No Sports Today, Romance Instead!

It's a relatively common theme for fictional romances, in which two men (both good) are after the same girl, to have one of the men make some sacrifice at the end so he can't get the girl but is happy in knowing that she's happy. Nice. Also, pure crap.

This has been done so many times, but probably the most famous example is [Spoiler Alert! Well, not really. If you haven't read it, you probably won't and really who cares?] Sydney Carton taking the guillotine for Charles Darnay so the woman he loved (Darnay's wide Lucie) could be happy in A Tale of Two Cities. Okay, first why does the guy always have to make the sacrafice? Generally the girl has some affection for the guy, albeit not total love. So why can't she ever sacrafice her happiness and make the guy happy?

In the case of Sydney Carton, what more could Lucie want from a man? He looks just like Darnay, who's stuck in prison and about to be executed. amd he's willing to die to make you happy! I mean isn't that enough?

Moreover, I don't care what Dickens said, that marriage could not last much after the book concluded. If your Darnay, how do you compete? The guy your wife could have had died for her. Not only died for her, but died in your place for her! Next time you don't take out the trash or put down the seat, Lucie's just going to remind you, "Sydney Carton died for me, and you can't even do chores for me?" That marriage is doomed and, really, so would be any relationship that's started or sustained by a third party's sacrafice

Over Time

So the NFL's changed its overtime rules. If you hadn't heard, it's fairly simple.

If the team that gets the ball scores a TD, the game's over.

If the team that gets the ball ends up with a safety, the game's over.

If the team that gets the ball first punts or turns the ball over, the game becomes sudden death.

If the team that gets the ball first kicks a FG, they'll kick off. If the other team scores a TD, the game's over.

If the team that gets the ball first kicks a FG, they'll kick off. If the other team also kicks a FG, the becomes sudden death;

These rules are only for the playoffs so ties do not come into play.

See? It's simple. If the two teams alternate FGs and score a combined 6 points the game's still going. If one team scores a combined 2 points the game's over. Two points = Win, 3 points = nothing really. Now I understand a safety's rarer than a FG, but still it does seem weird the numerical value of a safety is less than that of a a FG, but the importance of a safety is greater.

Beyond that, what really bothers me about the change is that it was wholly uncalled for. The overtime system was fine the way it was. I do not understand why people are making such a big deal about it this year. Actually, I think I do understand and that annoys me more than anything else.

These changes were only instituted for the playoffs. That's odd, don't you think. If a system is messed up, wouldn't you utilize it's replacement throughout the season? And if you wanted to test the replacement, would you choose the playoffs for a time to experiment? So, then, why the playoffs? Think back to last year's postseason. During championship weekend, a certain gunslinger lost the chance to go to the Super Bowl in an overtime game in which he never touched the ball. Suddenly, everyone in the media's crying out for overtime reform as if it was healthcare. I'm surprised that they didn't try to change the rules as soon as the Saints won the coin toss.

Now the misnomer that the previous system was unfair to the team that lost the toss. First, logically, the toss was fair to both teams. Each team had an equal chance to win that. Second. winning the toss does not equal winning the game. There is a defense on the field. Since 1993, the team that won the toss marched down the field for a game winning kick on the first posession in 27 percent of the games. Which means in 83 percent of the games the toss winning team scored a TD (which would end the game in the new system as well) or gave the ball to the other team.

Teams that win the toss end up winning the game 59 percent of the time. Far from a given. Is at an advantage? Absolutely. Is it unfair? How can it be? The fairest method possible was used to determine who gets the ball. Is an unsurmountable obstacle for the team that lost the toss? Definately not. The percentages bear it out. An advantage, yes, but conlusive, no.

Anyway, since we're only talking about postseason here, let's look at the postseason numbers. In the past 16 years, the teams that won the toss in a playoff overtime game are 7-7. I'm no genius, but that seems pretty even to me.

Now with the new overtime, I think I would automatcially kick off if I won the toss. The advantage is there. The only way you don't get the ball is if the other teams gets into the endzone, which you have to believe won't happen. So when you get the ball, you know what you need to do.

Still, I could predict how these games will generally go. We all know how conservative coaches tend to be towards the end of games, So when the first team gets into FG rangem they'll go into their shell and kick. Then the other team will generally answer the same way. Now they've gotten into sudden death where the first team will again march and kick another FG. Ooooh, excitement! All these media members will be watching with their jaws open when they realize that what's happened now it that rather than one FG winning in overtime, it's become that you need two. This is going to take a lot of excitement out of the overtimes.

Peace

Insanity

It's that time of year again. When, for two weeks, everyone becomes a college basketball fan and expert. When NCAA coaches start petitioning for more temas to be allowed into their playoff system. The time of year when the number 65 annoys me like no other.

I hate the fact that there are 65 teams in the tournament. Everything the NCAA does is to appease the big schools. That's the reasom behind bowl games and that's the reason behind 65 teams. They can't have a football playoff because what if Boise State wins it? Where does that keace the big time schools. They reconcile that by deciding who plays whom for what title. Same idea with number 65.

If you don't know, college basketball has a tournament to decide it's champion. The winners of each conferance get in automatically and the rest of the field is filled out by the NCAA. For smaller schools to get into the tournament, they're only chance is to win their conferance. Bigger schools just need to be competetive and they'll be selected.

Now, a 65 team tournament doesn't work. So two of the weakest teams play each other to get into the main bracket. The problem with this is that the two teams playing the play in game are always small schools that won their conference titles. These teams that are told that if they win their conference titles they'd get in suddenly have to win another gane to get in. They play each other while another big school that couldn't win it's conference title gets to go in one of the two smaller school's stead. That just doesn't seem fair. These schools just were euphoric because they won their conference and would get a shot to be on national TV with the big schools, but suddenly they need to win another game.

Now, which ever school gets in has almost no shot to win a single game in the tournament, but that's not the point. They get natioal exposire. Their players who've no chance to make the NBA get to live out some form of their dreams. I remember a couple of years ago SUNY Albany made it in and went up against UConn, a one seed. For about 2/3 of the game, Albany stuck with UConn. Going shot for shot. Taking a few leads. Eventually, UConn was too much for them, but for that hour that school was as hyped as it'll ever be. For the rest of their lives those kids could the story of the time they hung with a number one seed in the NCAA tournament. That's what you're robbing one of these schools of. Tomorrow night Winthrop plays Arkansas-Pine Bluff on ESPN. I reccomend you watch it.

Now the NCAA says that those teams were in the tournament and, technically, that's true. But who are you fooling? Really. Noone cares about the play in game. It isn't even on CBS where all the other games are. The NCAA should make two bubble teams play in that game, but then you're not adding an extra bubble team.

A quick note on NFL free agency. Teams are really butchering their QB situations. Case abd pointL The Browns. They got rid of Derek Anderson and Brady Quinn and replaced them with Seneca Wallace and Jake Dellhomme. Not an upgrade there. The Browns must be thinking of taking a QB early in the draft, otherwise I've no idea what they're doing. What was the rush to get rid of Quinn anyway? He's played 14 games in his career. 14. Not even an entire season. He's thrown 10 TDs and 9 INTs. Not the worst I've ever seen. Last year, in 10 games, Quinn threw 8 TDs and 7 picks. Dellhomme, in 11 games, went 8 and 18. In Quinn's last five game, he went 7 and 2. I call that imrpovement. So why give up on him so fast? Instead, why not give him some weapons. Why didn't they make the deal for Boldin? Harrisson, Crubbs, and Boldin QB'ed by Quinn seems like a good start at developing an offense for some time to come.

Peace

Talkin Badeball...

Let's face it, Major League Baseball isn't perfect. Every year, at least half the teams start the season with full knowledge that they have no shot at conpeting. Worse still, it's predominantly the same team annually. A salary cap has been brought up to even the playing field. That sounds reasonable, but it doesn't stop small market teams from having a minimal payroll. So I've come up with the perfect idra for repairing the competetive imbalance.

Oh, and I'm only half joking here.

Right now there's a soft salary cap. If temas surpass it they have to pay a luxury tax depending on how far over they are. This hasn't discouraged some teams from having a monstrous payroll. So to fix this I suggest we get rid of the luxury tax altogether. Instead, we lower the soft cap. I'm not sure exactly what it should be. We're going to have to discover where the line of demarcation should be.

Anyway, instead of a luxury tax, teams that go over the cap have to have their entire roster regularly submit to both urine and blood tests. Teams that are under don't have to submit to either. In fact, teams that are under the cap are subtelly encouraged to juice.

Look, HGH isn't known for having any terrible side effects. Definately not too worse than most of the medications that most people take anyway. Somewhere down the road HGH will be accepted more readily in the court of public opinion.

So what this does now is make teams with lower salaries a diserable destination for big time free agents. Teams with higher salaries would have to be smart with their money. Of course, there'll be some players who juice for a payday and get off once they sign the big deal. So the Yanks would have to their homework before signing.

Now the only other thing I'd throw in is that current contracts would be grandfathered in. So teams with high salaries wouldn't be tested right away. Only when a contract is altered, extended, or renogtiated would they start being tested.

I don't know, I think this could work.

Peace

Read This Post If You're Against Stabbing Babies.

Facebook groups fascinate me. I read the name of every one joined by my friends. Some of them are funny, and those I'll join. Some, on the other hand, were created by some loser who couldn't come up with anything clever but wanted to have a group with a lot of members so he could feel accepted so he uses some cheap tactic to get people to join. It'll always have a title like "Let's See How many People form New Jersey are on FB!" or "I Bet There Are Over 100,000 Yankee Fans on FB". There's also, my personal favorite, "If You Fear Allah, Join This Group". Really? That's what I should do if I fear God? Join your Facebook group? Funny, I always thought that I should do something crazy like maybe pray. Hey now that I know that all I have to do is join your group, it's all good!

I think it all started with that one group started by that guy who's girlfriend would marry him or a girl would go out with him if he could get like a hundred thousand people to join his group. That was succesful and people saw that they could simple try to get people to join their groups without having any real hook.

I was thinking about athletes who are known for choking today, when my mind went to an athlete who literally choked... his coach. Was it just because I was only around 11 or 12 around that time or was not a big enough deal made of Spreewell? I mean, he choked his coach! He physically assaulted his immediate superior, and was back in the NBA the next year. He got the same punishment that Arenas and Crittenon got for jokingly threatning each other. Then Spree was dealt to the Knicks and went on with his career as if nothing had happened. How crazy is that? If an office employee even verbally abused his supervisor he'd be fired immediately. No way would he be suspended for the rest of the fiscal year and then transferred to a more successful branch. I mean Owens didn't choke Andy Reid nor did Keyshawn to Gruden. And those guys were benched. Spree just thought he wasn't being used right and he choked his coach.

Then, of course, there's the Knicks. Sigh. What can you say? They dealt away a Knick hero, a fan favorite who, admittedly was at the tail end of his career, for a guy who choked his previous coach. That's where the Knicks started going downhill. They became increasingly short sighted. They did go the finals a couple of years after with Spree, but that was the worst thing that could've happened. The Knicks were rewarded for their short sightedness. They went into a "We'll just take on overpaid players from other teams who seemingly are still good and therefore will never have to rebuild" mode. That's when the Knicks made the trade that sent the team into a decade long funk. A decade long run well over the cap, a situation they are just now recovering from. I speak of course to the Patrick Ewing trade. Rather than just let Ewing's contract just expire at the end of the year, they traded him for a boatload of terrible contracts. They then tried to recover from that trade by making the same types of trades for the next 10 years (Marbury, Penny, JJames, Curry, Francis plus many more."

Well, the Knicks are finally out of that, but on that Ewing deal. As much as I love football and baseball, until the 8th grade the NBA was IT for me. The Giants were terrible more often than not throughout my childhood and I started watching baseball in 96 so I took the Yanks for granted. I loved the Knicks. I remember watching a Knicks-Pacers playoff game with my dad. By the way, I'm not trying to pull a Bill Simmons here. Knicks were down by three with under fifteen second left. My dad tells me the game's over and is openly wondering why I'm still watching. When LJ hit the four point play I erupted, even my dad was impressed. I remember Houston's shot against Miami. That shot that Made Gus Johnson who he is today in my mind. I'll never forget his call "Down the lane... running one handerrrrrrrrrr.... OFF THE FRONT RIM AND IN WITH EIGHT TENTHS OF A SECOND TO GO!!!" I think that's verbatum. I should look it up.

Anyway, before I started rambling what I'd meant to say was as much as the Knicks were IT for me growing up, I loved, I mean LOVED, Patrick Ewing.I mean how many kids, before they've started growing, wanted to grow up to be an NBA center? Kids want to be guards or, at the most, small forwards. I wanted to be a center. I'd play basketball with my back to the hoop. Couldn't hit a fade away, but would try at least five every game. I was so much into being a center that even today my game, such as it is, is more suited for being a center. I'm the shortest guy out there, but still I live in the paint trying to get rebounds and posting up. That's how much I loved Ewing. When the whole Gold Club thing happened, I barely understood it but was still upset by the sole fact that it was obviously something negative happening to Pat. I loved the guy so much that it still bothers me when people don't put him at the level that I think he should be at. I know, I probably overrate him. I can't help it. You never love a player the way you did when you were a kid. I was always flabbergasted by the treatment Ewing got from Knick fans toward the end of his career. I admit, had I been older then I might have been acting the same way.

So you could see why I was so crushed when the Knicks traded him away. I know it sounds melodramatic, but I never felt the same towards the Knicks after that. They betrayed me. They sent my hero to Seattle for freaking Glen Rice. I didn't understand the whole cap part of it. All I knew was that Ewing was gone and Glen Rice and Shandon Anderson were Knicks.

What's the point of all this? I don't know. I planned to just write about Spreewell and was reminded about the Ewing trade. I guess this could serve for any non Knick fans to excuse me for being giddy at the fact that the Knicks have a chance at greatness again. So forgive me if I'm overbearing if the Knicks land a big free agent or tow, and forgive me if I'mm too much to handle if the Knicks ever win it all. See, I'm not sure I ever thought the Giants would win the Super Bowl in my lifetime, I never really thought about. I mean REALLY thought about it. But the Knicks, the Knicks I was sure would win. And they didn't All that expectation, all that excitement, wasted. So yeah, a Knicks title would be an unbelievable sports experience for me. But it won't be what it should be because in the back of my mind I'll always remember that they dealt my hero.

Sorry, I just went over this and saw how carried away I got. I'll try to not let it happen again.

Peace.