Thursday, October 25, 2007

Really Kobe?

I don't normally watch the Best Damn Sports Show, but the other night, as I raced through channels, I stumbled across one of their "lists" shows. Since I'm a sucker for any type of "list", I watched it for a few minutes. This show was called something like "Most Best Damn Memorable Damn Sports Moments... Damn" or something like that.

This list was actually compiled of different athletes and celebraties recounting their most memorable sports moments.

Kobe was one of the athletes interviewed and he related that his most memorable sports moment was the US Hockey team's "Miracle on Ice".

Now I found this peculiar for a number of reasons. First, I wouldn't think Black Mamba was in to ice sports. I figured it would be a basketball moment, or soccer, since he spent part of his childhood in Italy.

I also found it odd because Kobe most have been pretty young when this happened. I was six and I have no memory of it. Now, I know I'm older than Kobe, so I thought I would check out exactly how old Kobe was when the USA upset those red bastards.

Turns out, Kobe was 18 months old on the night of the "Miralce On Ice". So his most memorable moment was an event that he didn't even witness live. Strange.

Jonathan Chait on Charlie Weis

The Worst Football Coach in the Universe

Not really into Jonathan Chait's politics, but he is one heck of a writer. He rips Charlie Weis to shreds here, and on this subject, I couldn't agree with him more.

Friday, October 19, 2007

Things Aren't Looking So Good

Wow, my last post was over four months ago! Like the Sox, I decided to take the summer off. Maybe I'll be motivated to post a little more often with college basketball around the corner.

As for the Sox, I don't hold much hope for them. Of course, I didn't before the 2005 season either. But looking back, a lot of things broke the right way for the 2005 Sox. Things look a little bit bleaker now.

I think it's become clear that Kenny Williams knows how to put together a decent pitching staff but falls far short when it comes to building an offense. He got lucky before the 2005 season, signing Pierzynski and Dye off the scrap heap. But resigning them to extensions during the 2007 season exposed Williams shortcomings: not clearly understanding the aging effects of players and not understanding the value of getting on base. Neither Dye or AJ got on base much last year and they will most likely only get worse as they get older. Thank goodness we have AJ until 2010!

But seriously, I Like Pierzynski. I just think 2008 will probably be the last year he will be an effective starting catcher. I like Dye a lot, too. How can you not like World Series heroes? Dye's two year extension also made more sense as the Sox really didn't have any other appealing options for the upcoming year.

But it looks like the offense again will be at best mediocre and there is just too much talent in the division to think that will be good enough. Like this year, you never know when a bullpen might implode or a starter will suddenly lose it. And the Sox offense will not be able to pick up the slack if the pitching falters.

I would like to think that Williams can make some moves to help the Sox offense in 2008. But while I know he is willing to make these moves, I don't think he knows the right moves to make.