So who will be this year’s Giants?

Last year the San Francisco Giants played their cards right and won the World Championship.  Technically, they won the Championship of one Canadian city and the United States of America, but that’s an argument for another day.  A good question is who picked the Giants to win before the season?  Last year they had numerous players playing above their previous levels, which few saw coming.  So who will be this year’s Giants?  In what will be the first of many, I present this 2011’s baseball breakdown.

AL East – I believe one team got significantly better this offseason through transactions and getting players healthy.  In signing Carl Crawford, the Boston Red Sox acquired the best non-pitcher free agent and weakened the Tampa Bay Rays.  Now the Rays didn’t have the financial means to resign Crawford, but with him signing within the division the defending AL East Champions had their title defense get that much tougher.  The Yankees went all in to sign Cliff Lee, only to have him sign with the Phillies.  Their most significant signing in the offseason was a new eighth inning setup man (also from the Rays).  They are a team loaded with all stars, but they’ve all gotten a year older.  The Blue Jays and Orioles must curse Bud Selig every day for keeping them in a division with the Red Sox, Yankees and Rays.  Red Sox

AL Central – A ton of balls are going to fly out of Comiskey Park this season for the Chicago White Sox thanks to acquiring Adam Dunn and resigning Paul Konerko.  (I don’t care what it’s called, it’s still Comiskey to me.)  The Twins always win when they’re not supposed to so they can’t be counted out, but the long-term health of 1B Justin Morneau is a big question mark as he tries to make it back from last season’s concussion.  As Miguel Cabrera goes with his addiction battles, so go the Tigers.  The Indians will be good again someday, and the Royals will be good again some decade.  White Sox

AL West – The Rangers return virtually intact from last year’s AL Pennant winning team, except for the aforementioned Cliff Lee, but what many people have forgotten is that Lee didn’t join Texas until midseason after they’d already established a lead in their division.  The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim came in second or third in the free agent sweepstakes of several players, thus not adding much to their underperforming 80-82 2010 season.  The Mariners have a beautiful stadium, King Felix Hernandez and Ichiro…sorry, not much else.  The A’s are the anomaly in this division.  While few can name any of their position players, the A’s Big Four pitchers (Dallas Braden, Trevor Cahill, Brett Anderson, and Gio Gonzalez) are set for a great 2010 campaign.  I don’t know why I like the A’s this year, so I’m blaming it on my love of the book Moneyball by Michael Lewis which chronicled the Oakland A’s, their GM Billy Beane and their groundbreaking use of statistics within their organization.  A’s

NL East – Everybody loves the Phillies with their vaunted rotation of Roy Halladay (on my fantasy baseball team), Lee, Cole Hamels and Roy Oswalt, which on paper is one of the best (if not the best) rotations in all of baseball.  What I don’t love is the injuries to 2B Chase Utley and Closer Brad Lidge; the decline last year of 1B Ryan Howard; and trying to fill the hole that OF Jayson Werth left (when he took the crazy money that Washington offered).  The Braves also sport a very good pitching staff and several very good players, and are the trendy sleeper pick to steal the NL East.  The Marlins aren’t due for another good season until ownership decides again to rent talent instead of just trading away their good prospects like they’re doing now.  Washington spent a boatload on Werth and made a run at Lee in the offseason, but they’re still several years off.  Hopefully the Mets can perform better on the field than the Wilpons’ are doing financially off it, as they wade through the Bernie Madoff mess.  Phillies

NL Central – All the attention will continue to be on Albert Pujols as he plays out the final year of his contract, and I think the distraction will be too much for the Cardinals to overcome when you add that to the loss of ace P Adam Wainwright, who is already out for the season.  I don’t care how loaded the Cubs’ lineup is, I won’t ever pick them to win…by the way they’re not loaded this year.  Milwaukee has gone all in this season acquiring P’s Zach Greinke and Shaun Marcum to capitalize on the last year 1B Prince Fielder is a Brewer.  (An interesting note about Marcum’s last season as a Blue Jay is in 21 starts against teams not named the Red Sox, Yankees, and Rays he posted a 2.74 ERA and 1.08 WHIP, compared to 3.64 ERA and 1.15 WHIP against those three teams…he’s not in the AL East now.)  The Reds have been hit with injuries to a couple of their pitchers, so a fast start shouldn’t be expected this year too.  They too had several players overachieve from their previous statistics, and although certain talking heads are picking them again, I’m not buying it.  It’s scary to say, but Houston may challenge the perennially bad Pirates for last place in the division this year.  Brewers

NL West – As I mentioned in the opening, the Giants overachieved big time last year.  To quote ESPN’s Jayson Stark “…Andres Torres arising from the scrap heap to get 67 extra-base hits last season … and a guy who got released by Tampa Bay (Pat Burrell) batting cleanup in Game 1 of the World Series … and a fellow who got claimed on waivers (Cody Ross) hitting two home runs off Roy Halladay in a postseason game … and the World Series MVP award going to a man (Edgar Renteria) who bopped two three-run homers in the Series after hitting none in the entire season.”  (http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/preview/2011/columns/story?columnist=stark_jayson&id=6267195)  I don’t recall the Giants being a trendy sleeper pick in the preseason a year ago, and I’m not going with them this year.  Odds are too great that their players will regress towards what they were in past years…which means not World Series Champions.  Like the Mets, the Los Angeles Dodgers of Los Angeles are in disarray as their owners are engaged in a bitter divorce.  Who knows how much money they’ll invest in the team this year and whether or not it will be sold.  Too many distractions for my taste.  San Diego also played way over their heads last year, and 1B Adrian Gonzalez is now in Boston and ace P Mat Latos is starting the year on the DL.  Last year’s 90 victories came out of nowhere, but now one of their biggest offensive weapons is OF Brad Hawpe, who’s not going to scare anyone.  Let the Rocky Mountain Bias begin!  The Rockies have three superstars in SS Troy Tulowitski, OF Carlos Gonzalez and P Ubaldo Jimenez, and just need to get more production out of their teammates.  This year they will (…as it’s an odd numbered year…check their stats).  Rockies

Wild Cards – AL:  Yankees; NL:  Braves.

Wild Card Round:

Red Sox over White Sox

Yankees over A’s

Rockies over Braves

Phillies over Brewers

Championship Series:

Red Sox over Yankees

Phillies over Rockies (this pains me greatly)

World Series:

Red Sox over Phillies

Why should we care about Barry Bonds' Trial?

This week, Barry Bonds' perjury trial commenced and in essence, the home run records were put on trial.  Bonds has not played in a professional baseball game since 2007, and the charges and this trial have been stewing since before even then.

First the legal side

Many legal experts agree that the prosecution has an incredible task ahead of them in getting a conviction, mainly because some of their key evidence, namely a urine sample, has been disallowed as evidence to be used during the trial.  Add to the fact that if Bonds takes the stand (99.99999% chance he won't), he'll plead the 5th.  Nothing else can be expected from Bonds.  For sure, only two people know if Bonds knowingly took steroids....Bonds (who wouldn't incriminate himself) and his old trainer (Greg Anderson), who is being sent back to prison for the fifth time for failing to testify.  Unfortunately for the prosecution (and more fortunately for Mr. Bonds), just because a star witness refuses to testify, this can't be directly correlated to the legal definition of guilt on the defendant’s part.

In the public's eye, Barry Bonds is guilty as all get out.  If his personal trainer, who knows exactly what Bonds took, won't testify, it's because he knows that Bonds is guilty.  Why else would he not testify?!  In the defense's opening statement they stated again that Bonds believed he was using flaxseed oil and arthritis cream, when in fact he was using The Cream and The Clear (two designer steroids).  Yes, as the lead prosecutor said, this is laughable.  According to several reports, Bonds never ate anything or put anything in his body without knowing its exact contents.  Rick Reilly once wrote an article about this, saying that Bonds refused to eat off the spread in the Giants' clubhouse because they couldn't tell him the exact ingredients (and amounts of each) that were in each dish.

Now the home run records

Although it's not being given much attention, I think that the home run records are also on trial here.  While everyone will admit that Bonds did break both the single season and all time home run records (two of the most revered records in all of sports), if it is proven that he knowingly took steroids, I believe Bonds' numbers should wiped from the record books and the records returned to their rightful owners...Roger Maris and Hank Aaron.  Yes, I said Roger Maris...Mark McGuire has already admitted to using steroids and Sammy Sosa's complete brain fart of the English language while testifying in front of the Congressional hearing fooled no one as to his guilt.  Many people point to the fact that Major League Baseball did not have a drug testing policy until a few years ago and didn't outright ban steroids before then.  Sorry folks, they actually did.  One little observed line in baseballs bylaws stated that all drugs that were illegal in the U.S. were also illegal in baseball.  You and I aren't allowed to legally buy or use anabolic steroids (or whatever people are calling it these days), thus baseball players couldn’t/can't either.

This trial has been in the making for years, and unfortunately for Barry Bonds, even if he is found not guilty, in the court of public opinion he'll never be exonerated.  Has everyone forgotten that OJ Simpson wasn't found guilty?  (Lying to a Federal Grand Jury and murder are vastly different, and by no means am I comparing the type of crimes...merely the outcomes of the trials.)

Let's ensure the home run records are returned to their rightful owners regardless of the trial’s outcome.

Why is the NFL so popular?

Through the years there have been lockouts in all four major professional sports leagues in the United States (NFL, MLB, NBA and NHL).  Why is it that the coverage of the latest NFL labor woes has exceeded the coverage of all the other labor struggles combined?  The NBA's Collective Bargaining Agreement expires after this season, and it's getting less than 1% of the coverage of the NFL's CBA situation.  (My opinion…the NBA seems to be heading towards a guaranteed work stoppage.)

The bottom line is that the NFL is insanely popular in the U.S. now...but this begs the question, why?  As your intrepid blogger, I'll make at least a feeble attempt at answering this.

With a shortened season, every game is meaningful...in multiple ways.

Baseball's 162 game season is crazy long, while the NBA's and NHL's last 82 games, thus safely ensuring that every game is not must see TV.  MLB has 81 HOME games alone!  Yes there are marquee games or series in each sport, but if you miss one game you've only missed 1.2% of the NHL or NBA seasons, and a measly 0.62% of your favorite MLB team's slate.  You may be very upset that you missed the first game between the Yankees and Red Sox in a given year, but fear not, they'll play at least 16 more times over the course of that season.  The NFL is different though.  Teams only have eight home games (16 overall), and if your cousin gets married on the opening weekend of the NFL season in a town that is not where you live, you've just missed out on 6.25% of the season.  (DeeDee, it was a beautiful wedding.)  Like the tagline that college football used recently, every game in the NFL matters.  This absolutely cannot be said for the NBA, NHL or MLB.  Fans have a limited number of opportunities to watch their favorite NFL team in person or on TV.

Every game also matters more to NFL players.  In the NFL, 9-7 teams sometimes don't make the playoffs (then again 7-9 teams sometimes do, I’m looking at you Seattle).  To wit, of the eight divisions in the NFL last year, five of them ended with the top two teams in each tied or separated by one win, while in MLB, over the last two seasons, only three divisional races have ended with a two game or less win difference between the top teams.  In fact, over those last NFL and MLB seasons mentioned, the average win difference between the top NFL teams in each division was 1.125, while MLB's was 5.417.  The much smaller sample size logically makes each game more important, and over longer seasons, the best teams separate themselves from their inferior division opponents.

People resonate with their local NFL teams

More so than any other pro sports, NFL teams take on the persona of where they're from.   The best example of this is the Pittsburgh Steelers.  The Yellow and Black with their stout defense and noted rushing attack very closely resemble their blue collar fans that have steadfastly supported them through the years.  Unfortunately the parallel between fans and teams has held true for the Lions, whose run of luck has been eerily similar to their host city’s.

Big Hits

Fans of football enjoy the hard hitting aspect of the game.  Personally I prefer good tackling to good hitting, but I understand how a big hit can fire up a team and crowd significantly more than a well executed form tackle can.  I think that ESPN (and specifically Sports Center) is to blame for this as they have grown to glorify the big hits, and thus people begin to crave them more.  Hockey has checking and the occasional fight, but on every play in a football game there is the potential for a player to get laid out with a big hit.  Baseball has rare skirmishes on the mound when pitchers and batters disagree about who owns the inside corner, but again the potential is close to zero compared to the NFL.  The NBA has its share of hard fouls and picks, but the NFL still dominates here.  I do believe the number of soccer fans is reduced here because it is more of a finesse game...that lacks violence.

Is it possible for the NFL's popularity to continue on its meteoric rise?  Yes, but I don't believe for long.  It is just not sustainable and I think the owners have figured this out.  Although they are making money hand over fist, they know that the league's popularity will plateau and eventually fall off.  I'm not saying that it will fall to the level of the NHL, but the peak is already here or will be soon.  Let's hope a new CBA can be reached so we don't have to find out how low the NFL's popularity will sink to.

Is there any hope?

Sorry folks, lockout is going to the most often heard word on sports’ talk radio and television for the next few months.  Maybe like my prediction of Chris Peterson going to LSU, I’ll be wrong, but unfortunately I don’t think that I am.

So let’s assume that in the next day, a new Collective Bargaining Agreement is not reached.  Let’s first tackle the question that’s at the forefront of everyone’s minds…I don’t know how I got this good looking.  Now let’s talk about that second question on your mind…when will we have professional football again?  Let’s get one thing straight, the owners are in no hurry to agree to a deal that gives the players anything close to the deal that the owners just opted out of.

The NFL has been, and will continue to be, a deadline league.  The first deadline is now upon us, and will come to pass at 11:59 pm Thursday night.  If a new deal isn’t agreed to (or the deadline isn’t extended by two weeks (which would only give fans a false hope)) in the next day, we will experience at least months of a dreaded lockout.

I say this because the second deadline would be sometime in early to mid August, when if a deal is not reached the full NFL season won’t be able to be played.  If a deal is reached by that date in August, teams will be able to hold an abbreviated training camp (hopefully Albert Haynesworth will be able to pass his running test more quickly or he’ll miss the entire camp), followed by a couple preseason games, and then we’ll see the entire 16 or 18 game season (whatever number is collectively bargained) starting in September.

Unfortunately, if August comes and goes without an agreement, we’ll have two to three more months of winter (sorry, it will seem like the movie Groundhog Day)…I mean lockout.  In October or November we’ll then hit the third deadline, which nobody wants to even think about…the date that the entire NFL season is cancelled, because not enough time will be left to play out even an abbreviated season.

Do I hope an agreement can be reached soon?  Absolutely, but the real question is will an agreement be reached soon?  Sorry, I think we’ve got many more months of winter ahead of us.

(It seems that the players’ best weapon at their disposal is to decertify as a union, and we’ll hear much more about that after 11:59 pm passes tomorrow.  ESPN’s legal analyst, Lester Munson, gives an excellent breakdown of the issues at play here:  http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/commentary/news/story?page=munson/110302 .  While no guarantees of labor peace are given, there is hope.)