Tell Us Something We Don't Know Mark

Mark McGwire has finally come out and told the world what most of the world presumed or thought they already knew. That he used performance enhancing drugs or steroids for over ten years. He admitted to using steroids during the season where he hit 70 homeruns and set the single season homerun record.
Like every person that uses performance enhancing drugs they regret it and say that they wished they never did it, but lets be honest if he wasn't smacking homeruns out of the ball parks he would have stopped using them. Every athlete wants to be one thing and that's great at whatever they do. They will use whatever advantage they can to get there to make history whether it's putting up extra iron in the weight room or needles in their back side.
There's only one reason that Mark McGwire chose to come forth about his steroid use and it wasn't to get a few extra people to buy his tell all book. McGwire came out to get into the Hall of Fame and that's the only reason. Sure he wants to be able to come to the St. Louis Cardinals' training facilities and not get hounded by steroid questions, but the Hall comes first.
I'm not mad at Mark McGwire for coming out about using steroids and I'm certainly not mad at him for using them either. America loves sports and they idolize the superior athlete and it was in the form of Mark McGwire. Baseball fans love the long ball and couldn't care less if he used steroids to do it. Mark was knocking them all over the park and real McGwire fans still love him for the things he achieved and it won't change their respect for him as a player or a person.
Look, I don't think him saying that he used performing enhancing drugs will get him into the Hall of Fame next year, but if he does great as a hitting coach and has no more bad marks on his record since being a hitting coach he should make it. Mark McGwire was great for baseball and brought more fans to the game with his monstrous homerun hits. With today's "Steroid Era" being called out a player with the accolades of Mark McGwire, he should be in the Hall of Fame.

Do We Have a Real National Championship?

After the Texas Longhorns were dismantled by the top ranked Alabama Crimson Tide I wonder would things have been different if another undefeated team were to replace the Longhorns. Of course it wasn't that good of a game with Texas quarterback Colt McCoy being put out of the game early, but I wanted to see a better game.
With Boise State being the second team to go 14-0 in NCAA football history I feel they should at least get a share of the national championship title with the Crimson Tide of Alabama, but they won't. They won't because the teams that are not in a so called "Power Conference" could not get the respect they deserve. Boise State has won a Fiesta Bowl before and also has beaten plenty of top ranked teams over the past six years.
There were five undefeated teams that went to BCS bowl games and three were from non BCS conferences, but for some reason only the two BCS conference teams were put in the national championship game. That’s cool with me, but why did TCU and Boise State have to play each other? The games could have gone totally different to give Boise State or TCU a shot at a share of the national championship if they beat Iowa or Georgia Tech and then there is the Rose Bowl. The Rose Bowl shouldn't be in the BCS due to only a Pac-10 or Big Ten team will be able to make it.
That's why I propose a playoff. I know a lot of people agree and some won't just because of the money, but no money will be lost, maybe gained. My playoff system will eliminate the long layoff between regular season and bowl season, but will probably end the college season later. Every Bowl game except for the four BCS bowl games will be played before January 1. After that the BCS playoff starts, each winner of those bowl games advance to the next round and so on till two teams are left, so 8 teams to 4 teams to 2 and the winner of that is the defacto national championship.
Like always that plan is too simple for people to understand and too easy for the big wigs to approve. This is better than the plus one game and the regular BCS crap they have now. I feel every Division I team should be able to make it to the BCS national championship game. If their not going to have that chance to make it to championship game then put them in the sub bowl division formally known as Division II. Everyone hates the BCS system and it is extremely flawed because unless it is only two teams that are undefeated at the end of the season we have no real national championship.

Roberto Alomar Gets Spit On

I was looking at who made the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame and who didn't and I saw that Roberto Alomar was snubbed by the voters. Seeing this happen I was baffled on why such a highly decorated player is not a first ballot Hall of Famer. I asked was it his batting or fielding? Maybe he didn't have a great career average, so I looked up Roberto Alomar's career stats and accolades.
Roberto Alomar batted .300 for his career and elevated his play in the post season hitting .313. As a matter of fact almost everything increased in the post season. Roberto had a .371 on base percentage and this statistic rose up to .381 along with an on base plus slugging percentage rising from .814 to .824. Alomar played in 58 post season games and had 72 hits with 33 runs batted in.
Then I was wondering about his fielding. I thought Roberto Alomar couldn't have been a good infielder if he was snubbed so bad and again I looked at his fielding stats and realized he was a great infielder with an almost perfect .986 fielding percentage not to mention him winning ten American League Golden Gloves at second base and in his twelve seasons he only had 100 errors, that is astounding.
With seeing his incredible batting statistics, impeccable fielding percentages and his trophy case full of Golden Gloves and an ALCS MVP I only thought of one thing that could hold him back. In 1996 Roberto Alomar spit in the face of a MLB umpire John Hirschbeck after being ejected from a game. I believe this is the real reason Roberto Alomar was kept out off the first ballot in the Hall of Fame voting. This leads me to ask why? Roberto was elected to the Major League all-star game every year he was in the league and it is few players that can lay claim to that feat till this day.
That’s why I want to say allowing the fans to vote players into the hall is not a bad thing to do. The Hall of Fame is for the fans anyway and what better way to honor them and the players then by at least giving the fan a chance to give their input. These writers have their own hidden agendas and prejudices and that makes it difficult for players to reach the Hall of Fame at the time they should. I understand the Hall of Fame is a prestigious occasion, but there's a difference between keeping a player out of the hall for alleged doping and a mistake that was apologized and forgiven. Roberto Alomar is a sure lock for the Hall of Fame and shouldn't have gotten spit on like this.

Maybe Its Better This Way

I was going to wait until it got closer before I was going to blog about this. The best thing I thought to do about this was to wait and see if this was really going to happen, but now I know for sure. This was destined to be the fight of the year, decade, millennium, or century. Whatever it was suppose to be it isn’t happening now according to Top Rank promoter Bob Arum.
Each boxer did what they were supposed to do, Manny Pacquiao beat down Miguel Cotto and Floyd Mayweather handled Juan Manuel Marquez easily to set up the so called "Super Fight". After Floyd won the fight I remembered hearing on ESPN that Mayweather had no intentions on fighting Pacquiao win, lose or draw and I thought that was the wrong information. Especially after Manny Pacquiao handled his business to prove he is a real contender for Floyd.
Right after the Manny Pacquiao versus Miguel Cotto fight was over, no time was wasted before negotiations began and a fight date was set for Floyd Mayweather versus Manny Pacquiao and then all hell broke loose. First it was about the money with Mayweather wanting more of the purse and now it just seemed to have problem after problem.
With Mayweather seeming to be the cause of all these problems, people started to blame and come up with reasons for his actions. People were saying he was scared, he's too cocky and it's basically because people don't like Floyd "Money" Mayweather. I understand the scared part. With Mayweather being undefeated I could see why he would be scared to tarnish his record, but at the same time how can he call his self the best pound for pound boxer when their is someone else out there who wants to challenge the champion.
If you ask me, maybe both of these fighters are scared. I mean what kind of crap is Manny Pacquiao pulling about this needle superstition and then he's already contemplating retirement so he can be a city official or something. What is wrong with random testing from now until March 13 if you're about to make the biggest pay day of your life? Then each side met with a mediator and could still not come up with a resolution. This is a sad day for boxing, with the UFC able to put on fight after fight and boxing on the decline this is a shame that this fight couldn't go on as scheduled to save the sport of boxing.

Gilbert Got a Gun

It is getting way out of control with athletes and their guns. Guns and athletes seem like it doesn't mix like oil and water. Just last year we watched a player named Plaxico Buress shoot himself in a night club and ended up in prison and not to mention the Tennessee Volunteers' players using a fake gun to rob some people at a local gas station.
Gilbert Arenas brought guns to his place of work at the Verizon Center where league officials and the commissioner clearly stated that they do not want guns near their facilities. First he said he brought the guns to the stadium to turn them into to the proper authorities because he has children and don't want them exposed to that and then we hear of him pulling these guns out on fellow teammate Javaris Crittenton.
It is said that Wizards' guards Gilbert Arenas and Javaris Crittenton were playing a game of cards on a team flight back to Washington and it escalated into a heated exchange between the two guards and went on for two more days. Javaris said on the flight back that if Gilbert didn't pay up on the bet he would shoot him in his surgically repaired knee and Gilbert tried to turn it into a joke. Arenas then took the guns he brought to turn into authorities and put them in Crittenton's locker stall and jokingly asked him to pick a gun to shoot him with. At that time Javaris pulled out his own gun to show that he had his gun to shoot Arenas with.
Arenas met with federal prosecutors at the United States Attorney's Office for the district of Columbia and detectives of the Metropolitan Police Department for over two hours, but still no further actions were taken. NBA Commissioner David Stern has not yet released a statement or even handed down a punishment yet and probably won't until the legal investigation is over. It is more likely that Gilbert will be suspended for blatantly breaking a league rule.
I understand that players need protection and some fear for their lives, but why have a gun in a place that your job told you not to bring one to. Players are more likely to be robbed because of their big contracts, flashy cars and jewelry and should also be allowed to protect themselves, but at what cost? Gilbert Arenas could be going to jail or out of the NBA for a while or maybe even both. Would receiving those sanctions really be worth losing out on a lucrative contract? I tend to think not.

Texas Tech vs. Adam Jones

It has been nothing but a snowball affect since the Mike Leach allegations and this time it happened faster than the Mark Magino's incident. It was reported that Mike Leach put a Texas Tech Red Raider player named Adam James in an electrical closet and a tool shed. Adam James is the son of an ESPN college football analyst named Craig James.
Mike Leach was suspended for those actions and some people think that it was just and some think that Mike Leach was fired because of who Adam James is. Mike was about to got to a court hearing to contest against his suspension from the team and coaching in the Alamo Bowl until he was served with his pink slip. Leach and his attorney agreed that there was no reason for further actions to taken.
At the Alamo Bowl there was nothing but support for fired Head Coach Mike Leach and disrespect towards Athletic Director Gerald Myers and wide receiver Adam James. During halftime as Adam James walked off the field he was heavily booed by Texas Tech fans and Mike Leach supporters. There were signs saying bring Leach back and how they are "Team Leach" supporters, others held anti-James signs and wore t-shirts that weren't very kind to the Texas Tech receiver.
There is no way Adam Jones should receive this kind of treatment. Adam thought he was being mistreated by a coach and spoke up. Head Coaches are there to nurture and mature that teenager into a well mannered man. If that coach doesn't comply with those ethics he is not a good coach or he shouldn't be coaching any kind of children.
Mike Leach didn't feel like he was doing anything wrong, but just didn't fully think through the plan. I mean who puts anybody with concussion in a tool shed or electrical closet without first having them check by the trainer or in a proper training facility? He said he wanted his players close to the field even though they're injured, for what? If a player is injured during most of the practice week, he most likely won't be playing that following week, especially if he has a head injury. A small part of me thinks that Texas Tech didn't want to pay Mike Leach his $800,000 bonus on December 31 of last year, but I must admit these accusations and some from his past warranted Mike Leach this firing.

Hooray For Dallas

If you were to ask me about them Cowboys, I'll tell you that the Dallas Cowboys haven't been worth anything since Troy Aikman, Emmitt Smith and Michael Irvin left. Especially after Jerry Jones stabbed Terrell Owens in the back and released him in the off season, but the Cowboys are looking like they are close to being a force in the National Football League.
After the Cowboys won today's game against the Philadelphia Eagles, Dallas has clinched the NFC east championship. This win saves Coach Wade Philips job for one more day and keeps quarterback Tony Romo looking good for right now. The Cowboys still are not the team of the decade, but still have a chance to win this year's Super Bowl.
The Dallas Cowboys didn't start off December like the greatest team in the NFL, but finished the month on point to clinch the title. Dallas has no real chance to win the Super Bowl because their offense is still lacking a good passing game. Yes Miles Austin looks like a decent receiver, but Roy Williams couldn't even hold Terrell Owens' jock strap.
Most likely the Cowboys will be put out of the first round and Coach Wade Philips will be out the door. Maybe Dallas will probably make their way back to a Super Bowl appearence and if they make it this year to the big game then Dallas has really come full circle. Whatever the Cowboys do, it better be good or the Cowboys will continue to be called the Cowgirls any Tony Romo will go back to being the reason they can't win the big one and I for one will feel total satisfaction to see Dallas fall hard on their face.