Ringing in the New Year

Ok folks, I have been MIA from this place for a long time but it was my New Year's Resolution (honestly) to get a post out every week at minimum. I know my loyal readers enjoy the blog pieces so I owe it to you all to give a consistent quality product. If I don't you can get a refund.

This blog is dedicated to the wonderful year of sports in 2011. Let's start with my favorite: Baseball.

Baseball fans, both casual and dedicated, were treated to one of the best World Series in recent memory (certainly since the 2001 and 2002 World Series where the Angels beat the Giants in 2002 in eerily similar fashion to this years world series, and the upstart Diamondbacks winning in seven by doing the unthinkable: scoring a winning run off Mariano Riviera). Unfortunately for me, my team was on the losing end again.


This picture makes me sick. After several back and forth games, we were treated to the best of the best in a Game 6 performance that saw Texas come within one strike to win it all....twice. The second time after apparently God told Josh Hamiltion (playing through the entire World Series with a sports hernia and having no power whatsoever) that he would hit a home run and did in the top of the 10th to put Texas up by 2, only to see St. Louis come back again and ultimately win the game and the series. Congratulations St. Louis, may you roast in hell.

Beyond that we were treated to an amazing playoff race that saw the Cardinals (and Rays) get into the playoffs when it was seemingly inconceivable. Baseball is supposed to be that purely statistical sport where all the odds balance out in its 162 games and you have clear playoff teams. Not this year. It was one of the most exciting nights of baseball watching the Braves and Red Sox lose, while simultaneously watching the Rays and Cardinals win to get into the playoffs. It was an exceptionally good year for baseball and next year only proves to be better as we expand to 5 playoff teams, and several huge name players are on the move including Albert Pujols to the hated Angels.

In football this year we were treated to a shocking playoff run by the Packers, that after this full season has played out was only the start for this storied franchise. Led by that Berkeley hippie Aaron Rodger and his touchdown championship belt we have watched the makings of the first juggernaut and dynasty since the Patriots of a decade ago.


While it is true in the middle of this we had a labor dispute, no one in their right mind (including this blogger) felt as though the NFL would break its golden egg. We missed precisely one game (a meaningless pre-season game) and all in all we got an NFL season we largely predicted and actually had some unique level of excitement to it.

Tebowmania sprung forth with a vengeance this year and I ate up every bit of it. This kid has moxie and I think with a full offseason of OTAs, trainign camp and the ability to really get to know his offense and receivers he can be better than he was this year. It's amazing the Broncos even made the playoffs and to honor that achievement we take a moment of silence for a little Tebowing.


In other news, the Cowboys of the 10's continued to act like the Cowboys of the 00's and frankly in the 17 years ive gone without any real playoff success im starting to get highly agitated. There is a malaise that sits in over the team in December and January and no one can explain it. It's not Tony Romo's fault or Jason Garrett's fault, or even Jerry Jones refusing to give up his GM title. It's simply the Dallas Cowboys' fault. They just can not seem to become the team they have the ability to become. Sounds a lot like my surrogate hometown Chargers too.

We got some surprises this year: 13-3 49ers (Harbaugh is easily coach of the year), Andy Dalton and AJ Green and a stout defense leading the Bengals into the playoffs, and Matthew Stafford staying upright for all 16 games and giving the Motor City the shot in the arm it needed from its football team.

Finally we got affirmative proof of what we suspected all along: Peyton Manning is worth 8-10 wins a year, probably on any team. Hopefully for their sake Andrew Luck (and yes they definitely should draft him) is worth the same.


While this year's playoff drama may simply come down to the question of Packers or Saints, I know the only thing we know about the NFL and any given Sunday is that we don't really know anything at all. I know I'm buckling in for a ride that no one can really predict.

College football, despite the inability have labor disputes, was in much more chaos and turmoil this year. We saw the Ohio State scandal lead to Ohio State finishing with 7 losses for the first time since the 1800's. Yeah you read that right. 1800's. We saw the once king of everthing right about football, Joe Paterno, fall from grace in his actions or inactions during the sex abuse scandals that are ongoing at Penn State.

We saw conference realignment after realignment after realignment take place this year. Lets try to do what the blog suggests and follow the bouncing ball:

The Pac-10 added two new members, Utah and Colorado, to expand its mountain time zone tv coverage. Then flirted with the idea of pretty much owning college football west of the Mississippi by looking to add Texas, Texas Tech, Oklahoma, and Oklahoma State. The Pac-16 would have been an awesome conference but the idea was ultimately scrapped.

The Big 12 meanwhile lost Colorado and Nebraska prior to this season, and then lost Texas A&M and Missouri to SEC and almost lost its 4 biggest schools left to completely annihilate the conference. Down to the Big 8 from the old days, the Big 12 responded by ganking Big East teams TCU and West Virginia. That is clearly enough to survive at this stage and then look to add maybe Boise State or Conference USA teams like Louisville or Big East's Cincinnati to get back to 12 and get a conference championship again.

The Big 10 (which had 11 teams entering the year) added Nebraska, which was an awesome move giving them 12 and a conference championship game for the first time ever. Unfortunately, with a down year from Ohio State and the Penn State scandal, the new fun of Big 10 football was quickly tarnished.

The SEC, not needing to do anything since its the most powerful conference in football raking in 2x the BCS and other bowl money as other conferences added a midwest presence of Missouri and Texas A&M. Yay new teams to hate. 14 is an odd number but the SEC is going to make it work.

The ACC followed suit to 14 adding basketball powerhouses Syracuse and Pitt. They wont add to the misery that is ACC football (can these guys ever win a BCS game?) and they will remain red headed stepchildren to the big daddy in their region, the SEC.

Meanwhile the Big East, the last of the BCS conferences had probably the most eventful time in realignment and ultimately made a farce out of the regional aspect of these conferences. First TCU reneged on its agreement with the Big East and instead went to the Big 12. The West Virginia, the powerhouse in the conference, left to also join the Big 12. Then Pitt and Syracuse abandoned them for the ACC. The Big East was already limited to 8 teams to start the season anyway. Now they are down to 5. How do they respond? By inviting the following teams clearly not from the East Coast: Boise State (Idaho), San Diego State (California), Houston (Texas), SMU (Texas), and only one team from the actual east coast: Central Florida.

In case you couldn't follow that geography, heres a map, not really Big East anymore:



It will be interesting to see how this plays out this upcoming year and in years down the road, but I doubt we've seen the end of realignment. As we start the New Year with a BCS championship that I doubt half the nation wanted, we can only assume the biggest change on the horizon is a plus one playoff system that would've given Oklahoma State it's much deserved shot.

I chronicled the basketball playoffs in the infancy of this blog, but it bears repeating: DALLAS MAVERICKS 2010-2011 NBA CHAMPIONS. Hate him or love him, you know if Mark Cuban was the owner of your favorite team you felt good about the future. Al Davis was all aboutabout excellence, Jerry Jones even roams the sidelines, but no owner in professional sports wears his desire on his sleeve the way Mark did. He wants to win. As long as Mark has the passion, I see a bright future in Dallas for years to come. You earned the right to carry that trophy wherever you want.


Tragically several All-Stars and even future Hall of Famers getting their first ring (Dirk, Jason Kidd, Jason Terry, Peja Stojakovic, Shawn Marion, Caron Butler) was not the lead story of this basketball year. In fact it didn't even finish second. The lead story of the year was whether the hellspawn Miami Heat could coexist with LeBron James as the Robin to Dwyane Wade's Batman, whether Erik Spoelstra could properly manage this hyper talented group, whether Chris Bosh looked like an ostrich, and whether LeBron really made the right "decision" (even though technically it was made in 2010). For my money they are scary, and I didn't like playing them one bit in the Finals so I think in the end he found his best chance to get a ring right now.


The desire for all things Heat was so rampant that ESPN had an entire blog on its website devoted it.: The Heat Index. ESPN has blogs and pages devoted to entire cities, but nowhere else did it have a page devoted specifically to one individual team. The Heat this year were more polarizing in its sport than Tebow is in his and ESPN ate it up. As we start the new basketball year it's clear the Heat are no longer as intriguing as they were last year. The reason for that is the second biggest story of the year: The NBA lockout.

This was an actual lockout that did threaten a season, and ultimately led to 16 fewer regular season games per season. What the lockout was supposed to accomplish was allow the small market teams to compete easier in the league by making it easier to retain your own talent and by punishing big market teams with huge payrolls with a strict luxury tax for going over the salary cap.

The problem: IMMEDIATELY after the lockout ended business resumed as usual. Chris Paul and Dwight Howard, two top 10 players in the NBA who were the centerpieces of their small market franchises demanded trades to *gasp* big market teams. It is true the luxury tax ramifications of the new CBA don't kick in for another couple of years, but nothing changed in the NBA to this point. Chris Paul is in LA (almost to the Lakers) and if the Lakers really wanted to, they could get Dwight as well.

It remains to be seen how this crazy season plays out but it doesnt seem like the NBA has even really started yet. Just feels like we are still in training camp. Going to be a weird NBA season when all is said and done.

In golf we all though Tiger might make his comeback this year, but it wasnt until a December surge (when he traditionally never plays) winning the Chevron World Championship and providing the winning match in the President's Cup that we started to see a Tiger who was putting it together. I expect huge things from him this year and yet another year removed from the scandal. It's about this time Kobe put his Colorado problems behind him, gained more sponsorships and revolutionized his game even further leading to back to back titles.

It was a memorable year in sports as always, and it kicks off again this year with the BCS National Championship on Jan. 9th, with the NFL playoffs in high gear immediately after it. Welcome to 2012 sports fans. I sure hope the Mayans were wrong.