Harry's Beef Trust

"To know how to suggest is the great art of teaching" -- Henri Frederic Amiel

2012-01-28T11:34:00.011-05:00

Well, it seems the Phillies are done tinkering with their roster in advance of Spring Training, the latter being an event that can't get here fast enough in a satellite television landscape festooned with nothing but college and pro hoops as far as the eye can see, with only tiny islands of the Senior Bowl and Super Bowl offering relief. It's like reliving the Dark Ages every winter…

Anyway, the Phils have settled with all of their arbitration-eligible players, the last being yesterday's signing of energetic and charismatic rightfielder Hunter Pence. They also reshaped the team's bench once again by inking veteran outfielder and one-time speedster Juan Pierre [left].

Signing Pierre on the heels of ceremoniously dumping solid infield back-up Wilson Valdez, who was Cast Away to the Cincinnati Reds for an erratic minor leaguer, gives some insight into the thinking of the team's braintrust.

First, the front office is enamored with the back-upinfield combo of Michael Martinez, last year's light-hitting 25th man (constant swinging from the heels by the tiny Martinez [right] rivaled that of hulking Ryan Howard) and AAA shortstop Freddy Galvis, slick of glove and long anointed as the heir apparent to Jimmy Rollins.

Both infielders flash leather like Madonna, but with far less idea of what to do when they eventually find wood in their hands.

You could do worse than installing Juan Pierre as your primary left fielder, even in the waning years of his career, if the Phils' other dice rolls don't pan out: Laynce Nix, John Mayberry, Ty Wiggington, Martinez, and even the star-crossed Domonic Brown.

It also speaks volumes about the confidence the team's medical and trainging staffs must have that they can keep the rickety Rollins, Chase Utley, and Placido Polanco on the field for most of 2012!

Still, more importantly, I see the team using Pierre as a spot starter, pinch hitter and runner extraordinaire, and as a second hitting coach (3rd if you count manager Charlie Manuel) with an eye toward refining the skill sets of Martinez and Galvis [below].

In his hey-day, Pierre was devastating combination of speed and contact hitting who could go get 'em in center field—a player who found himself in All-Star Games, World Series celebrations, and MVP voting discussions while authoring just 16 home runs in 162 big league seasons.

Look for Pierre in the field and on the plate, assuming he has anything left in the tank. Don't forget: He's listed at 5'11' and 175, but plays smaller, and once reeled off five straight 162 seasons from 2003 – 2007.

Look for him even more to be tutoring Martinez and Galvis on the fine arts of lead-off hitting, making contact, bunting, and situational hitting. This is in line with Ruben Amaro's off season mantra about changing the mindset of his teams' oft-flailing hitters, and he also may end up helping with the team's baserunning and stealing in the wake of the ill-advised dispatching of Davey Lopes...

The signing of Pierre, from this corner, looks like a great idea. How receptive the youngsters will be to his advice remains to be seen.

"Wilson!!!" -- Chuck Noland ('Cast Away')

2012-01-25T21:54:00.009-05:00

Wilson, we hardly knew ye! I know that Wilson could have been a starter on some team if only he'd choked up on the bat and hit more. But then the Phillies never would have sniffed ever having him on the roster.

Today, Wilson Valdez was swapped for a minor league lefty bullpen piece of the Reds. The deal supposedly was made because the Phils believed they had cheaper options at reserve infielder.

It says here, though, that the club will miss the experienced glove and penchant for the timely extra-base hit that Valdez has provided over the last couple of seasons.

Good luck, Wilson!

"He was but a youth, and ruddy, and of a fair countenance" -- 1 Samuel 17:42

2012-01-15T10:27:00.023-05:00

It's a chilly Sunday morning here in central Florida. The grass is tawny and the dry, crisp leaves skitter by in the breeze. The earth seems almost lifeless, and a metaphorically perfect day for Tim Tebow and his upstart Broncos to begin the winter of their discontent.

Back when Tebow played Goliath, I couldn't have cared less about him. He smiled boyishly and ran roughshod over college kids who'd be gainfully employed as teachers, accountants, and policemen in a year or two. While Tim seemed like a good fellow at the college level, he clearly disregarded the acquisition of what many considered to fundamental quarterbacking skills: Natural ability and off-the-charts leadership skill were all he needed. The Florida coaching staff simply sneered at pundits who criticized his game, arrogantly failing to consider the young man's future in the sport.

Now, cast as David, Tebow makes a much more interesting story. After having been anointed Denver's starter, the drama of his battles against the minor Philistines of the league seemed epic. Goliath, in the form of the Patriots last night, had the proverbial last laugh.

Watching the Patriots win last night was like watching a teeming school of piranha strip an unwary capybara, swimming unwittingly across the Amazon, to the very bone. And the key word there is 'school.' The Broncos en masse , including their experienced coaching staff, were all taught a difficult and predominantly violent lesson.

One recalls boxers gratuitously punching a nearly unconscious opponent who was somehow hanging on the ropes, turning to the referee between blows and imploring him to stop a bout that was clearly over. The Patriots, however, really never let up.

Anyone who blames this loss on Tebow is daft. Tebow, I'm sure, stoked the Patriots' collective competitive fire and was obviously a prime target of their ferocity. New England took the lumber to the entire team—any Bronco who can look at himself in the mirror today and blame the quarterback is delusional.

All we really learned last night was that the Patriots remain a slumbering giant, prone to smug self-satisfaction, but a veritable sleeping dog of a team that it would be far better to let lie. That, and the real difficulty of having a popular but polarizing Tim Tebow as your quarterback and ostensible face of your franchise: He wears a colossal target, and when talented teams with plenty of ill will decide to shock and awe him, everyone wearing orange and blue is potential collateral damage in the terrible carnage sure to follow.

Regarding Tebow, here’s hoping that New England finally knocked the pigskin saviour right out of the minds of the Broncos. Here's hoping that with this adversity he'll now face far more reasonable expectations for a young quarterback with a limited skill set and a heart the size of Nebraska.

Perhaps he be taught—as others have been (Can you say Michael Vick?)—to read defenses, know the playbook, check down his receivers, stand tall in the pocket, and, seemingly most importantly, hit the open man with an accurate spiral more often than not. A full offseason of OTAs, an entire training camp, and a complete schedule of preseason games won't hurt at all.

Now, hopefully, begins the winter during which Tebow starts to become a real big league quarterback, and not merely a swollen cash cow to be slaughtered violently on the altar of the national media and the NFL.

Happy New Year!

2012-01-01T03:13:00.003-05:00

Happy New Year, everyone!

"Why can't they invent something for us to marry instead of women?" -- Fred Flintstone

2011-12-29T13:37:00.006-05:00

Having been subjected recently to a comparison of John Belushi and Jackie Gleason and their similarity in appearance to Fred Flinstone, I wondered: Who's the sporting world's connection to Bedrock's lovable family man?

Check out the graphic above. Who's your Flinstone [clockwise from right]: Tony Siragusa, Wayne Fontes, or Keith Jones...?

Season's Greetings!

2011-12-27T21:27:00.003-05:00

A belated Merry Christmas to everyone from Harry's Beef Trust!

Featured is an illustration by the great Arthur Rackham from a 1931 edition of Clement Moore's The Night Before Christmas, published by London's G. G. Harrap, also a publisher of literature's George Mills.

Happy New Year!

"Live fast, die young, and have a good-looking corpse!" -- John Derek (as Nick Romano)

2011-12-13T17:41:00.015-05:00

It's funny hearing TV talking heads—especially older ones—saying things about Tim Tebow's current run of wins/spectacular finishes like, "In all my years covering the NFL, I've never seen anything like this!"

Now, Tebow seems to be something special, but "never" covers a lot of players in a lot of cities over the course of whole Hell of a lot of seasons. Doesn't it seem there must have been something similar?

Fortunately, here at Harry's Beef Trust, we have the benefit of almost 50 vast years of experience sacking out on the sofa on Sundays and watching the gridiron rumble. How many of you can remember when it did, indeed, happen before?

The guy was a left-handed quarterback with a proclivity to run first and throw later in college, hailing from and playing at school in the South. His throwing motion was not "classic," and there was much talk that he'd make a better running back than a quarterback.

Some pundits believed he could play QB in the NFL, but didn't believe he could make a team win—something that he proved wrong.

And while this guy's athletic ability was terrific, his newsworthy sense of morality seemed to make as many headlines as his play on the field—and sometimes more.

After spending about a year either on the bench or playing 'spot duty,' and languishing during a couple of training camps (and looking bad in pre-season games), he was unexpectedly named a team's starter and ripped off a stretch of play so phenomenal and unexpected that people, after less than a dozen games, were mentioning aloud his candidacy for league MVP.

It was a simply stunning, out-of-nowhere experience that left jaws slack and secondaries in shambles.

Can you recall when all of that happened once before in the NFL?

How about last year?

When Michael Vick was freed from prison, many experts predicted his career was effectively over after two years of prison living and, even worse, a prison diet. It was a rare bird indeed who quoth anything except that Vick's days as an elite athlete had come to an end. He was dubbed 'fit only for the wildcat.'

Vick was en fuego last year, in Tebow-esque style but with more explosive weapons, until he damaged cartilage in his rib cage. Since then, his numbers, his play, and his team's won-loss record all have been lacklustre at best.

Tebow? Nice story, but we watched this sort of feel-good story unfold just last year on the Philadelphia Eagles. How soon they forget...

If Tebow throws four interceptions and/or suffers a sprained ankle or concussion this week in a loss against the Patriots, it says here the clock strikes midnight, the coach turns into a pumpkin, and Cinderella has to come home from the ball. He could be going full time to med school by the end of next season, and all of this could be Mark Fidrych-like memory.

But I hope not. I like the kid!

Still, I've also seen a couple of other improbable quarterbacks do some amazing things over sustained periods of time that surpass a mere 6-1 record, and you don't have to be long in the tooth to recall those guys, either. Both played here in the New Millenium.

Ever hear of Kurt Warner or Tom Brady?

It's not like anyone already was polishing Lombardi and league MVP trophies for them when either of those guys first went to camp with the Rams and Patriots respectively—neither team having ever won a Super Bowl.

Tebow's got a looooong way to go before he's even the most unexpectedly amazing QB I've seen in just this century.

"There's a fine line between love and hate" -- Cecilia Ahern

2011-12-03T09:18:00.019-05:00

Seriously. I didn't see what everyone else was seeing.

Were the Philadelphia Eagles embarrassed by the Seattle Seahawks in Thursday night's thriller? Not so much, I don't think. They didn't play particularly well, especially in their passing game, but that certainly isn't a reason to be running around, screaming, "The sky is falling! The sky is falling!" It's just one they let get away.

First off: The Eagles played a late afternoon Sunday home game before crossing several time zones to play on the road in Seattle on Thursday evening. It would have been tough enough playing a road game in Cleveland, let alone on the West Coast—especially in noisy, inhospitable Seattle with so little time to prepare for that particularly hostile environment, home of the fabled "12th Man.".

Let's face it: If the Birds had been 7 – 4 instead of 4 – 7, this one was still no "gimmee."

Then: Marshawn Lynch ran through a bevy of arm tackles and racked up a gaggle of yardage, so the Eagles and their 'soft defense' were an embarrassment.

Say what? That's what Marshawn Lynch does! This was his fourth 100-yard effort in the last five games for the red-hot running back. It's not like he just dropped off the turnip truck. Didn't anyone see his spectacular touchdown against the defending Super Bowl champion Saints in last year's playoffs?

Also: The Eagles braintrust and head coach Andy Reid wasted time outs they might have needed later at critical junctures, yet failed to call a key time out to extend the first half.

Duh. Of course they did. Have you seen the Eagles play over the last decade? Clock Mismanagement: It's what they do.

The only difference between Thursday's time out squandering and the team's typical misuse of them is that, in that ill-fated prime time contest, no one was agonizing over it in the final seconds. The game was so out-of-hand at the end that it turned out there was no hand-wringing over the missing timeouts needed for last minute heroics.

In addition: The Eagles have a disgruntled player, li'l DeSean Jackson, who is a key to the team's success, who has hurt the team's chemistry and prognosis for success.

Yeah? The Eagles—and a bunch of teams— have pissed off players. The only difference is that the Eagles have a decades-long track record of throwing success under the bus over a few dollars, dating back to when A.J. Smith and Mike Brown were in short pants. Did you notice the great Reggie White went into the Hall of Fame as a Green Bay Packer? Have you heard of a fellow with the initials T.O., who almost single-handedly (with a little help from Donovan McNabb's nasty sports hernia) torched the 2005 season?

The landscape is littered with mounds of ivory dust generated by the continually gnashing of teeth of Eagles players who couldn't squeeze an extra buck—or ounce of respect—out of this team.

Make no mistake: The Eagles would just as soon see seasons go down in flames than be seen as giving in to a demanding player who'd like a raise, even if it's a critical star.

Finally: QB Vince Young basically stunk the joint up on TNF.

Yeah, but look at it this way: If Young had just chucked terribly-thrown incompletions instead of each of the two picks he tossed during potential Philadelphia scoring drives, and the Eagles had then been forced to try for field goals on each drive, and even if they then had dishearteningly MISSED BOTH FIELD GOALS, the score would have been just 17 – 14 in favor of Seattle in the final minutes of the fourth quarter.

Now, Seattle ain't exactly the Packers or the 49ers this season. But being down a field goal late in a Thursday night West Coast game wouldn't have been a bad situation for the Birds.

And if the Eagles actually had ended up kicking field goals on those two foiled possessions—one in the second quarter and one in the fourth—it's Seattle that's down by three, 20 – 14, in the waning moments of the game.

Face it, folks: We've all seen the Eagles play like this and come away with a win many times. Sometimes it's mind-boggling how often they have gone to the well, played poorly, and still come away with a metaphorical drink. Vince Young's gaffes prevented that from happening this time, but over the last couple of years I've seen the Birds post more than just a few wins in sloppy games like that.

This year, however, it isn't happening when they don't play well. They're thristy for wins that simply are no longer materializing as they once did.

The Eagles aren't wretched. But it's a thin line between love and hate, and an even thinner one between 4 – 8 and 8 – 4 in the NFL.

"“It is inevitable that some defeat will enter even the most victorious life" -- Ben Stein

2011-11-30T17:06:00.005-05:00

Welcome to reality, Syracuse!

After Penn State was dragged kicking and screaming into the world in which the rest of us live, Syracuse is now forced in as well.

A non-ESPN victim of sexual abuse has come forward, and suddenly we have coverage. It's not the wall-to-wall coverage engendered by the horrifying Jerry Sandusky case in Happy Valley, but it's getting some air-time.

Bernie Fine, long-time assistant coach to Syracuse's Jim Boeheim, has been axed. Boeheim, who threw the full weight of his support behind Fine, was contrite in a statement released to the media apologizing for possibly hurting people's feelings by suggesting that victims of abuse are just in it for the money.

He did not in any way, shape, or form apologize for blindly supporting Fime without ever so much as asking Fine if the allegations were true!

Franco Harris got whacked for supporting Joe Paterno—who hadn't been accused of any wrongdoing, even though Joe lost his job.

Boeheim, however, isn't an octogenarian that his school has been trying to figure out how to get rid of. Paterno did the legally correct thing, but was crucified by moral outrage. Boeheim broke no laws that we know of—unless he did, indeed, see one of Fine's victims in the assistant's hotel bed and failed to call authorities—but his castigation of the victims at both Syracuse and Penn State puts him on even more slippery footing than Paterno's banana peel. One important difference: The school, in the person of Chancellor Nancy Cantor [left] is backing Boeheim, at least for now...

Welcome to the real world, boys: An employee accused of sexual abuse can kiss his job goodbye, and in many lines of work, his entire career—even if the accusations are not true. And then the litigation begins: Ask O.J. Simpson how that "not guilty" verdict positively affected his civil trial, as well as the public's perception of him!

It's all ugly, and in the case of these college coaches, it's played out now on a tableau festooned with microphones, cameras, and reporters.

Some mailmen endure all of this, guilty and not guilty. Teachers do, too. So do police officers, dentists, and car salesmen. It makes the papers. It ruins careers, true or false.

We may never know for sure if Bernie Fine really was such a sleaze, or if Syracuse's insular athletics department turned a blind eye toward it all.

But, it doesn't matter now: Welcome to the real world, baby.

"I'm a great believer in luck and I find the harder I work, the more I have of it" -- Thomas Jefferson

2011-11-26T10:21:00.014-05:00

During the days and weeks leading up to the recent so-called "Game of the Century" between LSU and Alabama, many pundits, especially former college players were asked questions like, "Who's the better college football coach: Les Miles of LSU or Nick Saban of 'Bama?" [Pictured, left.]

This question is akin to asking "Wilma or Betty?" Or "Ginger or Mary Ann?" Or "Laverne or Shirley?" There is no right answer, and I do realize the question is hyperbolic and designed to bring a simmering pot to a boil (Read: Higher TV ratings and more clicks on sites like cbssports and espn.com).

What surprised me is it seemed almost unilateral that those "in the know" picked Saban—a turd of a man who despises the press and the media, who, by the way, represent me. Winning, as they say, is the deodorant that covers all of the stink.

One on-air ESPN former SEC college football yo-yo was asked who he would rather play for: Miles or Saban. He quickly chose Saban using the rationale that he'd probably have more fun playing for Miles, dubbed the "Mad Hatter," but he would become a better player under the driven perfectionist, Saban.

That seemed to be the thesis: Saban—a driven, acerbic, pathological winner who pushes his players to be their individual and collective best (something he couldn't manage to do in the NFL among the best players in the world, by the way); Miles—a charming, certifiable whack-o who wins by sheer luck, and who makes sure his players have fun.

At least Saban exhibits professionalism, though.

Watching LSU take out the Crimson Tide in the Game of the Century was fun, but watching them crush creepy, self-important hypocrite Bobby Petrino and his Arkansas Razorbacks was even more fun! [The weasel, Petrino, is seen in red above, right, classlessly snubbing Miles during the post-game handshake.]

The Tiger spotted Arkansas a quick 14-0 lead, then mashed the team in red 41-3 the rest of the way, leaving a fuming Petrino sputtering about a late field-goal that he felt was running up the score.

LSU had all the appearances of a national champion squad, and one that would probably beat up on the Indianapolis Colts and the St. Louis Rams if the Boys from Baton Rouge had a better quarterback.

Boy, is that whacky Les Miles lucky!

Isn't it actually about time for Miles to get his due? He spoke after the win about his team's "character," and that's something that should be placed a bit above the simple honing of talent and creation of defensive game plans.

Teams coached by Miles tend to be special, not merely talented, full of players with great depth of both character and passion.

Imagine how dominant his teams would be if he were actually a great coach like Saban! Sheesh...

Isn't it about time to give this guy his due?

"I need to do a better job" -- Andy Reid

2011-11-23T10:29:00.014-05:00

I'm not much of a Barstool Sports guy anymore, but they have apparently entered into the world of investigative reporting. Good for them! The level of secrecy maintained by the Philadelphia Eagles hierarchy makes the CIA look like the Daily Blab. Barstool has gained access to the inner sanctum, though.

Defensive Coordinator Juan Castillo recently claimed that head coach Andy Reid works up to 22 hours a day trying to right the Eagles' metaphorical ship. Here's Barstool's insider look at one of Reid's 22 hour days:

5:00 am – Wake up
5:30 am – Breakfast
6:00 am – Film Study
6:15 am – Film Study Snack
7:00 am – Snack Break
8:00 am – Find 3 Excuses to Tell Jeff
9:00 am – Mid-Excuse Pre-Lunch
10:00 am – Inspirational Team Speech
10:30 am – Post-Speech Hoagie
11:00 am – Pre-lunch Hot Pocket
11:15 am – Heart to Heart with DeSean
11:30 am – Urbandictionary.com to Figure Out What DeSean Said
12:00 pm – Lunch
1:00 pm – Catered Post-lunch Coaches Meeting
1:45 pm – One on Juan Defensive Meeting with Castillo
2:00 pm – Churro Break
2:15 pm – Grumble Four-Word Answers to Media
3:00 pm – 3 O’clock Pillow Scream
3:30 pm – Post Scream Ice Cream
4:00 pm – Fuck with Spadaro
5:00 pm – Shop Online for 5XL Hawaiian Shirts
5:30 pm – Pre-Dinner Steak
6:00 pm – Dinner
7:00 pm – Cry on Toilet While Texting Donovan
7:45 pm – Satisfy Random Craving For S’more-flavored Pop Tarts
8:30 pm – Film Study
9:00 pm – Man Vs. Food is on!
10:00 pm – Design 3 new Goal line Trick Plays
11:00 pm – Emotional Breakdown While Staring at GB Super Bowl Ring
11:15 pm – Post-Emotional Breakdown Pot Pie
11:45 pm – Nap
12:00 am – Fourthmeal
1:00 am – Ignore Incoherent Vince Young Voicemails
1:30 am – Eat all the Run Plays
2:00 am – Sigh Heavily to Self
3:00 am – Sleep

Now that's hard-hittin' journalism. Nice work, boys...

"When the pressure is on, I definitely showed up to play" -- Jimmy Rollins

2011-11-23T09:22:00.015-05:00

Just a note on the Phillies' slowly developing negotiations with longtime shortstop Jimmy Rollins…

Could Rollins be frustrating? Sure. He swings at way too many pitches that are not in his hitting zone. He also hit far more balls in the air than you'd like, considering the kind of speed he was once blessed with.

Still, all things considered, the Phillies were blessed to have him and his contagious, gap-toothed smile, and in signing him to a "cost control" long term contract, he was undoubtedly one of the best bargains at shortstop over the past 5 to 10 years.

Look for a minute at the money Edgar Renteria—and he hasn't been the real Edgar Renteria for a looooong time—raked in from 2005 – 2011: A cool $40,000,000.

And check out mediocre Jack Wilson, 2005 – 2011: $37,000,000.

Rollins, during that same time frame: $37,000,000, and he had to reach some incentives to get it.

Now, I'm not saying that Jimmy Rollins hasn't been able to pay the rent, but he certainly was a bargain at those numbers, given his production and leadership.

And don't quibble on the leadership aspect because of being late to the park once and not running out the occasional ground ball. He earned several of those millions just by kicking the Mets in the shins and raising the bar for expectations over the past few years. If the Phillies could have simply written a check for some intangible called "swagger" circa 2007 – 2008, they would have, in addition to paying Rollins's salary.

Instead they got it all in one relatively inexpensive package: A fiery, swaggering, cocky, sometimes arrogant, speedy, powerful, sure-handed shortstop with great range and a fine arm.

It says here that if Jimmy Rollins had played for the Yankees for his entire career, put up the same numbers, added the same swagger, fueled the same playoff runs, won the same MVP award, and played the same sterling defense, he'd be making $20,000,000 per, and they'd be getting ready to deify him—just like Don Mattingly and Paul O'Neill.

But if George Washington had been born a girl, we'd all be sipping tea in the afternoon and saying, "Cheery-O!"

What's always stunned me is that there continually have been so many allegedly-better shortstops in the National League than Rollins when it comes time to pick an All Star shortstop, even though he owns three Gold Gloves and a Silver Slugger.

Since 2004, the NL All Star shortstops have been Renteria (three times), David Eckstein (twice), Miguel Tejada (twice—yikes!), Jose Reyes (twice), Hanley Ramirez (twice), J.J. Hardy, Cristian Guzman, and an aged Barry Larkin.

And in all of that time, Rollins only made the team once—despite the Gold Gloves and Silver Slugger—the same number of times as Cristian Guzman, for cryin' out loud? And the National League version of Tejada? Really? J.J. Hardy? Seriously? But no room for Rollins?

Hogwash.

Maybe Rollins's talent is not as well-respected around baseball as it may seem. Maybe having been associated with the losing-est franchise in sports history has something to do with it. Maybe people just don't like him personally or the way he plays.

Whatever, Philly's been blessed to have him around during the New Millennium, and if he feels like he needs some additional dollars to make him feel wanted as his career winds down, more power to him.

He's earned the right.

"Thanksgiving, after all, is a word of action" -- W.J. Cameron

2011-11-22T16:50:00.011-05:00

This, that, and the other thing in advance of eating a Thanksgiving turkey…

* After watching the Philadelphia Eagles defense assert itself against the Giants in New York on Sunday night, I hereby take back all of the nasty and terrible things I've said and thought about Asante Samuel over the past couple of years.

Usually I'm lovin' on him when he makes a pick, and vilifying him for playing soft the rest of the time. Sunday night, however, was the most physical game I've seen him play as a Bird.

Nice work, man. Keep it up.

* I also take back what I said about backup QB Vince Young being useless. Watching him toss three picks earlier in the game, I basically was inclined to stand by what I said. But—and I have big but here—after engineering that nearly 9 minute, 80 yard drive, capped off with a great third down throw through traffic to Riley Cooper for the winning TD, he won me over big time.

That drive was just what the doctor ordered for a struggling Eagles defense that was being constantly returned to the field too often during the previous nine games. The patience in both the play-calling and execution of the drive was impressive.

Well done! Maybe we'll even see something like it again. Soon…

* And here's a tip of the cap to the entire Eagles defense, who played without ailing Mr. Softee, Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie, and dominated a very good Giant O-Line and their skill players.

* Shifting to baseball, the Philadelphia Inquirer's Bob Brookover made the case this week for the Phillies bringing back venerable Raul Ibanez if the price was right (Read: Low).

What—is Bob high?

Tell me whatever you want about Raul's numbers, clubhouse presence, OPS, blah, blah, blah. Ibanez was the poster child for the Phillies Over the Hill Gang offense. I'll give you that he was in good shape for a 39-year-old, but his overall lack of athleticism, bat speed, and ability to adjust to pitchers making adjustments on him—plus his proclivity to be eternally dinged up, if not flat out injured—made you want to shed a tear in remembrance of Jayson Werth.

If I never see Raul leaving his feet and sliding late under a ball that he'd have caught if he'd just kept running, it'll be too soon!

* Is it just me, or has everything about the Boston Red Sox since about October 1 been outright creepy?

The latest unctuous trail has been left as they've snailed about seeking a new manager. It's like the last guy standing after the music stops and all the chairs are gone gets to manage the dysfunctional team in Fenway.

Yuck.

* Word out of Syracuse University regarding their own "Forget legalese: Did we do the morally right thing?" sexual abuse scandal: Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

The police won't release details of the investigation to the prosecutor, let alone the press. Where's the outcry? Where's the outrage? After thoroughly charring beyond recognition the bitter remains of anyone and everyone associated with Joe Paterno, these new sexual abuse victims are on their own as far as the media is now concerned.

And you heard it here first.

Even more yuck...

"Nobody is bored when he is trying to... discover something that is true" -- William Inge

2011-11-19T10:22:00.011-05:00

One hopes there's the same rush-to-judgment in Syracuse as there was in Penn State when the former's own underage sex scandal broke this week. It would be fair, and it may even help Joe Paterno feel a bit better as he battles lung cancer.

In Syracuse, the accused molester is still on the basketball staff, still on campus, and his head coach, Jim Boeheim, was fully apprised of the molestations.

There is some legalese about the "statute of limitations" and "corroborating evidence" (the latter of which, it is widely understood, is really not necessary in charges of child sexual abuse, one of the few crimes in which the burden of proof falls on the accused, not the prosecution) which to a great degree smells similar to Paterno having passed along his information up the chain of command and washed his hands of it. Legal technicalities, however, did not save Joe from the firestorm when he did not precipitate the calling of the police.

Syracuse, in turn, conducted their own investigation of that school's sexual abuse scandal as recently as 2005, but no one called the police at that time, either. They all were satisfied with simply having handled it internally and finding nothing.

The most chilling testimony in this latest story is from one of the molested boys, lying in the hotel bed of the molester while the team was on the road, and being seen there by Boeheim, who made a face that the child interpreted as, "You shouldn't be in here."

Here's a smart bet: Will everyone in the media have become so tired of lynching Joe Paterno and the Penn State assistant coaches that Syracuse gets a "pass" on all of this?

YES is even, and NO is -140. In other words, the odds here say this all will fizzle as we turn our attention to the holidays, the BCS, and the never-ending Tim Tebow saga. The smart money is that nothing will ever come of this.

[Add-on, 11/20/11: After seeing almost nothing about this story on Yahoo Sports, I suddenly realize that ESPN broke this chilling news, not, for example, a legal authority. This story may get little coverage outside of Worldwide Leader. Why would other outlets want to promote a story in which they had been 'scooped' by another network?]

"There are many more bystanders than there are bullies and victims" -- Jerry Misik

2011-11-15T16:23:00.013-05:00

I'm not often moved to write about a TV show, but last week's episode of reality television's "Granddaddy of Them All," Survivor, did just that.

Cutting right to the chase, two "tribes" were marooned on an island in the sultry South Pacific. On one tribe was a "student" of the game and lifelong fan, Cochran, a weak and pale nerd with minimal social skills. If guys like Cochrane are not immediately befriended by a more dominant and socially-savvy player, they are usually grist for the mill and are sent packing quickly.

Somehow, in a way reminiscent of Gomer Pyle (if Gomer were an East Coast nerd who attended Harvard), every goof-up turned to gold for Cochran and he's still alive and kicking in the game.

This didn't stop his "tribe mates" from mocking and verbally abusing him virtually 'round the clock. They were as cruel and insensitive to him as a group as any "tribe" I've seen.

In a bold and courageous move—and courage was not something that the abused Cochrane was accused of possessing much of—he blindsided them all (after beau coup ansgst), joined up with the competing "tribe," and is in the process of winnowing away the creeps who'd been so abusive to him in a display that has to be admired by anyone who's ever been bullied, ostracized, or made to feel inadequate by a clique.

What's instructive here is the reaction of both Cochran and the abusers to his courage.

Children who are abused feel guilty about the abuse, internalizing it and keeping it secret because they have had it ingrained in them that it is the their own—the victim's—fault.

Cochran was tormented by guilt about changing his allegiance to a "tribe" where he seems to be accepted for who he is, and not abused because of what he is not. He need not have felt that way, but it is common among children who've suffered abuse.

Even more interesting—and distressing—was the way the abusive "tribe mates" responded: Anger and unprecedentedly vile maliciousness, followed by explanations about how well they all had actually treated and cared for Cochran, and what an uncaring ingrate he was!

One cowardly guy, enjoying the protection of the crowd, repeatedly swore at Cochran and called him a "coward" (ironically for having the courage to stand up for himself and end the abuse) and one vile woman told him [above, right] in a disgusting display of horrific vituperation, "You disgust me!"

As is so common among the abusive, when called out about their behavior, they blamed everyone but themselves.

Survivor is a game played for $1,000,000, but at times it seems much more than a game. This season we have been privy to abusive behavior usually done secretively by parents, domestic partners, in the locker room, or at the bus stop—where the prying eyes of those who might offer help can't see it.

It's been fascinating, just as a TV series based on the ultimate book on bullying, Lord of the Flies, should be. But at the same time it's also nauseating and terribly frightening…

"Know what is behind you, and pay particular attention to anything out of place" -- Jeff Cooper

2011-11-14T16:28:00.015-05:00

If you're a fan of the fading Philadelphia Eagles, you—like a lot of others—are asking, "Hey, what's wrong with the defense?"

My take on it all would be, "Hey, why can't an All-World offense take the air out of the ball and kill the clock with a lead at the end of games?" Maybe that's just me, though.

But where there's smoke, there's fire. And some of the smoke emanating from the defense of rookie coordinator Juan Castillo [helmetless above, left]is coming from his own locker room.

Dominique Rodgers-Cromartie—big on name, but small on play—may be the softest guy in a uniform at an Eagles game since Santa visited, but his words after last Monday night's devastating loss to the Bears are instructive:

"Yeah, I would like to be [playing on the] outside. At the nickel, it's a lot of thinking. Any time as a player, you go into the game and you're always thinking, you tend to play slower. In some calls, I'm a little confused."

Okay, let's set aside the fact that he's admitting that his understanding of the playbook isn't what it needs to be. And that he still hadn't practiced the plays enough—after 8 games—for them to become second nature yet. Or that his pissing and moaning here worsens the fact that he doesn't appear to be giving a full effort on the field. Let's hear him out:

"There's a lot of communication errors, I can tell you that. Certain combinations coming out, and then you don't get the [defensive] call out in time. And then when the plays come, it's too late to get [the call] out."

Who knows if any of that is true, or just mega-excuse-making? Still, would he dare to even say that if he was playing for a well-respected, veteran defensive guru. He plays for newbie Juan Castillo, though. Why take the blame for your own play yourself when the inexperienced D.C. is a sitting duck for blame?

Castillo may not totally stink, as many have written, but he clearly isn't commanding a lot of respect. Here's a quote from Joselio Hanson that's not exactly a ringing endorsement of Castillo's strategies:

"I'm not the boss here. I'm just a worker. When they tell me to go in, I go in."

To be fair, let's hear from Castillo himself, these particular quotes made after the Birds went belly up to the 2-6 Cardinals at home, with Phoenix playing their back-up quarterback:

"I gotta do a better job, man. I gotta do a better job. Simple as that."

When pressed about the coverage on the game's big play, a 37-yard catch by Pro Bowler Larry Fitzgerald who was being covered by untested rookie Jaiquawn Jarrett, Castillo remarked:

"Sometimes you play man underneath with a safety behind."

Safety Kurt Coleman's take on the play:

"We were in a combination coverage on the play. Not everyone made the right response. We just didn't get it done. We had a mental error and didn't get it done."

So who blew the coverage?

Pro Bowler Asante Samuel:

"It was kind of a zone. We had one guy on the inside [Hanson], one guy on the outside [Samuel himself] and one guy over the top [Jarrett]."

Right there, it sounds like Samuel was the one who played the wrong coverage and released the dangerous Fitzgerald to a rookie in the Red Zone with no help.

It doesn't really matter, though. It's crystal that all of these guys—after 9 full games—are not on the same page.

And until everyone is playing the same defense on the same play in the same game, and possibly playing it with some urgency and even some malicious intent, figure to continue seeing the Eagles cough up late leads into the foreseeable future…

"Losing a game is heartbreaking. Losing your sense of excellence or worth is a tragedy" -- Joe Paterno

2011-11-12T10:25:00.014-05:00

The Penn State Controversy—something that actually makes me wonder why it's such a controversy at all—has really crossed the line into "too much."

Penn State in and of itself has done nothing itself to cross that line. But their administrators, the guys with the pay-grade to handle the big problems, were befuddled, ostrich-like, too-little-too-late mentality would seemingly have the university's leadership confused about what to do if they were on "GO" in Monopoly and then rolled a three. Instead of moving their top hat those three spaces, they'd all probably just walk around the room in a panic trying to buy the other players' "Get Out of Jail Free" cards. They would fall into the category of "too little, too late."

But cancel Saturday's game? Have businesses revoke their corporate sponsorships? Fire Mike McQueary? And isn't the embattled receivers coach the most unfortunately named person who could possibly be involved here short of Jerry McJailbait?

Penn State itself didn't do anything wrong here. The professors, groundskeepers, receptionists, students, tutors, ticket takers, parking lot attendants, and snow removal specialists didn't have a hand in any of the heinous crimes committed here. Nor did any of the football players who'll take on Nebraska on Saturday.

I can't wrap my head around the vindictiveness of some talking and typewriting heads in the media. One of the opinionated-but-underinformed yahoos on local radio here in Ocala promised that he knew no one on coach Joe Paterno's current staff "will ever coach again."

Really?

What—are they a bunch of paedolphilic child molesters, too? What exactly did any of those nameless (outside of Happy Valley) schlubs do to torch their careers other than make the seemingly innocuous to accept a paycheck from Penn State? I get the fact that Penn State desperately needs to clean house ASAP, but that means the future careers of these guys are over?

Please.

There was a time in the not-too-distant past that most Americans wouldn't have wasted spit on the reviled Michael Vick. Now people are wearing his Eagles jerseys and cheering him on, having forgiven him for being guilty of personally snuffing the lives his poor dogs in sickeningly creative ways after seeing them slowly and painfully shredded with bestial brutality. But we're all about forgiveness as a culture, aren't we?

Yet somehow, we find it a litte harder to forgive the innocent?

McQueary is a perfect example of a guy who should get an immediate dose of that forgiveness, and here's why: I taught elementary school in Pennsylvania, and the laws there are such that one should, indeed, report suspected child abuse to superiors at work if the organization's protocols require it. There is no loophole that I am aware of for calling the police yourself if it is work-related.

McQueary absolutely would have ended his career at that point, as a graduate assistant (living on a meager stipend for a shot at a coaching career in NCAA football), had he decided just to go ahead and call child protective services himself in 2002. He'd have seen his career snuffed, and he might be the faceless manager of a Foot Locker store in Beaver Falls right now, if he'd have gone ahead and made that call, embarrassing a university that would definitely (and within their legal rights) have required a low-level employee to tell his supervisor, not the cops.

And students would not have rioted or protested to get McQueary his job back just because he did the right thing. He'd have simply cut his own professional throat in 2002 by doing what comfortably employed journalists today say was the "right thing."

The law is designed, as I understand it, to protect employees from just that: Being fired for doing the difficult job of reporting abuse because it might, in turn, make the company of institution look bad. Ironically, the law is designed to protect McQueary (or any witness to abuse) from exactly the sort of scapegoat's criticism and emotional heat that he's taking right now!

Pass the responsibility up the ladder to those who can do the right thing without recriminations against them—and without worrying how he or she will feed his or her family as institutional an 'thank you' for having done that "right thing."

However, it appears head coach Paterno—arguably the most powerful single person on the Penn State campus—used that the letter of that law to circumvent his own moral responsibility. Passing the abuse allegations up the chain of command to his athletic director is a joke in the case of Penn State: Paterno could have had the AD and probably even the president fired at will. There was simply no one on campus who could have fired, or even called out, Paterno for calling protective services.

The Pennsylvania law—different from here in Florida, where the witness must make the call immediately, even at risk of losing his or her job—worked as it is supposed to work in that state. The burden of the responsibility fell on those powerful individuals who would not be fired for having made the call to help the victimized children, but who would be prosecuted for not having made the call. That is supposedly the incentive for administrators looking to keep their high-paying jobs to pick up that phone and dial the police.

And that's exactly what we're seeing now: Powerful individuals, who selfishly hid the fact that a heinous series of crimes was being committed, are being axed and many will be prosecuted.

But don't confuse poor McQueary with the power brokers and insular enablers who turned a blind eye to the crimes without having to worry about their the loss of their livelihoods.

And as the metaphorical guillotine falls again and again: Good riddance to those in the Ivory Towers, Paterno included. Unfortunately, others, like the current Penn State coaching staff, will be part of the collateral damage.

The most important thing that we need to keep in mind is that, no matter what sort of hardships will now be endured by anyone at Penn State, those difficulties pale in comparison to the pain and suffering of the abuse victims and their families.

"How are the mighty fallen..." ~ II Samuel

2011-11-08T18:28:00.013-05:00

It's a sad day in Pennsylvania sports, and the least of the problems is the pair of frustrating, come-from-ahead losses by the Keystone State's pro pigskinners.

Philadelphia's legendary Smokin' Joe Frazier [standing, left], charismatic, classy, and at times controversial former Heavyweight Champion of the World, sadly lost a battle to liver cancer at the age of 67.

But the real epic tragedy being played out in Penn's Woods is the fall of Penn State administrators and beyond-legendary head football coach Joe Paterno in a hideous child sex scandal.

While prosecutors and LEOs are quick to point out that, as far as we know, Paterno is not the focus of the investigation and followed the letter of the law in handling the situation in 2002, we may have seen JoePa coach his final game at Happy Valley.

What a terrible swan song.

In turning a blind moral eye to the entire heinous situation for some nine years, he lost the high ground upon which he'd stood for five decades in just a handful of hours.

It pains us to say: Joe must go.

"Hype is the awkward and desperate attempt to convince journalists that what you've made is worth the misery of having to review it" -- Fellini

2011-11-05T08:58:00.014-04:00

Some thoughts while waiting breathlessly for "The Game of the Century"…

* First of all, don't you have to see the Game of the Century before you know it's the Game of the Century? And wouldn't you at least have to have seen a pretty sizeable chunk of the entire century first? This game will have a looooong way to go before it can even match just the Stanford-USC, Michigan State-Nebraska, and Notre Dame-Michigan games that have been played so far this year.

But the hype machine must grind on. There's advertising to be sold, dollars to be made, and promoting of such a game as #1 Alabama versus # 2 LSU game begins with hyperbole and proceeds upward from there.

It'll do for a Game of the Century—which, by the way, is just 11 years old—until the next one comes along…

* Here's a hearty "Welcome Back" to Jim Thome, once spurned by the Phillies in favor of an up-and-coming young first baseman whom the Phillies found almost impossible to trade, Ryan Howard.

Thome is an all-or-nothing type of slugger with a great reputation for clutch hitting and clubhouse presence. He's also one of manager Charlie Manuel's teacher's pets, and Thome loves the big West Virginian right back.

The aging Thome is not entirely the player he once was, but you could do a lot worse as a sub for The Big Piece (at least part-time) as he recovers from his ruptured Achilles tendon.

* By the way, am I the only one who recalls that, when Howard pushed Thome out of the starting line-up, the former was a guy who hit for a high average as well as destructive power?

Now he's a guy who is openly described in the press (this week by CSN Philly's dubious Casey Feeney) as, "He can’t hit lefty relievers. He can’t hit plus-fastballs. He can’t hit good breaking pitches."

The frustrating part of that mean-spirited assessment of Howard is that it appears to be correct…

* It looks like the always highly anticipated Christmas Day NBA match-ups may never be played.

Good.

Spend some holiday time with your kids.

* Much was made of suddenly-retired manager Tony LaRussa's phone mishap during Game 5 of the World Series, but it won't be the most memorable phone memory I'll have of him. Strangely, the most memorable—and hilarious—also occurred this season.

The phones were out in the St. Louis bullpen at Philadelphia's Citizen's Bank Park. LaRussa, at one point late in the game, strode unexpectedly up the dugout steps and began making strange gestures toward the outfield. The announcers (I believe it was a late-season local Phillies telecast being broadcast nationally by MLB Network) wondered what was going on.

I could see by the overhand throwing motion of LaRussa's left arm that he wanted a lefthanded reliever from the 'pen. But which one?

Then he raised one arm and held his hand horizontally, palm facing downward, about a foot above his head. I turned to my wife, Janet, and said, "He wants a tall lefthander!"

Then LaRussa, mystifying the announcers, held his curving arms at his side in the shape of a pair of parentheses and sort of jiggled them in and out.

I cried, "He wants the tall, FAT lefthander!"

And Arthur Rhodes trotted in from the bullpen.

It cracked me up—and absolute classic! Unless you're Arthur Rhodes…

"By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail" -- Benjamin Franklin

2011-11-04T15:57:00.010-04:00

It's not usually my style to sympathize with the rich. I know they're people with feelings, flaws, and problems. I just think that if I was going through a painful divorce or suffered the death of a close friend or endured the sickness of one of my children, on the whole I think there'd be a huge upside to doing any of things while being rich. It would be an enormous comfort to know I respectively wouldn't have to move back in with my parents, that I could take care of the present and the future of my dear friend's children, and that I could afford the very best in medical treatment for my child, not just what the insurance will approve. So screw 'em—all of that's much worse, and far more deserving of sympathy, if you're poor.

That said, I'm suddenly feeling little blips of sympathy for Tim Tebow.

Now, Timmy is just fine no matter what happens in his life. He's good-looking, young, healthy, rich, and famous. He could spend the rest of his life signing autographs for cash and make far more in a month than the average teacher could make in a year.

Still, seeing him run out there to play quarterback for the Denver Broncos when it obvious that he is in no way, shape, or form ready to compete on Sundays is sort of pathetic. What they're putting him through looks almost cruel.

That cruelty is political within the Broncos organization, and is no real fault of his own. It would seem that most talent evaluators—not the yahoos on ESPN, CBS, Fox, or even Yahoo, but actual, professional talent evaluators—can see quite easily he's not yet ready to compete. Heck, Joe Average, and even Mrs. Average, can see that he can no longer simply run over gridirons full of future accountants, police officers, PE teachers, insurance salesmen, and law students and make the most of his God-given talents, au naturel.

The NFL is where good do-bees who have worked to home their craft go to take their skills and abilities to new heights, just like the guy who worked two hours a day practicing the violin goes to the town hall to play at the square dance on Saturday, while the guy who worked 8 hours a day plays notably on every continent on Earth during a career with the philharmonic orchestra.

Tebow and his coaches conspired to neglect having him work to learn proper footwork, release points, and ball handling skills because he simply didn't have to—he could do it his own way in the NCAA and rise to the top.

Right now, though, the guys who spent a collegiate career honing those skills are flourishing on Sundays. Raw talents—guys like Tebow—primarily do it day after day, week after week, month after month, on the practice field without 60,000 cheering and jeering critics in attendance, and without a press corps full of writers and envious ex-athletes with sharpened knives savoring every misstep.

On second thought, I don't feel so much sorry for Tebow. He and Urban Meyer—his teacher (after all it is an educational institution, and football one of its programs)—could've worked on the things that would have allowed him to compete successfully at a higher level against the best in the world.

But they settled. And a couple of national championships and a Heisman Trophy aren't such awful things to settle for. If Tebow and Meyer really are such great football minds, they must have seen this coming: They robbed Timmy's future for success in the present. We all make our choices.

So, I guess I don't feel bad for Tebow as much I do feel for his fans, the dopes who didn't realize that they were hitching their affection and allegiance to a charismatic stallion who could make a lot of noise at, say, the popular Breeder's Cup, but can't even come close to Win, Place, or Show at the Kentucky Derby.

It's just sad.

"Where there is no imagination there is no horror" ~ Arthur Conan Doyle

2011-10-29T12:11:00.023-04:00

With all due respects to the website MLB Trade Rumors, their recent attempt at a blog post called "Baseball's Spookiest Transactions" was inventive, but just a bit incomplete. Nice try, boys.

The major leaguers they mentioned were Rick Helling, Uriah "Bloody Jake" Evans, Jerry "Casper the Friendly Ghost" Adair, Matt Perisho, and Sterling Hitchcock.

I love the inclusion of Perisho (wish I'd thought of that one), but it's just not the full roster without the addition of even more guys whose names are an All-Hallows Evening delight. Sticking only to fellows who played in big leagues, here is a list of players whose parents pinned their names on them:

Randy Lerch

Ricky Bones

Dick Drago

Danny Graves

Matt Batts

Ivan Calderon

Harry Ralston "Bud" Black

Then there are guys who earned eerie nicknames that are well-known:

Steve "Psycho" Lyons

Forrest Vandergrift "Spook" Jacobs

Richie "Gravedigger" Hebner

John "The Count" Montefusco

Al "The Mad Hungarian" Hrabosky

Hidecki "Godzilla" Matsui

Dave "King Kong" Kingman

Archibald "Moonlight" Graham

Honus "The Flying Dutchman" Wagner

Tim "The Freak" Lincecum

"RIP" Sewell

And then there are guys I just can't resist going all old-school "Chris Berman" on, bestowing my own frightful monikers:

Randy "Were" Wolf

Jeff "Grave" Stone

Rollie "Icy" Fingers

John "Bell, Book, and" Candelaria

This isn't even to mention Bill "Mad Dog" Madlock or Andres "The Big Cat" Gallaraga, both of whom are Cujo-esque, the villainous Sparky "Captain Hook" Anderson, or Ozzie Smith—"The Wizard of Oz.".

And let's not forget the nickname of the entire 1927 Yankees team: "Murderer's Row."

But the ultimate in Halloween evil is probably infielder Tim Teufel—his surname being the German word for "devil."

Who can forget his apocalyptic battles [as depicted below] at the plate with Germanic pitcher… Jim Gott?

Let me know if I missed any, and Happy Halloween!

"I’m going to listen to John Elway. He knows what he’s talking about" -- Tim Tebow

2011-10-23T20:14:00.015-04:00

Tim Tebow is an athlete who can impose his will upon you, whether you are a teammate or an opponent. He made that clear in the improbable comeback he engineered on behalf of the hapless Denver Broncos against the woeful Miami Dolphins.

Down 15-0 with 2:44 left in the game, Tebow led John Elway's Broncos to overtime where a long field goal into the wind iced a great road win in front of a Florida Gator-lovin' crowd that included his own Old Ball Coach, Urban Meyer.

Much like last week's underwhelming and poorly-played 49ers-Lions match-up, this will likely be described as a great win for the former Heisman Trophy winner (and the love-fest with Tebow will continue because there's a buck in it for TV). But that characterization could only come from those talking-heads who didn't suffer through this entire stink-fest.

Tebow looked like a below-average NFL quarterback who took advantage of a bad team riding an 8-game losing streak, and who hadn't won a game in their own stadium since 2009. His throws often wobbled toward receivers, and on some overthrows he missed by the length of one of the state of Florida's ubiquitous mobile homes.

Coach Bill Cowher, now an analyst for CBS apparently said this week that Tebow looks like he someday may be a decent NFL quarterback for a team that is not championship-calibre.

I can't say Cowher looks wrong. But there's a part of me that hopes he is, and that Tebow does eventually excel.

However, the best part of this game—as has been the case during the last dozen played in Miami—was definitely the Dolphins cheerleaders.

They did more in high heels than either team did in cleats today…

"I'm disappointed, but I'm not going to run around like Dennis Rodman and head-butt somebody" -- Greg Norman

2011-10-22T11:32:00.008-04:00

Call it a hunch, but I'm going to guess that this World Series will not accumulate the best television ratings of all time.

Personally, I'm not watching it because I still have the Cardinals stuck in my craw after the Phillies lost to them in the first round. It's still a little tender, a bit sore. I'm not talking about that.

When the ratings come out and are decried far and wide, people will point to evidence of some sort of slip in the popularity by Major League Baseball in our national psyche.

No way.

You do, however, reap what you sow. Sow the seeds of a national preference for big market, big money teams like the Yankees, Red Sox, and Phillies, and you'll reap little during that all-important autumn harvest: The Postseason.

Check to see how many times the Red Sox, for example, played on Fox's Saturday Game of the Week, TBS's Sunday game (it was like they owned it), ESPN's prime time games, and even on MLB Network's own nationally-televised games.

Then calculate the number of playoff games played by the Red Sox this year. That won't take long. Hint: It's less than the number of times their starting rotation ordered take-out chicken.

Now MLB ends up with exactly what you'd think they'd have wanted: An exciting match-up between two very good teams playing great baseball on the game's biggest stage—St. Louis and Texas.

That sound you hear is disappointed Fox Sports executives leaping from their penthouse office windows and spattering on the sidewalk below.

Watching a Yankees-Red Sox game is about as exciting as watching paint dry. I'm fine with just the highlights of those marathons. But that's what we market all year long, what create a taste for, and what we use to tempt our national appetite.

Now they're stuck with a terrific Rangers-Cardinals series that I'm betting few will watch because no one really knows anyone except Tony Larussa and Albert Pujols, and those two aren't loved everywhere like they are in St. Louis.

Bon appétit!

"You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him" ~ James D. Miles

2011-10-17T15:38:00.014-04:00

The highlight from last weekend's sports scene to me had to be Jim Schwartz vs. Jim Harbaugh.

Such bush league behavior (I'm not ascribing it to college "rah-rah" like most; I doubt he'd have done it to Mack Brown or Joe Paterno) by Harbaugh deserved the on-air criticism it drew. What surprised me was the criticism Schwarz drew for reacting to it.

As near as I can tell, no punches were thrown, so I'm wondering what the big deal is regarding Schwartz wanting to give harbaugh an earful. He wanted his say about it. He had his say. What's the problem?

To me, it boils down to this: If one of Harbaugh's 49ers players had bounded into a Detroit Lion like that after the game to bare his belly, exuberantly shake hands, shout an obscenity, and shove the player aside—precipitating an incident—I would expect Harbaugh to tell the guy to respect the game and respect his foe in no uncertain terms. Harbaugh should call himself out the same way for his own behavior.

And if Schwartz saw a 49er bounce across the field, bare his belly, careen into a Detroit Lion, etc., etc., I'd expect Schwartz would say to his own player, "Maybe don't punch the guy, but definitely tell him where he can stick it."

So, what we have here is Jim Schwartz behaving in the same way he would expect his players to behave.

And we have Jim Harbaugh non-plussed that he's being called out for behaving unprofessionally, although I'm certain he'd have more stringent standards for his players.

Ironic.

But maybe not. That was one of the most rag-tag football games I've seen in ages. Both teams played like crap, and Harbaugh's highly-motivated but undisciplined team won't be able to look at their performance on film and expect to win the Super Bowl based on Sunday's stinker in Detroit. Talking heads (who obviously didn't watch this poorly-played contest) worried whether the coaches' behavior marred a great game. They needn't have.

San Francisco's 15 penalties indicate their players' show about as much self-discipline as their head coach. Right now, that's apparently not a problem, but we'll see once they hit a speed bump or two and adversity sets in.

And the Lions definitely need to stop reading their glittering press clippings and focus on football again—something that seemed to have gotten away from them yesterday for long stretches of time.

It's a shame both teams couldn't lose. Justice would have been served.

Oh—by the way, we don't see many Lions games down here in sunny Florida: Does Lions QB Matthew Stafford frequently go all Kent Tekulve and sling the ball around sidearm like that? He looked like a budding Jake-Delhomme-in-training…

"How on earth can a wounded man make war?" -- Achilles

2011-10-13T16:29:00.018-04:00

On the occasion of Ryan Howard's surgery for a fully torn Achilles tendon, here are some thoughts about who will comprise the 2012 Phillies, position-by-position…

1st Base: With that exploding Achilles looming over the off-season, it's difficult to say how much of an impact the injury will have on the player—and the team. Even if Howard plays during first year of his brand-spankin'-new contract extension, one wonders how effective he might be. His performance was already sagging, although his numbers are still among the league leaders.

It's not every playoff team that gets its three-hole hitter walked in favor of pitching to a former Rookie of the Year, MVP, and World Series champion, though. And while many will simply choose to look at Howard's numbers on paper—many of which are piled up against bad regular season pitching—no one can say he's been effective for any sustained period of the post-season for quite a while.

Who plays first if Howard is unable to take the field? My hunch is Chase Utley, especially if Jimmy Rollins flies the proverbial coop. Less acreage to patrol defensively and not having to make the double play pivot could ease the burden on Utley's knee for a time while it continues to heal, and there's a Gold Glove second sacker waiting to replace him: Placido Polanco.

2nd Base: It's Utley's position, but if Howard misses extended time and Rollins departs, look for Utley to move over and Polanco to return to his best defensive position to work with Freddy Galvis—if the young defensive whiz is anointed the new shortstop—to help break him in.

The kid could do worse than having Utley and Polanco giving him pointers around the bag.

Shortstop: The Phillies (Read: Ruben Amaro) say they want to get younger. Here's the spot to do it. Rollins was the unluckiest guy ever to sign a multi-year, multi-million dollar extension, and has been underpaid for years. No one can blame him for wanting a salary commensurate with overpaid shortstops who couldn't carry his jock.

The team could always trade for a shortstop, but they can always do that after they give Galvis a shot. There are no plum free agents this year, either (save Jose Reyes, whose act, I'm sure, won't be appreciated as much in Philly as elsewhere), so why not give the kid a whirl before committing to someone else's guy?

Even if Galvis [left] flops and ends up backing up veteran Wilson Valdez (if the Phils bring him back), you could do a lot worse than that pair defensively. And most teams do!

3rd Base: Here's the spot where I think Amaro gets creative. Sign Aramis Ramirez? God, I hope not! He was one of the poster boys for those disappointing Cubs teams of the last several years.

Polanco could end up staying here, but my hunch is that he returns to the scene of his previous glory, 2nd base, as he plays out the last year of his contract with the Phils. And when and if Howard returns, Utley slides back here and Polanco becomes the utility man, a Tony Taylor for the new millennium, at least until October and hsi contract is up.

Look for the Phils to possibly even move pitching—Cole Hamels?—to shore up this position now and in the future for the first time in a long time.

Right Field: It's Hunter Pence's position. Nothing to see here. Move along, now…

Center Field: Despite speculation in the Philadelphia dailies about the trade value of both Pence and incumbent centerfielder Shane Victorino, who leads off and provides Gold Glove-calibre defense for the Phils if they trade Victorino? He's not going anywhere…

Left Field: There's rampant speculation about John Mayberry playing first if Howard's injury is significant. Maybe, if Domonic Brown tears the cover off the ball and lights it up it defensively in left during Spring Training, that happens. To pencil Mabes in at first, though, you have to hitch your wagon to Brown in left, and that's something the Phillies seem reluctant to do.

There are delusional writers around Philly who speculate that Raul Ibanez might re-sign for peanuts and accept a back-up or platoon role. Don't bet on it. Look for John, Jr., to get innings and experience in left field in preparation for 2012.

And look for Brown to be packaged for that third baseman.

Catcher: It's Carlos Ruiz's position, and that's all there is to it. The Phils, however, dare not enter this season—with Ruiz showing a bit of age—without someone who can spell Chooch without getting hurt himself, a la Brian Schneider. While I'm certain the team appreciated Schneider's tutelage of Vance Worley, the team needs someone cheap but reliable behind Ruiz.

The Bench: It would make a lot of sense for the Phillies to sign Wilson Valdez [left] right now, even if it meant not shopping around for a cheaper alternative. Valdez's defense is invaluable, as is his ability to play all around the infield (and pitch!), and he can erase a lot of personnel mistakes in dealing with Howard's and Polanco's recovery from off-season surgeries. And if they could get him to choke up a little on the bat instead of thinking he's Gary Bleepin' Sheffield, he could hit respectably, too!

Does Michael Martinez return? Probably not out of Spring Training. But he'll be stashed at AAA, waiting for his bus ticket to Philly—something that could come at any time, given the health status of the incumbent infielders and the potential departure of Rollins.

Ross Gload? The Radioactive Pinch Hitter is undergoing off-season hip surgery, and don't look for the club to bring him back on anything but a minor league contract and an invitation to spring camp. That's a shame because he could have shored up his own prospects for a new 2012 contract by having that surgery at mid-season and being in tip-top shape for Opening Day. Instead, he chose to tough it out for the team.

Don't look for a "thank you" in the form of dollars to be extended, though.

Ben Francisco may have pinch-hit-homered himself right off the roster. If I'm Francisco's agent, I'm going to use his clutch NLDS jack to ask for a hefty raise in '12, and that'll make him a non-tendered player as quickly as you can say, "Ed Ott." I'd be surprised, unless he can work out something that will fit the Phils' budget for his slot, if he returns. There's also the thought that he might want to go find a starting job somewhere else while he's still sort of young.

And don't figure to retire on that autographed Pete Orr baseball you have.

Ruben Amaro will comb the waiver wire and free agent lists for serviceable parts that can be had on the cheap and come up with something, but don't expect Manny Mota and Vic Davalillo.

The new backup catcher might serve as a key bench piece, and may not be as much of a paperweight as in the past if skipper Charlie Manuel gives Ruiz some extra days of rest—something that may pay off when Chooch's bat isn't down to slider-speed come the playoffs in 2012, as happened this year.

What about John Bowker? I'll answer in this way: What about John Bowker? He could probably hit .429 with 12 homers in Spring Training and I think he'd be bound for Lehigh Valley to see if he's for real. But who knows?

A wild card here is newly-minted southpaw bullpen specialist Joe Savery [left], the erstwhile outfielder and one-time starting pitcher. The kid can hit, and I'd expect him to be taking BP with the bench players on a regular basis in 2012 while he's serving in the bullpen.

Much of this becomes moot if the Phils find out Howard will be bouncing around the first base bag like a frisky colt by May 1. For some reason, though, I don't see that happening. Howard's surgery and the prognosis for his rehab will go a long way towards answering questions about his health.

But if you're the Phillies, don't you have to plan for the worst-case scenario? Or do you just write off 2012...?

"Strange how people who suffer together have stronger connections than those who are most content" – Bob Dylan

2011-10-11T17:35:00.031-04:00

This week, philly.com ran a story about the 10 most agonizing moments in Philadelphia sports over the last 25 years. What really struck me about it was how few were really anything I'd have considered. Two, in fact, involved horse racing! Until recently, it really was two-and-a-half decades of mostly mediocrity and awfulness, with none of the classic Philly scrapes with glory that would provoke plagues of city-wide anguish.

To really feel some pain, you need to set the "Wayback Machine" for 25 to 40 years ago, back to the Golden Age of Philly Sports, and in doing so, here are some infamous near-miss sporting events that caused Philadelphians like me a lot of pain...

1972: The Philadelphia Flyers, four seconds from a playoff berth, astonishingly lose 5-4 to the lowly Buffalo Sabres on Gerry Meehan's desperation 80-footer past goalie Doug Favell. The stunned Flyers lose the statistical tie-breakers and finish out of the post-season.

1973: The surprising Flyers rebound to make it to the Stanley Cup Semi-finals before being defeated when rookie defenseman Larry Robinson's 90-foot slapshot from the red line sails past a flailing Favell in overtime in the deciding game of the semis. Favell is then gleefully unloaded to Toronto for the rights to Bernard Marcel Parent.

1976: The Flyers' 'three-peat' goes awry as Reggie "The Rifle" Leach astonishingly sets an NHL playoff scoring record, but the favored Broad Street Bullies go belly-up against the Montreal Canadiens, losing in four straight games. The Flyers had set a team record that season for most wins (51) and points (118) that season. (Sound familiar?)

1976: The Philadelphia 76ers--"The Team of the Year"--and their newly-acquired superstar, Dr. J, lose to the Portland Trail Blazers in the NBA Finals, a team sporting big man Bill Walton. The Sixers had lost the opportunity to draft Walton on a 1974 coin toss, subsequently selecting Marvin "Bad News" Barnes (while passing on Jamaal Wilkes and George "The Ice Man" Gervin), adding to the lasting agony of their fans.

1977: The Sixers, playing the entire season under the noxious cloud of an ill-fated and overly-confident marketing slogan, "We Owe You One," are bounced out of the playoffs early by the eventual champion Washington Bullets.

1977: Black Friday. An excellent book has been written by Mitchell Nathanson about how the end of this epic tragedy of a game defined the city for generations.

1977: Wet Saturday. Commisioner Bowie Kuhn sits defiantly in his shirtsleeves as Tommy John outpitches Steve Carlton in a rain-drenched contest at the Vet that should have been postponed, sending the Phillies home for the winter.

1978: The Phillies fall to the Dodgers again, this time with sure-handed Gold Glove centerfielder Garry Maddox dropping a fly ball to help lose the clincher.

1978: The Philadelphia Eagles lose the first NFL Wild Card Game ever played when rookie punter Mike Michel, kicking in place of injured PK Nick Mike Mayer, misses an early PAT and was wide right with a field goal with 00:13 on the clock in a 14-13 loss to the Atlanta Falcons on a cold and rainy Christmas Eve in old Fulton County Stadium.

1979: After finally sneaking into the playoffs on the strength of a 3-0 win in their season finale, the traditionally hapless Tampa Bay Bucaneers , who had never had a winning season before, spank the favored Eagles in the Bucs' first-ever playoff game at Tampa Stadium, 24-17.

1980: Rookie Earvin "Magic" Johnson plays center for the ailing Kareem Abdul Jabbar, scores 42, and the Los Angeles Lakers ice the Sixers in an excruciating Game 6 of the Finals, taking the NBA crown.

1980: Bob Bleepin' Nystrom scores an overtime goal to win the Stanley Cup for the New York Islanders after veteran linesman Leon Stickle blew an offsides call that cost the Flyers that Game 6 game on Long Island, denying them a decisive Game 7 at the Spectrum.

1981: Harold Carmichael's motion penalty in the brand-new Superdome helps the tightly-wound Birds lose to the Oakland Raiders in the team's Super Bowl debut.

1981: The Sixers hold an almost insurmountable 3 games to 1 lead over Larry Bird and the hated Boston Celtics the Eastern Conference Finals before completing an epic and agonizing collapse.

1981 (& 1994): Work stoppages derail both seasons immediately after good Phillies teams had gone to the World Series and were looking to return. The '81 team returned to lose the second half of the shortened season in the finale of a three-game playoff against the Montreal Expos with Carlton on the mound and their offense fizzling. The aging, steroid-fueled "Macho Row" boys had any chance to return to the championship round taken from them as no World Series was played in '94. They would backslide in '95.

1983 (& 2000): The Phillies and Sixers both win exciting opening games of their respective championship series only to cough up the next four games in a row.

1988: Fog Bowl. Really, this Windy City loss was probably as frustrating and hard-to-swallow as any I've (barely) witnessed.

(Note: Not to be confused with the almost as frustrating and hard-to-swallow "Fog Game" loss the Flyers suffered at the hands of the Sabres in the 1975 finals, but the Bullies took the Stanley Cup that year anyway.)

This all doesn't even count awful "off the court/field/ice" events like losing that 1974 NBA Draft coin toss, the Eddie Waitkus shooting and Curt Simmons severing, the tragic deaths of Pelle Lindbergh and Jerome Brown, Bernie Parent's horrible eye injury, mean-spirited Eagles management driving Reggie White out of town, the Phillies' continual hateful taunting and bloody spiking of Jackie Robinson, the unexpected in-season passings of Richie Ashburn and Harry Kalas, the career-ending eye injury and death from leukemia of star-crossed player and coach Barry Ashbee, the Birds signing of Terrell Owens, anything involving the name Rich Kotite, the Phillies failing to sign Hank Aaron due to his race, and legendary Phillies scout Hugh Alexander getting a tip, but never even going to see high schooler Mickey Mantle play--let alone signing him--because Uncle Hughie then heard rumors that Mantle had a bum knee.

Well, as Bogart says in The African Queen, "Things are never so bad they can't be made worse..."

"If you want to make enemies, try to change something" ~ Woodrow Wilson

2011-10-11T16:54:00.012-04:00

An interesting quote came out of Phillies general manager Ruben Amaro's press conference today…

"We have to have a different mindset or different approach than we did in ‘08 or 2010. We don’t have nearly as much power, have to be better with two strikes, better situational at-bats. Those are frankly things we have to change."

Truer words have rarely been spoken. It's just a shame they've waited this long to let that really sink in. Had they decided to slowly move in this direction after stranding a record number of baserunners in the '08 World Series (a season in which the team's hitters were embroiled in such lengthy protracted slumps that they cried out for better pitching to balance it out), they may have 2009 and 2010 championship trophies on the shelf as well.

Better situational hitting would have allowed the team to beat the Yankees in '09 (go look at the tapes), and would definitely have let them compete with a Giants team that didn't exactly tear the cover off the ball last year. Just a handful more of runs in last year's NLCS would have made a world (Series) of difference!

Will Shane Victorino bunt more to draw in the corner infielders and have second basemen and shortstops concentrating on wheel plays instead of just fielding the ball?

Will Chase Utley work to move runners over when he comes up with men on first and second and no one out?

Will Ryan Howard learn to shorten up with two strikes and drive the outside pitch the other way with authority—even if just for line drive singles—with runners on base?

Will everyone begin to look at a few more pitches, be patient, and wait for the pitch they can drive, or take a base on balls if it doesn't come?

This Amaro quote did not make it sound like a fait accompli:

"Offensively, we have to try to look at different ways to improve. We have the personnel to do it, [but] it’s matter of whether they want to take the time and be committed to improving on some areas they need to improve on."

And, more importantly, will manager and de facto hitting guru Charlie Manuel actually demand it of them?

Amaro:

"We have to go about it in a different way. I have talked to [hitting coach] Greg Gross and talked to Charlie… Charlie is in agreement that we have to change the way we approach some things. If we can do that and are committed to it then we can be successful."

Amaro also offered this oblique comment regarding Manuel that provides some evidence regarding why the Phillies offensive inadequacies have gone from occasional to widespread:

"He’s come to the realization that it's not just about the home run."

Hallelujah…

"For us younger guys, we just want to perform. The veteran guys are prepared to steer. They'll take us wherever we're going" -- A Youthful Ryan Howard

2011-10-08T17:19:00.009-04:00

Last night's 1-0 loss to the underdog St. Louis Cardinals is still caught in my craw, and thoughts keep bubbling up as I sit and try to get interested in college football games…

The Phils didn't want to talk to the press in advance of yesterday's elimination game. Marc Narducci of the Philadelphia Inquirer noted that no one was rude, they simply didn't want to chat. In fact, he singled out Ryan Howard:

"Ain't nothing to say, I’ll say it in the game."

Howard went 0-4 "in the game," leaving a runner on base and eschewing a seventh inning walk in favor of hacking at a 3-0 pitch, and finished the series hitting .105.

He also apparently tore his Achilles tendon and may be recuperating well past next year's Opening Day festivities—when his 5-year, $125,000,000 contract extension kicks in.

Let's translate what his play actually said during last night's game: "I'm not knocking in or scoring any runs tonight, so Roy Halladay is on his own. See y'all next Father's Day, after my rehab... Maybe..."

"I'm an old-school guy who believes things should be done a certain way. I love the game, everything about it" -- Davey Lopes

2011-10-08T15:38:00.011-04:00

Just a word about karma…

John Gonzalez of Comcast Sportsnet's CSN Philly, a part of the NBS Sports Group, wrote of last night's painful 1-0 loss to the celebrating underdog Cardinals that it was "a sort of sick reenactment of 2010, only with a gruesome new twist."

You could see it coming. (Click karma below to follow the thread...)

Davey Lopes was probably a continent away, having finished his first season as Don Mattingly's baserunning coach on the Los Angeles Dodgers, watching Phillies baserunners getting tossed out with regularity on the basepaths in this abbreviated post-season.

Perhaps Lopes wouldn't have made a difference. Perhaps, as a scout recently told a Philly reporter, this team got old fast. Maybe even the fleet-of-foot Phils are no longer so fleet and are station-to-station runners these days.

Still, as you've read here before, the unceremonious dumping of Lopes (along the lines of penuriously jettisoning 2008 World Series champion bench coach Jimy Williams) over money—and then having the audacity to lavish more cash than the loyal and talented Lopes wanted on outsider ex-Phil Juan Samuel—certainly unleashed bad karma galore on the Phils.

The Phillies face an off-season of tough financial decisions across the board. Let's hope that they handle it with more class and loyalty than in the past. With 200 or so straight sell-outs, the relatively few dollars thay saved on Lopes's contract seems paltry in comparison to the profits culled from their current huge red-pinstriped money-making machine.

What goes around, as they say, comes around. And this year it came around... hard.

"It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart" -- A. Bartlett Giamatti

2011-10-08T11:11:00.025-04:00

I had a premonition about the Phillies' season-ending loss to the St. Louis Cardinals in Philadelphia yesterday afternoon.

While watching the Diamondbacks-Brewers game immediately preceding the Phils, Arizona tied the score on Milwaukee in the top of the 9th inning in Milwaukee on a safety-squeeze bunt. That put runners on 1st and second with nobody out in their elimination Game 5.

The announcer—maybe the vanilla Joe Simpson—said he'd talked to D-Backs manager Kirk Gibson about his lack of bunting, and Gibson replied something along the lines of, "That's not how we play."

Well, with the go-ahead runs on base in Milwaukee with none out and the tying run already having scored on a bunt, the situation called for yet another bunt, right? I mean, you bunt those runners into scoring position with one outa nd the score 2-2. Then the winning run can score on a medium fly, or both runs waltz across on a base hit. Either way, 'Zona grabs a 9th inning lead in the decisive game!

One-time power-hitter Gibson's head might have exploded if he'd ordered consecutive bunts to win the game, though, so he had Aaron Hill (who had seven sacrifices this season to go with his eight homers) hit away.

Hill swiftly struck out.

The next two batters promptly grounded out—perhaps Gibson knew that neither Justin Upton nor Henry Blanco could get the ball out of the infield in that situation anyway—killing the rally, and Arizona settled for that 2-2 tie, extra innings on the road, and an eventual walk-off loss to Milwaukee.

They played it wrong and failed, but they did it their way! It's not worth winning these days if you don't do it 'your way,' I guess. It reminded me of the Phillies...

I don't have the heart to dissect the feeble Phillies' attempts at offense against a very good Chris Carpenter, a guy who was desperate to walk someone, but just couldn't.

Marble-mouthed announcer Ron Darling , a man to whom the blatantly obvious is sublime, actually hit the nail on the proverbial head when he noted the Phillies were predominantly trying to tie up the 1-0 game, each attempting be the hero himself with a home run, instead of taking some pitches, working a walk or two, and trying to accumulate some baserunners that would've put some pressure on Carpenter.

That just ain't how the Phillies roll, Ronny.

Perhaps it's the fault of Phillies manager and hitting guru Charlie Manuel, who may truly prefer to sit and wait—now for months—for a home run. But he did say this during Spring Training about Shane Victorino:

"He needs to bunt enough just to get the corners up. It's a good way of hitting. It's an ideal way for him to hit."

Not to pin the series loss on Victorino, who had two hits, but did we see him come to the plate even once and hit in his "ideal" way during the series? Nope, but that was a given, really, based on past performance. Phillies speedsters just don't bunt. Ever.

I get that Charlie was hitting him fifth in the line-up, a spot that cries out for power production. But as the innings peeled away last night, and the situation became more dire, the idea of Jimmy Rollins or relatively speedy Hunter Pence dropping a bunt and getting on base in front of Ryan Howard became appealing—at least until you realized that the suddenly flailing 'Big Piece' wasn't really going to be able to drive them in anyway.

The Phils set a record for stranded baserunners in winning the 2008 World Series.

They let lots of baserunners die on the vine in the 2009 World Series loss to the Yankees.

They put fewer on and stranded most of them against the well-armed Giants in losing the NLCS in 2010.

This year, with the exception of clubbing tiring ex-Phil Kyle Lohse like a baby harp seal in Game 1, even a few baserunners were hard to come by, especially as the situations became more clutch.

This alarming trend has been noted here in the past. Now it's time for somebody to do something about it.

What? I don't know. I'm not a baseball exec.

But I'm not a firefighter, either. I do know, however, that if I see a house in flames, it needs to be extinguished or the occupants could lose everything.

Despite all that, let's end this season with words from this aging team's anthem:

And now the end is near
And so I face the final curtain
My friend I'll say it clear
I'll state my case of which I'm certain

I've lived a life that's full
I traveled each and every highway
And more, much more than this
I did it myyyyyyyy way....

"Every team knows the rule of thumb: 'Don't make the first out of an inning at third base'" -- Thomas Boswell

2011-10-07T17:38:00.008-04:00

Paul Hagen of the Philadelphia Daily News, with that organization's usual propensity for the hyperbolic, has dubbed tonight's Game 5 of the NLDS against the Cardinals as the "most important game in Phillies history."

Pshaw.

In the article, Hagen quotes venerable knuckleballer Charlie Hough as saying, "Every baseball game is important, but no one game is that important." He then disagrees with the sagacious hurler.

I come down on the side of Charlie Hough: Wednesday night's game was just as important. Win that one, and we never play tonight's tilt. Game 2 was pretty damned important as well: Win that one and we never play Wednesday's game.

Wait—no! The Phils' contest against St. Louis at Citizen's Bank Park on September 19th was the most important. If they'd won that one, St. Louis would've finished out of the Wild Card and the Phillies would have been playing Arizona right now!

The case can be made that any one game can be important—perhaps the most important. Think back a couple of decades or more, to Mike Schmidt making an error in a game in San Diego and suddenly and capriciously retiring, leaving the Phillies in the lurch for years as they tried to replace his power, his defense, his experience, and his leadership.

That turned out to be one pretty important game.

I agree with the old Houghster [right]. The Phils made tonight's game necessary by failing to win some winnable contests that would have made tonight's game unnecessary.

There is no way you can convince me that a game that should never even have had to played could be the most important game in Phillies history.

Black Friday... Any game in the weeks-long collapse in 1964... Joe Bleepin' Carter...

It's tough to tell me those weren't pretty important games.

The 1980 clincher... The 2008 clincher...

Tell me those games haven't shaped Phillies history in powerful and time-tested ways.

Tonight's game is just another game being played by a team whose players can't or won't adapt to playing good, fundamental baseball in the playoffs. The derring-do that won you game number 65 or 113 isn't de riguer for championship-calibre teams playing in the post-season.

Chase Utley summed it up when he unnecessarily was thrown out trying to take third base with no one out, deflating a Phillies rally in Game 4. His quote: "If I had it to do all over again, not knowing the outcome, I'd probably do the same thing… [It] didn't work out for us. But we have [Game 5] to make up for it."

No big deal. You can see the real importance Utley is putting on Game 5—nada. It's simply the game where they'll make up for any bonehead plays or poor at-bats during Game 4.

A cardinal (no pun intended) rule of baseball is not to kill rallies by making the first or last out of an inning at third base. Utley, of course, would do it again—and get tossed out again. Adapt to the situation? Not these guys, and make no mistake about it: Utley is a leader among these Phillies.

The Phillies will have gone out playing Sinatra's "My Way."

If winning was a big deal to them, they'd prefer playing "The Right Way."

Is tonight's matchup the biggest game in Phillies? If none of this seems to beany big deal to the guys on the field, why should it be that big a deal—or the 'most important game in history'—to anyone else, including Paul Hagen?

"An inability to stay quiet is one of the most conspicuous failings of mankind" ~ Walter Bagehot

2011-10-03T16:18:00.008-04:00

The introduction of social media into the sports world can often have every one, well… all atwitter.

After last night's Game 2 loss in the NLDS, Phillies shortstop Jimmy Rollins tweeted, among other things: "Fans were waaay to quiet tonight."

Besides signing up for a lesson in differentiating to, too, and two, Rollins may also want to stop and think about what, exactly, the fans would have had to cheer for between the second inning and the final out. Chase Utley was plunked to lead off the 8th, but he wasn't moved into scoring position.

And Rollins himself delivered the only hit, but was tossed out at second on a steal attempt to end the 7th.

That was it. When you talk about going down quietly—and to one of the most questionable bullpens in the playoffs—those seven innings of unadulterated offensive yuck define it. So blame the team, including Rollins, for the quiet crowd, right?

That's the narrow view. I watched the game from sunny Florida (well, it was a night game, but you get the point) and I felt the same way Rollins did.

During the first inning, St. Louis starter Chris Carpenter struggled with his control, allowing a lead-off double to Rollins and walking the next two hitters handily. He then ran a deep count on Ryan Howard before the big man singled in a pair.

I had turned to my wife and said, "This ain't Texas or some bush league locale. Philly fans won't let Carpenter off the hook. They'll get louder and louder with each ball he throws, forcing him to lose his focus, keep walking people, and knocking him out of the game when they hit the crescendo level!"

A funny thing happened on the way to the deafening crescendo: It fizzled like a beer-soaked firework. Carpenter regained his composure and tossed a double-play ball to escape the jam.

And I was left to consider that things have gone the way it did for the Philadelphia Flyers of the mid-1970s: As that team elevated itself to the height of popularity in the city by winning and contending for championships, their games were soon filled with soft bandwagon hoppers with a lot of disposable income instead of hard core fanatics wild about the sport.

The Flyers are still looking for another championship. I hope that doesn't happen to the Phils…

"I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him" -- Billy Shakespeare

2011-10-01T10:01:00.004-04:00

It's a new season, boys! Good luck, throw strikes, choke up an inch or two, and take the ball the other way when you have to. Keep the proverbial line moving, and good things will happen...

Moneyball

2011-09-25T11:39:00.007-04:00

A funny thing happened on the way to dropping $60.00 at the movie theatre yesterday: I lost two hours of my life that I'll never get back.

I figure if you want Hollywood to make smart, quality movies about baseball, you need to pony up and go see them in the theatre. And that should be done on the opening weekend, the initial measuring stick of worthiness in the glamour capitol of the world. That's why I journeyed out to catch Moneyball.

Critics from Roger Ebert to Peter Travers of Rolling Stone savoured the movie as great film-making. I thought it was an interesting but slow-paced 90 minute movie stretched out to numbing 126 minutes.

Travers in Rolling Stone: "A- ...One of the best and most viscerally exciting films of the year."

Huh? For a movie about statistics, even the characters' passion for statistics was a little low-level. There was actually a lot more angst shared between Brad Pitt and Jonah Hill than passion. Furtive looks and cagey smiles, too.

Ebert: "A ...a smart, intense and moving film that isn't so much about sports as about the war between intuition and statistics."

Moving? If by moving, he means the scenes during which a jealous Pitt (Billy Beane) gets snippy with his ex-wife's well-meaning new husband, or when a angst-ridden Pitt watches his daughter sing a poignant, angst-ridden-teenage-girl-will-I-ever-fit-in? tune or make a sundae in the kitchen during her infrequent appearances, then it must have been. Still, Sounder it ain't, and one could easily make the case that he was a bit of an unlikeable, self-absorbed, self-righteous dweeb.

Actually, the San Francisco Chronicle's Peter Hartlaub who awarded the film a C+ was spot-on when he wrote: " ...an interesting but frustrating near-miss."

It's a movie about bucking the system, tearing down dusty paradigms, and doing something that breaks the mold (Have I left out any clichés here?), and that subject matter is of interest to nearly everybody.

Making a talky, ponderous, stock Hollywood film out of the story of quick-thinking, thin-sliced innovation seems counter-intuitive and ironic.

Still, despite its dragginess, it's nice to see Hollywood investing in baseball. But words like 'war' and 'visceral' don't describe this film in the least. You'd be smart to hang onto your own cash until it comes out in the dollar-DVD-rental box...…

Miscellany: Vick, Kafka, McNabb, and Hunter Pence

2011-09-20T17:19:00.008-04:00

Recent observations on the weird world of Sports…

* From Rich Hoffman's column in yesterday's Philadelphia Daily News:

"They booed Michael Vick as he walked to the locker room, a doctor and a trainer and a security guy clearing a path. Vick - who it was eventually learned, suffered a concussion, not a neck injury - acknowledged his taunters by pointing to the scoreboard, which showed the Eagles leading at the time."

Michael Vick had just left the field after suffering a neck-wrenching sandwich shot between defensive and offensive linemen. He spit up blood on his way off the field.

Let's modernize the world of knee-jerk sports analysis and leave behind the Philly fans booing Michael Irvin's injury—one that was at least understandable because Irvin was despised in Philly. Seeing Atlanta fans showering Vick—their alledgedly beloved prodigal son—with boos after his injury, however, should set the new Gold Standard for boorish fan behavior.

And I won't even dignify with a rejoinder what the idiot blogger at Yahoo! wrote about the incident...

* It says here that there will be long stretches of time over the next several years when Mike Kafka is being chased around by teams who had weeks to prepare for him. Vick will be sidelined with the litany of injuries older players tend to get, especially players who tend to get whacked as much as Vick, and the Eagles may wish they had a.) kept Kevin Kolb, or b.) made other arrangements at QB entirely.

Vince Young? Long term, he's likely a non-factor.

* Speaking of booing, did you catch the pea soup of boos that slathered the entire Metrodome (or whatever it's being called) after the Vikings went belly-up, coughing up their second lead of the season and snatching defeat from the jaws of victory? After his forgettable season in D.C., Donovan McNabb, I'm sure, is wondering if those vicious Philly fans may be the best fans he'll ever have played for when all is said and done.

* Here's the ultimate in chutzpah: "I would consider this organization for sure, because the pitching is unbelievable, and adding [Posey and Sanchez] back, of course you're adding more offense to the ballclub. But I believe there should be a little bit more than that."

That's the administrative insight of an eternally injured self-imp0rtant jerk named Carlos Beltran. He's assessing the chances of him returning to the Giants next season. This guy is a dog who brings so little to the table these days that I shuddered every time his name was linked to the Phillies around the trading deadline.

Now he's hanging out on the disabled list yet again and trying to figure out if playing for the defending World Series Champions is something he'd like to continue to do, at least when he's on the actual field of play. What arrogance! The Giants are in the shape they're in because they put too many eggs into the baskets of players who were long in tooth and short of time off the Disabled List—guys just like Beltran.

While Carlos, anointed by MLB Trade Rumors and numerous other pundits as the "best hitter available" at the trading deadline, may theoretically be exactly that, I will remind those geniuses to flip a few pages off of their calendars: This is no longer 2006!

Thank goodness the Phillies took the passionate, energetic, charismatic, hungry, and exciting Hunter Pence off of Houston's hands at the deadline and didn't take a chance on a bum like Beltran. The latter may be a far better hitter in the minds of writers and broadcasters, but I'll take a guy like Pence—who collects his hits in reality, on the diamond, and not just in folks' vivid imaginations— over the aging and self-satisfied San Francisco outfielder any day.

"Too much of anything is bad, but too much Champagne is just right." -- F. Scott Fitzgerald

2011-09-18T10:33:00.007-04:00

Congratulations to the Boys in Red Pinstripes on the occasion of their 5th consecutive National League East title!

And you thought the most interesting thing in baseball on Saturday night was going to be the Marlins-Nationals game, which featured the match-up of Hand vs. Wang. Shame on you...

"Men are so full of greed today, they'll sell anything for a little piece of money" -- Little Richard

2011-09-12T13:40:00.012-04:00

I owe the NFL an apology.

When I saw players yesterday festooned with red-white-and-blue shoes and gloves and everyone wearing a ribbon in commemoration of 9-11, I figured these items would have been for sale at nfl.com and emporiums everywhere. After all, the NFL never met a revenue stream it didn't love!

But I was wrong. The stuff is for sale all right, but because it is up for auction to benefit 9-11 charities like Tuesday's Children and My Good Deed.

I was also wrong about Major League Baseball.

While the NFL had guys wearing garish gloves and shoes, MLB went with a small, tasteful American flag sewn onto the left side of each player's cap.

Tasteful it may have been, but those caps have apparently been on sale around the internet since August under the moniker "On Field 9-11 Patch Cap."

While baseball was instrumental in allowing New Yorkers and fans all over the country to express their collective emotion back in 2001, it seems extremely distasteful for them to tap into the earning potential of the terrorist attacks.

Shame on Major League Baseball for turning our nation's tears into just another revenue stream.

[Update: Just as I was about to post this, the story broke that the Mets wanted clearance to wear NYPD and FDNY hats during last night's 9-11 game in New York—and were turned down. Poo-bah Joe Torre: "We just felt all the major leagues are honoring the same way with the American flag on the uniform and the cap. This is a unanimity thing."

Yeah—it had nothing to do with unanimously featuring the official $36.99 'On Field 9-11 Patch Cap' to the largest possible ESPN audience of potential buyers. If they had been asked to simply wear their ordinary uniform caps during the game, just as they had been asked to do in 2001, I'd understand. But with a commodity to be sold, and a marketing opportunity on national television in prime time, commemoration now comes with about a $37 retail price tag.

Greedy bastards…]

"Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as you please" -- Mark Twain

2011-09-12T13:14:00.008-04:00

I've been anti-TBS since they dropped the Atlanta Braves in favor of washed-up talk show hosts and sitcom re-runs. I won't watch their Sunday afternoon game or any playoff games—unless the Phillies are playing.

Yesterday TBS was in Milwaukee to cover the final game of the series between the Phils and the Brewers. With play-by-play announcers having spread all across the landscape by a Saturday full of NCAA football games and a Sunday full of NFL contests, we were forced to listen to mush-mouthed Ron Darling (who always registers at a magnitude 6.5 on the You-stink-o-graph) doing play-by-play, and the improving John Smoltz on color.

I believe it was Darling who was discussing Phillies rookie starter Vance Worley and his virtually unprecedented success this season. He added something along the lines of, "But he has been lucky enough to start when the Phillies have scored quite a few runs for him."

It reminded me of that great line by Tim McCarver, who often said, "Bob Gibson was the luckiest pitcher in the world. He always got to pitch on the nights when the other team didn't score any runs."

That's been the case with Worley, too, Mr. Darling. The kid has a 2.92 ERA and a 1.18 WHIP. Opposing batters have hit a meager .233 against him, and all of these numbers include the loss he took yesterday in Milwaukee.

Just for comparison's sake, let's look at the numbers of some other Phillies starters: Roy Halladay, 2.44 ERA, 1.05 WHIP, and .243 BAA; Cole Hamels, 2.60, 0.95, .207; Cliff Lee, 2.44, 1.03, .227; and Roy Oswalt, 3.72, 1.39, .289.

Worley's numbers are right there with any veteran member of the rotation. Darling saying Worley has merely been the beneficiary of great run support is irresponsible and ill-informed.

And maybe that's just the sort of commentary that Ron Darling makes in the Mets broadcast booth that causes Keith Hernandez to drift off a little later...

An Ode to an Old Cowboy

2011-09-05T16:41:00.015-04:00

It's not every day that I'm moved to verse, but today the contemptible Cowboy Joe West—35 years of lousy umpiring and counting—has done just that, based on his dishonest explanantion of his crew's controversial use of replay in yesterday's Phillies-Marlins game...

    When the play is all in doubt
    And no one has a clue

    When strongest heart's no longer stout
    We look the umpiring crew

        And when the crew chief is Joe West
        An ump we'd never dare request
        How it's called's at his behest
        And he'll call 'em diff'rently than the rest

    'Cause every play
    We know, dear Joe
    Is really all about you…

Joe West: What a bum...

Reflections on Another "New" Superman

2011-09-05T13:52:00.013-04:00

To me, Superman has always seemed to be a pretty active guy. I often wondered what deodorant he used, especially since he seems to have worn his uniform under his nondescript Clark Kent two-piece suit, 24/7.

You also had to wonder how in the world he could've been comfortable fighting crime, assorted aliens, and Super Villains in a leotard. Seems to me it would have 'ridden up' something awful, particularly with his shorts on the outside!

And, what with having to travel at times to the core of the sun and fly through the air at the speed of light (the friction—oy!), I often wondered how a long-sleeved shirt was practical in all of that heat.

Now it's 2011 and Superman seems to have solved all of those problems and more, as we can see from the cover of Action Comics # 1 (which in actuality, already seems to have been printed in 1938, but who am I to quibble over a couple of quarter centuries?).

First, we can see Supes has dispatched with the long, flowing super-cape, which must have offered some nasty wind resistance, in favor of the more petite one he wore as Superbaby.

The shorter cape isn't exactly a look that we'd call manly, but then this new Superman doesn't look much like a man as much as he does a college student running late for his frat's Halloween party.

As we can see, Superman is now sporting a much more sensible short-sleeved "T" and a comfortable pair of jeans. (Presumably the red shorts are now underneath and sport a zipper for ease of super-urination.)

He also seems to be wearing a pair of semi-casual shoes, like a Rockport or something from American Eagle, although that may be because the more athletic Reebok® Pump Court Victory 2 "Miami Vice" shoes he ordered from amazon.com were still on their way.

I'm going to guess his jeans must be Wrangler®. If Brett Favre wears them, then it can be safely assumed they can withstand nuclear explosions, alien death rays, and unwanted access by that libidinous Lana Lang…

"Hard work never killed anybody, but why take a chance?" -- Edgar Bergen

2011-09-04T12:12:00.008-04:00

I had to laugh reading this morning's preview of Phillies-Marlins on Comcast. It said: "Roy Halladay (16-5, 2.47 ERA), will try to give the Phillies' bullpen a much-needed day off in the series finale."

That's funny! Just because little-used David Herndon gave up three runs to the offensively-challenged Marlins in last night's come-from-ahead loss, the bullpen needs time off? What a slap at the 'pen!

Since their game on Thursday, August 24, the Phillies only played 7 games in 10 days, including only one from August 26 through August 28 due to Hurricane Irene. Since they resumed play on Monday, here's how overworked the bullpen has been:

Kyle Kendrick—0 innings

David Herndon—1 inning (last night)

David Schwimer—1 inning (Tuesday)

Brad Lidge—1⅓ innings (1 Tuesday; ⅓ Thursday)

Michael Stutes—1⅔ innings (1 Monday; ⅔ Friday)

Antonio Bastardo—2⅔ innings (1 Mon.; 1⅔ Thu.; 2 batters faced last night)

Ryan Madson—4 innings (1 Mon.; 1 Wed.; 1 Thu.; 1 Fri.)

The seven-man bullpen pitched 11⅔ innings in the last six days—averaging less than two innings per game, and Madson pitched 33% (4) of those innings by himself.

Madson definitely needed a night off last night after pitching three days in a row. The young Bastardo, who's never pitched in a pennant race before, may have needed last night off after pitching 1⅔ dominant innings on Thursday, but always giving the only lefty in your 'pen two days off after pitching is a luxury the Phils can't afford. Bastardo was going to pitch last night—period.

The rest of the bullpen may actually be suffering from lack of work over the last 10 days!

What the Phillies need out of Roy Halladay today is to score 12 early runs for him, have him leave after five innings, and give the bullpen some work in a game they can't blow because of lack of use…

Of Karma, Dogs, Quarterbacks, and a Search for a Clue

2011-09-04T10:32:00.007-04:00

It's a gloomy morning here in Florida, and here are some quick-hit thoughts to get it started…

● I'm not sure how Karma works exactly—does the fact that Davey Lopes, who says he is now happily coaching first base with the dysfunctional Dodgers and is just fine, undo the bad Karma earned by the Phillies when they unceremoniously showed the loyal soldier the door?

As the club cascades toward a club record for victories, it should be noted that two of the deepest, most talented teams in Phillies history—the 101-win 1976 and 1977 squads—were disposed of perfunctorily in the first round of the playoffs and never reached the World Series.

The bad Karma of those clubs was earned in their hostile locker room. This year, the front office was the source…

● I know that NFL contracts, like marriage vows, are so non-binding that they could be written on Post-It® notes, but is there really anyone who thinks Michael Vick will be cashing the last paycheck of his six-year, $100 million contract with the Philadelphia Eagles?

Unless the Eagles suddenly realized, after he played one quarter of one game last year, that they had made a HUGE miscalculation about QB Kevin Lob's potential, trading Vick would have been the better move. Vick's value will never again be higher than it was before he played his first pre-season game this year.

I'm not one who thinks that Kolb will be a great quarterback, but I don't see Vick working out in the long run, or over the short haul, as his body becomes more and more fragile due to age in a sport that is cruelly unforgiving in that regard.

● By the way, I noticed this weekend during the return of college football that, with the reclamation and forgiveness of Michael Vick (since he can still compete at a high level), we now hear the return of the timeworn cliché: "It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog."

We certainly are lucky that illegal dog-fighting in the United States ended completely with the arrest and punishment of Vick! After all, have you heard a peep about it since…?

● Men's tennis has become such a snooze-fest that when PTI ran a segment on the U.S. Open on Friday, it featured Jimmy Connors!

● While waiting for yesterday's Phillies-Marlins game to begin, I watched the tail end of the UCLA-Houston football game, and it was an invigorating experience! But not in a good way...

I couldn't care less about the Bruins or the Cougars if I tried, and yet I spent a half-hour screaming at my TV while watching probably the most poorly-coached game I've seen in 40 years of pigskin viewing. In a perfect world, Rick Neuheisel and Kevin Sumlin would be updating their résumés tonight and ready to look for new jobs first thing Monday morning.

Inept clock management… Squandering time outs… Stopping the clock by throwing incomplete passes while leading and less than 2:00 to go… A complete lack of hurry-up offenses and/or intensity… Inability to get a play into the huddle in time… You name it, these two boobs probably did it during UCLA's narrow 4-point loss.

If these two guys had found a clue on the field during warm-ups, they'd have had to cut it in half and split because neither, apparently, has one of his own. The next time you want to rag on your favorite coach about problems down the stretch of a close game, just be glad you don't have Neuheisel or Sumlin stalking your sidelines.

Yuck…

And, by the way, there may be a tendency to want to blame a kid kicker for missing a field goal and extra-point in UCLA's loss. Don't be fooled: This one was all on the coach.

Thoughts on a Hot Summer Morning...

2011-08-06T11:11:00.024-04:00

This and that about what's going on in Philadelphia sports and around the leagues…

● Congratulations to the Phillies' Carlos Ruiz for his July 19th cover story on many issues of Sports Illustrated. It will not rest in my collection, however, as SI regionalizes their covers and, living here in Florida, I never saw it anywhere but the internet.

● Congrats are also due to the Philadelphia Eagles for finally spending money they had under the salary cap and hauling in the big fish instead of yet another useful minnow: Free agent Nnamdi Asomugha. This wise move also immediately made Asomgha an SI cover boy whom I won't see…

● We'll see if turns out to have been a smart move for the Birds to trade quarterback Kevin Kolb to the QB-starved Arizona Cardinals. Forget the return package: It says here that the team will probably regret it.

Don't think I'm enamored of Kolb's skill set or think he's headed to the Hall of Fame posthaste. The team, however, spent beaucoup dollars racking up free agents scores, but were modest in spending to protect incumbent Michael Vick's blindside while rookie draft pick Danny Watkins endures his baptism by fire.

Last year we heard the pundits—among them many former players—say the Vick wouldn't be able to withstand the season-long beating he was taking in and out of the pocket, and they were right. If he, and newly-anointed, fragile [both physically and mentally] back-up Vince Young take that kind of beating again… well, they'd better think third-stringer Mike Kafka, a righthander, can metamorphose into a starter in a hurry.

And that in an offense designed for their southpaw QBs.

Well, no matter what, the Eagles finally are doing what they can to wrest the headlines—and the discretionary local sports dollar—from the Phillies current dynasty. There finally seems to be some urgency on the part of the Birds to win, and that's something that's always seemed to be missing from that eely Midnight Green...

● By the way, kudos to everyone involved in getting football out of the negotiating chambers and back on the field. No one could have won in a battle between millionaires and billionaires.

The guys I was pulling for? The minimum salary players who'll end up with a below-average career length (three years is average), but who will have pain, injury residue, and surgical scars for life just to be able to tell people they once spent a season with the Buccaneers or Seahawks.

● And it appears the NBA is going the "lockout and litigation" route, but in earnest. Stars are lining up to play abroad during the work stoppage, which will be often and incorrectly called a "strike."

Let's see, the NBA would be cranking up its schedule during the same week that the NHL takes the ice, while the NFL schedule will be in full swing, NCAA football will be dominating headlines, and baseball will be finishing up the pennant races and cascading into the playoffs and World Series.

During the holidays, college hoops will start, the BCS bowl season begins, and the NFL stretch drives will be in full bloom. After the New Year, the road to the Super Bowl will captivate fans, followed by the crack of the bat in Spring Training and the NCAA's March Madness.

Follow March madness with the rebirth of sports—Opening Day—the Stanley Cup playoffs, and horse racing's Triple Crown and you'll soon after find yourself right back where you are now: With Training Camps opening for NFL teams.

Except for maybe a Lakers game on Christmas Day, who but the most die-hard NBA fans will miss the NBA…?

● Finally, plaudits are offered up here to the Phillies for infusing a much-needed dose of youthful enthusiasm as well as talent into their aging roster in the form of newly-acquired, spindly-legged Hunter Pence, an ADHD sort of player who never seems to take his Ritalin.

His energy and hell-bent-for-leather [What exactly does that phrase mean, anyway?] style of play over the next few years will be worth astronomically more than the occasional longball that generally cool and loafing Carlos Beltran of the stinkin' Mets, the other 'big stick' available at the trading deadline, would have contributed in two months on the team this year.

There are righthanded sticks, and then there are perfect fits. Pence [left] falls into the latter category. Great move, Rub!

"When I was out there when it happened I didn't see a tag" -- Jerry Meals

2011-07-28T09:39:00.010-04:00

One of my favorite things about the dweebs who rant on and on about the use of replay in sports is how they can take the most miniscule variable of evidence and present it as undeniable fact.

You can watch—seemingly endlessly, by the way—referees stand under a hood alongside of a gridiron on football Saturdays or Sundays allegedly "getting the call right"—and then doing no such thing, leaving announcers, viewers, and fans in the stadium to scratch their collective heads.

Whether or not the call goes for or against them it usually ends up hurting the team that was on a roll most—their momentum is checked while more commercials are shown on TV and people wander out to souvenir stands for a drink or a snack. Yeah, I get that it's all about "getting the call right…"

The other night, the surprising Pittsburgh Pirates and Atlanta Braves dueled into the wee hours of the morning, the game ending on a 19th inning "safe" call at the plate by plate umpire Jerry Meals. Meals claims he never saw the swipe tag touch the runner. Everybody else in the world—who, by the way, all had access to a slo-mo replay—says Meals got it wrong.

My thought: Who cares? Don't want to have an umpire hose youe in the bottom of the 19th? Then pitch a little better, or score a few more runs early, win it in 9 innings, and go home, dude.

But the most ridiculous thing I saw was at Yahoo! Sports, where the image above, left was proudly displayed as some sort of proof that the tag had been made.

Based on that, not only do I agree with Yahoo!'s blogger, David Brown, but I have also determined that a gigantic teenaged girl is holding up the Leaning Tower of Pisa!

Sheesh…

"On a large enough time line, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero" -- Charles Palahniuk

2011-07-12T14:44:00.006-04:00

The Darwin Awards lost a potential candidate last night when deep-thinking Keith Carmickle, a fan at last night's Home Run Derby event in Arizona, somehow managed not to plunge at least 20 feet after falling over a railing trying to catch a ball hit by the Brewers' Prince Fielder.

I think a few real-life Brewers had a hand in this escapade, which looked astonishingly questionable even before he took his aborted plunge [below]. Brilliant...

"When you put on a uniform, there are certain inhibitions that you accept" -- Dwight Eisenhower

2011-07-07T16:22:00.012-04:00

After blowing the dust off of the ancient oaken drawing cabinets, and taking one last look by the light of that lone overhead bulb, through all of the imagery and graphics we've created over the years here at Harry's Beef Trust, you see above the return of a memorable display of baseball's all-time worst uniforms. Oddly, while I admit they're awful, I just love 'em! I even find myself particularly partial to the pajama-like checkered-plaid uniforms of the St. Louis Browns, second from the left at the top, as well as to those pill-box Centennial caps as seen in the 1976 All-Star game snapshot at the bottom.

In fairness to baseball, however, I recently discovered this uniform [below] of the Fernie Swastikas girls' hockey club, circa 1922. Yikes! The early 20th century is actually chock full of teams called the "Swastikas," wearing the now-creepy symbol as their logo in hockey, basketball, and even baseball!

It'd be tough, in my mind, to top a uniform like this in the "Worst of Any Sport, All-Time" category. Any thoughts?

Remembering the Last Supper of Pat the Bat

2011-07-07T15:46:00.012-04:00

Since I've been immersed in old imagery from deep in the subterranean, climate-controled vaults here at Harry's Beef Trust, I thought this one was too large for this cast of characters to be appreciated fully in the Gallery on the sidebar at right. So, with a tip of the cap to his lone World Series RBI and his status as beloved child of a championship, I resurrect "Pat Burell's Last Supper."

"I can suck melancholy out of a song as a weasel sucks eggs" -- Shakespeare

2011-07-07T10:30:00.009-04:00

In honor of opening arguments in the perjury trial of Roger Clemens, I thought I'd take some related original artwork from here at Harry's Beef Trust out of metaphorical mothballs and expose it to the light of day. Above, Brian McNamee, the guy who injected steroids into the haughty would-be Hall of Famer. Below, Clemens in a telling "separated at birth" image...

And take a moment to scope out the brand-spankin'-new gallery of artwork, culled from the vast archives of the Beef Trust, and now on display on the sidebar at right. It's a "Best Of" collection you won't want to miss!

"Youth is a wonderful thing. What a crime to waste it on children" -- George Bernard Shaw

2011-07-07T09:27:00.015-04:00

Harsh words for the Phillies after last night's come-from-ahead loss snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. The team fell to the Florida Marlins, 7-6.

The Camden Courier-Post: "Phillies barely play like big leaguers in finale."

Philly Pro Sports: "Memo to Dom Brown: when you’re rounding second, please make sure you step on the bag."

Promising rookie outfielder Domonic Brown was contrite after missing second base after legging out an apparent triple that quickly became a single and an out at second after the Marlins appealed: "Right there it cost us the game. You live and learn. That’s all I can say."

Fellow rookie John Mayberry followed with his second homer of the night, a solo shot with Brown having been erased.

It's the second time in a couple of weeks that Brown has apologized for a mental gaffe. In addition, his awkward misplay of a drive off the bat of Omar Infante, a liner that might have had double written on it, into a single and two-base error, costing the Phillies even more runs last night.

Manager Charlie Manuel was eloquent on the subject: "We made a lot of mistakes, mental and physical. That's what happens."

With rookies proliferating in an injury-depleted line-up and bullpen, that's going to happen. The fact that it doesn't more often is actually a tribute to those kids. Who could've asked for more from Vance Worley, Michael Stutes, and Antonio Bastardo [right]?

The Phillies have gone "all in," with a 2011 payroll tickling the $160,000,000 mark. Some say, if it were to go much higher, it would go a lot higher, they'd pay millions in Luxury Tax. Still, sources indicate the tax limit is $178 million, but we're not sure how the team's salary commitments are actually calculated. Cot's Baseball Contracts has the figure at $165,976,381.

Now, that's a lot of dough no matter how you figure it, and despite people still dwelling on how "cheap" the team is, there seems no doubt that the Skinflint Era of Phllies baseball is over.

However, along with star players, huge salary commitments come with some distressing downsides.

The Phillies bench and bullpen are a mess—no depth. Once aging and expensive stars are nicked up (or flat out disabled, a la Brad Lidge), there's no money left to pick up experienced and able-bodied reserves.

Hence, you end up with Domo Brown doing his Triple-A learning "on the job" in the big leagues. You end up with erratic rookie pitcher Andrew Carpenter trying to cling to a scant 6-5 lead. You end up with petite, overmatched Michael Martinez—who holds the bat like Ryan Howard, but makes Mario Mendoza look like Ty-frickin'-Cobb—flailing away in the 2-hole, unable to advance runners or even get down a bunt.

So get used to seeing more of the sloppy baseball we saw last night—at least until the regulars start to return.

What's scary is that, once one fellow has returned from an injury this year, it seems two more have gone out. Such is life with an aging, expensive ball club saddled with both high expectations and bad karma…

"According to the karma of past actions, one's destiny unfolds, even though everyone wants to be so lucky" -- Sri Guru Granth Sahib

2011-07-02T11:14:00.012-04:00

Happy Canada Day and 4th of July!

Today, just a word about karma.

With the Phillies sitting high atop the baseball world with an MLB-high 52 wins, it strange to say that they have some bad karma—but they do. That would explain all of the hand-wringing and negativity around what, if you really just look at the record—should be a dream season in Philadelphia.

The bad karma was well-earned when the Phils chose to let fan-favorite coach Davey Lopes walk away from a position at which he excelled on the organization's behalf—combination 1st base coach and baserunning instructor—over what primarily appears to have been money. They weren't going 'above slot' for a 1st base coach—it wasn't in the budget. Apparently Davey, according to Lopes himself, wanted a wage more in line with what a 3rd base coach would earn. The Phillies have not commented that I know of.

Now, I love Davey Lopes, but I could live with that. The club'r payroll was hovering around $150,000,000 at the time, and where do you cut costs? Not on your 5th starter; on your best-in-baseball baserunning coach! [By the way, negotiations are a two-way street; Davey's actions in those contract talks landed him with the troubled L.A. National League franchise—BadKarmaville incarnate!]

Then, along comes former Phil Juan Samuel. Sammy, however, doesn't coach 1st, so he was signed as the team's new 3rd base coach, which must have come as a bit of a surprise to Sammy Perlozzo, the team's erstwhile coach at the hot corner.

Now "Sammy" Samuel was an mediocre infielder and a premier base stealer in his day—but he now also coaches the outfielders. Sammy Perlozzo, demoted to 1st base coach, will of course coach the baserunners.

Working under the assumption that Sammy 1.0 (Perlozzo) didn't take a pay cut to move across the diamond, the Phils ended up paying 3rd base coach money for a 1st base coach/baserunning instructor—something they claimed they couldn't afford. Sammy 2.0 (Samuel) pushed Perlozzo out of the 3rd base coach's box—this after he lost out on the bench coach position to Pete Mackanin when 2008 World Series Champion bench coach Jimy Williams left the team over a dispute about—you guessed it!—money!

Now, Jimy Williams was one thing. But screwing over good soldier Davey Lopes by paying the money he wanted to someone whose greatest accomplishment as a Phillie was having been traded for Lenny Dykstra, all while once again rubbing baseball lifer Sammy Perlozzo's nose in it… again… Well that's bad karma ratcheted up to Warp Factor 5.

So the Phillies are on their 4th-level-down closer, rookie Antonio Bastardo. And the Phillies bullpen now looks like the Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs bullpen-wait!—it is! And Placido Polanco is all aches and pains. Again. Chase Utley's knee is letting him down a bit. And Roy Oswalt's back is hinky. And Raul Ibanez generally looks like, well, an old Raul Ibanez, although it seems he just can't keep from having his head pull off the ball, a la Pat Burrell. Everyone's career numbers are better than what they're putting up at the plate this year. Ryan Howard now seems to officially believe he needs to homer in every at-bat. Ross Gload's hip is attached with duct tape. Joe Blanton is, well, Joe Blanton. Kyle Kendrick is in the starting rotation. And no one wants to replace Jayson Werth in right field…

This team has a lot of talent, a lot of experience, and a fan base that's both papidly and rabidly tossing money at them despite a sluggish economy. They sit atop the baseball world. Life's good, right?

So why does everyone have the feeling that this fabulous roster is the baseball version of the Titanic: Coming soon to an iceberg near you!

Karma.

The Phillies have to do something to assuage it.

And loving words from Davey Lopes on his last visit to town with the Dodgers don't seem to have done the trick…

"Once you learn to quit, it becomes a habit" -- Vince Lombardi

2011-06-23T23:59:00.014-04:00

Jim Riggleman quit after the Washington Nationals won this afternoon. The 58-year-old manager felt "disrespected."

What? Is he 14? And on top of all that, news reports are making him out to be some kind of folk hero, like he accomplished what he did all while being sexually harassed by GM Mike Rizzo or something, poor fella.

Baseball managers end up with nicknames like "Skipper" and "Bench Boss." You might even think they have some sort of authority. Hell, even they think so sometimes.

Not a chance. They don't get to fire people—they get fired. And they don't get to hire people. We know that, or Phillies manager Charlie Manuel would already have the righthanded bat that he's done everything but hire a skywriter to advertise his need for.

No way. Managers are leaders.

On the MLB Network game this evening, John Smoltz said that he commiserated, that things happen, and that it's a business—he understood why Riggleman quit.

Huh? The last guy I ever want to hear lecture viewers on the pitfalls of being a "lame duck" Major League manager would be anyone who played for Atlanta's Bobby Cox from 1990 to 2008. The last time Bobby Cox went home wondering if he was going to get his contract extended was in 1985, and I still had hair. And it was brown.

It's a business. And Jim Riggleman is in the business of taking young men—not the veteran players of the Atlanta Braves Dynasty, but young players—and leading them into their futures. Teaching them to win. Building character in them as they sharpen their skills and learn what it takes to have success in the big leagues.

Riggleman signed a contract to do exactly that, and the deal was good through the end of this season, with an option for 2012. If having 2012 guaranteed was something that was a must-have, he should have held out for it and had his showdown with the front office then, in an off-season, not in the middle of a season when guys in the dugout and on the field are counting on him. You sign the contract, you play out its terms—unless, of course, you're Manny Ramirez.

At least he didn't quite do a Manny-Being-Manny move and half-ass the rest of the season. He just completely quit. Something he'd bench his players for. Something he'd berate his coaches for. Something he'd lecture others about, while extolling the virtues of commitment, and pride, and hustle, and coming up big in the face of adversity.

Riggleman, I used to think, was a class act, despite his woeful big league record as a manager: His teams have finished as high as second place once and in last place 5—count 'em—5 times.

So his team is in 3rd place today, ahead of a putrid Mets team that's overachieving right now and a mediocre Marlins team that's on an epic schneid and clearly underachieving. But it wasn't all about that. It was all about his contract. Or his feelings. Or something else unrelated to winning ball games.

Nice job, Jim. Great almost-half-a-season, and that 38-37 record—wow!

This guy is a quitter. And that's what makes him a loser, not his piss-poor managerial record.

Good riddance.

"A recent police study found that you're much more likely to get shot by a fat cop if you run" -- Dennis Miller

2011-05-21T09:50:00.004-04:00

The rule of law prevails! The cop here in Ocala said, after I had rings stolen: "We'll never find them. If you want them back, start going around to all of the pawn shops and see if anyone has them. They won't tell you over the phone."

I assume it was the same with Kyle Kendrick, spending night after night in the Phillies bullpen, then flying back to Washington state to go from pawn shop to pawn shop looking for his World Series ring. I guess he finally found it, because a recent story said he got it back!

What? You don't think he had to? You actually think a marginal and highly forgettable Major Leagur Baseball pitcher could get service from the police that a teacher or any other worthless, work-a-day shlub couldn't get?

If you do, go to the head of the class.

For how I got my rings back, click HERE, with a big shout-out to the Navy, and a great big "Thanks for nothing" to the Ocala police.

BOLO

2011-04-17T13:30:00.007-04:00

Help a brother out, will ya...?

Beef Trust Stew...

2011-04-14T15:30:00.011-04:00

The baseball season, version 2K11, has begun but other sports seem to be making headlines as well. Here's a look at what's been going on…

• I know people just love to be loving on Rangers centerfielder Josh Hamilton, the man Bill Conlin of the Philadelphia Daily News dubbed "The Illustrated Man" (which is a terrific book, by the way, although you should read it before it becomes any more time worn). Personally, I think his saga is a nice feel-good story about a derelict junkie who finally kicked the habit.

Does that make Hamilton a nice guy, though? Nah.

Hamilton recently bellyflopped his way into home plate on a bang-bang play against some cat-napping Detroit defenders and apparently broke his humerus bone near the shoulder. He'll miss 6 – 8 weeks.

There's nothing ungentlemanly about that. But after the game Hamilton referred to the play as "stupid" and threw his third base coach, Dave Anderson, under the proverbial bus for noticing the fact that out-of-it Tigers pitcher Brad Penny failed to cover the plate on the play on a foul pop, and sending Hamilton home.

It was, in fact, a smart, aggressive call by a savvy coach who was more aware of what was happening on the field than Penny—or Hamilton. Had Hamilton been more aware and prepared to skitter home, there might have been no reason to slide at all. As it was, it took a lunging, desperation dive and swipe tag by the catcher to put Hamilton out anyway. "Make 'em throw you out" is a common baserunning mantra, especially when fielders are observed to be unaware of the situation or out of position. "Don't slide headfirst into home plate"—a hard, vulcanized block of rubber dug solidly into the ground, not a soft canvas bag like a base—is another common mantra of baserunning coaches everywhere.

That Josh Hamilton made some poor decisions on the play in question is obvious. The worst decision he made, though, was afterwards, when he criticized a coach for his own poor decision-making and fragility.

Jerk.

• It didn't happen in a baseball game, but Kobe Bryant of the Los Angeles Lakers apparently shouted a homophobic slur courtside the other day.

His apology was one of the lamest ever: "What I said last night should not be taken literally. My actions were out of frustration during the heat of the game, period. The words expressed do NOT reflect my feelings towards the gay and lesbian communities and were NOT meant to offend anyone."

I will be the very first one in line to buy that load of crap if, while playing in the 'heat of the game,' someone drops the N-word on him, and he replies, "Man, don't worry about it. I ain't offended—it was during the heat of the game. In NO WAY do I suspect that using that word in reference to me reflects your feelings toward the African American community and obviously was NOT meant to offend anyone!"

However, if that was not his reaction, then I hope his current punishment, a fine, was every bit as harsh as he would expect it to be for a racial slur.

• Probably the best thing that could have happened to Domonic Brown of the Phillies this Spring was his broken hamate bone. That bone, basically considered the appendix of the hand, serves no known purpose, and when broken, is simply removed.

Brown, however, was in a protracted, winter-long slump that started in Winter Ball and continued into Spring Training.

Had Brown not claimed the right field job this spring, many would have looked at the toolsy outfielder as a failure in the wake of the departure of stud Jayson Werth. Now Ben Francisco is very ably manning right field and the five-hole in the batting order, and Brown, when he's completely healed can begin collecting at-bats in AAA, making up for lost time, and preparing to take over next season when the Albatross-like contract of rapidly-aging outfielder Raul Ibanez expires at season's end.

• Here's hoping that NFL players, many of whom apparently are already cash-poor due to the labor impasse, manage to stick together to get a decent deal.

I'm not worried about guys like Peyton Manning, Tom Brady, Adrian Peterson, and their ilk. They have and will continue to earn more money than they'll ever be able to spend. I hope the deal covers players at the other end of the spectrum: Kamikaze special teamers who put their bodies and careers at risk every time they go careening headlong down the gridiron in search of a high-impact collision.

My heart also goes out to back-up players, taxi squad guys, and players who spend season after season on the bubble. The average NFL career is, I understand, less than three years long. The accumulated injuries and remnants of bodily punishment can last a lifetime—especially the aftermath of concussions. If there were any athletes deserving of guaranteed contracts, I would have to say they would be football players, men who are always one bone-crunching hit from a career-ending injury every time they step on the field.

More power to 'em.

• Oh, Barry Bonds was found guilty of obstruction of justice. It couldn't have happened to nicer steroid-soaked superstar. Here's hoping for many happy returns of his perjury indictments.

• What goes around comes around: Word is the Yankees were apparently upset that the Astros "never made them fully aware" that current Phillies starter Roy Oswalt was available last summer.

It wasn't long ago that former Phils GM Ed Wade, now working for the Astros, thought he had a trade deadline deal with the Yanks that would have brought frontline starter Andy Pettitte to Philadelphia in 1999.

Memories in baseball can be very long, and payback, as they say, is a bitch—even a decade or more later.

• Lastly, as we move into the Stanley Cup Playoffs, there is still a lot of namby-pamby hand wringing over fighting in hockey. The NHL is roundly criticized on networks like ESPN [purveyor of "Friday Night Fights"] for allowing it.

Kudos, however, to the powers that be in the National Hockey League, for not caving in to the demands of reporters (most of whom, by and large, are not hockey fans), and for listening to and caring about the opinions of the people who actually PAY to get into the games.

The NHL will know it's time to eliminate fisticuffs in shinny when fans head to the concession stands and rest rooms when a fight breaks out, instead of cheering wildly and standing on their chairs to get a better view. Until then, the talking heads on shows like Around the Horn and Pardon the Interruption, all of whom never played hockey, can just shut up.

"Men may come and men may go.....but pie goes on for ever" -- George Augustus Sala

2011-04-02T09:13:00.007-04:00

Another Opening Day, another Phillies walk off win. *Yawn*

Actually this was the club's only the team's 14th Opening Day victory since 1969, and John Mayberry's [pictured above, happily wearing a shaving cream pie] bases-loaded single capped the first bottom-of-the-ninth comeback for the Phils in an opener since Michael Jack Schmidt took Tug McGraw deep in 1974.

Cue Willie Nelson: "Ain't it funny how time slips away.....?"

"The discontented man finds no easy chair" - Benjamin Franklin

2011-03-20T13:59:00.005-04:00

If you're a Phillies fan, have a you seen more sobering and frightening photos than these in the last month of Spring Training?

And what is it about the place where baseball and sports medicine meet that makes this even a remotely good idea...?

"Sometimes I worry about being a success in a mediocre world" -- Lily Tomlin

2011-01-27T16:21:00.011-05:00

Here's a set of sports transactions that would normally never have caught my eye:

Miami Dolphins: Named Ike Hilliard assistant wide receivers coach, Tony Sparano Jr. offensive quality control coach and Dave Fipp assistant special teams coach. Promoted receivers coach Karl Dorrell to quarterbacks coach, offensive quality control coach Steve Bush to receivers coach and assistant special teams coach Darren Rizzi to special teams coordinator.

Now, being a tried-and-true Philadelphia Eagles fan, what possible difference could that make to me? Really, no difference at all.

But living here in Florida, I do have to roll my eyes on behalf of Dolphins fans. The Eagles, playoff bound in 10 of Andy Reid's 12 seasons at the helm, just sacked a bunch of longtime defensive coaches after finishing 2010 tied with the Redskins of 22nd in the NFL in points surrendered per game, 15th against the pass, and 15th against the rush, and a surprisingly lofty 12th in total yards against.

Sayonara, au revoir, and adios to coordinator Sean McDermott [right], defensive line coach Rory Segrest, secondary coach Dick Jauron, and linebackers coach Bill Suhey, due to those middling numbers.

Now, the Dolphins' 2010 offense finished 30th out of 32 teams in points scored per game and 20th in total yards from scrimmage and was 27th in time of possession. That's a way below average offense.

The Miami kicking game was 29th overall, they were 31st in FG/PAT, 6th in punting, and 22nd in returns. Not exactly scintillating special teams play.

In fact, those numbers are middling to… uh… awful.

So what happens in Miami? After flirting with Jim Harbaugh this winter while de facto coach Tony Sporano twisted in the wind, Miami re-ups Sporano—whose team went 7-9 this year and lost an astounding 7 of 8 at home in Miami—and allows his son to be named offensive quality control coach.

Then a bunch of coaches on the offensive side of the ball and special teams get promoted!

No knock on McDermott, et al, intended, but that's why Philadelphia, I suppose, is sniffing around the playoffs every single year in this millenium. Produce mediocre results? They'll have you looking for work elsewhere—like Cleveland or Carolina.

Produce mediocrity or even less? Get ready for a promotion in Miami.

Miami sure has a funny way of building a contender now that the Big Tuna is gone. Thank God I'm not a Dolphins fan…

Eagles Playoff Fever, 2010: Catch It! We dare you...

2011-01-10T16:06:00.003-05:00

And no Donovan McNabb to blame! Life just stinks...

"I'm not going to be caught around here for any fool celebration" -- Norman Rockwell

2010-12-31T11:30:00.005-05:00

Here's a new entry into the bulging file of reasons I don't much like the voracious, self-serving, greed-infested, egocentric, multi-billion-dollar conglomerate known as major college football:

A Kansas State wide receiver named Adrian Hillburn cost his team a chance to play overtime against Syracuse in the Pinstripe Bowl at Yankee Stadium due to his "excessive celebration."

His salute—literally a snappy, one-second military salute [pictured, in all of its celebratory excess]—to nearby fans was flagged by officials, forcing K-State to run a two-point conversion from the 18-yard line to tie the game.

This is just Reason # 4531 demonstrating what an unfunny joke the NCAA really is, and just another reason why I so rarely tune in...

Merry Christmas from Grand Rapids, Michigan!

2010-12-25T02:04:00.002-05:00

"Every parting is a form of death, as every reunion is a type of heaven" -- Tryon Edwards

2010-12-15T22:08:00.005-05:00

Wow.

"The blizzard of the world has crossed the threshold and it's overturned the order of the soul" -- Leonard Cohen

2010-12-12T11:50:00.015-05:00

Admit it: You thought things couldn't get much weirder for the Minnesota Vikings.

After another off-season of will-he-or-won't-he drama regarding QB Brett Favre's ever-impending retirement… After the team's woefully inept start, fueled to some degree by diva Percy Harvin's suddenly-perpetual migraines… After the ill-advised acquisition and jettisoning of mercurial bad-boy wideout Randy Moss… After the players mutiny faced by Queeg-like head coach Brad Childress, who was deposed by clueless, out-of-town owner Zygi Wilf… After Favre booted up and played with a broken bone in his foot… After the mini-resurgence fueled by the promotion of former Bear and Eagle Leslie Frazier… After Favre was drilled and knocked out of his last start while attempting to throw his first pass of the game, ending up concussed and with an injured shoulder… After the surprising reveation that wholesome, former Jets 'game day hostess' Jenn Sterger [right] won't sue the NFL or the Jets if they impose punishment on Favre for sexting pics of his johnson to her… After the stranding of the visiting New York Giants this weekend in Kansas City en route to Minneapolis due to a paralyzing blizzard in Minnesota, a layover that would've forced the team to arrive in the Twin Cities two hours before kick-off in the very best case scenario… After the league refused to allow the Vikings to change the game time from 12 pm CT, then relented late Saturday… After the 17 inches of snow fell between 4 and 5 am CT, collapsing two triangles of the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome [now, apparently Mall of America® Field] roof, causing a postponement of the game, allowing Favre more time to recover and continue his streak, and sending the league scrambling for an alternate location for the game on Monday evening, December 13… After the Giants—who could then sleep late in KC due to the postponement—were chased from their rooms at 7 am CT by an errant fire alarm…

Here's a tweet from Vikes receiver Bernard Berrian: "Joke goin round is Gods Tryin to preserve Bretts streak record Lol!!"

Tweeted Vikings defensive end Brian Robinson: "Can't wait to see what happens now. Let's make it even crazier and just take the roof off and play outside."

And, finally, a tweet from Minnesota punter Chris Kluwe: "Just when you think you've seen it all, there's always tomorrow."

If you're a Minnesota Vikings fan in 2010, those are some fairly frightening words…

"If there's a bright center to the universe, you're on the planet that it's farthest from" -- Luke Skywalker

2010-11-24T12:26:00.005-05:00

"Anyone who sees and paints a sky green and fields blue ought to be sterilized" -- Adolf Hitler

2010-11-24T12:01:00.005-05:00

"Reality leaves a lot to the imagination" -- John Lennon

2010-11-24T11:30:00.008-05:00

"Make preparations for us there" -- Mark 14:15

2010-11-21T11:18:00.002-05:00

"Don't look now, but there's one man too many in this room, and I think it's you" -- Rufus T. Firefly ('Duck Soup')

2010-11-21T10:12:00.003-05:00

"The panther is a fierce animal, but he will not attack until he is backed into a corner; then he will strike out." -- Huey Newton

2010-11-21T10:08:00.008-05:00

"Above anything else, I hate to lose" -- Jackie Robinson

2010-11-20T18:15:00.003-05:00

"I shall return" -- Douglas MacArthur

2010-11-20T18:12:00.003-05:00

"From error to error, one discovers the entire truth" -- Sigmund Freud

2010-11-20T18:08:00.004-05:00

"Nobody creates a fad. It just happens" -- Jim Henson

2010-11-20T17:58:00.003-05:00

Time for me to weigh in on the use of our latest world-wide cultural phenomenon from a great Tiger Woods photograph [above] from last summer: Cigar Guy! Or is it Cigar Man? Either way, I'm in…

"When I looked at the third base coach, he turned his back on me" -- Bob Uecker

2010-11-12T12:17:00.007-05:00

One of my favorite memories of Juan Samuel is having watched him leg out stand-up triples. Graceful as a gazelle, the lengthy stride of those long legs simply ate up the ground. It was a thing of beauty.

Another memory is Sammy swinging and missing, again and again, at low-and-away sliders. It was frustrating to watch—with his blazing speed, any contact causing just a dribbler in the infield was bound to end up being a hit—and he wasn't truly replaced in the line-up until the arrival of the similarly-flailing Pat Burrell.

Back then, Sammy hit in a Phillies line-up that, like today, eschewed making contact often in an effort to hit the longball. I can still see Glenn Wilson swinging through chin-high fastballs with runners on base and walking slowly back to the dugout. Wilson chasing the high strike was an important part of any offensive situation in the mid-1980s in which the Phils had runners on base with less than two outs: If he made contact, the smart money was on him hitting into a double play. Wilson kept many a key scoring opportunity alive with his futile flailing!

Anyway, Sammy now returns as third base coach for Bill Giles's favorite team. Watching Sammy play was often frustrating, but always exciting. So why aren't I happier to see him return?

Davey Lopes, that's why.

Lopes was the Phillies first base coach and baserunning instructor. Under his tutelage, the Phillies led the league in base stealing percentage. Lopes essentially ran the running game, with manager Charlie Manuel only exercising veto power.

Lopes understandably wanted to be remunerated for his efforts, however, and was apparently reminded that he was a essentially just a first base coach and should not expect to be paid much differently. In essence, he wanted more and was quickly shown the door.

That brings us to his replacement, Juan Samuel. He'll coach not first base, but the higher-profile assignment at third base. One also assumes he'll be paid commensurately.

Another Sammy, this one Sammy Perlozzo, the erstwhile third base coach, will assume Lopes's responsibilities over at first base—including baserunning.

Charlie Manuel on whether or not Sammy P. will be entrusted to manage the entire running game as did Lopes: "More than likely it may happen. He's very knowledgeable."

And Charlie didn't exactly release a surge of accolades regarding the work he thought Lopes did over the last few years: "When you talk about breaks and reads and the fundamental part of running the bases, there are a lot of areas we can improve on."

So there, Davey! Perlozzo will now have to pick up the slack in teaching all of those "fundamentals" it seems you were unable to!

Now, J. Sammy was a Phillies infielder who was a renowned base stealer [left] who stands at 71st on the all-time list (despite being only a part-time player during the last 7 years of his career) and was among the Top 10 in the NL in thefts five times (1984-1986 and 1989-1990). So Sammy knows bease-stealing.

J. Sammy played 1190 career games at second base, and a total of 1277 in the infield. Over his last ten seasons, he played another 267 as an outfielder. So Sammy was no master of the outfield.

Will J. Sammy coach the baserunners? No.

Will J. Sammy coach the outfielders? Yes.

It's sort of interesting how all of this shakes down, isn't it? I guess it all must make sense in some puzzling way. There's really only one thing that doesn't.

My assumption would be that the team will be paying Juan Samuel the going rate for a third base coach. My other assumption is that Sammy Perlozzo is still being paid the going rate for a third base coach as well.

That means this ultimately disloyal organization will be paying third base coach money for their first base coach after all—something it apparently wouldn't do in the case of Davey Lopes, a guy who helped win them a ring and appear in back-to-back World Series during the last three seasons. But in fairness, the team's new third base coach, who's now apparently the "hot ticket" in big league baseline coaching, also helped get them into the World Series—as a rookie back in 1983.

In a flabbergasting twist of the prevalent paradigm, the Phillies are now asking "What did you do for me last century?" while completely disregarding "What have you done for me lately?"

If you believe in karma, then you know this just can't work out well for the Phillies…

"Next to excellence is the appreciation of it” -- William Makepeace Thackeray

2010-11-08T15:03:00.004-05:00

I have to admit, even though it happened a week ago, I still can't believe that the Phillies even remotely let dollars come between themselves and keeping Davey Lopes on the coaching staff.

Lopes masterminded the Phils' running attack, taught even slow afoot players like Ryan Howard how to pilfer a sack now and again, and kept a "book" on opposing pitchers and catchers unlike anyone else. How they're planning to replace all of that with a run-of-the-mill first base coach, I have no idea!

For a team that already has enough trouble moving runners into scoring position, doing anything to blunt their notably effective running game is offensive suicide. Losing Lopes is one more reason to assume that next season there'll be even more players standing around waiting to hit the long ball, and even fewer runs scored.

Lopes left over more than money, though: He left because he felt his contributions weren't valued by front office bean counters, which would include GM Ruben Amaro. And, it's interesting to note, he's the second highly-respected Phillies coach in three playoff seasons to feel that way.

You may recall sage bench coach Jimy Williams walked, feeling underappreciated as well as underpaid, after the Phils won the 2008 World Series.

That's a lot of coaching talent to have lost over nickels and dimes in an organization setting club attendance records at the big league and Triple-A levels, and simply raking in the dough.

"He is a fool who lets slip a bird in the hand for a bird in the bush" -- Plutarch

2010-11-07T09:34:00.009-05:00

Bluegrass Joe Blanton [left] is a good ol' boy who is known more for being an innings-eater than for being a real winner. He once started on Opening Day in Japan after the thrifty Oakland A's had finally rid themselves of glitzy, one-Big-Three-starters Barry Zito, Mark Mulder, and Tim Hudson. He's started for the Phillies in the post-season, but has been borderline enough to have worked often out of the bullpen in October. Still, the club envisioned him being valuable enough to award him a contract in which he'll be paid $8.5 million during the 2011 and 2012 seasons for being the 4th starter.

Kyle Kendrick, on the other hand, is the red-headed stepchild of the Phils' starting staff. He isn't much trusted to pitch in the 5-hole of the rotation. He should have started the season in Triple-A, but didn't because of injuries. He was pulled from the rotation and was to be demoted for ineffectiveness, but never missed a startdue to injuries. He made $480,000 dollars, and is eligible for salary arbitration this off-season for the first time in his career.

The smart money says the Phillies will non-tender him so as to be able to pay him less than he would be awarded in arbitration. The risk is having him sign with a competing organization, leaving them with untested Vance Worley as the leading candidate for 5th starter. While it would be uncertain if the club could get an entire, effective season out of Worley, one certainty is that he would work cheaply.

Kendrick [right] has a reputation of being a finesse pitcher who was a slow-learner in picking up solid secondary pitches to complement his fastball and sinker. He also has a reputation for being a guy who'll make you go to your bullpen early. Certainly, he's nothing near that Blanton-esque bulldog type.

Or is he?

Here are the 2010 numbers:

Kendrick went 11-10 with a 4.73 ERA and a 1.37 WHIP.

Blanton went 9-6 with a 4.82 ERA and a 1.42 WHIP.

Those numbers seem to show you could throw the two of them under a blanket and who'd know the difference? That difference MUST be found in the voracious amount of innings devoured by Blanton.

Again, let's check the stats:

Kendrick pitched 180 ⅔ innings in 2010.

Blanton pitched 175 ⅔.

Now, I know Blanton spent some time on the DL. He was down about 20 innings from his previous three seasons, when he averaged about 196 innings a year. However, Kendrick was skipped in the rotation a few times during the season, denying him a some starts—and some innings—as well.

That's, then, a wash: Kendrick is officially an innings-eater for a championship-caliber club. After all, you may recall that, for the first time in team history, the Phillies were odds-on favorites to win it all in 2010, even if that didn't quite work out.

Kendrick ended up with only 10 fewer innings pitched than another vaunted innings-eater, Kevin Millwood, who spent last season toiling for the Baltimore Orioles, making $12 million and going 4-16, 5.10. Millwood piled up 190 ⅔ innings in his 31 starts.

That's the same number of starts made by Kendrick: 31. And when you boil down those 10 innings over those 31 starts, Millwood got just one, single out more per start than Kendrick over the course of a 162 game season.

One more out per start.

It's official: Kyle Kendrick has become an innings-eater. Toss in his 11 wins for a contending club, and it's actually a little curious that the club wouldn't be eager to offer him a fair contract to avoid arbitration, rewarding him for his above-and-beyond-the-call-of-duty services rendered in 2010. Doing that would ensure a pair of quality "innings eaters" after the Philadelphia rotation's own Big Three.

That's hardly the Phillies style, though. Just ask Davey Lopes.

"Nothing is really real unless it happens on television" -- Daniel J. Boorstin

2010-11-01T16:49:00.006-04:00

In a bit of interesting news, the NBC Sunday night football game between the last two Super Bowl champions, the Pittsburgh Steelers and the New Orleans Saints, apparently became the first ever to receive a higher TV rating than a World Series game.

According to the Associated Press, the game "drew an 11.8 overnight rating and 18 share. Game 4 of the World Series had a 10.4/16."

Is that surprising? Nope.

What exactly does it mean, though?

It means that FOX, who funnels nearly half-a-billion dollars into Major League Baseball yearly through 2013, played its cards poorly.

I guess they just assume that the Yankees, Red Sox, Dodgers, or Phillies will be in the World Series each year. They crapped out on that this year, ending up with an intriguing San Francisco Giants vs. Texas Rangers match-up.

Fox's problem is exposure. They regionalize the Saturday afternoon national game of the week, and make certain everything else blacked out—playoff implications or not. Regionalization means that you'll be seeing a team from your part of the country—unless you get the Yankees-Red Sox or Dodgers-Mets game.

That leaves most of the United States having never seen much of teams like the Giants and the Rangers. Suddenly, last week, it became paramount to try to promote the interesting stories and aspects of each team. Too little, too late: Fox already used the entire season to capture the imaginations of fans anticipating a Phillies-Yankees rematch. Or a Phillies-Rays rematch. And the proverbial boat sailed on all of those scenarios.

Admittedly, ESPN televises quite a few games during the season, but without having to worry about playoff and World Series ratings come autumn, they can televise what they please to try to achieve the best in-season ratings possible.

MLB Network televises quite a few regular season games as well. But that channel certainly isn't available to every cable subscriber, and is probably under-watched during the summer by the casual fan who may or may not be tuning in come October. Let's face it, showing a Rangers-Rays and Padres-Giants doubleheader at 7:00 and 10:00 Eastern in mid-July isn't exactly as electrifying as the Fall Classic.

If Fox wants better ratings, it should sow the seeds of those ratings during the regular season. Show a Rangers-Angels game once in awhile, and share it with the entire country, not just the west coast and Texas. Let us see the Dodgers taking on the hated Giants, even here in Florida, and across the country. Market those teams and players before October 23rd and maybe more people would watch later on when you crap out with no Yanks or Phils.

Not willing to bite the bullet in the weekly ratings to score better ratings if two less 'desirable' teams end up in the World Series? Then that's the hand you have to play in autumn.

Read 'em and weep…