TV Drives the Bus

I’ve had this idea in my head for a while, but like many blogs I haven’t written in the past few weeks, the storm that knocked me out for a week sort of put a kibosh on my productivity. With Saturday’s news that Maryland and Rutgers will likely be joining the Big Ten (known herein as B1G), it bears noting the influence that television has on each and every one of our pathetic, amazing American lives.

Sports TV and radio the focus of this piece, as they represent one half of the media spectrum; the other half comprise of print and web (the method of consumption is different, at least to me). TV and radio are two very different mediums for conveying sports information and opinion.

Islanders Stay on the Island

The image above is a satellite picture of the lower portion of mainland New York and Long Island. The stars represent major pro sports arenas in New York State, excluding Ralph Wilson Stadium in Buffalo. If you know basic geography, you can identify which one is Yankee Stadium, Citi Field, Madison Square Garden, Barclays Center and Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum. The Nassau Coliseum will soon be removed from this map, as the Islanders and owner Charles Wang have announced that they will not return to Nassau County when their lease is up in 2015, and will play at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn until at least 2040.

2012 World Series: How We Got Here

The San Francisco Giants stomped their way into the World Series last night, with a 9-0 drubbing of the choking Cardinals. They face the Tigers, who have been waiting for almost a week after shutting down the Yankees in the ALCS, and happen to have the most talented players on both sides of the ball in the sport. The Series (the only series that earns a capital ‘S’) should be exciting, and whichever team wins, we should not have trouble believing they are the best team in Major League Baseball.

5 Years Later…

Two pitchers, on two very similar paths

The MLB playoffs are moving forward without a representative from New York. There was a long time where between the Yankees, Dodgers and Giants, the Big Apple always had a team to love or hate in the World Series. These days, the Mets do a great job not making the playoffs, and the Yankees cannot be expected to get there every year, although their fans sometimes expect it. So with the Yankees failing to get any sort of offense going against the Tigers, the baseball offseason officially begins in New York.

The offseason is not only a time to look forward to new players and contract negotiations, but also a time to look back on how our team’s and players’ performance will affect the team going forward. In New York, today is a good day to take a look at the former golden boy pitchers Jon Niese and Phil Hughes. These two guys joined Joba Chamberlain (whose strange, up-and-down career sort of makes him an outlier in these conversations) as THE FUTURE of pitching for the Mets and Yankees. Both teams acquired an ace to anchor the rotations, but these two guys came into the majors at 21 years old and with a whole lot of promise. Their careers took different arcs, but have found them here, 6 years later, in very similar positions.

Football Failures (UPDATE)

England is not sad yet, but they probably will be.

First, a quick terminology lesson: Football is a sport played all over the world, though in the USA, the game is quite different. I don’t like it when people use the derogatory term ‘handegg’ to talk about my beloved NFL football, so i’m not going to degrade English, Italian, Spanish, Brazilian, Russian etc. football by calling it ‘soccer’. Soccer is the term used to describe the game known internationally as football when it is played in America. For instance, last night, the USA beat Guatemala in a World Cup qualifying soccer match. It is called as such because it took place in Kansas City, KS, where the MLS team (stands for Major League Soccer) Sporting KC plays; it is a soccer match. This is in contrast to England, whose World Cup qualifying football match against Poland was postponed due to a waterlogged pitch in a roofed stadium.

Football, of all varieties, is a funny thing. While the game may not be the same, you can mention football in any country, and it’s more than likely a citizen’s favorite sport. You know how football is here in America: It is religion; it is a reason to wake up excited on Sunday morning; a reason to go to the bar with your buddies; it gets you though Monday. Go to England, you’ll find the same thing. English football happens on the weekends, with the occasional midweek match. There is Monday Night Football there, too (it is broadcast most weeks in the US on ESPN2 at 3PM ET, 8PM local).

Replace the Goal Horn with a “Sad Trombone”

Ilya is sad, he wants to leave Russia.

I have a great amount to say about the US Men’s National Soccer Team, but I’m going to wait until later, once they advance, or completely collapse and let Jamaica back into the the current World Cup Qualifiers. I’d like to say a word about the NHL for now.

The NHL and NHLPA have resumed talks, and the NHL has finally become aggressive about compromising with the players and moving on toward ending the lockout. This comes a day after a Deadspin article (a medium which has quickly become a great catalyst in a lot of sports stories) revealed a focus group led by legendary spin man Frank Luntz whose purpose was to get some perspective and fodder for the NHL to create its popularity campaign as the lockout drags on. The league was looking for themes and ideas that could give the owners a bit of compassion in the fans eyes; they wanted us to feel like they want hockey back as much as we do, and that they are trying.

Ode to Joe

Joe. He is the least conspicuous: Joe Schmo, Joe Sixpack et. al.; he is legendary: Joltin’ Joe, Mean Joe, or just Joe; if you are a Yankee fan, he is your manager: Joe Torre, Joe Girardi…..he is Joe.

The name Joe is about as normal as you can get. Maybe John is a little more normal, but not by much. Joe is anyone in the world, he could be Joseph, Giuseppe, or Joey. There are millions of Joe’s, both average and extraordinary, in our big wide world. This isn’t about any but one: Joe Buck.