Let's Hear It For The Girls

Maya Moore - UConn Huskies superstar

On December 21^st, the University of Connecticut women’s basketball team will almost assuredly break one of college sports most prestigious records, eclipsing UCLA’s legendary winning streak of 88 games. The streak, that started opening night of the 2008-09 season, will be downplayed by many. It is, after all, only women’s basketball, the red-headed stepchild to the men’s version.

Bryant Gumbel has taken to the forefront of this negative campaign, imploring the viewers of his humbly named HBO show, “Real Sports With Bryant Gumbel” to not compare UConn’s accomplishments to those of UCLA’s.

Bruno Sammartino

Surely, in the coming days, many other writers looking to make a name for themselves, will follow suit. There will be disparaging comments; there will be giggles and insults at the notion that this record is any more legitimate than the longest WWE championship reign. (Bruno Sammartino, for the record, at 2,803 days, or nearly eight years.)

You’ll read that women’s basketball is inferior to men’s, that if you put UConn up against a twenty-loss Division III men’s team, the D3 team would win. You’ll read that UConn plays a weak schedule and that their conference is comparable to a mid-major. You will read that the Huskies only win because the best players all go there, and that the difference between the very best and the second level is a Michael Strahan front-teeth size gap.

Pardon my French, but that’s pure 100% grade A bullshit.

Crawford and Gonzo and.....

On December 4^th, the Red Sox made the biggest personnel move of Major League Baseball’s young Hot-Stove season. (Previously known as the “off”-season, but there is no off-season in sports anymore; not with the 24-hour news cycle.) In case you’ve been living in a cave under water on one of Saturn’s moons, then allow me to fill you in. That day, Boston completed a trade with San Diego to finally land the man Theo Epstein has been fawning over for two years, Adrian Gonzalez.

Red makes Gonzo smile.

When the news broke, Red Sox Nation let out an enormous “WOO HOO!” Twitter and Facebook immediately blew up with celebratory posts. Sons called fathers. Fathers called grandfathers. Friends rejoiced. And, the Nation howled “Suck it!” the their rivals to the south.

The Hot-Stove season was immediately successful.

Little did the Nation know, it had only just begun.

News broke on December 9^th that the Red Sox had signed the #1 free agent hitter on the market, Carl Crawford. Rumor has it, Lenny Clarke actually fainted into his bowl of Fiddle Faddle when the ESPN crawl reported it. The collective jaw of Red Sox Nation dropped to the floor in disbelief. Surely, the Angels were getting Crawford. That’s what we were told. And, if not them, then the Yankees. Not the Sox. Not after Jayson Werth signed that ludicrous contract with the Nationals. No way. No how. No effing way. NO EFFING WAY! Yet, there it was. Carl Crawford agreeing to terms with the Boston Red Sox.

Carl Crawford looks good in red.

If the Hot-Stove season had been a success after acquiring Gonzalez, the Crawford signing officially stamped it as one of the greatest in Boston history.

In the course of five days, the Red Sox, who were hampered in 2010 with injuries and a sub-par line-up had acquired an All-Star outfielder and a top five first baseman, immediately placing their line-up among the best in baseball, on paper.

With a transaction feast as robust as Thanksgiving dinner, Red Sox Nation officially plopped their asses on the couch, leaned back, put their feet up, unbuttoned their pants, and let out a satisfied sigh. But, the cook is not resting. Not yet. As the Nation digests this deliciousness, Theo Epstein, General Manager of the Red Sox, is still in the kitchen, preparing dessert.

Because, this Hot-Stove season is far from over. And, I’m not referring to the bullpen help that Epstein spoke about on December 10th. That’s more like the post dinner cup of coffee. Nope. Theo’s got something special cooking, something sweet that the Nation will devour. I’m sure of it.

Why? Aren’t the Red Sox recent indulgences satisfactory? Yes. Of course they are. And no, not quite. There’s still work that needs to be done. I can see that. And, seeing as I’m just an observer, I have to believe the master chef Epstein is seeing the same thing.

Like a democrat who can’t get his party’s bid, the Sox lean too much to the left.

End Zombie Prejudice - Watch 'The Walking Dead'

http://www.amctv.com/originals/The-Walking-Dead/

Do you like television shows that feature characters with depth, who you can relate to even if there is nothing relatable in your life to theirs? Do you like television shows with rich dialogue, where a turn of a phrase can evoke any range of emotion? Do you like television shows with beautiful cinematography, or award-worthy directing? Do you like television shows that put you on the edge of your seat, then leave you teetering there as the closing credits roll, and you wish next week’s episode would begin at that exact moment?

Then, for God’s sake, why aren’t you watching AMC’s ‘The Walking Dead’?

I know why.

Zombies. Yeah, that nearly turned me off, too.

Yes, there are an awful lot of zombies in the show. And, yes, they are about the most unattractive thing on television since Angela Lansbury. (I kid. I kid. Angela Lansbury is a wonderfully talented actress and a beautiful person.) And, yes, they are creepy and can scare the bejesus out of you.

But, if the zombies (or “walkers” as they’re called in the show) are the reason you’re not watching ‘The Walking Dead’, then you’re allowing yourself to miss one of the best shows on television. Not just one of the best new shows, but one of the best shows. Period.

Once upon a time, a few years ago, you probably wouldn’t watch a television show if it was about Vampires either. Now, most of you probably watch either ‘True Blood’ or ‘The Vampire Diaries’ or have seen or read the ‘Twilight’ series. You were able to overcome your monster prejudice for the undead with fangs. You gave blood suckers a chance. Now, give brain eaters one, too.

Here are some of my reasons why ‘The Walking Dead’ deserve your attention.

WHAT'S A JETER WORTH?

What would YOU pay Jeter if you were the Yankees?

According to ESPN, sources inside the New York Yankees are stating they are “at odds” with shortstop Derek Jeter regarding a new contract.

The Yankees, reportedly, are OK with giving the 36 year old, who posted career worst numbers in 2010, a contract in the area of 3 years at $21 million per. Jeter is looking for at least a 4 year contract, and prefers a 5 or 6 year deal.

There’s at least one unsympathetic voice in the Yankee front office. "Tell him the deal is three years at $15 million a year, take it or leave it," the person taking the hard-line approach said. "Wait him out and he'll wind up taking it. Where's he gonna go, Cincinnati?"

Are we really looking at a potential face-off between the richest and most popular organization in American professional sports and their most marketable and popular player? If so, who wins? Or, better yet, who should relent? Who needs who the most? Sounds like questions for a guy who loves answering these types of questions.

No, jackass. I mean me.

DOWNSIZING THE NFL

Once upon a time there was a professional football league where guys wore pads made of glorified Styrofoam, helmets made of leather and sans face protection, and there were no mouthguards to be seen. Horse collar and clothesline tackles were legal, and the quarterback was equally vulnerable to a hit as the rest of the team. There were no fines for gouging eyes or groin-punching; only a fifteen yard penalty, if that.

Dick Butkus, baddest football player of his generation,
has thighs the size of Patrick Willis' forearms.

As time went on, technology advanced and the league adopted hard plastic pads and helmets. Facemasks were introduced, as were rib and neck protection. The dangerous tackling practices were outlawed and players began being penalized if a drop of sweat fell on the quarterback. Fines were levied for harder-than-the-average-person-finds-comfortable-to-watch hits, and suspensions were levied if a player performed the outrageous act of trying to stop a receiver from catching a ball.

And, despite all the protection technology and rules have provided, serious injuries in this professional football league are much more prevalent than ever before. And, the current head honcho of the league is shaking in his boots in fear that a player may actually die on the field before too long.

What happened? Weren’t these technologies supposed to help protect the players that used them? Weren’t these stringent rules put into place to limit devastating injuries supposed to actually reduce devastating injuries? What happened?

CHEATING OUR YOUTH

Once I was playing Yahtzee with my daughter. She was three. (It was a child’s version. She’s not some kind of Yahtzee savant.) After she rolled her three turns and didn’t get her desired result, she wanted another one. Thinking it was cute, I went ahead and let her go again. When she still didn’t get her desired result, she asked again and I, again, obliged. This went on a few more times until she rolled the “yahtzee” she’d been looking for. When the game was over and the points were counted, she had beaten me handily; in large part to the thirty-five or forty extra rolls she was allowed. She jumped up and down taunting “I WON! DADDY LOST! I WON! DADDY LOST!” (Yes, she was taunting.) That didn’t seem so cute. Sure, she had won, but only because I had allowed her to. It’s not the sour grapes driving that last sentence. Winning or losing against a three-year old is hardly worth getting excited about. I just wanted her and I to have a good time, which we did, even with the taunting.

A few days later, we played again. This time, when she asked for extra rolls, I said “No,” and that “It was against the rules.” This ignited a fury in her I had only seen while turning off “Yo Gabba Gabba” and telling her it’s bedtime. She dropped to the floor and bawled her eyes out, kicking the ground and screaming as loud as her little vocal chords would allow. When my wife entered the room and asked her what had happened, she sobbed “Daddy isn’t being fair.” I explained my stance and my wife stared me down like I was an over competitive psychotic who needed to win so badly that he’d crush his daughter’s fragile ego to do so. I explained that she needs to know how to play within the rules; that cheating is no way to win a game. It wasn’t competitive. It was a life lesson.

Understand, I knew my three-year old daughter was not intentionally cheating. She didn’t even realize the concept yet. But, she understood the philosophy of winning at all costs. The idea of a game is to win, and, to her and most children her age, this needs to be accomplished by any means necessary. What I had effectively done by allowing her extra rolls the first time we played, then allowing her to exuberantly celebrate her victory, was to reinforce that belief. Now, it was my responsibility to teach her that winning isn’t always the point of playing a game, especially if you play outside the rules to do so.