Sports Views

Let’s look at offensive winning percentage (OWP) to see why this is true. It is a stat developed by Bill James that tells us the winning percentage a team would have with 9 identical hitters if the team allowed the league average number runs per game. Giambi’s OWP’s in both 2000 (.832) and 2001 (.846) are both in the top 100 of all time (actually they are both in the top 84). How many players in baseball history have had back to back seasons with an .800+ OWP? Not many, just 23. And all of them are in the Hall of Fame except Giambi, Barry Bonds, Joe Jackson and Pete Browning (one of the best hitters of the 19th century who probably deserves to be in the Hall). Since I am using data from the Lee Sinins Sabermetric Encyclopedia, OWP is also adjusted for park effects.

Its that time. NFL Fantasy Football is just around the corner. Those of you who know me personally know that fantasy football is very important to me, and I invest a lot of time and money into it. Every year I even fly half way across the U.S. for a big live draft party (I used to live in California and am still part of that league, which is my biggest, most important and largest money league). The rest of the leagues I am in are online, except one free league with 7 other guys from work.

Tiger Woods victory in The Open yesterday was probably the most controlled piece of golf ever. He lead from the first morning and, although players got near him, they never really looked to threaten his eventual win.

This is a little bit of a side track post. As I became a huge baseball fan again last year, after just being a casual one for years, and being a Christian for a number of years, it was cool when Curt Schilling came out last year after playing with the bloody sock and such, saying that he owes his pitching to God. I thought that was one of the coolest statements I’d ever heard, and not only that but brave for someone that is quite possibly one of the most infamous sports players in the last twenty years to be talking about. So upon hearing that, I found out that a good portion of the Red Sox team are Christians. Here they are in no certain order, (also these are the ones I know about.)

Peter King of CNN SI, herel , rates the NFL training camps opening next week. Basically he rates them on accessibility (to players), eats, tradition and ambiance. My Dad and younger brother are leaving Saturday for Green Bay for a two week stay. Too busy to join them this year, but (as usual) my thoughts are with them.

On the bright side, the most wonderful time of the year is upon us! What could that possibly be, you may ask? Well, my friends, football season is soon to grace us again!! Within the next few weeks, I should be receiving my season tickets to Aggie Football. Within the next month, we’ll be conducting our draft for the pay FFBL I am co-commissioning. I’m also in a free league with some other friends this season. So, that means every Saturday, I’ll either be in Kyle Field or in front of a television watching my boys play. Every Sunday, I’ll be in front of the big screen at home with my StaTracker pulled up on the laptop and flipping between channels on DirecTV’s NFL Sunday Ticket to monitor my players. Life…will be good.

This is an allegorical story, Boris & Rex did not do this, but I have always wanted to see a coach actually have the balls to sacrifice part of one workout to make a really strong point to their athletes (especially young athletes) who have horrible recovery habits. Years ago I went to a lecture by the nutritionist of the Denver Broncos, and she described how changing eating lifelong bad eating habits (both timing and content) made a huge difference for many football players who were simply used to hitting McDonalds about an hour and a half after getting off the field. This is why many pro and college teams now feed their athletes on a daily basis, US speedskating does, it lays out a whole spread for the National team. Nutrition is as important as ice time & coaching.

Horrible series, only one win. That was Friday night, and it was 17-1. It appears that while we can easily crush the Yankees they can’t crush us, the wins they got were really small and narrow wins. Johnny Damon extended his hitting streak to 29 games, lets hope he can keep it up and beat the 56 game hitting streak set by Joe DiMaggio back in 1941 with the Yankees. Curt wasn’t in at all this weekend, which I felt the Sox should’ve put him in on Friday with the 17-1 game, even if he let up a couple of hits it wouldn’t have been that devistating, but that’s just me. I really want to see Alex Cora and Adam Stern play more, Cora should take over for Mark Bellhorn on second base, despite Bellhorn hitting a home run the other night, he generally just can’t hit, and he does a decent job at second base but I think Cora would be great there. While I like David Ortiz, I think Stern should at least pinch run for him all the time, but I don’t know if that’s actually something they could do without making Stern the DH. Hrmm. I’ll have to look into that.

Simply put, he wouldn’t. He doesn’t nor did he want to the Knicks job at this time. There isn’t enough money in the Sultanate of Brunei that could convince Brown to spend the next two years harping Marbury to play D and practice hard. When he isn’t doing that, he’d be busy chastising Richardson and Crawford for poor shot selection. He spent six years butting heads with Allen Iverson in Philly and I genuinely believe Brown, whose 64 years old and battled health problems this past season, isn’t up for that sort of endeavor again.

One of the coolest things about working in the golf business is some of the people that you meet. The year prior (2000) I had worked with a girl that eventually went on to work for the R&A in St. Andrews. She sent me an email asking if I would be interested in coming to the Open and then playing some golf in St. Andrews. I don’t know of too many golfers that would say no to an offer like that. I rounded up a bit of cash (I was a student then) and booked my trip. The Open that year was at Royal Lytham and St. Annes so I flew to Manchester, boarded a train and got dropped off right at the course. I arrived late Friday afternoon… the tournament was still going on but jet lag didn’t allow me to see anything. I went and napped in the hotel for the afternoon. The R&A folks were staying in the same hotel as some of the players and I had a chance to see Vijay Singh (and his clubs) up close. I went to bed that night pretty excited!

One of the bits of information that goes into drafting that perfect fantasy team is interest in players when they hit the free agent market. You look at the contracts of folks like Shaun Alexander and Edgerrin James and look at how teams are evaluating their talent and durability. Today, though, John Clayton writes about the difficulties that running backs are facing when looking for contracts after reaching 27 or 28 years old. The length of the deal, it seems, often reduces the yearly contract values even though the running back may be a great draft pick for the next year or two.

He was not the only one to suffer on a tougher afternoon which gave way to some heavy rain in the evening - Ernie Els and Phil Mickelson, three and four in the world rankings respectively - begin today’s second round a shot worse on two over and even Spanish ace Sergio Garcia slipped back into the pack at two under having closed to within a shot of Woods after 12 holes.

My brother and I are always talking about David Ortiz and how he has smoked the Yankees the last couple of years. One thing we have noticed is that Ortiz is nice and relaxed at the plate. Why? Because for whatever reason, not a single pitcher would throw inside to this guy. And I’m not talking on the inside part of the plate. I’m talking about inside enough that it puts Ortiz on his big butt.

Lets start with the slightly smaller name, posessing tons of talent none the less, Ill tell you why Javon is holding out, because hes a fucking pussy. His job is to grasp footballs with his big florida state hands, not manballs with aid from his mouth. it might be significantly harder catching those balls from the cannon of brett favre, but thats what hes getting paid to do. Javon has made over 5 million dollars in the first 3 years of his career, id let brett favre chuck footballs at my testicles for 3 hours every sunday for 5 million dollars, and occasionly slightly harder on monday nights. well, maybe not my testicles, but any other part of my body is fair game.

Another huge mistake, selling the New Jersey Nets to Bruce Ratner. He just selected another 2/3. Ummm, don’t Vince Carter and Richard Jefferson play the exact same positions? What the heck is going on here?

I feel really sorry for the teams that passed on Gerald Green, Danny Granger, and Joey Graham. They will be pretty darn good.

I woke up to good news this morning. Tiger Woods is in the lead after the first round of the British Open. He shot a 6 under 66. Now I have to figure out how to convince the Mrs. that I need to go strait to bed so I can get up at 3:00 in the morning to watch some live coverage from St. Andrews. Yeah right! It should be a great weekend for Golf.

i just heard some good news today, the players of nhl and the league have all agreed and there will be a 2005 season. can i just hear a wup! wup! for the canucks! the players agreed to a salary cap that the owners proposed. to me its not about the money. nhl players are the hardest working athletes out there and they make the least amount. also the nhl hasn’t be subjected to the “larger than life” dramas that the other sport industries have become. it seems that the mlb, nfl, and nba are a bunch of whining, camera hogging, hams with a huge case of the “look at me”. sports went from “hi mom” to high drama only ever seen before in the wwe. look at the kobe v. shaq drama. and whatever happened to “mr primetime” there was a big bag of nothing waiting to happen. it’s these types of things that never happen - so far - in the nhl. the nhl is all about hockey. the players are out there to play, not try and make money off of their image with sponsor contracts. lets face it, it’s not the shoe that makes you faster, it’s you.

I have not collected cards in years. I found other things that absorbed my time and money. But it is sad that Fleer has gone by the wayside. I hope there are still card companies that are more interested in making a kid smile by letting him afford to finish a set that in selling a 24-karat gold autographed picture of Derek Jeter.

Just last week I had a ‘feeling’ while going over one of my Fantasy Baseball leagues that I should make a move to deal one of my best players and one of the top pitchers in all of baseball, Roy Halladay. Where this ‘notion’ came from I do not know, but nevertheless I pursued the idea. Now normally, for a starting pitcher of Halladay’s caliber (top 2 or 3 in the ML in Wins, Ks, ERA and WHIP at the time) I could announce my intentions to the other owners and see what big fish I could hook in return. Well, not so on this occasion…you see, the voice in my head was quite specific…it lead me to two players, both average (statistically) at best and both of whom were on the DL at the time…but the voice was right: I did indeed want those two players. I fought the urge to even make the lopsided proposal but after much thought I just said ‘fuckit’ I am going to go with this and see where it leads me. The final deal, which of course was accepted, was: ROY HALLADAY & SAMMY SOSA for JOSE VIDRO & RYAN FREEL.

I am not a big fan of T.O., unless of course he is on the field, but it is easy to see why the idea of pairing Randy Moss with Terrel Owens would intrigue the Raiders. Putting the two best recievers in the NFL (apologies to Marvin Harrison fans) on the same team would entice any team not run by the Pope. For Al Davis, the personalities involved won’t even cross his mind. If possible, the talent involved would just be too much for Davis to resist. As a fan of the Chiefs, one of my first thoughts was that if the trade is pulled off, there is no way KC could cover those guys.

flipping back to the all star game, i am reminded that the american league has won 7 straight all star games. is it such a good idea to make it "count" when evidently one league has a definite advantage? it use to be, in my mind...probably not in reality, that the national league had the home run hitters...dale murphy, mike schmidt...and then the american league had the real hitters in wade boggs and don mattingly, among others in both cases...now you have monsters who hit for 40 homers and bat .300 without even breaking a sweat. i don't think that steriods had anything to do with the influx of pure talent that we get to watch hit every year. pure hitters like alex rodriguez, derek jeter, albert pujols and derek lee are great to watch. the only difference that time can witness will be how many of the great hitters will we remember 10 years from now. i personally have no doubt that albert pujols will be around...and a-rod....i wish i could mention more mets...

He might have a point, but the guy is so combative that it’s hard to feel any sort of sympathy for him. It’s like reading articles defending how Barry Bonds is really a nice guy deep down inside his otherwise childlike and troubled soul. Whatever. He’s still on my all-pity team, the guys that look at themselves as martyrs or victims of some media or league or fan conspiracy. Inaugural members of this group across all sports include: Gary Sheffield, Barry Bonds, Jose Canseco, Carl Everett, Terrell Owens, Allen Iverson, Karl Malone, and Alexei Yashin (had to throw in a hockey guy). Can’t forget John McEnroe or Ted Williams.

Well I guess this is the big time!!

In case you missed it, last night I had a cameo appearance on Showcase Network's new series, "The nfL Word", about a group of football-crazed lesbians who are ready to get down (in the pigskin sense)...

Happy 75th, George. And the problem child, Jason Giambi, belted to longballls for you. If Boston loses to Texas tonight, the Yanks will be 4 games out of first place.

Last night, we went to a Trenton Thunder game. The Trenton Thunder is a AA minor league baseball team. They are affiliated with the New York Yankees ::shudder::. Ironically, the team that they were playing against was the Portland Sea Dogs, who are the AA affiliates for the Boston Red Sox! I have to say, I felt a bit torn. I wanted to root for my "home team", the Trenton Thunder, but I also wanted to root for the Sea Dogs because I knew they might eventually be Red Sox players.

UPDATE: Stephen Duncan Jr., who isn’t, I gather related to Tim Duncan, but who is a big Spurs and Jayhawks fans offers some reasons why San Antonio passed on Wayne here and here. RD Baker notes that with the departure of Udonis Haslem (and the gentrification of Christian Laettner), Wayne could be looking at a starting roll playing forward opposite Shaquille O’Neal. If he could only shoot freethrows on Shaq’s behalf, the Heat would be unbeatablee.

I play a decent game, but I’m no Tiger Woods. I’ve twice shattered my driver on the tee, and believe me when I tell you there’s prolly no stranger feeling than suddenly finding yourself holding a feather light graphite shaft minus the driver head, while watching that part of the club follow your ball down the fairway. But both times, King Cobra replaced the driver no questions asked. Can’t complain about that. I do love this game.

I am a football fan. A huge football fan...as in i refuse to make any plans (even work related) on Sundays during the fall and i tell everyone that it is because of 'religious obligations'. Calamity Jane has been well aware of my obsession ever since a severe miscalculation on her part led to me missing half of a Dallas Cowboys playoff game (a game that i am still positive they lost due to the lack of proper 'mojo' stemming from me failing to watch from my normal vantage point on the couch at home). The error nearly led to the end of our friendship, narrowly saved by what remains the first and only time that Jane has apologized to me for anything without first explaining how it was really my fault.

I absolutely love baseball. Can’t think of a better way to spend an afternoon or evening than munching on fatty snacks, surrounded by thousands of happy fans out for a day at the park. (I think I have this rosy view because I’ve never been to Fenway or Yankee Stadium, and I think I’ll keep it that way. I hear the fans are of a different breed.) And I love baseball for the same reason I also love college basketball and soccer: it is truly a team sport. Yeah you have your homerun hitters, and that’s fun to watch, but you can’t win with only homerun hitters (e.g., San Francisco Giants and Barry Bonds).

In 2000, the average male handicap was 15.7 and in 2004 it was 15.2. Among women, it improved from 15.7 to 15.2 over the same period. The statistics are not being trumpeted by the big sporting manufacturers, who spend millions of pounds convincing golfers that their dream of hitting balls like Tiger Woods still lies in buying the newest equipment.

Sorry For the delay….My best friend bought tickets to the June 22nd New York Yankees game, and invite our buddy and I to go. What was I to do? Say no? Ha Yeah right, I wouldn’t pass up a game anytime, especially a day game, so I have an excuse to use a vacation day.

It was hot, most of the day. We were a bit confused as to what we were supposed to do, but eventually got the hang of it and started going to tee boxes and holes to see the golfers we recognized and those that were doing well. We camped out at the 17th hole for the last hour and a half, and got to see some big names - Michelle Wie, Annika Sorenstam, Birdie Kim - up close and personal. It was quite cool, actually (not the weather, but the viewing).

What would it be like to live in the shadow of Lance Armstrong (or Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods for you other minded athletes)? I would say it would be pretty difficult to surpass their greatness. When you are always measuring yourself by the best, it is pretty hard to measure up. But isn't that the problem? We limit ourselves by today's best. Tomorrow, well maybe longer, someone will come along and say Lance who?

I just read that the latest trade rumor involving Terrell Owens has him going to Oakland for Jerry Porter and a first round pick. Ina way this makes sense for the Eagles. Porter is younger, he’s faster, and he doesn’t seem to be a bad citizen. Also Owens is clearly toast in Philly no matter what he does now. Philly’s fans will eat this guy alive if given the opportunity. For the Raiders, this makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. Owens is popular enough in the area to generate some ticket sales, but is he going to be able to share the ball with Randy Moss?

Now Tino is back (picked up as nothing more than a back-up player) and on a home run streak of the kind he hasn't had since he hit 46 dingers in Pinstripes the year he was runner-up for MVP. The man who was paid a gazillion dollars to play first base, Jason Giambi, meanwhile hasn't done anything in two years. He hasn't even been average, he's been horrible. I don't wish Giambi ill will but it looks like a test case for karma when the man who was deemed over the hill and who had supposedly seen his best days (Tino) is outperforming the man who he was replaced by.

Under the new labor contract, a player can’t enter the NBA draft until he’s 19 or until one year after his high-school class graduation date. Players who entered the league directly from high school include LeBron James, Tracy McGrady, Kobe Bryant and Kevin Garnett.