Happy 31st Craig and Mark

The Bradford would like to take a quick moment to wish buddies, Mark and Craig, a Happy 31st Birthday. Unlike past years, neither were available to help celebrate the occasion. I love it when their birthdays roll around each year, Mark is the 31st and Craig the 27th, because their birthdays correlate to the start of training camps for NFL teams.

Aug 6th is the first preseason game, Oakland vs Philadelphia.

Also want to wish Betsy McDaniel a happy birthday and welcome her to the 30 Club.

Top 10 Sports Lawsuits

I'm going to make a post about a Gamecock lawsuit but for now here are the top 10 Most Rediculous Sports Lawsuits.

1) Foul Ball Territory––A New Jersey man sued a baseball team and the owners of a food service company for getting hit in the face with a baseball while buying a beer in the concession area at the stadium. Judges in the case said fans in concession areas are at greater risk because they “let their guard down” more than when they’re in the stands.

2) Offensive Line––A woman in Tennessee filed a lawsuit for billions of dollars against Super Bowl half-time performers Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake as well as the broadcasters, claiming she was injured by the performers’ lewd actions when Timberlake ripped off part of Jackson’s costume, exposing her breast. According to the suit, she suffered outrage, anger, embarrassment and serious injury.

3) Field Goal Attempt––A man was injured when fellow Ball State students toppled a goal post after a football upset filed a lawsuit against the goal post maker claiming the aluminum posts were “designed and constructed in a manner which allowed them to suddenly snap and collapse.” Dumb South Carolina fan, you're not supposed to rush the field when you beat New Mexico St.

4) Blocked Shot––A California father filed a lawsuit seeking $1.5 million in damages from a school district after his 15-year old son was demoted from the varsity to the junior varsity basketball team. The suit claimed the demotion was “messing up [his son’s] future and professional earnings.”

5) Quarterback Interception– – A high school football star from New Jersey filed a lawsuit against the coach at the University of Miami for not naming him the starting quarterback, something he claims the coach promised through an oral contract when he was a high school senior.

6) Caught in a Pickle––A popular softball tournament in Arizona was canceled because of a lawsuit filed by a player who broke his ankle in the tournament the year prior. The man was injured sliding into third base in a game at the city-owned sports complex. According to the suit, the city is responsible for “the dangerous condition existing at third base.”

7) Take Me Out to the Courtroom––A family of four sued the Los Angeles Dodgers for false imprisonment and battery by security guards after one of the family members assaulted a female usher.

8) 40-Yard Dash–A woman injured by someone lunging for a ball in the stands during a Notre Dame football game filed a lawsuit against the university for failing to exercise care to protect her.

9) Choke-N-Roll–Latrell Sprewell, a guard for the Golden State Warriors basketball team, filed a $30 million lawsuit against the National Basketball Association attempting to recoup the salary he lost while carrying out his one-year suspension for choking his coach.

10) Warmin’ the Bench–A Florida father sued a youth baseball league because his son was told he’d made the league’s allstar team when he hadn’t. As a result of the lawsuit, the baseball league was threatened to be canceled the following year due to costs of the case.

Link

My Bud Lite 'Real Men of Genius' commercial Lance Bass style

Okay, I'm only posting this because buddies at both SportsTalkRocks and Bushido have posted the breaking news of Lance Bass finally coming out of that damn closet. On a side note can someone please chain thatdamn door shut. Anyways, to mark this occasion, I came up with my own Bud Lite 'Real Men of Genius' jingle to mark this moment.

Here's to you Lance Bass, boy band singer. You're the pioneer
of your genre, others hide in the closet while you're busting out.
You're not afraid to tell the world of your meat packing days,
you work up a thirst thinking about other boy band singers so
you reach for a cold Bud Lite. Because you're tired of living a
lie that everyone knew was a lie, so when you get to singing you
can't be weighed down by a heavy beer, you reach for a cold Bud
Lite. Here's to you Lance Bass, closet boy band singer.

I promise no more gay news on this site, this is a once and only time.

Now post your own jingle.

ESPN's back handed slap to the face to Spurrier and S. Carolina

Apparently the love affair ESPN has had with Steve Spurrier is over or at least on hold. They have a team preview for the 2006 South Carolina squad on its Insider site. In the brief article, you have to pay for the whole thing, they just give some facts about the coach and the program. There is a question they ask at the end of page. Here's the Jeopardy style multiple choice question. Answer B is where the back handed slap to the face comes in.

COACH AND PROGRAM

OK, the final Jeopardy! answer is: 38,806.

We know it's a doozy, so we'll make it multiple-choice:

A. The number of media requests for new coach Steve Spurrier since he was hired by South Carolina last November.

B. The amount of bond money raised for Gamecock players who were arrested for various offenses since January.

C. The quantity of T-shirts featuring a visor-clad palmetto sold since Spurrier's arrival.

D. The attendance for the Garnet and Black spring game last April.

If you answered D, congratulations, champ. If you picked any other letter, don't fret. You may be proved correct before too long.


There's no word on what the actual total of bond money raised to bail out players, though I'm thinking it's somewhere around the 38K.

Link to article.

Braves possibly trading Betemit for bullpen help

The Atlanta Braves are dealing with the devil, the NY Yankees that is. They are in serious discussions about sending utility infielder Wilson Betemit to the Evil Empire for one of their best relievers in Scott Proctor. Now I know the Braves need help in the pen but do we really have to get rid of Betemit to get it. Can't we package Giles and a prospect instead? I just view Wilson as too valuable to trade, he can hit for power, hit for average, back up Chipper, play shortstop or second base. He can play all three infield positions as if it were his natural position.

Here's what we'd be getting in return for Wilson. Scott Proctor, in his second year of MLB, would become the Braves setup man for newly acquired closer Bob Wickman. Proctor is 3-2 with a 3.94 ERA, 60 strikeouts to only 23 walks. Opposing hitters are averaging only .226 against him. Like Betemit, his best baseball is being played after the allstar break. Since said break, Proctor has pitched 9 innings of shutout ball, given up only 3 hits with 12 strikeouts limiting hitters to a .103 average.

So that's what makes this deal so attractive to the Braves brass, only question mark about the deal is what they are going to do to replace Betemit's utility role. Two options appear in the form of minor league prospects Martin Prado and Yunel Escobar. Prado seems the likely candidate since he's been with the club before and plays a solid third base to back up Chipper.

I'm sold on this as a short term trade getting solid help in the pen where we need desperate help, but this is not a good long term trade. I'm pretty sure over the next five years, Betemit will have the greater career and bigger impact for a team than would Proctor.

We'll see how this unfolds in the next couple of days. If it happens I hope Betemit does well in NY.

Click on their names for stats and personal info.

Wilson Betemit
Scott Proctor

Cowboys training camp begins in 3 days

I'm so ready for football season to get here it's driving me crazy. Dallas, still in the process of signing draft picks, starts training camp on the 29th in Oxnard, California. They won't break camp until August 20th. This will be the first real opportunity to see just how well TO will fit in with the team and Drew Bledsoe. As mentioned Dallas is in the process of getting all draft picks signed and on the field. So far Pat Watkins and OL Pat McQuistan are the only ones signed, 6 more to go including first round pick Bobby Carpenter.

In other Cowboys news, Dallas has begun to break ground on their new stadium in Arlington, TX, it will be next to the Texas Rangers Ameriquest Field. It will be home to the SuperBowl in 2011.

It's not known yet when Safety Keith Davis will be able to get on the field, he's still recovering from shot wounds he suffered two weeks ago. Though no serious injury it's still enough to keep him out some time. He needs to quit doing whatever it is he's doing, this is the second time in three years he's been shot late in the morning.



Here is the Cowboys training camp schedule.

ESPN fires Baseball Tonight's Harold Reynolds

Harold Reynolds, a fixture on ESPN's Baseball Tonight has been fired by the network, no reason has yet to be given. Undoubtedly he was one of the better analyst on the show, John Kruk is more the comedian of the crew but Harold was always easy to listen to. He was with the network for 11 years, he also covered the College World Series and the Little League World Series. His fill in on some shows and now probably permanently, will be former GM Steve Phillips. If you watch ESPN and aren't familiar with him, you'll know him through ESPN's baseball offseason faux press conferences in which he acted like the team GM for all 32 teams where he would talk about where each team needed improvements. If you weren't blessed to see that series don't worry, you didn't miss much. It was just another bad idea by the network to drum up ratings. This is the part where I have to stop myself from bad mouthing the current state of ESPN programming. I digress, back to Reynolds, if you didn't have the pleasure of watching him on the Baseball Tonight show, you missed out. He was colorful, always had fun and more importantly was just a great baseball analyst. The show will be different now having to listen to Steve Phillips analyze baseball, he once was a GM for the Mets until he was fired.

Good luck ESPN, you will be hard pressed to replace Harold Reynolds and you may lose viewers as well.

Story

Story update 7/26/06

I've been doing some reading on multiple sites and apparently Harold was the cause of his own demise. Around ESPN he is known to be a flirt with woman and was told by ESPN brass to chill on his antics. Well he finally hit on the wrong woman and she reported it, thus ESPN had no choice but to fire Harold or risk a sexual harassment lawsuit which would be more damaging to the network than keeping Harold. What has happened to our society when a former player, now analyst can't sexually harass a sexy female co-worker?? J/K. I hate to see someone as knowledgeable about baseball be fired from a show I love watching but he did it to himself. Hope you land on your feet Harold, just quit annoying the ladies.


Here's some legal info about Harold Reynold's termination and other info.

Woods, Landis and Hamlin, weekend worriors

PGA
Congrats to Tiger Woods on his 11th Major, 2nd straight and 3rd overall British Open Championship. He bettered Chris DiMarco by 2 strokes to claim the victory. You can't deny the talent and fortitude he has, he's just one month removed from missing the cut at the US Open and looking like he would need a few more months to get over the death of his father. In winning the tournament, Tiger only used his driver one time, favoring to play it conservative and getting it on the fairway then play from there. He's well known for his distance off the tee with driver but this course favored those that could accurately play from the fairway. He is now only 7 majors away from Jack Nicholas' record 18 majors and he's only 30 years old. Move over Phil, Tiger is back.

Tour de France
With Lance Armstrong retiring there's no way America continues it's dominance in the Tour de France right? Wrong. I'm sure the French thought this was their year to reclaim the title but thanks to Floyd Landis team America continues it's dominance in this race. It's now 8 straight years an American has won this tour, 7 of course by Lance. I think in some way, Landis winning this tour is a greater accomplishment than that of Lance Armstrong. I know you must think I've lost my mind but I haven't. Okay we all know what Lance has to go through to get back to racing and winning but at least he wasn't going through chemo when he was racing. Floyd Landis has an arthritic hip, a hip that requires surgery in the next month. He can't walk, he can only get on the bike from the left side, if he were to try from the right side he'll fall over. He was written off by everyone at least two or three times and after one grueling day lost a lead and fell 8 minutes back from the leader and that usually spells the end at that point. But Floyd just ignored the pain from the hip the next day and had one of the most incredible days in Tour de France history. Not only did he win the stage but cut that 8 minute deficit down to 30 seconds.
Look for Floyd to be next years ESPN's ESPY Male Athlete of the Year, something else Lance has owned the last few years.

NASCAR
If it were up to Rookie Denny Hamlin, he'd race at Pocono every weekend. He won the Pennsylvania 500 this weekend and won it from the pole. With the win he swept the season series at the track having also won the Pocono 500 June 11th, he also claimed the pole in that race as well. The rookie now finds himself in the race for the 10 team playoff, he climbed 4 sports to #8 and is now 425 points from NASCAR series leader Jimmy Johnson. He is a member of the Joe Gibbs racing team.

Notre Dame is Public enemy #1 in SC

Notre Dame has recently come under fire here in the Palmetto State for its recruiting tactics. For those of you that don't keep up with college football recruiting or log on to Tigernet, Notre Dame has gone after and recruited away South Carolina University's prized recruit, Gary Gray.

Gray is a 5 star Defensive Back out of Richland Northeast, Columbia SC. He is ranked #3 in the nation at his respective position. Up until about a week and half ago he was Gamecock devoted. Then enters in Weis and the Irish, poof, bye bye South Carolina, hello Notre Dame. Okay so Gray hasn't committed to ND yet but decommitting from SCU is just the same. He told Spurrier that he was reopening his recruiting and would make a decision in September as to where he will be going to school next year. SCU has been counting on Gray to help make this a top 25 class, one 5 star recruit usually brings such a ranking. Before his turnabout, he had been helping to recruit kids to the school so this decommittment might have some serious consequences to the recruiting class the coaching staff is putting together.

Now where ND comes into play here is that they may have used some very questionable recruiting tactics to get Gray away from SCU, at first you could dismiss this case because there was nothing previous to go on, well now there is. Enter Jamie Cumbie, a 4 star DE that signed with Clemson this past February out of Illinois.

Cumbie has now gone public with what he says were some very questionable recruiting tactics the Irish and Weis used to try and sway him away from Clemson last year. "I'm not going to lie," Cumbie said Tuesday. "The coaches at Notre Dame sent some bad letters ripping Clemson after I committed here." What happened to the days when college coaches recruited using their respective schools own merits? A school with the reputation that Notre Dame has should be ashamed to stoop to that level to get kids to go there. And it gets worse. Here's what he said about his recruiting trip to South Bend, Ind, "They had a piece of paper, and it broke down advantages and disadvantages. It said Notre Dame was televised every weekend, every Saturday. They said Clemson has a horrible education." You know I can maybe understand knocking a schools athletic program but why the need to try and do the same to its education? So not only does Weis use some very negative tactics but he's not very educated in the process. Clemson prides itself on his education, they are annually ranked by the US News for Americas best colleges and in 2001 was named the #1 public college of the year.

So I'm sure if Weis will trash Clemson to Cumbie you bet he did the same to Gray, I'm sure he used ND's football heritage to go against SCU's lack of football success which is well documented. I'm sure these aren't the only cases where ND has done some negative recruiting and I'm sure it won't be the last time either.

Story update 7/21/06

Jamie Cumbie has corrected the story that ran in Charleston's Post and Courier, thus I'm inclined to add it to this article, or not, but I should. Jamie says that Weis and company didn't really say that Clemson had a horrible education system, he just thought that was implied by the comparison. Here's the statement he gave about the situation and story:

"In an article in the Charleston Post (and) Courier earlier this week I was quoted as saying that Notre Dame recruiters had said Clemson's education was horrible. I did not characterize our conversations properly in that interview.

"No one from Notre Dame, either in writing or in general conversation, said Clemson had a horrible education. Notre Dame made a comparison in different areas between the two schools and the facts made Notre Dame look better. One of the areas was education. I am sure everyone makes comparisons during the recruiting process. It didn't bother me at all.

"No one from Notre Dame did anything wrong in their recruitment and I wish them the best this season."

Okay so maybe Charlie Weis and staff aren't the users of negative recruiting that we thought they were but they, thus they are no longer Public Enemy #1 here in the State of South Carolina, but they do remain the enemy in camp Gamecock for the Gary Gray fiasco.
Though Weis won't apologize for the Gray situation, he did take time to address what Cumbie had to say. "I find it quite amusing that a student-athlete already enrolled at another university has decided to be the team spokesman on Notre Dame recruiting practices," Weis said. "There is an obvious contradiction between how this was handled and what was stated. We do not use negative recruiting tactics."

Weis said all his coaching staff does is "represent what Notre Dame stands for."

"If supporting Notre Dame academics can be misconstrued as speaking down on another school's academics, call us guilty," he said.

We, along with Jamie, here at The Bradford Report no longer have an issue with ND and Weis and wish them both the best this season and into the future.

Go Tigers

Braves continue to celebrate 4th of July

It's 14 days after July 4th but don't tell the Braves that, they continue to light up the sky with homeruns, 20 to be exact in this 5 game stretch where they've scored in double figures in each. They've yet to score less than 10 runs since the Allstar break, they're crossing the plate at a record pace right now. In the 5 games, they have amassed 65 runs, which is a franchise record for any 5 game stretch. They also are the first team to accomplish 5 straight double digit run games since the 1930 NY Yankees, that was a team that featured some guy named Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig.

If you're wondering how they are doing it, just look at the line up and the players stats for July, it's really a team effort and everyone is hot.

Player	Avg	AB	Runs	Hits	RBI	2B	3B	HR	BB
Betemit	0.432	37	10	16	12	3	0	3	3
Renteria	0.411	61	20	25	8	4	1	1	9
C Jones	0.551	49	17	27	20	5	1	7	9
A Jones	0.302	53	12	16	22	3	0	6	11
McCann	0.345	55	8	19	19	3	0	5	2
Francoeur	0.328	61	15	20	7	3	1	2	1
LaRoche	0.401	50	12	20	11	5	0	4	3
Thorman	0.429	28	8	12	7	4	0	3	0

The Braves now stand 4 games under .500, 4 games from Wild Card leader Cincinnati and 11.5 away from division leading Mets. How much longer this offensive explosion will continue is anyones guess though I have a feeling it will end tomorrow against Allstar pitcher Chris Carpenter but if they do post another 1o it could continue well into the weekend against weak pitching Phillies in a hitters park.

Cubs fans throw trash items on field

Did you happen to catch the highlights from the Cubs/Mets game yesterday? If not you're missing out. Cubs fans littered the field with whatever objects were at their disposal after the team gave up 2 grand slams in the 6th inning, an inning that the Mets plated 11 runs.

The first grand slam was hit by Floyd two batters after Todd Walker's error allowed Beltran to reach base to start the rally with only 1 out. 5 batters later Beltran hit the second grandslam after another Todd Walker error let the inning continue. Two batters after Beltran, David Wright hit a two run homer. In all, 11 runs, 8 hits, 2 errors, 3 BB, 16 batters sent to the plate, 2 short of batting around twice. And to think the Cubs led this game 5-2 going into the top of the 6th but these are the Cubs and what could happen usually does happen.

Now usually I would say they fans are in the wrong and shouldn't throw things on the field but put yourself in their shoes. What would you do, your faithful team is 21 games under .500, you are beating one of the best teams in baseball and by 3 runs then they just completely fall apart. Yes there is a better way to show your displeasure like just don't go to the games but I'm sure those fans felt a little better afterwards. These cubs would drive me to alcoholism cause I'd be just as frustrated with them as their fans are. Cubs need to release both Wood and Prior, they seem to be living on the DL more than they are on the field and when they're on the field they are just a shadow of what they used to be in 2003 when they dominated in the post season.

The curse of the Goats continues to live in Chicago, they haven't won a world series since 1908 and that streak looks to continue for at least the next 4 years.

No Saves recorded on Saturday in MLB

I found this odd. For the first time since 1978 there were no saves recorded in a full day of games of MLB. There were 15 games with 6 blown saves and 4 games won in the bottom half of innings.
Guess the Braves aren't the only team with a struggling relief corps.

Seriously relief pitching now-a-days has just become a joke. Watching the Braves game last night I got probably just as frustrated as Bobby Cox. McBride was brought in the pitch the 8th inning and he wasn't able to finish it. He gave up 3 runs and was pulled with the basesloaded. Side note on that, McDowell was the one to pull McBride, a duty normally handled by Cox but I'm sure he's tired of that walk and speach. Braves entered the 8th with an 11 run lead, all McBride needed to do was just throw strikes, a seemingly impossible task for a Braves reliever. With an 11 run lead throw it down the middle and let the defense do the work for you, no need to get perfect. So when Bobby decided not to pull McBride himself he may have sent a msg to the rest of the bullpen, lets just hope they received it.

Story

Braves closing in on Wild Card/Mets

Remember back to June when it seemed the Braves couldn't win a game going a team worst 6-21? Well that looks like it was forever ago now. Since July started they are 8-3 and will be going for their first sweep since May 26-28 when they swept the Cubs. In the two games since the Allstar game the Braves against the Padres have scored 26 runs on 29 hits. Some of this resurgence is coming from former MVP Chipper Jones who won player-of-the-week honors a week ago.

Since the start of June, Chipper is hitting a ridiculous .527 with 19H on 36 AB's. With those 19 hits he has 8 Doubles, 6 Homeruns and is currently riding a 13 straight game extra base hitting streak. If he gets an extra base hit tomorrow he will tie a MLB record for consecutive games with an extra base hit. He also is riding a 15 game hitting streak. His 14 RBIs and 8 Runs lead the team in July.

Chuck James, the left handed rookie, takes the mound tomorrow in hopes of completing the 3 game sweep. He has only started 3 games this year and has won all 3. He brings in an ERA of 2.87. Sweeping the Padres will be exactly what this team needed if they are to get into the Wild Card chase and make a dent in the Mets division lead.

After tonights win, the Braves now stand 5 1/2 games behind the Reds for the Wild Card spot and are 12 games back of the Mets for the division crown.

83 year old makes baseball history

I heard about this the other day and couldn't believe it. 83 year old Jim Eriotes suited up for Sioux Falls Canaries in a minor league game and led off in the first inning. Though he ended up striking out on 4 pitches, fouling one off, he became the oldest person to play professional baseball.

You gotta love this mans attitude about his only AB and subsequent strikeout, here's what he had to say: "I don't give a damn about that stuff," he said, bothered by his failure to reach base. "If I got a couple more at-bats, I'd get a hit. Easy."

Mr. Eriotes used to play minor league baseball but for an 83 year old man to just be able to swing his stick, the bat I'm talking about, is impressive enough much less fouling one off. He says that he's hit pitches harder than the 83mph stuff he struck out on. He says he's hit 90+ mph pitches off of machine but notes that the real thing is harder than machine pitches.

So this story gives me hope that I can get out there and get my arm strength back up, I think I could get out there and throw at least an inning or so, well at least I'd like to try.

Story

Braves on TBS no more after 2007

I so wish yesterday was April 1st, that way I still wouldn't be sitting here in a state of disbelief. My beloved Braves will no longer be seen on TBS after 2007. I'm sure I'm not the only one here that is in a state of panic. TBS is pretty much carried by every cable company and thus can be seen in where in the country. So much for my plan to move to San Diego, if I can't see my Braves play I ain't moving, not that I would move from Charleston anyways. But I digress, I've been a Braves fan since I can remember picking up a baseball and have been following them on TBS since I was about 10 years old so it's going to be a sad day in 2008 when i want to turn on the tv to see the Braves and all I get is a Friends repeat.

If you haven't heard the news, TBS and it's parent company Turner South, just inked a deal with MLB to carry sunday baseball games and the Division Series playoffs. The reason for this is that TBS financially gets more advertising money from showing Friends and Seinfeld reruns that showing Braves games. But hope is not all lost unless you live outside of the southern region, because Atlanta based WTBS will still air about 45 Braves games to the clubs six-state home territory to include Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Mississippi, Alabama and Tennesseee.

So for my buddy Miles in Denver you're just SOL.

Internet gambling may be a thing of the past

If you are or have done any internet gambling, your gambling days maybe numbered. If Congress has it their way, you will no longer will you be able to place a bet online. It may also effect all those online pay-to-play poker sites. Congress was to vote today to prohibit credit cards and other forms of payment to settle wages. The bill would also give law enforcement the ability to block gambling web sites. John Kindt, a business professor at University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign says the internet is "the crack cocaine" of gambling. "There are no needle marks, there's no alcohol on the breath, you just click the mouse and lose your house".

To me, I do use gaming sites to place bets on football games and sometimes basketball games but mostly I use them to play poker. Playing for fun just is not as playing for money is. As they say, 'Money won is sweeter than money earned'. And that phrase can't be more true, there's just something about gambling and winning that feels so much better. Now I think Congress is taking this one step too far, instead of shutting it down they should figure out a way to tax this billion dollar industry. Too many Americans are using these out of country sites for their gambling kicks.

If this bill does go through and goes into effect, I'm not sure what I'm going to do come football season. I can't fly to Vegas every weekend so I guess I'll have to find a bookie somewhere.

This is America after all and Americans need to gamble during football season, that's what American men do in the fall.

Link to the article.

Steve Spurrier follows Zindane's lead, head butts Clemson's Tommy Bowden

Steve Spurrier inexplicably head butted Tommy Bowden during a friendly golf game recently. Later after being banned from an upstate golf course, Spurrier said Bowden called him a "terrorist rooter." "So, I butted him out of the game" the O'l ball coach explained. Later when asked about the incident, Bowden denied calling Spurrier a "terrorist rooter". "I said his team were a bunch of terrible roosters. That's the truth." When asked if he would like to retaliate against Spurrier, Bowden smiled nodded his head and appeared to mumble "Gaines Adams" under his breath. (Picture shows Steve holding his nose in pain afterwards)




I borrowed this little funny joke from revmarkg off Tigernet.

France's Zindane is this weeks "What were you thinking" award winner

France Captain Zinedine Zindane was given a red card for headbutting Italy's Marco Materazzi in the chest. For all you non-soccer fans, I count myself in this group until I found myself glued to the TV for this World Cup (okay back to my point), a red card is an automatic ticket to the locker room. The reason Zindane wins this award is that he is France's best player and by getting kicked out of the game he in affect may have cost his team the World Cup. He was their leader and best scorer so his team had to of felt the pressure of playing without him. He wasn't there to help them in penalty kicks to decide the championship or the remainder of overtime. Way to lead your team Zindane. It's ironic that today Zindane was named the World Cups most outstanding player by FIFA, the governing body of soccer.

If you haven't seen it, here's the clip.

Georgia Southern WR dies from Motorcycle accident

Teddy Craft, a wide receiver on the Georgia Southern football team, died Thursday from complications he suffered in a two-vehicle accident near Statesboro. He was reported to have been in serious condition late Wednesday night.

Craft was a senior for the Eagles and led them reception yards (319) and td's (5) , he was also voted to the second team All-Southern Conference the last two years.

First off I'd like to send my condolences to his family and to the university and the football team for it's loss. It should be noted that Craft was wearing his helmet at the time of the accident. But I still can't realize why athletes continue to ride these dangerous vehicles when they have so much to lose. It hasn't even been a month since Pittsburgh Steelers QB Ben Roethlisberger was almost killed in an accident where he flew into the windshield of an oncoming car.

The list of athletes involved in motorcycle crashes just continues to grow and until pro-league officials and college administrators do something about it, the list will continue to get bigger and lives will continue to be lost and careers ruined. The joy of riding in the open wind isn't worth your life or career.

Again though, my prayers and thoughts go out to Teddy Craft's family. My God bless you.

Lefty regroups at the Cialis Western Open

Remember back just 3 weeks ago. Phil Mickelson needed only par on 18 to secure his first US Open and 3rd career major. I'm sure if you're reading this blog you already know what happened to him on 18 unless you've been stuck in a closet. I'm not going to explain what happened, lets just say that watching Phil on 18 was reminiscent to watching the movie "Tin Cup" when Kevin Costner (Roy McAvoy) took aim at 18 at the US Open. In the movie Roy McAvoy needed birdie to win where Phil only needed par, well lets just say that Roy missed, and missed, and missed and missed some more. He wound up with a 12 over par to blow his chance at the US Open. I wonder if Phil has watched Tin Cup lately?

Well at any rate, you would think that blowing such a huge tournament would set someone back a while. Well Phil took the last 2 weeks off to regroup himself after calling himself an "idiot" for his shot selections on 18. But in true lefty fashion he seems to have gotten over that nightmarish hole and now finds himself one shot from the leader at the Cialis Western Open. He almost pulled of the shot of the tournament if not the year when he reached the green on a par 5 in only two shots. The second shot missed the cup by inches and would have been a double-eagle, instead he settled for an eagle on #9, his last hole of the day.

To say he's got some momentum behind him is an understatement. Look for Phil to take charge of this tournament early tomorrow and claim the championship. Looks like there is no let down hang over for Phil as many expected.

Here's a look at the leaderboard. Tiger sits at +1, 6 shots back.

10 year old being courted by Addidas

If things continue like this, then recruiters and shoe companies will be following kids from birth.
A 10 year old basketball player in Baltimore is already being followed by Addidas. This is most ridiculous thing I have ever read. Justin Jenifer is the 10 year that is striking everyone's fancy.

Across the gym, Scottie Bowden pulled down a flat-brimmed Washington Nationals hat until it almost shielded his eyes. A representative of Addidas, Bowden had invested many weekends and about $20,000 of company money in Justin and his teams. Bowden had provided the boy and his teammates with sneakers and travel money to tournaments in an effort to build brand loyalty in a 10-year-old with distant NBA prospects. In Justin, had Bowden accurately identified a star?

How exactly does an adult go about trying to figure out whether a child will achieve such greatness in adulthood. Does he go and look at family tree lines and genes? Does he just scout the kid for a time period? I think at 10 it is almost impossible to tell if a kid will develop the body necessary for basketball or if he will still want to play in the future. Some kids quit sports when people around them take it more serious than they do. Take for example his father.

Here's what Howard Jenifer had to say; "I always tell Justin: 'Get to 6-2 and we're good. We're good,' " Howard said. "But if he stops growing way early and everybody else keeps shooting up? Then that's it, man. That's a wrap. We might as well go try badminton or something." He was speaking of his size of 5'10 and mothers size of 5'2. What's going to happen to this kid if he grows no taller than say 5'8, his parents need to be focusing on his education, if genetics fail him then his parents will have failed him.

Here's what Howard makes his son do to get into shape: He has to run up and down 240 rows of stairs in a bleacher in 100 seconds or less twice a week, 25 pushups before dinner, jump rope 100 times in a minute, make 14 straight free throws and shoot 300 jumpers. This is the stuff of legend little league fathers. If there is one way to burn out a kid at 10 years old is to put him through some kind of army physical and make him practice hours on end. That's why most kids quit sports because they have parents that couldn't make it on their own so they use their kids for retirement or to live vicariously through them.

But getting back to Addidas. Addidas rep Scottie Bowden gets paid to find these young kids and get them into Addidas gear. Bowden started following Justin at 9 years old. "It's about brand loyalty, " Bowden said. "If you're in my uniform at 10 or 11, maybe you will stay with me later on. I'm not always happy we're focusing on 9-, 10-, 11-year-old kids. That's so early. But this is a business. And if that's what I've got to do now, then that's what I'm going to do." Why couldn't this have been going on when I was 9 throwing shutout games striking out 12 or more.

This craziness of looking for the next LeBron James at 9 is getting out of hand with these shoe companies, it's not going to stop unless there is some regulation put against it but that's not likely to happen. These companies need to let these kids be kids and not some superstar at 10 who hasn't even developed physically yet. They have these kids focusing on sports when they need to be focusing on education and life.

I can't wait to read up on the next kid when he's only 4 or 5, I'm sure that's not too far off into the future.

Click here for the entire article.

Dan McDonald to coach at Louisville

Former Citadel player and assistanct coach, Dan McDonald, was hired by Louisville to be it's new head baseball coach. He was at Ole Miss where they were one win away from the College World Series.

I am especially happy for Coach McDonald as I played for the team in his second year as a assistant coach. I remember going to his house with the rest of team watching the 1993 World Series matchup of Toronto and Philadelphia.

Here is the Citadel's article on him.

Congrats Coach McDonald, wish you alot of luck up there.

C of C brings in Cremins

In a stunning turn of events and I might add, ironic, College of Charleston has hired former Georgia Tech HC Bobby Cremins. The ironic part comes from C of C hiring Cremins to replace him with someone that pulled a "Cremins". Remember back 15 years or so, Bobby left G. Tech for South Carolina only to change his mind two days later. Chances are that he won't do that again.

Cremins has a mess to clean up once he gets behind the desk to begin work. He has to work to repair the broken imagine Tom Herrion left behind. The program under Herrion has gone downhill. Players involved in trouble with the law weren't punished on the court, players grades have slipped, and he wasn't good with boosters and if all that wasn't enough, he hasn't taken C of C where Kresse used to and that's to the NCAA tournament.

Cremins gives the school instant recognition with boosters and to future recruits. He knows how to win, having taken G Tech to the final four and to 10 NCAA tournament appearances. The court at the school bears his name. He will keep players from transferring and will get the quality recruits that will help restore the Cougar imagine.

The only problem with this hiring is it seems like a short term solution instead of a long term fix. But Cremins will succeed where Herrion couldn't and that is a fix.

Congrats to C of C for landing such a quality coach, look forward to seeing him on the sidelines against my El Cid Bulldogs.