Declining guarantees
September 28, 2007It's truly a sad day when "the guarantee," once made famous by Babe Ruth, Joe Namath, Mark Messier and former New York Giants coach Jim Fassel, becomes an obvious motivational ploy for 0-3 NFL teams.
Dolphins linebacker Joey Porter and St. Louis Rams wide receiver Isaac Bruce both pushed their chips to the middle of the table in Fasselesque fashion and guaranteed wins this Sunday over the improving Oakland Raiders and the Dallas Cowboys, respectively.
And I'm just not seeing it either case.
The Dolphins defense can't stop the run - as demonstrated by Clinton Portis, Marion Barber and Thomas Jones' success against them in consecutive weeks - while the Rams roll into Texas Stadium without injured running back Steven Jackson, but with an injured Marc Bulger at quarterback.
Motivation is one thing, but delusion is quite another.
I guarantee it.
Posted by Stephen Smith at 09:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Jackassery in Oklahoma
September 27, 2007It's been almost a full week since Oklahoma State coach Mike Gundy's now legendary rant against Daily Oklahoman columnist Jenni Carlson - an instant classic on sports radio - but the story's finally starting to die down a bit.
While Gundy busily prepares his team for Sam Houston State Saturday night at home, Carlson is no doubt back at work preparing to cover it - just two professionals getting back to their jobs and on with their lives, as well they should.
Too bad that all that professionalism was lost on them when it counted.
Carlson's irresponsibility in selecting her angle for a column about now-deposed Cowboys quarterback Bobby Reid plus Gundy's irrational reaction to it equaled total jackassery and the whole country got to watch.
Carlson may or may not gain a reputation as no-nonsense, hard question-asking sportswriter and Gundy may or may not have found a way to galvanize his locker room, but both are losers in my eyes.
Look, a sportswriter/columnist has every right to print his or her opinion on whatever he or she chooses to write about.
However, they also have an obligation to consider not only the subject matter, but also their opinion's possible reception. Additionally, it might not hurt to give a fact-based opinion rather than a low-brow psychological diagnosis.
To be fair though, coaches don't necessarily have to be emotional firebrands - but if you are, then that's what you are.
Yet, if you're the face of your program and the prime example to follow for a room full of still impressionable young adults, you've got to conduct your affairs with a bit more decorum than Gundy's meltdown showed he has the ability to.
Thus proving that confronting a jackass by acting like a jackass never works out in your favor.
Hopefully their ridiculous circus act is over, but with eight games left in the Cowboys' season - including the Bedlam Series - there are still ample opportunities for more nuttiness.
Unless, of course, professionalism just happens to win out.
Posted by Stephen Smith at 02:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Stuck with a genius
September 25, 2007Splat. Pow. Wham. Bam.
Those were the sounds of the Notre Dame Fighting Irish falling on their collective faces the first four times out of the gate this season.
Invariably, every time this happens, the focus shifts to current Washington Huskies coach and former Notre Dame castoff Tyrone Willingham.
But, somehow, I don't think he cares.
Willingham compiled a 21-15 record in three seasons with the Irish and lost his job for finishing 6-6 in 2004, his third and final season in South Bend. Yet, current Notre Dame coach Charlie Weis will be incredibly lucky to do that well in his.
Already 0-4, Weis' Irish have sure-fire losses coming to Purdue, UCLA, Boston College, No. 1 USC and maybe even Navy and Air Force before the season-ender with Stanford -- the only game they may have a legitimate chance to win.
"It kind of reminds me of our first year with the Patriots back in 2000," Weis told Stephen A. Smith on ESPN Radio. "We started out pretty bad just like this, but we won our last four games of the season and went to the playoffs the next year.
"That's what we hope we're experiencing here."
Truthfully though, Weis is staring down the barrel at a 1-10 or maybe a 2-9 campaign (if they're lucky), but he'll be back with the Fighting Irish next year.
Just as the NCAA will never parcel out another death penalty due to its effect on a still-reeling SMU, Notre Dame gave Weis a 10-year contract supposedly to ensure the stability of its program and put the Willingham controversy behind them.
Well, now they're stuck with him until 2015.
And that seems like an awful long time at 0-4 in 2007.
Meanwhile at the opposite end of the spectrum, Willingham is 2-2 with the Huskies and hosting the top-ranked Trojans on Saturday.
In fairness though, Washington is certainly no Notre Dame. But then again, a look at their records shows that Notre Dame is certainly no Washington.
Posted by Stephen Smith at 03:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Just in the Knick of time
September 24, 2007If Isiah Thomas isn't an O.J. Simpson fan by now, then he certainly should be.
Frankly, if he's still with the New York Knicks as their coach by the time the season starts, Simpson is who he has to thank.
O.J.'s recent shenanigans take up so much of our lurid fascination with the bizarre that no one's looking too closely at Thomas' plight in regard to Anucha Browne Sanders' $10 million sexual harassment lawsuit filed against the New York Knicks.
Her allegations center primarily on Thomas' actions toward her, which allegedly include sexual slurs, racial slurs and unwanted physical contact.
It's a PC (politically-correct) kind of world, but everyone knows that -- including Thomas.
Let's just say for a second that Browne Sanders made the whole thing up as a way to obtain compensation after her firing from her post as Knicks' vice president of marketing and business operations in 2005.
Since the Knicks are ones with the deep pockets here, then why focus on Thomas or anything he supposedly did? Unless something indeed happened, there would be no reason to.
Law & Order has its trademark "twist" every week -- a detail or angle to the story you may have missed the first time that changes the whole outcome of a case.
For Isiah's sake, there better be a twist here too or he'll be more than just a sub-par coach.
He'll be an unemployed sub-par coach.
Posted by Stephen Smith at 09:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Making a Big Splash in Big D -- again
September 19, 2007For anyone shocked by the Cowboys' signing of Tank Johnson on Tuesday, I have three words: get a grip.
Moral outrage and righteous indignation pale in comparison to winning in the NFL and Cowboys owner Jerry Jones knows it.
Even though my radio partners, Rick Taylor and Jermaine Farrell, obviously do not.
The two of them charged toward me astride their ethical high-horses when I dared suggest -- during our inaugural show on 1230 AM ESPN Radio -- that Chicago Bears castoff Tank Johnson might look awful imposing in Royal Blue and Silver later this season.
"They wouldn't do that," Rick cried. "That's outrageous -- the very idea of bringing another problem into that locker room is just crazy," Jermaine exclaimed. "It'll never happen."
Flash forward three months from his June 4th suspension and Johnson's a Cowboy in waiting until his November 11th debut with against the New York Giants.
Always remember, Jones loves to make a big splash (remember the T.O. signing?) and with the Cowboys traveling to the modern-art monstrosity formerly known as Soldier Field this Sunday night, what better time to ink a former Bears player?
Yet right now, Johnson is merely a "good" player who saw his playing time increase due to an injury to former Oklahoma Sooner Tommie Harris, who was among the Bears' 2004 NFL Draft selections along with Wichita Falls' own Nathan Vasher and Johnson himself.
Harris and Vasher are former Pro Bowlers while, at least for the time being, Johnson is not.
But he is a Dallas Cowboy now, so anything's possible.
(Whether you like it or not, Jermaine and Rick.)
Posted by Stephen Smith at 08:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Oy vey, O.J.
September 17, 2007The verdict of his 1994 murder trial may have temporarily divided the country, but I think we can all agree that the term, "tragic figure" should accompany any photo hereafter of O.J. Simpson.
Look, I don't know if O.J. did "it" -- and by "it," I mean murder Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman or have them murdered -- but it's painfully apparent that he's no Robert Blake.
Unlike Baretta, O.J. can't avoid the spotlight to save his life.
Almost as if he's still running through an airport on his way to the Hertz counter, Simpson seeks out obstacles only to go tumbling over them and into more trouble.
If you look at just the last few months -- with the harebrained, not-quite-tell-all book idea and his arrest in Las Vegas this past weekend for supposedly stealing back his own stuff -- you find a man who's his own foil, own worst possible enemy, own downfall.
And the real tragedy doesn't focus solely on how he's frittered away his own notoriety and respect in every circle imaginable, but rather upon the high cost paid by those who love and support him -- as difficult as that might seem to fathom sometimes.
It's no easy thing to tell a grown man where he can and cannot go, but if O.J. manages to slither his way out of Sin City a free man, somebody who cares about him ought to -- before he lives up to his new namesake yet again.
Posted by Stephen Smith at 10:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Watching through my fingers
September 14, 2007Being a Chicago Cubs fan is hard work.
Growing up in Tennessee, you'd think I would have ended up a St. Louis Cardinal fan. Yet, with the advent of cable television, every time I flipped the tube on in the summer time, the Cubs were always right there on WGN.
Naturally though, they've broken my heart a few times such as the 1984 NLCS when they let the San Diego Padres off the hook after jumping out to a 2-0 lead and most notably, the Bartman incident in 2003 that came in the middle of a three-game collapse after a 3-1 lead.
Lately, I've become accustomed to either watching through a space in my fingers because my hands were covering my eyes in anticipation of more heartbreak or just waiting for the highlights on SportsCenter.
But at least I'm watching -- and for me, that shows growth.
New Cubs manager Lou Pinella seems anxious for the team to shed its loveable loser label and become a consistent contender while rumors persist that Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban still has a shot to become team owner.
So things are looking up and moving further away from past disasters.
The good guys have a half-game lead coming into a weekend series with St. Louis while the second-place Milwaukee Brewers host the Cincinnati Reds, who just finished off a damaging three-game sweep of the Cardinals.
Hopefully, the Cubs can put the defending world champs out of their misery while the Reds do to the Brewers what they just did to the Cards.
And rest assured that I'll be somewhere watching -- with one hand over my eyes.
Posted by Stephen Smith at 01:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
A bit too much "flare" in European soccer
September 13, 2007Flares were originally designed act as distress signals on railroads and highways -- not as industrial-strength sparklers for crazed European soccer fans.
We may owe our system of government and justice to our European brethren, but thank God that their obsession with "futbol" didn't come along with them.
Don't get me wrong, we have our problems with crime. But, at least we keep ours out of the stadiums (well, Philadelphia and Oakland notwithstanding, of course).
Once you add hand-carried pyrotechnics and alcohol to the well-established insanity, it comes as little surprise that one of these Euro-idiots would take the opportunity to throw a lit flare at one of the players as they did yesterday.
As a matter of fact, it's become commonplace.
Type in "soccer, flares, players" into the web browser of your choice and you'll find numerous incidents and almost no retribution whatsoever.
Not to be any more ethnocentric than I must already sound, but we've gotten to the point in America where people have to go through a metal detector just to get into a high school football game.
So, how could the security people at these soccer games miss fans entering the stadium with freaking flares? Then again, "in some countries, fans light flares or even start celebratory fires in the stands, obviously dangerous practices," according to howstuffworks.com.
So obviously, no one's checking.
Don't get me wrong though. Universally, there's nothing wrong with soccer, per se.
As a matter of fact, we've got two great programs -- Midwestern State University and Rider High School, among others -- right here in town.
Thankfully though, we don't have any hooligans.
Posted by Stephen Smith at 02:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
It's a gray area
September 12, 2007Apparently the old NASCAR adage, "if you ain't cheating, you ain't trying" rumbled its way off a race track somewhere and parked squarely in the New England Patriots locker room.
Pats coach Bill Belichick gave the standard "I can't comment on that right now" in Wednesday's press conference, but it's pretty clear that the organization got caught with its hand in the cookie jar.
While NFL commissioner Roger Goodell -- who's coming off a lot like Judge Roy Bean recently --considers whether or not to punish the Pats by taking future draft picks, he should make things simple and just take away their now tainted 38-14 win over the New York Jets last Sunday.
Goodell is all about sending messages, and if the allegations levied against them thus far are true, the Patriots are in desperate need of one.
There's already rumbling about asterisks on Super Bowl victories and whatnot, but that'll never fly.
Just like no one can definitively say when steroids began in baseball, it's going to be just as difficult to ascertain when the Pats' Coach Cam opened for business.
However, a stiff current penalty in lieu of a future one would send a much clearer message to a league that was even dirtier than previously thought.
Posted by Stephen Smith at 11:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
