Major League Baseball righted a wrong today. And you will be the biggest benefactor. Finally, the All-Star Game has meaning.
That's probably something that Bud Selig wanted to say back in the summer of 2002. You of course remember that game. Both All-Star Game managers, Joe Torre and Bob Brenly ran out of pitchers and Selig, after eleven innings, declared the game would end in a tie. Selig was roundly booed. He should have been. And from that year forward, implemented a dopey rule that the winning side in the annual All-Star Game would dictate which league champion would have home field advantage in thee World Series.
It made absolutely no sense then, nor does it now. And now, with the owners and players agreeing on a new collective bargaining agreement, Selig's folly has been dismissed.
The idea of making that game into something more than it is was simply illogical. The World Series is the epicenter of all that is baseball. To have an exhibition game, with rosters largely selected by fans and populated by players who played for teams with little if any chance of playing in the post season, dictating which teams played in the World Series was misguided attempt by Selig. It was dumb at the time, that grew dumber with time.
Good riddance.....
Now then.....among things that may be over looked in the CBA: the 15-day disabled list has been cut down to 10 days. That puts a little more heat on the teams' medical staffs to make proper diagnosis and treatment at the on set of the injuries and makes playing 'roster game' for front offices a little less easy....
Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson and Washington are now and will be the Final 4, when announced on Sunday. They are the four best teams in college football. I'd like to think Colorado has a real chance at beating the Huskies. I still think they'll cover (+7.5 at this time). But despite making the biggest single season turnaround in conference history, I don't think they can win the Pac 12 Championship gam straight up.....
The real intrigue of this coming weekend is how it affects the slotting of the four teams. Alabama will be number one (win or lose I really believe). Washington will be number four, regardless of the margin of victory over the Buffaloes. But with Ohio State sitting this weekend out, the Buckeyes could drop to third IF Clemson blows out Virginia Tech. It wouldn't affect first round match ups. I don't THINK Ohio State will drop to number four, thereby setting up a first round match up with Alabama. And I'm pretty sure the selection committee really wants Ohio State vs Alabama in the championship game. That's their dream game.....
The AFC playoff race just got more interesting. With the news that Gronk will need back surgery, the Patriots aren't as dominating as they looked a week ago....
Of course, that's little consolation to the Bengals....
Heir to the Broo Fortune had an interesting take on the Bengals situation as it relates to Marvin Lewis. To say that a segment of the fan base here wants Marvin gone, preferably by last month, would be an understatement. The amount of fans in that camp is debatable.
However, ESQ said that Lewis sticking around may not be a bad thing. His logic (he has that every so often) is that it took Lewis eight seasons to gain Mike Brown's trust. Things didn't start to get better here until 2011, when Brown, in an effort to get Lewis to stay, relinquished some control and allowed Marvin and his staff to make changes. Long time offensive coordinator, Bob Bratkowski got the home game, Carson Palmer was allowed to walk and the coaches lobbied for and got A.J. Green and Andy Dalton in the draft.
So the kid tells me, if Lewis goes so does the rest of the coaching staff. In will come a new staff. The coach will be someone who will work within the "Bengals system," which means Brown, never one to cede power unless he totally trusts a coach, will go back to his pre-2011 days. The coach won't have Lewis' clout on draft day, but will probably sign free agents that fit his philosophy and his system. If that doesn't work out in 3-4 years, he'll be gone and it'll be right back on the "treadmill" again with a new staff, players and philosophy.
I thought it sounded good, then asked him this: why would Brown adios a coaching staff after 3-4 years if he's stuck with Lewis for the last 13? On most teams, Marvin would have called Allied after the 2007 season. The Heir was speechless on my thoughtful comeback. I'd be lying if I said that wasn't refreshing....
Best of luck to Vikings coach, Mike Zimmer, who won't be on the sidelines tonight....
Just starting my research for this Sunday's games But one of the games that's drawing my interest is 6-5 Houston at 5-6 Green Bay. Both teams are teetering between winning their divisions and missing the playoffs altogether. The Texans rush offense, ranked 5th in the league will run into the Packers rush defense, ranked 7th in the league. The Texans are 1-4 and are one of six teams that've failed to score 30 points in a game this season....
The Big East Conference appears to be the real deal again this season. And this writer is wondering if Xavier could the Final 4 goodIF Myles Davis returns.....
By all accounts, FC Cincinnati and the city hit a home run, while welcoming MLS Commissioner Don Garber to town earlier this week. The rapid fans who attended games this season were out in full force, from greeting the commissioner at Lunken Airport to the Town Hall meeting later in the day. There is no doubt that Carl Lindner III and his partners can afford the $100 million dollar expansion fee. But the stadium issue is real. MLS wants stand alone soccer facilities in every one of its cities, except New York which is always the exception to everything. I don't know where FC Cincinnati would build a facility in an 'urban setting', which is what the league wants. Real estate fees aside, where would a stadium fit in downtown Cincinnati? I don't see a 'footprint' big enough for a 20-25,000 seat stadium. Coughing up $100 million for an expansion fee is one thing. Finding the money for a $200 million stadium on top of that seems outrageous.The day of public funding for sports facilities are over. Nippert Stadium is a perfect setting for the soccer crowd. On that issue, Garber has to get over himself......
So where were you 26 years ago today when this was the number one song in the USA?
Vanilla Ice, a/k/a Robert Van Winkle had a short but meteoric rise to fame. The album this song was taken from "To the Extreme" spent 16 weeks as the #1 albumin the country and went platinum (one million in record sales) seven times. The song samples, liberally, the Queen and David Bowie classic "Under Pressure".
Van Winkle has been in and out of trouble with the law over the last quarter century, including a 2015 arrest on a grand theft charge. But this song brought hip hop into main steam America, the first hip hop song to do so. So if nothing else, Van Winkle has that going for him...
Word to you mother....
