How is Michigan (basketball) Not Top 25

With college football's regular season coming to a close you may not have noticed college basketball is in full swing. In that case you certainly would not know that Michigan has been excluded from the most current top 25. At 6-2 this isn't unfathomable until you take a closer look and when you do I think you won't be able to do anything else but scratch your head.

I have no love for Michigan Sports, C-webb blowing the national finals for the Maize and Blue didn't bother me one bit. That being said certain things in sports don't make sense to me and this is one of them.

Michigan as I stated is currently 6-2. Who have they lost to? At a neutral site to Duke who is 8-1 and the current number 7 team in the nation and on the road at Maryland a fellow fringe top 25 team. So neither of them were particularly bad loses.

So no bad loses how bout big wins? How does winning their second meeting with Duke who was in the top 5 at the time sound? How about a neutral site victory versus the then top 5 and current number 15 ucla bruins? Those sound like pretty nice wins to me.

So they have no big loses and a couple big victories, but that doesn't mean much if the rest of the top 25 can also make that case. They can't. Take number 25 Kansas their only loss was a neutral site loss to Syracuse who is currently number 13, so not a bad lose even if 'Cuse was unranked at the time. However who's their biggest win against? Washington? not an awful team, but not great either or maybe Kent State? New Mexico State?

Or how about number 24 Marquette who's 7-1 as well, and beat a very quality team in Wisconsin. However they also lost to Dayton, not a pushover, but not a borderline top 25 team either.

I could go on but I'll just add one more team they could easily be ahead of… UCLA. I know that's silly after all UCLA is much better right? But uh UCLA lost to Michigan, UCLA lost to Texas and you know who UCLA has beaten? NO ONE. I think everyone knows UCLA will end the season ahead of Michigan and yes early season rankings don't matter but I don't understand how they deserve a top 25 spot and Michigan doesn't.

Was it Really That Bad? Sean Avery Addition

So I read Sean Avery was being suspended for his comments the other day and I was shocked. Mostly because it’s not the playoffs yet so I didn’t know the NHL season had started, but also because he was suspended for comments.

Don’t get me wrong I can understand why the comments themselves were offensive to women, and shouldn’t have been said. As a guy I can’t fully understand how offensive they were but I understand they were offensive.

In all honesty I doubt a good percentage of women where all that offended and this yahoo article details that.

But I don’t want to argue about how offensive the comments are or are not, I’m willing to concede that they are offensive. However offensive they are though they’re still just words, comments, etc. Don’t we usually just fine people for comments? I mean in the NBA people get fined for all kinds of comments about referees and other things. I don't recall anyone getting suspended in this way for just comments.

The NHL has players elbowing each other, fighting each other, taking each other out at the knees and doing all types of reprehensible acts and this is what makes news? This is what warrants a 6 game suspension?

As far as I can tell the NHL made this a much bigger situation than it warranted by suspending him. There’s a good chance if they had just fined him and moved on no one outside of Dallas and parts of Canada would have even known he said it in the first place.

I’ll finish by asking this simple question: Sean Avery was suspended by Gary Bettmen and the NHL. Is it a coincidence that Sean Avery is also the same guy who basically said the NHL didn’t know what it was doing and didn’t know how to market itself?

The Giants Are Just Cooler Than You

Cool has a lot of meanings in our society. It could mean you’re just plain cold because the weather out is frigid. It could mean you’re the epitome of what’s “happening” or what’s “hip” or it could simply mean you don’t get rattled. If you haven’t guessed by now which cool I’m talking about in terms of the New York Football Giants it’s clearly the latter.

The Giants are not an exceptionally talented team. They have good players all around but I don’t think anyone would argue they have the QB, running back, LT, etc in the league. They had one of the better receivers in the league, but are currently 2-0 without him. One can’t really say they’ve been all that fortunate. They’ve had injuries to cornerbacks, Osi has been out all season, Brandon Jacobs has been out a game, and Plaxico is now suspended for the rest of the season for being the dumbest player in the league.

Yet despite all this they’re 11-1 and increasingly the biggest reason is they’re just plain cooler then you.

Perhaps it stems from the coaching staff, which demands complete focus no matter what’s going on around you. Or maybe it stems from their QB who once was criticized for being too unemotional, when in fact it’s his calm demeanor through the bad and the good that has been his biggest asset the last two years.

Whatever the case may be the Giants this year have been plain unflappable. Whether it’s the Plaxico suspension or the Plaxico self-mutilation, whether it’s a horrid loss against Cleveland on Monday Night or a schedule that features 10 straight winning teams to finish the season, the Giants just keep rolling along.

There’s still a lot of football to be played and still four more good teams in the regular season, but as a Giants fan I couldn’t be any more pleased with how they’ve played this year. I’m not going to predict the future I’m simply telling you where they are now and how they got there. Simply put they’ve shown that teamwork and coolness are probably the most important things that separate the 11-1 teams from the 0-12 in the NFL.

Hey Coach: Move the Ball to the Middle of the Field

If there was one thing that bothered me about this weekend’s games it was 2 coaches eschewing the chance to move the ball to the middle of the field for late game field goals. The coaches I’m talking about are Wake Forests Jim Grobe and South Florida’s Jim Leavitt.

Wake Forest was down a point with a minute or so to go in the game they drive down the field late and get it to the 23 yard line with about 15 or so seconds to go and a timeout remaining. The ball was on one of the hashmarks and it was second down and 4. Grobe elects to throw 2 passes that go incomplete and then try the field goal. Unfortunately while its only a 40 yard field goal for one of the nations best/most experienced kickers it is from the hashmark not the middle of the field. Luckily for Grobe they make the kick, but all I keep thinking is wouldn’t it have been smarter to run the ball to the middle of the field and then use your timeout and kick the field goal? While I may not be a kicker personally, kicking the ball from an angle is clearly tougher then kicking it straight on.

Later in the day Jim Leavitt makes a similar decision (maybe it’s a Jim thing). UCF tied the game late, but South Florida came down and had a chance to win the game in regulation with a field goal. Leavitt had a chance to move it to the middle of the field but didn’t and unlike with Grobe’s decision it did backfire as the kid missed the field goal wide left I believe. Had the ball been in the middle of the field and he kicks the same kick the ball goes in. Who knows if he kicks the same kick from the middle of the field then as from the left hash, but I like my chances better in the middle of the field.

Now maybe the reason I haven’t heard anything about these decisions is because both men won their games, but they both seemed like silly decisions to me.

How Brett Favre Made me a Worldly Individual or I’m sorry to see Brett Go

Editors Note: I wrote this a couple days ago, but i didn't get around to editing it or posting it till today, so hopefully it's still enjoyable.

Well Brett Favre has finally been traded. I’m not going to analyze the trade, or wax poetic about his time in Green Bay, I’ll leave that to others. What I will say is I’m somewhat sorry to see him go. Not because I wanted him to stay in Green Bay and not because I wasn’t sick of the coverage of will he or won’t he go, because I certainly was.

No I’m sad to see Brett Favre go because the coverage of his every move by ESPN was actually turning me into a worldly fellow. It used to be I would turn on ESPN in the background as I was on my computer or I would watch it while eating some dinner (yes I eat dinner in front of the tv, whatever). Then Brett Favre decided he wanted to play again and ESPN decided it was their duty to tell us of his every text message, let alone actual moves. Not only that, but we needed to know everything the Packers coach, GM and President were doing and thinking. If that wasn’t enough we needed the opinion on a daily basis from everyone on first and 10, PTI, Around The Horn, NFL Live, Sportscenter and pretty much every other show ESPN has. We needed their opinion on not only what was happening but what would happen next and what should happen.

So I could listen to this on a daily basis if I wanted or I could chose to watch something else. Personally over the last week or so perhaps more I made the choice to turn off ESPN every time they mentioned Brett Favre. So what’s a guy to do with no ESPN? I started watching the news instead of Sportscenter. I would occasionally turn on the history channel or even the e network to glimpse at who the paparazzi were stalking today. (I figure its good to be up on all types of current events even if you find them repulsive, because you wanna be able to speak with a variety of people)

Alas, Brett Favre has been traded and while it may take a little while for ESPN to get over it, maybe now they’ll actually cover stories that will interest me or at least ones I haven’t heard about constantly for days on end. Who knows they might talk about training camp developments around the rest of the league. They might talk about the Olympics, or the MLS, or even cover the NL West race a little bit (yes they suck but someone has to get into the playoffs). Heck they played a recap of the Houston Texans 2007 season and that’s more interesting then the Favre Saga.

So here’s to hoping now that the Brett Favre saga is over I won’t turn back into my normal mindless self.

Why the Timing of the Jeremy Shockey Trade is… Not Shocking

No one is surprised by the Jeremy Shockey trade. It’s been in the works for months and everyone knows why it happened, but people are a little confused as to why it happened now only 3 days before training camp. After all they got the same deal they could have had before the draft, so why do it now? Why not do it before the draft and get a replacement tight end through the draft or free agency?

All these questions can be answered fairly easily when you look a little closer at the situation. Who’s actually being traded here? Well we’re talking about Jeremy Shockey a multi-time Pro-Bowl tight end. Players like Shockey with speed, and toughness don’t come along every day. If you were the Giants wouldn’t you want to try to hold on to him? Then you consider the giants TE situation. They have Kevin Boss, no Jeremy Shockey certainly, but he made huge plays for the Giants in their Super Bowl run including an enormously important 45 yard reception in the Super Bowl itself. So while you’ll be downgrading at TE you have a guy who can block, and make the occasional big play. In other words you don’t necessarily NEED a replacement should things not work out with Shockey.

Now you consider how Shockey has acted this offseason. Instead of trying to help his teammates out during the super bowl run, he was sitting in the stands doing his own thing. I didn’t kill him for this as I figured he didn’t want to be a distraction, but it raises some questions. Then he skips the Super Bowl Parade and Ring Ceremony. Its not like he wasn’t part of the team, he made 57 fricken catches for them in the regular season, so there’s no reason he can’t get a ring, but he skips these events. In doing so to me it shows a complete lack of support for your teammates. Even if you feel you don’t deserve the ring yourself because you didn’t help them in the postseason wouldn’t you want to go support your teammates? Its not like you weren’t invited.

He also asked for a trade because he was worried about his role on the team. Last I checked his role was the same as it is on every team… HELP THE TEAM WIN. Apparently he was worried more about his stats then playing for the Super Bowl champs.

Will they win again this year? Probably not, but at least they have the talent to get it done.

Then he gets in a shouting match with the GM and I can only imagine what else was going on behind the scenes.

So why wait so long? Simply put because he’s a talented player who you don’t want to get rid of, you don’t neeeeed a replacement for him and you’re hoping things will work themselves out. When it became clear they would not and training camp was fast approaching they realized it was time to cut bait. So to me all the media types (and Plaxico Burress) expressing shock over the time, need to calm down.

Here's to You Ken Singleton

Many of you have never had the privilege of hearing Ken Singleton broadcast a baseball game, never mind the privilege of hearing him on a regular basis. As a Yankee fan in the NY area, I get the pleasure of hearing him quite often and I want to write a tribute to one of my favorite broadcasters out there.

Why is Ken Singleton so good? Well let’s start with that he’s completely unpretentious. He doesn’t speak down to you, and never comes off as self-important. At the same time he’s clearly very articulate. He doesn’t talk about things he doesn’t know about and keeps the focus on the game itself.

He’s completely self-deprecating and you’d never know he was really a quite good player, unless well… you knew was quite a good player. (No he wasn’t hall of fame material, but he was no slouch.) All these things allow him to work seamlessly with a multitude of partners, from Cone, to Lieter to Flaherty to Kay; he doesn’t miss a beat no matter who is in the booth.

But the best part about getting to listen to Ken Singleton? The little sayings you’ll hear every game.

One particular game a pitcher threw a curveball and they were showing the replay of said curveball and Singleton describing the brake on the pitch goes, “WEEEEE” like a school child going throwing his hands up and jumping down a slide. It was unexpected, enthusiastic and quite simply great.

Another game a Yankee (probably Jeter) made a high throw to first and Giambi has to jump up to grab it, lands on the bag and gets the out. Singleton says, “Giambi proves you gotta get up, to get down.” Once again unexpected, enthusiastic and great.

So here’s to you Ken Singleton, keep doing what you’re doing.