I Shouldn't Have...

"Go back to your hometown, get your feet on the ground
And stop floating around
I find a fatal flaw in the logic of love
And go out of my head"
--Gone for Good, The Shins

One of several bands on the high-quality "Garden State" soundtrack, I grew to appreciate The Shins (and Iron & Wine, who sing that slow acoustic cover of "Such Great Heights") during our multi-hour drives to and from Mammoth over the weekend. Steve is a musical connoiseur and his thousands of mp3's helped provide a bit of an education on our journey. The "fatal flaw" to which I'm referring with the lyrics has nothing to do with love, but instead with my recent writing. I re-read yesterday's blog and came away thoroughly disappointed, probably moreso than with anything I've written heretofore, which is quite frustrating. I'll attribute it to the title-referenced "cranial confusion" that's currently on the downslope, let it "go out of my head" (as the lyrics above suggest), and move on. So here's today's entry...
Things that have interested me this week:
- Peter King evidently has a golden retriever named Bailey. I can only hope, for Mr. King's sake, that his Bailey is slightly more well-behaved than her La Canada-based counterpart.
- Big win for Newcastle United over the weekend, upsetting Chelsea at St. James' Park in FA Cup action. The Magpies (my favorite Premiership club, in case you didn't know) got a big opener from Patrick Kluivert, who has been incredibly disappointing thus far on Tyneside, and a typically steady performance from captain Alan Shearer, who continues to be the greatest striker in Prem history. Graeme Souness, the manager, mentioned today that he wants to sign Michael Owen away from Real Madrid, which would be an incredible acquisition if he can make it happen. P.S. Man United v. AC Milan on ESPN2 at 11:30 today.
- If steroids don't help a baseball player, as Barry Bonds so adamantly maintained yesterday in his press conference, then why on earth would a baseball player take them? I'm sure seeing Lyle Alzado in the latter stages of his life would be a proper incentive to juice up, knowing that there's no benefit whatsoever. Sure, let's shrink our satchels, create random fits of anger, risk criminal prosecution (yes, they are illegal) and sacrifice our future for something that's not going to do anything positive at all. That's absurd. There absolutely must be an upside or else guys like Bonds (who is ridiculously meticulous about EVERYTHING he puts into his body) would go nowhere near those things.
- Nobody's talking about the baseball side of baseball as spring training gets underway, which really sucks. I mentioned several times last summer how much I love baseball, and I'm very much looking forward to the start of another season. The Padres have made a few minor moves, setting themselves up for success in the awful NL West, which gives me even more of a reason to be excited. But steroids, Canseco, Bonds and Giambi are the only things people are even discussing, and it's a big-time bummer. Let's just let the season play out, watch skinny Bonds hit like 30 bombs and blame his old age, watch Giambi hit .260 and endure accosting on the road, or whatever's going to happen. I don't care anymore. Let them play, and talk about the players and the games to come, not the drugs from the past.
- Jack Haley cracks me up. Evidently, minutes after his exclusive report regarding the pending Laker trade for Carlos Boozer was reported on FSN, Haley received a phone call from Laker public relations guru John Black, who proceeded to read Haley Bro the riot act. Irresponsible journalism on the part of the former Bruin and Laker, who apparently received his tip from "Employee Number 8" (that's Kobe, if you needed the interpretation) and didn't bother to check it out with any other sources before reporting it on the air. Hurts his credibility, but then again, what credibility did Jack Haley really have in the first place?
- This is why the Patriots' recent run of Super Bowls is incredible (and I apologize profusely to all Ram fans offended by this point): Eddie Berlin, Kevin Carter, Robert Holcombe, Derrick Mason, Shad Meier, Fred Miller, Joe Nedney and Samari Rolle. All eight of those guys were cut yesterday by the Tennessee Titans, who were $27 million over the cap and needed to purge in a big way. Just a year removed from a tough playoff loss to the Pats and an MVP year from Steve McNair, the Titans went 5-11 this season and now have to lose their best pass rusher, receiver, kicker and cornerback. It's impossible to do what Scott Pioli and Bill Belichick have done. Not literally impossible, because obviously they've done what they've done, but you know.
- It's amazing how quickly I've grown to love the Chargers' front office. I'm still not totally over the Rodney Harrison thing ('cause he was obviously over the hill when we released him. no help to anybody), but this "non-exclusive" franchise tag they placed on Drew Brees was a tremendous move by A.J. Smith & Co. Brees will be the starter this year, getting paid a manageable $8.078 million, and if he's great again (and he will be), they can franchise him again and/or work out a long-term deal. If somebody wants to pay the man and sign him away from San Diego, they'll have to compensate the Bolts with two first-round picks (one this year, one next year), which would give us three first-rounders this year, and then Rivers would step in and start the learning process right away. I'm obviously leaning toward the Brees staying thing, but the worst case isn't so bad. Can't wait for the draft, either, only two months away from today.
- Matt Leinart winning the first Manning Award: not big news. Evidently Archie, Peyton and Eli all got votes in determining the winner, which means they didn't vote like Carson Palmer did for the Heisman (Erik Ainge might have finished a little higher if they had), but made the real difficult decision of giving the award to the Heisman winner and quarterback of the national champs. Oh yeah, and the award is given out at the end of February? How long did they have to wait to figure out who the best guy was? Let's wait for the Heisman, the Maxwell, the Davey O'Brien, the Johnny Unitas, the Walter Camp, the AP Player of the Year, all the bowl games, the NFL draft deadline, the inevitable Peyton playoff loss, the turning of winter into spring, Daytona and the start of NASCAR season (you know those southern boys are neck-car freaks), pretty much anything and everything--and then we'll give our award. And by the way, Sports Guy's note on Manning last week was great: Peyton won the Pro Bowl MVP, so now he's gotta be better than Tom Brady, right? Nice.
- Just found out this morning that the actor who portrayed Jimmy Chitwood and the individual who was the "real" Jimmy Chitwood are going to be on our show next week in conjunction with a Hoosiers DVD giveaway. Other than the Antonio Gates/Keenan McCardell visit a few months ago, I can honestly say there's no segment to which I've looked forward with more anticipation.
I'll be re-reading and evaluating this one sometime soon, but I depart now with a bit more confidence (and a clearer head)...hopefully it's been a decent one. Peace.