A sports blog by and for Midwest Sports Fans
The Tinley children are on Fall Break, so we’re spending the week vacationing on Perdido Key. I was without Internet access until yesterday, when I successfully guessed the password for a wireless router in a neighboring condo. A word of advice: If you’re in Florida and your wireless password is “sunshine,” you’re inviting anyone who can pick up your signal to use your Internet.
Anyway, here are some things we learned this week:
The Super Bowl is less than 48 hours away, and that means one thing: four hours and 29 minutes of pregame on FOX leading up to the game.
Most of America, including myself, have a tough time watching the FOX pregame show for one hour; 4+ hours of nonsense and laughter is just too much. That is why I found a few other shows to watch before the big game starts at precisely 6:29 pm EST.
[Editor's Note: This is the first of a new weekly series by Big MB called I'll Tell You This. MB loves to tell people things, and especially loves using that phrase when doing so, so this is a match made in sports blogging heaven. Have at it MB.]
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We are just over one week away from NFL kickoff 2009, less that a week from College Football, and coming down the stretch in Major League Baseball. Here are my top 5 stories for this week.
As the waiver deadline approaches the most active team seems to be the L.A. Dodgers, picking up White Sox slugger Jim Thome and Diamondbacks’ hurler Jon Garland. As of today the Dodgers hold a 5.5 game lead on Colorado, who also made a move trading for White Sox pitcher Jose Contreras.
I’ll tell you this: the Dodgers are putting together a team that will compete with the Yankees in the World Series. There is no doubt in my mind that the Dodgers are the team to beat in the National League, save for maybe (and this is painful for a Cub’s fan to admit) the Cardinals.
Brett Favre and Michael Vick have made their comebacks and the inevitable debates have followed.
In Minnesota, talk of team mutiny was rumored, some sources saying that the locker room was split. These rumors were put to bed quickly, but Viking Nation may see it differently. One Vikings fan was found to have a live goat in her trunk painted purple and gold.
Vick has also been met with equivalent praise and disapproval, with Donovan McNabb going on record saying that Vick’s presence and the style of play-calling involving Vick was “a gimmick†and a distraction from their game plan.
I’ll tell you this: Like it or not, the Vikings became a contender when they signed Favre. However, Vick brings quite the distraction both on and off of the field. It will be interesting to see, but if McNabb is already skeptical about Vick’s role, then that can’t be a good sign for the Eagles.
In what has been a tumultuous summer of violations in College Football, one last situation has raised its ugly head right before the season’s start.
This week some former and current players accused Michigan coach Rich Rodriguez and his staff of exceeding the NCAA’s practice guidelines and complained that the staff was over-working student athletes beyond the maximum weekly and daily hours limitations. Rodriguez responded with an emotional press conference, completely denying the allegations by saying that they were “miscommunications†and “just not true.â€
I’ll Tell You This: The Wolverines went 3-9 last year in Rodriguez’s first year at the helm. While it would not surprise me that these players were over-worked, I think the bigger issue is that, to save his job, Rodriguez has to find a way to bring Michigan back to being one of the premier teams in the NCAA.
With the NFL preseason coming to an end, injuries have already begun to raise their ugly heads at big-time positions for teams.
Patriots QB Tom Brady injured his shoulder when Redskins $100 million dollar man Albert Haynesworth crushed him in the second quarter of their game last week. The master of masking issues, Bill Belichick, down-played the injury saying that Brady would be ready for the regular season.
Brett Favre has said that he has a cracked rib, but played in the Vikings’ preseason game against Houston without any protection. Could it be that Favre is preparing an excuse for what might become a disappointing season?
Finally, all of Kansas City stopped breathing for about 24 hours when off-season acquisition QB Matt Cassel went down hard with a knee injury. At first the prognosis was 4-6 weeks, seemingly a finishing blow to KC before the season even started; however, now reports are saying that the MCL strain that Cassel suffered was minor and he would return to the lineup possibly sooner rather that later, maybe even for the season opener.
I’ll Tell You This: Nothing can kill a team’s season faster than an unexpected and unnecessary preseason injury. Hopefully all of the above stay healthy so we can watch as many teams battle it out for the playoffs at full strength as possible. A healthy NFL is a more fan-friendly NFL.
Adam “Pacman†Jones has returned to football. But this time it’s not in the NFL. It’s not even with the upstart AFL, which launches next month.Â
No, Pacman Jones is headed to the Canadian Football League. He has signed “in principal†a one year deal with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers.
I’ll tell you this: Who cares?
Apparently no-one in the NFL is ok with giving Jones yet another chance to prove that he can’t control his personal life, and honestly, I can’t blame them. Jones is just one of those players with all the talent in the world but no self-control. And playing professional sports is a luxury. He can’t control his life, he is a thug, and he is not a role model like we want our athletes of today to be.
Good riddance Pacman. Canada, you can have him.
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* – Jose Contreras and Jim Thome photo credit: by Charles Rex Arbogast – AP via South Side Sox
Minnesota basketball is enjoying unseen success, since the addition of Tubby Smith. The team has exploded out of the gate to 11-0 and entered the nation’s top 20. They are sitting at 16-1, now, with their only loss coming to a seriously tough Michigan State team. They notched another gutsy win in Wisconsin last night, and I’m trying to find out what’s responsible for this team’s performance on the court, the inspiration seems to be on the bench, though.
Virtually identical, I couldn’t find any serious differences in numbers and percentages while I scoped the official Minnesota Wisconsin box score from last night. I read up on the game, watched the highlights and still couldn’t find a serious statistic or problem that would point to how Wisconsin fell to the Gophers at home, after taking an 11 point lead before the half. It had to exist in the intangibles, and it does.
Since he left Kentucky, the SEC has suffered, but the Big Ten has added one of college basketball’s best minds to match Tom Izzo. There’s a reason that he will be in the Hall of Fame one day. Tubby Smith knows how to create a team that wins. He has done that in Minnesota and we can look towards the Wisconsin game for why.
Every good coach has to “sell his systemâ€, when the W’s come, the troops get on board. Tubby Smith has his entire team on board with his system. Not just his assistants, not just starters, not just the sixth man; I mean the whole team. That’s because everyone is involved.
Bo Ryan worked a rotation of primarily 7 players, maxing out starters with each one close to 40 minutes for the Badgers last night. While some of the best squads in the country are primarily looking at 7 player rotations – Duke, Wake Forest, Michigan State, UConn. The minutes lean heavily on 5 starters and two players coming off the bench, for the most part.
7 players came off the bench last night for Tubby Smith. That means 12 players got minutes in a hard fought, OT battle, in the heat of conference play. 9 players saw more than 15 minutes in the game. The whole team got a win. Not just 7 guys and there’s value in a having a long bench in college basketball and it extends beyond conventional sports thinking
Putting guys on the floor, and having a deep bench doesn’t just keep legs fresh and defense active, it creates
intangibles. It creates a new definition for team game. Tubby Smith has 9 players averaging 15 minutes, more than 5 points and 2 rebounds. No those numbers aren’t staggering but at the minimum everyone is contributing, positively. To have accountability and 9 players that you can trust on the floor isn’t something every coach in the country has or wants to risk.
That’s a decision by the coach, to get every member of his squad on board, to get every man minutes, to create a culture of belief around your program. Taking risks on young players in college, at the peak of their development breeds confidence and hunger in a team and a locker room. When virtually every player on Minnesota’s team has contributed something to their start, players are all in. It shows, too. They’ve won 16 games and they are 4 wins away from the magic 20 and gaining that invitation to dance in March.
We all know that college basketball is an emotional game. One that champions a team game played with commitment, toughness, and a never-die attitude. The Gophers showed that last night overcoming a huge second half deficit. They showed swagger and depth on the road. They showed that their record is not a fluke, and that they have the moxie to challenge Tom Izzo’s team for the Big Ten title. (By the way, Feb. 4 is the date when the two see each other again in East Lansing.) All this, thanks to a new face on the sidelines. Tubby Smith has created a team in the Barn that is enjoying unseen success, and challenging the hockey team for headlines due to selling his brand of team basketball.
Far-fetched? Maybe, if you’re a numbers guy, or one that just believes in talent. Though, for those who have been part of a scrappy locker room, jumped around in warm-ups as part of confident bench, or get a little choked up during “Rudyâ€, it makes sense. When your coach calls your number more often than not, you’re that much more willing to fight for that team, that fight will win games in college basketball.
The sixth-annual Unauthorized Big Ten Basketball Writers Preview Poll was released over the weekend.
Purdue was picked to finish first and the recently punched-in-the-balls by Kelvin Sampson IU program was selected to finish dead last in the Big Ten.
Here are the results (first place votes are in parenthesis):
1. Purdue (10)
2. Michigan State (5)
3. Wisconsin
4. Ohio State
5. Minnesota
6. Illinois
7. Penn State
8. Michigan
T9. Iowa
T9. Northwestern
11. Indiana
