Princeton-Monmouth, Men's Hoops

I just laughed because when I typed the headline, I wrote "Men's Hops" instead of "Men's Hoops." Unfortunately for Princeton hoops fans, the Tigers didn't show a lot of "hop" in Sunday's 59-50 loss at Monmouth, losing their tenth in a row, which ties a school record. Monmouth, in beating the Tigers, snapped a 7-game losing streak. The game really wasn't as close as the score indicated.

I'll defer to Jon Solomon's excellent "Princeton Basketball Blog" for the full recap, but I was there and have the following observations:

1. The kids at Monmouth clearly don't play for the glory of DI hoops that say the kids at Carolina do. The Monmouth gym is intimate, but my guess is that some high schools around the country put more money into their facilities than the Hawks do theirs. The plus side: the fans are really close to the action, and that was fun.

2. Why do they keep some of these gyms in the northeastern U.S. so warm, especially given that it's wintertime? Thankfully, the Monmouth fans were very hospitable, and no one looked twice at my kids' Princeton attire (a few years ago on a North Jersey beach I wore my Philadelphia Eagles' hat and was met with laser-like stares).

3. At Princeton, they give away about a dozen or so t-shirts during the game -- the cheerleaders throw them into the crowd. At Monmouth, they tossed in precisely 2.

4. Before the game, a Monmouth official approached the son of a former Princeton baseball and football standout to handle the shooting contest at halftime. Little did they know that a precious three or so years ago he helped lead his HS to the small-school state title game in Michigan (losing to Chris Webber's and Shane Battier's alma mater). In any event, the now-college junior made the layup easily, hit the foul shot on the third try, the three on his first, and then airballed a few half-court shots before (i) banking one that hit off the front of the rim and (ii) having one go in-and-out right at (or slightly after) the buzzer. Good job! The gift certificate will come in handy.

5. Okay, now for the serious stuff. First, I didn't understand Princeton's offense in the first half. Monmouth used a man-to-man defense for almost the entire first half, and I counted about four Princeton picks the entire half. The Tigers whipped the ball around the perimeter and then didn't shoot the outside shot particular well. They tried to hit an occasional cutter (usually center Zach Finley), but they didn't succeed much. Senior co-captains Kyle Koncz and Noah Savage have shown over the years they can shoot the three, but they had trouble getting open (Koncz did hit three treys in the game and had 14 points). The Tigers' best move was getting the ball inside to soph center Zach Finely, who has a fine back-to-the-basket move going to his left. He needs to work on the left hook a bit (and make it more of a "money" shot for him than it is now), but he is strong enough to get in position to take the shot. I did wonder why a sneaky quick Monmouth guard (and they had about 3 of them, and sometimes they played four guards at once) didn't drop down and try to poke the ball away when Finley did this move for what seemed to be the umpteenth time in the second half. Finley didn't show that he could go to his right, and he'll need to develop that ability, or else I fear a guard will drop down and make life tougher when he puts it on the floor. Especially in Ivy play.

6. The Tiger guards did not look particularly good, and there doesn't seem to be a consistent three-point shooter among them. They'll need that outside shooting to come from somewhere in order to free up both Finley and junior insider player Michael Strittmatter (who showed signs of having a pretty fluid game). Otherwise, opposing defenses will sag on them.

7. On the positive side, the Tigers tied the Hawks in rebounds and won the battle on the offensive glass 12-6. On the negative side, Monmouth was quicker, seemed to play with more energy and, yes, I'll say this here and risk the brickbats, the Monmouth kids seemed to want it more, or at least more enough to win the game (the battles on the glass notwithstanding, the Tigers looked more flat-footed on loose balls and the guards looked at sea at times). The final was 59-50, the Tigers got it within 6 early in the second half, but at one time Monmouth had the lead up to 17 and the Tigers really weren't in the ball game for most of the second half.

8. The Tigers don't seem to have a player who can, on a consistent basis, take over the game and make things happen. Scott Greenman was the last Tiger player who showed signs of that ability, but at that time Penn had guys named Zoller and Jaaber were much better at taking over a game for archrival Penn than Greenman was for the Tigers. Zach Finley shows signs of being able to do that from the low post, but he's not there yet. I liked what I saw of him though, despite the silly comments made by ESPN's Sean McDonough that dissed Finley during the Princeton-Duke game earlier in the year because Finley was all-state in South Dakota, prompting McDonough to remark that there are only 5 basketball players in that state. I know McDonough is well-respected, but that was a bit much (even if Princeton stunk out the joint for the first 15 minutes of the contest). Finley can play.

9. Sydney Johnson shows John Thompson-like patience on the sidelines. He doesn't yell, doesn't get into the face of his players, isn't overly annoying to the officials and seems positive and encouraging. The Tigers need plenty of patience from their coaching staff, and the Tiger faithful need to hope that Messrs. Johnson, Newsome, Earl and Greenman can recruit a squad that can summon the memories of the last Ivy team to win an NCAA basketball game -- more than ten years ago.

10. Times are tough for fans of Princeton's men's basketball team, but there not so easy in University City, either. While the Penn frosh look promising, Penn is a very young team that has had its ups and downs (and there have been many downs) this season. Two nights ago, the Quakers lost to Florida Gulf Coast, 60-30, scoring only 6 points in the first half while shooting 5.9% for the half and turning the ball over 23 times in the first half (the Quakers shot 19% for the game and had 35 turnovers). This is not Florida or Florida State we're talking about, but Florida Gulf Coast, a team that upped its record to 4-8 and is in its first year of DI play.

Yes, Ivy men's hoops fans from somewhere other than Philadelphia or Central New Jersey, there is a vacuum out there, there is a voice crying from the men's hoops trophy that's saying, "I'm available, take me, take the title, it's up for grabs." The question is, who will take the title. There's no question that the tough road to the automatic bid for the NCAA tournament runs through the two sets of back-to-back games against historic powers Penn and Princeton, but those games could prove to be more like speed bumps this year than the barricades they've proven to be over the past 35 years. Then again, it isn't as though the rest of the Ivies are tearing it up, either. Anything can happen -- and has happened, on back-to-back nights in the Ivies, and I suspect that it will be a fascinating League season this year.

All typos are mine, as always.

Have a very happy New Year!

My Votes in Chris Berman's/ESPN's Top 10 Highlights

ESPN asks us to vote for our Top 10 highlights of all time (from a list of 100 that they provide). The pool of 100 highlights contains some memorable moments, making it tough on the reader (viewer, really) to pick just 10 highlights. But select I did, and I think that 9 of my 10 will stand the test of time (with a 10th, which I will identify) being a concession to a hometown heroic of the type that has seldom been seen in the past quarter century.

Here goes (and I will do so chronologically):

1. Bobby Thomson's "Shot Heard Round the World" on October 3, 1951, giving the New York Giants a playoff win against their archrival Brooklyn Dodgers and a spot in the World Series. Russ Hodges' memorable "The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant!" are forever etched into the sports memory banks of two generations -- the one that lived through the moment, and their children, to whom the story was repeated constantly. Drama at its finest.

2. Franco Harris's "Immaculate Reception" on December 23, 1972. The running back's controversial catch gave the Steelers a playoff victory against the 800-pound gorilla Oakland Raiders and helped start the Steel Curtain on its way to Mount Olympus status as an NFL dynasty (the others: the Packers of the 60's, the 49ers of the 80's and the Patriots now. Sorry Cowboys of the early 1990's -- you were outstanding, but perhaps not in the league of those elites). The catch itself was amazing theater.

3. Carlton Fisk Wills His Long Fly Ball to be Fair and a Home Run to give the Red Sox the win in Game 6 of the 1975 World Series on October 21, 1975. This was the walk-off home run to end all walk-off home runs. Set in Fenway Park amidst one of the greatest World Series ever, what more could a fan ask for? A true benchmark of great sports moments.

4. Dr. J. goes up and under the backboard to finish a baseline move on May 11, 1980. Yes, this is my homer pick, and it wasn't as much of a statement to me as his "cradle the baby" windmill dunk over Michael Cooper in the 1983 NBA Finals, but in a certain sense (with apologies to the likes of Earl "The Pearl" Monroe"), Dr. J showed us the future of athleticism and acrobatics in the NBA, and, well, it was just one awesome move from a great player. Yes, it's an outlier here, but I actually couldn't think of a great tenth pick on my list, so I reverted to the hometown hero.

5. Dwight Clark hauls in Joe Montana's TD Pass late in the fourth quarter against Dallas to win the NFC championship game on January 10, 1982. A dynasty begins, as this was the finishing test for the coming out party of a decade-old doormat, the San Francisco 49ers, en route to becoming a dynasty and fundamentally changing the game with the West Coast Offense. The Cowboys were the institution in the NFC, a force to be reckoned with year-in and year-out, and the 49ers broke through in a harbinger of things to come. Finally, someone was standing up to the Cowboys.

6. Lorenzo Charles' dunk earns NC State NCAA men's hoops championship on April 4, 1983. I remember watching this game with great curiosity, figuring that N.C. State would have little chance against Houston's very talented Phi Slamma Jamma squad (Hakeem Olajuwon, Larry Micheaux, Clyde Drexler, Rob Williams and Michael Young -- four would be first-round NBA draft picks). So did the rest of the country, but no one told that to Jim Valvano and his N.C. State Wolfpack. Houston's Guy Lewis stopped pushing the tempo, and N.C. State had the ball with the game tied and time running out. Guard Derrick Wittenberg took a long shot (there were no 3's then) and it was an airball. Out of nowhere, Charles grabbed the ball and dunked it as time expired, giving N.C. State the victory. Not only was this a great play, but we all remember Valvano's dashing around the court afterwards looking for someone to hug. This game put Valvano on the map, and before his untimely death, he charmed the nation.

7. Doug Flutie's Hail Mary versus Miami on November 23, 1984. Why was this amazing? Because it was a high-scoring game, and few gave BC any chance as time was running out. So what did this talented QB do? He worked another miracle, threw the ball as far as he could, where it landed in the outstretched arms of his favorite receiver, Gerard Phelan, and bedlam ensured. Flutie's BC Eagles were a great team to watch, and Flutie's grit showed the country (again) that the size of the fight in the dog trumped the size of the dog in the fight. A great ending for a deserving QB.

8. Christian Laettner's shot beats Kentucky to win NCAA Eastern Regional Final on March 28, 1992. I gave up tickets to that game to go on what proved to be a key date with the woman who would become my wife, and I remember walking out of the two semifinals thinking that Duke would wax Kentucky because Duke looked much better in the semifinal game. Kentucky played a great game, and it took a court-length pass from Grant Hill to Laettner, who hit a jumper as time ran out from the top of the key to give Duke the game (Duke was trailing by 1 at the time). Many refer to this as the greatest college basketball game ever played, and it was awesome.

9. Former team manager Jason McElwain scores 20 in a high school game on February 16, 2006. McElwain, who was autistic, gets put in a game near the end of the season. The coach did it as a reward to his loyalty, to his work ethic, and all McElwain does is rain down three after three. The homemade video is a real treat, especially when his teammates carry him off the court at the end of the game. This video underscores what sports are about -- effort, selflessness, teamwork and positive attitude. It's "Rocky" and "Hoosiers" all wrapped up in one.

10. Boise State's Statue of Liberty Play beats Oklahoma on January 1, 2007. This play got my vote for several reasons. First, few gave Boise State a chance to win this game, as it was a battle of a non-BCS conference team against a big bad wolf from a very tough BCS conference. Second, the play itself was a beauty, taking "old-time" football and shoving it right into the Sooners' (and the BCS Conferences and the silliness of those who are the BCS) collective grilles in front of an entire nation. Boise State made a great statement in that game -- namely, that the games are won on the field, and that on a given day, the school no one heard of can play its best and bloody the behemoths. That game proved to be a harbinger for a wild 2008 season, when the asthmatics and nerds of Division 1 (and, relatively speaking, 1-AA), beat up on the favorites every chance they got.

Those are my top 10. What are yours?

Check out the list. It's a lot of fun.

76ers-Lakers Last Night

The family went to see the 76ers-Lakers game last night at the Wachovia Center, and I have the following observations.

1. Mo Cheeks can coach. He doesn't have many players, but he coached some outstanding offensive sets.

2. The 76ers have 2 main problems. First, they don't have enough guys who should be starters in the league. Second, they have absolutely NO inside game on offense.

3. The 76ers' dancers should have had poles out there on the floor for some of the outfits that they wore. Talk about a mixed message on the issue of family entertainment. It was A Shot of Love with Tila Tequila meets Red Auerbach. Just horrible.

4. The Lakers' bench is bad. Luke Walton (who starts) looks overmatched out there, but there's no challenger for his spot among the reserves. The other four Lakers' starters were excellent. Lamar Odom is hard to guard, Andrew Bynum showed flashes of greatness on offense (and scored over 20 points), Kobe had a good if not great night, and Derek Fisher was very clutch in the second half.

5. The 76ers should not ink Andre Iguodala to a max contract after this season. The reason: he can't take over a game night after night the way the previous AI, warts and all, could. Andre Miller drove the offense early, taking advantage of Fisher, but Iguodala disappears for periods during a game, and your megastar shouldn't do that. Someone else might be desperate enough to give Iguodala the max, but the 76ers shouldn't be afraid if that were to happen. They'd be better off, having made mistakes with Samuel Dalembert, among others.

6. GM Ed Stefanski should trade Andre Miller to the Heat before the deadline in exchange for Jason Williams, whose contract will expire after this season. Then he should make a serious run at Gilbert Arenas, assuming that Number 0's knee is in good shape. And he should find some low-post offensive players while he's at it.

7. Great tribute to the 1982-1983 Sixers at halftime. Dr. J and Clint Richardson (the third guard and a great defender) were on hand, and Dr. J is as elegant as ever. He gave a nice speech, and was most warmly received by the crowd. Quite frankly, the place should have been cheering out of its minds, but it wasn't packed, and many of the fans there were so young that they probably hardly remember him. Still, it was a nice tribute, and there were some flashbacks to his great plays during that season (including the cradle-the-baby dunk over Michael Cooper in the finals against the Lakers) and to Dave Zinkoff's public address calls, which were legendary. Great stuff for a great team, and it was fun to see Mo Cheeks as a younger man and clutch player.

8. Whoever the public address announcer is, they should can him. He can hardly hold a candle to the legendary Zinkoff, and why should the NBA create an atmosphere that resembles a mediocre MTV reality show? Where's the maturity, the dignity?

It was a fun atmosphere and a very good game. Mo Cheeks gets as much out of the talent he has as he can, but it's a team that won't win more than 40% of its games and will be in the lottery once again. The problem will be that if they keep on playing feisty b-ball, they'll end up at the bottom of the lottery and get another Thaddeus Young or Rodney Carney, when they need a Greg Oden or Kevin Durrant. That's a fundamental problem in the NBA -- that a team can stay below average if not awful -- for a long period of time. The entertainment value only goes so far.

What the fans really want are winners.

And, as Dr. J pointed out, it's been 25 years since Philadelphia has had a championship in a major sport.

And the way the 76ers and Flyers are playing in that building now, we can say "and counting."

Weasels, Wimps and Scoundrels

Those words describe the owners of Major League Baseball teams, the alleged journalists who covered the teams during the steroids era and the ballplayers themselves, and, particularly, the leadership of the players' union (which opted to protect the malefactors at the expense of the good citizens among the players).

The owners got dumb, fat and happy during the steroids era, particuarly after the labor-relations debacle of 1994, which culminated in the cancellation of a season and a World Series. So, enter the personally inflated Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire into the fray, capturing America's hearts with a drug-induced (and perhaps drug-addled) home run love fest. The owners loved the attention that their teams got, particularly at the gate, despite the fact that the players looked on the average significantly bigger than they had a decade and a half earlier (where most looked like relative stick figures or the average European man of today who lives in a city where, unlike the U.S., walking is not only encouraged but necessary). In scientific terms, while species evolve, they don't usually do so markedly in a period of a decade or two at most. Yet, despite the obvious evidence (i.e, visual evidence -- think East German female swimmers during the cold war) and the whispers, the owners hid beyond shouts of "hearsay" and took the tactic of accusing the few brave souls who waxed skeptical as typical cynics who were envious of someone else's success (if, even, you could have found those souls).

Great tactic, because once it wears out you simply have succeeded only in doubling the enmity that arose because of the suspicions instead of extinguishing it.

I've excoriated the national media before on posts (and am too relaxed right now to link to prior posts on the topic, but if you Google "SportsProf steroids" or "SportsProf steroids media" you'll probably find those posts). Put simply, those guys are glorified fans, not journalists, because any self-respecting journalist would have smelled a story and at least told his editors and urged his newspaper to get their investigative reporting team on the matter and draw attention to the issue. But they didn't do it. Why? Because they love being around the game, love having a special relationship with a player who might give them more access than the next guy, and they didn't want to lose that. Write what they saw? Take a stand and ask hard questions? That's what journalists are supposed to do. These guys -- and I include Gammons, Verducci, Kurkjian, Stark and Olney -- did not do that at all.

What makes matters worse is something I heard Tim Kurkjian say on ESPN radio last week, when the talk focused for a short time on Hall of Fame voting. Kurkjian said that he knew fellow voters who would not vote for anyone implicated in the steroid controversy. He didn't agree with this position, because he (and host Mike Greenberg) offered that given how widespread the scandal might ultimately prove to be, then perhaps you couldn't vote for anyone. Kurkjian, if my memory serves me correctly, then said he spoke with a writer about a few players who weren't implicated but who in the inside circles of baseball were widely suspected of using performance-enhancing drugs and wondered aloud whether that writer would vote for those players (whose names weren't mentioned in the Mitchell report). That comment irked me and should have irked any true baseball fan, who should reasonably rely on these top writers to break a story (or to have broken it years ago). Why did guys like Kurkjian sit on the sidelines and not cover those players' alleged use if the knowledge of it was "so widespread?" That's baffling, and now they're taking ludicrous positions about Hall of Fame balloting when they blew their coverage in the first place. You can say one thing about these so-called baseball journalists -- they really broke this story. Literally.

As for the players' union, well, there's a proverb out there that says "you don't always win by being right all the time." And, to a great degree, this union has won most of its arguments since its inception. But where they erred tactically is by closing ranks at all costs and harming the overall good name of players generally. If I'm a union member I have to question whether Don Fehr and Gene Orza remain fit to lead my union, especially if I believe that a majority of the players did not use performance-enhancing drugs. Because if that's the case, then why did the silent majority let a minority of players drag all players' collective reputations into the gutter? And why did Fehr and Orza lead them down such a slippery path? Then again, if there is silence and the leadership doesn't change, then perhaps the usage was much more pervasive than anyone thought? Half? Two thirds? Three quarters? It's one thing to support one another, but to contribute to a culture of damaging a great game without any regard for the welfare of all players is just wrong.

The Mitchell report is what it is. The interesting thing about it now is that certain players and former players have admitted to using either human growth hormone or steroids at various intervals in their careers. Those admissions give the overall report some credence, but the issue of Roger Clemens looms. Will he sue the Lords of Baseball to clear his name? That trial would compelling viewing, because the evidence posed about Clemens just doesn't seem to be very strong, at least at the moment. There's a catch for Clemens and others, however. Senator Mitchell had no power to compel people to come forward to testify. Should Clemens sue, both sides will have broad discovery powers to compel witnesses to testify under oath about what they know. So while Clemens can shield himself at the present time behind arguments about flaws in the Mitchell Report, what could come out under discovery in a lawsuit could be much more damning. Given the public beating Clemens has taken already, how much more does he have to lose by bringing that lawsuit?

Think O.J .trial with more sophisticated media coverage. Court TV execs should be salivating, because it might just happen.

And that trial could blow the whole roof off.

As for baseball overall, a few things need to happen. First, better urine tests for performance enhancing substances (including HGH) and, second, blood tests as well. The union should roll on this issue before Congress passes laws about this, and given how well Congress has done lately a negotiation with the owners should be much more preferable. Two, let history be the judge of what happened, don't suspend anyone for past sins, and let the Hall of Fame voters decide the fate of those with puffy numbers. And, while they're at it, they should give extra consideration to the skinny Fred McGriff, the onetime great Blue Jays' and Braves' 1B who had a great career and who at times was dissed as not being powerful enough for his position.

Probably because the only "Cream" he had in his arsenal was an occasional cream soda on a road trip. He'd get my vote.

Baseball needs to move on, but the writers themselves deserve their periodic descents into Hades during Hall of Fame balloting for their blown coverage on the entire subject. The owners will get away with it because, well, they make up the rules (unless we all vote with our feet), and the players will also, to a degree, because you can't play the game without them.

Except for one thing -- they know who did what, and they have to live with it.

And that can't be a comfortable feeling.

When Team Matters the Most

Read this and see what I mean.

Late in the Dallas-Philadelphia game, with the Eagles leading 10-6 and the Cowboys without any timeouts, Brian Westbrook broke through the Dallas line and was headed for a touchdown. Instead, he put on the brakes and went down at the one-yard line. The advice came from OT Jon Runyan, but Westbrook, a running back trained to go for the goal no matter what, was smart enough to heed it. The result was that the Eagles ran out the clock and won the game.

How many OTs would have thought about that? How many RBs would have taken the advice?

Not many.

In the age of glitz, what happened yesterday was special.

The Eagles' last 3 losses were by a total of 10 points. They've fared well in Dallas in recent years, played the best game that any opponent has against New England and beat Dallas yesterday. For those Eagles' fans who despair, they aren't that many players away from being a contender.

Yes, they have to be the right players. Game-breaking receivers, of course, are at the top of the list and have been for some time. Also, certainty is needed at the QB position.

Thankfully for Eagles fans, they have smarts at OT and great ability and brains at running back.

Sometimes you win by doing the smart thing, and the smart thing isn't always obvious.

The Eagles did just that yesterday, getting a good win on the road in an otherwise frustrating season.

SportsProf's Endorsement for President

This shouldn't come as a surprise.

This guy's got what it takes, if he only can win a local race.

The Risks of Getting a Good Quarterback in the NFL

Great stuff last night on WIP Sports Radio in Philadelphia from host Glenn Macnow, who had an intern evaluate quarterbacks taken in the top 3 rounds over the past 10 years.

I didn't have a chance to take notes, but the numbers look like this:

45 were taken in the top 3 rounds.

About 5 are bona fide stars.

About 10 are good players.

The rest are either so-so are busts.

The odds:

You have an 11% chance to get a potential Pro Bowler, a 22% chance to get an above-average to good QB, and a 2/3 chance to get a QB who at some point will be mired in a QB controversy.

Which might explain why the Philadelphia Eagles gave Donovan McNabb a vote of confidence yesterday and proclaimed that he's their QB of the future. A.J. Feeley proved last weekend with his four picks that he's only a back-up (and perhaps in a more tenuous position than he was in two weeks ago after the noble effort against the Pats, where he threw three picks), and Kevin Kolb is a second-round pick with promise but certainly no sure thing. When healthy (and, yes, McNabb has had serious injuries over the past four years), McNabb is a proven winner. Sure, he hasn't won a Super Bowl, but how many QBs who are currently playing have? Not many.

Mike and Mike were unprepared on ESPN Radio this morning, allowing for the McNabb to Chicago talk after Rex Grossman went down with a bad knee injury last night. Sure, it makes sense to some degree, McNabb going back to play in his hometown, but the guess here is that for that to happen the Bears would have to trade more very good draft picks to get McNabb than they're willing to.

Good QBs are at a premium. Some QBs are given too many chances (Joey Harrington), some get them too early (Alex Smith) or without good protection for years (David Carr), and some have to wait patiently because they went to Eastern Illinois and the football gods don't think you can play in the NFL unless you played superlatively against superior competition in college (hello, Tony Romo). Others linger until the sixth round and benefit from an injury to the top-pick franchise QB (Tom Brady), while one or two come out with great expectations (the Manning brothers, McNabb). But for every Peyton Manning there's more than one Ryan Leaf, and for every Donovan McNabb there's a Tim Couch and an Akili Smith.

The verdict: if you have a good QB, find ways to keep him healthy and don't let him go. To paraphrase Captain Reynaud in "Casablanca": "you shouldn't let quarterbacks with good records go, they might become scarce."

Indeed.

Radio Silence on Ivy Hoops

Some of you have e-mailed as to my whereabouts on the Ivy hoops scene.

There are a few reasons for this.

First, the blogosphere covers the Ivies well (sometimes for a fee).

Second, Penn and Princeton both are having down years. Evansville undressed the Tigers by over 20 points the other night, and Penn is playing mostly underclassmen.

The time is ripe for another Ivy to take the prize, but, to do so, they'll still have two weekends' worth of Penn and Princeton.

And that's never easy.

Michigan Spurned Again

First, Les Miles.


Second, Greg Schiano.


The first one makes sense.


The second one does not.


Why is Schiano staying in Northern New Jersey?


Only one theory comes to mind: he's waiting for Joe Paterno to retire at Penn State.

Any others?

Name Your Headline -- Philadelphia 76ers Style

I had 3 choices for this post:

The King is Dead

Is Ed Snider Next to Go?

Eddie the Reluctant Takes Over

The news: the 76ers have fired formerly teflon-coated GM Billy King and replaced him with Penn grad (and former guard) Ed Stefanski, currently the GM of the Nets.

As for the first headline, all 76ers fans (and former ones) were waiting for this to happen. The 76ers haven't made much noise in quite a while, owing to some bad signings, bad draftings, bad drama ("Practice? We're talkin' about practice!") and inability to recognize that there is talent across the ocean that could help the team. For some reason, despite significant coaching turnover, Billy King kept his job -- for 10 years. Yes, the 76ers did challenge for the NBA title many years ago, but that was much more Larry Brown's doing. Once Brown cut the tether and left town, King was exposed. Unfortunately, he didn't pan out, although the 76ers waited too long to draw their conclusion. Attendance is bad, the team is 5-12, and they won't be very good for a while.

As for the second headline, well, the Flyers have turned the corner this year after several years of being skated around and by. The 76ers, though, have been dismal, and the Flyers haven't been preeminent. I still marvel that Comcast continues to let Ed Snider run the show. It seems like he's living in the 70's when it comes to sports, and there have to be more talented executives out there to manage over the situation. Sorry, Comcast, but it doesn't seem you're holding a Philadelphia icon as accountable as you should.

As for the third headline, Stefanski was a guard on some great Penn teams in the 1970's, but he seemingly past up open looks when he got the ball. That caused Big Five play-by-play commentator Big Al Meltzer to call him "Eddie the Reluctant." His CV since his playing days has been impressive, and he seems to be over the "reluctant" phase. You have to be if you're a GM in the NBA, although I do wonder why the Nets have let him go to a division rival mid-season. What's that all about? Rod Thorn's decision does raise questions -- although I'm not sure whether about the Nets or the 76ers.

At any rate, while you hate to see people lose jobs, you need to see improvement. Hopefully a new GM will cause the 76ers to view the pro world through a different lens and make better player personnel decision.

Broad Street Bullies, Y2K Version

The NHL has made sure that the Philadelphia Flyers got the memo this time.


The Broad Street Bullies have minored in headhunting this season, and Commish Gary Bettman and discipline honcho Colin Campbell have connected the dots, whether or not there is a team theme here or people have acted rashly and independently. The message: we're watching you, and if you continue to headhunt, we're going to force some of your boys to watch games for a very long time.


I recall the hip teacher at my high school. She was attractive, she knew it, she was popular, and she kept on getting into car accidents and getting hurt, to the tune of four accidents in two years. I remember discussing her automobile issues with my father, who offered the following sage advice: "Son, if you get into one crash, it could well be an accident. If you get into four in two years, you have a driving problem."

The NHL office has diagnosed the driving problem, and the Flyers are now in traffic school. If some continue to transgress, they'll lose their licenses or go to jail, or some combination of both.

Now that they've gotten the memo, hopefully they'll be smart enough to read it.

Do People Really Do This?

A recent blurb in ESPN the Magazine caught my attention, this time about how college football and basketball players get harrassed and threatened by opposing fans. There were several laments from players about needs to change cell phone numbers, about getting threatened both on the telephone and at games, and the whole thing was shocking.


Why do people do this sort of thing? Don't they have lives, family members, day jobs, things to keep them interested and busy, or are their lives so narrow that they'll have a bad year and abuse their families and pets if their favorite college football team doesn't run the table ?

Do you care that much that you harangue the opposing players, who are just kids? Do you go out of your way to bother them and their families?

These are, after all, games. They're supposed to bring out the best in our competitive spirit and sportsmanship.

Even if you're a fan at a rival school. Even if you think that the other school plays dirty or cheats at recruiting. Write letters to newspapers, put up funny banners, come up with creative cheers, and exercise all of your First Amendment rights -- within reason.

But harrassing people personally is out of bounds. I don't live in an area where college football is taken as seriously as in other places, so perhaps I don't understand the passion of fans where the major conferences play. Fine. But I don't think I will ever understand what motivates people to do this sort of stuff.

Has the Fall of the House of Krzyzewski Begun?

ESPN The Magazine suggests as much.

I'm sure that Jon Pessah's article hasn't set well inside Cameron Indoor Stadium or among Duke hoops fanatics, but the writer makes some compelling points. Among them:

1. Is Coach K overextended?
2. Has the college game passed Coach K by?

Read the whole thing and decide for yourself. The Duke student newspaper has lamented the decline in recent Final Four appearances, and recruiting has gotten tougher. The commercial endeavors of Coach K are substantial, and he's also employing three family members at Duke Basketball, Inc. In addition, the article suggests that the well-respected coach took a powder when not commenting publicly on the Duke lacrosse scandal at the time it took place.

Such is the nature of being one of the most successful people in your trade, ever. That's not to say, however, that some of the questions or comments are unwarranted or are not thought-provoking. Conversely, Jay Bilas (a former Duke player) was quick to point out on a recent ESPN telecast that Coack K seemed reenergized as a result of his experience coaching the U.S. National Team. The coach learned much from his assistant coaches and paired his Duke assistants with those assistants. The result: if you've seen Duke play this year, they're playing with more energy and pressing the action more than in the recent past.

It's hard to sustain the type of excellence that Coach K has brought to Duke forever. It's hard to have the hunger of a rising DI coach once you've appeared in umpteen Final Fours and won several national titles. You have to continue to create new challenges for yourself within your day job in addition to outside of it (where Coach K is more than well covered, and I submit that instead of his having an embarrassment of riches some of those riches are embarrassing). What are those challenges?

There's no doubt that Coach K has done a lot for Duke and is an institution there. The question is whether, with very limited access for non-hoop program people to Cameron, his lucrative contract and his outside endorsements, he has become bigger than the institution -- in his own mind. That type of thinking led to Bob Knight's ugly parting with Indiana and has led to Joe Paterno's tortured, extended tenure with Penn State. Hopefully, at the right time, he'll know when to call it a career.

There's something about knowing when to retire and leave on top. I'm not saying that Coach K needs to retire or that the game has passed him by. Neither. He's an outstanding coach with an excellent team this year. What I am saying that even Coach K cannot coach forever. The real question is when the challenges will no longer be compelling enough for him to continue to do what he's done so well for so long.

And ESPN the Magazine has begun the Coach K watch in earnest.

The Washington Wizards

My seven year-old and I attended the Washington Wizards game last Wednesday night at the Verizon Center, a very pleasant 10-minute walk from our hotel in downtown DC. Everyone who worked at the arena couldn't have been more helpful or nice (we bought tickets over the internet that afternoon), and my son was happy to let me purchase him a Gilbert Arenas t-shirt as a trip gift. The game proved to be fun, as Arenas showed why he'll command huge bucks on the free agent market next year. Caron Butler is hard to stop, Brandon Haywood works hard in the low blocks for the Wizards, and Darius Songalia is a terrific sixth man. In contrast, Jermaine O'Neal looked lost out there, Jamaal Tinsley disappeared, and Marquis Daniels was the best player on the floor for the Pacers. Center Jeff Foster can rebound but has little to show on offense, and Mike Dunleavy, Jr. looks overmatched. The Pacers rallied near the end, but the game really wasn't close.

The arena was about half-empty, and many of the fans in the good seats arrived in the second quarter. The Verizon Center is downtown and on DC's great Metro, so it's easy to get to, but the ticket prices are steep. There also seems to be too much glitz and too many sideshows, from the skimpily clad dancers to a spotlight on a huge leather couch behind one basket (I think it's the Bud Light Living Room) to DJ-like folks going up in the stands with all sorts of contests during play stoppages). All this stuff is gimmickry, belies a few fundamental problems that the NBA has.

First, there are too many teams. Of the ten starters on both teams, only about half really should be starters -- Arenas, Butler, Antawn Jamison, O'Neal, Tinsley. Too many teams, too much dilution in talent, and that yields a so-so product.

Second, way too many games. Too many games dilutes the importance of an individual game, which means it's hard to get too excited about this particular game in the fall.

Third, way too high ticket prices. You need to be rich to afford a season ticket for two good seats, as many go for over $100 per game. Do the math, and your realize that the potential to sell season tickets is limited, and perhaps very limited. The more something costs, the fewer buyers there are out there, and this is a luxury good. Take a lesson from the politicians -- it's better to play to an overcrowded venue, where you'll look like you're in demand, than in a half-empty one, where it looks like no one cares. Drop the number of teams and games and you'll improve quality to the point where you might even be able to keep ticket prices where they are. and more people will show up -- they will pay for quality, they always do.

Fourth, get rid of the gimmickry. It takes away dignity from a sport that used to have a ton of it. Bill Russell's Celtics, Magic's Lakers, Larry Bird's Celtics and Tim Duncan's Spurs didn't and don't, respectively, need all of this glitz. If the product is good enough, you don't need the distractions.

Basketball is a great game, and we saw some great basketball at times on Wednesday night. But it was lamentable seeing a half-empty building and the glitz that accompanies the game. Perhaps when the NBA focuses on its core -- which should be basketball and not entertainment -- is when it will make a true breakthrough.

Remember the Hornets

Delaware and Delaware State will meet for the first time ever in the NCAA Division I-A football playoffs.

That's curious in and of itself. Now, this isn't like Kansas and Kansas State or Oklahoma and Oklahoma State, exactly, as Delaware State is an historically African-American college. Read into it what you will.

The good news is that they're playing now, and the game is the talk of the state.

It's about time.

Stupidity in Mississippi

Read this and see what I mean.

So, 20 players get caught stealing items from hotels and get "probation," whatever the heck that means down at Ole Miss. No suspensions, no missed games and, yes, no leadership from the adults about consequences, apparently.

Because beating Mississippi State is more important than building character.

The headline for this article was "Punishment's a Crime." Apparently down in certain corners of the Southeastern Conference, it most certainly is.

NFL Cedes Super Bowl to the Patriots

Well, not exactly, but since everyone else has, what's the point of playing the game? And why not cede the title to the Patriots so long as Bill Belichick holds the head coaching job? Isn't that what everyone is saying?


That said, what if there's a freak play in the next several weeks, a clean play, but one where an offensive lineman is pushed backwards on a pass rush, falls down and right into one of Tom Brady's knees, causing a season-ending injury. What then? Are they that good that Matt Cassel can lead them to a Super Bowl victory? And will they feel silly if Brady gets hurt when the team is up 35 points?


The football gods are funny, aren't they? Just when you think you can put you team on cruise control you lose in OT to the Jets on the road and virtually let their sad-sack pass rush double their season's sack total -- in one game. A star runnnig back who just set the single-game rushing record hurts his knee. These things happen.


Even in New England.

Why Did Notre Dame Fire Ty Willingham?

or, why did they hire Charlie Weis? And then give him a new 10-year deal 7 games into his first season?

Well, no one is happy with the Irish's 2-9 start, especially coming off two great recruiting years. So what's Weis going to do? He's going to review his problems with his former colleagues at the New England Patriots.

He's got to do something. Funny, but I don't sense the feeding frenzy over Weis's problems that I sensed over the last season Ty Willingham coached in South Bend. Why is that?

And how long will Notre Dame let these problems continue, contract or no contract?

And the Reason We Don't Have a D-IA Playoff Is?

Look at the polls and tell me why.

It seems like every week we have a slew of upsets, meaning that an 85-scholarship limit per school has helped achieve parity in Division I-A. Without a meaningful playoff system, we could have the teams that lost the earliest in the season play for the national title, whether or not they're the best teams. Is that right? Fair? The more these teams beat up on one another, the more likely we'll have a huge controversy.

ESPN's Game Day Will Be at Williams College This Weekend

This is no joke. The ESPN crew wanted to hold game day at a big "little" rivalry, so Chris, Lee and Kirk will be in Williamstown, Massachusetts this Saturday for the Williams-Amherst rivalry.

It's about time they got their priorities straight!

Why are the New York Giants Better This Year?

I was listening on my drive to pick up lunch to WFAN, and I heard the Giants' O-lineman Shaun O'Hara being interviewed. The Giants are 6-2, playing well, have a defense that is very strong after a rough couple of weeks at the season's outset and have a more confident Eli Manning.

I have two main theories:

1. The defense needed an attitude adjustment and face lift after last season, and they got it with Steve Spagnuolo, their new defensive coordinator who learned from the master, Jim Johnson, in Philadelphia. Spagnuolo implemented an aggressive scheme, and, after some adjustment, the Giants' defense has been awesome.

2. The absence of Tiki Barber and the relative silence of the Giants after Antonio Pierce's unfortunate ruckus earlier in the season. No players are creating media controversies or saying anything silly about teammates to the press. Tiki seemed to talk way too much and then out of school in the recent past, and my guess is that most Giants are very happy that the Hollywood-oriented Barber is gone. Sure, some might have worried that they'd miss his presence on the field (but his replacements are doing quite nicely and the offensive line is playing well), but I doubt they thought they'd miss him in the locker room. Also, and very importantly, I think that Tiki's personality -- intentionally or unintentionally, but it doesn't matter -- eclipsed Eli Manning's and blocked the QB from asserting his role as a primary leader of the offense. With Tiki gone, there is no overwhelming presence in the locker room on the offensive side of the ball, or (given that Jeremy Shockey can be controversial), a presence that eclipse's the quarterback's authority. That absence has to have enabled Eli Manning to relax more and play better.

The big issue for the Giants now is to sustain their momentum for the rest of the season. They've had great starts before and faded badly late in the season. I think that this season will be different, but the Giants will have to prove it to themselves and their fans.

Maybe the State of Washington Has the Right Idea

And, if it does, then it should be celebrating ideas over celebrity and entertainment that sometimes doubles as a sport. Read this and see what I mean.

NBA Commissioner David Stern is becoming dyspeptic in his advanced tenure at the helm of this once venerable league. Who in their right mind would trade Seattle for Oklahoma City except if you're an Oklahoma City native, which is what the Sonics' owner is? But why should the league want to be in the middle of Oklahoma anyway? True, OK City helped the NBA immeasurably when the Hornets moved there after Katrina, the fans were terrific, and, yes, I have cousins there. But so what? There's no really comparing the two.

Unless your the commissioner of a league with a so-so product who seems to be missing the point that legislatures have to deal with many more pressing problems than a home for a group of men playing a kids' game in short pants. What about aging populations and the huge burden that they'll put on public employees' pension funds and entitlement programs? Compared to those issues, who can really think about an arena?

Seriously, I'd rather be known for my good public schools and libraries, community involvement and participatory recreation than building a palace for a league that has way too many teams and that has let quality control go out the window.

Somehow I don't think Seattle residents will miss the Sonics terribly if they leave, and perhaps it's time for municipalities and state governments to take stands like this. Sorry, Mr. Commissioner, but before you pop off next time, improve the overall quality of your product.

Should Sports Be Treated the Same as the Arts on College Campuses?

Being a little slow on the uptake, I just discovered the joy of podcasts, and I downloaded a bunch of them on my iPod for a cross country trip. My wife told me that she heard Frank Deford on NPR discussing this very question and quoting the proponent of this thought, Princeton's Athletic Director, Gary Walters. I decided to check out the podcast and have some thoughts on it.

Deford was eloquent in his dissection of the issue, and I suggest that you listen to the podcast and form your own point of view. My view is that the arts deserve a bigger break and higher status because of the greater struggles involved in pursuing them at most universities. Sports can be a big business at many schools, and at some there are more assistant football coaches than there are assistant deans of students, let alone art and music instructors. That's not to say that sports don't have a place, they do, but the arts typically don't draw the staggering alumni support, financial resources and, okay, sometimes less-than-deserving (from an academic point of view) "student-athletes" than the arts. Read Michael Lewis's book "The Blind Side" and his brief indictment of Ole Miss football players to see what I'm talking about.

There are exceptions everywhere, of course, but even the Ivies and the DIII liberal arts colleges around the country can fall victim to putting a disproportionate amount of funds to athletics. Why? Because alums like sports, and if alums played the sport, they're sometimes prone to donate money to the teams that they played for. And there's nothing wrong with that. But the dedication to winning, even to see Williams try to perenially whomp Amherst, seems to be greater than to have Amherst's version of the Whiffenpoofs (I think they're called Zumbays, but I can't be sure) sing on a national stage. It seems to me that most schools spend considerably less money on their orchestras and theatre programs than they do their football and basketball teams. And lest you contend marching bands are part of the arts, at DI schools they are part of the football pageantry and in the Ivies they're a sometimes decent inside joke, but they don't form a part of the arts culture on campus. The true art form of marching bands is at the traditionally black colleges, where the marching band is a form of art (and perhaps harder to join than it is to make the football team).

But I've digressed too far. Are the arts more attractive because excelling in them is less common, is more subjective, and isn't subject to a conversation of winning and losing? Are those who play sports disdained because glory on the field or in the arena is more easily given to athletes than it is to writers on the school newspaper or ballet dancers on campus? Is it unfair that one can major in journalism or music or sculpting but not in football or basketball, and is there a difference as to why you can major in one and not the other? All are good and compelling questions worthy of discussion.

Walters is more and less likely to win his argument at a place like Princeton. He's less likely because, well, you don't go to an Ivy League school to emphasize a sport. You go for the education and to become well rounded. Yet, the debate on campus on the topic is likely to be more lively, as the Ivies are more likely to intellectualize a curveball (a Yale prof once wrote a book on the physics of baseball) and discuss the group dynamics of a successful basketball team (as has been done at Penn) than, say, an SEC school that is much more interested in beating its in-conference opponent and making sure its athletic dorms are conference standard than say sponsoring a conservatory. Still, at a place like Princeton, Walters has an uphill fight. It also doesn't help him that the two marquis sports programs -- men's basketball and football -- are at relatively low ebbs right now. If those sports are an art right now, they're the type of art that you buy by the yard and see at auctions and flea markets. Sorry to be harsh, but the great thing about sports is that the records don't lie.

In contrast, the argument is probably a winner at the BCS conference schools. Sports are not only accorded as much respect as the arts, they're accorded more. After all, Boone Pickens gave about a quarter billion to his alma mater, Oklahoma State, for athletics. Not for batik, baroque music or a mime company. Pick an SEC school or a Big 10 school (perhaps other than Vanderbilt and Northwestern) and you'll get more of the same. Sports are huge, so if Walters wants a better environment for his beloved sports programs, he should take a shot at being an Athletic Director at a "big-time" school.

Finally, I think that Walters has the question backwards or even wrong. At some schools the question should be "why aren't the arts accorded as much respect as sports?" Worse, at others, the question should be, "why aren't academics accorded as much respect as athletics?" Sadly, there are many schools where this could be the case.

His question, in short, is a luxury for most institutions, where the reality doesn't provide the facts to legtimize the basis for asking the question.

Caveat Emptor

for those teams eyeing Marlins' third baseman Miguel Cabrera.

Yes, the man can hit, but he weighed in at about 250 this year, showing signs of Mo Vaughn disease.

He's too young to be that heavy, and you have to believe it won't help his game in the long run. Whoever trades for Cabrera will have to give up a lot, and I've read that the Dodgers are looking hard at him, and they have prospects to trade. Given the Dodgers' depth of young players, going for Cabrera might be worth a shot.

Just don't let him have any access to the "all you can eat" seats.

What Should the Cleveland Browns Do?

They have a budding star in QB Derek Anderson, and they invested a lot of money in Brady Quinn.

A few years ago, the Bengals drafted Carson Palmer in the first round and kept him on the bench while Jon Kitna started for a year. Kitna played well, but the Bengals let him go to make room for Palmer. Kitna has gone on and played well in Detroit, but all would agree that he's no Carson Palmer. Palmer was a transcendant QB in college and labeled a "can't miss" pro. He hasn't disappointed.

Fast forward to the other Ohio city where they play pro football. Anderson looks to be better than Kitna (and Kitna is the starting QB for a 6-2 team, so I might be going a little bit out on a limb here), but Quinn didn't ultimately land as a "can't miss" pro. True, he went into the draft as a "can't miss" pro, but then he fell to the end of the first round. Questions abounded about how good he really is and whether he was simply a product of a great offensive coach in Charlie Weis. The guess here is that the questions have redoubled now that Weis's honeymoon in South Bend is over and questions have been raised about how good he is as a head coach (and not to go off on a tangent, but I wonder what facial expressions Tyrone Willingham displays when he hears that Notre Dame has lost yet another game).

The Browns have invested a lot of money in Quinn, and they'll have to make a decision on Anderson. Do you go with the guy who has made the plays all year on a team that is exciting, or do you go with the guy who was your first-round draft pick and in whom you've invested a lot of money and some cap room?

There are lots of old-time sayings that come to mind, but it says here that if Phil Savage is wise, he signs Anderson to a long-term deal and moves Quinn to a team that is looking for a long-term answer at quarterback. He has to be careful, though, because when Atlanta did that 15+ years ago, they traded a second-year player out of Southern Mississippi to the Packers for a high draft pick, and that kid turned out to be Brett Favre. I am not a cap expert, but it strikes me that Quinn's sinking in the first round cost him a lot of money, saved the Browns money and makes him a more attractive acquisition for a team looking for an answer at QB.

It says here that the Browns will find takers for Quinn if they opt to go that route. They have a hard decision, but they have a good thing going and should remember that, Brady Quinn or no Brady Quinn.

Update on Phillies' Pitching Plans

Apparently I was incorrect and misread many published reports of the Phillies' intentions to keep Brett Myers as their closer. Read this and learn that Myers will move back into the starting rotation. He was, after all, the Phillies' opening day starter last season and has the distinction of throwing the first and last pitch of the team's season (the last one being the one that clinched the NL East title).

There's a big debate about what to do with outstanding young arms. For example, two seasons ago, when closer Jason Isringhausen went down, the Cardinals moved Adam Wainwright into the closer's role with great results. But Wainwright's stuff was so compelling (witness his curveball to Carlos Beltran that froze the Mets' centerfielder for the last out in the NLCS) that they moved him back into the rotation this past season. That said, the Red Sox don't appear to move Jonathan Papelbon out of the closer's role, and it doesn't appear that the Yankees will move Joba Chamberlain out of the setup role (and he projects as the heir apparent to Mariano Rivera). Both hurlers have outstanding arms and were projected as starters, but they have great value in relief.

Myers has great stuff. His makeup has been iffy, and he hasn't proven to be a stopper although he has stopper's stuff. If you pair him with Cole Hamels and pitch them back-to-back, you'll have the savvy lefty with the great changeup and the flamethrowing righty with an outstanding curveball. That's a pretty tempting combination and should fortify the Phillies' rotation, which is a point of great concern for the ball club.

Now the rotation looks like this:

Cole Hamels
Brett Myers
Kyle Kendrick
Jamie Moyer
Adam Eaton.

The problem is that Kendrick is probably a #4 starter, Moyer is old and if he's not on the lines he gets lit, and Eaton was the worst starter in the NL last year and has an iffy shoulder. I don't think that the Phillies are done here, and I look for them to make one more move for a starter. I don't expect them to re-sign Kyle Lohse, who could be this year's Gil Meche and command much more money than he'll prove to be worth (as well as a contract that will be too long). It could be that they re-up with Jon Lieber on a one-year deal with a club option, and don't rule out their bringing back Randy Wolf, whose days with the Dodgers might be over. They would have loved to acquire Curt Schilling for a last hurrah, but Schilling did the smart thing by re-signing with the Red Sox and opting to end his career in a town where he's a legend.

The gamble for the Phillies is that a) Lidge's psyche is better and that he can prove he can close again, b) that Myers can be consistent as a starter and c) that Michael Bourn doesn't turn into the next Lou Brock (and, correspondingly, that Lidge doesn't turn into Ernie Broglio). Geary and Bruntlett are a wash, the former a so-so middle reliever who doesn't walk people that often but who has average stuff, and the latter is the utility man the Phillies need now that Abraham Nunez is gone.

I still think they need to buttress their outfield and third base, because Wes Helms showed little last year and Greg Dobbs is a journeyman who had one good year. Chris Roberson is not a fourth outfielder, and you really could use five good outfielders. The problem is that the Phillies' farm system looks as though Oklahoma dust storms that John Steinbeck made famous have hit it, so they have little to trade. Still, Pat Gillick is not "Standing Pat", and he made a great statement by pulling off the first major deal of the post-season.

A Farewell to Outfielders or a Stupid Ed Wade Trick?

Reports are that the Phillies traded outfielder Michael Bourn, long reliever Geoff Geary and minor leaguer Mike Costanzo for former Astros' closer Brad Lidge and utility infielder Eric Bruntlett. Read this report from Espn.com to see for yourself.

Here are a few things to consider:

1. The Phillies are short on outfielders. By all accounts, they aren't going to re-sign centerfielder Aaron Rowand, who had a career year in a walk year. By giving up Bourn, they have resigned themselves to a starting outfielder of stiff-legged Pat Burrell in left (he's not the best leftfielder, but he's far better than the Cards' Chris Duncan, who looks like a middle-aged former professional wrestler out there -- and a loyal reader wonders that with all the Phillies' fan groups, why hasn't "Pat Burrell's Fat Girls" taken root?), Shane Victorino in center and Jayson Werth in right. Decent fielding and light hitting Chris Roberson is the only backup. This isn't an outfield that is going to scare most teams. Does Pat Gillick have another deal or free agent signing up his sleeve?

2. The Phillies will be getting some erudite players. Lidge went to Notre Dame, Bruntlett to Stanford. The issues, though, are whether Lidge ever will be able to regain his old form and whether Bruntlett can play consistently.

3. Lidge will be a setup man, at least based upon recently published reports quoting Pat Gillick that Brett Myers is the closer, period, as no good will come out of moving him back and forth from starting to closing. That said, what will happen to Flash Gordon? He clearly would be an upgrade over the iffy Geary as a middle reliever. Bruntlett apparently will replace Abraham Nunez as the utility infielder. It does remain hard to believe, however, that Gillick really is satisfied going into the 2008 season with the platoon of Wes Helms and Greg Dobbs at third base. They and Nunez combined to give the Phils' the worst OBP of any third baseman or third base platoon in the majors.

4. What is Ed Wade thinking? He's really trading for Bourn, who showed great promise under the tutelage of Phils' first-base coach Davey Lopes as a base stealer. If Bourn hits (and he did in 2007), he can be a good leadoff hitter and tablesetter in Houston. Geary won't give the Astros much. He has average stuff, and if he doesn't pitch to the right spots he'll get hit, and hard.

Let's watch to see who'll be getting the better of the deal -- the Phillies' GM or second-to-last GM?

Required Reading

Jim Dent wrote The Junction Boys, a wonderful book about Bear Bryant's first season at Texas A&M and the training camp of attrition that Bryant held in Junction, Texas to see who was tough enough to play for him (the camp proved to be so tough that the Aggies had little left for the regular season). Dent did a great job with that book; ESPN dishonored it by having a bunch of no-name Aussie actors who couldn't get the Texas accents right in the telemovie that was yet another ESPN made-for-TV flop.

Dent outdid himself with his latest effort, entitled Twelve Mighty Orphans, about the Mighty Mites of the Masonic Home in Fort Worth, Texas in the 1930's and early 1940's, who, despite the size of their school and their players, competed for the Texas state championship in football every year. Fielding teams that averaged about 145 pounds per player and that had rosters of as few as 12, Coach Rusty Russell's "Mighty Mites" became the darlings of Texas and even that nation the way Seabiscuit did during that same era. (Russell himself was an amazing story, surviving a mustard gas attack during World War I that robbed him of much of his sight.)

This is just one great read. The circumstances that brought many of the kids to the orphanage were dire, and the boys at the orphanage were survivors, plain and simple. A few were to make it all the way to the NFL, and the play of one inspired a future Hall of Famer, Ronnie Lott, to become the most feared hitter of his era. Football aside, it's a story of an innovative and compassionate coach who could have forsaken the Masonic Home year after year, electing to return.

How did he win? Oh, by implementing an offense that today is known as the "spread" offense. Rusty Russell was an innovator, a coach way before his time, and he had to figure out ways to beat teams that outweighed his Mighty Mites and had much more depth.

Read this book or buy it and give it to a friend or family member for the holidays. If you're a coach, give it to your captains or your upperclassmen.

I Hope the Boston Celtics Lose Every Game. . .

because, well, I'm a 76ers fan.

Now, before you say that I'm rooting for the worst team in the league (don't I know it), my deep-seated passion stems from growing a fan of Wilt Chamberlain, Hal Greer, Luke Jackson, Wali Jones, Chet Walker, Billy Cunningham and later Doctor J, Andrew Toney, Bobby Jones, Mo Cheeks and Moses Malone.

Fiercer rivalries you just don't see anymore, with the possible exception of the Yankees and the Red Sox.

The arenas were smoke-filled, the fans sat very close to the players (forget the sushi-serving luxury boxes), and there weren't that many games on TV.

Yes, they're strutting their stuff up in Boston with Garnett, Allen and Pierce.

And that's all well and good.

But I'm sure I am not alone (and that Knicks fans will join me) when I say that, well, I hope they lose every single game.

I know that these sentiments will surprise most of you, but there are just certain things that are deeply rooted from childhood that are difficult to overcome.

And the newly constructed Boston Celtics are one of them (and perhaps the only).

Brady or Manning?

In the sikids.com fantasy football league, you get a salary cap and can re-pick your team each week, so long as you stay within the cap. This week, with New England playing at Indy, do you dare activate either Tom Brady or Peyton Manning, or do you step aside and go with Matt Hasselbeck against the Browns defense in Cleveland and Carson Palmer against the Bills?


It's an interesting question. We're challenging for the title, and it could be that the Pats and Colts end up in a shootout. It also could be that their defenses, which are both good, take over and the game ends up being a 14-10 affair.


And it's more likely that Seattle, coming off a bye week, and Cincinnati, with its air attack, could light up the skies this weekend.


What would you do?

Speaking of Buying a Wii

Why is it that all retail establishments are sold out and are inarticulate on the subject of when they'll get them again? I went to a local Best Buy today to get one in anticipation of the holidays, and the sales people fumphered about telling me they didn't have them without any explanation, and a checkout kid told me that they don't know how many they'll get in, when they'll get in, but check on Tuesdays or Thursdays because sometimes they'll get 10 in at once. As if, though, I have time to camp out at my local Best Buy the way kids do at Duke for basketball tickets. As if not.

How does this market work? I can find Wii's on E-bay for about $100-$200 over the retail price (which is $249.99) and I can find them on Amazon through companies that you've never heard of for about $150.00 over the retail price. Is it that people are going into the big retailers, buying them there and then marking them up at their own companies? Is it something worse than that? Why is it so hard to get these products at one of your local retailers or on-line at Target, Best Buy, Circuit City or Wal-Mart?

What are your thoughts? What should I do?

Is Boras Boorish?

Read this and you might think so.

Buster Olney reports that Team A-Rod told the Yankees before L'Affaire Opt-Out (brought to you at the heart of Game 7 of the World Series) that A-Rod told the Yankees that he wasn't going to talk with them unless they presented him with a package worth $350 million.

What does A-Rod want to do with all that money, buy the International League? How about a Wii from a retail establishment?

Heck, he probably could buy the International League and the American Association, and maybe even a few National Hockey League teams to boot.

Now, before you pin the tail on Scott Boras, and, yes, that's a fun thing to do, remember this: it takes two to tango, or, in this case, ask for a ransom from the empire that King George built in New York. Boras might be very aggressive, and his announcement tactics during the World Series summon all kinds of unprintables, but he wouldn't have done any of this if it were against the wishes of his client. And what his client did spoke volumes -- A-Rod basically said, "Hey, it's about being the 'It' baseball player. Championships? Who's talking about championships? It's all about me."

Yes, he will put people in the seats, and, yes, he could help you win a championship. A-Rod isn't an awful guy, and you haven't heard that he's bad in the clubhouse. He hasn't excelled in the post-season, and he'll command so much money that all but the super-wealthy or daring teams cannot afford him. By asking for as much money as he is, he's sending a mixed message. First, he's saying, "I'm worth all that," and it's arguable that he should be the most highly paid position player and, ergo, the most highly paid player. But how highly? Second, he's saying that it's his team's problem about making the economics work to bring home a contending team -- and not his. Third, (okay, there's at least a third), he might be saying that he doesn't care if he plays on a contender ever again, because he could well end up in San Francisco, which is years away from contending. Compare him to Tim Duncan and the San Antonio Spurs, and, well, if you're a baseball purist you might fall ill.

Blame Boras? Aggressive people attract aggressive agents, dignified people hire dignified ones, that's the way the world works. Boras certainly doesn't help baseball's image, but in the long-term we won't remember him. We'll remember A-Rod, and A-Rod might want to think about the legacy that he's leaving, other than that as the most highly paid player ever.

Don't think, though, that all players are united in their views of A-Rod. Many will support his quest for the biggest contract possible, because that contract will up the average and bring in more money for them. As for what might go on in his clubhouse, true, there will be guys who will resent a gap between his contract and everyone else's. But they're the same guys who might bristle if others were to question their free agent deal after having a good (and perhaps the player's only good) season in a walk year. What's the difference between a relatively anonymous lefty set-up man who had a good three months for a contending team and gets a four-year $20 million deal and A-Rod, outside of the pure dollars? Both might be overpaid, but the market sets what they'll get, and they will have ended up in the right place at the right time. Most players realize that.

The A-Rod watch goes on.

Way Too Little

The NFL has pledged a fund of $10 million to help retired players deal with their medical issues.

That amounts to $312,500 per team.

And that has many former players, Mike Ditka among them, bristling that the funding is just a gesture.

They are being diplomatic. It's just way too low.

Pro football has become the national pastime (while my kids love baseball, they were ticked that they couldn't stay up to watch any World Series games, a problem which the Lords of Baseball don't seem to care one iota about). We glorify it, we rearrange our weekends around it, and we enjoy watching it (I don't do the first two -- life's too short to spend a full fall day watching others exercise). But what does it say about us when we treat former players like they're an old computer or a ten year-old sofa? We can throw those goods on the scrap heap, and some special trash hauler will come take them away. We can't do the same with former players -- they're people. Yet, the NFL has done so figuratively, by providing band-aid solutions to situations that need major surgery.

Ex-players have all sorts of medical issues that stem from playing a violent game for decades. The stories are too numerous to tell here (but you can read about them here and here), but given all of the money that football generates, the owners should put a lot more money into three phases, as follows:

1. Research and development on the best equipment that can help prevent long-term injuries. There are all sorts of possibilities, and they should exploit the game's popularity to get some great minds working in these areas. The teams should commit a $100 million fund for this effort (roughly $3 million per team).

2. Medical monitoring of former players to determine the long-term effects of the game and then medical research that can help treat traumatic injuries for the long-term.

3. Money. Fund a large fund (and I'm talking an evergreen $320 million minimum or $10 million per team) to run as a Medicare/Social Security fund for these players. It isn't fair to ask the former players to do it, as they aren't baseball players and haven't enjoyed the financial successes that members of the Major League Baseball Players Association (who don't have these long-term health issues) have. The owners have the valuable franchises, and the owners should care about the long-term health prospects of those who bring glory to their teams and their cities. What does it say about them if they don't?

The owners should help our their former players to make sure they can live dignified lives, why, because these players gave their all for the owners. Sure, they're not making money for them now, but they're part of the rich tapestry that is their NFL franchise, part of the foundation of the team, children in an extended family. True, some players made good money (and, my guess is that some didn't manage it well), but the health and life issues we're talking about are staggering -- Alzheimer's, serious neurological and orthopedical problems, etc. The average player from this collision sport needs more help.

And more than a total of $17 million can possibly provide.

Attention All Basketball Coaches

I've now learned that only man-to-man defense will be permitted in the second-grade basketball league. I'm all in favor of man-to-man, and I think it's great to teach kids to learn how to play proper defense.

Now, if you have any ideas for drills or plays for this group (other than having a quick kid dribble by everyone), please let me know. I have some ideas of my own, but it would be great if you could share your knowledge with me.

Thanks.

I Joined the Starbury Movement -- Will You?

I remember some cruel scenes, even when I was growing up, of kids being mocked because they got their sneakers from some bin at a five-and-dime store as opposed to Pro Keds, Converse or whatever brand was hot at the moment. I didn't care what people wore and was taught that it didn't matter, but unfortunately there were kids who were either too dumb to know better or who just simply weren't nice. Some of the kids in my neighborhood referred to the non-designer sneakers as "bo-bos", and as far as they were concerned you shouldn't have been caught dead in them. I know that I didn't participate in making fun of those wearing non-designer sneakers, and I recall telling them that it was wrong. My guess is that as an elementary schooler I didn't do it loud enough or soon enough, and I felt bad about the whole situation.

Fast forward by several decades, and the situation got exacerbated when Michael Jordan teamed with Nike to create unbelievably expense sneakers. Parents in all neighborhoods felt pressured to keep up and drop a lot of coin for sneakers, and it became a vicious cycle because kids grow fast and need new kicks all the time. It was hi "cha-ching" time for Nike and Jordan, but the societal good that resulted was non-existent, except for some fund managers who rode a Nike wave (or swoosh) every now and then.

And who wants to pay $40 or more for a pair of sneakers that will last six months? Especially if you have a couple of kids, and especially if you don't make a lot of money. Sure, you don't want your kids to wear Shawshank Prison-style footwear, but you also don't need to be like Mike.

Or Nike.

And that's where Stephon Marbury comes in. He worked with the retailer Steve & Barry to create Starburys, some funky sneakers that are sold exclusively at the retailer -- for $14.98 a pair! That's right, in case you can't read my decimal point -- fourteen dollars and ninety-eight cents a pair! We bought 4 pairs -- high tops for the kids for their basketball leagues (my daughter's have pink trim, my son's are all-white), high-tops for me (with Carolina blue trim, quite stylish) and some everyday low-tops for my son (they have some of the Knicks' blue and orange in them). They look good, feel great, and I saved a bunch of dollars by not going to Foot Locker or somewhere else.

Again, in case you missed it -- 4 pairs of sneakers for $60. As opposed to, say, $140.

Stephon Marbury and Steve & Barry's are an oasis of sanity in an otherwise commercial desert as far as affordable sneakers are concerned. They look good and feel great, so join the movement!

Now!

You'll be glad you did.

Ebbets Flannels

For a while I've received the catalog of Ebbets Flannels, a maker of vintage jerseys (minor leagues and Negro leagues). Over the summer, I indulged and bought a Homestead Grays home jersey (Josh Gibson's number on it) and a New York Knights t-shirt.

I wore the latter a lot this summer, including to a few Phillies' games at Citizens Bank Park (the shirt is blue with orange lettering and has the golden lightning bolt on the left sleeve). The shirt drew a bunch of nods from discerning fans, and it was fun to wear. I wore the Grays' jersey to my local mall on Saturday, and I drew hardly a look. Then again, a majority of the crowd consisted of teenagers, and some of them don't know about Jackie Robinson let alone Josh Gibson or Satchel Paige. Heck, you wonder if they've even heard of Franklin Roosevelt or know of the significance of D-day.

The stuff is of great quality, and you should check it out. If you want a vintage Major League jersey, go to the Mitchell & Ness website. I gave a vintage Mickey Mantle jersey as a gift to a friend over the summer, and it went over very well.

I'm not normally one to spend on stuff like this, but every now and then you have to say what the heck and go for it. I'm glad I bought my Grays' jersey -- and for a whole host of reasons.

Chess Question

The kids periodically ask me for electronic gadgets, such as iPods, and I'd be inclined to honor their requests if and when they improve on their bedmaking and putting-clothes-in-the-hamper rituals. My thinking is that if they leave clothes on the floor, what would they do with their iPods? And, if they did the same with their iPods, what would happen to them?

If you step on clothes, they might get a little dirtier. If you step on an iPod, you can't put it in the washing machine and fix it. Make sense? Okay, so it's my house.

I've taught the kids chess, figuring it's a game that will make them think and solve problems. They like it, and now I've given them an extra challenge -- beat Dad, and I'll buy you an iPod. Nano, Nano with video, what have you. Dad will play you on demand, and Dad will not teach you any pointers during a game. (My thinking on this translates to sports -- I try not to correct a bad swing during a game; we'll wait until practice to do so). I've even ordered a chess-for-kids book on Amazon to give them something to learn from, and I'll work with them after we play, but I will not help them win.

Right now, they know how to move the pieces, but they don't know anything about strategy. They somewhat embrace the concept that you have to attack while defending (golf is somewhat similar -- you have to pound the ball hard to get it close to the hole but be delicate enough to putt it in after having mustered your adrenaline to send it flying). Anyway, right now opening moves consist of moving pawns one space, say to king's bishop three. Not exactly the most robust of openings.

I have a fifth grader and a second grader. Neither is a math whiz (although having gone to school with some, I'm a little glad they're not), but both have a good sense of games.

What's the over and under? How long will it take both of them to beat me?

Sure, it depends on how hard they work at it, how much they play and how much they like the game. Assume they're in the middle of the continuum. They're not obsessed with it, but they don't hate it. Assume that they think it's a challenge and sometimes fun.

What do you think?

Who Remembers Manny Leaks?

The 1972-73 76ers won a total of 9 games the entire season. Their center was a guy named Manny Leaks, who played with NBA legend Calvin Murphy at Niagara. I think that Fred "Mad Dog" Carter, a talented guard, was on that team, but the rest of the squad was populated with players who wouldn't make today's fantasy league rosters, small forwards with no jumper, big guys who could be timed with an hour glass in their dashes down the court, one-time back-ups for good teams who disproved the notion that a back-up on a good team can be a good starter somewhere else, players like that. It was, to say the least, a depressing year in a hoops town.

Rock bottom.

Well, this week's SI predicts that the Philadelphia 76ers will be the worst team in the Eastern Conference. Mind you, I think that anyone who picks the Celtics as the best in the East or the favorite to get to the NBA Finals is just dead wrong, and it hurts as a Philadelphia fan to see the dreaded Celtics rise back to prominence, at least in the minds of the pundits who act as guardians of the pro game. What's more galling is that they do have the 76ers figured right -- they are a bad basketball team, a collection of swingmen, an injured post player who looks like he could be a Q-tip for Halloween, albeit with a gifted if aging point guard. There's not much muscle on the boards, and the collection of swingmen, all relatively young, offers some, but not much, hope for the future.

I pity Coach Mo Cheeks, who deserves much better. Whenever GM Billy King discovers that there are non-Americans who can play and help build a roster, it will be the first time. He's kind of on a parallel course with the Flyers, who only realized about 10 years too late that having good skaters on your team helps win hockey games and that having 6'5", 232-pound monuments does not. In King's case, he gets too much of a pass because he played for Coach K at Duke and communicates well with the press. The bottom line is that he hasn't helped the team win that many games.

Last year the 76ers were second-to-last in the NBA in attendance, and this year promises to be no better. And next year doesn't, either, unless and until the 76ers figure out a way to fortify a roster and make the team a serious playoff contender.

9-73 doesn't seem possible in a bloated NBA, but 23-59 does.

Ouch.

What Would Your Song Be?

Suppose you were a closer, and you could pick the song that they play at your home stadium when you enter the game from the bullpen. What song would you pick?



I don't know the title, but I'd pick the music from "Rocky" with the gongs that get sounded when the action begins to intensify. There are several gongs sounded in succession, followed by the type of "Rocky" movie music that let's you know the action is going to intensify. If you're a "Rocky" fan, I think you'll know what I'm talking about.



What would you do?

Terry Francona's a Good Manager

So says Jim Salisbury of The Philadelphia Inquirer.

Too bad that they just discovered this fact. Few realized at the time that when Francona managed in Philadelphia he was managing a AAAA team that had two stars and a bunch of guys people have already forgotten.

Francona seems a bit stung from his experience in Philadelphia, and he's quoted as saying that certain media types painted him in a negative light. He's right, they did, and really for no good reason. They got on Francona for his pitching changes, but it wasn't as if he had a bullpen that was competent at putting out fires. They got on him because he touted the wares of jacks-of-all-trades like Kevin Sefcik, but what was he supposed to do, moan in public? No, he made the best of what he was dealt, and, quite frankly, it wasn't much.

Phillies' fans shouldn't have a short memory about the disastrous decisions the current ownership group made. Francona was a well-received choice at the time, but he really didn't have a chance to win.

When he was given the talent, he showed what he could do.

And remember this -- if your team doesn't have or is unwilling to spend for talent, it will not win.

Even if Joe Torre is the manager.

Or Terry Francona.

Only Three NCAA Men's Hoops Teams Have Done This

This being scoring a 3-point basket in every game since the 3-point shot was enacted (a twenty-year stretch).

Click here and scroll down to near the end for the answer.

Fantasy Football with My Son

My second grader caught the fantasy football bug this summer, and, as a result, we entered into 2 leagues, one at espn.com and one at sikids.com. Both leagues are different, and we're faring much better in one than the other.

So let's go to the one where we're not faring so well -- espn.com. We entered a ten-team league, and this league has teams playing "against" one another every week. The computer automatically drafted for each team, and the computer program isn't nuanced -- it simply takes the best player on the the board. You activate a quarterback, two running backs, two wide receivers, a wide receiver or a running back in an extra slot, a tight end, a team (for defensive and special teams points) and a kicker. Which was all well and good, except the draft gave me 1 quarterback and about eight running backs, among them Brian Westbrook, Adrian Peterson and Edgerrin James. The sole QB was Chad Pennington (since released), and I had to scurry to build depth on the wide-receiving corps since 2 of my top wideouts were Javon Walker (injured) and Jerry Porter (in one of Dante's circles of football hell).

Anyway, we're now 3-4 in the league, despite the anomaly of having scored the second or third highest amount of points. The problem is that during certain weeks our team fared well, only to have the team we're matched up against in a "game" fare better. And it's not a case of our team having played bad defense; the other team's players simply had good weeks on offense, period. We've rallied well and hit the waiver wire aggressively, although we missed out on Derek Anderson, picked up Wes Welker but then let him go (to get Patrick Crayton). One was a bad non-move, the other a bad move. Still, we're in the hunt, and that's what matters. Working the waiver wire is pretty fun, although not every team is into the game as much as we and a few other are.

The SI Kids league is more fun and kid-friendly. Basically, you can cut your team each week and activate a new one. We're in a 100-team league, and we're in fourth place, as the Darwinism suggests that you make sure you have Tom Brady and Randy Moss on your team each and every week, and then you look for players who are playing teams with bad defenses. There's a salary cap here ($75 million), so you can't load up on all the big names, but Adrian Peterson costs a paltry $5.75 million or so when compared to the $11 million or so that Brian Westbrook commands. The key is watching the schedule and now seeing who plays St. Louis and Miami, among others. We're within striking distance of first place, and the most fun thing is that we do it together.

I do confess that I'm not a huge fantasy fan, but participating with my son is fun and we've learned the NFL a lot better than we otherwise would have had we not joined these leagues. Basketball, of course, is up next, and participating in an NBA Fantasy League is particularly a good thing if you're a Philadelphia 76ers fan, where the reality won't be too pretty this year.

But first thing's first -- we have a bunch of roster spots to fill because we have a lot of players who have a bye week this week.

What a College Football Season!

My Temple Owls are now the scourge of the MAC, having won three straight for the first time since 1990. Yes, that is not a typographical error -- 1990!

Somewhere, Bill Cosby is lighting up a cigar, and Joe Klecko is lifting up eighteen wheelers to celebrate.

Remember the name Al Golden -- he is working a miracle on North Broad Street.

My Family is Getting Booed!

Actually, this has nothing to do with our being Philadelphia Eagles fans.

We're heavily into Halloween in our Southeastern Pennsylvania neighborhood. During the past week, anonymous packages of candy have been left in goody bags on our front porch along with a flyer indicating that we got "booed" and should deliver copies of the flyer and candy to other people's front porches.

It's actually kind of cool and shows community spirit in a good way.

And I never thought I'd say that getting booed is fun.

On the Yankees' Managerial Change

Overall, I think that the Yankees erred in the way that they treated Joe Torre. He's a classy, dignified guy, and while $5 million is a lot of money to turn down, you simply don't treat a manager who led you to 12 straight playoff appearances and 4 World Series titles the way the Yankees did. Offering any manager with Torre's track record a one-year deal was dignity stripping, and the Yankees, who spend money the way Pac-Man Jones doles his out at a strip club, suddenly got awfully careful with their dollars when it came to their manager. Clearly, they really didn't want him to return, despite what Sons Steinbrenner have said publicly since the public relations fiasco of last week.


After all, Charlie Manuel, a manager who makes the late Casey Stengel look like a Shakesperean player and whose handling of pitchers won't be confused with that of Tony LaRussa, got a two-year deal in Philadelphia and he hasn't won anything. But the circumstances are somewhat distinguishable (and the expectations in the Cradle of Liberty are lower than they are 90 miles to the north) . Manuel did get the Phillies to their first playoff berth in fourteen years despite mentoring a team that suffered numerous injuries and fielded 28 pitchers during the season. Uncle Charlie, as he's now known, clearly deserved the new deal. He did a helluva job.


But is he Joe Torre?


And that leads to a whole bunch of questions. First, let's take a question that Colin Cowherd raised on his show on ESPN Radio. If you say that the ALDS loss wasn't Torre's fault (and his players were quick to rally to his defense), then can you give him credit for the four World Series titles? It's a good question, and it goes to the heart of how much difference a manager makes anyway. The answer, probably, is somewhere in between. Torre wouldn't have won any titles without the talent the Yankees paid for, but he did set a tone of professionalism and class that helped the Yankees ignore all of the NYC-induced pressures and led them to four world championships. Then again, remember an adage that Wall Street types are fond of turning to when the markets are red hot: "Don't confuse brains with a bull market." Put differently, years ago SI wrote an article on Whitey Herzog, the great Royals' manager, who opined that if you have a great manager with horsebleep talent or a horsebleep manager with great talent, he'd bet on the horsebleep manager every time. Bottom line: a manager makes some difference, but not to the degree that a head coach does in the NFL. It's hard, though, to calibrate that difference. Back to Cowherd's point -- Joe has some responsibility for the Yankees' not getting past the first round of the playoffs during the past three seasons. He can't be anointed with sainthood for the four titles and then not be held accountable for the "slide" that the Yankees have suffered during the past three seasons.


Fine, but it's more complicated than that, isn't it? The Yankees' pitching wasn't as strong during the past three seasons as it was when they won the four titles. So is that Joe's fault, or that of the front office, especially one that stops at nothing to acquire the talent that it thinks it needs. Still, in the end, there's another baseball adage -- it's easier to jettison the manager than a bunch of players, including pitchers who are past their prime or who were free-agent signing mistakes (such as Pavano, Igawa, etc.).


Then there's the question that unabashed Yankee hater Chris "Mad Dog" Russo posed on "Mike and the Mad Dog" on WFAN in New York (he is, by all accounts, an admirer of Joe Torre). Russo's position is that while it's all well and good to say that Joe hasn't done as good a job as in the past, who out there is better for this team at this point in time? It's a great point, because it's hard to know. Who wanted to follow Bear Bryant at Alabama or John Wooden at UCLA? After 25 years, it seems that 'bama finally has found a successor to Bryant (and this is written in jest because some fine men have filled that position, but to the fans they just weren't Coach Bryant). Can that new manager succeed?


Again, it's probably up to the manager, the front office and the players. Will the front office fortify the roster the way it has in the past? Will the manager establish his own identity and bond with the players? Will the core of the team let a new manager into their hearts, or will some of them -- Posada and Rivera -- bolt for other pastures? In other words, how long with the mourning period be, and how long will the adjustments take?



Then there's Hank Steinbrenner, King George's maligned son, who was publicly hurting when he lashed back at Torre after Torre claimed that the Yankees' offer was an insult. Hank made some good points, especially regarding the fact that in '95 Torre was a managerial re-tread two times removed and his father gave him the chance of a lifetime. It's an excellent point, for sure, but a hard one for the public to swallow. After all, the Yankees didn't manage the P.R. well, and all the fans know is that a man they truly trust no longer is running their team. People quickly forget the past (it's human nature but generally a good idea), and many fans don't remember that Torre's elevation wasn't exactly met with cartwheels in Manhattan when the Yankees selected him to be manager. Bottom line: Hank has a point.


So let's crystallize all of the arguments and come to a conclusion. All speakers -- Cowherd, Russo, Torre and Steinbrenner the younger make valid points.

Should Joe Torre have been fired?

Should he have been offered a two-year contract with an option for a third year?

Should the Yankees have done what they did?

Should Joe Torre be returning to the Yankees?

Did the suits, the beancounters, make a mistake? Did they forget the public relations aspect of their decision, or did they draw up the decision tree wrong?

I think that they goofed. The Yankees either should have told Joe Torre they wanted to make a change, feted him, offered him a sinecure position for the next 3 years, a Joe Torre day, etc. and scripted a grand and respectful exit, or they should have offered him a 2-year deal with an option at the same money he was making, not a deal with incentives depending on how well the team fared in the post-season.

Why?

Because that's how you treat a future Hall of Famer, in New York City, where even the most highly paid manager in the game gets paid what is tip money to Alex Rodriguez.

I wish Don Mattingly, Tony Pena and Joe Girardi good luck. The comparisons will be inevitable, and each of these men will fail in them. And their successors might fail, too.

It says here that you don't want to be the manager to succeed Joe Torre. You want to be the manager to succeed the manager who failed to replace Joe Torre.