Coffee as Expensive, Unyielding Religious Doctrine

Well, I Prefer Mine Black, Hot, With One Ice Cube, But That’s Just Me

John Kass says “History could have helped Starbucks foresee revolt”.

Starbucks is in the process of closing 600 stores nationwide, while Dunkin’ Donuts — that oh-so-unhip place where you can pay less money, get good coffee, much less attitude, and even a sinful doughnut if you dare — is opening 500 stores. Draw your own conclusions; I’ll go out on a limb and say that the demand for expensive coffee doesn’t go above the price of a gallon of gas. Who knew these things were tied together economically?

And then go read about this goofiness, where a hoity-toity coffee house in Washington, D.C. has a set of policies about just exactly how their customers are allowed to order their coffee. One of them is “no ice with espresso”. A customer got kinda P.O.’d, and blogged about it. Hilarity ensued.

Links to this ridiculousness can be found in the story; I’m not going to bother reading any more about this than I already have, because those are precious minutes of my life I can never get back.  But I basically agree with the customer in this case.

This is the explanation given by the owner:

At his cafe, Cho explained the policy: “The way we do espresso is different than what people are used to. It’s a very exacting technique. … When you pour it over ice, it creates a certain acidic reaction that makes the drink sour.”

In his letter on Murky’s site, Cho wrote: “To others reading this I will say that if you don’t like the policies, I respectfully recommend that you find some other place that will give you what you want, or select something that we can offer you.”

Maybe some customers like it sour. People have different tastes; you can still take their money. In fact, as somebody running a business, the whole idea is to think up more ways to take their money.  I just don’t see the problem here.

But, of course, the problem is obvious:  it isn’t just coffee for these people, it’s a quasi-religion.  There are coffee beliefs, and Thou Shalt Not Disobey Them.

Yes, even if you fork over your hard-earned $4.50, you are still too stupid to make decisions about what you like, so just bend over and take it, and learn to like it!  Oh, and come back soon!

Writer Tries to Goad Mickelson into Admitting Tiger Woods is Better than He Is

Some AP sports writer named Paul Newberry is shocked and amazed that he couldn’t get Phil Mickelson to say “Tiger Woods”. Or “Tiger”, or “Woods”.

He asked three separate questions meant to hound Mickelson into finally admitting “yes, YES, fine, I’ll say it: winning this tournament might be a little easier without Tiger here, because, quite frankly, the rest of us are not as good.”  And he even wastes extra words, and precious seconds of my life that I’ll never get back, noting that Phil wouldn’t even say “Tiger”.

Oh, good grief.

Well, it probably is true that Tiger Woods is just better than everybody else, but that doesn’t matter.  He may go down as the greatest golfer of all time, but that doesn’t matter either.  Because it isn’t about Tiger Woods.  Since, he, you know … isn’t in the golf tournament.

Yet the media wants to continue yakking away about him.

Phil Mickelson, as a professional golfer, can’t afford to buy into the Tiger Woods Cult of Personality that the rest of the media world enjoys so very much.  And any writer covering the frigging British Open, the most storied tournament in the history of golf, should damn well know that.

Let’s review.  If you’re a professional golfer, your goal is to win the tournament you’re playing in that week, not to obsess over a player that is not at the tournament in question, and is out for the rest of the year. You should really not spend a single second of your week even thinking about a golfer who isn’t there.  Mental toughness is part of the job as a professional athlete — the major part, at the highest level — so if you’re smart, you don’t take the bait of just any old goofy writer that jams a microphone in your face and asks about some other golfer that isn’t even there.

Even if that golfer is Tiger Woods, and even if the writer happens to be right.

I guess the thing that annoys me the most about such stories, though, is the way they are constructed.  The whole story revolves around a game of “gotcha”, where the writer baits the athlete, hoping to get him to bite.  What is this, Watergate?

Who do these “journalists” think they’re kidding?  Harrassing a great guy like Phil Mickelson, just so you can get a Tiger Woods angle in there?  No thanks, I’m trying to cut down.

Other than that, though, nice story!

Josh Hamilton is the Feel-Good Story of the Year

Faith, Recovery, and Good Baseball — What’s Not to Like?

Josh Hamilton might not have won the overall Home Run Derby last night, but he put on an amazing display of hitting in the first round, with 28 homers, many of them in the upper deck. He hit 500+ foot blasts not once, not twice, but three times.

But Home Run Derbies come, and they go. The main thing to understand about Josh Hamilton is that, in the most important ways, he’s already won. After being drafted number one overall by Tampa Bay in 1999 — and being called “the best I’ve ever seen” by multiple scouts — he ended up taking a detour as a drug addict and an alcoholic for three or four years, and was out of the game from ‘03-’05. He could easily be dead already.

But because of his new-found faith, and his wife, and his family, he’s turned his life completely around, and can now show the world his talent for hitting baseballs. Win … win … win.

So good for him. God Bless Josh Hamilton.

Sports is often filled with stories of failure and disappointment, especially because so many young men with too much time and money on their hands are central to just about every sport. It’s sad to watch, even if it is inevitable much of the time; young men will do what young men will do. But because Josh’s recovery is faith-based, it would seem that he has a higher chance at success; here’s a quote from UT-Southwestern addiction specialist Dr. Bryon Adinoff (from the above link):

“If you replace addiction with religion, it’s not an addiction, it’s something meaningful, socially appropriate and rewarding,” Adinoff says. “It’s typically very healthy behavior.”

It was interesting to me how neither the broadcast crew on ESPN, or the article I read this morning (AP), noted that faith played the central role in Josh’s recovery. It’s like they’re scared to even mention it.  Out here in the real world, we know that oftentimes, religion helps people, and we also understand that acknowledging one specific instance where it quite likely saved a man’s life is just mentioning a true fact.

If they all care so much about the Josh Hamilton story, don’t they owe that to him, if nothing else?

Hello, Congress? Chuck Norris is Calling You Out.

Chuck Freaking Norris! … vs. a bunch of Congresswimps.

It’s like a dream come true. A cage match featuring a True American Bad-Ass against a body of elected officials currently enjoying a NINE PERCENT approval rating.

Nine. One less than ten.

Just to amplify on that point … if you tripled it, you’d still be on the wrong side of 30%.  I think even car salesmen and dentists have higher approval ratings.  President Bush, too.

Actually, after reading the article, it turns out that Chuck just wants to thin out the Congressional herd a little bit. By changing the rules, not by actually fighting 535 people.

Huh.  Well, I guess that could work too.

Armstrong and Torres

Amazing Ability to Both Dominate AND Avoid Testing Positive for PEDs? How DO They Do It?!

Tribune sports writer Phil Hersh writes a pretty good blog about Olympic sports called Globetrotting. Even if he does descend into ill-advised political commentary sometimes.

Recently he posted a couple of good items about cycling champion Lance Armstrong and 41-year-old Olympian swimmer Dana Torres, and asked some pretty sensible questions about their ability to outperform others.

Lance Armstrong, for those who don’t remember, won the Tour de France seven times in a row (1999-2005). Here’s Phil:

… all we know about Lance is he rode during an era when dopers were everywhere in the sport, and he crushed those dopers climb after climb, time trial after time trial, year after year.

And we know that five of his ex-teammates have been involved in doping.

Hey, maybe Armstrong’s stunning success was due to some previously unknown benefit from cancer treatment, which gives people super-human strength and endurance. Or maybe, just maybe, not having any testicles gives you more endurance.  You never know.

About Torres:

Torres told Eric Adelson of ESPN the Magazine she was diagnosed as an asthmatic about 18 months ago –- coincidentally, about the time her second comeback began to pick up speed.

Torres told Alan Abrahamson of nbcolympics.com she takes Symbicort, an asthma medicine in which the active ingredient is formoterol, and Proventil, an asthma medicine in which the active ingredient is albuterol.

Athletes are allowed to use both banned substances, which increase lung capacity, in an inhaler as long as they ask for a therapeutic use exemption (so many Olympic athletes applied for anti-asthma drug exemptions at the 2000 and 2004 Summer Games it concerned anti-doping officials, who found 10 percent of those asking in 2004 had no asthma.) But if the amount of albuterol in the system exceeds an established limit, 1000 nanograms per milliliter, it is considered a potential doping violation. And what about athletes who know how to stay just below the limit, say at 990?

The media storyline is that Torres has too much integrity to pretend to have asthma in order to take albuterol and formoterol.  Based on what, I’m not sure; truth be told, an athlete who is clean, or an athlete who knows in advance they will test clean, are both in the same position re: testing.  But in any event, we’re supposed to both (a) acknowledge that a 41 year old mother can whup a bunch of 22 year olds in the pool, and (b) assume that nothing untoward is going on there, despite the fact that both common sense and history fly right in the face of such a thing.

I just got done reading “Game of Shadows”, about Barry Bonds, Marion Jones, BALCO, and that whole mess.  It’s a pretty seamy tale, and one thing that comes through, loud and clear, is that whenever a new record seems too good to be true, or an athlete has unexpected and spectacular success, a healthy dose of suspicion is a good idea.

A Band Aid on a Gaping Wound

It’s Just a “Perception” Problem … Really, These are the BEST REFS in the WHOLE WORLD !

NBA Commissioner David Stern has brought in Retired Army Maj. Gen. Ronald L. Johnson to “oversee” the referees.

A couple of quotes tell us all we need to know about this hire. Here’s Commissioner Stern:

“Our referees are the best in the world,” Stern said in a statement, “but they never stop striving to improve and Ron has made a career out of getting the very best out of people.”

And Joel Litvin, president for league and basketball operations:

“We don’t want to make him a star, insofar as the point of an officiating program is be as invisible as possible. But we do understand we have a perception problem and to that extent, we hope to put a better face on the program. It deserves that much.”

Um, OK.

Well, one reason they might have a perception problem is because they rarely call traveling, double dribble, or hanging on the rim anymore, and they often play to the home crowd on foul calls. And so, the perception is that they don’t enforce rules and are too compliant to the home crowd.

Praying for a Miracle, and Getting It

On Monday night, around 8:30, three-year-old Ryan Flake somehow wandered away from his house in Oswego Township.

12 hours later, he was found, alive and unhurt, in the woods about a mile from his house.

Ryan Flake and Dad

What a miracle. The odds of finding a missing child alive go way down the longer they are missing; I don’t remember exactly what they are, but after 12 hours, they can’t be very good. I heard about this story on the news Tuesday morning, when they said he’d been missing 11 hours at that point. I thought, “oh no”. It sounded like this wouldn’t end well. But then this morning, when I went to the Tribune’s website, I saw it had a happy ending, and even though I don’t know the child, or the family, it brought me great joy.

We confront quite enough bad news; I like to hear something good once in a while.

Of course, I can’t imagine the grief and heartache those parents had to endure for all those hours, and the fear in a little three-year-old boy, alone in the woods, all night long. Words fail me. We lost our then-kindergartner at Epcot a few years ago, for 10 minutes or so, and while I try not to freak out about kids getting lost for a few minutes, it was Epcot. Have you seen Epcot? It’s very, very big. Lots and lots of people. Who knows what a little kid is going to do in that situation? But our little boy was so smart, and went up to a uniformed security guard, and said “I can’t find my parents”, and then I saw them walking towards me, and … well, the sense of relief was indescribable.

So for this one story at least, it’s nice to hear everybody is OK.  I like that.

Last year, there was a similar miracle, that I wrote about here.

IU President: “Kelvin Sampson Shouldn’t Have Been Hired”

No Kidding!

So, Indiana University Athletic Department … how’s that whole “firing Bobby Knight” thing working out for you?

Seems to me, the post-Bobby-Knight Knight era is actually more embarrassing to the University han the actual Bobby Knight era.

Now the school finds itself with an AD, Rick Greenspan, that is resigning due to the Sampson fallout, but not until the end of the year, which is more than five months away. Plus, a new coach (Tom Crean), and a bunch of players recruited by Sampson. And, a whole bunch of egg on its face.

You have to figure this isn’t going to help with recruiting.

Not that I’m complaining, though. As an Illini fan, anytime something embarrassing happens to IU, you just have to drink it in. And when it is a disaster as complete and perfect as this, you savor it, and swirl it around in your brain, and enjoy a little schadenfreude.

Joe Buck Criticizes Baseball

Joe Buck, lead announcer for Fox Sports baseball coverage, recently admitted on a sports talk radio show that he doesn’t have time to watch much baseball.

He said the games are too long, and too available, and kinda boring, and people are busy. It’s not like it was when he was a kid, when many games weren’t on TV at all, and the Saturday afternoon Game of the Week was a huge deal, especially if your hometown team was featured.

Both Awful Announcing and Big League Stew are annoyed.

I’m sort of down the middle on this one. I get what they’re saying, and agree with it to a point; it is a bit odd that a lead baseball announcer, who is really also a diplomat for the game, would come out and say such a thing. But let’s not shoot the messenger here; I also find it hard to argue with anything he says.

Blackhawks Sign Campbell and Huet

WOW:

The Hawks made the biggest splash on the free agent market Tuesday when they signed two-time All-Star defenseman Brian Campbell to an eight-year, $56.8 million contract and also obtained the top available goaltender in Cristobal Huet, who received a four-year, $22.4 million deal.

These were the top-rated defenseman and goaltender available in free agency; this is the top story at nhl.com today.

Longtime Blackhawks fans are stunned, and ecstatic, because this is the latest message from the new ownership that they want to bring championships home for the fans.

Of course, eight years seems an awfully long contract for a 29 year old like Campbell, but maybe that’s what it took in order to get him here. He brings excellent skating, lots of ice time, and passing ability:

“He has ability to move the puck and to skate up ice to get you out of trouble combined with his ability to play lots of minutes—half of the game most of the time,” Tallon said of Campbell, who led the league in ice time at 29 minutes 19 seconds per game. “It gives us more foot speed, more creativity [and] more ability to move the puck out of our own end. He has the ability to pass and see the ice. [He can] go from defense to offense in a split second.”

Campbell was courted by many teams and chose the Hawks because of his desire to move closer to his family in Strathroy, Ontario, and because he likes the direction the club his heading.

Not sure where Strathroy, Ontario is, but apparently it’s, like, a Chicago suburb or something. In Ontario.

The Hawks are hoping Campbell can help improve the power play, too, which has been pretty useless the last few years.

As for the signing of goalie Cristobal Huet, this seems a clear message to No. 1 goalie Nikolai Khabibulin, who is a free agent after the upcoming season, that his perch is tenuous. The Blackhawks already have a young goalie they played a few times last year, Corey Crawford, that was very impressive, and he appears ready for at least backup duty already. So now they have 3 very capable goalies, which protects them from injury, inconsistent play, and pending free agency next off-season. As Tallon says:

“The No. 1 goaltender in this market was Huet and we made a decision … that it’s important to make sure we’re really good in the net,” said Tallon, whose current plan is to keep both goalies. “That goaltending tandem is as good as there is. Without strong goaltending you have no chance.”

The 32-year-old Huet appeared in 52 games last season playing for Montreal and Washington. He posted a record of 32-14-6 with a .920 save percentage and four shutouts.

So, the bottom line? The Hawks and their fans now have good reason to expect improvements in their defense, power play, and goaltending, all things that a championship team needs.

Giants Make It All Better For Cubs

After losing 5 of their last 6 to the American League in interleague play, the Cubs were happy to return to the National League on Monday. And even better, the National League West, against whom the Cubs were 18-5 coming into last night’s game against San Francisco.

For the Cubs, this year’s NL West is like a big, warm, fuzzy security blanket. And the Giants, for some reason, are bad at home, 14-24 going in.

The Cubs won 9-2.

After looking anemic offensively against the White Sox and (to a lesser degree) the Orioles, they managed to pile on runs against the Giants, but that might be mainly due to facing Barry Zito, who is having a horrible year. He allowed 5 runs (4 earned) in 5 innings, and walked 5, and two of them scored.

But even worse for the Giants, in the eighth inning, they brought in a second relief pitcher, Billy Sadler, who as TV analyst Bob Brenly noted multiple times during the inning, couldn’t throw anything but his fastball for a strike. So the Cubs, showing their newfound patience at the plate, walked the bases full, and then Mark DeRosa, who already had hit a two run homer earlier deep to left-center, whacked a fastball into the same general area for a grand slam.

Ted Lilly (9-5) pitched into the ninth with a shutout, but gave up two hits to the first two batters, and was yanked for Kerry Wood.

So the Cubs are now 19-5 against the NL West, but finished interleague play 6-9 (though they played 9 of those on the road).

Regarding the White Sox series, I’m not sure what more there is to say. They got swept. Aramis Ramirez was 0-for-13. The pitching wasn’t too bad, but gave up just enough home runs to get outscored; that’s how the White Sox score their runs all year. If you shut down the home run, they have lots of trouble scoring. They were unable to do that. At the same time, the offense was pathetic, leaving runners in scoring position over and over again, including 4 runners stranded at 3rd with less than two out just in Saturday’s game alone! That’s a good way to get your butt kicked in a series, and so that’s what they did.

But that’s over now. And one of the great things about baseball, what makes it truly unique among sports, is that there is a new game every day. It really tests mental toughness, to shake off bad stuff, which every team is going to go through at one point or another, for a whole variety of reasons.

And after watching many of those interleague games, I have to offer these conclusions, and I’m not sure which is right, or maybe all of them: (1) the pitching in the AL is much better than the NL pitching, (2) the NL scouting reports on AL pitchers are not as good as the AL scouting reports on NL hitters, or (3) NL hitters take a long time to adjust to new pitchers and parks? I dunno. I’m leaning towards (1). I’m too lazy to sit down with a bunch of stats and prove/disprove it, though.

Glad That’s Over

The Cubs lost to the Orioles 11-4 yesterday, and in so doing, lost the series 2-1. It’s just the third time this season they’ve lost a home series.

This means that they are now 3-6 against the AL East. The second, fourth, and fifth place teams in the AL East, to be exact.

Maybe this means nothing at all. But take a look at this: the Cubs have a ridiculous 18-5 against the NL West, but the NL West is a crappy division, where the first place team is 40-39 but still has a 3.5 game lead. Stated another way, the entire division is under .500 except the leading team, which is one game over.

So the Cubs are a total of 19 games over .500, which breaks down to 13 over against the NL West, 9 over against the other two divisions, while they are 3 games under against the AL East. And they haven’t even played Boston, and won’t play them this year at all.

Are there conclusions to be drawn from this? Maybe, maybe not, but what it seems to indicate is: (1) the AL is better than the NL, possibly by a wde margin, and (2) the Cubs, as probably the best team in the NL, still might have a ways to go to seriously contend for a World Series title. But it’s still June, and there’s a lot of baseball left to be played, so we’ll have to revisit this later on.

Mike North Era at “The Score” is Over

The man who re-invented himself as a radio talk show host, after a career hosting rock jocks from WXRT-FM at his hot dog stand, is now out at WSCR-AM 670 after being the signature voice during the entire 16 years of the station’s existence.

His current contract paid him $1.5M per year for 5 years, and the offer on the table, which was yanked on Tuesday, was around $700-800K. That is a pretty transparent message from management that they’d like you to go away, or take a huge cut. Totally up to you! But since nobody ever takes a huge pay cut when other jobs await them at salaries more to their liking, especially in the radio world, the real message there, understood by all, is “we’re just not that into you”.

So for better or worse, North is gone now, and the image of the station is changed forever, by just a tiny bit.

I listen to the station sometimes, and could appreciate North’s “man on the street” style for what it was. I always tend to value letting people say pretty much whatever they think over the public airwaves, all else being equal, because if there is anything we do not need, it is more political correctness and fear of offending the easily-offended. I’m not sure if this unpolished manner was a factor or not. I doubt it, because in radio, like TV, you can explain every executive decision with one word: ratings. North’s ratings were OK, finishing 8th among men 25-54 in the latest period. But for $1.5M, management wanted more, I expect.

UPDATE 06.28.08:  I forgot to mention one thing:  Mike North gets lots of criticism for being a little too forward with his opinions, but it is this same uninhibited style that also allows him to be a very good interviewer of the same people that sports journalists are afraid to ask the tough questions.  It’s one of his strengths, and as listeners, we should be indebted to him for it.  Very few journalists are willing to risk losing easy access to players, coaches, GMs, etc., by asking tough questions of them.

Tacos for Breakfast

This morning I was sitting with my nine year old son in our living room, in our big red chair, him on the huge oversized armrest, me in the cushioned part, watching Wimbledon tennis on ESPN2.

Suddenly he announces, “I have a taste for … tacos”.

It was just after 8 o’clock.

Then we laughed.  And for a few seconds, life stood still, and it was good.  It was one of those silly episodes from my life, and his, our life together, that seem disposable, but are in fact the glue that holds people together, the canvas we write our favorite memories on.

Word has gotten around in this household:  apparently, I’m a sucker for a silly kid, and somehow I have THREE of them; not sure how that happened, except that I love to laugh with my kids, and they all seem to learn that early on, and so they make me laugh.  Huh.  What is THAT about?

Being silly just to get Daddy to laugh?  Who could imagine such a thing?  Clearly, a riddle for another day.

But he wasn’t just being silly; he actually wanted tacos at 8 in the morning.  Which is still a little silly.  Not completely, though.  That actually sounds kind of good, to be frank.

Maybe tomorrow morning.

Little League Wrap

One game short of the championship, my middle son’s team lost 4-3. All three outs in our last at-bat were called third strikes, all well over the batter’s head; the last came with the bases loaded.

The first two strikeout victims came back to the bench crying. I could hardly blame them; when you take a pitch because it’s over your head, which is generally the right thing to do, even in Little League with 12 year old umps, and then you get called out, in your last at bat in a playoff game when losing by one run … that’s a tough one to accept for anybody, much less an 8 year old boy. I remember thinking “I hope that doesn’t happen to Jake, because I won’t have the right words to help him”.

Fortunately, Jacob didn’t make one of those outs. He drew a walk, and if I remember right, was on second base as the game ended, and would have been the winning run with a base hit.

All in all, Jacob had a great season this year. He learned a lot about hitting, and fielding, and became pretty good at both. He even did a little pitching. And he made some new friends. He even made the All-Star Team.

He had some great coaches, who taught him a lot. His first two years were a struggle. Baseball is a really tough game to learn, and unless you do most everything right, especially with hitting, you aren’t likely to have much success.

So this year was filled with all good things, and as any former little boy knows, few things instill self-confidence like hitting a pitched baseball squarely and solidly, into the outfield.

Congratulations on a fine season, Jake!  Work even harder to get better next year!

Hank Steinbrenner: “We Like Our Pitchers To Be Fat, Uncoordinated, and Out of Shape”

Hank Steinbrenner thinks American League pitchers should never, ever have to run fast, especially around the bases:

“My only message is simple. The National League needs to join the 21st century,” Steinbrenner said in Tampa, Fla. “They need to grow up and join the 21st century.

“Am I (mad) about it? Yes,” Steinbrenner added. “I’ve got my pitchers running the bases, and one of them gets hurt. He’s going to be out. I don’t like that, and it’s about time they address it. That was a rule from the 1800s.”

Making a rare appearance on the bases at an NL park, Wang pulled up rounding third and hobbled home on Derek Jeter’s single. Wang doubled over after scoring, pointed toward his right foot and was helped off the field.

Here’s another idea: get rid of the DH in the American League, so that everybody who plays Major League Baseball has to maintain the skills they all learned in every other league they ever played in, since they were 7 years old. You know, actual baseball skills, including baserunning.  And by doing so, stay in better shape.

Pitchers don’t have to be complete liabilities on offense: the Cubs have 3 or 4 pitchers who can be dangerous at the plate, and even use one of their pitchers as a pinch-runner on occasion. Carlos Zambrano is hitting .362 this year, with a home run, two doubles, and last week, a triple, and has a .511 slugging percentage. Their top four pitchers with at least 21 AB (Zambrano, Dempster, Marquis, Lilly) have scored 9 runs, have 31 hits (including nine doubles), and have driven in 13 runs. Not DH type stats, no, but not bad for the number 9 spot in the order, which is the correct comparison.

Happy Father’s Day

I wish my Dad was still here for me to say that to him. But he’s not, and has been gone almost two years now, and so the best I can do is to remember him today.

When I picture him in my mind, I see him smiling and laughing, because he did that more than just about anybody I ever met. It was his defining characteristic, and anybody who ever knew him would probably agree.

I could use some smiling and laughing right about now, for a whole bunch of reasons. I could also use a little more faith, because mine is being tested now in ways I’d never imagined. Today’s sermon at church was about worrying, and what a waste of time and energy it is. And when you really break it down, intellectually and rationally, of course that is so true.

The trouble starts when we see ourselves painted into corners that we don’t fully understand how to get out of. So we worry as a way to exert control over events beyond our control. Worrying causes bad stuff to happen in our bodies; it physically changes your body chemistry for the worse, which adds a whole new layer of stress over whatever was already going on. It is just about the worst thing you could do.

I’m not sure how much time my Dad spent worrying about anything. He was very sensible about a lot of things in life, except for the appetites that ultimately proved his undoing. He always liked the saying “que sera, sera”, which apparently means “whatever will be, will be”. Hard to argue with that.

So if he were here today, I’d tell him that I miss him, and I miss the feeling that he was as close as a phone call away, and that I admired his more “happy go lucky” ways, an attitude that I’m not quite as naturally tuned into, for whatever reason. And that I loved him, despite the distance that developed between us in the latter years. I mistook the side effects of clinical depression for emotional distance, and didn’t stop to think that maybe he needed me sometimes, too. And for that I’m deeply sorry; it is a debt I can never repay to you, Dad.

But I try not to dwell on that. I have three kids of my own, and they need me, at various times and in differing amounts. So the best thing I can do — the only thing I can do, really — is to be the best Dad for them that I possibly can.

So today, I think that’s what I’ll try to do. And tomorrow, it will be time to do that again. And with the help of my wife, and our kids, and our families and friends, and God, and a little luck, and a lot of patience with myself and others, I hope and pray that I can not mangle it up too bad.

What Was Your Favorite Memory of the Cedric Benson Era?

You might not have one. Which is understandable, since Cedric Benson is not a very good football player.

But you better figure one out, because he is now officially gone, released from the Chicago Bears today.

My personal favorite is “every game he ever spent on the bench, in street clothes, injured”. A close second is “when the fans booed him getting hauled off the field after a season-ending injury in 2007″. And third would be “missing the entire pre-season during his rookie year holdout”, because alienating your teammates is always a really great way to start your pro career.

I think Matt Forte’s playing time just increased by about 500%.

Barry Bonds: Gone, and Still Annoying

Barry Bonds has a trial date now — March of 2009 — so now comes the chorus of “why won’t anybody in major league baseball sign poor Barry Bonds?”

I don’t claim to know. But it doesn’t really shock me either.

Let’s see … he’s 43 years old, and a PR nightmare, and a clubhouse tumor, and in legal hot water. You don’t exactly have to be a Barry-Bonds-ophobe GM or owner to look at all that and think, “eh, maybe not”.

Whether right now is the ideal time for baseball to grow a conscience, or not, who knows? Who cares? Any time is a good time to grow a conscience. To quibble over the “when” is to miss the point of why not having one is a bad thing in the first place. And where is the criticism within the media — i.e., the media that was so in love with Bonds during his various record chases? When is the proper time for them to grow a conscience?

And then of course there are the arguments about stats. He hit 28 HR last year in 340 AB, and had an OBP of .480. Nice numbers, especially if he takes them to the AL and becomes a DH, so that his lack of speed on defense is not exposed. Still not worth all the hassle noted above? Apparently not.

Or, maybe an unofficial edict has been handed down by Bud Selig, who never fails to miss a trend 10 minutes after his lawyers tell him about it. Since baseball ownership has never shown much talent for avoiding PR nightmares and clubhouse tumors and old guys before, that leads me to speculate that maybe the whole legal hot water thing has finally pushed baseball “leadership” to do something proactive for a change. Maybe Selig knows something that we don’t; lets hope so, actually. Maybe Selig figures “he’s got Babe’s career HR run record, and Hank’s, so it’s time to go away now”.

As for me, I could not care less about Barry Bonds, or what he does this year, or next year, or the whole rest of his life. The reality of running a sports team is that you don’t hire stats, you hire people; those people affect the team and its public image in many ways, and not all of them take place on the field.

If it has taken this long for baseball to grow a pair, well, good for them. Barry Bonds is an entire sideshow unto himself, not least because of the media clamoring to talk about him.

The game itself is probably better off for Bonds sitting on the sidelines.

Seen It Before

Well. It’s June 7th, and the Chicago Cubs have the best record in Major League Baseball at 39-23. And apparently, this is the first time they’ve had the best record in baseball at this point in June since 1908, which happens to be the last time they won a World Series. 100 years ago.

These things are interesting as trivia, but are worth … exactly nothing.

I’m happy they’re doing so well. I’m very pleased with the tenacity, the efficiency, the depth, the managing, and just the overall feeling of quality and quiet confidence that this team gives off. All great things.

But there are four months to go before the playoffs even start. So you have to first endure that torture test, just to get into the playoffs. Then, in the playoffs, you have to first beat one good team in a best of five, then another (even better) team in a best of seven, then another (better yet) team in a best of seven. It’s not easy, even for a very good team.

And a lot can change between now and then.

I’ve been through a lot of baseball games, a lot of pennant races, in my life. One thing I’ve learned is that it doesn’t make sense to get too emotionally wrapped up in all of it, unless you like disappointment.