NFL MVP Race

So unfortunately I am not given a vote for the NFL MVP award, which is a shame because I am very smart and am excellent at making these kinds of decisions. That being said I am going to try to predict the likelihood of who the award will go to out of the four most probable candidates. Through week 10 the four MVP leaders are all quarterbacks: Drew Brees, Peyton Manning, Brett Favre, and Tom Brady. All four quarterbacks have strong arguments in their favor as to why they are worthy, and I am going to go over their reasons.

Drew Brees: (Through week 10) Comp.%: 68.1 TDs: 22 INTs:9 Yards: 2746 QB Rating: 105.8

Possibly the most impactful free agent acquisition in NFL history, Drew Brees has almost single-handedly turned around the 'Aints to the Saints in a few short years. An organization that has been maligned with poor quarterback play (the iconic Archie Manning 's 11 season record with the Saints was 29–66–3) they finally found stability in the undersized gun slinger. Last season was his most prolific season statistically in the Bayou but this season may be his best. With a talented Saints offense and a more consistent defense, Brees has steered the Saints to their best start in franchise history, 10-0.

In most years he would be the shoe in for the award, but with the competition is as stiff as it has been in years. In order for Brees to win the award he will have to secure the number 1 seed in the NFC, which means he will have to beat out Brett Favre.



Brett Favre: (Through week 10) Comp. %: 69.7 TDs:21 INTs:3 Yards: 2482 QB Rating: 112.1

God knows everyone outside of Minnesota and Wisconsin couldn't have hoped more that Mr. Favre's 30th retirement this offseason was his last, but alas, we have at least one more to go through before he is finally gone. That being said he has one of the strongest arguments in his favor due to the drastic improvement of the Vikings. Just a season ago the Vikings' more accurate name was the Adrian Petersons as he was their offense and most of their defense. This season Favre makes them a complete team. Last week Peterson had only 82 yards on 24 attempts and no touchdowns, but the Vikes won 35-9. A game like that could not be expected last season with Tavaris Jackson under center.

Favre is on pace for his best statistical season in his career. The one-loss Vikings are only one game behind the perfect Saints and are all but assured a playoff bye. Favre may stand the best chance of all the candidates.


Peyton Manning: (Through week 10) Comp. %: 69.7 TDs: 21 INTs: 9 Yards: 3102 QB Rating: 102.8

Manning has consistently been in the top 3 of the MVP discussion for most of his career. This year is no different as he is once again leading the Colts to a perfect season with one of the least talented wide-receiving corps he's had. He seems to be doing everything necessary for his team to win, and he has been nothing but clutch to this point. He has been so money at the end of games, he forced Belichick to call the risky and controversial fourth and 2 play and his mere presence forced the Ravens to be over aggressive at the end of last week's game, which caused Flacco's back breaking interception. Teams are struggling to prevent Manning from having the ball with little time left in a one score game. So far it seems like Manning is the other candidate with the strongest chance to win the award.

Tom Brady: (Through week 10) Comp.% 66.4 TDs: 20 INTS:6 Yards: 3049 QB Rating: 100.4

Tom Terrific is managing one of the greatest comeback seasons ever after the catastrophic and nearly career threatening injury he suffered in 2008. Although he stumbled at bit out of the gate in regaining his timing and skills, he has rebounded expertly to be in the top 3 of the major quarterbacking categories. Had he hung on to beat Peyton Manning's Colts that fateful Sunday night, and if he can beat the Saints this Monday, he would be have had a stronger argument for the prize. If he can keep up his statistical pace in the wintery months coming up, and if the Patriots can nail down the number 2 seed in the AFC, then he will stand a small chance at winning the award. He is on pace to break 4800 yards passing and throw over 32 touchdowns; amazing in any year.

No matter how it turns out, for Brady to return from a destructive knee injury and lead the Patriots back to the playoffs with a division title is nothing short of amazing. He has a great team around him but he still exemplifies what the quarterback position is.


My Pick

This season is one of the strongest fields seen in some time with four sure fire hall-of -famers in the mix. However it seems like it will boil down to a 2 horse race between Manning and Favre. Both are operating at levels unseen before in their storied careers. The "value" Manning and Favre bring to their teams seems to be nearly equal. The Vikings went from a mediocre club to an elite NFC team, and the Colts remain atop the AFC with some crafty veteran play by Peyton. The Colts have locked up the number 1 seed in the AFC and chances are good that the Vikings will take the number 2 seed in the NFC. If that situation holds, I feel the award will be split and go to both of them. Co-MVPs are not rare, Manning's first MVP was a co-MVP with Steve McNair. However, if the Vikings over take the Saints and secure the top seed in the NFC, Favre will win the award solely. You can't ignore the impact he had on the Vikings in making them an elite team in only one season.



















...Tom Brady can rest easy, though. He wins the MVP of handsomeness... and the Comeback Player of the Year.

Scalabrine Photoshop of the Month

Tonight I will be starting a monthly tribute to one of the legends of the game of basketball. Of course I am talking about current Celtics great Brian Scalabrine. This is not going to be your run of the mill, everyday tribute. I will be posting pictures with Big Scal's face photoshopped on different people and things. Much like the good folks at NBA on TNT do with Chuck Barkley's round head, I will be photoshopping him on to different photos without rhyme or reason and they apparently don't have to make sense..

Without further ado, here is the first (of many):

SCALABRINE PHOTOSHOP OF THE MONTH

November 15th, Patriots Vs. Colts

It was already a weekend of aggravation for New England Sports fans. The Celts lost some pretty terrible games against some less than stellar basketball teams, and the Bruins lost in overtime in what looked like it would be a come from behind victory because the Penguins scored with .4 seconds left in regulation. So everyone in New England was looking to the Patriots-Colts game for their solitude in what already was a bad weekend for their sports teams.

I can assure you I was nothing less than heart broken by this loss, seeing as though I hate the god damn Colts. I also despise that ad campaign whore "Seyton" Manning. So the loss weighed me down momentarily, but I've always been a man who can see more positives in a loss like that, than negatives. In all the Patriots played a better game. Maybe not defensively in that 4th quarter, but their offense put up over 450 yards against the Colts and put up a lot more points than any other team had all season on their team. We also made a few careless mistakes which made the score a lot less than it should have. For example the Brady interception in the Red Zone and Maroney's dumb fumble. Right there 14 points that we should've had. In a loss like that I look at the other team who is 9-0 and I see that they were given a gift. You learn more from losing a game when the other team comes from behind to snatch a victory right from your hands.

Many people question Belichick's call to go for it on 4th and 2 from their about their own 30 yard line with roughly 2 minutes left. It is one that should be questioned but people need to relax. Belichick knew the risk. He also knew that the Colts had freely driven that field the entire quarter, stomping all over the Patriots defense. It was a disgraceful showing of defense. All of a sudden

it became apparent how young and inexperienced the defense was all in that one quarter. Belichick at that point of the game saw how bad his defense was and he had to send a message to them. The message was that he would rather have his offense on the field than his defense because he knew that if they had to go 30 yards or 70 yards, Peyton Manning was going to drive that football field in 2 minutes the way the defense was playing. His decision was bold and it showed the Defense that they simply have to execute better in the future and that he had no confidence in them. I can only imagine how practice is going to be this week for the defense for how they played in that forth quarter. It reminded me of their play in the 4th quarter of the Denver game where the Broncos trailing a touchdown drove 98 yards for the touchdown to tie the game. They simply have to learn to execute better as a defensive core. At times you catch them with flashes of brilliance but they are a young unit and they need these type of losses to learn how to execute better.

In all of the years when they Patriots won the Super Bowl they continued to improve with every game they played. They continued to grow as a squad and execute better. This season has been in my opinion very much like their Super Bowl winning seasons with the ups and downs of the early season. The team does also seem to be playing better and better every week. While they are still making mistakes, it is evident that they are playing better, certainly offensively. That 4th quarter was uncharacteristic for their defense but it will make them learn what they have to do to make sure their team wins. If the Pats offense would've bailed them out in the 4th quarter with that 4th down completion which was also questionable by the refs, than the message wouldn't have been received as much. They would've wiped their foreheads and said "phew, we almost blew that one."

It is important that we have losses in this season as we continue to build our team and our defense. If we had gotten away with poor play on defense it would've given them breathing room to slack some more in the future because they will have it in their minds that the offense will always be there to pick them up to win the game. It was our game to lose. We had the lead and had outplayed them the entire game. Patriots fans need to relax. We're so used to winning every game for the last decade it seems that we freak out any time a loss occurs. Yeah, it sucks that we lost to Indy and that most likely they will have home-field advantage throughout the playoffs at this point, but it makes for a far greater narrative if they win in regular season and get home-field and we march into Lucas Oil Stadium and make them look like clowns during the AFC Championship.

Colts Fans, Swallow your pride for your team, cause it won't be long before you're looking at Peyton Manning pouting because the Patriots ran a train on his ass in the playoffs.

Reche Caldwell

I was scrolling through the channels today looking for something to watch when I stumbled upon the 2007 AFC championship with the Patriots Vs. Colts. It only makes sense for them to be showing that game in accordance with the Patriots-Colts sunday night game this week. So I stayed on the channel for a little while watching a game that was extremely frustrating to watch back in 07' and I forgot how much I hated Reche Caldwell.

Reche Caldwell was the leading receiver on the team that year. A guy that not many had heard of, and basically a scrappy 3rd or 4th receiver was the number 1 guy that Tom Brady had on his team to throw to that year. Gaffney was also there, another 3rd or 4th option.

Nobody has heard of Reche Caldwell ever since this game pretty much, seeing as though he dropped multiple wide open passes toward the end of the game that essentially cost the Patriots a Super Bowl appearance.

In watching it I began to wonder how fortunate Brady is to have legitimately good receivers on his team. Not to bash all the ones before the 07 season, but lets just say we actually know their names now. I knew when the Pats finally got Moss that things were going to change. I always said that if Brady had someone like a Marvin Harrison or a Randy Moss he would make magic happen and have seasons like Peyton Manning had prior to that. In 07-08 season before the playoffs when Belichick decided to change his game plan to make games closer, Brady had the best season ever for a quarterback numbers wise. Finally he had good receivers who were known names. Maybe Wes Welker didn't have an established name, but lets face it, he is also better than any patriot receiver Brady had to throw to before the 07-08 season.

This is not to say all the others did terrible jobs, but they only did a fai

r job. You can't say that Troy Brown wasn't the man. That man could do everything, but still Wes Welker and Randy Moss are better than him. I loved David Givens and Deion Branch, but they too have done virtually nothing since leaving the Patriots. Unfortunately for Deion he has been plagued by injury problems. Who even knows what David Givens is doing. Probably wishing he stayed with the Patriots at this point.

The point is that Tom Brady has always been one of the best quarterbacks in the league if not the best. Who knows what his numbers would be if he had some premiere receivers on the team his whole career. If he had amazing ones like Peyton always has, then I think his numbers would be pretty close to his. Instead Brady just made a lot of receivers look good, when they were just okay. It is nice to see now that instead of depending on Reche Caldwell and his massive eyes, we have Randy Moss, Wes Welker and I'll even throw in Julian Edelman (Wes Welker Jr.). We have dependable great receivers that now make Tom Brady have the numbers he always should have.

PS. Kevin Faulk is, and always will be the unsung hero of the New England Patriots.

Money Can't Buy You Love But It Can Buy You Championships

So the inevitable was realized and the 2009 crown went to the Bronx, and everyone in America sighed. The 2009 Yankees squad is proof that with enough cash thrown at the right places, a team can be fielded that will be the most talented in the majors. When a team has the most talent, in baseball especially, it is only a matter of time until that team wins. The Yankees managed to secure the two top pitchers and the top position player during the free agency period in the off season for the bargain basement price of $422.5 million. As it turns out the near-half a billion dollars turned out to be a sound investment as it yielded the desired results.

Up until this season the 2004 Boston Red Sox had been the team with the highest payroll to ever win a championship with a payroll of around $125 million. This years Yankees team will have that distinction with a payroll of $208,097,414.

This is not to say that a team with a smaller pay roll has no chance of competing for a championship, the Yankees have consistently spent upwards of 200 million dollars for the past 8-10 years and this is their first title since their new money-spending philosophy. The hall mark of the 2000 Yankees, when they won their previous championship, was that they were a team of scrappy ball players, who were brought up from within the Yankees system. The contemporary version bears no resemblance of that squad, minus the few holdovers from that one.

New York's World Series opponent, the Phillies, spent nearly 100 million dollars less and managed to have a chance to repeat as champs. The Tampa Bay Rays had a pay roll of $43 million in 2008 and managed to beat their affluent Boston and New York rivals for the AL pennant. These teams show that money is not everything, but their margin for error on their drafting and scouting is minimal compared to a team who can just patch a hole with that years big money free agent.

Ultimately MLB is a 9 team race: Red Sox, Yankees, Twins,Tigers, Angels, Dodgers, Phillies, Cardinals, and Team Du Jour (the one surprise team that makes some noise in the wild card such as the Rangers or the Rockies). As long as their is no salary cap system in place, MLB will retain this hierarchy of rich versus poor and the fans will be the victims. Parity, the accomplishment of the NFL, is nonexistent in baseball.

The Yankees, 2009 World Series Champions....

I now remember why I despised baseball as a child. The Yankees have crafted a team over the last decade that has nothing to do with the word "teamwork" and one that derives solely on the fact that there is no salary cap. The idea of the farm system seizes to exist and there are only maybe 3 yankees that came up with the organization. Baseball is dead. The only hope for baseball is that a team will come and knock them off their pedestal every other year with a budget thats less than half of theirs. George Steinbrenner and his demon son have single handedly ruined what is considered to be "the american pastime." What's the new american pastime? Well its hoping that the Yankees fail every year.

The 2009 MLB Season

This season of 2009 had to be one of the most bland seasons I've ever watched. There was no personality in the league at all. Everything has been deflated and boring. Sure Yankees fans can rejoice that their over half a billion dollars worth of acquisitions have paid off, but how could you even consider them a team? It's basically just a stacked all star team minus the shitty bullpen other than Rivera. Back when they were winning in the 90's I have to hand it to them, they were a real team. A team of close knit players who knew each other well. I look at their team now and not one of the players seems to fit with one another, and I feel like once the games are over they probably aren't even friendly to each other.

There is a fire missing, one that doesn't seem to come up. There were hardly any brawls this year, and when the Red Sox were playing the Yankees the games were very bland and the tension wasn't there.

I'm a Red Sox Fan, the blood of Red Sox Nation flows through my veins. I live for the postseason play and refuse to do any work while the Red Sox are still in it. This year was different, even the Red Sox didn't have any fire.

While everyone is embittered by Manny and his assholed-ness at least he brought some flavor to an otherwise bland squad. Manny had at-bats that just generated electricity in the stands and you felt like you were watching something special every time. He also would add the suspense any time a routine pop-fly was hit into left field. Ever since Manny has been gone David Ortiz hasn't been the same. The dominant force he was at the plate hasn't shown in the last two seasons at all. Papi's large and bright smile has dimmed since Manny has gone to L.A.

When you think about the current Red Sox team the player with the most personality is Jonathan Papelbon. That's sad to me. Yes, I love Paps, but Cinco-Ocho? Okay, you don't have gold teeth and you don't play for the Bengals, so you should probably shut the hell up. Papelbon is a cool guy, but I don't want him to be the face of the franchise.

Two other players on the team in 2009 with great personalities, are Jason Bay and J.D. Drew. They are both the most bland people I have ever seen in my life before. I'm pretty sure they are just robots, except I feel that Robots may try a little harder than J.D. Drew does, well at least if they are programmed well. They are great players, but they just aren't interesting, and seem passionless. Even Youk didn't seem to be angry enough this year. I miss the days when he would strike out and throw his helmet and piss everyone off in the dugout.

Point is, this season just wasn't that interesting to watch as a fan. The league needs the Pedro's, the Shilling's, the Manny's and the rest of the shit talkers. The media and the games feed off of it and it makes the games far more interesting when shit talking is involved. In my mind nothing will ever compare to the 2004 season. There was a lot of drama, the Yanks and Sox hated each other more that year than I had ever seen before. Everyone on the Sox fit together so well and had great personalities. Even though Bellhorn was on that team, I would take the 2004 Red Sox over any other Red Sox team in my lifetime. Nothing will get any better than that. Unless they had KG on their team.

Bill Walton Retires from Broadcasting

Bill Walton, former basketball great, is now a former broadcasting great. Coming off of a recent major back surgery, he has decided today to retire from being an NBA analyst at ESPN. Walton sent out this statement, "As I return after a grueling multiyear, life-threatening, life-changing ordeal with back problems, it is time to dedicate the rest of my life to service," he continues "It is great to be back in the game. Thanks everybody -- for everything."

Bill, even though we will never be able to see you again on ESPN, the smooth sounds of your voice shall echo through eternity in this memorable diatribe about one Boris Diaw:   

Boris Diaw sound bite  Basketball sound bites

God bless you, you classical human being. Enjoy whatever services you are doing.

A-Rod the Man-Horse

I think it needs to be known by all that the potential World Series MVP has several paintings in his house of him as a Centaur, the mythical half man, half horse of Greek lore. Former girlfriends who have been over his place reported that he had the paintings in his bedroom. It is creepily fitting that someone who has historically come off as ego-maniacal has pictures of himself portraying him as a Greek god... Not that Sox fans needed any more reason to hate him.

The Decline of the Great American Sports Nickname

Having spent my sports-loving youth in what some would call the golden age of sports nicknames (the 1990s); I grew up not only learning players’ names but also thoroughly enjoying their ever important, often necessary and sometimes hilarious nicknames.   So let the record show that I come to you with a great appreciation and understanding of nicknames in sports.

The 90s were a glorious time when you could witness Thunder Dan Marjle toss up a trey, or see Grandmama throw down a slam dunk in his/her fresh converses.  Pavel “The Russian Rocket” Bure would sneak one through the 5-hole of Dominik “The Dominator” Hasek, while Neon Deion “Prime Time” Sanders was high-stepping into the end zone.  You could see The Kid, Junior Griffey, rob a dinger away from The Big Hurt, or stand in awe of the home run race between Slammin’ Sammy and Big Mac.

But now-a-days this is no longer the case; nicknames in sports have gone the way of the English language, we’ve gotten lazy and downright uncreative.  Now you have to see K-Rod strike out A-Rod and I-Rod (the player formerly nicknamed Pudge), or you can watch as T-Mac loses in the playoffs to five different guys nicknamed Superman.  The current nicknames are just so unimaginative; you don’t see anything like the brilliant two for one nickname of Sir Charles “The Round Mound of Rebound” Barkley, but you get to hear plenty of ‘first-letter-in-first-name-first-three-letters-in-last-name’ nicknames or the name of some superhero.

The number of creative nicknames has gone down exponentially over the past decade and out of the few clever nicknames in sports 75% of them are for Shaq.  One of the most popular names in basketball is Superman; the best known owners of this title are Shaquille O’Neal, Dwight Howard and Paul Pierce.  From now on this nickname will be giving solely to Dwight Howard because he doesn’t have any other nickname and he actually looks like a comic book superhero. With that being said Shaq gets to keep Man of Steel and Paul Pierce can still be called Superman, but only by KG.  Shaq doesn’t need Superman because he is also known as Shaq Fu, The Big Twitterer , Manny Shaq-iaou, The Big Deporter, Wilt Chamberneazy, The Big eQuotatious, The Big Maravich, M.D.E (Most Dominant Ever), The Big Baryshnikov, The Big Agave, The Big Galactus, The Real Deal, Witness Protection, Diesel, Shaq Daddy, The Big Felon, The Big Field General, Shaqovic, The Big IPO, Shaq-tus, L.C.L .(Last Center Left), Dr. Shaq, Osama Bin Shaq, The Big Banana, and my personal favorite, The Big Aristotle, just to name 25.  Paul Pierce doesn’t need to be Superman because he is ‘The Truth’ which was a nickname coined by who else but Shaq Diesel.

Now that the Superman debate is dealt with, I submit that no future players are named after superheroes* and there definitely should be no more A-Rod-esque nicknames in the future, at all. With this being said, it is my hope that one day we will all be a little more like Shaquille “The Big Nickname” O’Neal and have nicknames for players that are inspired and imaginative.  So I say to you, all the players, commentators and fans of the world go forth, throw on those creative caps and start nicknaming. Let’s bring back the glory days, there is hope for us yet.

*Manu Ginobili can be called Batman because he swatted a bat out of the air.

Rondo Extends Contract with Celts

According to Yahoo Sports, the Boston Celtics and PG Rajon Rondo have reached a agreement early this morning on a contract-extension worth $55 million over five-years.  The deal, that not even a week ago was reported as basically dead in the water, was made on the morning of the Monday deadline.

I am glad to see that both sides could make this happen.  Rondo is an exciting, talented and super-athletic point guard, who only seems to be improving.  After last year's playoff performance where he nearly averaged a triple-double, and having an impressive start to the 2009-10 season, including a 16-assist game against the Bulls, it just makes sense for the Celtics to make this deal.

Mariano Rivera

I hate to watch teams haplessly fail in coming from behind against Mariano Rivera, and all they do is swing at the first pitch, and give Rivera an 8 pitch save. The blown saves I remember Rivera throwing were long and drawn out, where he had to throw upwards of 30 pitches. Now I am no professional baseball scout, but I fancy myself to be one, and my advice would be to have each batter try to see at least 3 pitches. Rivera can't be wild if you're swinging.

Brad Lidge's Mental Breakdowns

Welcome to the most important blog written by the most important people on the internet. Our witty, accurate, and outspoken analysis will eventually be what you, the readers, will use to judge sports by.

As a Sox fan, I have to express some major concern that our only hopes of the Yankees being stopped from championship number 27 is a closer who was demoted as recently as September, and had a very public choke pitching in the 2006 NLCS. Game 4 is the make or break game of the series, if it hasn't already been broken yesterday during Game 3.

I also hate the fact ARod has redeemed his postseason reputation. I hoped he would bat .111 in the playoffs forever.

Watching the Phillies blow this game just reasserts my opinion that the NL is the lesser league, and unfortunately, it seems like the Yankees are the best team money can buy.