These Next 12 Months Are My Favorite Time of Year

As a pretty avid watcher of all sports, this time of year is pretty fantastic for me.  Starting with the run up to the NCAA tournament, then you have baseball Spring training, the Tourney, baseball's opening day, the start* of the NBA season and then postseason, NHL playoffs, the Grand Slams and golf's Majors, Tour de France, this year we had the Winter Olympics and we'll have the World Cup, then the baseball postseason pushes, NFL starts, October, "BCS is unfair" month, the bowls, and then the NFL playoffs and Super Bowl and then the NCAA bubble talk starts up again, and you sprinkle in various drafts, trades, free agency, scandals, other tournaments and events throughout this time.

OK, so as it turns out, it's pretty much the whole year.  But still, February/March always seems to be the start of it all somehow.  Maybe I am just a baseball/college basketball fan first and everything else follows? 

*in my world, the first 50ish games of the NBA are preseason and don't matter.  Then somewhere between the Super Bowl and the Final Four, the NBA gets going.  Ironically, most NBA players and management seem to feel the same way.

Sadly for me, this most magical time of year is overlapping a time when I simply cannot follow any of it very closely.  I've just moved to San Francisco (fun fact: everyone here hates the Lakers and Dodgers, just like me!) and didn't have TV for a couple of weeks (staying with non-sports people - did you know people really watch Jersey Shore?).  We finally got TV in our room, but now that I am moving out of my friends' basement into my new place, I will be without TV or the internet again for a few days...during this weekend of all weekends (though I would probably be this mortified pretty much every weekend). 

All that said, it has made it hard for me to write anything about sports, even though there have been so many things I wanted so badly to write about.  So here's a capsule of what I have watched over the past month or so:

-Canada's hockey fans inspire me to be a better sports fan in general - they collectively know the game at such a detailed level, they applaud the other team, they chanted "USA" at our women as they collected their silver medals.  Very impressive.  That said, I wish we'd broken every single one of their hearts.

-When someone says, "Oh, don't tell me what's happening in the Gold Medal Hockey game.  I am taping it and left it when we were down 2-1 with 9:00 to go."  Your response cannot be, "Oh, well it's in overtime now, so you will love it."  Dammit!

-Derek Anderson said after he was released that Browns fans are "ruthless."  "I will never forget getting cheered when I was injured. ... I know at times I wasn’t great. I hope and pray I’m playing when my team comes to town and (we) roll them."  People are very upset about this and he issued an apology.  What should he have said?  "I will miss the loyal and wonderful Browns fans, especially the ones who cheered when I got injured.  I look forward to coming back here with a new team and I hope the Browns crush us."  Kudos to him for saying what he really meant and really not being all that offensive anyway.  Derek, you can keep the balls dry for Eli Manning anyday...just stay off the field. 

-Mike Dunleavy got canned as Clippers GM and found out about the move because a reported from ESPN asked him what he thought of it.  The Clips then went out and lost by 30 that night.  That pretty much sums up everything you need to know about them.

-The Jets, who have the best corner in football, just got one of the best corners in football to play on the other side.  That pretty much sums up the opposite of everything you thought you knew about them.

-The NFL Combine happened.  People ran and jumped.  Al Davis decided to draft the fastest person there with the Raiders' first pick.

-Speaking of the fastest person there, my mom (Hall of Famer, Kathy Bergen) set two World Records and an American Record at a Masters track meet a few weeks ago.  Incidentally, I really feel that she should now sign her name, "Kathy Bergen, Legend" as though it is a masters degree or a doctorate or something.

-Some race car driver got angry and ran down and crashed into another race car driver repeatedly until he wrecked because he was mad at him.  NASCAR gave the guy a three week probation, so apparently the penalty for attempted murder in the South is no longer jail.  NASCAR has seen it's popularity wane in the last few years, so they decided to allow drivers to police themselves more and let these types of things be handled on the track.  In other words, they feel that having people run into one another at 150 miles an hour will draw in more fans.  This seems a little far-fetched to me because I didn't think demolition derbies were that popular.  Maybe they just haven't been going fast enough.  This will probably be less fun when people start dying.

-The Winter Olympics presented a whole slew of events that made me look again at the Definition of Sport.  The Sport vs. Non-Sport lists grew as well.  Stay tuned.

-A women's college basketball player socked another one.  Also Connecticut's women have just set the record for longest winning streak.  Some folks say these things should make me want to take interest in women's college basketball.  Somehow women fighting means they've reached a certain level of legitimacy and passion.  And UConn's excellence supposedly shows that women can play on a really high level.  Frankly, all this makes me think is that some girl is a thug and the sport is more of a joke than ever since one team can win their games by an average of 30 points all season.  I've said it before, but I don't watch women's basketball because they are not as fast or athletic as men's basketball players.  That's not sexist, it's science (thanks Ron Burgundy).  I don't watch minor league baseball either, because it is not as good a game as major league baseball.  I also don't watch the Raiders for the same reason, and even if Tom Cable punched an assistant coach, I still wouldn't.  Oh, that happened?  Ok, I'll YouTube it.

-Milton Bradley, who signed with the Mariners this offseason, said it wasn't his fault that he kept getting into trouble when he was on the _______ (insert team here).

There are many, many more, but I need to find a job and there's only so much time I can spend on this crap.

The Ultimate Power Rankings, March 10

Every sports site and channel seems to publish a constant stream of power rankings (I am guilty considering I have a weekly California Division I college basketball power ranking on CBS2.com), so I have decided to add the Ultimate Power Rankings here occasionally. This week's top 10 are as follows, in no particular order, and there are only 9:

Oklahoma Women's Basketball player Courtney Paris took the microphone at Senior Night and declared that if the Sooners do not win the national championship this season, she will return her scholarship to the university. It has been reported that this is worth about $64,000. My head is spinning with follow up comments on this one: "Suck on that, Jim Calhoun!" $64,000 for room, board, books, fees and meals at OU? How much does this girl eat (a lot, by the way)? Oklahoma lost by 30 to the undefeated Connecticut early in the season, so I hope Paris has a good job lined up after graduation (does the WNBA even pay $64,000 year?).

Gonzaga led the WCC men's final game against St. Mary's 1-0 with 20 minutes to go in the first half. How? Apparently a St. Mary's player dunked a ball in warm up and was assessed a technical foul and the Zags made the shot before the tip-off. Imagine if St. Mary's had lost by 1. Fortunately they doused that fire early and went out and lost by 100 (approximately).

Dwyane Wade is pretty good, whether he knows how to spell "Dwayne" properly or not. Monday's finish was one of the great endings to an NBA game in a long, long time, and it was one of three buzzer beating 3-three pointers for Wade in this game alone! How good is that LeBron vs. Wade second round series going to be?

There is nothing better than blind homer announcers. On AM710 yesterday (ESPN radio in L.A.), they had three local NBA "experts" talking about the Lakers and Andrew Bynum's return. One guy said that having him get hurt and not return till the playoffs have already begun is a blessing in disguise because he will have to come back and play with the second team until he shows he is ready to start (if ever). So this guy said that this is all a good thing because of what a boon he'll be to the Lakers' second team. Now that is how you find some silver lining.

My ultimate frisbee team, Slow Children at Play, won the L.A. Winter league title this weekend after last year going 0-the season, including being beaten 15-0 in one game. But that's not the best part. In the final game, we were down 14-7 (game to 15, win by 2) and we came back to win 18-16 in easily the most dramatic sporting event I have ever been a part of. I kid you not, people rushed the field.

I absolutely love all of the "bubble watch" conjecture that is all over everywhere right now. This is funny because of how much I can't stand mock drafts, which are essentially the same thing. I think the difference is that the NCAA tourney talk starts in earnest about two weeks before selection Sunday and by that time the guesses are fairly accurate and informed. While the mock drafts will start 4-5 months before, when the guesses are like a monkey throwing poo at a draft board and then measuring which players got more crap on their faces.

The Netherlands beat the Dominican Republic in the World Baseball Classic despite having Sidney Ponson as their only Major League star, with the term "star" used extraordinarily loosely. The Dominican team has 23 Major Leaguers. That's a 2008-sized upset and perhaps the first really good one of 2009. They play a rematch-elimination game against one another today. Best of all, the Netherlands dropped Andruw Jones from their team since the last WBC. How far have you fallen if the Netherlands would rather not have you on their team and you are a former Major League Baseball Player of the Year, Rookie of the Year and 10-time consecutive Gold Glove winner?

March Madness is here. Yesterday I watched five college basketball games, four of which were tournament finals with the winners going to the Big Dance. Today around 10 a.m. when I first went to check on who was playing today and when, there were already two conference tournament games underway. Spectacular.

The New York Jets were supposedly a team that "needed" to sign Terrell Owens. And when you consider that they haven't won a Super Bowl in 40 years, maybe the risk of a little controversy in the clubhouse would be worth signing a top-line talent. After all, they did dump their franchise quarterback and send him off to a division rival in order to sign Brett Favre just a year ago, so they're not afraid of making a splash. But despite decades of losing and frustration and embarrassment, a Jets official came out last week and said, "What message are we sending to the team if it signed Owens?” That's how big of an a-hole Terrell Owens is. After allowing star receiver Laveranues Coles to leave via free agency, essentially they said they'd rather not have any wide receivers than have have T.O. on their team. How can you not love the Jets after this?

If The Jets Beat The Patriots, And No One Was Watching...

Thursday night, the Jets got to get a real look at Brett Favre for the first time since he joined them. Sure, they've won six other games Favre threw six touchdowns in one of them and won another by 44. But this was one of the bigger games in regular season franchise history: on the road, tied for first, at New England, in the latter half of the season. And from what I've read, Farve was his usual spectacular self. Of course it wasn't on TV, so how would I know?

This was the second of the NFL network's eight televised games this season. Few people really noticed that they missed the Browns and Broncos last week, but this one hurt a little. You may remember from last year (when the debate got hot) and the year before that the NFL network is not carried on most cable companies so a huge majority of football fans cannot watch their programming.

The reason for the debate is that the NFL wants its network to be carried on basic cable like, for instance, ESPN. If placed there, they maximize their viewership and can charge boatloads more for advertising. However, the cable companies do not think that the channel is a viable choice for their basic packages since it is niche programming, it will fit better in their sports packages, and it is too expensive. The cable companies will have to pay the NFL network for the programming, so they will have to raise rates for their customers. Their argument is that rates should not raise for all basic cable customers, rather only the customers who want this channel. Clearly at some point, someone will notice that the way to solve this is a la carte pricing for cable. Until then, we are stuck.

Dish and DirecTV both bought into the NFL network and offer the channel on their basic services. But only around 20% of homes in the U.S. have satellite (and that number is a high estimate).

As a pretty big sports fan, I can say whole-heartedly that I do not want to be forced to pay extra for the NFL network and am thrilled that the cable companies haven't bowed to the NFL's pressure. So I missed last night's game. Bummer. But if I was paying for this network, that would be three-and-a-half hours of program I watched, followed by 164.5 hours till next week's game that I wouldn't watch. And next week is Cincy vs. Pittsburgh which I wouldn't watch. In fact, the only other game this season I might watch on NFL network is Arizona at Philly, but it is on Thanksgiving day, so I'd probably miss it anyway.

The NFL network folks like to say that for the price of a cup of coffee a week, you could get 24-hour NFL coverage. The problem is that makes 3.5 hours I want, and 8756.5 hours I don't this year. No thanks. Either put it into the sports package and let sports fan pay the bill or just put the games On Demand and I'll buy them individually (which is also where TV programming is going).

The funniest part of this debate is last season in Week 17: the Giants played the Pats with the undefeated regular season on the line, the Giants playing their starters in a "meaningless game," New York vs. Boston, etc. etc. There was so much of a stink raised around the country about that game only airing on 1-in-5ish TVs, that Congress stepped in and told the NFL network that they were being stupid and forced them to air the game on network TV as well.

So the moral of the story is that while most of us can't get this channel, if we really cared we would make it happen and still not have to pay for it.

A Brave, Unproductive, New World

A new era in my life has begun and there is almost no way that it can be positive in almost any way...

A sports bar has opened within stumbling distance of my apartment.

It was bad enough that my brother, who is my best friend and best sports-watching-buddy, and his new bride moved in across the street from me. That was enough of a distraction from real-world responsibilities (especially since they have Guitar Hero). But now that a sports bar has been thrown into the mix, my wife is in deep trouble. And apparently a bowling alley is being built across the street from the bar.

The bar, Big Wangs Wings, opened this past weekend was an absolute mad-house on Sunday for the NFL games despite that the air conditioning doesn't work yet and it was somewhere between 80 and 400 in there. There were people standing along the walls waiting for a table to open up (good luck) and it was the most egalitarian sports crowd I have ever seen.

With no L.A. football team, and with the fact that everyone from L.A. is from somewhere else, we tend to have pretty eclectic crowds, but generally if you go to a bar, there is always one team that dominates the crowd (Raiders, Chargers and 49ers usually, unless it is a "Patriots bar", etc.). The opening weekend festive atmosphere was perhaps to blame, but any time anyone did anything in any game, the place erupted.

I saw jerseys from all of the following teams: Seattle, New Orleans, Jets, Giants, New England, Denver, San Diego, Indianapolis, San Francisco, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Oakland and even Kansas City. And I wasn't there for the early games!

When Jay Cutler held up his two fingers after scoring that last minute touchdown and the Broncos went for, and converted, the two-point conversion, the roof almost blew off of the place. It was one of the great sports-related moments I can remember being a part of (except for the openly weeping by the Chargers fan sitting next to me who was utterly confused by the no-fumble call that ruined his entire existence). There were people standing on top of booths hugging perfect strangers. It was spectacular.

To say the least, I will be back next Sunday. And as soon as I let my wife know that they have bloody mary specials on weekends, she will be joining me.

As for the games themselves, I only have a few observations from last weekend: Devon Hester was carted off of the field with a rib injury. Where are his ribs, because mine don't really have much to do with walking. Ladainian Tomlinson is a huge sissy. He missed three quarters with a jammed toe? Pull it out and get in there. You are the best player on your team/league; you are playing a divisional rival; you are already 0-1 and 0-2 = no playoffs; and you are the #1 draft pick in every fantasy draft in the country (except for those of you who smartly picked Adrian Peterson like I did). The Giants may never lose again (especially if they keep getting to play terrible teams!). Tom Brady is totally over-rated and should start looking for another team. Matt Cassel may have just "Tom Brady'ed" him...or not. The Pats may get things together and be good, but they aren't doing anything in January, but when the Jets figure out what the hell to do with their offense, they might be. USC got 61 of 64 first place votes in the AP poll. The three people who did not vote for them after they beat the #5 team by 32 should have the right to vote stripped from them. No one, but a shameless Georgia alumnus would vote for them after they struggled to beat a crappy team and USC did what they did. And finally, Vin Scully has a very hard time using linking verbs (but I still want him to tell me stories as I fall asleep each night).

I'm Back...What Did I Miss?

So it has been nearly a month since I last added any new posts to this site but that is just because not much has really been happening in the sports world, plus that photo of the guy getting hit with a soccer ball was too spectacular to replace as the top story photo. Here's a quick, cursory glance at the insignificant stories and events that have taken place since my last post:

The Summer Olympics
I suppose that the fact that NBC is airing 216 hours of coverage per day (I did not make that up, that is their official number) means the Olympics are kindof a big deal. A few months ago, I wrote that the best Olympic rivalry is the U.S. and Australia in swimming. After Michael Phelps (ever heard of him?) tied the Aussies with eight gold medals through the end of the swim meet, I think the rivalry may be no more. Ian Thorpe looked more and more pissed every time they showed him on T.V. as the meet went along. It was wonderful.

Team Handball has once again become my favorite Olympic sport that no one knows about. In the Winter Olympics, it is usually the biathlon because the fact that they race around while armed, having the full capability to shoot their competitors gives me a great thrill. There should be an open-water swimming obstacle course in which the athletes are armed with harpoon guns. That's how to make the most out of those underwater cameras. Tell me you wouldn't watch.

Chris Kaman has taken a lot of flak for playing for the German National Basketball Team in the Olympics from seemingly everyone in the United States, including the Clippers and his own father. But at least Kaman is of German descent. Becky Hammon is playing for Russia because she was a free agent!

Because there is no women's professional basketball league anymore, you may not know about her, but the 2007 WBNA MVP was not selected to the U.S. National Team. (Wait, 2007? Oh, I guess the WNBA does still exist. Oops.) Hammon, who has been about as big a star as anyone not named Lisa Leslie, wasn't chosen to be among those trying out for the U.S. team. She plays for the WNBA's San Antonio Feminine Sounding Mascots, but in the off-season played for a Russian team coached by their National Team coach who offered her a chance to play with them for cash.

Hammon defends herself saying that athletes have competed for other countries than their native homelands quite commonly and that naturalization is a common practice. I agree. The U.S. track team's best milers are from Sudan and Kenya and I root for them. The problem I have with Hammon's situation is that it was purely a financial thing. She doesn't live there. She doesn't even really speak Russian. She has no connection to Russia. She wasn't oppressed or forced from her war-torn homeland. She just wasn't good enough to make it here anymore. Basically, she was an aging free agent and signed a deal to play for a club, and that is what is sad about the Olympics now.

I get that the games need to feature pros now because there is too much money at stake for countries to send people they know are not their countries' best. Advertisers would never pay for a college all-star basketball team. The ironic thing is that sports like baseball and tennis are in danger of disappearing from the Games for good (baseball is already out for 2012) because the best athletes...that is, the pros...don't see the value in playing and often sit out in favor of prepping for their professional leagues (baseball playoffs and U.S. Open). So because they may only get amateurs to play in the future, they will be dumped from the Olympics.

In other Olympic news, the U.S. soccer team stunk so badly, and interest has dipped so deeply, that they weren't even on T.V. Well they were on T.V. because again, there is 216 hours of coverage per day, but they were relegated to the midday time-slots on Oxygen or something. Where have you gone Cobi Jones?

Did you know that little girl who sang the song near the end of the Opening Ceremony (I don't really know what I am talking about because I didn't watch it) was lip-syncing? Government censors stepped in minutes before the Ceremony and forced the 'ole switcheroo because the girl actually singing wasn't cute enough and they didn't want an image of Chinese people possibly being ugly beamed out to billions of people around the world. I have seen some of their athletes and I can say that that ship has sailed.

The New York Bretts
The embarrassing Brett Favre mess finally ended with an abrupt and surprising trade to the Jets. That along with a Mets win that day made for the best day in months for my brother Steve. And he got married a week ago! Favre was traded for a conditional draft pick which means that the more he plays, and the better the Jets do, the higher the pick that the Packers get becomes. The thing is, the Jets still would only have to give up one first round pick next year if they make the Super Bowl. Correct me if I am wrong, but I don't think there is a single sports fan or front-office person for any sport on earth who would not give their next 3-5 first round draft picks for a trip to their league's championship (besides people in Boston who have completely forgotten what being a real fan is like).

Manny Goes To Hollywood
The Dodgers traded nothing for the best hitter in baseball, thus making their need to sign Barry Bonds disappear. Manny has been spectacular since joining the Dodgers, hitting .424 with 6 homers and 21 RBI in 16 games. He has done everything right, including saying he wanted to finish his career in L.A., invigorating a completely stagnant offense, and saying he'd even gladly cut his hair as per team rules (still waiting on that one). And best of all, they have pulled into a tie for the Division lead with the D-Backs. Of course, they were only one game back when he was traded. So after two weeks of everything going their way, they have gained a game in the standings and have only been playing four-games over .500. They'll miss the playoffs and he'll sign with the Yankees for five-years and $100-million.

Late-Season Baseball Packages
For the last few years, I have waited for the last month of the baseball season or so, and then signed up for the MLB.tv package where I get to watch all the Mets games live online (besides the 4-5 games per week that are blocked out because the whole system is corrupt). I wait on this because the entire season is far too expensive at the start and typically I would not have been able to watch 100+ games, thus making it worth it. But they prorate the package and you can get the last month for $15-$20 (right now it is $30 for the premium package, $20 for the basic with 1/4ish of the season to go).

Before signing up, I decided to try the cable company to see what their prorated price is for the same package on TV instead of the internet because I'd rather sit on the couch than in this chair. They don't prorate it after midseason! That's right, for the low-low price of $130, you too can watch the last 38 games for the same price as if there were 81 games left. What a deal! And Major League Baseball wonders why they're losing fans? I can't afford to go to a game or watch it on T.V. anymore. And the games I get for free are mostly on Fox, which means they take twice as long as they're supposed to and I have to deal with fancy space-themed sound effects and graphics every time Tim McCarver misreads a stat sheet.

Kraft Pleased: Paper Says He Only Cheated A Little

I am glad that Robert Kraft, owner of the New England Patriots, feels "vindicated" after the Boston Herald published an apology for reporting that the team had taped the Rams' 2002 Super Bowl walk-through as a part of the worst-named controversy in history - Spygate.

Apparently the paper printed that among the eight tapes that a Pats former employee was turning over to the league was of the practice, which would have amounted to cheating in the Super Bowl. The NFL would not have taken the Super Bowl title away. They didn't force forfeits in of any of the games they have proof that the Pats were cheating in, and they wouldn't have started with the Super Bowl!

The report wound up being false, the tapes showed they cheated in eight other games, including the 2002 AFC Championship game, but not the Super Bowl. So I can see why Kraft feels vindicated. I mean, anybody would be ok with cheating and then being called a cheater, but how dare they call him a huge cheater!

After reviewing this new set of tapes, the NFL has ruled that the Pats cheated a number of times between 2000-2002 and then again in the first game of 2007 (when they got caught), but no other times. Never mind that between 2002 and 2007, a number of teams said they suspected the Pats and the Packers even said they caught the Pats cheating but didn't report it. Never mind that it was essentially the same staff during all of this time. Never mind that it was apparently working very well when they used this strategy, and they didn't get caught until a former Pats assistant didn't like them doing it to his team.

It makes complete sense that despite all that, the Patriots just stopped cheating for five years and then resumed at the Meadowlands last Fall. It makes sense that Belichick would wait all that time and then break out the old illegal video-taping technique again against a very bad team that was coached by his former protege, who now hated him, and who would have known the Pats would likely cheat. It also makes complete sense that Belichick stopped the apparently effective taping for five years despite that he insists he was not aware that it was illegal.

I am sure that the Patriots did not cheat in every single one of those games between 2002 and 2007. I am sure that the fact that Walsh did not have tapes, and the Pats did not turn in tapes from those years means that there are none and it never happened. That makes complete sense. Even though they cheated and got caught, then lied and said those were the only times they'd done it...and then it was discovered that tapes from at least eight more games existed, why can't we all trust them on their word that now they really mean that there were no other instances?

How dare the newspapers accuse the Patriots of being huge cheaters and liars when it is clear that they are only big fat cheaters and liars. Good for Kraft to come out of his castle to show his disdain for the press at having the audacity to call it like they saw it.