G-Rob's Perfect Opportunity

The mark of a good coach is utilizing the best tools he has to his advantage. In 2008, Greg Robinson has the tools. Whether he chooses to use them will decide his fate.
If you're not a fan of Syracuse Football (and that breed is more endangered than the Narwal), you probably won't recognize the names Taj Smith, Mike Williams, Da'Mon Merkerson, Lavar Lobdell or Deandre Preaster, but if you're Syracuse Football Coach Greg Robinson, those names and how they are featured on the field represent the only chance you have of surviving the 2008 season.

To say that Greg Robinson's tenure with the 'Cuse has been rocky would be an understatement. Since taking over the 'Cuse, Robinson is 7-28. He just fired Brian White, his 2nd Offensive Coordinator since taking over and is working on picking the third in four years. And with this team Robinson finally has the personnel around whom he can sculpt an offensive philosophy. These are his guys of his choosing and some of them are fucking good. Mike Williams has the potential to be a top 15 draft pick. He'll be one of the best players to come out when he does. Taj Smith, when healthy, is a beast and can break a play better than most in the Big East. Lavar Lobdell has all the promise in the world if he can get his head on straight and get himself involved in the offense. And then they've got the Sophomore Merkerson who was highly recruited out of high school and the kid Preaster coming in next year who both are impact players. That core group of wide receivers are as good in any in the Big East. With offensive line and running back concerns and a defensive that is suspect at best, Robinson needs to show now that he understands what he's got and what he's up against. He needs to hire a guy who will spread it out and fire it downfield. He needs to go 4 wide and score 40 a game. That is what this 2008 Syracuse team is setup to do. He needs to show that he can coach or he's gonna be shown the door.

Exclusive Footage Of The Bart Scott Freak Out

This video didn't capture when he threw the flag into the stands but you get the picture. This Ravens team does an awful lot of complaining.

Hank Is Taking This "Steinbrenner Role" Awfully Seriously

Hank Steinbrenner isn't just as pompous and arrogant as his dad, but now he's breaking the rules just like dear old dad used to do.
When George Steinbrenner paid some scumbag to dig up dirt on Dave Winfield simply because he didn't like the guy, big Stein got himself banned from baseball (only to be reinstated 3 years later). It was Steinbrenner's second Commissioner-Ordered absence from the game of baseball and just one of many of Steinbrenner's less than admirable maneuvers. Now that Steinbrenner has moved off into la la land, his son Hank has stepped up and filled that substantial void of low class behavior.

After Hank shot his mouth off, not only was it reported that the Twins and most others in the MLB were laughing at him, but now it seems the Twins might pursue tampering charges:

A Twins official this morning confirmed that the club is not pleased with comments made by Yankees senior vice president Hank Steinbrenner about trade talks involving Santana.

When asked if he thought the comments constituted tampering, the official replied, “We’re not happy. We’ll deal with this internally.'’

It’s unsure if the Twins will pursue tampering charges (or what the penalties are) but it’s definitely added even more spice to the Twins attempts to trade Santana - as if more was needed.

I'm sorry for devoting so much time to this, but you have to admit, between spending $400 million on guys they will pay well into their forties, getting all uppity with A-Rod and then paying him the exact same amount, setting some bullshit deadline and getting called out on it and now possibly tampering charges.... the Hank Steinbrenner era is pretty entertaining.

In The Steinbrenner Family, The Asshat Doesn't Fall Too Far From The Tree

So lil' Stein says the Yanks are gonna pull their offer for the best pitcher in baseball after Monday because he doesn't like waiting. That seems reasonable.
It's been less than a week since the Twins made it clear that Johan Santana was definitely on the trading block. In that week there has been a lot of back and forth and speculation and conjecture and posturing and all the other bullshit that goes along with these types of things in the MLB. Well, it seems that Hank Steinbrenner has had just about enough of your "negotiating." According to lil' Stein, if the Twins don't take their final offer by Monday, the Yanks will go on their merry way:

"By tomorrow," Steinbrenner said (of the deadline) Sunday.

..."The Twins are aware of it, that I'm not going to wait much longer. And the truth of the matter is, they don't want to be stuck with only one team to deal with. If they're stuck with just Boston, they're going to get a lot less. I'm not going to be played. This is not a game. This is serious business. I'm not going to be played, us against the Red Sox. That's not going to happen."

You tell em, Hank! You're not gonna get stuck in some kind of bidding war like the one that already happened where you first refuse to give up Phil Hughes and then concede that you have to because the Sox countered with a better offer (like I said before, I don't necessarily believe that this "bidding war" went down the way it is portrayed in the media, but Steinbrenner makes it seems as though that's exactly how it went down).

But here's the thing that gets me: why is this deadline necessary? Steinbrenner claims that they have to move on because they don't want to miss out on a potential deal for Dan Haren but then later notes, "Nobody wants to lose the Yankees in a negotiation." EXFUCKINGACTLY. Oakland's not going to do a deal without calling the Yanks to see what they will offer. The Yanks won't miss out on shit. And if and when the A's call, the Yanks can give them their offer pending the outcome of the Santana deal and I can guarantee you that the A's will wait. Because if the Yanks lose out on Santana, THEY HAVE TO get Dan Haren. The A's won't come close to dealing Haren utnil the Santana deal is sewn up. That deal is their leverage. The Sox must be ROFL right now (sorry about the text message lingo). They can just sit back and wait wait for Monday to pass and bullshit that they'll go higher than the Yanks. Once the Yanks are "out," the leverage falls apart. And another thing, if the Twins come back on Tuesday and say, "we'll take your deal," Hank will fucking sign the paper work faster than you can say "sweet buzz cutt."

But my favorite part has to be the selective memory that spawned this little ditty from Hank:

"I don't really care what the Red Sox offer, to tell you the truth," Steinbrenner said. "The way I do things is, I make a strong offer, take it or leave it."

Yes, A-Rod would agree that once you turn down Hank's initial strong offer, there's no looking back. This deadline reeks of pompous blowhard and stale cigarette breath, and as a Sox fan, I fucking love it.

I Don't Want To Say I Told You So.... Well, Maybe I Do

Rory the Lion doesn't like what sees in Detroit these days.
About a month ago, I wrote a piece about how the Lions were not nearly as good as their 6-2 record and the only decent teams they played beat them handily. I suggested that not only would they not get to Kitna's promised 10 wins but that they would likely win only one more game the rest of the way. There were some who doubted this theory and others who objected more strongly to it. One commenter was rather forthcoming and undaunted with his disgust and offered his own predictions:

"[The Lions] are just as good as the Cowgirls, Giants, and Packers. The feel good story of Brett Favre will come down to earth on Thanksgiving when the Lions destroy them .... I sure hope everyone continues to doubt the Lions this season because WHEN they have a first round bye in the playoffs people will finally smarten up. Then again people will continue to doubt them until they DEFEAT the previous unbeaten New England Patriots in Super Bowl XLII, which I may add is in Arizona, the home of the Cardinals: the team you say will be the home of the Lions final victory. Well your (sic) right in that respect. Sort of..."

The Lions are now 6-6 and finish the season against the Cowboys, Chargers, Chiefs and Packers. That's 1-3 at best. Don't say I didn't warn you...

Do I Believe Any Of These Sox / Yanks / Santana Leaks? Not For A Second

When the Sox and Yanks are involved in a potential trade, there's more feces in the air than a Chinese take-out kitchen.
The Johan Santana trade situation is infuriating. Every minute there's a new story about a different player the Sox or Yanks are willing to part with for Santana despite the fact that the player was labeled "untouchable" in a previous leaked story. And there are the stories about the stories. Writers are writing stories about how the teams are using the media to leak bullshit trade props in order to make the other team up their offer and get rid of better players. And the writers are perfectly happy to oblige and post as many bullshit stories as possible no matter how realistic. It's f'n ridiculous and I don't believe a fucking peep of it. I think when you step back and take a look at the two teams involved in this, it's easy to see exactly what's going to happen without trying to weave through the thorny thatch of misinformation the writers are feeding us.

First, the Yanks need Santana much more than the Sox do for a ton of reasons. The first being that their current rotation is not really major league quality. So far it looks like Wang, Mussina and three guy who have combined for less than 20 starts over their entire careers combined. And as much as you might love the idea of Hughes, Chamberlain and Kennedy starting some day, that is about as shaky a rotation as there is in the AL East and perhaps all of the major leagues. I know everyone loves Joba Chamberlain (and if you've been a reader here for awhile you know that I do not), but you have no fucking clue what those 3 young guys will give you as starters and even less of a clue what Mussina has left. That rotation is in dire need of a frontline starter. Meanwhile the Sox have 6 guys in their starting rotation right now and two guys in the minors who they think they could bring up at any point this season in Masterson and Bowden. While the addition of Santana certainly wouldn't be a downgrade, there's not as much of a need.

Second, the Sox will not part with either Buchholz or Ellsbury and the Yanks will not part with Cano, Jackson or Tabata. I don't care what you read, none of those guys are going anywhere. The position players especially will go nowhere. Projecting position talent is INFINITELY more reliable than pitching talent. The Yanks are old at every position except 2nd base. Cano is a potential perennial All-Star while Jackson and Tabata (Tabata in particular) are well developed talent in a system very light on good position talent. None of those guys are going anywhere. Ellsbury is locked up by the Sox for a bunch of years for cheap and is the best position prospect in their organization. Meanwhile the guy Ellsbury is replacing, Coco Crisp, is a top notch defender who the Twins could use and who they can move to Oakland for Haren if the Santana deal falls through or to the White Sox straight up for a young arm. Why would the Sox trade their younger, cheaper and better CF option for a position of depth in their organization when teams are interested in the older, shittier and more expensive CF?

Third, other than Chamberlain, the Yanks will give up ANY combination of young pitchers to get Santana. This seems like common sense to me but no one seems to get it. Of the three young pitchers on the Yanks, it is likely that one will flame out and be out of baseball in a couple years, one may find his way to the bottom of a rotation at some point in his career and one may become a number 2 starter, probably after Tommy John surgery. But it is even safer to say that NONE OF THEM will become Johan Santana. Let me repeat that. Of all the pitchers being considered for the trade for Johan Santana, NONE will be as good as Santana. Not Joba Chamberlain or Clay Buchholz or Phil Hughes or Ian Kennedy or Michael Bowden or Justin Masterson. The chance that these guys never throw a pitch again in the majors is ten times more likely than the chance that they become a starter even in spitting distance of the talent level of Santana. So the idea that the Yanks would think twice about the giving up the middle of the rotation ceiling of Ian Kennedy or the top of the rotation potential and mounting injury history of Phil Hughes for the best pitcher in baseball is absurd. They will trade any of those guys. The only reason they wouldn't trade Chamberlain is for PR reasons. People haven't fallen in love with Hughes or Kennedy yet (though they probably should love Kennedy because he may be the smartest "pitcher" of the bunch), so they won't be as upset if those guys are moved, even if it may be true that Hughes and Kennedy have a better starter's pedigree.

Fourth(ly), the idea that the Yanks, Twins and Sox are talking and accidentally leaking this information is flat out comical. The Sox don't talk about this shit in public. Ever. Under Theo, they have a steadfast policy of complete radio silence during negotiations. And unlike past regimes, it's actually been effective. The Gagne deal got done in the last days without too many people knowing. The trades for Renteria and Coco Crisp came out of nowhere, as did the famous Nomar trade. Nobody saw that coming. It doesn't benefit the Sox to have other teams know what they are offering. So the only reason that this information would come out would be to provide bullshit information so that other teams up their offers. But there is no way that the other teams aren't aware of this, so it ends up being bullshitters bullshitting other bullshitters. It's all so fucking stupid.

Lastly, you're kidding yourselves if you think that anyone other than the Yanks are getting Santana. In the end, they'll include Hughes, Cabrera and possibly Sanchez or some other young arm (maybe even Kennedy) in order to get a deal done. It makes too much sense. The Twins can't afford Santana so it makes sense for them to move him now when his value is highest (Santana has a history of starting slowly in the first half of the season so his value might decrease by the trade deadline). The Yanks have talent the Twins need and they have a gaping hole at the top of their rotation. Throw in the fact that their biggest rival has won two world series over the last 5 years to the Yanks' none and that their fans are being told that the Sox are in prime position to grab Santana without substantially decreasing the talent in their organization (creating a Beckett, Dice-K, Santana, Buchholz rotation for the next 4 years at least), and it's a no brainer.

My guess is that the 72 hour negotiating window is opened tomorrow and by Wednesday the Yanks have their man at 7 years for around $180 million with Hughes, Cabrera and Horne (or possibly Sanchez) gone to the Twins. As a Sox fan, I'll be glad it's all over. And more importantly, I can't wait for the Jacoby and the Sox to take on the Yanks and their elderly outfield threesome of Matsui, Damon and Abreu. Even Manny could hit a triple against that crew.

Paul Harris Is Charles Barkley

If this Syracuse team is going anywhere, it will be because Paul Harris wants it to.
Syracuse small forward Paul Harris has a game only a mother could love. He can't shoot from outside of 10 feet, he's not that sweet from the free throw line and he just plays ugly. He bangs, he turns the ball over on ill-advised passes and he forces tough shots around the rim without giving a second thought to whether his shot will get sent into next week. But it's that ugliness that makes him so good. He is always around the ball, routinely outrebounding guys half a foot taller than and putting it back up in traffic with reckless abandon. It doesn't hurt that he's built like a truck. He's 6'5", 235lbs and looks like a linebacker out there. Watching him play reminds me of someone about his size who about 2 decades ago played in almost the exact same fashion. So much so that I decided to look up his stats and compare the two. And when I did, I was struck by how much their games mirror eachother. That man, Charles Barkley.

First, Barkley's college playing size was 6'6", 235lbs. Paul Harris is 6'5", 235lbs. So the size is almost exactly the same. But check out how similarly their stats are:

Paul Harris
06-07 Syr 8.6 pts 7.1 rebs 1.6 A's 0.8 stls 0.6 blks 68.1 FT%
07-08 Syr 12.2 pts 10.5 rebs 3.8 A's 2.2 stls 0.5 blks 72.4 FT%

Charles Barkley
81-82 Aub 12.7 pts 9.8 rebs 1.1 A's 1.8 stls 0.5 blks 63.6 FT%
82-83 Aub 13.0 pts 8.6 rebs 1.6 A's 1.5 stls 1.0 blks 63.1 FT%
83-84 Aub 15.1 pts 9.5 rebs 2.1 A's 1.8 stls 1.1 blks 68.3 FT%

It's remarkable how similar they are. Paul is a little more complete a player who looks to dish more often and playing the wing on the 2-3 zone doesn't give him the opportunities to block shots like Barkley did in man-to-man, and Barkley was a little more valuable on the offensive end, but other than that their production is almost identical. And I love watching Harris play in the same way I remember watching Barkley play. If Paul can keep this up, he make a name for himself in the same way... at least on the court.

After This Garza Trade, The D-Rays* Might Be Pretty Good

With 3 young studs at the top of that rotation and the young stars in that lineup, the D-Rays might just be worth watching.
To say that the D-Rays are a second rate baseball franchise would be giving them too much credit. Their moniker was ridiculous even before the cut the "Devil" out of it. Their uniforms look like they were put together by Ally Sheedy and Molly Ringwald circa 1988. Their manager looks like he should be leading a poetry jam in Park Slope, Brooklyn (I will admit, however, that I really like Joe Maddon and think he's a pretty smart and fearless manager) and they play in a poorly lit mini-putt course in front of less people than the average attendance at MENSA meetings in L.A. (Hey-Yo!). Oh, and they also suck at baseball, finishing last every year but one (we all remember that magical summer of 2004 when they finished 4th) over their entire history (spanning a full decade). But after this Garza trade and with the flier on Troy Percival combined with the emergence of the likes of Carlos Pena, BJ Upton and Jamie Shields... the D-Rays are pretty f'n good.

Lost in the shuffle of the thrice daily updates on the status of the 4th prospect in the hypothetical Santana to the Sox / Yanks deal was the trade that actually occurred between the D Rays and the Twins in which they effectively swapped outfielder Delmon Young for pitcher Matt Garza. And while Young has some name value for finishing second in the AL ROY voting and for being the perhaps the top prospect in baseball before last year, the real prize of this deal was actually Garza. Going into this year, Garza was the top prospect in a deep Twins minor league system. Projected a number one starter, Garza has dominated at every level and was named "Minor League Player of The Year" in 2006 by USA Today; joining a list of former winners including Francisco Liriano, Prince Fielder, Jose Reyes and Josh Beckett. If Garza were in NY or Boston, he would be an "untouchable." He was "Phil Hughes" before Phil Hughes. It was assumed that Garza would jump into the rotation in 2007 but due in large part to a disagreement over how the organization used him and overprotected him after a bizarre neck injury (he had what was called "common somatic disorder"), Garza and the Twins were never really on the same page and he wasn't the first or second pitcher called up in 2007. He didn't take it very well and coming into the offseason the rumors began that the Twins were willing to part with him. They certainly couldn't be faulted for doing it given their depth at pitching (see Bonser, Slowey, Liriano and whoever they get back from the Santana trade) and need for pop in the outfield, but whoever was going to get Garza was going to get a potential Ace at below market value because of the non-baseball issues. That's where the Rays come in.

The Garza-Young trade almost made too much sense. The Rays are hemorrhaging young talent in the outfield and despite finishing as the ROY runner-up this past year, he may have been the fifth most talented outfielder in the D-Rays organization (whether he is more or less talented than Elijah Dukes remains to be seen. Dukes certainly one-ups him in the crazy department). But now with Garza in the rotation, the Rays feature a top 3 of Jamie Shields (12-8, 3.85 ERA, 184K's, 34BB's), Scott Kazmir (13-9, 3.48 ERA, led the league in K's) and Matt Garza, the aforementioned potential right-handed Ace. As presently constituted, I'd take that threesome over the every top 3 of any staff in the AL other than the Sox, Indians, Detroit or Toronto (even though I said "as presently constituted," I assume Johan won't be with the Twins). The other two guys are barely old enough to drink. That's something to build around. And that may not even be the strength of their team!

The D-Rays offense is young, fast and good. Carlos Pena is the best hitter no one's ever heard about. Pena hit 46 home runs last year. FORTY FUCKING SIX! He drove in 120 RBI... FOR THE F'N D-RAYS! He hits behind some other guys with absurd talent. Carl Crawford steals 50 bags a year and Lou Piniella called him a future batting champ (he hit .315 this year and his average has improved by an average of 10pts per year). BJ Upton is a budding superstar at center after hitting 24 homers in less than a full year of play. Elijah Dukes has more talent than he knows what to do with and if he could just calm down for half a season, he could hit 40 home runs himself (he'd also probably K 200 times and murder several small children with tossed gear). They've also got Rocco Baldelli, who if healthy... well, that's not even worth talking about. And those guys aren't the most talented guys in the organization. They are moving Akinori Iwamura to second base after a solid year at 3b (.285, 7hrs, 20 doubles) because they've got the most talented infield prospect in baseball coming up next year in Evan Longoria (no relation... to me or Eva). Longoria finished 2007 with a combined minor league average of .299, while hitting 26 HR, knocking in 95 RBI and drawing 73 walks for an OBP of .402. With Longoria in the lineup, that lineup has discipline and pop 1-6. It is a legitimate and imposing lineup that can match up with at least Toronto and Baltimore, if not the Red Sox in the AL East (no team can matchup with the paper tiger that is the Yankees lineup. On paper those guys should score about 1500 runs). Unfortunately for the D-Rays, baseball requires more than 3 starting pitchers and 6 batsmen.

The D-Rays' bullpen is their biggest weakness. Though they featured a fairly reliable closer in Al Reyes and picked up the former All-Star Troy Percival this offseason, the rest of that group blows. Last year the D-Rays featured 10 relievers with 20 or more appearances who with an ERA of at least 5.76. I personally witnessed them blow 6 games with leads of over 3 runs after the 6th inning. Their bullpen is so bad that when it gets to like the 6th or 7th inning and your team is only down 3-4 runs, you feel as though your team is winning. But the thing about bullpen strength is that it is very fickle. One year nobody can hit Kyle Farnsworth, two years later batters are knocking his down and away slider into the corner for doubles. Guys like Mike Timlin and Mike Meyers have seen multiple incarnations. So you never know what you're gonna get with your bullpen. But the D-Rays have options. If they could move a guy like Edwin Jackson to the bullpen they could get a big power arm in there for one and two inning stints. A reliable long man would give the D-Rays 6-8 wins a year (seriously).

At the end of the day, while I think the D-Rays are a fun team to watch and are CONSIDERABLY better than they have ever been, they ain't winning the AL East or the wild card. The Yanks will probably pull in Santana and the Sox have Beckett, Buchholz. and Dice-K locked up for another 4 years or so (Beckett isn't "locked up," but he's getting an extension either midway through this year or after the season). But they are markedly better than the Orioles and will compete with the Blue Jays this year. If the Sox or Yanks suffer anything even resembling a serious injury in their rotation or suffers a significant slump, don't be surprised if the woe begone D-Rays start nipping at their heals. They may not be good enough yet to win anything, but these kids are good.

*I'm aware that we are supposed to call them simply "The Rays," but I refuse to abide by that PC Christian bullshit. They are, and forever will be, the fucking Devil Rays.

Hobos Of Jamaica Are Not Fans Of Eli Manning

How bad are things for Eli? He's even lost the faith of the hobos.
If I were you, I wouldn't go hanging around the 169th and Hillside Ave subway station in Jamaica, NY anytime past 10pm (or Noon for that matter). It's not.... what's the word.... it's not.... well, safe. It's not safe. At all. Unfortunately, my circumstances require me to hang around this area after 10pm about 4 times a week. I'd have to say that it is not my favorite part of my tertiary education experience. When I'm not looking over my shoulder waiting for Hobo McStabby and Joey AIDS Face to shove me onto the tracks or jam something up my urethra (not that I'm ever taking my piece out around there), I'm dodging the rats that roam the platform like fucking free range chickens. Again, not my favorite half hour of my day.

Now normally the drunken hobos and mole people who inhabit the station stay to themselves and though I am always VERY aware of my surroundings and have one eye over my shoulder waiting for Stumbly McStinkeye to defecate on me, I rarely get harassed. That was until Tuesday evening.

On Tuesday, I had a newspaper with me and it must've been opened to an article about Eli Manning or there must've been a picture of Manning displayed to the outside because as I descended the stairs I heard two guys start to yell at me. Being the naturalized New Yorker that I am, I didn't flinch and kept on my way. The guys continued to yell and though I had trouble interpreting their husky malted drawl, this is what I think I heard:

Hobo1: Eliiiiii. You like Eliiiiiiiiiiiii?
Hobo2: The J-eyes suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck.
Hobo1: Doan...doan, doan bring Eliiii here.... Eliiiiii suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuucks. They all suck.

That last part was really the only thing I heard clearly as they were pretty close to me when that was said. After that, whatever else they were talking about must've been in hobo code because I couldn't make any of it out. The best part was when they later got on the same subway car and proceeded to have a conversation while sitting at opposite ends of the car. Always a good time.

Anyhoo, more than anything I just wanted to get this info out there for Eli's benefit in case he had any inclination to head out to Jamaica to hang out. If so, Elisha, take the bus.

HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

The Knicks gained some confidence with their 2 game win streak. So much so they started talking a little shit. That worked out well...
Here are a couple of headlines from the NY papers this morning: "BIG 3? BIG DEAL" "The Celtics aren't as good as they think they are." Quentin Richardson had this to say:

It's not that big a deal to us," Richardson said of facing the 11-2 Celtics. “It's like the media makes more of The Big Three and all of them. We're not in awe of them. They ain't won no championships. They have a good record right now, but that don't matter. Dallas showed that [last season]."

And the final score: 104 - 59!

I'm not even a Celtics fans but this is fucking fantastic. If that is not the most embarrassing on-court performance in the team's history, I don't know what is. The Knicks player said that Celts weren't deep. 5 players in double digits (not including KG who ONLY scored 8), 27 assists on 37 field goals. The Celtics could've played only their scrubs and beat the Knicks by 20. I don't think anyone in the world is as bad at anything as Isiah is at coaching basketball. If he were in any other occupation, he wouldn't just be fired, he'd be incarcerated. I'm not sure on what grounds his incarceration would be justified but holy fuck does he suck. He'd probably suck at being incarcerated too. The Knicks sucking is so much fun. I can't wait to wake up tomorrow so I can read and hear all about it!

Welcome Back Smittblogg!

The Smittblogg is BACK! Sort of. Not done with finals but I should be able to pick up the posting a little bit over the next ten days or so. It feels so good to be back. There's so much I want to talk about. I'm gonna post so much shit your ears are going to be pissing useless information and poor grammar. I fuck you not!

This Sean Taylor Thing Sucks

Whether you remember him more for the top picture or the bottom picture, it sucks to be a Skins fan today.
I'm not going to go into one of those speeches where I opine about how Sean found himself and re-dedicated himself to his wife or team or kid or whatever. I have no fucking clue about any of that, and neither does anyone else who is going to take a stab at it over the next couple of days (I'm talking to you, Peter King). I'm also not going to lament over how little we knew the kid because he was a quiet personality who always seemed to mind his own business, except when he was on the field. I'm not gonna get into the sadness of how Sean is the latest example of an athlete from a troubled background who ended up the victim of a violent crime nor will I discuss some greater significance to his death. I'm not even going to try and debate about whether it is more or less tragic that he was murdered and not the victim of some other less senseless death (not that any death makes more sense than any other I guess). The only lens through which I can view Sean Taylor's untimely demise is that of a fan. And though I'm not a Skins fan nor ever more than an admirer from afar of Taylor, for some reason his death is really bumming me out.

This is gonna come out wrong and is kinda a horrible thing to say, but when Joe Kennedy died last week and Darryl Kyle and Josh Hancock before him (those are just some of the ones I could think of off hand), I was sad for their families and friends, but I really didn't spend more than 5 seconds thinking about it. But when I woke up this morning and learned that Sean Taylor died, I was legitimately tweaked. I had to sit down for a little while and gather myself. I got the details from the various news sources and couldn't even really believe it. A lot of it probably had to do with the fact that we were re-assured that he had a good chance of being ok late last night, so the shock was a little greater upon hearing the news but that doesn't really distinguish him from the other guys because those deaths were complete shock. No, I think the thing about Sean Taylor hurt was deeper for a couple reasons.

One, the kid was indestructable. You could never imagine something hitting Sean Taylor and injuring him. It had to be the other way around. Only Sean Taylor's own blunt force against an object and an action of his own volition could create enough force to injure him. It had to be him projecting himself at that bullet, not the other way around. The other thing that made this more tragic and shocking in my eyes is that Sean was the Redskins. People I know had HIS jerseys. When the Skins were in town HE was the guy you were psyched to see. On the replays of Sunday it was Sean Taylor you expected to see taking someone's head off or being in the right place at the right time. AND HE WAS JUST GETTING STARTED! He was 24 years-old. I mean Jesus Christ! In the history of sports, has anyone so young and so outstanding been so unfortunate has to have his life stolen from him like Taylor (maybe Ernie Davis)? It's tough to get your head around.

But for a fan, I don't know how you deal with it. What is a socially acceptable level of reaction? The strange thing for me is the other day I woke up from some strange dream (yeah, that's been happening a lot recently. I need to stop falling asleep in front of the TV) thinking that Manny Ramirez had died. I realized very quickly that this wasn't the case but it got me thinking. What would I have done? I would have been devastated. Would it be ok for me to cry? I don't know the guy, don't know his family. How sad could I really be? People sobbed when Lennon was killed but that was a different time when there were fewer celebrities and far fewer as famous as John Lennon (yes, I'm equating Manny Ramirez with John Lennon and indirectly Sean Taylor. Deal with it). I know that had it been true that Manny was no longer with us, I would have reacted and been treated as though someone close to me had died. I would've gotten phone calls immediately from my friends and family. I would have been consoled by acquaintances and couldn't even imagine focusing on work or school for the immediate future. I would have been absolutely crushed and it would take me much longer than I'm comfortable talking about to get over it. Maybe that makes me crazy but I think anyone who has been a serious fan of any team would be lying if they told you they wouldn't have reacted similarly if the player they hold most dear from their favorite team met an untimely death.

So I guess I really don't know what I'm getting at here or if I have any point at all actually. I think this served as some sort of catharsis because I am having trouble coming to grips with why Taylor's death is dragging me down so much. I think some of it has to do with the small part of me that still views athletes as different than you and I. Not so much in a personal or professional level but in a level I can't properly describe. Athletes can do things that I cannot do. Their ability and achievement inspire awe in a way that no one one else is capable of. Sure there are talented people out there but Yo Yo Ma doesn't make me jump out of my seat and scream at the top of my lungs when he effortless makes his cello sing. Athletes are different in that they can create an immediate and more visceral emotional reaction out of people than almost any other performer. And even amongst those awe-inspiring athletes there is an even more discrete group of athletes who dominate and run circles around the awe-inspiring guys. These are guys who, twenty years from now, sound 20 feet tall and can run faster than cheetahs in the stories you tell about them. These guys are the reason you cheer for your team and they are who you identify with your team. In less than 5 years Sean Taylor had become one of those guys and he had ten more years of that kind of blow your doors off talent up his sleeve. I can't imagine having a guy like that stolen from my team in the most tragic of fashions. I can't imagine being a Skins fan today.

Verne Lundquist Is The Man Of My Dreams

This is the last thing I'll leave everyone with before I call it an all too necessary night.

I fell asleep on the couch during the LSU - Arkansas game (perhaps the best game since Boise St. - OU last year) and Verne Lundquist was calling the game. While asleep I had some weird ass dreams. One of those dreams involved Lundquist and man was it ever fucked.

As far as I can remember, I was out to dinner with some friends of mine and we stepped outside to grab a cigar (not generally a practice of mine). We looked down the street and Verne was outside grabbing a smoke. He was shitfaced and hanging with Jim Nantz (who I believe is talking with Gary Danielson's voice. I didn't say I could explain this dream rationally, just giving you the details) and about 5 other people talking about college football and dishing some funny stories. My friends and I meandered over to shoot the shit and Lundquist starts giving us shit about the quality of our cigars we were smoking. So we ask him if he can do better. Verne just looks at Nantz and starts laughing. He gets on the phone and in no time there's a Hummer limo that pulls up and Verne invites us in. Inside the limo is a hookah the size of a sewer piper and plasma screens lining the ceiling. Verne shows us how it's done. He lies down on the floor of the vehicle and starts taking a giant pull off the giant fucker like a champ. His mouth expanded like a fucking boa constrictor and he probably inhaled about 8 ozs of steam in one pull (I'm sure Verne was pulling straight North Carolina Tobacco...). It was unreal. We attempted to follow suit but had to use the secondary apparatus (think Half-Baked's Billy Bong Thornton) and our party of about 20 people are flying through NYC in a Hummer Limo high as kites watching LSU - Arkansas on a ceiling TV with Verne Lundquist giving play-by-play for every move we make (and also calling the game at the same time. If nothing else, Lundquist is a renaissance man). We had to pull over and let Verne out because he was being called out on some government business (if I remember correctly, there was a helicopter waiting for him). Things are a little blurry from that point on but I woke up in the middle of the 4th quarter of the actual LSU game with my mouth feeling like I'd been sucking on cotton balls and serious a hankering for Cheese Nips (I satisfied that hankering even though in real life I was sober as a church mouse).

Other than the game ,the rest of the day was a bizarre afternoon followed by an average night of mediocre television. If I ever do hang out with Verne or get a chance to meet him, I'll ask him about his magical peace pipe and his secret double life as a government agent. Or maybe I'll just hold out hope that Verne is half the party animal he was in my dreams. Because if that's the case, the man take me around in his ceiling TV limo any time (man that sounds gay...).

And Now Some Belated Love

Look what the Sox found at the dollar store! A $12 million third baseman.
For those of you how read this on a relatively consistent basis, I apologize for the spotty posting over the last two weeks. I'm up against finals and a couple paper deadlines for school and the next couple of weeks after this aren't going to be any better. Regardless, this is something I wanted to get to. So I will.

Mike Lowell signed a three year deal for $37.5 million last week and thus the World Series MVP will be manning the hot corner through his mid thirties til 2010 for the Sox. And that's really good. But the thing that I don't get is that this was portrayed as some kind of victory for the Sox. Some have even gone so far as to call it a steal considering he likely could have gotten that fourth year and probably could have commanded somewhere near $13-14 million per. But here's the thing, while Mike Lowell has had a resurgence with the Sox and is very valuable for them, his value anywhere else is highly overrated. Check out his home / away splits.

At Fenway, Mike Lowell hit .373, hit 14 home runs and had an OPS of .993. On the road he batted .276 with 7 home runs and had a .767 OPS in almost the exact same number of at bats. Lowell is a pro anywhere but he is dangerous at Fenway. And if he is ever going to sign a new contract after Fenway, he knew that the stats he accumulates over the next 3 years at Fenway will go a long way towards getting him 2-3 more years if he wants it. I'm not saying he couldn't have put a few out in Philly our used the alleys in Anaheim, but Mike Lowell will be at .300 and 100RBI at Fenway over the next 3 years because of Fenway and not necessarily Mike Lowell. The hometown discount Mike Lowell took may earn him a 3 year contract and 20 million more dollars at 36 years old that he may not deserve in another park.

But with all that being said, I love the fucker. He's a pro. He hits in all counts and plays to the situation. When a guy with no control is walking Manny and Ortiz in front of him, Mike Lowell is driving a first pitch curveball down the line or taking a fastball into the gap because he knows the guy is gonna try and get ahead against him. He understands the situation better than any hitter in that lineup and never tries to do too much. He takes pitches when the starting pitcher is nearing his limit and swings at first pitch strikes when a righty reliever has been brought in after Ortiz just got intentionally walked. He's not light tower dangerous but in the same way Paul Byrd and Greg Maddux are crafty and know a hitter's holes, Mike Lowell sees a drawn in infield or the position of the outfield and recognize how the pitcher's gonna pitch him and he reacts accordingly. He's not the most talented hitter and dollar for dollar isn't going to produce like a Carlos Lee or some other young stud earning $12 million a year but I'll take a Mike Lowell at-bat in almost any situation over a $15+ million Soriano at-bat or watching $20+ million of Giambi swing for the hills only able to use 1/4 of the field.

Uno Attacks AIDS Commercial

I saw this commercial last week and have been waiting for someone with a little more tech savvy than myself to post it on youtube. Well finally someone made it happen. I love America. Now, you may be wondering what the F I'm doing posting this stupid commercial but if you listen closely to the words around the 12-13 second mark you'd here a line that makes it sounds like this card game could give you a communicable disease that will likely lead to a lifetime of chemical cocktails and a slow and untimely death. The line I'm speaking of sounds something like this "...you might get AIIIIIIIIIDDDDDDDSSSS!!!" It's really unbelievable that they could let this commercial get out like this. If you can't hear it very well in the above video, check out the snippet below. It's pretty clearly AIDS.