Sports JAM with Jeff and Mike

The Blog of No

By Jeff Stoyanoff

1. Naturally, with the exception of a few stat dorks out there, the sports world is fixated on the NFL. Yet, I am going to start out in the largely forgotten world of Major League Baseball. Come on, even boxing thinks that baseball isn’t getting any good pub right now. But, there is a fantastic race in the AL east going on as the Rays and the Yanks are separated by just a half game with under 20 games remaining in the regular season, that is as good as it gets in baseball. My response as a fan? It would be the same response private John Winger offered when asked what he thought of the entire platoon doing KP…..I think it sucks…

Why would a great pennant race suck?? Because there is no pennant race! Let me tell you what these two great teams are playing for….the right to host a game seven if it happens in the playoffs…..oh the drama. The biggest screw up in baseball in the last 30 years has nothing to do with steroids. That kind of thing happens, it will be forgotten and the players involved will be judged accordingly. Do we assume that every player who played in the dead ball era was a girlish weakling? Of course not, we know that pitching dominated the era and we adjust our analysis. Nobody in their right mind thinks Sammy Sosa is among the greatest power hitters of all time because he put up his inflated numbers in the steroid era. Relax everybody and have a little faith. It’s no big deal and baseball is taking care of it.

No, the all time bonehead move was the money grab that is the wild card, for it forever killed the pennant race. The Yanks and the Rays should be in the middle of the greatest thing baseball ever gave the fans, a pennant race. One team gets the glory and a shot at the brass ring and the other team suffers the agony of going home empty handed only to contemplate what might have been. The pennant race is the timeless drama that ties the game to its rich and storied past. As it is now, both of these teams must ponder the awful penalty of losing out on this race….going on the road for game seven…..I’m sure they are just shaking so bad that they just can’t get their hand in their glove.

Let me stick with private Winger one more time…..“I’d like to take a biigg swing at you Mr. Selig…..”

Let’s move on to football…where the wildcard is not such a bad thing.

2. Michael Vick looked pretty good coming on for Kevin Kolb in the Eagle game against Green Bay. But, let’s be honest, the Eagles trailed the entire game. For much of the game, the Pack seemed determined to take away the big play potential of Philadelphia. That decision invariably opened the door for the Eagles to methodically work their way down the field through a time consuming mix of short passes and running plays. The Green Bay defensive game plan certainly makes sense when you are confronted with one of the game’s top playmakers in Desean Jackson. Predictably, Green Bay did a good job of bottling up Jackson as well as limiting Jeremy Maclin pretty much all day by consistently employing softer coverage. In fact, the only speed they struggled with appeared to be that of, Michael Vick.

The point is, Vick was allowed to make the easy short throws and showed no new ability to make the tough ones; he even blew a few easy ones. Let’s recall, it’s not hard to put points on the board against a prevent defense, even Matt Leinart can do it. Everybody misses Michael Vick, he was pretty exciting. But, the Eagles are going to thrive by getting the ball into the hands of guys like Jackson and Maclin. Guess who is going to be more effective doing that? Vick is not a long term answer, he is still pretty limited in what he can do and Andy Reid knows it.

3. I’m not sure I understand the rules here. Let’s pretend for the sake of argument that Lions receiver Calvin Johnson made the exact same catch in the middle of the field only to then have the ball stripped away by a Bear defender for a fumble. If they took a look at the play under those conditions they would have surely determined that his feet came down in bounds and the ball was firmly in his possession and would thus allow the fumble. So, Johnson’s catch was good enough to fumble, but not good enough for six points? It didn’t take long to come up with “the tuck rule” to describe that asinine play, what is taking so long here? This one deserves a name…

Random thoughts

1. If there was no such thing as Fantasy Football, how many people would have watched the Browns and The Bucs? On second thought, who drafts players on those teams? OK then, how many people actually watched The Browns and The Bucs??

2. Wes Welker is the Steve Nash of the NFL…unless it’s revealed that he is a master at pushing off to create space without the refs seeing it….then he is the John Stockton of the NFL.

3. Here is all you need to know about the receiving corps of the St. Louis Rams; Mark Clayton has been there six days and lead the team with 10 catches this week. And this is no mystery phenom here. This is Mark Clayton…you probably remember him running after errant passes from Kyle Boller in the passing Siberia known as the Baltimore Ravens circa 2007. Mark Clayton of the Ravens! Mark Clayton from the Dolphins could start in St. Louis right now.

4. Jay Cutler had just one interception this week in a Bear victory…..it will be a high water mark for the season.

5. Austin Collie had 163 yards receiving….just what everybody who drafted fantasy dork poster boy Pierre Garcon wanted to see. Drafting a Colt receiver other than Reggie Wayne is like drafting a running back in New England. All you have to do is be able to accurately forecast what Peyton Manning or Bill Belicheck will be thinking at a given moment in time.