The NCAA “Super Sleuths” struck again while I was away. They concluded their “investigation” into allegations that Rich Rodriguez had his Michigan football team practicing 24 hours a week instead of the NCAA maximum allowed 8 hours a week and the sleuths came to this conclusion:
It was a clerical error. The school was not sufficiently vigilant in keeping and filing the records on practice schedules.
Memo to All Small Time Football Schools: Do not try to use this defense if you come under NCAA scrutiny. This only works for the “big boys”.
Let me get this straight. Several of the “student-athletes” on the Michigan team blew the whistle here. These are some of those folks who the NCAA loves to tell us “will be going pro” in lots of fields other than athletics. The players claimed they were practicing more than 8 hours a week. However, the NCAA says it was only a clerical error.
Translation: The Michigan football players are too stupid to tell time. They cannot differentiate between 8 hours in a week and 24 hours in a week.
Michigan has a new AD; he comes to that position having been the CEO of Domino’s Pizza; perhaps he can find jobs for all those Michigan players who cannot tell time? Allow me to point out something to the new AD that I am sure has not been a centerpiece of the briefings he has gotten from his football folks:
1. Rich Rodriguez has a winning percentage of .333 in his time at Michigan.
2. The team has been practicing 3 times more than it should.
3. If I suggested that his winning percentage might be .111 with appropriate levels of practice, do you think keeping better records for practice time is your biggest problem there?
You are welcome.
Regarding the seemingly ever-expanding set of divorce proceedings between Frank and Jamie McCourt, one report said that the attorney fees for both sides could exceed $19M. [Aside: Did I hear someone say ‘recession”?] LA Dodger fans need to keep that number in mind because the Dodgers could solve a lot of their pitching problems for less than $19M.
The Arena Football League is back after it crashed, burned and canceled a season. Maybe it should be called the Phoenix Football League – - rising from its own ashes? A key element in the resurrection here is a one-year TV deal with NFL Network. NFLN will televise a Friday night game during the season, which will run from early April thru August. Already in high rhetorical form, the Arena League Commish, Jerry Kurz, pronounced that the relaunch of the Arena League is “bringing back jobs”. So, maybe he is positioning himself to be the next Secretary of Labor or maybe Commerce? Neither of those positions would give him a hard act to follow…
On the website now there are 15 teams listed for the new Arena Football League – - and the season starts in less than a month. Unless the league has some exciting new ideas that will allow three teams to compete in the same game, one team will have to be “inactive” every week.
Here is one other interesting thing about the new league. One of the teams is brand new; it is not one of the teams from any of the previous arena leagues; it is starting fresh in 2010. That team will be the Jacksonville Sharks. In the NFL, Jacksonville cannot sell out its tickets. It will be interesting to see how that same market responds to minor league football.
Having mentioned the rebirth of the Arena League, perhaps it is fitting and symmetrical now to mention the precipice on which MLS finds itself. There has been plenty of talk about the bargaining in the NFL for a new CBA and about the financial woes of the NBA. Flying under the radar here is a similar problem for MLS. The players and the league have been negotiating for a new labor contract for months but it has not reached fruition. The MLS season usually starts in the last week of March/first week of April time-frame; so, there is not a whole lot of time left to get something done here.
The thing that makes these failed negotiations seem really stupid is that this is a “World Cup Year”. In the US, that translates into a higher level of interest in and awareness of soccer. One might think that both the league and the players would want to capitalize on that spike in interest/awareness to bring new fans to the league. MLS has grown in size and in popularity in recent years; if both sides do not find a way to avoid a work stoppage, they are all dumb as bait. Alienating fans this World Cup Year and in this economic environment is probably the worst idea since the leisure suit.
The league position is that they will not lock the players out. The league says they are willing to continue to negotiate while playing the 2010 season under the terms of the now expired CBA. The Philadelphia Union will play its inaugural season in MLS this year – - if there is a season – - and next year MLS hopes to expand by two more teams in Vancouver and Portland.
Memo to MLS Owners and Players: It is time to channel Larry The Cable Guy. Git ‘r done.
Finally, Greg Cote of the Miami Herald can bring you up to speed very quickly on two happenings in the Miami area so you need not spend time looking for information on your own:
“A sponsor referred to last week’s Miami Marathon as ‘the Pro Bowl of running events.’ I take that to mean half the runners pulled out with fake injuries? Turned out to be a great, somewhat historic race, though. Americans won, not Kenyans.”
“The annual Miami International Boat Show is wrapping up. Tough economy for that. I understand the biggest-selling boats were the kind that float next to the rubber duck in the bathtub.”
But don’t get me wrong, I love sports…