"There's a place for LOMBARDI in the Broadway huddle... It is theatrical catnip for husbands or boyfriends otherwise reluctant to see most Broadway shows: Football! Vince Lombardi! The legendary Packers!", said The Associated Press, using a typewriter with a stuck exclamation point key.
"Even if you never cared about Lombardi, you will enjoy LOMBARDI. And that really is everything." That's Mike Vaccaro of the New York Post, who made an even more tangential connection to Lombardi's famous quote than I did.
Then there's Roma Torre, of something called "NY1," who said "Sports fans will get a huge kick out of the it, but there's plenty for the uninitiated as well. As entertainment, LOMBARDI scores points."
Unlike the present-day Packers! (Ba dum bum!)(Look, I know they score a lot of points, but I had to take a shot at the Pack anyway, okay?)
And finally, there's Peter King of SI, who wrote "I know what I like, and I liked this show." Which doesn't have anything to do with Lombardi quotes, but I wanted to include it because Peter King has a feature in SI titled "Things I Think I Think," in which he says stuff he thinks he thinks, proving that Peter King in fact does not know what he likes; if he's unsure whether he's thinking something, how can he be sure what he likes?
If you decide to listen to what Peter King thinks he likes, and want to see a Broadway play featuring Wonder Years' Dad making more of his living recreating stern people from the 60s, you'll get not just that, but a guy named "Michael McCormick," talking like an extra who didn't make the cut for Guys & Dolls:
True story: I worked with a lawyer named Michael McCormick, so I'm practically part of the Lombardi story.
Also, if you see Lombardi, you'll get to see Wonder Years Dad recreate that famous scene where a desperately lonely Vince convinces the paperboy to kiss him.
Okay, I made that last part up. There's no way Thompson will give that up. After all, legend has it that tragedy will befall any person who gives away The Lombardi Hand. Why do you think Favre is doing so poorly this year? He had the jar with the Lombardi Hand in it until Thompson's goons broke into the Vikings' locker room last year and got it away.
And that explains everything.
No, I don't know what I'm talking about anymore, either. Something about Lombardi, I think. Off to lunch!
How much time would you lose if you were in a foot race and collided with a deer?
And, more importantly, are our runners under attack by deer?
That's the question raised by an alarming set of news stories I dug up and/or heard while driving.
First up, Sarah Glidden, of Hortonville High School. While running a cross-country race on October 22, Sarah was only about 100 yards from the finish when a deer bolted from the woods in front of her, and Sarah hit the deer.
She was spun around, but she and the deer continued on their respective ways, with Sarah suffering only a bruise and some deer fur on her. She didn't qualify but finished 18th overall, with a time of 17 seconds slower than her previous time a few weeks ago.
Seventeen seconds is all she lost by hitting a deer? And she finished the race? I think we all need to remind Sarah that this is America, and when you run into a deer during a race, you do not finish the race. You drop to the ground, yell whiplash! and sue everyone within a 200 mile radius, including the deer.
Glidden says she's a magnet for deer and has gotten offers to join hunting parties. Glidden's coach, meanwhile, said no big deal, this happens all the time:
"When I was coaching in Virginia, I was at the state meet years ago and it was the same kind of deal," said Sours, who has 20-plus years of coaching experience. "A deer cut across and hit the lead girl runner."
The school children were singing through the bush during the even and that might have startled the animal.
No word on what they were singing -- probably a Lady GaGa song. Deer hate those. Especially Canadian deer, who also seem to hate young Canadian cross-country runners, given that 14-year-old Emma Ashby was also run into by a deer during what was billed as a "midget girls' 3,000 meter race," back in 2009.
Was just a precursor. Obviously, we're in the early stages of a Deer Uprising, one in which our brave young cross-country running girls must risk life and limb in order to run 3,000 meters.
What can you and I do to help them? You can get out to the woods and cheer them on, for one thing, and form a human barrier against deer attacks all along the course.
I'll do my part by by hunkering down to watch The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret. Let me know how things go for you.
Did you even know that NPR was holding a LeBron Poetry Contest? Of course you did -- you, like everybody else, not only diligently follow the NBA but also tune in every week to A Prairie Home Companion, and read The New Yorker, right?
NPR held a LeBron poetry contest, inviting people to write poems about LeBron, thereby further transforming him into a sort of the Red Wheelbarrow of the 21st Century -- a vessel into which we will pour our thoughts and symbols, our fears of our life and our remembrances of a life that we once had. Or maybe never had, but wished we did.
Too high-falutin' for you? Sorry about that. It's all that Garrison Keillor on my iPod. Anyway, here's the winner of the LeBron poetry contest, who got herself two tickets to a Heat game and a reading of her poem live on NPR:
Untitled LeBron James Poem by Crystal Booker Letting go is hard, we know. The King is here, and we've warmed up his seat. Cleveland, go ahead and spit flames. You can't burn up the Heat.
That wasn't the only entry, though. There was also
LeBron Haiku, by Mary Cox
So not a sports fan. Must sheepishly admit first response, LeBron who?
Ten years of dating, she wants to wed. Take me to the altar, she said. What can I say to string her along? A ring, you'll have, before LeBron. Content with that, she brings me a beer. And now I'm good for another ten years.
The World Series is set -- so it's only about 2 weeks until I don't have to worry about baseball box scores showing up in that little box in the corner where I check to see if the Buffalo Bills have scored any points. (Note: They haven't.) And when they do run that score, at least I won't have that momentary confusion that comes sometimes when the baseball teams share an abbreviation with the football teams. Seeing "SF: 0 NY: 3" just gets my hopes up that there's a football game on somewhere -- even a football game between two teams I don't care about is better than a baseball game, in almost every instance.
And yet, I like the World Series. I don't watch it. That'd be nuts. Who has time to watch the World Series? Or any baseball game? It's so slow. Election returns come in faster than a baseball game -- and it takes 12 hours from the start of voting for us to get some news on who's winning.
No, I don't watch the World Series, because baseball games are too long (mirroring the season that's too long.) Cut those games to five innings and I'd give it a shot. I'd devote about an hour of my time to watching the game, and in exchange I'd get to see only good pitching, as without 9 innings to cover teams could pitch only the starter and jettison some of the dregs they keep around as "middle relievers." With fewer opportunities to score, teams might try more aggressive base-running and batters might be jumpier about swinging, so there'd be more action.
Plus, you only see about 3 pitchers in the postseason anyway -- teams throw guys like C.C. Sabathia about every 3 hours, on "short rest" or "long rest" or "whatever rest," so it's not like having 5 or 7 games with 9 innings (or more) guarantees you'll see other pitchers; it's just a guarantee that you'll see C.C. when he's fresh, then when he's a little tired, and then when he's exhausted. My plan would at least avoid seeing him exhausted.
Faster? More action? Better pitching? I realize that baseball purists are shuddering right now, but baseball purists are losers, so I don't care if I offend them.
In any event, I doubt that Bud Selig will make the change anytime soon; less is more is not a mantra that baseball, or any sport, wants to take up. Leagues get bigger, games get longer, seasons get longer, star players become more widely dispersed around the bigger leagues, the quality of play suffers, revenues drop... and ticket prices still go up while owners still get rich, so nothing will change, although leaders of the sports will talk about doing something like contraction in order to pressure players into taking less money.
So you and I are stuck with 162 baseball games per year -- 150 more than anyone watches, I bet -- plus countless playoff games plus a World Series that could end as late as November 4. What are you going to do to kill all that time, besides wonder what sexy costume you're going to wear this year to the Halloween party? (Sexy Big Bird appears to be the hot commodity this year, by the way.)
The answer is: You're going to learn The Three Best Things You Really WANT To Know About the 2010 World Series -- as Whodathunkit?! cuts past the wheat and the chaff of "sports stats" and "predictions that aren't" and "Mike & Mike" to give you information you can use to impress people at your World Series party.
But, since nobody has a world series party -- the Series stretches over a week, after all -- you could just mention these at the next office meeting to prove to the Boss that you're good for something. So here goes:
1. How'd The Lone Ranger Become The Lone Ranger?
The Texas Rangers Baseball Team are named for the Texas Rangers Law Enforcement group, which raises a question: If announcers constantly feel the need to say "The New York Football Giants" even though there's only one Giants team in football and it's in New York, so that if you just say "New York Giants" everyone will know you're talking about the football team, how come announcers don't feel the need to say "The Texas Rangers Baseball Team" to avoid confusion with the Texas Rangers Law Enforcement, which, after all, still exists? Think how confusing this hypothetical headline might be without that clarification:
Texas Rangers Beat Up Santiago Casilla.
Without clarification -- that it's the Baseball Rangers -- you might think you're reading a wishful-thinking headline from an Arizona resident.
The Lone Ranger was, of course, a Texas Law Enforcement Ranger, equipped with the pistol and white hat that mark the Texas Rangers to this day -- apparently they do wear them -- and equipped with a mask which was of dubious utility in hiding his identity -- and it's not clear why he needed to hide his identity in the first place.
According to The Texas Rangers Hall Of Fame (Law Enforcement Division):
The Lone Ranger is the sole survivor of an ambush that killed five of his Texas Ranger comrades. With the help of Tonto, a friendly Indian who cames to his aid, the Ranger buried his five companions and recoverd from his injuries. In order to mislead the outlaws into thinking that all of the Rangers died, the Lone Ranger dug a sixth grave which was left empty. Hiding his identity with a black mask, he set out with his new friend to track down and apprehend the outlaws.
Now, I don't know how much to trust that site -- how credible is a site that also claims Buck Rogers was a Texas Ranger (Space Division, apparently?) But I'd question it even without the addition of the Space Cowboy stuff -- because of this:
The Lone Ranger wears the mask to keep the people he's hunting from... knowing that he's hunting them? And he dug a fake grave just in case the outlaws were to go back and check?
Think about that: assuming the bad guys did go back and check on their handiwork, who was supposed to have buried those bodies? The outlaws thought they'd killed all six of the Rangers -- so how'd the bodies get buried? A supposed master of disguise, the Lone Ranger (who's name is usually given as John or Dan Reid) had blown his cover before he even left the scene of the massacre.
And the people who were supposed to have massacreed him? Supposedly it was "Butch Cavendish" and "a man named Collins." Collins had infiltrated the Rangers (Law Enforcement Division) and was, for his troubles, later shot in the back by Butch Cavendish. That information comes from the Wikiepedia page on The Lone Ranger, and to show you how reliable Wikipedia isn't, consider that the page on The Hole In The Wall Gang correctly lists the leader of the Hole In The Wall Gang as "Butch Cassidy," but I didn't need them to tell me that: I knew it already, because as a kid, I took piano lessons, and one song that I was asked to learn to play was "Raindrops Keep Fallin' On My Head," a song my dad wanted me to learn because he liked the version of that song that played in the movie Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid. That became the only part of that movie I ever watched:
And you can see that my ability to go from a baseball team to a Robert Redford movie in a conversation is what makes me such a great addition to any party. But don't bother inviting me; I'm pretty antisocial and don't go to others' houses to watch sporting events, which means that usually, I end up just saying this stuff to The Boy or Sweetie until they get bored and walk away, leaving all the salted-in-the-shell peanuts for me.
So there's method to my madness. 2. What's the most popular walk up song ever?
Also called "at bat" songs, the walk up song is an only-sometimes-noticed thing in sports: The last mention of it I could find on ESPN was in 2004, when they listed the at-bat songs for all 30 major league baseball teams' starting lineups -- on Page 3, a spot I didn't even know existed on their website. The Giants' roster was heavy on light metal and pop rock -- ZZ Top and Van Halen made the list-- while the 2004 Texas Rangers (Baseball Edition) went with a stranger mixture of hip-hop and movie themes: In talking about OF David Delluci's choice of "The Godfather Waltz," the site notes:
Recently, Dellucci requested "The Godfather Waltz," a k a "The Godfather Theme" as his at-bat music. An Italian American, Dellucci thought the tune fit him well. Right before the next game, the outfielder got cold feet and began debating whether to use the song or not. The Rangers staff played it anyway, and it has become all the rage in Texas. Fans call up the stadium by the dozens asking what the song is from, and why they recognize it. In turn, Dellucci has become a fan favorite. Delluci's apparently not playing baseball anymore, but here's his song:
MTV picked a 2010 all-star roster based on the at-bat songs chosen by players, and some usual suspects showed up there -- "Crazy Train" by Ozzy Osbourne, "Enter Sandman" for a closing pitcher, that kind of stuff.
The weirdest song on that list -- it's not just me saying that, but MTV, too -- was "My Chick Bad," the song picked by Phillies SS Jimmy Rollings:
MTV heralds that as "pushing the envelope." The lyrics to the song, though, make it clear that in playing that song at a public ballpark, it's not so much "pushing the envelope" as it is "finally proving that Tipper Gore lost her fight."
A site called "Operation Sports" has what purports to be an updated list of walk-up/at bat songs for the San Francisco Baseball Giants, and outside of my iPod it's the only list you'll see featuring both BeeGees and Led Zeppelin. (The official SF list is here.) The Texas Rangers (Baseball Edition) have their own list, on which appears "Crawl" by Kings of Leon...:
That's not how you know "Kings of Leon," though. You know them from the song "Molly's Chamber,"
...a song featured in a Jetta commercial. I was going to put the Jetta commercial on here so you could see it, but Jetta has forbidden embedding the commercial -- so they want you to see their commercial, but only when they feel like showing it to you. In response, I suggest that Volkswagen owners begin pretending their cars are subject to sudden unexplained acceleration, the way Toyota owners did last year. We'll show them not to forbid embedding videos.
But I couldn't find, anywhere, anything purporting to claim what has been the most-used at bat/walk-up song in Major League Baseball. So, since nobody else anywhere has determined what that song might be, I've decided that I will simply pick it for myself -- that's how facts work, right Republican Party? -- and I've decided that it's a fact that the single most popular walk-up/at bat song ever used by Major League Baseball is...
"Una Paloma Blanca," by The George Baker Selection:
Watch for it in the Series.
3. It's a World Record! Or not - -while records may be set, or not set, in the World Series, do you really care about those baseball records? Evidence* (*my personal opinion) suggests no. Since it's a proven fact** (**see foregoing note) that every single baseball player, ever, has taken steroids and also been helped by Delaware-candidate-style black magic*** (***my last chance to make fun of Christine O'Donnell before she goes down by 20 points next Tuesday), we all know that Major League Baseball records are meaningless.
But what about records tangentially involving baseball? Well, those obviously have all kinds of meaning, and can be used to sprinkle into the conversation whenever the action in the game starts to lag**** (****which will be constantly; it's baseball, after all.). So here's a few baseball-related World Records to keep in mind while you don't watch the World Series:
Fastest Mile Run While Balancing a Baseball Bat? 7 minutes, 17 seconds -- which is faster than I can run a mile not balancing anything. The farthest anyone's walked while balancing a baseball bat is 7 miles, according to that same site. The longest throw of a baseball belongs to Canadian -- finally something for Canadia to celebrate!-- Glen Gorbous, who threw one 445 feet, 10 inches, back in 1957. Women, you're lagging behind. The longest throw by a woman was only 296 feet, back in 1931. (No 21st Century Woman has challenged that throw?)
"Sensei" Karl Varley of New Zealand -- what is it about New Zealand and World Records? -- claims the not-officially-recognized-by-Guiness record for most baseball bats broken in under 60 seconds:
What's interesting to note about that record is that there were 27,789 people at the stadium -- so over 600 people refused to take part in that toast. Spoilsports.
On the eve, or something like that, of LeBron's debut, let's check in on Road To A Championship (Or At Least A Roster Spot) to see who's winning -- TO, Favre, or LeBron.
In first place by virtue of not having done anything amazingly stupid lately, and because he has yet to play a meaningful game with Dwyane Wade's team, is LeBron, who's latest move is a Nike Commercial that is controversial enough to get itself embedded into Dan Patrick's website (among others?)
Poking fun at Charles Barkley (and eating a doughnut) is good enough to get that ad to go... what's the corporate version of viral? It's not really viral marketing if it's all corporatized, as all Nike/ESPN ads are... how about corporatal. The ad goes corporatal as various "news" outlets discuss the "news" that LeBron is confronting his critics in the classicly confrontational style of selling overpriced shoes to basketball wannabes -- but give credit, as this commercial does a little philosophizin', as LeBron asks at the end "Should I be what you want me to be?"
To which I think the answer must be a resounding Yes. How can America go on without LeBron personally being what each and every one of us wants him to be? You know, kind of like what Obama was for the first 60 days he was in office, before the tides started rising again and Jim Bunning kept getting his way.
In second place is TO, who, in spite of his team's 2-4 record is at least averaging 6 catches per game for an average of 14 yards or so per catch -- that's on pace to get 96 catches for more than 1300 yards -- and who also can tie a tie:
You know who never gripes about a bad call? The team that won by 30. If your team wins by 30, you don't care how many bad calls there were in the game.
If, on the other hand, your team is barely eking out victories (or barely not eking them out and losing), you'll complain and complain and complain about bad calls and bad decisions by your quarterback and (for all I know the crummy food) they serve on the plane to Lambeau because all that distracts the press from noticing that you, yourself, didn't do so hot a job coaching.
Right, Not Really The Coach Brad Childress? Right -- and listen to how NRTC Childress criticized the refs for blowing the call on Shiancoe's Emanuel-style catch Sunday night:
They said he didn't control it, and he controlled it... the litmus is 50 drunks in a bar. Those 50 drunks say that's a catch."
And at the sound of the words "fifty drunks in a bar," Ben Roethlisberger yelled out "Hot damn, I've got dates for Halloween now."
You watched sports; I did too. And here's what we saw...
Pumpkin Carving Happened: Shown at right is a pumpkin from a few years back. I can't take pictures of the pumpkins Mr Bunches and I carved last night because we don't have lights for them yet. But we carved 'em -- four of them: A sarcastic pumpkin, a spider, a Heffalump pumpkin, and the Sad Little Pumpkin. Then we threw out the spider pumpkin because Mr Bunches was afraid of it.
Brad Childress Not Reading This Blog Happened: Did you watch the battle of the teams that didn't want to win on Sunday night? And did you see that Brad Childress, with his fear of The Two and his obvious failure to have Nonsportsmanlike Conduct! bookmarked, blew the game?
Favre's three picks are taking the blame for the loss today, but a bigger contribution came when, down 28-17 after Favre's second interception of the night, the Vikings scored a touchdown to make it 28-23. I mumbled to myself (because Sweetie was sleeping): "Use The Two!" It was the perfect time for that: You're down by more than 3, whether you make the EP or not: If you kick the point, it's 28-24 and you need a touchdown to go ahead. If you Use The Two and miss it, you're down 28-23 and need a touchdown to go ahead. But if you Use The Two and score, a field goal will tie the game. It's Win-Win! Unless you're Not Really The Coach Brad Childress, who followed up his meek decision to sit on the ball at half with the meek decision to kick the meaningless point-after, which is what led to the need for a touchdown on that last drive. How much easier would it have been for the Vikings to simply need a field goal to tie it up? We'll never know.
The World Series With Actual Baseball-Type Weather Happened: Remember when Kenny Rogers -- not that Kenny Rogers -- had to cheat in the World Series because baseball plays 130 more games than people care about, pushing the World Series back to Thanksgiving? At least this year, with games in Texas and San Francisco, you'll be able to not care about the Series taking place in warmer weather; when they break into football with highlights, the players won't have to be wearing parkas.
And, if you know this sports blog -- know it like Brad Childress doesn't -- you know that with the World Series starting, a Whodathunkit?!is on the way!
Listening to Petros & Money last night on the way to buy Lego Harry Potter for my nephew for his birthday, I was treated not just to Petros' exaggerated nasal voice and his dad's boring commentary, but also a reflection on the fact that all week long all anybody's been talking about is how the NFL is cracking down on dangerous hits and head injuries -- and doing that in a week when there are other great sports stories, like ...um...
... well, Petros & Money said the Rangers leading (at the time) the Yankees, and Brett Favre's molexting return to Green Bay... were both bigger stories than NFL hits. I don't necessarily agree; the Yankees winning is good for sports and good for America, which means the Rangers' getting into the Series is the opposite, plus since when is something that's good for Texas also good for the rest of us?
But the point was well-taken: there was a lot of hoopla about the NFL's new harsh stance on big hits and head injuries -- a harsh stance that echoes the league's previous harsh stance on concussions -- and by "harsh stance" I mean "hanging up posters in the locker room." (Pros don't read the locker room announcements even when they involve rules that might cause the non-reading pro to lose a major golf tournament. Why would they read about head injuries?)
The Poster Tough Stance was itself a echo of the 2009 tough stance the NFL took on concussions -- so you know the NFL's serious about cracking down on concussions, because every year the NFL tells us it's serious about cracking down on concussions.
What's the one thing your football team can do to really improve their chances of winning? Get more free agents? Run the ball more? Pass the ball more? Use the pass to set up the run? Vice versa? Hire a new coach? (Maybe so, in Dallas and Green Bay.) Stop turnovers? Switch to a 3-4 defense? Switch to a 4-3? Get a new stadium? Use the spread more? Bench Jay Cutler?
Odds are, you all answered that one -- or more -- of those were the answer for your football team, the one thing (or several things, or Jay Cutler-y things) that were keeping your team from being truly great.
But you're all wrong. The one thing your football team can do to really become a better team, to really win more games, doesn't cost a thing. It doesn't require any personnel changes. It doesn't happen on draft day. And it doesn't rhyme with mench May Mutler.
The one thing your team can do that will improve its chances of winning each and every game without spending a single dollar more on anything is this:
Go for the two point conversion, every time.
In sports, you win by scoring points. Not by defense, not by pitching: Defense keeps people from scoring, making it easier to win by scoring fewer points, but it doesn't put points on the board (not often, not enough.) Offense puts points on the board, and points on the board is what makes a team win, specifically having more points than the other team.
But, given the chance to put more points on the board, coaches in football games routinely leave a point laying around without ever trying to score that extra point; rarely do coaches go for 2 after a touchdown. Instead, they kick the extra point and walk off the field, a point short of where they could be.
I've written about this before, but it's on my mind again now because I've followed the controversy about Wisconsin's coach Bret Bielema going for two late against Minnesota (and then blaming it on the card, as though coaches have no discretion about it.) And then I watched as the Packers this past weekend scored a touchdown late and opted to tie the game by kicking the EP rather than win it by going for two. And it's happened other times this year that teams which should have gone for two for the win didn't -- and lost. And there have been precious few times when a team that was down in a game did the right thing by going for two; the only one I can think of is Tampa Bay this past weekend, against the Saints: down 24-0, the Buccaneers scored to make it 24-6, and then went for 2. The attempt failed, but the Bucs were on the right track, there.
I don't get it. Now, granted, there are lots of things I don't get in football, including how Wade Philips and Norv Turner keep getting jobs, but this one seems to me to be not so much a "football" thing as a "common sense" thing. You have a chance to score more points; why not take it?
It's so rare in any sport that a regular play can be turned into an extra-point play, giving a team a chance to score a little more for doing the same thing. Baseball and hockey and soccer don't allow it at all: every score is 1 point. Basketball only allows it sometimes -- a 3-point shot or a basket-and-foul. But football allows it every time you score a touchdown: Every single time a team passes the goal line, the game lets them try to add 1, or 2 -- and coaches almost uniformly, and meekly, take the 1.
Fans get upset when teams don't go for it, when they don't score touchdowns, when they seem to be not trying their hardest to win; why not demand your team try to put more points on the board?
Imagine the effect of a team going for two every time it scored a touchdown. Going for two, and making it, instantly puts pressure on the other team to do that, too: Your team is suddenly up 8, not 7, and the other team is going to have to respond by trying to get 8, not 7, points. So getting the two-point conversion is instantly helpful.
But missing it doesn't hurt you that badly: Assume my team scores first and goes for 2 and misses. The score is now 6-0. Your team then scores, takes the 1, and makes it. It's 6-7. My team can take the lead again with a field goal, anyway, and another touchdown and 2-pointer would make it 14-7. If my team scores another touchdown and misses the 2, it's 12-7. Even after another score and EP by your team, my guys are still only a field goal away; your team has to score four touchdowns and four extra points before my side can't make it up with one field goal.
And if your team is going to score four touchdowns, it's not very likely my team's going to win.
The traditional argument against going for 2 is that it doesn't work all the time. Coaches and "analysts" routinely say that 99% of point-after kicks are made, while the two-point conversion works (they say) only about 50% of the time.
If that's true -- and I'm not saying it is -- but if it's true, then it's an argument in favor of going for two. Scoring 1 point on almost 100% of your point-afters is the same thing, mathematically speaking, as scoring 2 points on about 50% of your point-afters. If coaches were not mathematically challenged, and pathologically conservative, they'd see that.
The 2-point conversion -- a feature of the AFL -- was reintroduced to the NFL in 1994. Since then, it's had varied success rates that were pinned by one New York Times story at about 50%. And yet, according to the Times story, coaches still don't know when to use it or how to use it and haven't ever figured it out. Each coach has their own rules for when they will and when they won't -- Failed Coach Herm Edwards wouldn't consider going for 2 anytime before 12 minutes were left in the game, for example -- while other coaches tried to have some logic in when they went for it and when they didn't. Says the Times:
Brian Billick, a former Ravens coach, said he was more likely to try 2-point conversions on the road because he thought his team was more likely to convert one play than to complete an extended drive in overtime.
Which seems like a good philosophy, except that the one play is going to be the final play of the game, a winner-take-all play in which the home crowd could get the home defense fired up, while an overtime would allow for a brief break in the action and possibly lull the crowd, while also allowing for special teams breakdowns (such as a kick out of bounds or fumble) that could result in a short field.
But you don't need me to argue that Billick's strategy was flawed, as in that same article he undercut his own thinking and said he was lying about going for it, as the Times reported:
Billick said he would usually rather play for a tie and go to overtime than try for 2 for a win because his defense was good enough to stop offenses in overtime.
Which also is flawed, because while his defense was good, getting a stop doesn't help the offense, which Billick didn't trust to complete one play or a sustained drive.
Other coaches don't seem to get it but actually show a greater understanding about how to Use the 2: Tony Sparano -- whose name is the generator of the most annoying pop culture references from lazy sportswriters-- went for 2 against the Jets after his team had gone up 30-19; the attempt failed and critics said it wouldn't have helped anyway. Asked his thinking on the move, Sparano said:
“I just didn’t know how many more at-bats that team was going to get, O.K.? The way the game was going, and with where we were offensively in this football game, I had no idea how many more at-bats that team was going to get.”
Which doesn't sound smart, but it is: coaches don't know how many times they'll get the ball, so why not try to score as much as possible. In that game, the Dolphins' offense managed to gain only 104 yards, while the Jets scored four times in the second half alone. While the 2-pointer failed, it was a smart move on Sparano's part: get points while the gettin's good.
That was a thought that legendary cryer Dick Vermeil would have after his Chiefs failed to go for two against the Patriots* in 2002, kicking the point after and losing in overtime. The Chiefs had gained nearly 400 yards in that game, and Vermeil later said he didn't factor in the ease with which they'd moved the ball.
One problem is that when coaches go for two, and miss it, they get the blame for losing the game. Consider this blurb from Doc's Sports Service:
Much more recently, it can be argued that Carolina Panthers Coach John Fox may have cost his team a chance to win Super Bowl XXXVIII for his decision to go for two with more than 12 minutes left facing a five-point deficit. In this case, the Panthers missed the try for two but then scored six minutes later to take a one-point lead. At this point they pretty much had to go for two, which failed again, to try to make it a field goal game as the fourth quarter began to wind down. In what would turn out to be one of the most entertaining fourth quarters in Super Bowl history, the Patriots marched right back down the field scoring a touchdown of their own to reclaim a five-point lead. With less than three minutes to play Patriots Coach Bill Belichick's decision to go for two, which succeeded, required very little thought. Down by seven, Carolina went on to tie the game before losing on a last second field goal. The point is if they had not gone for the first two, they wouldn't have been compelled to go for the second try.
So John Fox got blamed for trying to scored as many points as possible in a football game, while the Panthers' players, the ones who'd actually failed to complete the attempts, were let off the hook. That's a syndrome that Tuesday Morning Quarterback has blamed for punts in the opponent's territory: Coaches would rather do the call fans expect, then the call that's right, because when they call what the fans want and it doesn't work, fans don't get mad at the coach and the coaches don't get fired.
And experts can't agree on it anyway: one blogger said that teams should never or almost never go for two. Tuesday Morning Quarterback thinks like me: the 2-pointer is underused.
People who are against going for two uniformly cite the low success rate - -sometimes as low as 35%, usually around 50-55%, according to Football Prospectus, but those people don't factor in one other thing. Just as I pointed out that going for two (and making it) will make other teams also have to go for two -- as happened in the Panthers-Patriots* Super Bowl-- going for two will make your team better at it.
Practice makes perfect, right? Teams right now go for 2 only rarely -- 53 times in 2009, according to that Times article, and 35 times in 2006. There are 256 games in a regular season - -that's a tiny rate of attempts for play that's usually needed when everything's on the line. Teams actually make the two-pointer less effective than it could be by never using it... and then calling out the play when it's all-or-nothing.
Why use a rarely-practiced play on one of the most important snaps of the game? Going for two every time would mean that your team gets good at it - -and converts more of them. Then, when it comes down to the end of the game and Aaron Rodgers had just snuck in to put your team in striking range, the guys will be ready, knowing that they've done the 2-point conversion numerous times before and have made it on many of those plays. It'll be routine -- and your team will have a chance to win in regulation rather than risk it in OT.
I don't expect that we'll see teams going for 2 more often than we do now -- at least not the pro level. There are high school teams that have adopted unique approaches: one team never punts, for example -- and college teams that want to make an impact adopt seemingly-wacky schemes that then take over the football universe. Maybe one of them -- Boise State, perhaps?-- would take up the mantle of Use The Two and start being more high scoring and impressive.
But the rest of us will have to just sit and watch our teams leave points on the field and off the board - - and know that it's because the coaches and players don't really want to win. They just want to play it safe.
Stuff I did while you did the stuff you did... "Catbugs" happened: Shown at right: A caterpillar crawling on the nature trail where Sweetie and I and Mr F and Mr Bunches went for a hike on Saturday -- climbing up to the highest point in Middleton for a scenic view of... some of Middleton. (Middleton's highest point is not really very high.) The highlight of the walk was the abundance of caterpillars trying to make their way across the path. I picked one up to show it to Mr F and Mr Bunches, and Mr Bunches proclaimed it "a bug." I then said "It's a caterpillar," to which he replied "Catbug."
Wisconsin's Victory Happened: When you beat the number one team, shouldn't you be the number one team? Especially when you beat them handily and prove a local blogger wrong in his prediction of bad things happening on Saturday night? I actually watched the game on Saturday with Sweetie... and, yeah, I know it was Sweetest Day, more on that in a moment ... and found it entertaining. Wisconsin played well, appeared well-coached despite still being coached by Bret Bieleman, and earned the victory. And this person:With their "OH ST BUX" personalized Wisconsin license plate probably feels a little more conflicted than ever this morning.
Kentucky's Victory Happened: When you beat the team that beat the former number one team, shouldn't you be... well, forget it. I was curious to see whether the Gamecocks could win again. Not curious enough to watch the game, but curious enough to check the scores at the bottom of the screen and watch the highlights about how Kentucky pulled out a victory over Spurrier's team. I bring this up because everyone knocks the BCS and the polls -- but it's the BCS and the polls and the fact that one loss can end your season that makes college football so exciting; I wanted to see if Spurrier's team could go on winning, or if somebody would knock them off.
There's no other sport where every single game counts as much as it does in college football, and changing a single thing about that would not be a good idea. You've got a system, college football, that gets people like me -- casual fans -- watching games and talking about them. The BCS ain't broke, and you know how the saying goes. Rodgers' Sneak (And Disagreement With His Coach) Happened:Did you catch the great 4th-and-Goal play the Packers made to tie things up before going on to lose in OT against the Godawfulfins? Rodgers' sneak fooled even me -- not saying much -- as Kuhn motioned out of the backfield. I'd been telling The Boy that 4th-and-goal requires motion and trickery, because the previous three plays have been stopped, and when Kuhn went running out I figured that the was the trickery, but A-Rodg had even more up his sleeve, moving up like he was changing a play and then just taking the snap and walking into the end zone. Shades of Marino!
Even more interesting is the continued sniping back and forth between A-Rodg and coach Mike "Mike" McCarthy. SI pointed out not long ago that there was bad blood between Rodgers and McCarthy when McCarthy first became the head coach: Rodgers hadn't forgotten that McCarthy was part of the group that took Alex Smith over him for the 49ers.
Then, Rodgers took on McCarthy and the "lack of identity" on offense about three weeks ago. Then, Rodgers said his concussion didn't happen on the last play of the Redskins game, as McCarthy claimed it had. And now, Rodgers and McCarthy seem to disagree on whose idea, exactly, the sneak was:
According to [Offensive Coordinator Joe] Philbin, the play is designed to give Rodgers the option of simply taking the shotgun snap and trying to throw for the touchdown or, if he sees a favorable alignment up front from the defense, moving under center and keeping the ball on the sneak.... “It’s a built-in thing. He sees a soft spot in the defense and takes it,” Philbin said.
But Rodgers sees it differently and says the play idea came up in the huddle:
“They called timeout right before that and we were in the same formation. The line said, ‘Hey, if they line up with nobody over center again, let's just sneak it.' So we talked about it real quick,” Rodgers said. “They actually lined up with a guy over the center, but the next guy out was, I think, outside the tackle on the left side. So I just told them I was going to act like I was changing something and then just went up there and quick-snapped it and got it in there."
Designed play? Or Rodgers' quick thinking? It seems there's trouble in River City as the "Coach" and "The Anointed One" continue to disagree.
Latest up: The Superficial. While I was waiting for my ridiculously-slow Internet connection to get me the game on NBC Sports (how come the commercials come through without any buffering, NBC?) I checked out The Superficial, and found this post:
It's not just the headline, either; the brilliant writer of that post turns his talent from making fun of "celebrities" to giving you sports fans the business:
It’d be disingenuous of me, or anyone, to sit here and demand Lindsay Lohan rot in a jail cell so she’ll stop snorting mountains of cocaine and running over strollers, only to turn around and give Ben Roethlisberger a pass because he throws a piece of leather with incredible precision. Granted, there’s no definitive account of what happen that night in Georgia, or the first alleged rape, it’s no secret large amounts of cash exchanged hands to keep both voices silent. Some might say this speaks to the truth of these women’s allegations, but I’d counter by saying I don’t think of any of us would know how to react should a life-changing amount of money present itself to us. Would you choose the gauntlet of the press or having all your financial hopes and dreams instantly satisfied? Regardless, something happened. Twice.
Now, here’s where I begin to take issue, especially with women and fathers with daughters: The mental gymnastics.
“Those girls had it coming. Twice.” “They were just after his money. Twice.” “SUPER BOWL RINGS, BABY! Twice.”
It was once said Kobe Bryant would be “judged on the court.” You think guys like Ben Roethlisberger don’t know that? You think they don’t realize in the back of their head they simply have to move a ball down a field to satisfy an entire audience horfing down beer and nachos? They can do whatever they want, and you will forgive them. Because of a game.
Bravo, The Superficial. That's so genius, I want to get it tattooed on my back and then go sit shirtless in front of a Pittsburgh fan so he can spend the game reading it. Except I don't want beer spilled all over me. And except that people from Pittsburgh always look like they have b.o. Not, like, fresh body odor, but just sort of ground into those jerseys they wear to the games, like maybe they didn't always wash them after the last time they wore them, and now that odor is part of the fabric of the shirt.
What I'm trying to say is, I'm not going to Pittsburgh.
And, also, I never did get that NBC Sports to work, so I'm just going to listen to A Prairie Home Companion.
Sometimes sports writers get it wrong, and sometimes they get it really wrong. Which is why this blog exists -- to get you the information about sports that sportswriters (and sportstalkers on the radio, and sportssitters on TV) don't get you.
So this week, while the rest of the "sports" "world" was focused on that huge Brett Favre story -- no, not that one, but this one:
Where was I? I'm sorry. I lost my train of thought. There is nothing funnier that "Football To The Groin." Right, Homer?
From which you can see that the big story the "sports" "media" was following this week was the Vikings have decided to plagiarize The Simpsons. Which is dumb of the "media," because plagiarism isn't a story; it's common in the sports world. ( As I learned.) It's a little-known fact that J."K" Rowling got her start in sports writing, which may explain whythiskeeps happening. (J."K." also recently said she may write another Harry Potter book, which I can only hope is called "Harry Potter And The Golden Snitch To The Groin.")
BUT, while "sports" "people" were talking about J.K. Rowling throwing footballs at Brett Favre's groin, I was noticing other stories that not only went more or less under the radar, but also in which the basic point was missed... and I'm talking, of course, about Mackenzie Putnam, Vigilante Cheerleader.
From NPR.org comes a story that also appeared as a blurb in Sports Illustrated about two weeks ago -- a story that deserves far more attention than NPR. I'll give you their take on it with the two lead paragraphs
Jacksonville receiver Kassim Osgood leapt out a second-floor window to escape a gun-wielding man who attacked him and a 19-year-old Jaguars cheerleader, according to police.
The armed intruder exchanged gunfire with his ex-girlfriend, Mackenzie Rae Putnal, after putting a gun to her head Monday night, according to the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office.
That's under a headline about a Jaguar's receiver being attacked in a cheerleader's home. You have to read five paragraphs later to get to this:
Putnal and Osgood were watching television around 11 p.m. in an upstairs game room when a man walked in with his face covered with a plastic bag and pointed a gun at them. Saying "I can't believe you're with that guy," the man pulled Putnal around the room by her hair and hit her with the gun and his fists before hitting Osgood in the head with the gun, according to the report.The gunman took Putnal's cell phone and tackled her as she tried to flee. When he ordered the couple to sit on the floor, she escaped downstairs in her parents' home and grabbed a gun, police said. They shot at each other and both missed.
So the Cheerleader saved the football player? Forget Save The Cheerleader -- Vigilante Cheerleader doesn't need your help, man.
Even that version, from NPR, seems a little weak compared to the SI blurb, which says that as they were attacked
Putnal escaped by jumping downstairs, over a balcony, and used a laser-sighted pistol to trade shots with the intruder.
And here you thought dental hygiene majors-- Mackenzie Putnal's major -- were meek and retiring. I bet you'll floss now, won't you, scumbag?
And yet, all the stories focus on whether the receiver is okay. One even provided his stats (meager and unimpressive, like his behavior in this incident) while ignoring the fact that this cheerleader should be held up as a hero to everyone.
Seriously: I'm not in favor of people owning guns, mostly because have you seen people? We, as a general rule, cannot be trusted to carry around lethal weapons. But I'll make an exception for any cheerleader who's essentially Batman (only a Batman with an in-depth knowledge of gingivitis and a great repertoire of dance routines -- a SuperBatman -- if you will.) So as you go about your business today (your business being to giggle everytime you remember Brett Favre's football-to-the-groin), take a moment to thank your lucky stars that we're all a little safer, thanks to Vigilante Cheerleader:
Some places take seriously their sports' teams contention for national titles -- hoping (and requiring) that their team actually compete for a championship.
Not Wisconsin, where Cheeseheads are glad to just be invited to the party and won't ever require that their team really contend as one of the best.
This is on my mind because of Tom Oates' column in the Wisconsin State Journal today. Headlined with the innocuous-seeming title "Despite injuries, the Packers aren't drowning in this year's watered-down NFC," Oates helps give Packers Coach Mike "Mike" McCarthy a free ride this year by blaming injuries for how bad the Packers looked getting to 3-2, and then goes on to add that everything's okay anyway, because the Packers might still get to the playoffs, where they could lose to, you know, an actually good football team:
It would be helpful, however, if the Packers could find something beyond McCarthy's resolute optimism to hang their helmets on, something more tangible to help them maintain their status as a playoff contender.... the best thing the Packers have going for them at this point is the sorry state of the conference. Go ahead and shudder at the thought of what might happen to the NFC champion should it meet Pittsburgh, Baltimore or the New York Jets in the Super Bowl, but if the Packers can keep their heads above water until they get their players back — the ones that are coming back, anyway — they could still make something of this season.
Oates finishes up by saying the Packers "still have a shot at making the playoffs in the NFC," which Oates seems to feel is good enough. So what if the Packers don't stand a chance of beating any AFC contender? So what if the mere thought of playing a good team should make the Packers "shudder." At least they can get to a playoff game, and isn't that good enough?
I question whether having your team get to the Super Bowl, only to get slaughtered, is good enough -- and I'm a Bills fan since 1990, so I know what I'm talking about -- but getting there may be all Wisconsin sports fans want.
After all, year after year, Wisconsin goes through the motions of claiming it wants to contend for a BCS title, only to then schedule teams like Austin Peay and San Jose State in their nonconference schedule -- scotching any chance (sorry, Scottish people, for that slur) that the Badgers could actually contend for a national championship.
Do Badgers' fans complain about that? They do not. While Wisconsin continues to go to mediocre bowl games and generally get featured on national TV only when a number one team comes to town (I'm predicting, by the way, Ohio State 33, Wisconsin 17), attendance remains high and there's no shortage of red on State Street on Saturday.
Remember fans -- of Wisconsin sports and other states -- you won't get more than you demand. If you insist your team just be in the hunt, the owners won't try to do more than that, and if they can stay in the hunt without paying top dollar for a running back available in a trade, they'll just stand pat and make a bunch of comments about "building through the draft."
Click here for the NL preview. Is it the year of competitive balance in Major League Baseball? Is it time for small markets to prove that baseball need not worry about instituting a salary cap to allow someone other than the Yankees to win a World Series?
To answer those burning questions -- as well as the burning question of how I was absolutely right that Joe Mauer would hurt his team for selfish reasons -- which, technically, is not a question, but rather me gloating -- let's turn to the NonSportsmanlike Conduct 100% Accurate, Never-Fail, Always-Right, Sure-Fire System For Picking The Playoff Winner (The NC100%ANF,AR,SFSFPTPW" for short.)
The 100% System, together with some other esteemed guests and choice articles, will help you not only determine which teams are going to meet in the World Series, but also who will actually win the Series, and, for good measure, this installment of the 100% System will help prove that it's not the Year Of The Small Market, that Joe Mauer sucks and must hate Minnesota, and finally get around to explaining why only a salary cap is going to help your team win the World Series.
Let's get on with it! You know the drill if you've already read the NL preview. And if you did read the NL Preview, you're probably thinking how can you, NC!, say the system is "always-right," and "never-fail?") Which is a fair question, and deserves an answer. And I'm going to answer it, because when someone asks me a fair question that deserves an answer and when not answering that question would distract from my goals and otherwise interfere with me doing my job, I answer that question.
So, to answer your question, The 100% System is always accurate. It's reality that sometimes is wrong. In other words, I got it right. Baseball got it wrong. I'm here making predictions that are guaranteed to be right. I'm doing my job. It's not my fault if MLB doesn't hold up their end of the deal.
(Actually, I'm also not doing my job; I'm taking a break from that and doing this.)
So on with the 100% System's analysis of who's going to be the AL's representative in the World Series:
The teams remaining are Texas, Tampa Bay, and New York. But for fun, and to prove my point about Joe Mauer hurting the Twins, I'm going to include comments about Minnesota, as well. 1. Mascot/Logo: The only team that's really worth mentioning when talking about team names or logos is Tampa Bay. Why are teams from Tampa claiming they're from Tampa Bay? Why don't teams simply be the Tampa this-or-that's? The city is not, as we've always heard, called Tampa Bay. It's just Tampa. But whenever Tampa gets a professional sports team, the sports team says, geographically, it's from Tampa Bay.
I've mentioned before that sports teams sometimes appeal to the ignorance of their fans by broadening their geographic horizons -- or sometimes just claiming that they're from a city that they don't play in (like the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.) They do that, I assume, because fans may not find themselves willing to root for a team that's from Minneapolis when they, themselves, are from a different city in Minnesota.
So what does it say about the fans when management decides to name the local team after a non-existent entity? Are they trying to send a message to locals, that message being "We'd rather you didn't root for us... thanks just the same."
Maybe the fans were confused not just by the geography, but by the name changes: The Rays started out as the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, but got their name shortened to just Rays. Why? Because the name Rays is
"a beacon that radiates throughout Tampa Bay and across the entire state of Florida... Tampa Bay and the Sunshine State are beautiful places. We want the Rays to reflect the best our region has to offer."
That quote, from Stuart Sternberg the team's principal owner, was made while Sternberg was speaking... in St. Petersburg.
Yes, that's right: The official baseball team of the City of Tampa doesn't use the city's name, and it's owner makes press announcements from another city.
This is the new logo that Sternberg selected:
And I have to confess, until I wrote this post just now, I didn't realize that Rays wasn't sting rays but was rays of the sun. Which, frankly, is lame.
You may ask yourself: How did the Tampa Bay Sunbeams manage to make it into the playoffs, being from a small (some would say non-existent) market? Asking yourself, though, isn't going to be helpful; you don't know anything. Instead, let's ask Bud Selig, who chalks it up to competitive balance:
"When you've got Cincinnati winning and San Diego up there, and even San Francisco and Colorado and Tampa, it's a great sign... There's no doubt, as I study things, that we have more competitive balance than we've ever had in our history."
(Source.) Bud fails to note that you don't have Cincinnati winning; they got swept. San Diego's not up there by any mark. The Giants are almost out. And Tampa's only tied with Texas, who ranked 21st in salary (to the Rays' 29th) in the latest year I could find.
Consider, instead of payroll and salaries, teams' revenues. As of April, 2010, the teams that entered this year's MLB playoffs ranked as follows:
In other words, contrary to Selig's glowing, rhapsodic lie about competitive balance, this year's playoffs continued MLB's trend: 6 of 8 teams were in the top half of the league in revenues. 3 of 8 were in the top 1/3 of the league in revenues. And New York, Philadelphia, and the Bay Area can't exactly be considered small markets. (San Francisco in fact is the 12th-most-populous city in the US. Arlington, where the Rangers play, is midway between Dallas and Fort Worth. Dallas is the 9th biggest city in the US. So four of the 8 teams are from major metropolitan areas. Five, if you count Atlanta.)
So how is Tampa Bay winning? Frankly, I don't know. Good young players with a good manager... maybe. But that won't last. Big teams with big revenues from big cities win in baseball, because of the salary cap.
Of course, having a terrible logo doesn't help. -1, Rays.
The Rangers and the Yankees' logos are nothing to talk about, period - -they're those blandly corporate logos and designs, Times New Romanesque typing done to appeal to... who? Typographers? Descendants of Gutenberg?
It seems to me, based upon my scientific survey of things I think I remember as I write this, that baseball teams, more than any other sport, simply use their initials or their city's initials as their logo -- and, to make it worse, that they do so in a more and more boring way, each year. For example, the Brewers went through this progression of logos, from a Swing-Away Beer Keg Robot
To the fun, 70's-ish baseball glove that spells out "MB,"
:To a more corporatized logo that features some sort of wheat used in brewing...
To a logo that Ellen Page created in exactly two minutes because Leonardo DiCaprio told her to:
And, really, when I look at that last one, I have difficulty seeing what it says, at all, and when I am able to focus, it looks more like a "D" and an "M" and part of an "R."
Texas and New York, 0 points for boring logos.
Scores so far:
Tampa Bay: -1 Texas: 0 New York: 0 2. Craziest Fan on Youtube. After suffering through the worst round of these, ever, I have to wonder if we have crazy fans in baseball anymore. While nearly half of Americans claim to be baseball fans (a number that dropped after McGwire and Bonds cheated their way to "records" that baseball won't disavow), roughly 1/3 of all baseball fans are over 50-- and nearly 1 in 5 baseball fans is over 65. You won't see many septuagenerians drunkenly body surfing their buddies into the dugout to get a kiss from Derek Jeter.
I hope.
The method remains the same: Go to Youtube, search for "Crazy [team] fan" and take the first video on the list. With 77,000+ views, here's the Rays' entry:
That's a Rays fan who climbed a street sign to celebrate something (the Rays' acknowleding his city, maybe?), only to get drilled in the head by a bottle. I can't prove the bottle was thrown by Rays' management... but I can't not prove it, either.
On the other hand, that fan didn't do anything crazier than try to show the Rays some love -- which we know the organization doesn't want. 0 points.
Running onto the field, and then posting lengthy Youtube videos about it, seems to be the craziest things most baseball fans can imagine. Why on earth this guy thought we needed five minutes of a fan on the field, I can't imagine, but here's your crazy Texas Rangers' fan:
Did someone do something crazy? I got bored a minute in and stopped watching. -2, Texas Rangers.
New York's full of nuts, right? And not all of them are busy being homophobic, possibly illiterate Tea Party candidates for office, so that leaves some time to be a crazy Yankees' fan, like this guy.
That was painful. The next time I want to see a shaky, out-of-focus video of so-called New Yorkers acting stupid in a movie with no narrative thread and gaping plot holes, I'll watch Cloverfield.
-3, Yankees.
Scores So Far:
Tampa Bay: -1 Texas: -2 New York: -3 3. Strangest Fact About Their City. Over on a site called "Pinellaslife.com," or maybe called "Go Local Tampa Bay" (it was hard to tell), I found the fact I was going to go with for Tampa's entry here, the claim that "Edward Scissorhands was filmed in Land O’Lakes." That seemed fitting, both because Edward Scissorhands was a weird (but great) movie and because it would continue the trend of Tampa's teams being about Anything But Tampa.
But the very next fact there was this:
Tarpon Springs has the largest percentage of Greek-Americans of any city in the U.S., and is considered the “Sponge Capital of the World.”
I don't know where Tarpon Springs is, but I'm intrigued by that fact -- not only because it's a number one ranking, so Tampa (or Tarpon Springs) is not celebrating almost winning, but also because of the odd juxtaposition of Greek-Americans and sponges.
I wondered, as I read it: Is there some link? Are the Greeks known for sponges? Are sponges a peculiarly Greek thing? Through further investigation (Googling "Spongebob Toga") I found indisputable scientific evidence of just such a link:
Above: Socrates (in blue.)
Further evidence was uncovered in this video, headed "SpongeBob TogaPants," and previously viewed by only 218 people:
To judge how popular (?) SpongeBob Toga Pants is, consider that this video, of my twin Babies! watching a video on Youtube, has been viewed 469 times:
Man, they're cute. Don't you just want to hug them? And don't you just want to get in touch with their dad and sign them to a television show deal paying, say, $100,000 per episode? I'm waiting for your call.
For Greek Sponges (and the chance to put up a video of my kids), 3 points, Tampa.
If you like bowling or not glowing in the dark, then Arlington, Texas is your place -- the city brags about being home to the United States Bowling Congress, the International Bowling Museum, and the International Bowling Hall of Fame. The Bowling Hall of Fame actually comprises five different levels of Bowling Hall Of Fame, including a Hall of Fame for bowling writers. Skimming through that section, it appears that bowling is huge in the Philippines.
Not all is fun and games and 7-10 splits, though: Arlington has serious business, as it's home to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for Region IV, charged with ... um... regulating nuclear things in Region IV? I'm not sure. (Region IV is everything between Arlington, Texas, and the Philippines.)
Bowling and safety: 1 point, Texas.
Over in New York, meanwhile, they ought to change the lyrics of that famous song to Give My Regards To Highway 9 in Albany, as the strangest fact about New York I could find is this:
Broadway, originating from Lower Manhattan at Bowling Green and ending in Albany, is one of the world's longest streets at 150 mi (241 km). The official name of this street is Highway 9.
Again, though... "one of" the world's longest streets? Is New York now content to boast of being second (or worst) fiddle?
And, more importantly, am I ever going to get to the part where I said that Joe Mauer hurt the Twins and that small market teams can't spend their way to championships?
Sure -- let's touch on that now, by pointing out that an article in Slate not so long ago made the case that winning hurts teams' bottom lines -- and that even spending a lot of money can't really help a team win more games.
First the latter part: Slate cited to Baseball Prospectus for the proposition that for every $5 million a team spends on a free agent, it can expect about two extra wins per year. This year, Milwaukee finished 14 games below Cincinnati in its division -- 77 wins to 91 wins. (Milwaukee was also 14 games out of the wild card, so that's a good measure.) Using Baseball Prospectus/Slate's claims, Milwaukee would have to spend as much as $70 million more to win those 14 extra games -- maybe a little less, because some of those games are against Atlanta and the Reds, so Milwaukee wouldn't need to win 91 games because it could reduce those teams' wins. Milwaukee's revenues last year, though, according to Forbes, were $171 million. So they'd have to spend nearly half their revenue to catch up to ... the Reds and Braves. And that doesn't count trying to keep up with bigger-market teams who can simply outbid them; if the price of a free agent goes up, those two wins could be $6 million, or more.
(That, too, is how Joe Mauer hurt the Twins so badly -- by taking all that extra money, Joe Mauer kept the Twins from using it to get other good players. While baseball is second only to basketball in terms of the impact of one player on a team, one player can't beat the Yankees, as Mauer's Twins just handily proved again. Mauer's extra money -- money that's meaningless to him -- kept the Twins from having other free agents that could have added additional victories to their total.)
But if the Brewers, or any other team, do that -- bid up free agents and buy some extra victories (the Brewers did just that when they brought in C.C. Sabathia, after all), what happens next? The Slate article answers that, too: Baseball (and simple economics) punishes the small markets and makes them losers again.
Here's how that works:
Slate demonstrated using the Rays, who went from worst record int he AL in 2007 to goign 97-65 in 2008 and winning the World Series. That jump saw Tampa's ticket sales and concessions increase by about $17 million, but to get there, the Rays had to spend $20 million on salaries. So they were already $3 million in the hole, and then MLB's revenue sharing system cut payments to the Rays -- because they were making more money at the gate. That cost them an additional $8 million.
Overall, the Rays saw their revenues rise by about $9 million for going from worst-to-first, but saw their actual operating income decline from $22 million down to $3 million.
Slate concluded:
As amazing as it seems, even after adding in $11 million in postseason earnings, the Rays were more profitable when they went 66-96 than when they went 97-65.
And remember, as I always say, sports teams are businesses. They don't want to win, they want to make money. Businesses that don't try to make money don't last long.
Why spend more to win if it means you'll make less in the end? No team would do that, and baseball teams are no different. They'll continue overpaying for beloved free agents (Joe Mauer), and occasionally bidding into a high-priced free agent, but they're doing that to keep the fans happy, while watching the bottom line. No team is going to year after year shell out its money to generate wins while taking net losses.
Even the Rays: After the 2008 debacle, the Rays haven't begun being free spenders again. Their 2010 payroll is 10th lowest in the league. In the top 11 of that list, we find the Yankees (1), Phillies (4), Giants (9) and Twins (11) -- four of the 8 playoff teams have payrolls in the top 1/3 of the league.
So your team can only win the Series if it's a big market/big money team, or if lightning strikes once in a while and everything comes together -- which happens just often enough to keep fans sedated and not force major changes on Selig and MLB.
I used to be one of those people who demanded that teams spend money -- saying that if teams spent money they'd make more money because more fans would come into the stadium, etc. I no longer believe that. Absent a salary cap, it's going to be Yankees-Phillies-Sox for a long time, reducing the rest of baseball to the equivalent of the NCAA's nonconference schedule.
Oh, and the longest street in America? It's a subject that's hotly debated, as is shown here, which may be why New York is hesitant to declare Broadway the longest street in America -- but the New York City I know isn't afraid to just go ahead and say something, truth be damned. Shame on you, modern, timid, Bloombergian New York City. -1 point.
Scores So Far:
Tampa Bay: 2 Texas: -1 New York: -4
4. Weirdest Thing For Sale In Their Pro Shop: Christmas is coming up, and despite the fact that the Rays want nothing to do with Tampa or its residents (Another bottle! Duck!), the Rays want the fans to have something to do with them, and specifically, they want you to buy a personalized photo of jerseys hanging in a locker -- one of which can feature your name. For just fifty bucks, you can imagine what it would be like if you were going to get dressed next to a guy named Crawford:
I'll give that a 1.
Meanwhile, over in Texas, I tried to find the Rangers pro shop but got shunted around, seeing server errors and other problems, until I finally got to this site, a rather generic site that had a bunch of disabled links to other places to buy Rangers gear. -2.
I had the same problem with the Yankees' pro shop -- baseball teams really need to work on that, because it's impossible to find an official shop for a pro baseball team, and it shouldn't be that hard to have the Official Team Pro Shop be easy to find; I mean, when I went looking for Aussie Football merchandise, I got to the official site in about two clicks. True, there's no actual pro shops yet, but they at least have a site.
A memorabilia item that'll set you back only $99.99. But it's totally worth it: according to this review, which I'm quoting verbatim,
The Viz-A-Ball New York Yankees if prefect for the Yankee Fan. It has the team Logo on one side and a picture of the stadium on the other. It is a good ball for anyone.
That review comes to you from Lenny Biondi Jr, who works the Deltona Lanes Proshop -- a shop you can find in one click. The Deltona Lanes Pro Shop is, I dare say, the single largest collection of bowling knowledge outside of Arlington, Texas, and I found it fascinating. I really did. Far more fascinating than those Youtube fan videos, which I still haven't watched.
But, the Yankees didn't actually have a pro shop, did they? So I've got to penalize them for that. I'll say - 2.
Final Scores :
Tampa Bay: 3 Texas: -3 New York: -6
There you go: The NonSportsmanlike Conduct 100% Accurate, Never-Fail, Always-Right, Sure-Fire System For Picking The Playoff Winner has determined that the AL representative in the World Series will be the Tampa Bay Rays -- not that they'll let their fans know about it --
...and they'll square off against the Reds (Reality be damned! The system works!). And, since the Reds finished with a score of 3, and the Rays finished with a score of 3, the 100% System has further determined that this year's World Series will end in a tie!
You heard it here first. (Which means you'll hear it from Bill Simmons in about 2 weeks.)
And you might just run into Bill Nelson (shown at right), of Bradenton, Florida, who won tickets to Lombardi! on Broadway, plus two tickets to the Jets-Packers game tomorrow, plus an all-expense paid trip to New York, plus he gets the jar containing the pickled hand of Vince Lombardi that's ordinarily kept on Ted Thompson's desk.
