Category Archives: National

A Few Tweaks that Could Save The MLB All-Star Game

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Okay, I just can’t help myself. A sports “opinionator” is powerless when it comes to an issue like MLB’s All-Star voting.

First, a few disclaimers. I’m a baseball purist, and I’m older than 25 (okay, significantly older). Those two things may, unfortunately, have become redundant, but as the kids say today, “it is what it is.”

Since the job of All-Star voting was returned to the fans in 1970, the annual listing of the players who were “snubbed” has become as big a part of the game as the list of the guys who get in. Teams have always campaigned for their players, and players who got lots of national TV exposure always had a big advantage.

Because of that history, it’s tempting to look at the results of this year’s selection process and simply say, “well, you can’t make everyone happy,” and leave it at that. Unfortunately, if you’re an “opinionator,:” you need to try to figure out a way to fix it. So here goes.

There are several challenges to fixing this system, not the least of which is that baseball itself has absolutely no interest in doing so. They’ve made several changes to the player selection process over the last few years, including adding much-needed roster spots, but none of these has gotten to the unfortunate root of the thing, which is that most fans are woefully unqualified to pick an All-Star team.

Oh, I can hear it now, all the wailing, “It’s the fans’ game!”

Hey, you know what? Not anymore. You see, one of those changes a few years ago was to take the home field advantage in the World Series and give it to the league that won the All-Star Game. To me, that means it’s no longer “the fans’ game.” It’s serious business, as any team which has led the World Series 3-2 and lost it in seven games will tell you. In fact, you may be surprised to know that 20 of the last 25 World Series were won by the team that played the first two games at home.

It’s ironic, isn’t it, that the very thing that the Commissioner of Baseball came up with to make the game more “meaningful” (meaning: interesting for top players to play hard in) also had the effect of taking the role of the fan out of the selection process. Well, except, it didn’t. In an incredible convolution of logic, the All-Star Game became hugely important in the pursuit of the Championship of the Sport, and yet the most important factor in the game, the selection of the players, was left in the hands of mechanics, schoolteachers, astronauts, six-year-olds and other, less-qualified people.

And here’s the best part! Baseball is thrilled! This year’s voting broke all records! People voted from their computers, from their phones, from kiosks at the ballpark! Early and often (25 votes at a time). This is not going away, folks. So, let’s get back to trying to fix it.

The concern amongst reasonable people is not that Pablo Sandoval won the starting NL 3rd base spot over David Wright. Sandoval doesn’t suck, and Wright is still on the team. No, the problem isn’t what happened out here in San Francisco, it’s what ALMOST happened.

Okay, I just can’t help myself. A sports “opinionator” is powerless when it comes to an issue like MLB’s All-Star voting.

First, a few disclaimers. I’m a baseball purist, and I’m older than 25 (okay, significantly older). Those two things may, unfortunately, have become redundant, but as the kids say today, “it is what it is.”

Since the job of All-Star voting was returned to the fans in 1970, the annual listing of the players who were “snubbed” has become as big a part of the game as the list of the guys who get in. Teams have always campaigned for their players, and players who got lots of national TV exposure always had a big advantage.

Because of that history, it’s tempting to look at the results of this year’s selection process and simply say, “well, you can’t make everyone happy,” and leave it at that. Unfortunately, if you’re an “opinionator,:” you need to try to figure out a way to fix it. So here goes.

There are several challenges to fixing this system, not the least of which is that baseball itself has absolutely no interest in doing so. They’ve made several changes to the player selection process over the last few years, including adding much-needed roster spots, but none of these has gotten to the unfortunate root of the thing, which is that most fans are woefully unqualified to pick an All-Star team.

Oh, I can hear it now, all the wailing, “It’s the fans’ game!”

Hey, you know what? Not anymore. You see, one of those changes a few years ago was to take the home field advantage in the World Series and give it to the league that won the All-Star Game. To me, that means it’s no longer “the fans’ game.” It’s serious business, as any team which has led the World Series 3-2 and lost it in seven games will tell you. In fact, you may be surprised to know that 20 of the last 25 World Series were won by the team that played the first two games at home.

It’s ironic, isn’t it, that the very thing that the Commissioner of Baseball came up with to make the game more “meaningful” (meaning: interesting for top players to play hard in) also had the effect of taking the role of the fan out of the selection process. Well, except, it didn’t. In an incredible convolution of logic, the All-Star Game became hugely important in the pursuit of the Championship of the Sport, and yet the most important factor in the game, the selection of the players, was left in the hands of mechanics, schoolteachers, astronauts, six-year-olds and other, less-qualified people.

And here’s the best part! Baseball is thrilled! This year’s voting broke all records! People voted from their computers, from their phones, from kiosks at the ballpark! Early and often (25 votes at a time). This is not going away, folks. So, let’s get back to trying to fix it.

The concern amongst reasonable people is not that Pablo Sandoval won the starting NL 3rd base spot over David Wright. Sandoval doesn’t suck, and Wright is still on the team. No, the problem isn’t what happened out here in San Francisco, it’s what ALMOST happened.

Brandon Belt and Brandon Crawford, second-year Giants starters who each looked like they could get sent down to the minors at various points this season, both finished second at their positions in the All-Star voting. Crawford, whose glove is magnificent but is hitting under .240, missed getting the start by only 350,000 votes.

Aubrey Huff, who has 9 hits in 58 at-bats, finished 17th in the voting in the outfield. Freddy Sanchez, who has not spent one minute on the active roster this season, finished fourth in the balloting at second base. Both of them had over 1.9 million votes. Really!

This should scare MLB. Because of the World Series appearances in 2002 and 2010, the Giants have a very strong fan base in the 18-34 age group, and they are wired to the teeth. The fact that they’re not competent to vote for All-Star teams is not their fault. If you take someone who’s never driven a car and give them the keys, you bear some responsibility for what happens.

Okay, that’s the problem, what do you do to fix it? First of all, there has to be a way to remove people from the ballot if they haven’t played enough games. That would have taken care of not only Sanchez and Huff, but Sandoval. Pablo missed 35 of the team’s 80 games this season, and that alone should remove him from consideration for a starting spot.

Secondly, there could be a minimum performance standard for position players. Maybe a player needs to be in the top 10 in the league in any of the key offensive categories to be eligible to be voted on. This can’t be that difficult. I understand that there are still paper ballots that are printed way ahead of time, but any votes for ineligible players would simply not be counted. That would take care of the Belt and Crawford situations, which came very close to being very embarrassing for MLB.

Lastly, it’s time to recognize that things in the world have changed since 1970, and we need to let go of the rule requiring each team to have a representative in the game. It was a nice rule when it was first implemented, but again, now that the game counts, a manager has to make sure he’s got all the positions and pitcher spots covered. Ron Washington chose a rookie closer from the A’s, Ryan Cook, because he needed a relief pitcher. Cook’s been a nice surprise, but he has 7 career saves in 10 career opportunities. And he’s an All-Star? Over Josh Reddick? Really?

So there you have it. We keep fan voting, as ridiculous as the concept is, and just try to limit the damage. If they don’t do something, the Giants could have the whole starting eight next year. There’s no market that has the combination of sellout crowds, high TV ratings and internet penetration that the Giants enjoy, and they’re not afraid to use it.

The Case For Penn State Canceling Their Football Season

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Written November 11, 2011

By now it seems clear that Saturday’s game between Penn State and Nebraska will go on as scheduled, barring a monumental and sudden shift in public mood. I’m writing this for two reasons: 1) because I perceive it as so true that if I don’t get it out it will burn a hole in my brain and 2) so that in the aftermath of this game, when it becomes clear that it should have been cancelled, I will have a basis for my “I told you so” comments

I’m not the only person who holds this opinion; that the best way for Penn State to start the process of clearing out the current culture and replacing it with a better one is to not play this game. I’m just one of the people who looks beyond the obvious, which is that the logistical challenge of calling it off, combined with the emotional effect it would have on the Penn State players themselves, make it much easier in the short term to go forward with it.

It’s true that the players would be paying a high price for sins they didn’t commit if their last home game was canceled. That’s not fair, is it? Let’s pose that a different way, though. Is it as unfair as having an adult you admire take advantage of you sexually? Repeatedly? Okay, losing “Senior Day” is starting to look not quite so unfair.

These children didn’t do anything wrong. They didn’t deserve what happened to them. What they deserve right now, at this moment, is for the world to take what happened to them seriously, and if you play that game tomorrow, it’s a giant flashing neon sign that says “you know what, kids? We really don’t care. We’ll wear blue shirts, we’ll throw money in a pot for you, we’ll have a moment of silence; but we’re not willing to give up our entertainment, our recreation, our drinking; in short, our fun, because of what happened to you.”

Let the NCAA step up for these student-athletes. Grant them an extra year of eligibility to compensate them for losing the rest of this season. Allow them to transfer without sitting out a year if they want to. Don’t let the couple of dozen seniors on the football team be the reason that this momentum for change is stopped in its tracks.

The other reason I hear that the game needs to be played is that there are contracts for TV, and “think of all the money.” I actually laughed the first time I heard this, because I thought the person was joking. Then I realized that they were dead serious. Folks, that’s exactly the kind of thinking that got us here in the first place. Penn State can write some checks and get out of whatever TV contracts and game contracts they have. No other school is going to protest; they’re too busy looking in their own closets to make sure this doesn’t happen to them.

Already the talk is about Paterno’s successor. People are already tired of talking about child abuse, and it’s much more fun to talk about football coaches.  Firefighters sometimes have to destroy houses or trees to stop the flames from spreading, and that’s the situation facing Penn State’s Board of Trustees right now. Tomorrow’s game is fuel for the fire that threatens to consume all of the good intentions and pious speeches that you’re hearing right now.  Cancel it, and the rest of the season, and you have a chance to save the other half of the forest.

Not enough for you yet? Here’s another reason to cancel the game, and the season. Do you know how long Tom Bradley has been on the PSU Staff? 33 years. He worked under Jerry Sandusky, and eventually replaced him as Defensive Coordinator.  He was at the practices, the bowl games, the events that Sandusky is alleged to have attended with underage boys.  They just fired Joe Paterno because they know he knew about Sandusky. What are the chances that Bradley didn’t know? What are the chances that the rest of the staff didn’t know? I mean, really? These men work together for decades, and a couple of them know that this man is sick, and the rest of them don’t? Really?

I understand that there’s no proof that Bradley or any other PSU coach knew anything about the allegations about Sandusky, but the general consensus about this story is that we’re at the beginning, not the end, and it would be terrible if we find out in a year that it was an open secret in the football offices, and all of the people they let coach the remainder of this year were in on it.

If Penn State is serious about getting its University back from the football program, it has to make a clean break from the Paterno regime, and that means cancel the rest of this season and maybe even next season. A self-imposed Death Penalty, ESPN Legal Analyst Lester Munson called it. Bring in a new coaching staff, give them the tools they need to be competitive, but make it clear that the football team is the tail, not the dog.

Penn State alumni have been among the most proud and vocal of any school in the country. As soon as this happened, I thought of several of my friends here on the West Coast who went there, because if you know someone who went to Penn State, you know they went to Penn State. That’s how it can be again, but only if they resist the urge to play that game tomorrow, and call off the rest of the season.

Show the victims that you’re willing to put more than words on the line, Penn State. They’re watching.

America’s Tebow Obsession

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Published November 18, 2011 at CSNBayArea.com

This is not about football. I thought I’d better start with that, this being a sports website and all. I would have hated for someone to read the whole thing and then feel ripped off because there was nothing about “release points” or “technique.”

This is an attempt to explain why Tim Tebow is the most polarizing figure in sports today, and maybe outside of sports as well.

First of all, I’m going to give Raiders fans a pass on the whole Tebow thing. While most of America is grappling over the issue, for Raiders fans it’s pretty simple. The guy wears a Broncos jersey to work. That’s pretty much game over for them.

The fact that he’s apparently revived a division rival that seemed to be dead on the side of the road, they don’t like that very much either. Throw in the way he ran through, around and over the Raiders a few weeks ago, and you can bet that the mere sight of No. 15 is enough to get their blood boiling.

OK, the Raiders fans are sedated and in the other room watching the Super Bowl XI highlight video. Now we can get down to the topic at hand:

What is it about this guy that makes him so easy for critics to dismiss and deride, yet there are also people who would “Forrest Gump” him at the drop of a hat (meaning run behind him from one end of the country to the other for no reason).

Most people aren’t trying to answer this question, by the way. They’ve picked their side, and now they’re rooting like crazy for him to succeed or fail depending on their choice.

There’s another question, however, that is beginning to work its way through the minds of America’s sports fans, and it’s being discussed around thousands of water coolers today: How in the world does he do it?

How does he win these games? How can he play like Clark Kent for 55 minutes, and then turn into Superman for the last 5 (plus overtime, if necessary)? And especially, why do defensive players and special teams guys seem to play so much better when he’s the quarterback, even though they don’t occupy the field at the same time?

Here’s my theory, and it’s pretty simple, really. He’s a really, really good guy. OK, that’s not a news flash, even his detractors always mention it. Here’s why it’s significant, though, in my view: Goodness is very easy to deride and demean, but only from a distance. When you actually come face-to-face with goodness, it’s much harder to have such a negative viewpoint about it.

That’s why the people who believe in Tim Tebow the most are the ones who actually know him. The ones who have looked in his eyes, either in the locker room, on the practice field, or, the past few weeks, in the huddle and on the sidelines. They see the goodness up close.

There was nothing not to like last night about Tebow. He stood up on the podium after the game, complimented his teammates and coaches, explained in considerable detail what went into the winning play, smiled a lot, and seemed very happy to be Tim Tebow.

In another time, Tebow would be a national hero, not a controversial figure. I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but we live in a world in which cynicism is often rewarded. Our entertainment is largely watching “real people” on TV doing things that allow us to laugh at them, not with them. Here’s a clean-cut, religious, polite, humble guy who, by the way, wins football games in bunches and always has.  What’s not to like? What part of that package would you not show your child and say, “That’s how it’s done?”

But we’re cynical, remember? So we don’t trust Tebow. There must be something wrong with him, right? Nobody’s that good, not even Joe Paterno, for goodness sakes! We are not going to fall for whatever he’s selling, so we can feel good about ourselves when he has his inevitable fall from grace. That’s part of being human, and it’s why we protect ourselves with all manner of defense mechanisms to keep from getting hurt or disappointed.

Here’s the crux of the matter: Goodness is attractive, but it’s also threatening.  Everywhere this guy goes he draws people to him, and he makes them feel better about themselves. Any success expert will tell you that’s at least half the battle, whether you’re trying to sell copiers or win football games.

If you don’t know him personally, though, it’s very easy to see the goodness as arrogance. We assume he thinks he’s better than us because maybe deep down we think he might actually be better than us. That gives us two choices, rise to his level or bring him down to ours, and it doesn’t take long to figure out the path most of us will take given those options. So we pick away at him, even while he goes about the business of winning football games.

I think what it boils down to is that what we think about Tim Tebow says more about us than it does about him. He gives us the opportunity to feel good about someone who is genuinely good, and as time goes on I believe more and more people will take that opportunity.

There will always be people, though, that can’t give in to that, who won’t allow themselves to let their guard down even for a minute lest they be taken for naïve, gullible, or foolish.

Then there are the people who can’t get past the Broncos jersey. That’s OK, Raiders fans. I don’t think even Tebow would want it any other way.

If The NCAA Can Get Replay Right, How Hard Can it Be? MLB, Pay Attention!

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Published on October 24, 2011 at CSNBayArea.com

Baseball’s refusal to take instant replay seriously has evolved from a minor nuisance to a full-blown disaster over the past several years, and it reared its ugly head again in Game 3 of the World Series. Well, actually, it sent a little warning shot in Game 2, as well.

The Game 2 play I’m referring to was the ball hit by Adrian Beltre in the ninth inning that looked from every replay angle like it changed direction after hitting his foot, before caroming out to shortstop. The ball was ruled a fair ball, and Beltre was an easy out at first base. Fox’s new  “TSA Scan-Cam,” as I like to call it, showed a small white dot on Beltre’s toe, in case the physical reality of a ball hit down and to the left that suddenly went to the shortstop wasn’t enough evidence of the ball’s foul-ness. Readers of a certain age will recall the Warren Commission report on the JFK assassination as using similar logic to that of the umpires on Thursday night.

That play was fairly quickly forgotten, because, after all, the best Beltre could have gotten out of the situation was another pitch to hit from the Cardinals’ flame-throwing closer, so you can’t make a concrete case that the call changed the outcome of the game.
Besides, on Saturday night the umpiring crew, allegedly selected on merit these days, presented proponents of instant replay with some real honest-to-goodness ammunition. They blew a call that prolonged an inning that produced four St. Louis runs, an excellent head start in a game the Cards wound up winning 16-7.  Many baseball experts have attempted to make the point that the call didn’t cost the Rangers the game, but I don’t see how you can definitively say that. Get that call right, and there are two outs with nobody on, which the percentages tell you is a big difference from one on, one out.

Rangers pitcher Matt Harrison, who had been pretty effective so far, got the next batter to top a ball toward first. With two out, that’s an easy play to second or first, but Mike Napoli tried to get the runner at home and threw it away, allowing two runs to score. Harrison, who should have been on the bench watching his team hit, then allowed a single and a ground-ball out (the fourth out of the inning, by my count, but only the second official one), and was removed by Ron Washington.

So not only did the Cardinals get four gift runs from the blown call, but they got the Rangers’ starter out of the game, and there’s no way to know how that impacted the outcome. This was not just any game, it was Texas’ first home game, and the game after the Rangers had wrestled home-field advantage away from St. Louis. They had it, if not taken away from them, made a much more difficult task than it would have been had MLB had any kind of decent instant replay system.

We know these things have happened in baseball for years, and one of the most ironic things about Game 3 was that the beneficiary was the St. Louis Cardinals, the team that got the worst hose job of all time in 1985. They were in the process of putting away the Kansas City Royals in Game 6 when Don Denkinger went to sleep on a play at first base, opening the door for a Royals rally that not only won that game but carried right through Game 7.

Back in 1985, however, instant replay was still considered a technological marvel, and we all had kind of a Star Trek “don’t change the course of history” attitude toward it. There was the “human error has always been part of the game” argument, which is one of the dumbest things anyone has ever said. The NFL was still years away from getting its act together, and I don’t remember anyone suggesting that baseball should start using replays to get calls right.

But time marches on, and the NFL, college football, the NHL and the NBA have incorporated some form of instant replay. The best MLB has been able to do is to look at replays to determine whether home runs were actually home runs, which comes into play a handful of times per year. Other fair/foul calls and outs on the bases have been distinctly excluded from review, leaving the umpires to just “do their best,” which has never really been good enough.

The folly that is MLB’s stance on replay was made clear just about two hours after the blown World Series call. Wisconsin and Michigan State had played 59 minutes and 56 seconds of inspired football with tons at stake for both schools. Wisconsin was playing to remain undefeated and a candidate for a BCS championship game berth, and Michigan State was playing to stay in the hunt for the Big 10 Championship and a trip to the Rose Bowl.

With :04 on the clock and the score tied, Michigan State launched a Hail Mary pass that wound up in the hands of one of their receivers on the 2 yard line. He immediately put his head down and tried to get in the end zone, but was thrown back by two defenders. The referees called him down on the 1, and the game was going to overtime. Except that every play in every college game is reviewed by a replay official, and after a very short period of time the announcement came that the call had been overturned and it was indeed a touchdown.

In real time, it looked like the refs had gotten it right, but the first look at a goal-line replay showed that the ball had broken the plane of the goal line ever so briefly. If the Badgers had gone on to win in OT it would have been a faulty verdict, and should they have played for the BCS championship the whole season would have been a sham. Because of instant replay, that won’t happen.

There’s no way that college football can do this and Major League Baseball can’t. I could go on and on about the reasons they’ve given in the past, but the debate is over.  Human error on the part of the players we can’t fix, but we can help those human umpires, and we need to.