Category Archives: Sports

September 12, 2010

USA!

By By

Many thought that the team that Jerry Coangelo & Coach K built and brought to Istanbul was a Silver medal team at best, but I begged to differ.  I was never worried, not for one moment that Team USA would fail to bring home the Gold.  And on the first NFL Sunday of the season, I celebrate basketball, and what our country accomplished against a good Turkey team.

Why I never faltered in my belief in our team?  For one, Coach K is a great, great coach, and aside from the X’s & O’s, he manages egos well.  What went on unnoticed during the selection process was the idea of building a “team.”  Due to the frenzied free agency that took place this past Summer, it was safe to assume that the top names in basketball would forgo making the trip overseas to play in the FIBA Championships.  So Coach K swooped up KD, and basically built a Euro style team around him, with some shooters, hustlers, and speed.  Take a look at the team the US presented, and all though there were plenty of All-Stars and franchise cornerstones, they all happily took a back seat to KD and the winning cause.  And quite simply put, they became a “team”.  Once that was established, KD led the way, Odom held it down, and the cast played their part.

It’s similar to when the US lost in Athens (despite winning a Bronze, we chalk it up as a loss), many threw around the idea of just sending the NBA Champions to the Olympics.  At the time, the team would have been the Detroit Pistons, the epitome of a team.  There’s no question in my mind that the Pistons would have won Gold that year.  Of course, in 2008 the Redeem Team willingly formed to take back what was rightfully ours in Beijing.  This time around, we didn’t have the luxury of sending the absolute best players in the planet to Istanbul, so Jerry Coangelo and Coach K basically built the 2004 Detroit Pistons 2.0, bigger and bolder.  The team was predicated on defense, and our undersized, scrappy, athletic group of kids shut teams down and suffocated them.

The result, we remain on top of the world in the sport of basketball!  USA!  USA!  USA!

9 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , | posted in Sports

September 11, 2010

USF AD Stepping Down, Forcefully

By mceezy

From the Sacramento Bee……

USF athletic director Debra Gore-Mann is resigning to pursue other opportunities. The school said Friday that Gore-Mann’s resignation is effective Sept. 17. Charles Cross, USF’s vice president of business and finance, will assume interim athletic director duties while a national search is conducted to find a replacement. Gore-Mann leaves less than five months after making the high-profile hire of Jennifer Azzi as women’s basketball coach. In June, the NCAA placed USF on probation for two years after more than a dozen athletes spent more than $13,000 in scholarship money to improperly buy textbooks. USF didn’t receive a postseason ban.

Talk about ironty. After all. Debra Gore-Mann is the one who handed head coach Jesse Evans resignation papers.

2 Comments   |  tags: , , , , | posted in Sports

September 10, 2010

Doin 2010 NFL Over Under Predictions

By cali4dre

We always end up being a little slow on getting these predictions up, and with one game in the books it makes all of these predictions so much easier right!?! No, not really… We took a look at the Vegas over under wins and losses for each team and picked if we thought that team would win more or less than that. Skip around to the teams you care about it’s in alphabetical order, if you can’t make it through the whole thing (very understandable).

Arizona Cardinals regular season wins 7 ½

Chappy: Under, even though I think Derek Anderson is going to do better than people think, he still won’t get them to where old man Warner had them.

Dre: Under, no way that offense is the same without Warner and Boldin.  Will end up on the wrong side of some low scoring games.

Dyslecix: I’ll take the over, 8 wins in a terrible division is very possible. However, I don’t see them winning 9 games, so this will be close.

Atlanta Falcons regular season wins 8½

Chappy: Over, I really like this Falcons team. Turner didn’t get overworked last year because he was hurt, so he should be good for another 300+ carry season like his first year in Atlanta. Their defense is questionable, but the offense will make up for it.

Dre: Under, division will be tough this year.  Even the Saints will struggle to 10 wins, and the Falcons will settle in at 8.

Dyslecix: Under, never been a believer of the Falcons. In a tough division getting to even 8 games might be a feat. Continue reading

6 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , , , , | posted in Sports

September 9, 2010

In Defense of Matt Barnes

By mceezy

I don’t like Matt Barnes. I should. He’s from Sacramento, he’s multiracial, his name’s Matt, and he’s played for the Kings and Warriors. But aside from my sophomore year in high school when we literally rooted for him against our own varsity team in our own gym, I’ve never really cheered for him. Simply put, I’m not a fan.

When I saw the news this morning that Barnes was arrested last night for domestic violence, my gut reaction was “not surprising.” However, after reading some other gut reactions from others online, I had to put assumptions aside and give him the benefit of the doubt. Sure, he’s 6’7″ with a crazy haircut, lots of tattoos and half-black, but that doesn’t automatically make him a wife-beater. Like he tweeted, “9 times out of 10 the man gets arrested.” Ask any police officer, they’ll openly tell you. If the woman has a single mark, whether it be a bloody knuckle from punching the guy or a scraped leg from tripping over the futon while chasing him with a knife (these are both real life examples I’ve heard of), the man is going to jail. Many people scoffed at his text saying he was the victim. They said “sure, a 6’7″ guy was the victim.”  Well, being the victim doesn’t mean he lost a fight, it just means he was the one who was attacked. It’s amazing how in the land of ‘guilty until proven innocent,’ domestic violence crimes don’t apply. Matt Barnes will forever be considered a wife beater, while Ben Roethlisberger and Kobe Bryant have never really been considered rapists. You tell me which is worse.

So ultimately, I don’t know if Matt Barnes is innocent here, but let’s put snap judgments aside. He may be a loose cannon on the basketball court, but it doesn’t mean he would put his hands on a woman. If there’s one thing people close to him will vouch for, it’s that he was very close to his mother, who passed away a few years back. I’ve got to believe he was raised better. That’s not to say I’ll be surprised if it turns out he beat the hell out of this girl, but until that day, I think the guy deserves a break. I think we’re more likely to see the charges dropped, and he’ll be riding around Sac in an Indy Car rather than posting up at 651 I Street.

2 Comments   |  tags: , | posted in Sports

September 8, 2010

Doin Lines Week 1

By chappy81

I’ve been impressed with the revival of Entourage this season. For the last couple of seasons, I thought the show was heading downhill, but this year they got Vinny on a drug binge, making bad choices, and dating a porn star. Excellent twist to what was getting to be a repetitive series. Speaking of things reviving themselves, and the true reason for this post, the NFL is bizzniizzzizzaacckk! This means that every team has hope again (including my Raiders and the overly optimistic prediction I made about them making it to the AFC Championship), but this also marks the beginning of gambling season, and the return of Doin Lines! Even if you aren’t betting on spreads, lets face it, there’s plenty of $10 bets thrown down on games amongst friends. I found myself enjoying keeping track of how I did against the spread last year, and ended the season doing surprisingly well considering I was way below .500 for awhile there, and had pondered giving up posting my picks out of sheer embarrassment. My comeback was strong, and ending 49-45-3 on the season, which made me want to see how I could do in my second year of keeping track. At points during the season, I was much more into making these picks correctly than keeping track of my fantasy teams. Not to say that I didn’t care about fantasy, but of all the fantasy seasons, football is the least attractive to me. It’s too much of a crapshoot, and everyone talks endlessly about their “squad”, which is more of a turnoff than a girl with a butterface. Instead of picking ALL of the games, we decided to each pick the top six or so games that we believe are either mortal locks, or very watchable. I did say “we” right!?! Well, this season, By has decided to join me on the adventure of posting picks, so I don’t feel like such an addict doing all these lines by myself! By also had a couple quick thoughts before we get started.

Before I reveal my picks, I must say I’m excited to hear that Entourage is back on the radar in terms of “must see” programs.  There was a point in my life where I looked forward to watching Entourage as much as I looked forward to watching a football game on Sunday, but then it slipped.  But from what Chappy just wrote, and from what friends have mentioned, Vinny addicted to hard drugs, Sasha Grey,  plus the return of Carla Gugino (who is one fine woman) equals the return of Entourage!  I have catching up to do …

Now, on to business … Continue reading

7 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | posted in Sports

September 7, 2010

Feelin the FIBA Championship More Than I Thought

By chappy81

I really didn’t think I’d get into the FIBA championship this year, but surprisingly I’ve caught at least a little bit of each game. Either when they decided televise them 12 hours after they happened on NBATV, or on ESPN3 when I’m at work, and not so busy. As much as I was unimpressed with the names on the squad we put together, I was very impressed with how well they’ve come together over the past month. If you watched their first game and last game, you’d see a dramatic improvement. They finally looked comfortable together against Angola, and sent them back to their country. I was surprised to find that the U.S. was not the favorite to win the title. I guess not winning the tourney since 1994 is a good reason for them to be ranked lower, but still, shouldn’t the country that invented the game be the favorite even with the rules being much different than the NBA? I’d think so, and even with the B squad they should beat down the competition. Continue reading

8 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , , , | posted in Sports

September 7, 2010

Brawling and Foul Balls

By chappy81

Sometimes the fans take center stage, and ARE the story more than the athletes at times. We saw Bo and Sarah’s foul ball fiasco give them more than their five minutes of fame, and fortunately, I think we are done with both of them. This past Friday a fight between an unruly fan at the US Open made more waves on internet forums  than the actual tennis being played. I figured it was only fitting to show you the compilation clip that someone spent some time syncing up all the camera phone videos that caught the incident. I’ll let you draw your own conclusions about this jackass. I’ve never been a fan of people from the eastcoast, and this might just be another example of why…

This second clip shows us that unitentional pain is always funny. Cali4Dre’s thoughts summed it up nicely…

Three things I like about that one:

  • The HD feed looks really nice
  • The multiple replays of ball contact to forehead
  • The camera dude saying he tried to warn him, as if that made a difference

6 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , | posted in Comedy, Sports

September 6, 2010

Labor Day Ramblings

By chappy81

Three day weekends are never a bad thing. You everything you want to in the first two days, and have an extra day to come back to the reality of knowing that tomorrow you will be heading back to work. I pretty much missed all of the first college football Saturday of the year, but fortunately the game of the week is on tonight. The Sportschump broke it down what the teams looked like, so that helped. In an attempt to get myself ready for the upcoming NFL line predictions, I figured I’d start my ramblings with my pick for the college game of the week.

Virginia Tech (+2) Over Boise State

I’m going to be rooting full force for Boise State, but in the end, I have a tough time seeing them coming out the winner. I’m not basing this pick off the players, the coaching strategies, or even team strengths. I’m mostly picking Virginia Tech because they are at home, and the underdog. Since Boise State has to travel to the other side of the country, it’s going to be an even tougher task for them than just playing a great team. I think this is one of the biggest factors that’s overlooked in a game. Teams don’t do well traveling from the westcoast (sort of) to the eastcoast in the NFL, so why should they in college?!? Hopefully this game lives up to the hype, and we get a close one. Anytime you can take the home team with points in a game that you aren’t sure who’s going to win, you do it. The Hokies win unfortunately win tonight!

Jets cornerback Darrelle Revis finally ended his holdout agreeing to a contract worth $46M for four years, with $32M of that guaranteed. He held out to get paid as much as Asomugha, but didn’t really get close to his numbers, and isn’t even the second highest paid cornerback in the league (making less than Asomugha and Champ Bailey this season). I’m not sure I understand why he incurred half a million in fines only to sign this four year contract when it sounded like the Jets offered him that wacky ten year $120M deal. I’m on my own island when it comes to understanding contracts, so maybe that offer had a lot of incentives, and the guaranteed money wasn’t where he wanted it to be. To me, it’s like watching a porno for the dude “actors”, it doesn’t make a ton of sense, but $32M guaranteed > $1M this season… Who knows, I just hope Hard Knocks will clear that up for me on Wednesday night, and now maybe Rex Ryan’s #2’s will play a lot better now that Revis pushed one of the #1’s down to a #2. Are the Jets the favorite to win the Super Bowl now? Maybe, but it all still comes down to how well the Sanchize does, and it’s sounding like the experts have less and less confidence in him. If you somehow didn’t know that Revis was an amazing cornerback, our buddy Weller broke it down like only he can.

Floyd Mayweather apologizes?!? He made this racist rant challenging everything he could conjure up about Manny Pacquiao towards the end of last week. Not surprisingly, it ended up making him look foolish.

Floyd likes chicken so much he's becoming one!

He apologized after the video hit the newswires, but I’m not sure why he was calling him out in the first place. It seemed like a month ago, the fight was going to happen, and Pacquiao conceded to some things in the contract to get this fight going more on Mayweather’s terms. Once again pretty boy Floyd backed down. I’m actually shocked that he apologized. I didn’t really know that this guy even had the word sorry in his vocabulary. Maybe he finally realized that he was the idiot ducking the fight that could save or  revive boxing. I’m not sure how these guys can’t agree on a $100M+ fight. It’s just ludicrous that they are holding this sport hostage, and denying us a chance of seeing rematches as the two slowly grow out of their primes. Mayweather has never been short on confidence, but you have to believe he’s scared at this point, since we’ve never really seen him apologize about anything. If he’s truly the best, he needs to prove it, and I don’t think he is even drinking his own Kool-Aid anymore.

The Padres lost their 10th consecutive game. They are scratching for answers anywhere they can find one, but just flat out aren’t playing well. I was one of the semi-doubters, but was still rooting for them more than against them. I understood how they were getting it done for most of the season, yet I still couldn’t really understand, if that makes any sense! This bump in the road might be showing that they don’t have enough offense, and their pitching might just be too young. The NL West is starting to heat up with the Rockies, Giants, and Padres all in contention now. Two weeks ago, I thought the Padres were going to walk into the playoffs, now they might have to use Latos more than they originally wanted to, and are finding it’s never easy to close out a division title. In contrast to the Padres sudden demise, is the big rise of the White Label Hot Rockies, who seem to come out of nowhere at the end of each season. They’ve won 11 of their last 15, and have a former A’s player, Carlos Gonzalez, who is putting up some MVP type numbers. Too bad for C-Gon, that he has to compete with guys like Pujols and Votto are pushing for a triple crown. This might be the most interesting race in baseball down the stretch, so stay tuned!

15 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , | posted in Sports

September 3, 2010

Trojans Win Track Meet At Aloha Stadium

By cali4dre

David Ausberry, a 6'4', 235 LBS WR, pushed away CB Lametrius Davis with one arm after catching the ball and strolled into the end zone.

Here’s some observations I had from last night’s USC vs. Hawaii opener, and the nightmare on defense, for both teams…

  • USC’s offense looked mediocre when you take into account Hawaii has a terrible defense that was outsized on the line by a wide margin
  • USC’s defense looked absolutely terrible, missed tackles and blown coverages galore
  • Hawaii’s offense looked very good, even their 3rd string QB passed for 2 TDs, which is the only solace for USC
  • USC’s offense will only get better, they’ll have 4 effective RBs with four different styles of play, and they have about 6 WRs that when healthy would start anywhere in the country
  • 2 possible Heisman candidates stood out last night as well as a possible third: Matt Barkley and Ronald Johnson looked in sync and ready to go from snap 1, and Tyler looked strong and quick.

THE GRADES:

Passing Offense: B+

Couple of bad drops/deflections, couple of holding calls, but for game 1 on the road, a very good showing

Running Offense: B-

Mark Tyler waited for this opportunity for a long time. He started this year at #4 on the RB depth chart. He showed why he's now #1 after putting up 154 yards rushing and a TD in the opener.

Easy to look good running against Hawaii, should have run for 300 yards and didn’t.  See Wisconsin last year.  Younger Oline but so much talent

Passing Defense: D-

Perhaps deserved an F but the Off bailed them out.  Young secondary looked terrible, blown coverages and hands on defenders all over.  Pass rush was ok.

Running Defense: C

Line looked a little tired toward the end, but that’s what happens when your thin after injuries and key departures.  Room for improvement, especially tackling

Special Teams: C

Only highlight was Ronald Johnson’s (ill-advised) spectacular return, but again against a weak defensive team.  What was the 2 point conversion thing???  Yuck

Overall: C+

Not a good performance against a weak Hawaii team.  Coaches should be worried.  Oline really should have dominated more against a smaller but speedy D.  The Defense looked the part we expected: very young and inexperienced.  Pass rush will look better against normal offenses, this was a quick strike run&gun so the pressure they did put on was impressive.  Tackling should get better as they did not tackle in fall ball, so all kinds of room for improvement there.  And kick a point after for chr sake.  That was embarrassing.

5 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , | posted in Sports

September 1, 2010

Caption Contest Giveaway!!

By chappy81

What do people want most in life? FREE STUFF! We’ve brought you discounts on tickets, apparel, and golf crap, now we bring you our first ever giveaway. No, hackers didn’t jump on our account and post this, we are really giving something away for nothing more than a few words. All you have to do is think up a good caption for the picture below that we took in China of this guy passed out face first on the cement in a park. Can you believe we saw Yao there, and didn’t even  mention it!?! We have a $35 gift card that can be used for thousands of online products that you will learn about if you win. Nothing is out of bounds for the caption; race, religion, cussing, etc. I’m not sure exactly how many readers we have out there, but I’d bet that your chances are pretty good in winning if you play along.

To enter the contest, either leave a caption in the comments section below (make sure your e-mail is correct) or you can email us using the subject “caption contest” at doinworkstaff@gmail.com. The contest will run through the end of Labor Day weekend, so if you think of a better one than your first submission feel free to submit that one too. We will declare a winner, and notify you via e-mail with your prize. Good luck!

14 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , , | posted in Comedy, Discounts, News, Random, Sports

August 31, 2010

Cahill’s a Contender, But It’s Felix’s Cy Young To Lose

By chappy81

I was all fired up to write a Cahill for the AL Cy Young Award last night, but sadly he got shelled for 8 runs by the Yankees. His ERA ended up ballooning from 2.43 to 2.82 dropping him from second to third in ERA. He held the lead in WHIP with an amazing 0.99, but that ballooned to 1.07 after last night, and now he’s now second behind Cliff Lee in that department. He was going to need to lead those key categories if he was going to have any chance in winning a Cy Young. Cahill missed April with an injury, so he had some ground to make up in innings pitched to be considered. Since he doesn’t strike out a lot of guys he needed to keep that ERA and WHIP down to get any Cy Young votes. He’s about as dominating a ground ball pitcher as you can be, but voters value K’s A LOT, so falling out of the lead of those two major categories might have pushed him out of the Cy talks. Until last night, he’d lasted five or more innings, and given up seven or fewer hits in all 23 of his starts. That was broken up yesterday, but the streak was still good enough for an Oakland record, which is surprising thinking of all the pitching greats that have donned the green and gold over the years. I ended up posting Stealing First Base last night, because I was rattled by this rare ugly start for our 22 year old sensation. If he’d shut down the Yankees, there would be more optimism in his Cy Young candidacy. At this moment, I can’t really put him at the top, so I’d probably drop him down to the second tier where I have CC, Bucholtz, and Wilson. He’s got a month left to get a new streak of zeros going, but the way Felix has been firing on all cylinders he’s the man to dethrone now.

If it was decided today, I’d would crown King Felix with the AL Cy Young. He’s been phenomenal after a so-so May. If he played for any team but Seattle, he’d at least have 15 wins. If he was on the Yankees he’d probably have as many wins if not more than CC’s 18. A 10-10 record isn’t anything to write home about, but I care a lot more about the pure pitching numbers, and the 24 year old is having another great season. He’s lost a number of games where his team only scored one run for him or in some cases was completely shut out. Nothing surprising coming out of Seattle since they own the lowest total amount of runs scored in all of baseball. They can’t even score as much as Pittsburgh! Just checking out his game log, it tells the story of his lack of run support. Quality start after quality start, and nothing in the win column to show for it. Over his last 15 starts he’s pitched at least 6.2 innings, and has given up only three runs three times, and two or less runs in the other twelve starts. He’s currently second in K’s (192), second in ERA (2.47), third in WHIP (1.11), leads in IP (204.1), and is holding hitters to a .225 BA (sixth best in the AL). I’ve found myself feeling sorry for the guy. Every time he goes out there he gets the least run support of any of the candidates, and the Seattle crowd knows it, giving him standing ovations even when he leaves the game behind on the scoreboard, because they know they are watching a great pitcher that gave them everything he had. Maybe I’m picking him because I thought he deserved it last year or because he’s on one of my fantasy teams. If it weren’t for Greinke’s freakish year that made Felix an afterthought when the award was handed out, he could be going for back to back awards. Even Greinke got better run support in his Cy Young season last year than Felix has had these past two seasons. I know the award isn’t given out based on a two year period, but consistency can be taken into considered in a year that the award could go either way. Kind of like when Kobe and Barkley won their MVP awards in the NBA. Kobe wasn’t the overly obvious choice for the award, but sometimes you have to reward someone that is at the top for an extended period of time. Same went for Barkley, they might have been tired of giving it to Jordan,  so they threw in a change up and gave it to the big man who finished runner up a few times. If Felix keeps doing what he’s been doing, he should win the award! Now that I’ve said all that, I bet Felix gets blown up by the Angels tonight…

15 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , | posted in Sports

August 30, 2010

Stealing First Base

By chappy81

This happened a couple days ago, and if you haven’t seen this Gary Robinson ejection, it’s worth a watch. It was probably the most controlled out of control ejection, I’ve ever seen. He started off with the ol’ cover home with dirt, which was when I thought he had lost it. He started heading to first, and as soon as he pulled first base out of the ground, I was hoping for him to bust out his best Phillip Wellman impression. Going nuts is highly underrated these days. Sure you get ridicule, but you are remembered! It didn’t end up being one of the greatest blow ups of all time, but did have an unusual ending. I wonder if that base will end up on ebay?

2 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , , , , | posted in Sports

August 29, 2010

Upgrading The Man Cave

By mceezy

The football season is upon us, though it looks like someone forgot to tell the Pittsburgh Steelers. Since the Raiders aren’t in last place yet, I’m pretty excited for the season right now. Chappy and I did some shopping online for some essentials to enhance our Sunday afternoons, and here’s some exciting products that will help you cheer on your team….

Wildon Home Foxton Bar

I’ve produced and seen some pretty impressive spreads at Super Bowl parties and such, but always felt like a dining table didn’t quite suffice. Sure, the food looks nice and all, but you still had to get your beers from the fridge. You know what I always felt was missing? A BAR. I just assumed one would have to own a house that had one, but that is not the case! Apparently you can purchase a stand alone bar, at a pretty decent cost. This one was the best one I found, but there are surprisingly a good handful of options for right around $500. This one, and others, can be found at http://www.diningroomsdirect.com/

Wincraft Keg-a-Que

I’ll admit, this caught my eye because I thought it was a keg. It turns out it’s a portable BBQ, but that might even be better! At least I’d probably be likely to use it more. Most people already have a grill for home use, but what about tailgating AT the game? I had a pretty trusty portable bbq for years, but it was red and black. How am I supposed to feel good about myself using that in the parking lot of the Oakland Coliseum when the Chiefs, Cardinals, or 49ers are in town? Well, here’s the solution. These steel, keg-shaped portable grills come in propane and charcoal models, and are available in all teams at http://www.nflshop.com/category/index.jsp?categoryId=2415724&ab=Tailgating_BSpot_Grilling_072210

Panasonic 3D Active Shutter Eyewear

The ESPN 3D era is here, and I’ve got to believe Monday Night Football is going to be the centerpiece of their offerings. There’s been good (Avatar) and bad (Alice in Wonderland) in terms of 3D thus far, but I don’t see ESPN bothering with this if they weren’t going to make football games amazing. Let’s hope they have cameras in the end zone seats so those Lambeau Leaps will come right into your living room. I’m also looking forward to coaches’ gatorade showers and those wire cams figure to play a key role. Granted, you’re going to need a new TV and cable box, but start with the glasses, because you can at least rock them in public in the meantime. These badass shades can be found at http://www.rcwilley.com/Electronics/TV-Video/Video-Accessories/TY-EW3D10U/2361744/Panasonic-3D-Active-Shutter-Eyewear-View.jsp

Tailgate/Ping Pong/Beer Pong Table

They call this a tailgate table on the site, but it’s pretty much essential in my book for any mancave. Besides being easy to store, it has a plethora of other uses. Whether you’re playing beer pong in the mancave because your team is behind by 28, and you no longer care about the game, or you’re tailgating right before the game with the Wincraft Keg-A-Que it will be perfect for any football sunday. Apparently you can also turn this into a ping pong table, but looking at the dimensions, I’m not so sure you’d want to play doubles. This is already making me want to get a beer pong game going right now… I wish it didn’t take a week to get here! Check it out here http://www.csnstores.com/Tailgate-Toss-TPN-D-122-TAI1440.html

GAME FACE

I’m far from the most intimidating guy in the world, and sometimes random Charger friends end up stopping by to rain on the Raiders party, which hasn’t been that hard recently. This year I’m going to be prepared for them with my game face! Just to make sure the new people don’t think us Raiders fans are soft. This new look will surely garner some respect. I’m not sure I can hang wearing vinyl for three hours, but sometimes it takes that kind of dedication from a fan.  http://www.csnstores.com/Franklin-Sports-6991F22-FKS1289.html

7 Comments   |  tags: , , , , | posted in Random, Sports

August 27, 2010

2010 Fantasy Football Mock Draft

By dyslecix

Before each season we try rep our fantasy knowledge, err, get in a little pre-league draft practice reps with the mock  before we take on the real thing. It’s slowly becoming a tradition here at DW for every sport and every season. Since there’s only five of us, we have to draft for multiple teams, but we try to make each pick based on how we’d want the first three rounds to go for a given team. Some of the picks make more sense than others, but just like real drafts, some people throw out the ADP rankings and go with their gut/guy! If you get nothing out of this, we hope you at least enjoy the team names, and the sh** we talk on some of the players!

ROUND ONE

#1 Huge Fake TD’s – Chris Johnson

Not sure there’s much to say here.  2500 total yards last year, over 2,000 on the ground.  Made Big Fat Lendale White’s 15 TD’s from the previous year expendable.  One of the fastest guys in the NFL.  And in tandem with VY, the Titan backfield is ridiculous with the variety of spread plays they can run.  Everyone has CJ and his golden grill #1, and so do I.  But my grill has diamonds.

#2 Just Win, Maybe – Adrian Peterson

I haven’t finished higher than 10th place since 2002, coincidentally the last time the Raiders were good hence the team name. I get “rewarded” with one of the top draft picks every year, and it never helps probably because the snaking draft order system, which is the gayest thing in the world if you ask me. I guess AP is going to be solid this year especially with Favre losing his number one receiver, so he should be getting more carries and probably even be involved more in the passing game too! It’s a shame on my team he’s more likely to get hurt all my first rounder picks do…

#3 Richmond Rapists – MJD

So, this is an easy pick. The back up to this pick is obviously Ray Rice, however I would only think about taking him in a keeper league situation. MJD is a TD machine and great building block for my draft in the later rounds.

#4 Bloodfart – Frank Gore

The 49’ers are getting better, so the Bloodfarts will get better as well.  Alex Smith has continued to improve (when healthy), the addition of Michael Crabtree at WR and the blossoming of Vernon Davis at TE will only help make the run respectable.  Frank Gore runs like his teachers are chasing him, and that’s definitely a good thing for fantasy owners.  He still feels he has a lot to give, and a lot to prove.

#5 Scott Pilgrim vs. Your Mom – Aaron Rodgers

Let me start by saying I suck at fantasy football.  Now that I got the waiver out of the way, let me explain why I selected Aaron Rodgers so high in the mock draft.  Did you not see last season?  Yes, I totally just explained my reasoning with a question, and that makes me totally awesome.

#6 Washing Headskins – Ray Rice

Great to see a player like this fall! When I saw I was drafting six, I was going to pull the trigger on Aaron Rodgers, but having Rice fall to me instead is a great consolation price. Hard to make the sixth position a great draft spot, but this certainly helps. Continue reading

2 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , | posted in Mock Drafts, Sports

August 26, 2010

Taking A Look At The MLB Waiver Period

By chappy81

With Manny being put on Waivers last night, it made me curious exactly how the waiver process works. I mean, even Casey Blake doesn’t understand what’s going on after hearing the news he was put on waivers. Now that we have the blog, it’s given me an extra reason to find out what is going on with this seeming second trade deadline. The waiver period doesn’t really end there, but that’s when teams have to declare their playoff eligible players. So, just like I broke down the Super 2 rule that keeps some teams from calling up their top prospects. Now, I will loosely use Manny as an example of how this waiver crap works…

It all starts with the Dodgers deciding to place Manny on waivers. This means they control three things that happen at the end of a 48 hour period or a kind of0 silent auction so to speak. One note, it’s not actually 48 hours sometimes. For some reason it only counts business days, so if they held off putting Manny on waivers until Thursday or Friday his waiver period would last through the weekend until Monday or Tuesday. By doing it yesterday, the Dodgers insured that the period will end before this week is over.

So who can claim Manny? Basically any team can throw their name into the claim hat, but there is a priority list, and it starts with the worst team in the National League, because Manny is in the NL. If the Pirates decided to throw in a waiver claim in for Manny, they’d have the top priority. The team with the best record in the AL (Yankees/Rays) would have the lowest priority if multiple teams were putting in claims on Manny. Also, the best team in the NL would have a better shot than the worst team in the AL. Still with me?

Ok, so let’s say a team claims him. The Dodgers now can choose three different outcomes. They can pull the player back, and keep him on their roster. They can negotiate a trade with the team that put the claim in (Two business days to work out a deal from the time the claim goes through). They can also let the player go without compensation to the new team like the Blue Jays did letting Alex Rios go to the White Sox last season, and let the new team assume all of his remaining contract. We saw Johnny Damon weep like he just realized his beard was gone, and denied a return to the Red Sox was a prime example. It will be Manny’s choice if he goes anywhere, which in a likely scenario, the team that put the player on waivers is usually stuck with that player they put on waivers, and just have to hope for some compensation picks, which isn’t a terrible 2nd place prize if your stuck with said players contract.

Another interesting thing I found was how much strategy there is in the waiver process. Just because a team claimed someone doesn’t necessarily mean they REALLY wanted them. Sometimes a team will claim a player just because they want to block that player from going to a rival or someone they are chasing in the standings. It’s why I think the Red Sox put in a claim for Damon and might for Manny. They would rather have these guys deny a trade to play for them, and block the Yankees and Rays from improving. Who knows, they might even be happy that Damon stayed put! This factor made me realize that the July 31st deadline is way more important than the August 31st deadline, because teams are heavily restricted with who they can negotiate with. The problem though, is what if a team claims one of the players without a no trade clause to block someone else from getting them, and they just get screwed with a someones recycled pile heap? I guess that’s just the risk you have to take as a GM sometimes…

11 Comments   |  tags: , , , , , , | posted in Sports