COMMENTS FROM THE PEANUT GALLERY (X-RATED) - MIKE IN DA

COMMENTS FROM THE PEANUT GALLERY (X-RATED)

Written by: Mike in DA
Date posted: 3/24/2011

EVEN HITLER IS UPSET ABOUT THE NFL LOCKOUT!

lockout

BUTLER BULLDOGS CONSIDERING OFFERS TO RELOCATE TO A BIGGER MARKET!

March 23 (SP) - In the midst of another surprising NCAA Tournament run, the Butler Bulldogs have informed local officials that they are exploring a move to a larger market that can raise the team’s profile and merchandising opportunities.

“Sports at this level are a business,” said Butler athletic director Barry Collier. “And we have to make the best business decision for our team. We have established ourselves as a premier program and bigger markets have come calling. We’re hot right now. It’s not the time to sit still.”

Butler is currently located in Indiana, seven miles from Indianapolis, a mid-sized Midwestern city, but is now weighing offers from New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Miami, among other locations.


“I love it here,” said Butler head coach Brad Stevens. “But imagine the media coverage we’d get having this success in New York City. Not to mention what they could pay me there. I know it would definitely be enough to keep me at Butler for a long time.”

Butler would instantly dominate the New York college basketball scene currently populated by mediocre St. John’s, Rutgers, and Seton Hall. But similar opportunities exist in Los Angeles where USC and a sliding UCLA play, as well as Miami - home to the poor Miami Hurricane program - and Chicago, which is saddled with Northwestern and DePaul.


University officials do not want to see the Bulldogs go and are considering moving the entire university out of Indianapolis to the team’s desired location.


“We don’t want to lose them,” said Butler University president Bobby Fong. “We can pretty much load up one moving truck and be set. We’ll take our university sign and some desks and chairs and maybe a few microscopes. As for books, it makes more sense to have that all online anyway. I’m ready to go when they are.”


But Indiana officials are hoping to stop the move.

“I’ll raise taxes to build them a huge, state-of-the-art arena,” said Indiana governor Mitch Daniels. “I’ll pull strings in Washington to get them more national coverage. I’ll cut our state education budget to pay Coach Stevens more money. Whatever it takes. Please, Butler. Please just don’t leave us with the Indiana Hoosiers as our state’s most well-known basketball team. We don’t deserve that.”

THE PEANUT GALLERY VS. THE HOUSTON CHRONICLE “EXPERTS” CHALLENGE

Last week, in the 3/19 Peanut Gallery (http://sheltonmedia.blogspot.com/2011/03/comments-from-peanut-gallery-mike-in-da_19.html), I told you of the four "experts" from the Houston Chronicle (Jeffrey Martin, Richard Justice, Kevin Pender, and Jerome Solomon) who made their Men’s NCAA Sweet Sixteen, Final Four, and National Champion selections in the Chronicle on 3/15 (page C6).

Since I don’t play bracket pools, I used the Crier’s ratings shown here last week to make my selections to see how I would do against the "experts".


After going 4 for 4 in the "First Four" and 14 for 16 in the Second Round, I was 10 for 16 in the Third Round. So going into the Sweet Sixteen, I have ten teams alive, including my Final Four (Ohio State, San Diego State, Kansas, and Wisconsin).


Jeffrey Martin has been following College Basketball almost all season long and picked Pittsburgh to win it. With Syracuse, Texas, and Purdue also in his Final Four, he gets shutout of the Final Four, as all were knocked out this past weekend. In his Sweet Sixteen, he selected only thirteen teams (a flub) because he probably knew he was a “dead man walking”.

Richard Justice has nine teams in the Sweet Sixteen. He might have had ten, but his Sweet 16 listed only fifteen teams (a flub). His Final Four consisted of Ohio State, Texas, Kansas, and Pittsburgh. Since Texas and Pittsburgh are out of it, Richard is sweating it out. But he does have a solid Kansas team alive as the champ.


Kevin Pender has nine of the Sweet 16 remaining, but he’s also sweating it out, as Notre Dame and Pittsburgh of his Final Four are gone, leaving him with just San Diego State and his champ, Ohio State.

Of the Chronicle “experts”, Jerome Solomon seems to be the only one who liked the chalk. He has eight of the Sweet 16, but all of his Final Four are left – Ohio State, Duke, Kansas, and Florida with Buckeyes as his champ, which is the same team I have.

Next week, we'll follow up on this "challenge".









THIS GYMNAST IS CHEATING!

THE GREATEST LIVING BASEBALL PLAYERS – EXCEPT MAYBE FOR HOUSTON!

At the Houston Chronicle website, staff writer, Steve Campbell, has an article about the greatest living player for each baseball team (http://www.chron.com/sports/photogallery/Top_baseball_players_alive.html). So I thought I’d check out Steve's “definitive” list of greatest living players of the active major-league franchises.


First of all, Steve flubbed, as he couldn’t even spell or didn't proof his last name right, “It’s a question so good, I, Steve Campell am going to look for great answers.”

I read the headline and the next thing I knew, I was in a 31-slide slideshow. I don’t want no stinkin’ time-consuming slideshow. Just give me the list of players by team. I’m sick and tired of slideshows, unless they’re nude or semi-nude pix of women. I just want to read the list and don’t need pictures. I know what Willie Mays and Hank Aaron look like and if I didn't and was interested, I'd "google-image".


The selections were Steve’s own personal opinions and most of the selections were straightforward and obvious (Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, Stan Musial, Yogi Berra, Mike Schmidt, George Brett, etc.), but some were questionable to me, but since they were his choices, I’m not going to rip into him in the several cases where I fully disagreed with him.

But I don’t see how he picked Joe Morgan as the greatest living Houston Astro. Was it because Joe is a Hall of Famer or did former Astros Craig Biggio, Jeff Bagwell, J. R. Richard, and Jim Wynn secretly die?

Joe played ten seasons for the Astros and hit .261 over that period. He made the All-Star team twice with the Astros and his Astros per season stats were less than his career per season stats except for triples.

I would think that if you were considering a team's best player, you would look at his time with that specific team and not what he did with another team; in this case, the Cincinnati Reds.

 

 

Steve, are the Astros so weak, that Morgan is their greatest living player? Wow!

I’m sure there’s a lot of Astros fans out there who also disagree with Steve.

THE ART OF LYING: JUST ASK PINOCCHIO!

This week, our local sports talkers are spending some time talking about Bruce Pearl and Barry Bonds. Lying is what got both of these guys in trouble.

The firing of Bruce Pearl at Tennessee is a big story. The PG expected it to happen around last Thanksgiving time, as it was predicted then that Pearl was on a short leash. It is important here to find the reason that Tennessee fired him. True, Bruce Pearl was caught in the act of violating NCAA recruiting rules; but make no mistake, that is not why he is out of work today.

Bruce Pearl is out of work today because when confronted with evidence that he did something wrong and something he knew was wrong, he lied about it. Some hack has made a lot of people refer to that behavior as “providing false and misleading information to NCAA investigators”; in the hood what Bruce Pearl did was lie through his teeth. As a result, he is out of work.

The Barry Bonds trial is underway; the jury is in place; the lawyers have their vocal chords tuned up and ready to go. Why is Barry Bonds on trial and in danger of serving prison time?

The allegation is that he used illegal steroids and when questioned about that usage he lied to Federal investigators and then lied under oath to a grand jury. If the government can convince those 12 jurors that Bonds lied under oath, he will be guilty of a felony and could go to jail. Lying under oath is lots worse than lying to NCAA investigators.

The life lesson here is that lying your way out of a bad situation may work some of the time and perhaps may work many of the times you find yourself in hot water. However, lying your way out of a bad situation might also make things a whole lot worse. Bruce Pearl would never have been fired with a winning percentage in the neighborhood of .660 and with six NCAA tournament appearances in six seasons absent the lies. Barry Bonds would not be staring down the barrel of prison time had he been completely candid.


“BACK TO SCHOOL” IS NOT FOR ALL - SOME DROP OUT!

San Diego State is one of the Crier’s Final Four using the rating system shown in last week’s posts on the Tournament. In the same "Sweet Sixteen" bracket with UConn, Duke, and Arizona, It's chances of moving on to the Final Four are less than 40%.


However, regardless of the outcome for the Aztecs, it has been a very successful season, as the team rose from the discard heap several years ago to become a winner and a No. 2 seed! Hooray for success stories!


I wonder how they did it. Turns out, it was pretty easy. San Diego State was recently identified by the Knight Commission on collegiate academics as having the worst on-track-to-graduate record along with Syracuse, Kansas State, and Purdue of the teams in this year's NCAA Tournament.


For all the big dirty little secrets we know about the NCAA as to how TV conflicts, afflicts, and ultimately rules, there are other secrets that are not told.

For example, how many Division I basketball players, especially those whose eligibility has expired, simply will call it quits and not return to their school, let alone attend class, the moment their team is eliminated from or wins the NCAA Tournament or NIT?


This figure is usually in the several dozens and this happens every year and you can say the same thing after the last college football game and that number of dropouts is even higher. The players never even bother to return to school. Their job at the school is now complete.


You may ask how it’s possible for college basketball players, so many having been recruited and enrolled despite academic liabilities, being able to legitimately attend school during a regular season spread over two semesters, followed by a conference tournament, then the NCAAs or NIT.




The answer: What difference does it make? For them and the school, school is optional. The dropouts were recruited to play ball, not to go to school.

ROCKET SEASON TICKETHOLDERS  SHOULD BE HAPPY CARMELO DIDN’T COME TO HOUSTON!

For months, Houston Rocket fans on local sports talk radio were hoping to see Carmelo Anthony in their team's uniform. Since the time that the New York Knicks acquired Carmelo in “The Trade Heard Around The World”, the Knicks have a losing record (7-10 as of 3/24).

Then shortly after the trade, the Knicks announced a huge ticket price increase for next season. One of my former co-workers who shares Knick season tickets with his brother-in-law has tickets behind one of the baskets and to the right. The cost of the tickets for the current season is $110 per seat per game. That is way above my budget for a sporting event (actually any event), but in 2011/12, those same seats will cost him $300 per game (those seats are expected to range around $500 next season for the playoffs). However, to be fair, not all of the ticket price increases are in the 170% range. Neither are any of them in the 2% range.
 

Then to dip even further into the pockets of Knicks’ fans (New York Ranger fans also), the team and MSG management announced they will make major new renovations to Madison Square Garden and will provide venues with new ways to collect money from fans. Here are some of the highlights from the Knicks’ announcement: “Our top priority is to create a world-class experience for every person that visits Madison Square Garden. The Garden transformation will provide our fans with best-in-class service, new amenities, and outstanding food and beverage offerings. This will be a new state-of-the-art arena with wider concourses, new seats, better sight lines, and improved social settings.”

If you're looking for a good meal and a nice bottle of wine and have a grand or two available, why don't you go to Madison Square Garden for dinner? You might even get to see a Knicks game.

The latest ticket price rise promises the finest in amenities, including food, a festive pub atmosphere, and fine mall shopping. But who asked for them? It's as if ballparks and arenas should be viewed and attended as restaurants and hangouts, as if the games played within are just throw-ins and sideshows, like a pool table in the back of a bar. Hey does that sound familiar - Reliant Stadium, Minute Maid Park, Toyota Center?


Fine. But what about those who'd like to buy tickets to games to experience a good game from a decent seat at a reasonable price? When did those people become the minority at a game?

Well, to the Knicks credit, season ticketholders don’t have to buy PSLs to attend games at the Garden.


One more thing for Knicks’ fans to think about as they consider paying for season tickets is when might the 2011/12 season begin? Fans that pay in full for 41 home games might only get to see 20 of them in the season and you can bet that the folks from the Knicks and MSG will not be sending refund checks out as each home game is missed.

The Knicks shouldn't be expecting my former co-worker to renew his seats for next season. St. John's basketball and the minor league Brooklyn Cyclones are more to the liking of his budget.

AU REVOIR. MONSIEUR PHIL!

Being an LA Laker fan, I will be sorry to see Lakers’ coach, Phil Jackson, leaving the team at the end of the season. With this in mind, the perfect way for the NBA to script the NBA Finals would be to have the Lakers play the Chicago Bulls (sorry Heat, there's always next year). In case the conspiracy theorists had not considered this yet, let me be the first to make them aware of it.

With regard to Phil leaving the Lakers, the question will be: “Is taking over the Lakers’ coaching job in 2012 a dream or a nightmare?”

On one hand, the next LA coach will inherit a team with Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol, Lamar Odom, Andrew Bynum, and a loyal fan base. On the other hand, the new coach gets to follow a legendary coach who has won 11 NBA championships in 20 seasons and following legendary coaches usually does not work out very well for the successors. Please ask Gene Bartow (John Wooden), Phil Bengston (Vince Lombardi), Ray Perkins (Bear Bryant), Bill Guthridge (Dean Smith), Earle Bruce (Woody Hayes), Mike Davis (Bobby Knight), etc.

"FAB FIVE" TALK

There was a lot of local sports talk over the last week concerning ESPN’s “Fab Five” special. A lot was said about Jalen Rose’s comments as an 18-year old about how Mike Krzyzewski only recruited “Uncle Toms”.

These were the social observations of a kid; they do not merit being taken with a grain of salt. It is important to note, however, that Chris Webber, the centerpiece of the "Fab Five", was not actually a “ghetto kid” growing up in poverty and making it to college only because he was lucky enough to dodge bullets going to and from school and the gym every day.

Webber was a middle class kid who went to private school; his family was not super-rich, but he was not worried about where his next meal was coming from either. The characterization of the “Fab Five” as representation of the underclass was a bit of a stretch.

ODDS AND ENDS:

1. When and if there is an NFL CBA in place such that teams can make roster changes, Tiki Barber will be looking for work as a running back. When he announced his desire to return to the NFL, there were rumors linking him to Pittsburgh and Tampa Bay. If those do not work out, the next team that he might want to check out is the Cincinnati Bengals. That is the elephant’s graveyard of the NFL where players with solid careers go to die.

2. As mentioned here last week, this week, Chad Ochocinco (or is it back to Johnson now) is trying out with the MLS team in Kansas City. What? Why can’t one of the NFL’s biggest egos and an attention-starved soccer league get together without everybody assuming it’s just a fuckin’ publicity stunt!?!”


3. Oakland University coach Greg Kampe, on President Obama picking Texas over his Golden Grizzlies in the Big O's bracket pool: "I didn’t vote for him, either, so I guess we’re even now."

CRIER'S CORNER

BASKETBALL ACTION

Yesterday’s Record ATS: 2-3


L - PHILADELPHIA* (-7) over ATLANTA
L - UTAH (+10.5) over OKLAHOMA CITY*
W - SAN ANTONIO (+5) over DENVER*


NIT
W - CHARLESTON (+7.5) over WICHITA STATE*


CBI
L - BOISE STATE (+5) over OREGON*

Cumulative Season Record ATS (excludes “pushes”): 556-342

Today’s Action (for reading purposes only):

NBA

DALLAS* (-15) over MINNESOTA
The Mavericks will be in a war to retain the #2 seed in the West the way the Lakers have been playing of late. And the repercussions of having to go all out at this time of the year could take a toll once they get to the spring. The Mavs won both games this year with the Wolves, but they failed to cover March 7 in Minnesota mainly because they were playing in a back-to-back and were horrible defending the perimeter. DALLAS, 118-96


COLLEGE HOOPS


NCAA

Superdome, New Orleans, LA
FLORIDA (-3) over BRIGHAM YOUNG
BUTLER (+5) over WISCONSIN


Honda Center, Anaheim, CA
CONNECTICUT (-1) over SAN DIEGO STATE



MIKE IN DA
 
HMW