THE TEN WORST THINGS IN SPORTS

1. Major League Baseball. Just call it what it is: George Steinbrenner’s rotisserie league. There is nothing–NOTHING–interesting about MLB anymore, and until there’s revenue sharing and a meaningful salary cap (not a useless “luxury tax”), there won’t be. They ought to just sell the World Series title on eBay.

2. SportsCenter. When Keith Olbermann and Dan Patrick were doing “The Big Show,” with Craig Kilborn on the bench, it was great TV. Watching the current passel of who-dats trying to imitate what once was great–well, that’s another story. The story of schtick over substance, to be specific.

3. Interviews with athletes who have nothing to say. You’d better “bring [your] A-game” every week because that’s what you’re getting paid for. And we also know that you need to minimize mistakes and capitalize on opportunities. We know that because everybody in the freakin’ world knows that, and we all learned it when we were six years old.

4. Olympics telecasts. Ever since ABC started “Up Close and Personal” during the ‘76 Summer Games, Olympics telecasts have been about 20% action and 80% stories of athletes overcoming the heartbreak of psoriasis to become the fourth-best trapshooter in the world. I already know that gymnasts start young and get up early in the morning to practice and forego a lot of the things that “normal” kids enjoy. The Olympics are the only chance most Americans get to watch sports which aren’t terribly popular in this country, like fencing, bobsled racing, and soccer. Less Lifetime, more ESPN, got it? People who aren’t already sports fans don’t watch the Olympics!

5. The NCAA’s eligibility rules. Nobody buys the fiction that the majority of athletes in major-conference football and men’s basketball are in school to get their educations. More to the point, nobody cares. Let athletes on full athletic scholarships go to school part-time, just like everybody else who has to work their way through college. They’ll still get some education, which is better than none, and if they want to go full-time, they can.

6. One-named Brazilian soccer players who aren’t Pele. He was given the nickname; he didn’t just claim it. How about proving you’re worthy before you declare yourself to be his equal? Which is what you’re doing by refusing to use a last name.

7. Quarterbacks who wear the number 7. Last I checked, a touchdown was only worth six points. “7″ should, by all rights, be a kicker’s number, since only a kicker can score the 7th point.

8. Americans’ relationship with the NBA. Everybody in the world hopes and hopes again for a championship series without the Lakers in it. Then we get one . . . and nobody watches it.

9. The credit given to drivers in NASCAR. Yep, I’m sure the main reaon Jeff Gordon had so much success in NASCAR is because he’s a better driver than anybody else. Couldn’t have anything to do with the dozens of people who kept his car running faster than everyone else’s every week. Nope, it’s all his driving. Ridiculous A trained baboon could win a NASCAR race if it had the fastest, best-maintained car, and it wouldn’t even have to be a particularly smart baboon. Jeff Gordon is just any commuter who’s had too much coffee.

10. Men’s tennis and women’s golf. To understand why, see #3 on this list.

PICKIN’ ON THE BIG XII: 8/30 EDITION

Once again this season, everybody says the Big XII is the best conference in the country, which means that, once again this season, the national champion will come from some other conference. This is the Big XII’s 8th season, and so far they’ve exactly matched the Big Ten in national champs. And, despite the vaunted Texas football traditions, that’s exactly how well the old Big Eight would have done in the same time period. Yep, this here experiment’s working out real well.

It’s a big weekend, with several teams playing meaningless matchups against technical colleges and American Legion posts that needed the money. Oh, and there’s two games that are just too strange for words. So let’s get the party started:
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PICKIN’ ON THE BIG TEN, 8/30 EDITION

One of the most traditional college football institutions was destroyed in a brief, blinding flash last night. I’m talking, of course, about the MACrifice, that guaranteed win that major-conference teams pencil on to their schedule when they find a team from the MAC that needs the money badly.

It was inevitable that one of these MAC teams would step up and take a game one day. Last night, they did. Northern Illinois beat #15 Maryland 20-13 in overtime. And all of a sudden, athletic directors in the Sun Belt conference are getting a better class of phone call.

It’s a light Big Ten schedule this week, with only four games on tap. But they involve the conference’s heavy hitters, so interest will be high. (Except for the Central Michigan/Michigan game; the Chippewas have about as much chance in that game as a chihuahua has of impregnating a Great Dane.) But otherwise, we’ve got two teams that will contend for the conference title facing quality opponents, and one inexplicably-ranked team facing a supposed MACrifice. So, on with the picks!
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PRESEASONED FOR YOUR CONVENIENCE

Bryan from Arguing With Signposts is pondering whether the revenue lost by NFL teams when a star player is injured in the preseason is greater than the revenue they gain by playing the preseason games. He writes:

But I have to ask if the revenues generated by these games won’t be more than offset by the LOSS in revenues from an injury to a marquee player like Michael Vick or Chad Pennington? I mean, who in New York is really going to watch the second week game between the Jets and the Dolphins now? Who’s really going to watch the first four weeks of Atlanta’s season now?

Or, another interesting scenario: how long before players start putting clauses in their contracts stipulating the number of plays they will perform in preseason games?

I can’t recall which book it was in (something by Dan Jenkins, no doubt) that mentioned the old tradition in NFL football about preseason games where no one really hit that hard because everyone understood that it was stupid to risk injury in a meaningless game. If possible, players didn’t play because of “pulled groins” or “twisted ankles.”

Maybe the players should take a page from those who played before them. Of course, players today probably have insurance that pays them even with the injury, and the team has disaster insurance as well. The only people who lose out are the fans. And isn’t that always the way?

Well, first of all, unless you’re the Cincinnati Bengals, you probably sell out all your games long before the preseason starts. So it’s not like people can really say, “Chad Pennington’s hurt, so I guess I won’t buy any Jets tickets.” It’s a dead option at this point; the only persons facing a financial consequence from Pennington’s injury are ticket scalpers . . . erm, I mean, ticket brokers. Otherwise, every NFL ticket that’s going to be sold this season has been sold. And the TV networks have some flexibility; they can decide during the season which games they’re going to make national, and which will remain regional. Plus, the teams in the NFL pool the TV money anyway. So Mike Vick’s four-week layoff isn’t going to have a huge effect on the Falcons’ bottom line.

In terms of disaster insurance: maybe the players have it, but the teams don’t. Nor do they need it. The NFL is the only major sports league where player contracts are not guaranteed; if a player fails to meet performance standards, they make less money, period. It would be smart for players to specify a maximum number of preseason plays from a financial point of view, except that (a) it would inevitably lead to a lower overall contract; (b) the last thing a backup player would ever want to do is limit his preseason plays, especially if he’s finghting for his job, and (c) these guys are football players, therefore, they’d never go for it.

Plus, as many wags have pointed out, with free agency and the salary cap in place, it’s fruitless to be a fan of individual players unless they’re megastars like Brett Favre, since your favorite player will change teams every 3-5 years, no matter what. So you might as well just be a fan of the uniform and not the players on the team.

Who would lose the most if the NFL restructured preseason games? Not the fans, most of whom don’t really watch preseason games anyway, but can be counted on to watch their favorite team, even if they’re bound for a 3-13 season. The people most affected by it would be the rookies, journeymen, and reserves, who would lose their only chance to prove what they can do under game conditions if preseason games became little more than glorified scrimmages.

PICKIN’ ON THE BIG XII: SPECIAL “IT’S 138 DEGREES ON THE FIELD AT ARROWHEAD” EDITION

CALIFORNIA v. KANSAS STATE

Billed as “The BCA Classic”. “BCA” stands for “Black Coaches Association.” Which neither of these teams has until you get deep into the ranks of position coaches. Oh, the hypocrisy!

Anyway, you know how every year there’s one team out there that just massively overachieves and racks up a record that nobody could have possibly predicted–like Iowa last year, or Iowa State the year before, and so on? You know how there’s one of those teams that rises up mightily against opponents with national-title aspirations and makes a huge “statement” victory?
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THE SACRED AND THE INANE

There was a disastrous musical experience yesterday morning at my church. The first hymn was misprinted in the bulletin, which took all the wind out of the service. And it got me to thinking (ranting, actually) about the quality of worship music floating around these days.

A little background, dear reader: My church is ELCA, the most “progressive” Lutheran denomination in the US. Our primary hymnal, the Lutheran Book of Worship, was published in 1978 at the height of the liturgical renewal movement. A supplemental hymnal, With One Voice, was published in 1997, featuring more contemporary (but still far from “contemporary”) hymns and service music.

I am sensitive to the realities involved in this. The 1978 hymnal draws on seven centuries of music tradition; the 1997 hymnal draws on about 25 years’ worth. You would guess that the quality of hymns is higher in the older book, and you’d be correct. (Don’t fool yourself, though–there’s plenty of duds in the LBW.) And yes, churches are full of people who need to be drug kicking and screaming into the 1950s. But doggone it, if there’s sacred music writers out there, I wish, wish,, wish you would give heed to the following:

1. Enough with the Psalms, already. Yeah, I know they were written to be sung, and they’re actually poetry, and all that. And they’re perfectly lyrical and metrical–in Hebrew. English is another story. I don’t need more lumpy, tortured musical settings of praise songs. I need worship music with decent lyrics that scan. If you can’t write good lyrics, find a wordsmith who can.

2. Turn off NPR once in a while and listen to commercial radio. This is where you’ll learn that most music is built around 8- and 12-bar phrases. Not 6, not 10, and certainly not 9. So knock it off with the trick where you have the people hold the last note of a phrase for an extra bar–I know dang few people who can hold a note on-pitch for 6 or 8 beats, even at a fast tempo. Oh, and this will also teach you that most people out there do not listen to contemporary folk music.

3. “Syncopated” does not equal “contemporary.” You can write a nice, moving, contemporary-sounding melody without resorting to polyrhythms that require a PowerMac to interpret correctly.

4. And watch the melisma, too. Most people can sing the melisma in “Angels We Have Heard On High”–you know, the “Glo-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-ria” part. Most people can’t bend a note to 13 different pitches in the span of 0.3 seconds like Whitney Houston can.

5. There’s a market for contemporary music other than “7-11″ songs. You know–songs with 7 words that you sing 11 times? How about hymns that are actually about something? I’d buy a hymnal full of those. In fact, I’d buy 150 of them.

6. We need flexible accompaniment styles. That means it has to sound good with just a keyboard or organ instead of a seven-piece band of semi-professional musicians. And would it kill you to publish some tablature for guitar players?

Wow. Cranky am I. But it’s been chewing away at me for a long time.

PHIL O’SOFFICKAL QUESTION

Which would be more embarrassing to admit to: being in an Alabama tribute band, or being the apple in the Fruit of the Loom commercials? The world breathlessly awaits your opinion.

THE WORST MOVIE FIGHT SCENE EVER

. . . has got to be the fight between Colin Firth and Hugh Grant in Bridget Jones’ Diary. You can almost feel the actors cringing. Discuss.

PICKIN’ ON THE BIG XII: SEASON PREVIEW EDITION

Everybody in the Big XII joined the Grave Dancers’ Union last season (and yes, they had to file) as Nebraska, always the 500-pound gorilla of Great Plains football, took a horrible spill all the way to a .500 record. Huskers head man Frank Solich dumped most of his defensive coaching staff and surrendered offensive play-calling duties in a valiant (but probably futile) effort to save his job. End result? Nebraska no longer has “wingbacks” and “split ends”–they’ve now come all the way to 1974 and call their pass-catchers “wide receivers.” The DEs are still “rush ends,” though, so you can hardly call it a whole new era in Lincoln.

Elsewhere in the league last season, Iowa State had the best first seven weeks they’ve ever had . . . until they hit an implacable juggernaut and wound up losing to Connecticut (Connecticut!) at the end of the regular season, then getting gutted like bullheads in the What Do Humanitarians Eat? Bowl. Oklahoma State showed signs of life for the first time since the mid-80s, and Baylor finally admitted that Kevin Steele was an experiment which failed. The league went a respectable 5-3 in bowl games.

THE FUTILITY SWEEPSTAKES: or, SOMEBODY HAS TO COACH BAYLOR

The aforementioned Frank Solich survived the wrath of the Children of the Corn, even after getting beat by Good Ol’ Diddly-Dang-Dum-Doodly Miss in the Poulan Weedeater “Shreveport is the Council Bluffs of the South” Independence Bowl. Rest assured, if the Maize Defoliators don’t even make it to a better bowl this year, Frankie’s going to have a lot of time on his hands. But everybody knows that already. Kevin Steele is gone, now coaching linebackers for Bobby Bowden. Replacing him, for reason known only to God, is Guy Morriss, who was just starting to feel some ground under his feet in Kentucky. Did nobody tell him coaching at Baylor was like coaching at Vanderbilt, only a little more so?

R.C. Slocum haunts the A&M sidelines no more. He’s replaced by the worst traitor to come down the pike since Benedict Arnold, one Dennis Franchione, who may not be a rat, but knows when to desert a sinking ship anyway.

So, now that we’ve got that out of the way, on to the teams:
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