The Wide World of Sports

It’s been a long time since I’ve written in this space and for those of you who have opened my blog and come away disappointed in the past few months, I sincerely apologize. However, there are aspects of my life that take precedence over a blog that, while I love writing in it, I don’t get paid to write in it.

My goal here is simply to touch base on the events of the past few months and give my perspective, a task that looks almost Herculean. In the past three months, we have had the highest profile free agent in the history of the NFL, we’ve had a team with a subpar record win four games against teams with better records to claim the Super Bowl, we’ve had a relatively unexpected team claim that aforementioned free agent, we’ve had a commissioner flex his incredible muscle in ways never seen before, and we’ve seen Tim Tebow lead his team to a playoff win. The most exciting part? That was only the headlines from the last three months in the NFL.

Because I am going to be writing about a lot of different things, I thought I’d give you a little list of the topics I’m going to touch on so you know what you’re getting into:

- Bounties
- Peyton Manning
- The Denver Broncos
- The New York Giants and Tournaments
- Tim Tebow
- March Madness
- Opening Day is Almost Here!

BOUNTIES

Unfortunately, I have to start with quite possibly the ugliest story of the winter. In what I gather is an incredibly extensive report compiled by the NFL, the New Orleans Saints defensive players (at least 22-27 of them) under the direction of defensive coordinator Gregg Williams, ran a bounty system where cash bonuses were given out for big hits and additional payouts were made for “knock-out” hits or “cart-off” hits where the player that was hit had to be carted off the field. He has been suspended indefinitely and he will not have the possibility of getting his job back for a year.

Head Coach Sean Payton either knew about it and did nothing or should have known about it. General Manager Mickey Loomis also falls into that category. Payton was suspended for a year (effective April 1st) and Loomis was suspended for 8 games (starting after the conclusion of the last preseason game). The severity of their suspensions is unprecedented but before you wonder why it was so harsh, you have to remember a few key factors. First, as I said before, they either knew or they should have known. Second, they were specifically told by the NFL to cease and desist this bounty program several years ago and all evidence points to the fact that they both did nothing about it. That level of arrogance is something that leagues always despise and leagues (either professional or amateur) feel the need to remind coaches, players, and teams that nobody is above the sport. Lastly, this commissioner is serious about making the sport safer for its players. When you add all of that together, you get fines and suspensions the like of which the NFL (or any other professional league, for that matter) has never seen.

In my opinion, this is what Roger Goodell had to do. According to ESPN legal analyst Lester Munson, the NFL has been named in more than 650 lawsuits by former players who are claiming (essentially) that the league did not do enough to protect them from the dangers of playing football. Truthfully, if you look at the incidence of severe brain damage amongst former players, you realize that some of these lawsuits might have a point. One of the largest issues with regards to the lawsuits that are specifically talking about head injuries is until recently we as a society haven’t known that much about concussions. How much did the NFL really know about head injuries back in the 60’s and 70’s? That is a question that these lawsuits will have to try to answer.

In the meantime, there is nothing that the NFL and Commissioner Goodell can do about what the NFL said or did forty years ago. All they can do is control the present and the future of the league and with these penalties, Goodell has sent a powerful message. The days of the NFL being a gladiatorial league are nearing an end and the more finesse type players are succeeding more than ever.

The last step that remains to be seen in this saga is what happens to the two dozen players that were involved in this program. They will be punished but Goodell is very wisely seeking counsel from the union with regards to their punishments. If the union balks at penalties, Goodell can use that to say that he is more serious about player safety than the union is. If the union thinks the penalties are too light, then Goodell has free reign to enact even harsher punishments. His job is to protect this league and he is wielding that power and wielding it well.

PEYTON MANNING

Never in the history of the NFL has a player with as sparkling a resume as Manning’s become a free agent. The NFL’s collective bargaining agreement is set up to restrict player movement and help keep players like Manning in cities like Indianapolis (the 21st largest TV market in the country). The entire concept of the franchise tag was to give teams an extra year to negotiate a long-term contract with a star player. That’s not exactly how it’s been used and now many players view it as an insult to be tagged in the first place and yet, when a new collective bargaining agreement was being negotiated, never did the player’s union try to do away with the franchise tag. The problem is that the franchise tag isn’t a bad idea; the player gets a one year contract that is guaranteed to be the average of the top five contracts at that position and the team gets another year to work out a long term deal.

Nonetheless, the five year contract that the Colts signed with Peyton Manning a year ago caused this situation to come to a head far sooner than it usually does. Rather than pay Manning a roster bonus of $28 million, the Colts decided to cut him. As cold and ruthless and heartless as it sounds, it was the best decision for both sides. Now the Colts can move on and rebuild their franchise from the ground up starting with a new general manager, coach, and quarterback. Meanwhile, Manning is free to chase down a second Super Bowl ring with another team. After a lengthy process in which he spoke to representatives from several teams, Manning signed a five year contract with the Denver Broncos potentially worth $96 million and the obvious question that follows is whether or not he is worth that much coming off of four neck surgeries.

First and foremost, with regards to the actual surgery, his neck is not in any more jeopardy than anyone else who plays professional football. The issue is that a nerve that controls his right triceps muscles needs to regenerate so he can regain strength in that muscle group. Without that strength, he won’t be able to throw a football consistently. All I have to say is this: if he wasn’t on the right track to be able to start and play effectively in September, the Broncos would not have tied the next five years of their franchise to Manning’s wagon.

So what can he bring to the Broncos? He brings a level of football genius that few have ever brought to the field. The Broncos have a talented young core of receivers and a terrific offensive line and both will instantly become much better with Manning under center. If you remember, the Broncos are coming off of a year where they went 8-8 with a defense that was solid and at times brilliant; their offense was the problem last year and even if you figure that Manning won’t add more than 7 points a game versus Tim Tebow (and I believe he’s worth much more than that) their record last year would have been 12-4.

Peyton Manning is the greatest player ever to play the position of quarterback. I know that I wrote otherwise in this space some time ago but nobody has ever brought more to the position. Other quarterbacks have thrown for more yards, others have won more games, and others have won more Super Bowls but none have combined the physical skills with the ridiculous level of intellect that Manning has brought to the position. I am simply glad that his career didn’t end on an injury and now he has the opportunity to go out on whatever terms he wants. I’d also be lying if I said that I’m also glad that he has the chance to supplant Brett Favre in the record books.

THE DENVER BRONCOS

The Broncos? You mean that team with the college quarterback? Yep, that was the team that Manning chose and I believe that it comes down to one thing; John Elway. I gather that the two of them are friends and that they play golf occasionally but that’s not why he was a big factor. John Elway was a great quarterback, won two Super Bowls and was a lock for the Hall of Fame when he became eligible back in 2004. Most importantly, he followed that brilliant playing career with a so far successful career in the front office of an NFL franchise and I think that’s what Manning wants to do after he’s done playing. I think he wants to learn from a guy who has had success at that level because it’s far from a given. If you want an example of how former players don’t necessarily do well in the front office, look no further than Matt Millen. In the seven full seasons that he was the CEO and general manager of the Detroit Lions, they went 31-81 and made many of the worst draft picks of the decade.

The last thing that you have to remember about Elway is that he was not only an amazing athlete who probably could have gone to the Hall of Fame as a baseball player had he not chosen football (he hit .361 with 9 home runs and 50 RBI as a senior at Stanford). He is also a very smart person and he received a bachelor’s degree in economics from Stanford. Likewise, Peyton Manning is a very smart person who finished his degree in three years at Tennessee but decided to come back for his senior season.

For anyone out there who thought he might have gone somewhere else, played for a few years and then moved straight up to the front office, I don’t think that was in Manning’s mind. Besides, who says that he has to move to the front office of whatever team he signed with? I have no doubt that he will not be a part of the Broncos front office largely because of John Elway. He’ll play in Denver for a few years and then he’ll get a job running someone else’s team after (or more likely before) he gets enshrined in Canton.

THE NEW YORK GIANTS AND TOURNAMENTS

For the second time in four years, the New York Giants came into the Super Bowl with a record significantly worse than the Patriots (four games this year versus six games worse in 2008). I could go on and on talking about the similarities between Super Bowl XLII and XLVI but there is a different point I would like to talk about. In the last five years, the Super Bowl has featured two 9 wins teams and two 10 win teams and the last two years the NFL’s biggest game has been won by a 10-6 team (Packers) and a 9-7 team (Giants). It is time to stop saying that the best team wins the Super Bowl. The best teams make the playoffs and that’s it.

The same thing can be said about the NCAA tournament; the best teams make the tournament but the best teams rarely win it anymore. I know that series are impractical when it comes to college basketball and the NFL but the fact of the matter is that if two teams play once, anything can happen but if two teams played a seven game series, it is extremely difficult for the lesser team to win.

This is one of the beauties of the BCS. In the short history of the BCS, many arguments can be made about which teams belong in the national championship game but you will never be able to say that 29% of teams had a better won-loss record than the BCS champion (9 of the other 31 teams had more wins than the Giants’ 9).

TIM TEBOW

This is one of the issues I have with the average sports fan and let me know if you’ve ever heard anything like this before: “I am a huge Tim Tebow fan so there’s nothing the Broncos can do at QB that will be better than that.”

That statement is ludicrous. There is no circumstance in which the Broncos are better off with Tebow at quarterback instead of Peyton Manning. If you watched the last few games of the season last year (as I did) you would see that defenses were starting to figure out how to play against Tim Tebow. Smother the receivers and make Tebow throw into small windows. In the last four regular season games (in which they went 1-3) the Broncos scored 13, 23, 14, and 3 points and that 23 point outburst against the Patriots would have been less had it been a closer game.

“But what about the playoff game against the Steelers?! He was 10-21 for 316 yards and two touchdowns!”

Yes, he was. And half the starting quarterbacks in the league would have been able to put up better numbers against that defense. On the final play of the game, an 80 yard strike to Demaryius Thomas, the deepest Steelers defender was less than ten yards off the line of scrimmage. Tebow simply had to lay the ball out in front of Thomas and then let him sprint the final 60 yards into history. He did play well against the Steelers but it was because the Steelers defense dared him to beat them and then NEVER ADJUSTED. Tebow burned them in the second quarter and in the second half, the Steelers didn’t change their defensive attack, a true failure on the part of the Steelers coaches.

Here’s the interesting thing; I like Tim Tebow. I’ve liked him since he was jumping in the air and throwing horrible passes as an 18 year old freshman on Florida’s national title winning team. I liked him even more the next year when he played with a reckless abandon and an enthusiasm that was very refreshing (and still is). The fact of the matter is that he is a great football player and a bad quarterback. He never should have been drafted in the first round. He should have been a third round pick who would get into the game for 5-10 snaps a game and when he’s in the game, nobody knows what is going to happen. Putting him alongside a Tom Brady (Bill Belichick was interested in Tebow) would be very interesting; much the way he was the change-of-pace QB as a freshman behind Chris Leak at Florida.

I hope that he does well with the New York Jets but I also think that the Jets’ brass underestimates the phenomenon that is Tebow-mania. While I don’t claim to be an expert, I live in the Denver metro area and experienced it first-hand last year. The fact of the matter is that John Elway and John Fox were hired after Tim Tebow was drafted and he wasn’t the type of QB that the Johns wanted. It’s unfortunate but it’s the fact of the matter and Elway and Fox have been around the NFL for a long time and have seen what wins and what doesn’t. Traditionally, quarterbacks like Tebow don’t win in the NFL.

MARCH MADNESS

There are things going on in the world of sports that have nothing to do with the NFL. 9 days ago, something happened that has never happened since the tournament expanded to 64 teams; two teams seeded 15th beat two teams seeded 2nd. Despite a scare near the end of the game, number one seed Syracuse survived the first round and did not become the first #1 to lose to a #16 seed but at this point I believe it is becoming more a psychological problem. Since the tournament expanded to 64 teams, #1 seeds have a record of 112-0 in the first round and for a team coming off of a small conference tournament championship, that is a huge hill to climb before you ever step on the floor.

Someday a #16 will beat a #1 and at that point the spell will be broken. I’m not saying that a #1 seed will lose every year but right now there is a mystique about the 1-16 game and it has so far been impossible for the lower seeds to break. In the 3-14 games, the lower seeds do not have a very good chance of winning and rarely do but every coach of every #14 seeded team can point to the 16 teams seeded #14 that have won a first round game for inspiration.

This year, the basketball has been great and, as always, extremely hard (for me) to predict. I tried something new this year and went with the Blindfolded Bracket feature on the website of the Wall Street Journal. While my picks this year have not been terrible, I would have been much better off simply picking the higher seeded teams.

Heading into the first games of the Elite Eight (later today) Kentucky is looking like the team to beat. Nobody else has been able to match their level of domination in their first three games and the single biggest threat to them just lost one of their biggest playmakers (North Carolina and point guard Kendall Marshall).

My Saturday picks: Florida over Louisville and Ohio State over Syracuse.
My Sunday Picks: Kentucky over Baylor and Kansas over North Carolina.

Final Four: Kentucky over Florida and Kansas over Ohio State.

For the title game, I picked Kansas in my bracket to go all the way but right now if I had to do it all over again, I’d pick Kentucky. Wildcats over Jayhawks.

OPENING DAY IS ALMOST HERE!

To me the theme of the free agency period for Major League Baseball was, if you have a player at position who can’t play another position, go get another player who plays the same position!

The three biggest free agent acquisitions (amongst position players) were Prince Fielder, Albert Pujols, and Jose Reyes (in alphabetical order). The issue is the teams that got them already had Miguel Cabrera, Kendrys Morales, and Hanley Ramirez. Now, if all six of those players were outfielders, this really wouldn’t be all that big an issue and for two of the three teams, there is a built-in apparatus to have these pairings work (the DH). The problem is that four of them are first basemen and the other two are shortstops.

The incumbents (Hanley Ramirez and Miguel Cabrera) are doing the right thing and are moving to third base but the problem is that third base is not where you put a guy to hide his glove. Third base is a very important defensive position and a substandard defender can be a serious problem if the guy playing there isn’t completely committee to his glove.

The Tigers and Angels have a serious leg up on the Marlins in these scenarios because of the designated hitter. The Tigers can play an octopus with seven gloves and a wicked throwing arm at third base and it won’t hurt them offensively because Cabrera and Fielder can split time and first base and DH.

I see the biggest problem in Miami with the Marlins (man, saying Miami Marlins sounds weird). Hanley Ramirez is a supreme talent who is two years removed from a slash line of .342/.410/.543. He did miss time with injuries last year but his slash line was a horrendous .243/.333/.379 and on top of that he has shown a serious lack in maturity in the past few years. He has said that he is willing to move to third base to accommodate Jose Reyes but how long will that last if Reyes struggles or if Ramirez struggles at third base?

So what does this mean for the upcoming season? The Angels have thrust themselves into the World Series discussion with the signing of both Pujols and CJ Wilson. Not only did they make their good rotation deeper, but they also hurt a key rival in Texas (Wilson’s team from a year ago). The Yankees and Red Sox will be there again but no team in the AL combines the lineup depth with the rotation depth that the Angels have. Having said that, I still have to say that the Rangers are the favorites to go back to the World Series since they have won the last two AL championships.

In the NL, the race is wide open. I don’t think the Marlins added enough to win the NL East this year. The Phillies are still going to be a favorite because of their rotation and the Nationals could be a dark horse contender if they stay healthy. In the central, the Cardinals lost a lot in Pujols but they get Adam Wainwright back from Tommy John surgery so they will again be favored to win the weak NL Central.

My way-too-early prediction: Albert Pujols will haunt the Cardinals as the Angels beat St. Louis in the World Series.

…

If you’ve managed to make it to the end of this, I applaud and I thank you. It’s been a busy few months for me and I haven’t been able to write in this space nearly as much as I would like and I’m going to try to write much more in the coming weeks and months. I plan to write more about the Broncos and Peyton Manning (since they plan their home games less than 10 miles from my house), I plan to write more about the Saints and why I as a former athlete hate the thought of the bounty program that they ran. I also plan to write more about the differing business models between the major sports, why they are different, and what the owners want their business models to be.

Until next time, enjoy the March Madness while it lasts!