Why Should I Care? Why Should I Care

First posted at Big Dave on sports

The Red Sox were playing the Mariners and on their way to their eighth straight loss at Safeco Field when it was announced that Barry Bonds had hit number 755.

I felt sad at first, because Hank Aaron breaking Babe Ruth’s record was part of my childhood, and then the feeling passed, and I concerned myself with the Sox, who rallied passed the Mariners to get their first win in Seattle since Fraser Crane had a top rated radio show.

After the game I was left with this thought about Barry Bonds. Do I care? Does anyone care?

The National Media decides what we should care about, whether it be some Hollywood starlet’s criminal activity, or a politician’s latest sexual dalliance.

Now the national sports media is doing the dictating and the thing we are told we should care about is Barry Bonds’ pursuit of Hank Aaron, but what I am wondering is why should I care?

I have been told it is because the homerun record it the most cherished record in sports. Well, by whom? My most cherished record is that I have not thrown up since drinking the better part of two kegs in August 1988 and then tried to eat an English muffin. That’s a record folks.

Of course I am supposed to be up in arms because Bonds cheated. Well Shawn Marion cheated, helped the Chargers get home field for the playoffs in 2007 and the only thing that kept them from advancing was another Mary meltdown. Marion was a candidate for Defensive Player of the year until clearer heads prevailed.

Sunday night Tom Glavine won his 300^th game, and good for him. Good citizen, nice guy, I’m happy for him like I’m happy when my neighbor tells me he eagled the 14^th at the local club. I don’t really care, but I’m happy.

Then there is A-Rod hitting is 500^th, which may be the greatest achievement of them all, considering his age and potential, despite the fact that I hate him with every fiber of my short, round, being.

The truth is their achievements were inevitable. The work to get there had been done long ago. The real news would have been if A-Rod went the rest of his career without going yard, Glavine got a tragic career ending injury stopping him from getting win 300, or that Bonds got stuck on 754, which, my loyal readers will know, I already wrote (thanks, Mom.)

Besides these records we are also supposed to care about the British invasion. Yes David Beckham and Posh Spice Beckham have landed on our shore and its like when John Lennon arrived if he had already married Yoko.

The initial Beckham sightings are going to bring fans to the soccer stadiums like an exhibition of King Tut’s tomb, but once we all realize he’s just an old guy with lots of wrapping around him the novelty will wear off.

Americans are never going to care about soccer. The difference is as clear as American and European literature. In the works of Jane Austin lovers come together, break apart, tragedy pulls them further apart, and then they are, 500 pages later, reunited in a night of glorious passion.

In American literature someone gets laid every ten pages.

In America we don’t have patience to weed through hundreds of pages until someone scores, nor do we have the patience to wait through two hours of soccer waiting for someone to get a goal.

These stories are all currently cresting, by the end of the week Bonds should be past Aaron, and the Beckham shine should begin to lose its luster (Does anyone else think he is the English Fred Thompson: Hot wife, gets lots of publicity, isn’t actually participating in anything?)

Former Speaker of the House Tip O’Neil said that all politics is local, and that is true of sports. While we have interest in Bonds in New England eyes will be turned to Curt Schilling taking the hill in Anaheim and not Barry Bonds at Pac-Bell. In New York the focus will be the Mets holding on to first and the Yankees slow climb to the wild card lead. In Chicago it will be Alfonso Soriano’s injury, in Nebraska, it will be, as always Cornhusker football.

So, while the National media tries to get us concerned about Pac-Man Jones’ wrestling career (I will only be interested if he comes in a costume that is a gigantic mouth and feuds with colored furry creatures) the rest of us will be more worried about what is going on at home.

Because if I get much more A-Rod, Bonds or Pac-Man coverage my 20 year no vomiting record will come to a sad end.

Garnett Trade Linked to Bridge Collapse

Minnesota Timberwolves General Manager Kevin McHale came under fire today when it was learned that Kevin Garnett, traded one day before the I-35 bridge collapse to the Boston Celtics, spent all his time off court standing in the Mississippi holding the bridge over his head.

“We knew he carried the team,” said a Minnesota Fire Department member, “I’m not surprised he carried the bridge too.”

“Unless he was on the court he was under that bridge bearing the weight,” said teammate Rickey Davis.

McHale defended the trade saying it strengthened his bench, while weakening the cities infrastructure. The only thing Al Jefferson, the third year forward, who was the key player the Timberwolves acquired in the trade, has held up is the line at Wendy’s.

Garnett was unavailable for comment, already having positioned himself in the Charles River holding up the Longfellow Bridge.

My Answer to Danny Ainge

To Danny Ainge: General Manager – Boston Celtics.

Dear Danny:

I would like to start by thanking you for your prompt response to my request for press credentials for the upcoming season. While I must admit I am disappointed that it was rejected I think I know why.

It’s possible that you took an exception to a post on newblaze.com and bigdaveonsports.com where it may have seemed that I made a reference to you being the worst GM in the NBA.

I believe I may have written something like the following: “So Danny’s first big move was a huge mistake, trading Antoine, and he has been trying to correct it ever since, including getting Antoine himself, and each time he tries to correct it the price gets steeper and steeper.”

I can see why this may have upset you, and how you might have mistakenly thought the tone of the piece was negative since it basically said you were the worst GM in the NBA.

But I think there were a couple of points missed in this post. One is that it was satire. Obviously, with your recent acquisition of Kevin Garnett you have proven that you are at the top of your field. You took a team with the second worst record and turned it into a team that is contending for a championship, so when I said you sucked, it was ironic, because you’re obviously so good. People read that and said: “Oh I get it, it’s like saying Dick Cheney is unpopular, it’s irony.”

Also, by posting this nationally, I was making the other GM’s think that you were a rube. Imagine your old friend Kevin McHale reading that post and then you call him with a proposal for the Garnett trade and he thinks “Hmmm, I just read a piece by that Gay guy on the internet who said Danny was a sucky GM. I need to make this trade and take advantage of him.” So he does, and you end up looking like a genius, pretty much thanks to me, not that I’m looking for credit or anything, you know, just press credentials.

(You know, between you and me Danny, I don’t want to kick them when their down after the tragic bridge collapse, but have you noticed that anyone who stays too long in Minnesota: Bob Dylan, Prince, Jesse Ventura, Ted Baxter, Kevin McHale, gradually loses their mind? Might be all that snow.)

So you see, when you got my application, you probably thought, “I’m not giving that jerk press credentials,” but pal, I was on your side the entire time.

Now, thanks to me, with of course, help from you, and Mule Head McHale you have rebuilt the Celtics who will once again be ready to challenge for the title.

There is just one little question I have, and I don’t mean to be flip or get you upset, but, what exactly are we supposed to do about the other two guys who are going to play with them?

You remember in the 80’s after Len Bias died. At that time CBS was running their popular “Red On Roundball” halftime show and those heartless people at National Lampoon ran a piece called “Red On Deadball,” where plays were drawn up for Larry Bird and Robert Parrish to play while McHale carried two dead guys around the court. While I found it, of course, tasteless, I was reminded of it this week because it seems to me that your plan may include Garnett carrying two dead guys all over the court.

And that’s a fine plan, really, he’s a big guy, we did get him to carry the team, but I think it may tire him out, and having to carry two bodies may also limit his rebounding capabilities. I know you have high hopes for Rajon Rondo, as did I as soon as I found out he wasn’t a villain on Smallville, and we have Tony Allen coming back after being viciously injured by the floor while dunking a minute after the whistle blew, so good game sense there, and Kendrick Perkins, who has shown a great deal of promise, if you expect very little.

Then there’s the bench led by Big Baby. Nothing gets me more stoked for a season then going to see a guy named Big Baby. It’s like going to Thanksgiving at my brother-in-laws but having to pay for it.

But then again, you are playing in the diluted eastern conference so with your new black (I mean big) three you should make a run at the NBA finals. And once you’re in the finals the C’s will probably be bigger road kill then the Cavaliers but who knows, right? And just because Allen, Pierce and Garnett will probably have to play 48 a night doesn’t concern me. They do get the summer off.

And you have Doc Rivers, he of the 12-man rotation, coaching the team. Doc has as much winning playoff experience as his namesake does getting into the sack with Snow White. But he never had talent like this. Danm, the man has 33% of a basketball team, who could ask for more?

Looking over things Danny, maybe you and I are going about this all wrong. Perhaps once again we can help one another.

I never played organized ball after middle school, I’m 5-8 and weigh about 200 pounds, some of is solid muscle, and some home made brownies. I have a decent out side shot, my Yorkshire Terrier cannot get the ball from me when I’m determined, I used to have a cross over dribble, now if I move too quickly my testicles cross over, but the point is, I come cheap, you need a guy for Garnett to carry around, once again we are a marriage made in heaven.

So let me know Danny, and if not then I will go golfing with you in May, you know, after the first round of the playoffs, when you’ll have nothing better to do.

I Don't Want my ESPN

During Wednesday night’s Rescue Me Denis Leary, defending the heroics of his suicidal chief, looks at Daniel Sunjata and asks him “The Bronx is Burning? You ever hear of that?”

Well, Sunjata probably did, since he stars as Reggie Jackson in the ESPN mini-series of the same name, unfortunately the reference was missed by everybody else, because it’s doubtful anyone saw the premire.

It was scheduled for 10:00 at the end of the homerun derby, which went from being the summer’s premiere event to bowling show ugly in the space of 30 at bats. The contest, which should be renamed “The History of the Pop-Up,” ran so long that the kids catching the balls in centerfield formed a union and threatened to strike.

But mercifully it pushed The Bronx is Burning far past its 10:00 starting time, which, along with Ryan Howard taking a pitch the size of Rose O’Donnell’s left cheek and grounding it back up the middle, insured the target audience was fast asleep.

Now maybe we can live with an ESPN mini-series airing after the homerun derby, when the sports world is dark, but starting this week it will air while games are being played. I don’t think Cinemax will be broadcasting the White Sox game, unless they sign a bunch of Hooters waitresses and during the seventh inning stretch order pizza from a vendor named Pork, so I don’t know why ESPN needs to be showing a movie. This is the network that I go to when the only acting I want to see is Manu Ginobili skid across the floor like he came off a toboggan at the first turn in the Winter Games.

For anyone interested the series stars John Turturro, who is cast whenever a director needs a New Yorker, as Billy Martin, and Oliver Platt, best known for, um, Oliver? as George Steinbrenner, a thankless role, since no one will do Steinbrenner better than Larry David chastising George Costanza. I don’t have a problem with the show, I’m sure everyone is very talented, I just wish the thing had gone straight to DVD and not on my sports network.

Sunday night at 8:00 I settled in for ESPN’s telecast to find the game in the seventh inning with the Cardinals up three touchdowns. I first checked all the clocks in the house to make sure I hadn’t had another one of my “spells” and lost three hours, and when I determined I hadn’t, checked the cable guide, and saw that the game had started early so they could broadcast the ESPYS at 9:00.

Now if you find the ESPYS entertaining, you should do what Chief Jerry did that caused Denis Leary to defend him to Daniel Sunjata and clean your fingernails, pluck your nose hair, and then put a gun in your mouth and blow the back of your head off you big gay man you.

Hosted by Jimmy Kimmel, who is constantly walking a tightrope between the Conan O’Brien and Fred Travelena sides of his personality, and Mr. Entertainment himself, Lebron James, the ESPYS pass themselves off as a celebration of athletic achievement but are really ESPN’s celebration of ESPN.

Having the ESPYS is like having CNN present the CNNYS. “And now for the nominee for the President Who Screwed up Their Country the Most the Nominees are: George W. Bush; Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Kim Jong Ill and Nuri Al-Malki.”

The reason we have movie, television and music award shows is we don’t have competitions to see who were the most accomplished acts in their field. The picture that wins the Oscar is the best picture of that year. If we didn’t keep score in games, or declare a champion, maybe we’d need a sports award show. The team that wins the World Series is the best baseball team. The team that wins the ESPY for best team provides free advertising for the network.

ESPN has become such a controlling figure in sports that Kevin Durant can miss a developmental league game to attend and Lebron James can do a song and dance number. If every fan in each enemy arena doesn’t ride him for that every second he’s on the floor they should turn their tickets in at the gate.

There was even an After the ESPYS show, which I did not see, but I am sure will be shown a thousand times. I think it was mostly Adam Carolla interviewing hookers about who they would be going home with. “You got LT? You go girl!”

Part of my ill feeling to the sports leader is the announcement that Dan Patrick would be leaving, the last tie to broadcasters whose intent was to put the game over and not themselves, who, like with Craig Kilborn or Keith Olberman, used clever quips to add to the broadcast, not overwhelm it. They had personality. Stephen Smith is a personality.

There was a time when ESPN reporters managed to keep a distance between themselves and their subjects, but now interviews consist of fluff questions followed by a fist pump. ESPN reporters have fallen into the trap that Phillip Seymour Hoffman explained in Almost Famous. “They are going to buy you drinks, they are going get your girls, and they are going to make you think you are cool, and you are definitely not cool.” Reporters, except for Hunter Thompson, have never been cool. Smart celebrities and athletes make them think they are and then use them to their own ends.

When it comes to quality non-event sports television the sports leader continually has its butt handed it by HBO with Costas Now, Real Sports, and films like The Ghosts of Flatbush. While Bob Ley still does a fine job with Outside the Lines it gets publicized with 10% of the emphasis The Bronx is Burning or ESPN Hollywood does.

The flagship for ESPN, Sportscenter has damaged sports, convincing every youth that the only successful basketball play is a one-on-one move that ends with a dunk; a base hit is useless as compared to a “back, back, back” homerun; and a smart play that helps you win will end up on the Sportscenter cutting room floor while a flamboyant play that leads to a loss will get you on the highlight reel. There is no I in Sportscenter, but there is not U either, so given the choice, I’m going with me.

To ratchet up the annoyance factor Sportscenter is asking viewers to help determine what athlete is the most “Now.” The only times I have ever been in an argument over who was now was in a barbershop and a whorehouse. I’m not even sure what it means so I voted for Sammy Hagar.

I wonder if in the not to distant future ESPN will be broadcasting sports. Twenty years ago it seemed ridiculous that MTV would not be showing videos. Maybe ESPN Cribs will take up their time: (“This week Pac-man Jones:” “Yeah, this is my bunk, and this is the toilet where I shit, and these are the bars I hold on to when I’m yelling at the screws.”) and movies like “Millar Time” the story of the 2004 Red Sox with Kevin James as Kevin Millar.

If you’re reading this then you know what ESPN doesn’t. There are millions of sources to get sports news and opinions, and millions of people who seek it, and not award shows or poorly scripted movies. If ESPN wants to be the leader in sports coverage, then it needs to lead, because right now where they’re going I don’t want to follow.

Stevens Igloo Raided By IRS and FBI

first posted at http://www.pugbus.net

A coordinated effort by the Justice Department, IRS, and the FBI resulted in the raiding of Alaska Senator’s Ted Stevens newly remodeled igloo earlier this week.

Federal officials are investigating missing funds distributed by the Senate Appropriations Committee, which Stevens has either been the chairman of, or Senior Republican on, since being appointed by U.S. Grant in 1866.

The main focus of the investigation is where money obtained for the non-profit Alaska SeaLife Center, started after the 1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill, was spent. Authorities are investigating if that money went to oil field services contractor Bill Allen who oversaw a construction project that doubled the size of Stevens’ igloo after his ill-advised purchase of a Jacuzzi in 2000.

Trevor McCabe, a former legislative director for Stevens, received almost $700,000 of this money for doing questionable work for SeaLife. McCabe, according to life partner Mrs. Miller, was unavailable to comment.

Stevens defended his action in a often-combative press conference on Capitol Hill. The Senior Senator claimed that Alaskans have given him the power to do whatever he feels necessary with public funds because: “I am Alaska. My left arm is the untamed wild lands, my right arm is the tamed civilized land, my mind is the midnight sun, my heart is the eternal darkness, and my Little Teddy is the Alaskan pipeline!”

As Stevens conducted the press conference unlucky federal investigators searched the Stevens’ compound’s ice holes and caribou herd’s orifices.

Fat Charlie Has the Blues

Charlie Weis is in the second year of a contract extension with Notre Dame that will pay him two million dollars a season. This does not count the money he’ll get from endorsement deals and speaking gigs.

He has brought pride back to Notre Dame football after crafting the offense for the three-time super bowl champion New England Patriots. But in counting his blessings, the greatest may be that he’s still alive.

In 2002, at age 48, Weis had gastric bypass surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital. At the time of the surgery Weis looked like this:

After the surgery Weis became ill in the hospital, suffering from internal bleeding, and had to have emergency surgery to save his life.

Fortunate to be alive, with three Super Bowl rings, one of the most prestigious jobs in college football, and a salary to keep him filled with onion rings and clam cakes, Charlie took the only action available: litigation.

The trial clogged up the justice system in Massachusetts, first in February 2007, which ended in a mistrial when a juror, after several vivid descriptions of just what was removed from Weis to change him from an obese assistant professional coach to a plump college head coach, collapsed.

According to Charlie, based on “principle,” he continued with a second trial, further clogging the judicial arteries. This trial took place in July (you know, when college football coaches have nothing to do) and a stronger stomached jury came back with a verdict, for the defendants.

Charlie stated he knew winning was a long shot but was still surprised. There is a term for people who are surprised long shots don’t pay off: destitute.

Charlie said he thought jurors grew “bored” during the trial. Perhaps hiring John Madden as his council would have been more compelling: “See this, this is his small intestine, and here came the doctor with the knife: and bam! He ripped it out, but see over here, he’s nicked this artery. That’s really something the doctor’s coaching staff are going to have to look at during half time.”

Basically the trial boiled down to this. Charlie ate a tremendous amount without exercising, and just before training camp, where he was about to make young men run in the stifling heat until they vomited and begged for mercy, he elected to have surgery and have a backhoe remove blubber from his enormous gut. Something went wrong with the procedure that was done because you can’t just eat four Twinkies a sitting, you might as well go for the box, which required a second surgery. For this Charlie sued. If I’m on the jury I would have a hard time awarding someone who got big, fat, and lazy, had the money to get it surgically corrected, and then sued when the surgery went wrong.

Ah, yes, money well spent Big Charlie. I can see the doctor’s lining up to do a second surgery for you. Maybe Vinnie Boom Botz is available.

Charlie said if he had won he would have given the money to people, like him, who had special needs.

Being fat doesn’t mean you have special needs Charlie, unless the money was going to people who could only afford the cheese pizza and through his generous donations could get one with the works.

In the words of Dean Wormer “Fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life son.”

And fat, litigious and stupid is no way to go through life Coach.

Lighten up Charlie.

Really.

Lighten up.

Doubting What I am sure of

At the end of the day it’s about trust.

We trust our parents, our spouses, our children, our closest friends, and when that blind trust is broken, it shakes our world.

What Bruce Springsteen wrote 20 years ago stands true today: “God have mercy on the man who doubts what he’s sure of.”

There is less and less to be sure of today, we don’t trust our government, we doubt our spouses, our kids, our parents lied about the whole Santa thing, Brad and Jen were supposed to be forever, and now there are whispers of trouble in the land of Brad and Angelina.

All we could be sure of was sports, where the athletes strived for glory, and outside of a few untrustworthy French figure skating judges, those who were paid to mediate the contests, were honest and true.

Naivety meet Tim Donaghy, the crooked referee. (Allegedly the crooked referee, only Nancy Grace can get by without saying that, no matter what the facts before us are.)

Unless you have been in a coma, or your Google search for the Pillsbury Doughboy has gone horribly awry and you are on a sports site for the first time in your life, you know that Donaghy had placed bets on basketball games, some of which he worked, with bookies controlled by the underworld, and not being Tony Soprano with a deep pocketed friend like Hesch to bail him out, traded his professionalism and reputation for workable kneecaps, and began making calls, or not, during games, to control the points spread, and, as John Sayles, as Ring Lardner, sang in his own Eight Men Out “The gamblers treat you fair.”

The first question I had, when learning that Donaghy was front and center at the league’s previous worst nightmare, the Pacers v. Pistons brawl leading to the Ron Artest meltdown, was what if Donaghy had money on this game? What if it was on the Pacers? What if he allowed Artest to manhandle Ben Wallace through out until Wallace had enough and took a swing at Artest precipitating the brawl and suspensions?

When a police officer is found to be accepting graft, all the felons he testified against are freed because his testimony is tainted. Do Artest, Stephen Jackson, and Jermaine O’Neil get the salaries they lost during the suspension back because the street cop was dirty? Do Artest and Jackson have a case that Donaghy’s crooked officiating led to their suspensions, which adversely affected their lives causing them to do further bad deeds, leading to their current suspensions? When cops go bad total Tools like Jackson and Artest walk. Should it be any different for a referee?

If this scandal were going to happen, then it would be in basketball. A home plate umpire has a great deal of control over the outcome of a game, but if he is deliberately making one-sided calls it would be easy to see, and he would not keep his job for long. Plus, even with making bad calls, he can’t control bad pitching and good hitting.

In football a referee can sway the game with penalties, but still won’t be able to stop a Manning to Harrison hookup, and if he tried to, instant replay would reverse it.

Maybe an official could fix a soccer or hockey game, but if you are betting on that, buddy you have problems.

Its basketball, with its rapid movement, its high scoring, the gray area of what is a charge and what is blocking, where whistles in the right direction can change a few baskets here and there, where the scandal would inevitably occur.

And it could go largely unnoticed. We are not talking about throwing a game here, where Lebron James doesn’t get the foul call in Game Three of the finals and the Cavaliers lose. We’re talking about James not getting the call on a last second shot with his team down five and getting four in the spread. James may bitch about not getting his two, but the game was lost, and the coaches will file off the court with nary a complaint.

If the underworld only persuaded (allegedly, Nancy) Donaghy to effect games that had spreads of 10 points or more, then his undermining of the athletes on the floor would have slipped by as just incompetent officiating, a group that could fill the first row of seats behind the basket. If the Lakers are 14-point favorites over the Grizzlies, unless the Memphis entry is on fire that night, how difficult is it to make sure they lose by 15?

But I believe in the butterfly effect as it relates to the NBA. If Pau Gasol can’t get a call from Donaghy because he has money on the Lakers, does this affect his next non-Donaghy involved game? Does he play more aggressively because he didn’t get calls the previous games? Are those calls made against him? Does he get in early foul trouble? Do the Grizzlies lose? Does this loss affect the playoffs? The lottery? Donaghy may not have affected the victors in games he officiated, but how many games did the ripple effect of his work affect?

And how did a guy who is, at best, considered a mediocre official by the NBA, and who has, been identified by several individuals as being an asshole (inevitably, after this scandal, a noun and adverb will be added to that nom-de-plume) get to referee game three of the Spurs-Suns series, the defacto NBA championship?

I know the union contract says that these assignments should go by a rotating basis, but if the playoffs contenders are based on performance and not rotation, then shouldn’t the players be given the same courtesy?

Did Donaghy have money on that game? Did he let fouls go against the Spurs making them more frustrated each minute? Did Nash get away with several slaps during the game? Did Robert Horry wait until the closing moments of Game 4 to retaliate, causing Amare Stoudemire and Boris Diaw’s suspensions? Did Donaghy’s gambling problems affect who won the 2007 title?

There are a thousand more questions to come about Donaghy’s involvement in games and their aftermath, and no way for David Stern to answer them all before the opening tap.

What Donaghy has done is made us question every call. On Friday night Tim McClelland badly missed a JD Drew homerun call (Yo, John Henry, paint the ledge yellow), after a few calls went against the Sox on previous days, bad thoughts began to creep in, like the umpires are under pressure to let the Yankees back in the race. (My Father, a well-respected and intelligent man, always said that Yankees had more home games than any other team, a sure sign of what Yankee paranoia can do to a man.)

Umpires and referees are used to being told they are blind, that they suck, and they roll with that, but no one wants their integrity questioned.

Now, thanks to Tim Donaghy, not only will paranoid fans say it, but rational fan, will think it.