The Cleveland Indians have won 9 out of their last 10 games, they have an incredibly talented, exciting (I’m speaking in terms of relativity, for nothing visually is exciting about baseball; mentally – yes, but that’s not what we’re talking about here) and yet they can’t draw a crowd. Why? Why NOT ?
 
Let me begin by saying that I love[d] baseball and I still maintain that there is nothing better than seeing a child field his first ground ball, catch that seemingly scary skyscraper – high fly ball, and ultimately put wood into fair play; Little League Baseball is ideal for kids. But, let’s face it, baseball for adults on a professional level is DEAD !! The last time I went to a major league baseball game I had to drown myself in beer (when I drank – lol) just to get through the tedious spitting and ball (testicle) – scratching 9 innings.
 
Baseball was never an action – packed sport, in fact I think it’s only 20% of the time that the players are actually playing the sport, the remaining time like I said is spent scratching and spitting. A decade ago I would have been appalled at such commentary and probably would have said something akin to “You don’t understand the chess match !!!” The problem is, I’m not going to drive to a ballpark, pay exorbitant parking fees, and even with free tickets (yes the Cleveland Indians are doling out free tickets) watch over – paid, spoiled athletes play a game that no longer means anything anymore. Baseball used to be all about tradition and records (the steroid generation sadly ruined it for us baseball geeks) and we wouldn’t mind waiting for the hitter taking his time to step into the batter’s box, after all we were trying to figure out what Mickey Rivers’ batting average would be if he sliced a single into left field.
 
Baseball is a boring sport and not unlike golf, I’d rather watch it on TV; but if the stadiums need to be filled in order for the sport to survive, then screw it, let the sport die. The days of Howard Cosell and Monday Night Baseball, baseball cards, never – to – be broken records are over.
So WhaDaYaThink ? What do you think ? I think the three hot sports today are Football, College basketball, and finally the greatest sport of all – MMA – Mixed Martial Arts.

26 miles and 385 yards – that’s insanity!!! People point their finger at me and say that I’m a fan of a brutal sport (MMA –Mixed Martial Arts) but not a single person has ever died in the UFC octagon; and though I don’t have the exact statistics, invariably every year or so, one hears that a person has died of a heart attack running the outrageously long race.

Why does the race have to be that long ? And, who are the morons who elect to participate in such a deleterious sporting event? It’s a medical fact that engaging in any cardiovascular activity for more than an hour provides no further benefits to one’s health and in fact pushing oneself beyond 40 minutes to an hour without pause is simply put – dangerous. I find it quite interesting to note that these professional marathon runners do not look in any way shape or form  – healthy; in fact they look sickly and in need of a good highly – caloric meal.

I do respect the gutsy toughness of the runners, but can’t they cut it down to 13 miles, instead of 26 ??? Wouldn’t that make sense?

So, WhaDaYaThink ? What do you think ?

I am just going to name three: 1. Travis Henry, former running back with the Buffalo bills has 9 children with 9 different wives or mistresses (he also was sent to prison for dealing cocaine but I won’t get into that) 2. Evander Holyfield, champion boxer has fathered 11 children – ELEVEN with 9 different mothers; he pays 100s of thousands of dollars in alimony and child support each and every year. 3. Jason Caffey, former NBA star with the Chicago Bulls (he has 2 championship rings) also has 10 children with 9 different mothers. How can any human being be so utterly reckless, immoral, promiscuous and just plain old stupid !!!

I’ve blogged in the past about professional athletes who make a ton of $$$ and end up bankrupt a year after they retire; however I’ve never specifically written about the # of children these uncontrollable animals (I know terrible thing to say but what else can you call them) have fathered. Where do they get the time ??? I guess all they do once the game is over is fornicate. Even if the aforementioned is the case, why not use a rubber??? Everyone knows that there are groupies and celebrity – stalking whores who don’t give a rat’s ass about the player and purposely try to get pregnant – well guess what ladies ? Get in line, besides these “ballers” are going to be broke in a few years anyway.

The 3 athletes I named are black but I’m sure there are some stupid promiscuous white people out there too. So WhaDaYaThink ? What do you think ? Feel free to add to the list.

Today the baseball hall of fame released its 2013 ballot and there are 3 very interesting first time nominees on it – Barry Bonds, Sammy Sosa, and Roger Clemons. We all know that all three of them used steroids and performing enhancing drugs (though laughably they still deny it) but the numbers they put up are just completely off – the – charts awesome. Sammy Sosa is only one of five MLB players to hit 600 or more career home runs (609), Barry Bonds holds the single season HR record with a gaudy 73 home runs and a career HR number of 762 plus a plethora of other records. Take a look at the milestones below which I got from Wikipedia:
Records held
Home runs in a single season (73), 2001
Home runs (career) (762)
Home runs against different pitchers (449)
Home runs since turning 40 years old (74)
Home runs in the year he turned 43 years old (28)
Consecutive seasons with 30 or more home runs (13), 1992–2004
Slugging percentage in a single season (.863), 2001
Slugging percentage in a World Series (1.294), 2002
Consecutive seasons with .600 slugging percentage or higher (8), 1998–2005
On-base percentage in a single season (.609), 2004
Walks in a single season (232), 2004
Intentional walks in a single season (120), 2004
Consecutive games with a walk (18)
MVP awards (7—closest competitors trail with 3), 1990, 1992–93, 2001–04
Consecutive MVP awards (4), 2001–04
National League Player of the Month selections (13—2nd place: 8 – Frank Thomas; 2nd place (N.L.) – George Foster, Pete Rose and Dale Murphy)
Oldest player (age 38) to win the National League batting title (.370) for the first time, 2002
Roger Clemons’ accomplishments are just as garish with an incredible 354 career wins and a whopping 4,672 strikeouts.  He has won many other awards and has broken several other records not unlike Bonds, but I’ll spare you the cut and paste from Wikipedia.

I think what the Hall of Fame board must consider are 2 things: 1. although all these incredible numbers were achieved while under the influence of performing enhancing drugs, not every player accomplished this much and we all know that this was the era of dopers – I mean everyone was juicing. 2. Barry Bonds and Roger Clemons were great before (but who knows for sure) and then became super – human during the steroid craze.
So WhaDaYaThink ? What do you think ? I say induct Barry Bonds and Roger Clemons but nay to Sammy Sosa because unlike Bonds and Clemons, I don’t think Sosa was hall of fame material beforehand.

There are 2 fights I’m awaiting with great anticipation – the amazing Anderson Silva (still undefeated in the UFC) on 10/13/2012 when he squares off with the “tough as nails” (there are no wimps in the UFC, but Bonner uses his face to ward off punches and won’t stop fighting until: a. you kill him or b. mercifully the ref stops it) and the other is between Georges St. Pierre (pound for pound, in my opinion the greatest all-around fighter to have ever stepped into the cage) and Gary Condit. Georges St. Pierre (22 – 2) hasn’t lost a fight since April of 2007 when the MMA world was shocked (to use a baseball analogy, it was not unlike Bobby Thompson’s HR 10/3/1951) when MY former instructor and all – around GREAT guy, Matt Serra knocked him out in the first round. I was talking to Matt the week before and I asked him if he was nervous, and he told me that he feels butterflies the night before, but the day of the fight he’s “psyched” and can’t wait to get it on.
The title of my blog suggests ambivalence to the sport (Senator John McCain called it human cockfighting in the 1990s and wanted it banned. Sorry Mr. McCain, you’re a war hero and I have all the respect in the world for you, but MMA is mainstream now, and is here to stay – thanks in part to the former boxer/President of UFC and spirited, Dana White). The Gracie family introduced Ultimate Fighting to the United States and Brazilian Jiu – jitsu  became the hottest and most practical martial art after UFC 1. Joyce Gracie, 175 lbs., was the toughest man on the planet (except for other members of his very large family) and it didn’t matter if you could bench press a truck; strength had very little to do with fighting back then, and the gentle but prodigiously effective art had arrived and transformed the Gracies from a poverty-stricken Portuguese speaking family to a multi – million dollar dynasty.
I’ll conclude this blog with my personal involvement with the sport of MMA. I had always been interested in fighting as a kid, I wrestled in HS (sadly, I was a late bloomer and not not very good, but I tried) and took up Kung – Fu (Kung Fu with David Carradine was my favorite show)  and Kempo Karate. In 2004, I finally, with a little trepidation took up the sport of mixed martial arts, practicing Brazilian Jiu – Jitsu at Matt Serra’s academy and studying wrestling, boxing, and Mauy – Thai at Ray Longo’s and other gyms. To be honest, I was not very good except for boxing (I’m sure I had the hardest punch in the gym but the aforementioned does not make you a great boxer, though my private instructor maintained I had very good instincts) and not to make excuses, I was in my 40s and the young guys were just quicker and had more stamina (yes I lost whole lot more than I won). Still, at the age of 42, I had these very quick hands and as I said earlier, if I connected, it was lights for you, end of story. To cut to the chase, I never entered a tournament, but I sparred in the gym, and here comes the hate part of story. Yes, MMA  is fun, character – building, a beautiful art, and as we fighters liked to call it, a physical chess match. I’m not sure exactly how it happened, but I think my opponent just happened to graze my left eye – I wasn’t knocked out and I finished the fight and felt fine. Two days later, I was slowly starting to lose my vision from my left eye. If I closed my right eye, I couldn’t see my nose if I looked to my right and when I say it was dark, it was dark – SCARY DARK. I left work immediately, saw an Ophthalmologist, and got the bad news. “Mike, you have a detached retina and we have to perform emergency surgery.” I elected to go with the easy procedure, the laser retinopexy.
Well, the operation was a success and I got my vision back completely in two months. Afterwards, I made a very stupid decision – I went back to MMA; what can I say I was ADDICTED ! I couldn’t stop, even though I was 42, was going nowhere with sport, the truth be told, MMA WAS IN MY BLOOD. My rationale was, okay no boxing, I’ll just stick to wrestling and Jiu – jitsu. Stupid, stupid, stupid and STUPID ! Suffice to say, I was in the the hospital again, and this time it was MAJOR retinal surgery (I won’t go into detail, but essentially they took my eyeball out and stitched the retina back on) and unlike the easy laser treatment; I was under, so I didn’t feel any pain during the operation nor did I feel much pain  when I got home (Oxycodone works). However, the next day, still blind as a bat in the left eye, and WOW, EXCRUCIATING PAIN !!!! It was a combination of incredible soreness and pressure. It was so uncomfortable, plus I had to lay on my right side for 6 weeks (I watched a lot movies).
Fast – forward, it’s 2012 and I’m fine. I still have a little blurriness in my left eye and always have to worry about retinal detachment (for both eyes, my retina in my right eye is thin) but I’m very lucky. So there you have it – WhaDaYaThink ? What do you think? I sensibly quit after my second surgery and I stick to weightlifting and Tai –Chi to stay in shape. My position is I still love the sport but I hate the violence (if that makes sense) plus the deleterious effects one may suffer from blows to the head. I also think that because, I am near-sighted, I was more susceptible for this thing to happen. Lastly, I have never met nicer people in my life than the fighters. One might think that they’re violent, etc. but nothing can be further from the truth. MMA fighters are incredible men with character who possess these incredible skills and are second to none in terms of being phenomenal athletes. Another misconception is one might think they take it out on the streets –WRONG, only punks and insecure losers street fight. But, just to be on the safe side, I don’t think it would be wise to say anything derogatory to Randy Couture’s wife – lol. I hope everyone enjoyed my little story.

Yes it’s true – the two – time All American from Brigham Young University and the incredibly cocky and handsome QB from that amazing “Super Bowl Shuffle” 1985 Chicago Bears team is suffering from dementia. We human beings are not built to absorb repeated blows to the head – period. Everyone knows about boxing and Muhammed Ali, etc. but the NFL has the same problem and it’s starting to get SCARY.
This is Lurie Navon’s description of her boyfriend, Jim McMahon, today- “He has a slow shuffle (sadly, no pun intended), an empty stare, and responds to my questions in non-sequiturs.” According to the article in Sports Illustrated, 9/10/2012, Jim sometimes stands confusedly in front of his house and doesn’t recognize it. He also bursts into senseless rage and is on a daily dose of antidepressants to deal with the situation. Lurie insists on having many pictures taken with him, because she’s afraid that he’s going to wake up one day and not remember her. Well, I can go on, but it’s just too sad….
There are a multitude of stories not unlike Jim McMahon’s and the plaintiffs representing the ex-players who are afflicted with dementia are filing a class action suit. The sad truth is that no money in the world is going to bring their memories back. What’s also unfortunate, is the league is certainly aware of the monumental problem of concussions, brain damage, dementia, etc. but what else can anyone do but manufacture safer head gear. I don’t have any answers except for the aforementioned and it’s clear that the NFL doesn’t either.
So whaDaYaThink ? What do you think? Does anyone out there have a solution to this seemingly difficult dilemma in which NFL finds itself? Please, I’d love to get your feedback.

Written by Le Duke de Fromage

With the summer season winding down to days of humid torpor, comes a spectacle that only fanatical sports fans can understand. Pro football starts its annual frenzied extravaganza. For millions of fans the next 5 months is the only meaningful time of year. All the hype and buildup of training camps is over and now the real deal begins. Television has been showing a numbing array of preseason games that are mostly ignored except by the most die-hard fanatics, and an even more puzzling lineup of announcers unknown to most people. If you watch these games notice how empty the seats are. Ex jocks,station sports guys and dubious sports celebs revel in calling these games. This obviously is their time to shine.But woe to the poor fan who has to endure their inane, repetitive chatter. In most cases, their home team favoritism is embarrassing even to the most die-hard fan, and please learn how to pronounce players names.
In addition, this does not include the obligatory sports chick reporter. Above all this is an insult to every true fan. They appear to be chosen for their their looks, at times debatable, their ability to engage in inane chatter, and give the impression to the fan they really care about the game. They usually conduct interviews from the sidelines with players who seem to take it with complete lack of interest or slightly disguised humor. Or at times give the impression they just wonder what the reporter looks like with no clothes on. Reporting breathlessly on the latest injury or seizing a coach running into the locker room just before halftime, they barely justify the fact they are on the field.
[ watch Bill Belichek, Patriots Coach react to a pre halftime interview]
The idea that they can take themselves serious, never mind the poor suffering fan watching is hilarious. Not that their male counterparts are any better. Some of the biggest idiots in sports broadcasting are thrown at the public week after week under the guise of of pro expert. Retired from pro football, no matter, you are now a football expert, even if you cant speak intelligently. Have you ever seriously watched E.S.P.N.with a critic’s eye? where do they get these people? I dare you to tell me that such personalities as Suzy Kolber, Tray Wingo, or Skip Bayless knows more about the game than you do. In addition, the constant commercials, every 5-6 minutes bombard your senses to a point of dull acceptance, enough to go back watching Skip Bayless analyze anything of no real importance. Yet they do it with the sense that would suggest they are omnipotence. Stating the obvious fills about 20 minutes of a half hour show the rest are commercials. Admittedly they are clever at their presentation;some would say they are good at what they do. But what do they do? Does it justify your watching? Evidently the networks think so.
It is a mind numbing. hypnotic, gambit designed to keep you glued to your easy chair waiting for the games. And who knows some may find Suzy Kolber’s smarmy, yet coy demeanor appealing. Her condescending attitude is designed to make you feel she is all knowing, or at least more than the poor dummy watching. The fact that she is just a ploy or even more unsettling, eye candy for some is disturbing and an insult to intelligence. Her appearance is supposed to make you keep watching. Picture thousands of fans in front of their TV’s screaming,”WE want Suzy”. Honestly, I have never ever met a fan who said they watched a game because Suzy Kolber or Pam Oliver was on the show.
At this point I am stating I am not anti-feminist. It is just that if you accept the job you are open to the criticism that goes with it. Especially if you are there for the wrong reason. However, the networks insist that is what the public wants.I am inclined to believe that is what they think that’s what we want.
Sports announcing can be a very well paid job, the industry averages run from $28 to $210 thousand per year.Of course the big boys get a lot more. Some examples are Chris Berman $3 mil per yr., Terry Bradshaw $2.2 mil per yr. and Al Michaels $5.0 mil per. yr. E.S.P.N. does not publish salaries so you can only guess what your favorite sportscaster is making vs. what he or she is worth.The great thing about American sports is that everyone understands the average fan knows more about the game than the clown broadcasting. So why the hell don’t I have that job? Finally, this comment from Mike Ditka, ex player, coach turned broadcaster, “What’s the difference between a 3 week old puppy and a sportscaster? after 6 weeks the puppy stops whining”. Well the football season lasts a lot longer and these guys just ain’t gonna stop.
Whadayathink? turn down the sound or watch Turner Classic Movies

Written by Guest Blogger Le Duke De Fromage

While watching the opening ceremonies for the Olympics and trying to figure out what was going on, I kept feeling this is just one big commercial. Yes, it was glitz, showy, and glamor but also confusing and at times very messy. Compare it to a Monty Python skit on steroids or a questionable Super Bowl half time show. The blatant selling of England, the host country, was bewildering to non-brits and probably brits alike.
[ except for Mr. Bean, a personal favorite]
The spectacle reminded me of an excellent article written by Frank Deford for Smithsonian magazine on the History of the Olympic Games. Deford,if you are not aware is one of the premiere sports writers in America. He describes the struggles of the earlier games and some of the more outrageous acts committed by promoters and athletes alike. No doubt, this 2012 opening will be included in a later book for some future writer.
Cost estimates for these games are estimated to run over 24 billion pounds.No wonder there are over fifty official sponsors for the Olympics and this does not include the T.V. money for which N.B.C. paid a fortune. As Deford outlines in his history this is a far cry from earlier games,which were run on a shoestring. However, costs escalate as do ticket prices and hosting the Olympics is no cheap venue.The opening night average ticket price was $2500.00 dollars, slightly less than a super bowl ticket seat .Average price for any basketball game is $400.00, swimming event average $700.00 that is if you can get a ticket. Some demand events have been embarrassed by blocks of empty seats held by advertisers, and V.I.P.s who just didn’t show up. Again Olympic spirit at work.
Some countries have been accused of scalping their allotment of tickets to make a few bucks, others make sure that only fat cats and select dignitaries get to attend. Most of us get to watch on the telly which considering the cost of London is the best way. Estimated viewing for opening night was forty million people in the U.S. Of course, one cannot discuss the Olympics without mentioning the contests and the judging of such. Some of the most corrupt,inept, and home country decisions have made the judging an international disgrace.They make Vegas boxing judges look honest. The International Olympic Committee has not been without its scandals either. Corruption, bribes, unaccounted dollars and a host of improper and illegal acts have haunted the Olympics for years.
That leaves the athletes, doping, illegal equipment, questionable sex gender and every other wrongdoing one can name has been leveled against the participants one time or another. To win medal is the goal at any cost. So much for the spirit of the games. Isn’t it also contrary to the Olympic creed to count medals? The thought was to compete on an amateur level with sportsmanship and friendly competition the main goal. Just like the U.S. amateur Olympic basketball team.
There is another side to all the negative,the heart warming stories of individuals who sacrifice their youth for a chance to compete. At times, they actually achieve the goal and everyone feels good.I hope they can cash in and make it pay for all their hard work and dreams.
The games have become a big spectacle with the host country trying to out due the previous one, and hopefully make a few bucks.
Whadayathink? Are the Olympics worthwhile or is it just another sham production hoping to make a few bucks and gain publicity for the host country and a select few of the world’s best athletes?