Sports’ writing is an oxymoron

If you have been paying attention – and I am talking to all four of the regular readers of this august blog – you have noticed that there has been a distinct difference in the topic and tone of what I write as compared to what the proposed raison d’etre of this blog is supposed to be.

And sometimes I wonder if I am just being a hater, cause I can do that in a hurry. (What did you say? The sky is blue? I think I see hues of green and yellow there! And what about at night? Is it blue then? What about when you are looking at the sky through smog? It sure isn’t blue then! And what about…..)

So yeah some of the time I can be a pain in the ass just because.

Not this time though.
I think we can all agree that sports today is at times an excuse for a media orgy. Large corporations have figured out that content – at times dripping with tedium and fraud – will keep people coming back again and again. It doesn’t matter if it is crap as long as it keeps changing its’ appearance.
So this week it is some blather about Multi millionaire Dale Earnhart Jr and his feud with his multi millionaire stepmother, and a few weeks ago it was all about whether or not the Peyton Manning love-in would be ordered to a close by the FCC, because porn isn’t legal over the public airwaves yet.

(That is not to say that the current media overload hasn’t had some positive impact. I don’t think we will ever automatically equate heroism with sporting proficiency while sober at any point in my lifetime. And by the way, the oedipal connotations of Earnhart and his step momma might just make these pages in the next few days.)

So I though I would list a few things that I call bullshit on, on a daily basis in the wide world of sports writing, and locate the kryptonite to these mendacities.

Pre season predictions down to the end of season champion.
Is there any refuge as reprehensible as the beginning of the season prediction? No one ever goes back and says ‘yeah I thought that The Redskins were going to the Super Bowl. Turns out every one of my reasons were about as far off as could be. Hey I still get paid right?’
Or
‘I know I told you to draft Texiera in the first round, uh, my bad?’

That the pre season prediction game is such as morass of displaced credibility and has taken on a life of its’ own is one of my secret joys at the start of each season. Witness the mountain of publications and websites touting their champions and who to draft where. Is this not taking away the inherent reason that we watch sports? Because we don’t know what is going to happen? And except for the American League East division, ( uh, Yankees, Red Sox, Jays) are any of these predictions worth the $5.75 we paid for them. Or that one time offer for a yearlong subscription? A remarkable waste of pages and pixels.

The Kryptonite
Look for the articles that talk about the dramas that are going to unfold like ‘How is Bud Selig going to make himself disappear when Barry Bonds breaks the Home Run record?”
Or, “Will T.O. still be able to get the entire ESPN football division to follow him again?”

Guys Playing the right way. Or the ‘Playing with emotion’ spiel.
Commonly known as ‘how to give credit to the less talented (most often white) media suck up cause the true top player treats us like a bunch of vanilla cupcakes with microphones and notepads’. Case in point, Raptor Fan favorite, the Junk Yard Dog Jerome Williams. This guy got paid MILLIONS for what? Doing what any number of JUCO players could have done. That he was such a big part of the proposed Raptor Future was more an indictment of the front office – now blown up – than it was regarding the talent level of the team. Why didn’t anyone have the stones to talk to Oakley? Sure he might have slapped you, but he would have educated you before the assault.


The Kryptonite
Every time you see Brett Favre chuck up another helpless hail mary of a pass, while the announcer goes on about how he is ‘just having fun out there’, turn to the person next to you and say, ‘He sucks now. He has sucked for about four years. He needs to retire’. Trust me, you will feel great afterwards.

Fantasy Sports

Before we get to fantasy sports, let's have a look at this picture.



It’s not a smile, a grin, a knowing look or any other friendly facial expression; it’s a smirk. It’s the same condescending look that Vince Carter always wears when he plays the Raptors. He flashed it at Chris Bosh when fans chanted “MVP!” and he smugly threw it at Mo Pete while the longest serving Raptor tried to pump up the crowd but by the end of the game the Raptors had wiped the smirk from his face. During the final minutes of last night’s match up between the top teams in the Atlantic, Carter had a face like a slapped ass. It was fantastic. It doesn’t matter that the Nets were missing three of their starters; a message was sent. The Raptors are the better team.







Let’s talk about fantasy sports. For those of you who don’t know, I started a keeper hockey league with nine friends of mine a year and a half ago. We had been playing in an annual pool and decided that the best way to make the General Manager experience more complete was to allow each manager to keep two players from their teams every year. This means that managers with teams on the edge can trade away picks to try and win this year and others can improve their chances in next year’s draft.



This season started slowly but as the NHL’s and fantasy league’s trade deadline approaches people have been more interested making moves. In the past week, someone traded away Jagr for a second round draft pick. The manager who grabbed Jagr now has an excellent chance to win this year and the other GM will have 2 second round picks next year. It has been interesting to watch as managers decide when it is time to make a move. My team is sitting in the middle of the pack but I don’t think that adding one more player is going to put me into the top 3 so, as of now, I am holding on to my picks.



This is the next level of fantasy pools. Being able to trade next years draft picks and choosing franchise players to keep adds an exciting extra dimension.



The only problem with a keeper pool is that you have to have a group of people who are willing to commit to the pool for a number of years and it can be difficult to replace managers. New comers have to choose keepers from someone else’s team and it take a while for them to put a personal touch on their team.





Years ago a website called sandbox offered keeper baseball leagues. They were great leagues but you had to pay for them. I am organizing a keeper baseball pool this year and am hoping that it will as successful as the hockey venture. Baseball is the best sport for fantasy pools. It is a statistical game and the seemingly endless season is made more bearable when you have a vested interest in a pool. There are so many positions and player in baseball that keeping 3 players per team will allow managers to create a team identity. Some people will decide to keep all hitters, others pitchers and some a combination of both. Being able to stockpile talent at a position will also create new trading options.



The baseball pool season is about to open on Yahoo and I am planning to get my leagues ready tomorrow. I will be getting together with some other fantasy experts to put together some draft tips as well as fantasy draft guides so stay tuned!

Ford, Claderon and Gin & Tussin!

T.J. Ford has reclaimed his role as Toronto’s starting point guard. Sam Mitchell and Brian Colangelo are hoping that will be the end of any discussion about who should be starting for Raptors. Too bad Jose Calderon is out playing Ford. Calderon is making a very convincing case for himself to be top point guard for the Raptors. He is hitting big shots, playing great defense and most importantly; he always seems to be getting the ball into the right player’s hands. I know that Ford is the franchise’s point guard for the future; but man it has got to be hard for Mitchell to keep Calderon on the bench. Last night Calderon put up 16 points to go along with 9 dimes and 5 boards compared to Fords 7 points, 7 assists and 1 rebound; Calderon also played one minute less. Right now, I feel more comfortable when Calderon is on the floor running the offense and I think that the team feels the same way. I will be watching closely to see how minutes are dished out.

I hope the Raptors blow out the Nets tonight. Without Kidd and Jefferson on the floor the Raptors should be able to key in on Carter and shut him down. I hate Carter so much!!! He simply gave up on the Raptors and there is no excuse for that. I am happy that he is proving to be an inconsistent player who can’t lead his team into the playoffs. If you want to sell tickets you get Vince Carter and if you want to win championships you get Shaq. Bosh could score 40 tonight. Richard Jefferson has been one of the few players in the East who has proven he can shut Bosh down and he won’t be playing.

The Leafs played a forgettable game last night. What an effort by Rick Dipietro! The Leafs out shot the Islanders 16-1 in the third period and couldn’t put one past the goalie. What must have made every Leafs fan upset was to see what Antropov and Ponikarovsky did in the shootout. These two oafs both decided to try and score on wrists shots?!?! No moves, no stick dangles, not even a head fake; just a wrister in to the pads of the goalie. Maybe they think they are the next comings of Mats Sundin. Sundin scored his shootout goal on an absolutely perfect shot into the top corner of the net. If those two donkeys think that they can just skate up to a NHL goalie and score without making a move then Paul Maurice needs to rethink who he selects for the shootout.

The Leafs should bring back Mogilny to teach some dangles to the next generation. Gary Roberts would have broken Ponikarovsky and Antropov’s neck if they had tried that rubbish with him on the team. If they are going to bring back players then they should also think about getting Belfour to introduce Raycroft to his secret Gin and Tussin’ recipe. Belfour would go through 3 bottles of his recipe every night and still easily stop any rookie in a shootout. Raycroft had a good night but you can’t let some rookie embarrass you like that in a shootout.

It’s hard to be fan of this team and I think most people in the city are jumping on and off the band wagon with every game. They really need to make the sensible decision and rebuild this team.

Confucius says "To Beat a Team You Must Be a Team"

Brian Colangelo builds teams and teams win championships. The Raptors are a team in the truest sense of the word. Yes, they are built around a superstar but they only win when they play as a team. Bosh is not the typical, swing-man, NBA superstar in the mold of Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant and T-Mac. If a comparison has to be made it would be with the player who has quietly had a Hall of Fame career: Tim Duncan.




Duncan and Bosh play the unglamorous power forward position. Their body type keeps them from throwing down the jaw dropping dunks that have made so many shooting guards famous. We don’t see them dribbling the ball up the court or running the plays from the top of the key. This results in less media attention and thus less attention from the fans. This is very unfortunate because what players like Bosh and Duncan bring is maybe the most important building block for a team. The threat they pose with their inside/outside game forces defenses to come out and cover them as well as double team them in the post. This opens up driving lanes and open looks for the rest of the team. Anyone that says Tony Parker would ever have been an All Star without Duncan is spending too much time looking at his girlfriend (a great pass time!) and not enough time looking at his game. Parker can’t shoot. He can lay the ball up with both hands and does it with the best but he cannot shoot. His career field goal percentage is a very deceiving 48.5% because of the number of lay-ups he makes. Anyone who watches his game will know that he has a very difficult time making jump shots on a regular basis. If you take away Duncan, you take away the lanes and you take away Parker. I can’t wait until Duncan retires and all those “great” Spurs players are forced to play without one of the greatest big men ever. Ginobili will have to go back to Argentina and Parker, well he can bask in the beautiful glow of Eva some where in the French Riviera.



Bosh isn’t as good as Duncan but Calderon and Ford are getting great lanes to drive and it is because of Bosh. Anthony Parker is chucking up a very respectable .433% from 3 point land because of good, team ball movement and double teams that Bosh draws. The team dynamic that Colangelo and Mitchell have created is what makes the Raptors do difficult to match up with. Unfortunately, the Raptors have a hard time beating teams with the same dynamic.



If you have watched the Raptors recent wins you may have noticed that are having a fairly easy time beating teams that focus their games around one player ie. the Lakers. They are also having a hard time beating teams that have a variety of weapons ie. the Pistons. Tonight they are facing a team in the later category. The Bulls have won the past fifteen games against the Raptors and that comes from strong team play. If the Raptors can win tonight it would be a huge moral boost and represent a major team accomplishment. By knocking off the Bulls, the Raptors can take a place as one of the top teams in the East and send a message that they will be tough to beat come playoff time. They will need perimeter defense and good shooting by the supporting cast. I am calling for Bosh to put up 25 and 8.



I do have to say that Anthony Parker did a fantastic job on Kobe on Friday night. If he gave an effort like that every night the Raptors would be a very dangerous team! I am also loving what Mo Pete does in the fourth quarter. He is hitting big shots and playing great D. Did anyone else see him cut off the base line and keep on the away from the net in the fourth quarter? I know his minutes have been cut dramatically but he has turned into a veteran player who can bring a lot of energy off the bench. I hope he realizes that Toronto is on the verge of something great and that he should accept a reduced role to stick around.

You say Goodbye, and I say Hello

)))))



I want all you Cowboy haters out there to remember today. Because today is the day you can look back to and say “shit, that’s when the Cowboys started really kicking our asses again”.

The most popular Sports Team in North America (aka, the part of the World that Matters) finally choose a Maestro one Wade Phillips - Son of Bum - , (and really, when the old white guy with the pattern baldness wins a position of power, can any of us really ever be surprised?).

I don’t want to gush here, but when the Cowboys are beating the snot out of your favourite team next year – and Chris (Skins), Brad (Fleagles), Seb (incredibly, the Lions, THE LIONS?!), you too Natascha (whoever your team is this week) – you can say that you know a guy that predicted the rising of the Doomsday Dallas Defense.

When Demarcus Ware picks up his first Defensive POY award, you can say you heard it here first.

Mr. Ware just became Unblockable.

(I don’t want to get technical with you guys, but Mr Ware just spent Two years getting strong (265lbs) and fast enough (4.6 40 time) to control offensive Tackles at the LOS one on one, while remembering to split out into the flat and cover speedy RB’s, FB’s HB, and TE’s. Now he is moving into a system that will let him cheat that Tackle and stand over the TE or on the outside shoulder of the Tackle. I am frothing at the mouth thinking about his sack total next year. He might take out two QB’s on his own next year, and in Detroit that might be a blessing.)

But I digress.

What I want to talk about is the passing of the last true pin up girl, Anna Nicole Smith.



She died this week in a lavish hotel room in South Florida. (Had this been another era, she would have been penniless and living in a shack somewhere. I for one think that this is progress).

Anna became famous in the early nineties, the last era where you had to work for your porn. People actually bought magazines with pictures of naked women in them!
Really!
You couldn’t just google ‘sweater meat’ and get some relief whenever you felt like it. She was a stripper who was to go on to be playmate of the year and a model for Guess? Jeans. She then married an 89-year-old oil billionaire. (Will the arrows of Cupid ever be predictable?)



What I loved her for is her honesty. She grew up dirt poor, worked at the shittiest jobs – Fried Chicken joint waitress, Wal-Mart, Stripper – and managed to hit the jackpot by becoming a media circus in high heels. There was never a point where she claimed a yearning to be an actor, or singer, or fashion designer. She knew what was going on.

(I do know what the real tragedy is here: That poor people have little or no chance of escaping their poverty, and that some might say that Anna had to exploit herself to get out of poverty. Those same people might say that Women are exploited and emotionally destroyed without the rewards that Anna enjoyed. Some might even say that her exploitation of herself might have been what killed her in the end. I disagree with the last statement. I think that Anna Nicole knew what she was doing and did the best she could with what she had. The fact that her options were so limited is another topic...)

She was beautiful.
She would let pictures be taken of her while undressed.
She would be paid lavishly for that experience.

Adieu Mademoiselle Anna.
We all loved watching you make your way to the top.

Bryant vs. Oakley

Get ready for great basketball Toronto because Kobe is coming to town. If he drops 80 again I am going to be sick. I can’t stand Kobe Bryant, he brings out so much hate in my heart. I want to throw him in a Vietnamese torture chamber with an irritated Charles Oakley suffering from hemorrhoids, stir in some fire ants and see what comes out…..Ok, that might be a bit dramatic but I really don’t like the guy. The problem is that he is such a good basketball player.

Kobe Bryant is the best player in the NBA. I’m not talking about who you would start a franchise with if you could choose anyone. If I was playing a game of pickup and had first choice of all the players in the league; Kobe is a no brainer. He has matured from a great scorer into a complete player. He can pass, rebound, defend, lead and his basketball IQ is off the charts. The other Lakers are having career years because Kobe is getting them involved, getting them good shots and making it a team effort. He is taking 7 fewer shots a game but his field goal percentage is the highest it has been since 2001-2002. Kobe is still getting the last shot and he takes what is his but last year taught him once and for all that he can’t do it alone.

My hate of Kobe began when he decided that total domination of the NBA wasn’t enough because he didn’t do it alone. All those rings seem to mean nothing to him because he knows, deep in his heart, that Shaq did that. He ran Diesel and Phil Jackson out of town and then, slowly realized that he can’t win a championship alone. After Shaq made a break for the sunshine state, Kobe tried to fill the leadership void left on the Lakers. While he put up great individual numbers, the Lakers slumped in the standings. It takes a team to win a championship and that has been proven again and again. Very rarely has an individual won a championship for a team and if anyone can think of one please let me know (MJ HAD a team I don't care what anyone says). A very good argument can be made for Dwayne Wade in last years finals but I am not totally convinced. The Spurs, Pistons and Suns all play a team game around superstars of all different types (yes Billups is a legit superstar). The NBA and Adidas have tried to hammer that message home with a set of commercial based around the slogan “It takes 5” and it seems Kobe is listening.

The Raptors are listening. Last game they had both point guards get double-doubles!! I am looking forward to a real challenge for the Raptors tonight. The Lakers are the first top level team they have played in a couple weeks. I want to see Anthony Parker getting up on everyone of Kobe’s shots and get help when he needs it. Bosh will carry the load on both ends and I’m calling 30 points and 10 boards tonight!!

It still hurts....Lakers vs. Raps

Coming off another impressive win and a ridiculous performance by Bosh, you would think Coach of the Month, Sam Mitchell would be able to get a good night's sleep. But his nightmare kept him up in a cold sweat all night. What would cause such an unpleasant evening?.....81 POINTS!

Two words Mitchy: Double Team

Kobe Bryant visits the ACC tonight with his own dreams of trying to shake off one of his worst shooting games of the year. Last night Kobe shot 5 of 13 for 18 pts while also committing a dismal 8 of his team's 18 turnovers in a loss to the Pistons. Expecting the Raptors to hold #24 to the same numbers is highly unlikely. Kobe is, as always, an MVP candidate and still the best go-to guy in the league. You can be sure he will want to bounce back from yesterday's performance and look to put up big numbers; and who better to do that against than the team he disgraced a year ago.

The Raptors, however, have an MVP candidate in the making of their own. Chris Bosh has established himself as one of the most dominate players in the NBA. While being a force around the basket, Bosh has made it known to all players that he can now step back and hit the outside jumper. So how do you defend him? Well, like all great players, you just kind of hope he has off nights.

As the Raptors continue to make noise around the league and make a name for themselves in the Eastern Conference, these next two games will truly be a test of how far they have come and where they can go. The Lakers( 30-20 ) are a well coached team that can beat anyone on any given night. Only the Raptors best efforts will give them a chance against a team that they are 4-17 lifetime, with their last win coming nearly two years ago.

This will likely be a close game with a sell-out crowd and lots of highlights for fans to be entertained by. And although I love the Raps, I see Kobe being a little too much, again.
Either way, tonight will not only be a great test for Toronto, but a chance at redemption for the embarrassment the team put its fans through last year. Look for Bosh to try and upstage one of the all-time greatest players and make a case for himself as the league's MVP.