website). My attention has been waning as my favorite team has been busy dashing all my delusional spring training hopes. The only stats I really know are those for the players on my fantasy team, so I took about an hour and looked at the list of names and decided who actually deserves to make an appearance at the game and contemplated who many players will get voted on just because of rabid fans and name recognition.

The Orlando Magic are down 0-2 in the NBA Finals to the Los Angeles Lakers. Sports sites and basketball experts are busy decoding every game and pinpointing the Magic’s struggle and one of the arguments you and I are sure to hear is that the Magic take too many threes.

I do not know if anyone noticed between news of Randy Johnson reaching 300 wins and the Braves dishonoring Tom Glavine, but this weekend the only two teams with winning percentages above .600 are playing. The Los Angeles Dodgers, who have continued to play incredible baseball in the absence of Manny Ramirez, host the Philadelphia Phillies in a rematch of last season’s NLCS.

Every year just before the NBA playoffs begin, the postseason, the 16-team tournament or “second season”, seems to be sold as a story with plot points at every round and a black and white biopic for every charismatic player or superstar for each remaining team.

After a month prelude that was at times compelling (Celtics-Bulls) and at times uninspired (Mavs-Spurs) the conference finals have finally begun. The Los Angeles Lakers, who won last night thanks to Kobe’s fourth quarter performance, play the Denver Nuggets for the Western Conference title and the Cleveland Cavs play the Orlando Magic for the Eastern Conference title.

The American League is being dominated in the early season by shades of blue. Every division has a team clad in blue, in powder blue, in blue block lettering, or in a bright blue outline, leading the way. Each team, the Toronto Blue Jays in the AL East, the Kansas City Royals in the AL Central, and the Texas Rangers in the AL West, is surprised to be there. So which team will hold on to a little bit of Their Blue Heaven and which teams will come crashing down to Earth and be singing the blues by the time the pennant race really begins?

Woe is the Greeks. They have a mythology seemingly based on the gods’ series of one night stands (all those father-less children destined to perish in misguided quests just to get their father’s attention), they have had their greatest ruler defiled by Oliver Stone in the movie Alexander (a movie with Angelina Jolie and Rosario Dawson clad in revealing robes, yet the most intimate moments are between Colin Farrell and Jared Leto), they have endured an unwarranted attempt to turn My Big Fat Greek Wedding (which resurrected Joey Fatone’s career) into a television series, My Big Fat Greek Life, (and Fatone’s career began its downward spiral once again), and, frankly, have been nothing but bad for the beautiful game of baseball.

This year’s NBA Playoffs is turning out to be as predictable as I expect the summer blockbusters to be this summer. The Eastern Conference has only one possibility for the NBA Finals, the Cleveland Cavaliers. The Celtics and Magic are an injury or a year or two of experience away from cancelling the coronation of LeBron James. Despite the abundance of quality teams in the Western Conference(the first six seeds had a winning percentage of at least 60 percent), the Los Angeles Lakers appear to be playing on another level, with a deep bench, a penchant for smooth interior passing, and a superstar. Still, there or more storylines than simply the finals this spring, there are 14 other teams in the postseason and yesterday I discussed the Eastern Conference seven, now I get to take a look at why exactly the rest of the Western Conference is playing.

The NBA Finals has been set since it became evident Kevin Garnett was not coming back to Boston this postseason. It is all but a foregone conclusion that it will be the Los Angeles Lakers and the Cleveland Cavaliers - the deadly assassin versus the newly anointed king, the perennial champions from the land of the sun and stars versus the have-nots from America’s rust belt. Still there are 14 other teams in the playoffs, and there must be some meaning in their postseason participation besides avoiding a lottery pick in one of the worst drafts in the last decade. So, this begs the question, what are they really playing for?

One of the most exciting things about the beginning of the baseball season is the first few weeks. I think they are kind of like he first few rounds of the NCAA Tournament. You get some real surprises at first before reality sets in and brings those hopeful teams and players crashing down to Earth. Here are some of my favorite trends that will come burning through the stratosphere over the next couple of weeks.

After a few months of wondering what was going to happen in this new season of MLB, opening day finally commenced yesterday. Of course this was simply game one for many teams (apart from the Philadelphia Phillies and the Atlanta Braves who officially opened the season on Sunday night) in a long schedule that will give the winners 161 more chances to end their perfect season and losers 161 more games to find redemption. Still, to say that a few things did not surprise me would be a liar.

I have been one of the many baseball fans outraged by the Alex Rodriguez saga this summer, but sometimes it helps to back up and take a look at the allegations I have simply accepted as fact in the last few months. I have to really look at facts, our at least first hand encounters, and decide does A-Rod really deserve all the flak he has been getting.

Whenever anybody thinks of the NBA and can’t miss games, the same match up comes up, the game between the purple and gold Los Angeles Lakers and the green and white Boston Celtics. This is perhaps the only nationally recognized rivalry in basketball, which is odd considering that the NBA has been around since the 1940s (which is also why everyone was so excited about last year’s finals). However, if you live near a city lucky enough to have one of these professional basketball teams you know that there are plenty of regional rivalries that have as much passion or are revving up to be as intense as the ultimate East Coast-West Coast showdown.

My heart jumped when I realized that my latest move landed me in the cave of married friends’ duplex in Chicago without any means to watch March Madness. They did not want to get cable, which is cool, and meant to get rabbit ears at some time but never quite got around to it. I could have gone out and splurged on rabbit ears and that digital signal box but I really did not want to start feeding me television habit. So there I was stuck between my desire to watch endless hours of basketball and not wanting to spend needless money on something I was going to use for a couple weeks. Then I found that NCAA.com was streaming the games live and the heart murmur went subsided.

Normally I would be appalled by the rampant East Coast bias that has an undeniable imprint on ESPN and many other major publications and media outlets. However, with three number teams in March Madness, the return of the NFC East to the forefront of competitive football ball this last fall, and after a  quick look at the divisions throughout Major League Baseball I simply cannot blame the networks. Even though the MLB season has yet to begin I can already rank the divisions pretty confidently and found that the East is king this year.

As I watch this modern version of basketball I often wonder where the game is going. I wonder how these stars will change the way the game is played and what coaching strategies will make the game look different in an arbitrary date it the near future like 2015.

Invariably, any basketball postseason experience, whether you are watching an NBA game or any of the contests on the slate during March Madness, will have a game that will come down to the final minutes and a four or five point deficit. It is moments like these, after years of watching painful finishes, that have made me despise announcers who feel required to say that the team trying to claw into the lead does not need to go for three.

This weekend not only signals the beginning of the March Madness, but it also marks the final playoff games of the World Baseball Classic and the beginning of the MLS season. The sad reality is that I do not care about either one. I do not care about the WBC because I have 162 games of MLB baseball in front of me and that is a lot of baseball to care about. I simply do not know why I cannot get myself to care about the MLS though.

Last year around this time I was eagerly awaiting the normal insanity brought about by the first two rounds of the Men’s Tournament only to find a rather lame series of results. Nine and ten seeds do not get upset status in the first round. So, there were five upsets in the first 32 games. That was not a very exciting development.

A week ago the number one seeds in the NCAA Tournament seemed pretty much set. UNC, Pittsburgh, UConn, and Oklahoma were on their way to leading the regions, but then a little funny thing happen called Championship Week. First Oklahoma lost in the Big 12 quarterfinals to Oklahoma State, then Pittsburgh lost in the Big East quarterfinals to West Virginia, and most recently UConn lost a ridiculously fantastic six-overtime game to Syracuse a few hours later. Meanwhile UNC is set to take on Virginia Tech with out star guard Ty Lawson. So, what is the seeding committee thinking?

Back in the 19th century the Netherlands surprised the world. They were a small country with more channels than natural resources, yet they built a Dutch imperial empire that dominated parts of Brazil, South Africa, southern India, and Indonesia. Now the year is 2009 and the little country has again upset the world, this time keeping the Dominican Republic out of tournament play in the World Baseball Classic.

Terrell Owens left America’s Team for a team he dubbed North America’s Team. While some might be amused by this clever turn of phrase, many more are surprised by the decision to play in Buffalo for Dick Jauron, the place offense goes to die. In retrospect, the last couple of years have actually been a pretty dynamic and shocking time for us in the sports world. Owens decision joins the ranks of these other sundry moments that have kept me on my feet in the last couple years.

With a little more than 20 games left to go before the NBA regular season is over it is time to take a look at the stories that are sure to dominate the speculative headlines, features, and blogs.

If the Los Angeles Dodgers thought the pressure was on when they spent all winter trying to deal with Greed Master General Scott Boras, then they need only wait until the season begins to find a whole new boulder thrust upon them smashing a few vital organs.

The stock market may be a bear right now, but the first day of the free agent market was bullish. The opening day acquisitions have been somewhat surprising considering the fact that most MLB teams spent the winter in hibernation despite a very soft luxury tax and most NBA teams scrambling to gather as many expiring contracts as they could in preparation for the salary cap decrease, the loaded free agent market in the summer of 2010, and the impending lockout in 2011.

F. Scott Fitzgerald, between suicidal thoughts, once said that intelligence is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function. According to this definition, Chicago Cubs fans must be geniuses.

First the pitchers and catchers reported. Then the rest of the position players came to camp. Now, on this fine Wednesday, the first exciting, but meaningless games begin.

New York Yankees fans will get the chance to heckle A-Rod in the Grapefruit opener, Chicago Cubs fans will reset the doomsday clock, and everyone else will practice making pitchers cry on the mound. Tomorrow morning baseball “enthusiasts” will read there first box scores since October 28, 2008, back when Bush was president and Philadelphia was rewarded with a team that did not let them down.

Last season the trade deadline was a chance to improve a team’s position to try and spoil the Boston Celtics or the Los Angeles Lakers chances to win an NBA Championship. This season the trade deadline was a chance to collect expiring contracts to put themselves in position to sign an NBA Star in 2010.

The summer of 2010 promises to be one of the best free agent classes in NBA history with a plethora of top tier players becoming unrestricted free agents or having a player option to terminate their contracts and cash in for bigger deals.

Professional sports in the United States are a funny thing. A sport that goes in circles can entertain millions. A sport as quick and violent as Lacrosse cannot make headway in a culture that loves to see pain being doled out and inflated scoring. A sport loved by the world fails miserably time after time (I must admit I cannot stand soccer either).

Sports leagues are an even more amazing phenomenon. Look at the history of the NBA, MLB, and the NFL. They each seemed to catch a lucky break or get a particularly stellar group of showmen that moved each league into the major three. Is there any room left for competition though? Four football leagues are about to find out.

This weekend the NBA All Star Game brings together the most popular (not the best) players in the league, a bonanza of sponsorship deals, and 20 hours of useless television coverage. This is truly a corporate retreat run awry. I should not have to listen Charles Barkley and Kenny Smith reflect on their careers as professional basketball players for hours on end just to watch a few events that should take a little more than an two hours to complete.

Before baseball season begins it has become tradition to wait for Brett Favre to decide whether or not he will retire. Word is in that he has decided to retire. Of course, we all remember that last season he told his agent the same thing. Then he found that he could still throw the ball around with some zip with a bunch of high school kids, decided to comeback, and cause the Packers a gigantic headache, sabotaging Aaron Rodgers transition into the starting quarterback role.

This weekend was one of extremes. It started with a Sports Illustrated expose that implicated New York Yankees Alex Rodriguez as one of 104 people who tested positive for performance enhancing drugs (PEDs) and ended with an NBA match up between two of the best basketball players in a game that did not disappoint.

The glorious world of the NBA has fans who adorn their walls with pictures of tremendous athletes who can work magic with an orange leather ball. How many guys have LeBron James posterizing some poor second string guy trying to earn a multi-year contract and not be remembered as a cringing face on a highlight reel? How many have people have Dwayne Wade on the wall twisting and contorting his way through the lane for level of basketball awe and impossibility.

This is the final week of the NFL regular season and there are still several games that are actually worth watching if you are not from that city or have become an indentured fan thanks to your family lineage.

The real question is not who is better, the 23-2 Boston Celtics or the 20-3 Los Angeles Lakers. The real question is can any team in either conference actually stop these teams in a seven game series?

The NFL Season is 14 weeks old and the experts are talking about who is the most value player. I hear names like Kurt Warner, Eli Manning, and Drew Brees. I hear about a couple of running backs named Adrian Peterson and Michael Turner and a safety called Troy Polamalu. I do not hear talk of who is the least valuable player, though.

Now I thought the Yankees got the memo about the recession. The memo read that everybody is supposed to be trying to save a little money and hold back on the spending spree.

Early on in the season the winners and losers of the weekly slate of NFL games are pretty clear. As the season wears on that simple definition becomes more and more complicated. Each game holds meaning and value with regards to the immediate postseason, the upcoming off season, and the team’s future seasons.

A recent CNN poll found that 61 percent of people opposed the bailout for the Big Three. Those 61 percent better not be fans of NASCAR because the sport that has been on the verge of cementing itself in the Big Four of sports is warning that a failure to help the automotive industry could set back the sport 30 years.