We'll start off with a pop quiz this morning. Put your books on the floor and please write your answers legibly. There are two questions today:
- On a spectrum that has “rolled eyes and a shoulder shrug” at one end, “total boredom” in the middle and “catatonic stupor” at the other end, rate these two items of sports news:
The WNBA Finals begin.
The NHL teams report to training camp.
- Will sales of Starbucks triple espressos skyrocket in the next week?
Before there was a WNBA and before there was an ABL, women played in the Professional Women's Basketball League back in the 70s and 80s. Players from that league will gather in Chicago next week to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the formation of that league. The first team admitted to the league was the Iowa Cornets. Their team bus was called “The Corndog”. Other franchises included the Houston Angels, the Milwaukee Does and the Chicago Hustle. The Does fired their coach after the first game; the Cornet fired their coach after 2 games – both of which were wins. The Women's Basketball League may not have been an economic success or even an artistic success, but it certainly provided more interesting news tidbits in its short lifetime than the WNBA has in its existence.
In the NBA, we learned this week that Vin Baker is an alcoholic who was given to binge drinking. He has been through rehab and supposedly has lost weight – all the way down to 245lbs, which is what he weighed when he was actually a good player. If binge drinking was the cause of his terrible play for the last 5 years, I'm surprised that his liver does not have the consistency of a cinder block by now. But since I don't wish illness on people who are merely incompetent and not evil, I hope that he has recovered from his affliction and can play basketball competently again.
After the Dolphins' loss to the Texans last week, calls for Dave Wannstedt's head were ringing throughout South Florida. Last year, the Texans won their season opener – actually it was their franchise opener too – over the Cowboys. Please note that the Cowboys changed coaches in the off-season. Is a trend emerging here?
Here is a factoid from the Elias Sports Bureau. Believe me, if they had not come up with it, I would not have it here. In no way would I have the patience to go and dig this out. The Eagles and Pats play this weekend and both were shut out in their openers. That has not happened in over 70 years. In 1932, the Chicago Bears played the Staten Island Stapletons in game two of that season and what happened then was that the Bears/Stapletons' game ended in a scoreless tie. I suspect that will not be the outcome in Philly this weekend…
I wonder if Andy Reid and the Eagles' staff spent the week practicing “game situations”. After all, without practice you might not be able to have first and goal at the one and come away with no points again this week. And there is always the ever-popular two-yard pass attempt when it is third and eight…
Four members of the Baltimore Ravens have had their homes burglarized in the past couple of months. It always happened when the team was practicing or in training camp. All of the players live in the same area, which is a short drive from the Ravens' training facility just outside Baltimore. A statement from the police doing the investigation said, “It seems like more than a coincidence that this has happened.” In a separate statement the same police department announced the hiring of Inspector Clousseau who will be put on this case immediately.
Kansas State continues to schedule cream puffs to pad its record. UMass is on their schedule. Can anyone who is not an alum of UMass name three football players who graduated from there? Troy State and McNeese State are on their schedule too. I'm surprised they did not put Allstate on the schedule. Maybe they were worried when they heard about the “good hands” and thought it had to do with their wide receivers. Sheesh!
Grambling coach, Doug Williams, had a news conference this week where he waved a Grambling uniform that had “Clarett” on it. He waved it around and made some attempted humorous references to Maurice Clarett transferring to Grambling. Where is the outrage here? If Grambling had a star player and Jim Tressel openly invited him to come to Ohio State and pulled that kind of nonsense at a news conference, Tressel would be pilloried and investigated by the NCAA. Jim Brown would scream that Ohio State was raiding Grambling and call them slave traders. Jesse Jackson would call for Congressional action to assure that the HBCUs get an “athletic set-aside”. But it's OK for Doug Williams to try to get a player from another school to transfer to Grambling…
The Auburn Tigers have to be the biggest dogs in NCAA football so far this year. In their first two losses, they have scored 3 points; that has been trumpeted all over the country. Here is another stat for you. They have run the ball 74 times in those two games and gained 83 yards. For those of you who live in a basement and have solar powered calculators, that translates into just under 40 ˝ inches per carry.
I'm sure you've read about the Pitt football player who died and a priest is charged with involuntary manslaughter in the death because allegedly the priest provided alcohol to the young man. The charges were dismissed once but have been refilled. Lawyers for Father Krawczyk say they want the charges dismissed again and claim that “they're holding this guy to a higher standard because he's a priest.” I always thought that was the general idea.
Finally, Florida International University just named John Fair to be their director of basketball operations. If I were doing the hiring there, I might have held out to try and get Bob Excellent into the job. What do I know?
But don't get me wrong, I love sports...
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