Roger Goodell, Hero

Roger Goodell, relaxing at home after a hard day at work

The funniest thing to come out of the replacement ref fiasco has not been any of the on-field stuff, hilarious as that has been. It has not been the overblown bloviating by the chattering classes, nor the hysterical overreactions on Twitter (some of which veered off into deeply ugly, hateful bullshit). No, it’s been those noted labor economists at places like ESPN trying to spin this thing so that Roger Goodell comes out of it as some kind of hero, or, failing that, a victim.

Look, anyone who thinks the lockout was about anything other than Goodell trying to punish the refs for standing up to him is delusional. The money involved is, in the grand scheme of things, minimal. Dan Snyder pisses away more than that trying to bully Washington free papers in a given weekend. No, this was about power and control, and nobody in the NFL has more of either than Roger Goodell. The guy is Sauron, the all-seeing eye dispatching Nazgul to swoop down and fine players unexpectedly for inappropriate towel lengths. You’re going to tell me that in the face of a labor dispute that threatens to undermine both the product the NFL puts on the field and, more importantly, its relationship with Vegas (anyone who doesn’t think the rise of the NFL isn’t directly attributable to a combo of gambling and fantasy sports is delusional), Roger Goodell was suddenly impotent, waiting on the command of those same owners he bullies and fines to cut a deal equivalent to a single game’s concessions take?

Please.

It was a power play. And for once, Goodell lost. Everything else is just spin.

Referee-related observations

Inspired by my esteemed colleague's post below...
I
Have you noticed how the post-whistle scrums have gotten longer, as players realize that the refs don't really control the game?  They can keep shoving and jawing for a few extra seconds and nobody's going to do anything.  What happens if, this weekend, when the Broncos and Raiders play, Richard Seymour shoves Orlando Franklin into Peyton Manning after a play ends?
The NFL's owners should be protecting their investments, not arguing over pocket change.
II
Stop watching.  Seriously.
American football is a lot of fun. It's a great sport. It's fun to play. High school football is enormous fun to watch. But the apparatus around collegiate and professional football has become absurd. 11 minutes of action packed into 3.5 hours of beer commercials.
They're going to keep doing the same shit so long as we all keep watching. We keep watching, and Coors pays NBC to pay the NFL to keep doing the same shit. Imagine what a few percent drop in viewership will do to everyone involved.
III
The NFL still has an antitrust exemption. One might ask one's representatives to ask the league's owners why they are jeopardizing the health and safety of their employees so flagrantly.

Really, all this complaining about the NFL proves only that they continue to have a hold on our collective attention and imagination.  We could do worse things than to walk away.

No More Foobaw For...Someone

Pertinent fact 1: This whole dispute with the NFL refs  could be solved for roughly half of what Tarvaris Jackson is making to back up a guy from Harvard.
Pertinent opinion 1: The fact that it has not is due solely to the fact that Roger Goodell wants to show the miserable peasants who's boss. Saying that the refs suddenly don't get the pension plan they'd been promised for years because he doesn't get one only works as an argument if all of those refs were also making north of $10M a year. I'll give you a hint. They're not.
Pertinent fact 2: Refereeing NFL games is really hard to do well.
Pertinent opinion 2: For all of the mythology about the simple elegance of football, the NFL rulebook is a horrific mishmash of weird rules, special cases, and just plain strangeness about the thickness of an L. Ron Hubbard novel. Mastering its contents as part of a part-time job would be extremely difficult. Trying to then use that knowledge while having to pursue world-class athletes (and nose tackles) up and down the field whilst being screamed at and intimidated by dictatorial nutbar headcoaches and two small armies of human goliaths (and kickers), all of whom literally have millions riding on the outcome of the season and who are used to having their every whim catered to, is nigh impossible. There was no way they could ever have slid in flawlessly to replace teams of professionals who have been doing this for years, who have the league's backing, and who have earned the respect of the guys they'd be refereeing. The replacement refs, on the other hand, have been thrown into the deep end by a league that will clearly abandon them as soon as they're no longer needed, and the players and coaches know it. To be blunt, it's a miracle there haven't been more catastrophes, and I challenge any of the armchair Ed Hochulis out there to do any better under these insane circumstances. Here's a hint - you won't.
Pertinent fact 3: The NFL thinks they can run sub-standard product out there and you'll watch anyway BECAUSE IT'S FOOBAW.
Pertinent opinion 3: Available evidence suggests they're right. Remember how, during the lockout of the players, everyone was all "Oh, this will destroy trust in the game" and "the fans will take years to come back" and "Tony Romo sucks"? The second the lockout ended, bam, butts were in seats, fantasy leagues were full, and you were hooked again. Never mind that it did affect the product on the field - ask any Eagles fan about trying to break in new schemes and coordinators without benefit of a real offseason or training camp - for the worse. It Was Foobaw. And so, when this thing wraps up, when Goodell extracts some token concession from the refs and pays them their promised pension, all the folks who have sworn up and down that they're tired of the league showing contempt for them, that they're tired of getting substandard product, that they've had it and they're not coming back....they'll be back. Instantly.
Pertinent fact 4: The racist chuckleheads tweeting horrific things in Golden Tate's direction because of that last play need to go get bent.
Pertinent opinion 4: Immediately.

Speaking of Cardinals...

The World's Dumbest Bird, aka "Rex Hudler", is still at it. Five months later and he's still slamming his face against every window in our house...and our shed...and our live-in-nephew's car...he can, apparently to defeat the magical cardinal who lives inside his reflection.

Quoth the wife: "How does that bird not have brain damage?"
Quoth me: "How do we know he doesn't?"

Why I'm Rooting For the Cardinals (Sort Of)

I am of two minds on the second NL Wild Card spot.

On one hand, I'm a Phillies fan, and I'd love to see them steal it. A season that's largely been pissed away due to injuries, curious playing time decisions (Hey, whaddaya know? If you leave John Mayberry alone, he hits!), bullpen meltdowns, and too many inexplicable meltdowns against the Houston Astros could still provide a happy ending. And, with this year's cockamamie playoff system, any time you can run a Cole Hamels and a Cliff Lee out there, you've got a puncher's chance.
And yet, on the other side, there's the Cardinals. Lord knows, I should be rooting fervently against them. the luckiest WS champions of recent years - seriously, who did Tony LaRussa sacrifice to Thor to get those fortuitously timed rainouts last year - they angered my formerly-Cardinals-loving wife by not hiring Jose Oquendo as their new manager. (Seriously. They announced the Matheny hiring and she announced they were dead to her. Hope of Jose was all that kept her going through the LaRussa years.)
But at the same time, part of me wants them to win. Why? Not for any love of Lances Berkman or Lynn. Not because I think "the best baseball fans in America" deserve more affirmation. No, it's for one simple reason: For years, LaRussa wallowed in the "genius" label, for certain values of "genius" that include "having one of the greatest players in history anchor your lineup and several gazillions sunk into your pitching staff". If a first year manager...with no prior managerial experience...can win with that same roster MINUS Albert Pujols, well, maybe that takes a little bit of that self-applied shine off that genius label.
It's petty, I know. But with the Phillies 4 games back with 10 to go, it's about all I've got.

Lord Almighty, There's Violence In Foobawl

Jay Cutler vs. J'Marcus Webb: A Recreation

Football, it must be noted, is a manly sport played by manly men (and also by kickers). It involves putting impossibly burly men in suits of space-aged armor and having them running into each other repeatedly with the impact of 30-MPH car accidents. (That time in high school when you accidentally crunched half your Saturn's front end into a pretzel by bumping into a telephone pole while standing on your brake? Yeah, imagine that hitting the guys on your favorite team every time they open the way for a three-yard draw play. ) We cheer on reports of fistfights in training camp, choosing to believe it means our favorite players are "feisty" or "leaders" or something. We are trained to cheer on guys who have "non-stop motors", who don't take plays off, who play for 60 minutes (as opposed to the actual 11 or so minutes of action that most football games actually comprise). In short, we demand our football heroes go hard, go hard nonstop, and then come back and ask for more.
Except, of course, when they do. Last week, two things happened. One, Chicago Bears quarterback and walking edge case Jay Cutler got frustrated with the play of his offensive line - justifiable, really, as they had managed to do a credible impression of a group of matadors in the face of the Green Bay rush - and shoved one of his linemen. Meanwhile, new Tampa Bay coach Greg "Rutgers Forever" Schiano sent his defense full bore after the New York Giants on a kneeldown play as time ran out, hoping to incite a fumble.
Both instances, naturally, evoked howls of outrage, not to mention a great deal of pearl-clutching and fainting couch-reclining on the part of the NFL's chattering class. You don't do that sort of thing, commentators said again and again. You don't put your hands on your teammate. You don't try on the last play if your opponent is in Victory formation. It simply isn't done!
All of which, of course, puts the lie to all the self-serving myths the NFL likes to serve up like bratwurst. Look, any Eagles fan can tell you there's plenty of reason to go after the Giants on the last play. You'd be amazed at how often it works. Yammering about how the Giants weren't prepared for it just means Giants coach Tom Coughlin should have been paying better attention; the notion that players were endangered conveniently overlooks the fact that these guys are in danger on every single play. Yes, it's not the usual response to Victory formation, but since the normal response is a guaranteed loss, you can't necessarily blame Schiano for trying something different. And really, it's the something different that's the issue. For all that the highlight reels love to praise innovation and talk up the game's cerebral strategy, the truth of the matter is that playcalling's barely evolved since Bill Walsh's day. By all means, be clever - just do it in a way that we feel comfortable with.
As for the Cutler nonsense, it's even sillier. Cutler's maybe half the size of the lineman he shoved. He did no lasting damage, he didn't hit him at speed, and he didn't, break his teammate's face the way beloved All-Star WR Steve Smith did. He shoved the guy, which maybe shows a little poor judgement, but that's about it. And yet, the way sports talk radio blew up, you'd think he'd gone full Tony Jaa.
Seriously. Let's look at it again. Cutler. Shoved. Him. That's it. And in a sport where the shovee is expected to slam into a couple of 350-pound meathemoths on every single play, a shove from Jay Cutler is about as noteworthy as a new Maroon 5 single. And yet the Mike Golics of the world went full "Ehrmegerd" on the story, chewing it over for days when other things - like, say, actual games - happened.
By season's end, nobody will remember either of these too well. The narrative of the Unlikable Jay Cutler was written long ago; he'll get sandbagged by the press for failing to walk on the waters of Lake Michigan.  This thing is likely to get added to the dubious evidence pile, but that's as far as it goes; anyone who'll dredge it up is someone who's already decided that Cutler's a weiner. The Tampa Bay thing will get hauled out every time Coughlin and Schiano meet again, which is to say, probably never. But for those who pay attention, the disconnect between what the league celebrates and how it reacts when those "virtues" actually hit the field is immense.

Lessons From College Football, Week 2

Dear Missouri:

If you look around the conference and you don't see Kansas, you are Kansas.

Little-Known Secondary Rules For Dez Bryant

The big ones - no strip clubs, the curfew, the bodyguard - have already been reported. But what most folks don't know is that there's a whole slew of secondary rules the estimable Mr. Bryant has to follow as well. At great personal risk, not to mention prolonged exposure to Ed Werder's mustache, we've obtained a partial list of those conditions. They include:

"Fluttershy, you run a post route"

• Not permitted to participate in illicit street racing with Vin Diesel
• Banned from attending IMAX showings of The Dark Knight Rises; must only see it in regular theaters
• Required to remove sing-along video of "Call Me Maybe" from YouTube
• Not allowed to serenade members of his 3-man security detail with "And I Will Always Love You"
• Required to block on at least one out of every three running plays.
• Not permitted to rub Tony Kornheiser's head or Michael Wilbon's belly "for luck" before games any longer
• Must write a lengthy review of the latest episode of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic by no later than Thursday, every week
• No longer allowed to use the Chocolate Wonderfall at Golden Corral
• Mandatory sessions visiting Mrs. Ethel Goldstein at a local nursing home every Tuesday, wherein she will announce that he's "a nice boy, but she's very disappointed he didn't become a dentist"
• Must return Chris Berman's toupee the next time he sees him, and stop calling it "baby Tribble"
• Required to blame Tony Romo for team's inevitable late-season collapse

Big Deal

The Dodgers get:
Former All-Star 1B Adrian Gonzalez, a SoCal guy who could single-handedly double the production they get out of that spot
Former All-Star and World Series hero Josh Beckett, who looks primed to get a boost by returning to the NL
Former All-Star OF Carl Crawford, who was a lousy fit in Fenway's tiny left field, and who should do much better in the wide-open spaces of the NL West, once he recovers from Tommy John surgery
Infielder Nick Punto, who is Nick Punto, and was once part of a trade for Eric Milton
$11M in cash to help deal with the $260M in salary obligations they just took on, or, as some folks call it, "piss in the ocean".

The Red Sox get:
Sub-par 1B James Loney
Pitching prospects Rubby De La Rosa and Allen Webster
Infield sorta-prospect Ivan DeJesus, Jr. As someone who watched Ivan DeJesus, Sr. for many years, I'm not bullish
OF not-really-a-prospect-any-more Jerry Sands, who looks to be a AAAA-style tweener.


What the Sox really get out of this, though, has very little to do with the players who came back. They dumped hundreds of millions off payroll, recognizing that this team wasn't going to win as it was constructed, and they might as well come in fourth for $70M as for $170M. They cleared the decks of just about all of the last regime's big-ticket free agent purchases (and Nick Punto), making it clear that this is Ben Cherington's team now, and nobody - regardless of contract - was safe. They off-loaded the guys who supposedly led the mutiny against divisive manager Bobby Valentine - with the way the Red Sox seem to excel at mudslinging their own people on their way out of town, we'll never know the truth, but at least the optics are good - and made a strong effort to make the team "likeable" again. I'm not sure you can run an ad campaign on "We traded the jerks who wrote mean texts about the manager!" outside of middle school, but what the hey. Give them points for trying. They did all these things and got all of these intangible goods out of the deal, except...

...there is no way to spin this. The trade made the team worse, both in the short term and potentially for the next couple of years. A-Gon may not have been the Ruthian uber-masher the team envisioned when plucking him from the wide-open pastures of San Diego, but he still produced a hell of a lot more than James Loney ever will. Webster and De La Rosa aren't ready to contribute. Sands and DeJesus don't seem terribly likely to produce much of anything.  The team as it had been constructed was flawed, and subtracting a big bat from the middle of the order isn't going to help. Nor does this year's free agent market look likely to provide a quick turnaround. The best bat - Josh Hamilton - comes with all sorts of questions about durability. The second-best bat is Michael Bourn. All those zillion-dollar deals cleared off the payroll don't mean anything if there's nowhere else to spend the money.

And so, it remains to be seen how Boston's really going to react to the deal once they figure out what it means day-to-day. Sully from the Cape (long time listener, first time caller) may be crowing to Dale and Holley on WEEI about how they finally got rid of the guys who were screwing the Sox up, but give him a season of no-hope noncontention, and he just might change his tune. Loudly.

There's a strong sense that at least part of this deal was done to provide a sop to a fan base that found the team "unlikeable" because of all of its shenanigans. It remains to be seen what the team will do when its fan base says the Red Sox are unlikeable because they're losing.

The Steroid User Narrative, Or, Why We'll Conveniently Forget About Bartolo Colon As Soon As Possible

The new face - and chins - of steroids in baseball

Can't wait to see how the Bartolo Colon suspension affects the narrative of the jacked up, totally ripped,   mega-noggined steroid abuser. Seriously, Colon's the sort of guy who looks more likely to test positive for P-I-E than P-E-D, and who presumably took his synthetic testosterone after it was batter dipped, deep fried, and wrapped in bacon. When you think "steroid user", you think Barry Bonds' giant dome and ripped physique, and conveniently forget that that Bonds' workout regimen was so legendarily brutal that it broke freak-of-nature Gary Sheffield. You don't think "guy who looks like he stars on Man vs. Food Nation"; you think one hit of steroids is like Popeye sucking down a six pack of spinach and Hulking out immediately.
But then again, that's always been the case. The bulk of steroids guys busted in baseball haven't been uber-athletes. They've been fringe guys trying to hang on, end-of-the-bullpen arms and scrappy middle infielders looking for a way to hang on to another year of major league service time. Think back to the Mitchell Report. How many of those guys had you even heard of?
But the public perception of steroid users is set in stone, at least for the moment. It's all about the record-breakers and the superstars, because it's a lot more fun to tear down a guy who's famous than it is to put the final kibosh on the dreams of a guy who's been cut six times and is desperately trying to hang on in Durham or Indianapolis or Scranton. And so the narrative won't change, which means that honest debate on the issue - which is sorely lacking - will continue to remain an impossibility.

Tell Clemens-a We're Going To The Mattresses

Roger Clemens has lumbered out of retirement and joined an independent league team, the effervescently named Sugar Land Skeeters. (Presumably, the team owners looked at the shocking merchandising success of the Savannah Sand Gnats and said "We want some of that", which tells you exactly what we're dealing with here.)
Of course, it seems highly unlikely that Clemens is going to be satisfied to compete at this level. Various baseball outlets noted that the Houston Astros, one of Clemens' former teams, had scouts watching him beSkeet himself, and let's face it, it's not like the Astros have anything to lose this year by turning the ball over to a 50 year old suspected PED user whose strikeout fixation was probably a severe hindrance to any of his kids getting laid in college. (Kody? Kory? Koby? Kacy? Thank God they didn't stop at 3).
Now, if it were Curt Schilling making the comeback, I'd understand it: Curt kinda needs the cash after heroically flushing $75M Rhode Island tax dollars down the mighty Woonasquatucket River. But Roger? What's his angle?
I can think of one. Getting onto the Astros' roster, even for a day, resets the countdown on his Hall of Fame election. Five more years means five more years of separation from Mark McGwire and Barry Bonds on the ballot. It means five more years for the electorate to come to grips with what the hell PEDs actually mean, and five more years to forgive/forget/shrug their shoulders.
And five more years for writers to decide that they didn't know what the hell they were talking about when it came to PEDs, and to vote Roger in on the first ballot. Because his ego will let him wait five years after making a comeback, but it won't let him wait a couple of years on the ballot to be let in.

Worshipping at the Altar of the Scrappy White Guy

So the narrative goes like this:

Star player doesn't give 100% on a particular play.
Local sports talk radio calls him out for not hustling.
Idiot calls in, carefully identifies himself as Not A Racist, and then demands to know why Star player, who is often African-American, can't hustle like Scrappy Infielder Guy, who is always white.
Someone says "Hey, dude, that's kinda racist."
Chest-thumping about how not racist saying the white dude tries harder than the black dude is invariably ensues.

Seriously. I have never heard anyone say "Why can't Jim Thome hustle like Joe Thurston?" Because, for all that I adore the awesomeness that is Thome, the guy's built like Bluto and for the sake of his hammys, doesn't always bust those tiny little gams of his up the line on routine grounders. Joe Thurston, on the other hand, never seemed to be going less that nine million miles an hour, even on a swinging bunt that would do everything but crawl into the pitcher's glove and beg to be petted. Or how about Jose Oquendo? Or Hector Luna? Or Michael Martinez? Or Jose Altuve, or Josh Harrison, or....well, there's a whole lot of scrappy out there that's not named David Eckstein. Honest. Watch a few games. You'll see.
So, first time caller, long time listener, do me a favor. Next time you call in to bitch about a guy not hustling, see if you can find an example of scrappiness to compare him to who isn't at least six shades paler than he is. If you can't, then hold off on the "I IS TOTALLY NOT RACIST BUT THE BLACK /HISPANIC GUY DOESN'T HUSTLE AND THE WHITE GUY TOTALLY DOES" bullcrap until you can, and then think about what you're saying.
Okay?
Thanks.

Bryce Harper, Political Narrative

Hey, you remember back when Bryce Harper was the embodiment of all that was good, right, and apparently politically conservative in the world, and Jason Heyward was the symbol of everything that was lazy and evil and liberal and stuff?

Heyward: 21 HR, 64 RBI, 17 SB, .842 OPS
Harper: 12 HR, 37 RBI, 13 SB, .741 OPS*, 1 case of telling kids to be "sexy"

Yeah. Me neither.

And this, boys and girls, is why you don't try to cram political narratives hamfistedly into one night's worth of Sportscenter highlights.



*None of this is intended as any sort of value or talent judgment on Mr. Harper, who is handling the athletic and social pressures of being in the big leagues before his 21st birthday with grace, aplomb and skill. More power to him, and all that. He's a great ballplayer and, by  most accounts, a pretty decent guy. He's just not a lame political metaphor, and neither is his opposite number on the Braves.

And Melky Cabrera is the End of Civilization

For all the amusement Melky Cabrera's clown-car antics may provide, using his special flavor of idiocy as a launching point for endless "baseball's not serious about steroids" screeds is exactly the sort of simple-minded concern trolling you'd expect from ESPN radio. These are the same geniuses who defended Brian Cushing to the death, after all, because he played football, and apparently no one who plays football would ever have interest in getting bigger, stronger, faster, or more muscular - unlike baseball players.
In a sense, baseball can't win with these bozos. If the drug testing program doesn't catch anyone, it's ineffective. If it does catch someone, then it's evidence that the program isn't working. The narrative is set and all that's left is to fill in the blanks.

STFU, Steroids Edition

Here's a thought:
If you work for a sports talk radio station, or a sports-themed television network, that takes advertising revenue for supplements designed to reverse the dreaded "Low T", then you don't get to say jack about steroids, Melky Cabrera, or any other damn thing related to chemical enhancement. If your salary's getting paid in part by ads for drugs to make middle-aged guys whose ding-dongs can't serve as tire jacks any more feel like they're 23 again and you still feel the need to moralize about other people taking the exact same stuff your employer is selling, then you need to take a look in the mirror and shut the hell up.
Because by normalizing that crap, by wallowing in hypocrisy, by feeding an audience that demands that kind of physical impossibility, you're as much a part of the problem as Victor Conte ever was.

Frickin' Laser Beams

No, there weren't sharks or even ill-tempered sea bass at Estadio Azteca last night (I accidentally referred to it as "Rey Azteca," which is the name of our favorite local Mexican restaurant, because I am a philistine).  But someone there had some frickin' laser beams.

Last night the US Men's National Soccer Team played the Mexican National Team in Mexico City. There's plenty of footage of US goalkeeper Tim Howard having lasers shined onto his face and chest throughout the match.  Fortunately drunks have a hard time keeping a pencil-thin beam aimed at the eyeball of a moving target a quarter-mile away, or Howard might have left Mexico blind.

Amazingly -- for the first time in forty years -- the US team beat Mexico last night at Estadio Azteca.  This was a major triumph for the US program, especially given their recent descent in the FIFA power rankings (we were 36th going into last night, compared to Mexico at #17).

But, seriously here, I'd like to understand why the referee didn't put a halt to the match, or charge Mexico with fouls or cards, in response to Mexican fans' attempts to distract or blind the US goalkeeper.  This can't possibly be acceptable.

Is That Dwight Howard's Theme Music?

If you think about it, it's really easy to understand why Bill Simmons' two favorite sports - using the term loosely in one case - are basketball and wrestling. No other sport offers the sorts of heel turns, off the turnbuckle insanity, chest-thumping speechifying, and slamming of people in the back of the head with figurative folding chairs that the NBA does, and the recent Dwight Howard four-way orgy is the best proof of it yet. Howard himself did his best heel turn, alternating between declaring his allegiance to the Magic and demanding to be traded to the team of his choice (Brooklyn, because presumably he's got a titanic fixed-gear bike, an iPod full of Lana Del Rey MP3s, and a closet full of corduroy in earth tones). And in the end, he got what he wanted - a trade to a contending team, the chance to make max money in a place with more star power than Orlando, the chance to test free agency, and a year to take advantage of a lineup that could probably finish second in the Olympics to nab that championship that's done so much for LBJ's reputation. He might as well have donned spandex tights and a luchador mask for his post-trade press conference.
You generally don't get this in other sports. Try it in baseball and you get buried by the fans and media, as Ryan Dempster can now attest. Try it in football and you're a wide receiver, which means either you're productive and they put up with you, or you're not any more and they cut you, and even Bill Belichick has a strict limit on the number of reclamation jobs he can undertake in a single year. Try it in hockey and you lose teeth, because the hockey core fanbase has an even more Norman Rockwell-ized view of a what a player owes his team than baseball, and they still hate Keith Primeau here in Carolina.
But basketball is where the stars' egos come out to play, and it's so Simmonsy it's perfect.
Me, as a rough approximation of a Sixer fan, I'm interested in seeing if the Bynum-shaped gamble pays off. I'm sorry to see Andre Iguodala go; he always put more on the court than you saw in the box score. He'll be a great fit in Denver. The Sixers have at least made themselves interesting. And Orlando...has a lot of picks they can potentially bundle in trades.
But really, none of that matters. What matters is that Dwight Howard grabbed the mike, then grabbed the folding chair, then grabbed the belt. And as the Hulkster will tell you, heel turns pay.

If You...

...believe that the Olympics are part of an Illuminati ritual to crown Prince William as King of the West by way of the blood sacrifice of the Aurora shootings...
...think that the most discussion-worthy thing about Gabby Douglas was either her hair or her leotard, and not her stunning performance...
...are offended by how Serena Williams celebrated her gold medal despite not having any idea what the crip walk might or might not be...
...got your knickers in a twist because you thought the greatest swimmer in the history of athletics didn't train hard enough for your liking...
...actually care enough to take sides in the insane argument over whether this USA men's basketball team could beat the original Dream Team...
...or are convinced that the Olympics will be the staging ground for a false flag attack that will usher in a US strike on Iran...

....then you are a goddamned idiot.

Thank you.

The sports commentariat

I heard guys this morning on sports talk radio evincing surprise! and shock! that Andy Reid would be coaching tonight.

My question is: are these guys just stupid?

But I guess that's my question every time I turn on sports talk radio.

Houston Astros, 2013

The Houston Astros are terrible. Legendarily terrible. Barely-above-.300-winning-percentage terrible. We've-won-four-games-since-people-thought-Herman-Cain-was-relevant terrible.
And next year, they're going to the American League.

It's going to look something like this.

Observations From Tonight's Bulls-Braves Game

• The Bulls are a terrible baserunning team. There were three separate instances of TOOTBLAN, with the best one being Stephen Vogt just beating a terrible throw to second on a double, then oversliding the bag, then betting tagged out as he tried to scrabble back. If you don't have a lot of offensive thunder - and the Bulls, like most of NC, are in a year-long drought - then throwing away outs in the bases is insanity. Throwing away an inning's worth...
• Julio Teheran's arsenal is impressive, especially on the rare occasion he knows where it's going. Gwinnett catcher Jose Yepez spent a good chunk of the night sprawled out or leaping to his feet to corral errant pitches.
• Every time I looked up, it seemed like Josh Kroeger was coming up to bat.
• Watching a Gwinnett lineup that featured Terry Tiffee and Felix Pie made it feel oddly like the tail end of a fantasy baseball draft set in 2006.
• Braves shortstop Jack Wilson - yes, THAT Jack Wilson - was replaced late in the game by shortstop Josh Wilson. I am imagining a Highlander-esque scenario where Jack, who is actually immortal, fakes his own death and is replaced by his "nephew", another good-fielding, slap-hitting middle infielder whom reporters can safely describe as "scrappy". 
• Tim Beckham's OBP is much higher than one might expect, given the way he was determinedly lunging at things tonight. No strikeouts, but not a lot of solid contact, either.
• The big attraction tonight was rehabbing Ray Evan Langoria sitting in with the band at DH. He was clearly just trying to work the rust off at the plate without reinjuring himself, however. No hits, though there was a popup to shallow center that endangered aircraft on approach to RDU.
• Both starters went six innings, and survived rough early innings to get there.
• Not much to see fielding-wise, apart from your standard 5-3-9-2 putout (E5)
• There is no finer sight in minor league baseball than watching Wool E. Bull get stampeded across the outfield at the DBAP by a horde of shrieking small children who, presumably, have just been told where short ribs and burgers come from.

Trade Deadline Night in Toronto

Last night, I had to console a server at Toronto's finest whisky establishment, over the fact that Travis Snider was no longer a Blue Jay.  Oddly enough, "he can't hit lefties" and "Brad Lincoln just became the best guy in your bullpen", not that effective.

A Few Thoughts On the MLB Trade Deadline

• The Phillies' outfield next year is going to consist of Dominic Brown, John Mayberry Jr., and some guy they kidnap off the street in Manayunk. 
• Getting anything at all, much less a prospect with a pulse and a relief pitcher who's not actively gargling kerosene, back for Shane Victorino is impressive. Victorino's starting to slow down, he's going to be a free agent, and he's precisely the sort of guy Ruben Amaro Jr. has a hard time saying no to when the words "contract extension" get mentioned.
• Considering that the Phillies turned their farm system upside down and shook it until change came out of its pockets to get Hunter Pence, the return they got was not so impressive. It's hard to believe that Amaro couldn't have snagged an out-of-favor Brandon Belt instead of a never-had-any-favor-to-be-out-of Nate Schierholz. 
• On the other hand, the Phils seem to have pulled themselves below the luxury tax, which is really what this was all about. And there's still a month left to slough off Joe Blanton and Juan Pierre.
• Pittsburgh's moves - adding Qualls and Sanchez and Wandy Rodriguez and Travis Snider, and losing Gorkys Hernandez and Brad Lincoln and Casey McGeeheeheehee - looked suspiciously like the end-of-season bottom feeding that goes on in most NL-only roto leagues. I expect Reds management to weigh in on the NL message board over at ESPN to complain that the Marlins were totally, like, dumping and didn't call around to get the best offer.
• Who gives the best hugs? Travis Snider. (Bonus points if you get the movie reference)
• That being said, getting Snider out of his dysfunctional relationship with Toronto fans is probably a good idea. Now, if he could just avoid lefties....
• For all the deck chairs they rearranged, the Pirates managed to hang on to pretty much all of their farm system depth, which is impressive.
• Is there anybody the Dodgers didn't either trade for or try to trade for? Bugs Bunny, maybe? Ol' Hoss Radbourn? Craig Calcaterra?
• I suspect a lot of teams who passed on Zach Greinke because of his history of anxiety issues are going to watch him go bananas in Anaheim and kick themselves.
• Ladies and gentlemen, now playing at Wrigley, your 2012 Iowa Cubs. Seriously. Who's left?
• That being said, if Arodys Vizcaino recovers from Tommy John surgery, him being swapped for Paul Maholm and Reed Johnson is going to be the Bagwell/Andersen moment of this deadline.
• Speaking of which, "Reed Johnson" sounds like a minor character on Archer. You'd think the Braves would just clone their tweener outfielders by now.
• Remember when Geovanny Soto was going to be the next great NL catcher? Me neither. It's hard watching a career go off a cliff that fast. Why Texas wanted him I have no idea; it's not like he's a particular improvement over the mighty Yorvit. 
• On one hand, it's kind of sad that Jonathan Broxton went for a couple of meh prospects. On the other hand, not that long ago you couldn't have gotten a ham sandwich for Broxton, so this is progress. Royals fans, trust The Process. It's going to get a team - in this case, the Reds - to the World Series.
•  One can only assume that McGeehee will, upon his arrival in New York, be lowered into the Lazarus Pit below New Yankee Tax Boondoggle Stadium and be exposed to the same rejuvenative powers that have pulled Andruw Jones, Eric Chavez, Raul Ibanez and Ichiro off the scrap heap and turned them back into useful major leaguers. Then, he will go try to kill Batman.
• Seriously, Red Sox. Did you make those trades just because you were feeling left out?
• I'm fairly certain that KennyWilliams also got a few other GM's best Pokemon cards in this year's deals. The man is that good.

Observations from Today's Jays-Tigers Game

• Jeff Mathis vs. Jose Valverde simply is not fair.
• Anthony Gose vs. Jose Valverde, especially after Valverde has loosened up and is hitting 95 regularly, is even less fair.
• I have never seen so many failed attempts to do the wave at a single game. And when it finally did get going, it went the wrong way.
• Brett Cecil actually pitched a pretty good game. Peralta's first homer doesn't happen without an iffy defensive effort from Travis Snider on a ball hit to the wall in left, and both Fielder and Cabrera were off-balance and lunging all day.
• Shutting down a Bautista-less Jays lineup isn't as hard as it could have been, but Doug Fister was masterful. Very few hard hit balls at all today, and basically none of them in the air.
• If there is a just and kind God, there is a van in the Jays' player lot that has a painting of a wizard fighting a dragon while riding a polar bear on its side, and Colby Rasmus is the owner of that van. Also, the only two albums that have ever been played on that van's stereo are "Street Survivors" by Skynyrd and "Tarkus" by ELP.
• Rajai Davis at the top of the Jays' lineup - a better idea than you'd think.
• E5 playing first base - also better than you'd think.
• Beers at Rogers Centre - about $4 more than you'd think.
• The Jays ran when they could - Gerald Laird did not have a good day behind the plate for Detroit. Credit Fister with keeping them off the bases when it counted. Also, Gose really is that fast. Possibly faster. 
• Overheard in the stands: "Why can't Snider give effort like that guy on the highlight reel?" "The guy in the highlight real is Snider." "So why can't he do that?"
• Also overheard in the stands: "I wish everyone gave effort like Colby Rasmus." Somewhere, Tony LaRussa just felt a stabbing pain in one eye.
• Two homers for Jhonny Peralta, and neither of them was an excuse-me shot.  Both to left-left center, and both were line drives. Prince, on the other hand, was hitting 300 foot moon shots all day, swinging at the first pitch and getting himself out.
• Trying to explain how exactly Anthony Gose got to Toronto to someone who's got multiple tallboys of Stella in them just isn't going to work. Ever. Trust me.

What the Hell Is an Arctic Monkey

It's easy to make fun of the Olympic opening ceremonies. You can mock the music, you can mock some of the costumes, you can mock the commentary, you can mock NBC's edits in coverage, and you can mock the organizing committee for deciding that the band that would best represent London to the world was the Arctic Monkeys. Seriously, was Radiohead busy? Coldplay? The surviving members of Camel? Whatever. It's a target-rich environment.
At the same time, it does pay to remember that the opening ceremony is supposed to be ridiculous spectacle. It's supposed to be wacky and over the top and visually out there, and it's supposed to be memorable.
And let's face it, we're never going to see anything like the red-eyed butterfly-winged cyclists doing loops to a cover of "Come Together" ever again.
Yes, the last time that many people in alien-looking costumes descended on London, it was a Dr. Who Christmas special. But at the same time, the event succeeded at doing what it was supposed to: being a spectacle, and getting you to watch.
So, yes, it's all well and good we all took whacks at the Spanish team's headgear, or whatever. We raged at lousy commentary on NBC, and we moaned about how the US feed cut partial versions of songs we've all memorized anyway.
We still watched. And that's what mattered.

Cole Hamels Signs for A Bajillion Dollars

At first glance, this is a terrible deal for the Phillies. They're already locked into monster contracts for a large pile of other guys. There are younger players coming up on free agency - Shane Victorino, Hunter Pence - who are going to need to be either paid or replaced, and there's not a lot coming up in the system.  Then there are the guys who are just going to need to be replaced, and one gets the feeling the Ty Wiggingtons of the world aren't going to be the preferred option next go-round. And of course, there's luxury tax, all of which add up to say that the Phillies spent money they didn't have to reinforce an area they didn't need to, and screwed themselves in the process.
Except, of course, it's never that simple. You can, as they say, never have too much starting pitching, and Hamels' deal isn't out of line for what you pay for an ace. And yes, he is an ace - durable, often better than his W-L record, and usually capable of going deep enough into games to hide the Phillies' dreadful bullpen. As for the money, to be blunt, the Phillies can afford it. They are in one of the largest single-team markets in the US. They sell out every night. They are going to, in a few years, get a new local television rights package that, if it is in line with the ones being signed in places like Anaheim, will pay for the Hamels contract and a few metric tons of scrapple besides.
And, to be blunt, there are two things that keep that stadium filled: winning and stars. Hamels is a star, a guy who came up through the farm system and has never played for another team. He puts butts in seats and moves jerseys in the gift shop and, despite bearing an uncanny resemblance to one of the two brothers on Supernatural, is well-liked by the fan base. And nobody out there is going to say that having six more years of Cole Hamels is going to hurt the Phillies' chances of winning. Yes, you can say that spending the money they spent on Hamels on a viable center fielder or third baseman would go that route, but to be blunt, there aren't any impact bats out there to spend that money on. Better to double down on pitching, pray that they get something out of Dom Brown and Freddy Galvis, and rebuild the bullpen on the cheap instead.
Maybe they should have signed him sooner. Maybe they could have gotten him for less. But as far a bajillion dollar contracts for pitchers go, this one ain't bad.

Rick Reilly, Please Shut Up

Dear Rick Reilly:

The Jerry Sandusky case is not about you. It is not about any reporter feeling the need to go all Krakauer in public and rend their hair over how, gosh, Joe Paterno fooled them for all these years, which really is a way of making the story all about them. There's endless yammering about the myth of the great man Paterno, when it's the same guys in the hair shirts now who were instrumental in building, brick by brick, anecdote by anecdote and year by year.
Here's a hint. We, as readers, don't care how you feel about this. We are horrified by what happened, saddened to learn that someone we thought was a symbol of how to do college athletics right was in fact party to something monstrous, and angry that those in power did not stop it at the first instant they had a chance to. We are not interested in self-righteous self-absolution, nor are we in the slightest bit interested in how all this affects the Rick Reillys of the world.
Now, if you're so inclined, you could use those reporting instincts of yours and keep a sharper eye out. Maybe question these legendary coaches you so consistently canonize. If there's smoke, ask a few questions. And God forbid, do your job instead of plugging yourself into the hype machine that allows coaches and programs to be insulated from real-world concepts like "accountability" and "law". Don't build any more untouchable great men for the sake of the overblown football narrative.

And you'd definitely think that in the wake of the report coming out of Penn State, and all the geshrying about the flawed myth of JoePa, that we'd take a few steps back from that godlike coach myth. That we'd take a minute or two to reflect on how the deification of college football informed the coverup at Penn State, and maybe hold off on building something like that again.

Then again, the Freeh Report on Penn State dropped two days ago. Yesterday, ESPN.com ran an article asking if Nick Saban - who ran out on his Dolphins contract, has been linked to various scholarship and recruiting irregularities, and whose daughter apparently battered one of her sorority sisters senseless - is the greatest coach of all time.

24 hours and the machine is up and running again.

Jerry Sandusky Questions

Jerry Sandusky coached at Penn State for 29 years before his earliest confirmed sexual assault of a minor. He ran The Second Mile for 21 years before his earliest confirmed assault.
Does anyone think that, in his 50s, Jerry Sandusky spontaneously began molesting little boys for the first time? That this was some kind of mid-life crisis?
Sandusky retired from coaching in 1999, after the Nittany Lions trounced Texas A&M in the Alamo Bowl. This was a decorated assistant coach in his mid-fifties. No other college approached him to recruit him? Even a little one elsewhere in football-crazy, Penn-State-football-crazy Pennsylvania? Pitt or Temple didn't want to have their football program run by this guy? California University of Pennsylvania didn't even ask? Really?
Boy, that's weird.
I mean, either they approached him, and he turned them down (which would be kind of strange), or they knew not to ask. Or approached PSU and asked permission to talk to him, and were discouraged from doing so.
You know, now that I think about it... this guy won two national championships as a defensive coordinator, in '82 and '86. How come he never got poached? I know he was then seen as Paterno's heir apparent, but it's not like heirs apparent are never poached or supplanted (see Dana Holgorson).
It's weird. I feel like there's more to this story.

Booing Cano

Just so you can keep it straight:

it is perfectly acceptable for New York fans to boo the living hell out of anyone they like, not to mention throw whatever crap they can find up to and including month-old casualties of the Nathans' Hot Dog Eating Contest, onto the field. Players who don't appreciate it "can't handle the pressure", and are presumably named Ed Whitson.

It is deeply unacceptable for fans from Kansas City to boo a New York Yankee, which is disrespectful and inappropriate.

Of course, Robinson Cano, the guy who actually got booed - and let me tell you, the Kansas City fans did not half-ass it - had the right attitude about the whole thing. He understood why they were mad (he didn't pick local hero Billy Butler for the AL's Home Run Derby squad) and he could appreciate that they were behind their guy. The booing was a little silly - this was an All Star Game, after all, not anything that counted - but still, it's not like they were throwing snowballs at Santa (Philly) or batteries at Chipper Jones (the Bronx). And for the most part, the applause and enthusiasm shown by the crowds for the whole All Star kit and caboodle was impressive.

But yeah, they got on Cano for not picking Butler. The thing is, I can't blame him. Yeah, it would have been a nice story on a night of nice stories to have hometown guy in the Home Run Derby, but really, who do you replace with him? Prince Fielder, a guy who was hitting homers out of Tiger Stadium when he was bar mitzvah aged? Jose Bautista, who's been the best power hitter alive for the last few years? The beastly Mark Trumbo, who's got more homers by the All Star Break this year than Butler's had in any season in his career so far? Or Cano himself, last year''s champ? Not happening. So it's perfectly understandable that Butler wasn't going to get named to the team unless a meteor hit Kauffman Stadium during the Derby itself, and it's perfectly understandable that the hometown fans, whose baseball team is so screwed up that they're banning bloggers and giving Jeff Francouer long-term deals, let their displeasure with this be known.

The only real villains in the piece are the hypersensitive New Yorkers with column inches who are mortally offended by the whole affair. I mean, I realize they don't understand that anyone living beyond the broadcast range of WFAN does not actually have motivations of their own and instead exists merely to serve as backdrop, but c'mon, kids. Seriously? You're New Yorkers. You're supposed to be tough. Getting booed by a bunch of hicks from flyover country (their words, not mine. At least, presumptively) should be rolling right off you faster than a Rusty Hardin cross-examination. And yet, the geshrying is epic. It's as if Yankees fans and writers are somehow ashamed of their team's success and are looking around for anything they can find to make them feel persecuted, so they can justify whatever it is that Yankee fan types do.

Of course, I expect the a full-on media frenzy the next time the Royals to come to New York. I expect full-throttle booing of the likes of Luke Hochevar, not that he needs the help. And I expect someone in New York to finally be interested in a game with the Royals, for the first time since George Brett retired.

Bring Back the Snubs

Dear Major League Baseball:

I'm sorry I have to be the one to point this out to you, but in your efforts to make everyone happy, you've managed to destroy one of the best things about the All-Star Game.

I speak, of course, of the outraged fan reaction to deserving players they root for getting snubbed. It was the best part of seeing the teams get announced; the immediate, frenzied analysis of who'd gotten jobbed by being left off because the team needed at least one rep from every squad. And in the old days, guys did get genuinely jobbed, because there were only so many spots to go around, and a couple of them had to go to the Sid Monges of the world or the old warhorses who still raked in the popular vote regardless of performance, and, well, yeah. Guys who should have been there got left off, and we as fans got upset, and we went to war for our favorites who'd gotten screwed. There was passion there, and interest, and a genuine interest. There was weight to the debates over whether the team should be made up of proven guys who maybe didn't have the best stats this year or unknowns who were having the best first halves, and might never shine this brightly again.

Now, though, there's no debate. Put 'em both on. Hell, put 'em all on. 34 players per team. Fan votes. Player votes. Manager picks. More fan votes. By the time it's done, everyone gets a say and anyone who's got a positive WAR is on the team. There are no real arguments left to be had. Oh, sure, this year we got a little heat over Tony LaRussa's decision to leave off a couple of Reds he wasn't particularly fond of, but A)Brandon Phillips isn't having a particularly great year and B)Johnny Cueto is kind of a jerk. There's maybe a little smoke here, but even if LaRussa was being a vindictive jerk (and all signs point to yes), it's really not that big a deal. Poke around the bushes of the baseball blogs and you'll maybe see some love for Enesto Frieri, but other than that?

Also: Ernesto Frieri. Yeah, he's got 10 saves and an ERA of 0.00, but...he's Ernesto Frieri.

So we're left with bloated rosters and no excitement, no real investment in who makes it because everyone vaguely deserving does. Someone at MLB's offices should remember that the big excitement with the NCAA tournament isn't who gets the 1 seeds, or whether the big name schools get it. It's on the bubble, where the fans of the maybe-teams live and die with every game all season long. With rare exceptions, none of those teams ever makes noise in the tournament (VCU, you're excused), but everyone still goes out of their mind over perceived snubs, relative RPI, and the like.

Baseball used to be like that, before the 34 man All-Star roster, and it was better for it.

Nash to LA

Steve Nash goes to the star-studded Lakers, in a last-ditch effort to get that ring.

Somewhere, Karl Malone is saying he's seen this movie before.

He Is The Lord High Executioner

God bless Roger Goodell.

He has ruled to uphold the suspensions that he handed down under the rules he created under an appeals process he designed, spun by a marketing machine he controls. He's also suggested that in doing so, he's above the rule of law.

I, for one, am stunned. I also expect he's going to start wearing a crown to games, asking players to kiss his ring in exchange for reduced suspensions, and referring to himself as the kwisatz-haderach.

Okay, maybe not the last. He doesn't seem like much of a reader.

In Pursuit of the N(B)Arrative

So let's play hypotheticals.

Let's take a superstar in his sport, a guy who's good enough to be mentioned in the same breath with the all-time greats.
Have him put a team on his back, despite a supporting cast weaker than the below-the-line players in a SyFy Original, and carry it to the playoffs again and again.
Let him, when he becomes a free agent, use the interest in his choice of destination to raise millions of dollars for charity.
Have him take less money to go someplace where he can win, in part to ensure that there's enough cash in the kitty to pay the talent around him.
Make sure he stays clear of drug scandals, bar fights, steroids accusations, incidents in strip clubs, driving his SUV into someone's living room while watching porn, and all of the other fun tidbits we've come to expect from our star athletes.
When his teammates get hurt in crunch time, have him pick up his team once again and carry it with a historically great playoff performance.

You'd think this guy would be lionized. Instead, he's LeBron, and we're all supposed to hate him for walking away from a dingbat owner and a franchise that wasn't going to be in position to win it all for years, if ever.

Of course, James' real crime wasn't bolting for south Florida. The same idiots yammering about how awful James' Decision was are the guys licking their chops over the far-future day when they imagine Bryce Harper in Yankee pinstripes. The real problem was that athletes aren't supposed to control their own narratives. They're supposed to give hometown discounts and stay, or let themselves be courted to go someplace in search of a championship, or let sportswriters beat up on them for taking money to do what they do. And with The Decision, James took control of his own narrative. He decided on the goal (championships), figured out the best way to get there (talented teammates), and made the plan happen, cutting the sportswriters and nabobs and myth makers out of the loop.

Naturally, he got buried. They draped it in outrage on behalf of Cleveland, but really, every AM radio host who chewed on James' gristle was upset over the fact that athletes aren't supposed to think that way, plan that way, do that way. How the hell are we supposed to project our fantasies on these own guys if they're going to act intelligently in their own self-interest?

But now LeBron's won a championship, and by the unwritten rules of the game, that makes him worthy. And if he's worthy, he can't the villain any more, according to the byzantine, Eddie Izzard-like constructions of sports narrative morality. Never mind that there are a lot more Earl Curetons and Marc Iavaronis walking around with rings than Karl Malones and John Stocktons; it's the arbitrary divider, the climax of the ordained narrative, and reaching it washes away your past sins. LeBron's going to be a hero now. They'll craft the story that he learned humility last year, that he accepted responsibility this year, that he did what they all wanted him to.

He'll know better. But he'll let them pretend, because it will make his life easier.

And down in Orlando, they'll find a new villain, a kid who had the temerity to be indecisive about whether or not he wanted to stay in his current job. The rumblings are already starting.

Dwight Howard, you're next.

Stern Vs. Rome! Fight!

I admit, in the Jim Rome vs. David Stern tempest in a teapot, I have to go with Stern. Rome's a bully, a jackass who built his career on schoolyard taunting a guest into taking a swing at him. He regularly incites his listeners to abuse their subject matter and each other (and no doubt there's a ton of self-abuse going on as they dream about getting on-air for a SmackDownTM). His interviews tend to hit one of two poles: complete suck-ups, or smarmy insults phrased as questions, the "So when did you stop beating your wife?" bullcrap that Stern correctly called him on. And when he does get called on it, he hides behind the "Hey, I'm just the guy asking the questions" excuse, cheerfully ignoring the fact that sometimes, giving a stupid question play is as good as believing in it.
Which leads to the question he asked Stern, namely, was the NBA draft lottery fixed. This is a stupid question, and an insulting one. Smarter people than have pointed out that no matter who got the first pick, there would have been accusations the whole kit and kaboodle was rigged. New Orleans? That's Stern doing the new owner a favor (or bestowing one last good-night kiss on a team the league briefly owned, take your pick.) Charlotte, he's doing Michael Jordan a solid. Brooklyn, hey, we want stars in New York, right? It goes on and on and on, and it feeds on itself. It's not just the draft, either. Go to any NBA discussion board and half the content is conspiracy theory. They're not calling fouls on LeBron because The League wants Miami to win. They froze the envelope so the Knicks could get Ewing. On and on and on, and above it all sits the grinning, Machiavellian spectre of David Stern, puppetmaster extraordinaire.
And that's where we get into the deeply insulting aspect. The business Stern runs - and I confess, I'm not a huge fan of his, either - is one based on the notion of honest competition. The day the perception that the NBA is rigged moves out of the comments sections and into the conventional wisdom is the day the NBA dies. And the question Rome really asked David Stern is this: Are you a crook? Are you cheating your customers and the cities that host your teams? Are you lying to your fans? Are you actively engaged in what can only be described as criminal fraud? Because that's what "Was the lottery rigged?" really means. It implies Stern rigged it, and that he and his entire enterprise are crooked.
Think about how you'd react if someone asked you that question. I'm guessing, probably not well. Rome got off light; Stern saw his bullshit for what it was and called him on it precisely. And then Rome turned around and played the martyr - always the last resort of the bully - to his fans and his peers, because the big mean commissioner was mean to him. And then the next day, Rome was back to talking smack and smirking, same as always.
But if you ask me, Stern won this smackdown. And if for just a second Rome felt the slightest bit queasy about the sleazy stuff he was doing, then it was worth all the fallout and yammering and geshrying. And if we're really lucky, maybe there's a question Rome won't ask next time, because of this.
Or at least we can hope.

Clemens Found To Have Been Friends With Unbelievable Asshole

So here's what I think happened:
Rusty Hardin (Wesleyan '65) took a look at the case. He realized that his client was an unlikable bully who couldn't keep his yap shut, operating in a climate that was disinclined to be sympathetic to those accused of using steroids. He saw that the prosecution had handled its prosecution of Barry Bonds with all the delicacy of Paula Deen taking a frozen ham to the side of her head. He saw that the government's case, regardless of whether or not his client had in fact jammed his ass full of enough monkey hormones to make him climb the Empire State Building clutching Naomi Watts in one meaty paw, rested on the testimony of a dyed-in-the-wool scumbag. And he did a little math - they do teach math at Wesleyan, when no one is looking - and did a rough estimate of how long this case could run, and how many billable hours he could get out of it.
Then, in my imagination, Rusty Hardin did his best maniacal laugh, twirled his imaginary mustachios, and tied an innocent woman to a set of disused railroad tracks. Because that's what Republic Serial Villains, like Rusty Hardin, do.
To be fair, nobody really expected Clemens to be found guilty, not when the government's entire case rested on Brian McNamee, and the public remained convinced Clemens was on trial for using steroids. (He wasn't. He was on trial for perjury, which is kind of serious, and the sort of thing you'd hope they'd actually prosecute, otherwise that whole "trial by jury" thing goes out the window. But I digress.) But Clemens had already had his name dragged through the mud, the public was sick of it, and it became fashionable to bitch about what a waste of time and money the whole thing was.
The real test, of course, will come when it's Clemens' turn on the Hall of Fame ballot. Remember, he wasn't found not guilty of using steroids. He was found not guilty of committing perjury. And the gatekeepers of the Hall of Fame tend to frown upon steroid users and suspected steroid users, even ones who never failed a test or were mentioned in the Mitchell Report or got put on trial for perjury.
There's a hell of a lot more evidence to suggest Clemens did PEDs than there is against Jeff Bagwell. If Clemens gets in - if Clemens gets close - while Bagwell and McGwire and Sosa are locked out, then all hell will break loose.
Then again, maybe it won't. Maybe the weary acceptance of Clemens' greatness will open the door for those other guys.
And if it doesn't, I'm sure Rusty Hardin would be happy to advocate on their behalf.

Heat is On. Again.

So when the Miami Heat started last season, their first one with LeBron James and Chris Bosh on board to play Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson to Dwyane Wade's Neal Peart, around the .500 mark, there was wailing and moaning and gnashing of teeth, and widespread speculation that Pat Riley was about to dump coach Erik Spoelstra and take over the reins of the team himself.
This did not happen. The Heat straightened themselves out, and had a largely successful year.
They did not, however, win the NBA title. And as such, there was rumbling that Spoelstra was going to get fired.
This did not happen, and the Heat started this year with Spoelstra as their coach. They played extremely well, considering the Benny Hill sketch of a condensed schedule the NBA threw out there. But when they hit a rough patch, largely due to injuries, the rumblings were back. The team wasn't jelling. LBJ and D-Wade (and how lazy do you have to be to abbreviate a guy's name to something with THE EXACT SAME NUMBER OF SYLLABLES) couldn't play together because their skills overlapped. You get the idea.
Spoelstra was not fired. The team lumbered into the playoffs and immediately went down, 2-1 to a fresh, exciting Indiana Pacers team that had no players anyone had ever heard of. Miami was in turmoil. The team was going to get blown up, starting with injured star Chris Bosh. Spoelstra was gone. LBJ couldn't handle pressure. Wade - well, Wade was immune to criticism, despite having a game 3 that was very A.J.-Burnett-at-Yankee-Stadium. But you get the idea. Kaboom. Heat can't win under pressure, Spoelstra can't coach, etc. Blow it all up.
Except, of course, that the Heat woke up and then brutalized the Pacers three straight to close out the series. Wade and James clicked and had some truly monstrous games. On came the Celtics, fresh off a Londo-G'kar deathmatch with the scrappy, undermanned 76ers. Needless to say, the Celts immediately put the Heat in a 3-2 hole and looked poised to eliminate them. Again, Spoelstra was gone. Again, the team - despite firm statements to the contrary from the front office - was going to get blown up. Umpteenth verse, same as the first.
And  of course, the Heat woke up and left a leprechaun-green smear on the bottoms of their sneakers. 4-3, Heat win the series, and on to face the Oklahoma City Thunder in the finals. The Thunder are favored, and the talk is about how if the Heat doesn't win, and James doesn't star and get Finals MVP and throw down the game-winning dunk in the last seconds of the last game, then his legacy is tarnished forever and Spoelstra is gone.
Again.
All of which suggests to me that there are people out there, many in the sports media, who get unhealthily attached to narratives and will attempt to cram them in at a moment's provocation. They decided a while ago that Pat Riley coaching the LBJ/Wade/Bosh triumvirate was a better story than some random dude who'd never coached the Lakers doing it, and they've been pushing for it ever since.  This is, I think, both bad narrative and bad journalism.
There are narratives there with this Heat team, compelling ones. Will James be able to fulfill his massive talent and claim a title? Can he put the ill-omened Decision behind him and earn the fan base's love? Can the Dream Team experiment work in an NBA setting? Can Chris Bosh thrive in the shadows of metaphorical giants? And of course there's Spoelstra, who is the first Filipino-American coach of a major professional sports franchise and who's done nothing but win since he was handed the reins of the team.
But that's not good enough for some. They want the equivalent of a Heavy Metal cartoon, with Pat Riley riding a dragon and wielding an axe as he swoops down to court side to rescue the day. Excellence and striving, need not apply.
And honestly, that's kind of sad.

Stellar System

Deadspin says the whole fixation on "the best player in the NBA" is  pointless.
Deadspin is wrong. You need stars.
Right now, the Stanley Cup Finals are in full swing. The teams involved - Jersey and LA, in case you were wondering - represent the two biggest media markets in the country. There are story lines here, with LA chasing a Cup that even Wayne Gretzky couldn't give it, and Jersey trying to win another one for the ageless Marty Brodeur. It's exactly the sort of thing that NHL commissioner Gary Bettman - a man who apocryphally was once given a hockey puck as a present and spent an hour trying to open it - would want.
And yet, nobody's talking about it. The airwaves are full of LBJ choke this and Kevin Durant that and some Josh Hamilton, and maybe a little Drew Brees on the side. But no hockey, not unless you really look for it.
On the NBA side, everyone's a-flutter over the ascent of the Oklahoma City Thunder, and totally stoked to have them in the finals. This is despite the fact that OKC is the 30th largest city in America, the sort of market whose presence in a Finals tends to provoke hand-wringing and sad cries of "will no one think of the ratings?"
But they have stars. They have Kevin Durant, who is turning into the MJ to Greg Oden's Joe Barry Carroll. They have Russell Westbrook. They have James Harden, whose national profile skyrocketed after Metta World Peace used him for a speed bag on national TV. And this makes all the difference.

Thuuuuh Yankees Lose (some money)!

The Yankees are unhappy.
There are empty seats at the cavernous hippodrome of New Yankee Stadium, and someone's got to be to blame. It's not the economy. It's not the fact that a single game ticket in many sections costs more than a monthly car payment. It's not that the Yankees haven't been terribly interesting to watch this year.
No, the villain is StubHub.
StubHub, you see, is MLB's official ticket resale partner. The deal MLB made with StubHub was a simple one: You get to be our official reseller, and we get a chunk of the action. And because it's an official partnership, the teams are locked into it. Even those who thought they'd be selling out every game and getting a slice of the resales, too. Even the Yankees.
The Yankees are not selling out every game. Tickets for Yankee games can, in fact, be found on StubHub for less than face value. This is not a surprise; you buy a season ticket package and then life surprises you,  such that the day you thought you were going to the Stadium to watch Yankees-Rangers is instead the day your in-laws suddenly need to get picked up at Newark International right around first pitch. So, you put the tickets up on StubHub - they're yours, after all. You bought 'em - and mark them down, and hope to get some of the cost back because God knows the Yankees aren't going to be understanding about that sort of thing.
But Yankee President Randy Levine is furious that StubHub (which, incidentally, does not set prices), is selling tickets for Yankee games for below face value. It is an outrage. It is an affront. It is something that he cannot let stand, and he has promised a "fan-friendly alternative" from the depths of his high dudgeon.
Now, color me crazy, but I think "cheap tickets" is about as fan-friendly as it gets. Also, there's that whole "contract with MLB" thing going on there, not that the Yankees have ever let that sort of thing stop them. What Levine is really saying is that he's tired of his business partner undercutting him, and he's going to get that money back by hook or by crook. "Fan Friendly" is just the barest cynical nod to PR.
But why is this happening, and what is Levine so upset about? It's simple.
Let's say you're Joe Fan, who wants to take Junior to a ballgame. You go to the official Yankee website and you see two good seats available for $500. Sure, that's a couple of car payments, but it's going to be a special day with Junior, and they're really good seats.
Then, Joe checks StubHub and finds that there are seats in that same section going for $300. Why are they going for $300? Because Bob Seasonticketholder can't make the game that night, say, on account of his kid's dance recital, and he wants to get rid of the tickets. Joe sees the tickets, sees the location, and buys them from Bob through StubHub.
So far, so good. Joe wins, because he got great seats for 40% less than he thought he'd have to pay. Bob wins, because he gets something back on those tickets, which he was ready to take the full $500 loss on. The only loser here is Randy Levine, whose desired outcome was that A) Bob ate his tickets and B) Joe bought from the ticket window, ensuring that the Yankees sell 2 sets of seats, not just one.
Needless to say, in every instance where Joe is not actively deranged, he's going to buy from StubHub. It's the sensible thing to do. The model Levine was counting on was one where Yankee Stadium sold out every game, pushing the prices in the secondary market higher due to scarcity. But that's not happening. For whatever reason - the Yankees' insane ticket prices, the economy, the general blah nature of the team, fear of having John Sterling bleat "THUUUUHUHUHUUHUH YANKEES WIN!" in your ear, the games aren't selling out. And when you can't sell your stock of a luxury good (like a baseball ticket), then the secondary market for that same good is going to come in lower than the primary.
It's basic economics. It is, in fact, the free market at work in all the ways it's supposed to, finding an equilibrium between buyers and sellers. It's just not the one the Yankees want.
But let us not forget, we are dealing with the Yankees here. We are dealing with the team that took $800M in public money and perks to build its stadium, that sputtered about "socialism" and UnAmerican badness when discussing the luxury tax, screaming to high heaven when the oracle of the free market suddenly turns against them. Here's a news flash, bunky: You don't get to get it both ways. Or maybe you do, but hey, I'm at least going to make fun of you for it.
And in the meantime, it's enough to make a man root for the Red Sox. Or StubHub.

The Logic of Mario Chalmers

So let me get this straight:

LeBron James was a choker, because he gave the last shot to Mario Chalmers in a Round 2 loss to Indiana. Giving the ball to Chalmers was a betrayal of James' superstar status, because superstars should always want to take the last shot, regardless of whether they're the guy with the best chance to make it. And so, we cued up endless yammering about LeBron being soft, and "it", whatever "it" is, being in LeBron's head, and how he would never be as great as Robert Horry, and, well, you get the idea.
All that lasted until James woke up and destroyed the Pacers over the next three games, at which point no doubt some talking heads claimed credit for "waking him up".
Dwyane Wade, on the other hand, went rogue by not giving the ball to Mario Chalmers for the last shot in a Eastern Finals loss to the Celtics. Because the play was drawn up for Chalmers, you see, and by ignoring him Wade was being selfish and immature and...err, being a superstar who wanted the last shot at crunch time, which is what the media said a star should do, and...yeah, whatever.