Categories
NBA General

Air Jordan gets deflated by about $150 million

Michael Jordan has a lot of titles and distinctions to his name, but his latest accolade is almost certainly not going to have the greatest athlete of all time real excited. That’s because his Airness will probably lose more than $150 million to his ex-wife Juanita in what Forbes.com is calling the most costly divorce ever in their list of “The 10 Most Expensive Celebrity Divorces.” So, do you still wanna be like Mike?

Here are the rest of big losers or winners, depending on how you want to look at things.

#10: Mick Jagger and Jerry Hall: Estimated settlement – $15 to $25 million

#9: Lionel and Diane Richie: Estimated settlement – $20 million

#8: Michael and Diandra Douglas: Estimated settlement – $45 million

#7: James Cameron and Linda Hamilton: Estimated settlement – $50 million

#6: Paul McCartney and Heater Mills: Settlement pending – Possibly more than $60 million

#5: Kevin Costner and Cindy Silva: Estimated settlement – $80 million

#4: Harrison Ford and Melissa Mathison: Estimated settlement – $85 million

#3: Steven Spielberg and Amy Irving: Estimated settlement – $100 million

#2: Neil Diamond and Marcia Murphey: Estimated settlement – $150 million

#1: Michael and Juanita Jordan: Settlement pending – Possibly more than $150 million

While losing $150 million has got to suck, it’s a small price to pay to be able to do things like this…

Links:

[Forbes.com]: The 10 Most Expensive Celebrity Divorces

Categories
MLB General

MLB Cost Index for April 16 2007



Attention K-mart shoppers

The MLB Cost Index is one measure of how well your GM did over the course of the offseason and during the season. The Index takes a look at the payrolls for each team and calculates a Cost per Win number. Pretty simple stuff right? But in the wide open world of baseball with no salary cap, it’s the best way we can think of to judge teams on a level (monetary) playing field.

Here’s week 2 of the MLB Cost Index. The Yankees have settled into the bottom slot where they’re likely to stay all year because of their monster payroll. However, they are joined by the Phillies, Giants, and Cubs who are playing well under expectations.

The Marlins and Devil Rays are where they usually are because of dirt cheap payrolls but the surprise here are the Arizona Diamondbacks, leading the NL west and 3rd in the Cost Index with 9 wins, paying $0.46M per win. The Indians and Padres are also relative bargains.

The complete MLB Cost Index after the jump.

Continue reading “MLB Cost Index for April 16 2007”

Categories
NBA General

Around the Rim: Let’s get it on!


1. He said, he said
The Spurs and Mavericks got together in Dallas on Sunday and as usual, they tore the house down with an extremely competitive game that we can only hope to see duplicated in the Western Conference Finals. The Mavs limited San Antonio to just 10 points in the fourth quarter to win 91-86, but the turning point of the game came in the third quarter when Joey Crawford decided to flex his officiating muscle by slapping Tim Duncan with his second technical as he sat on the bench laughing. Duncan claims that Crawford came into the game with a personal vendetta against him and the old man even challenged Timmy to a fight. “He looked at me and said, `Do you want to fight? Do you want to fight?”‘ Duncan said. “If he wants to fight, we can fight. I don’t have any problem with him, but we can do it if he wants to. I have no reason why in the middle of a game he would yell at me, `Do you want to fight?”‘ Meanwhile, Crawford said that Duncan called him a piece of $#*! as he walked off the court. Wow; forget about Barkley vs. Bavetta 2, we wanna see Duncan vs. Crawford in a boxing match during next year’s All-Star weekend.

2. The Oden Ordeal

So, what’s the deal with Greg Oden? We already know that Kevin Durant is bolting from the Longhorns and into the pros, but conflicting reports over the weekend are leaving people scratching their heads about Oden’s intentions. First Oden’s old man told The Indianapolis Star that his boy was leaving Ohio State because “They had an exciting season, but why take the chance on him getting hurt?” But then Mike Conley Sr., father of Oden’s teammate Mike Conley Jr., basically told the press that Greg Oden Sr. was completely out of the loop. “The process for Greg Oden is, he’s going to talk to his mom today, he’s going to talk to me tomorrow, and he’s going to talk to Thad Matta on Monday,” Conley Sr. said. “And after that, he’s going to decide what he’s going to do and when he’s going to report it.” Conley Sr. can claim whatever importance in the equation that he wants to, but we’re going to believe Oden’s pops on this one.

3. The Magic’s Magic Man
The Orlando Magic guaranteed themselves a spot in the playoffs on Sunday when they narrowly defeated the Celtics, 88-86. Thanks to the victory, the Magic are back in the post season for the first time in four years and nobody is happier about it than Dwight Howard. Not only did he hit the final point of the game on a free throw with 4.6 seconds remaining, but he is also having some monster games as his team prepares for a playoff run. On Saturday night against the 76ers, Howard scored a career-high 35 points on 14-of-15 shooting and despite a poor offensive performance against Boston (3-8 FG, 4-12 FT), Howard still managed to pull down 14 rebounds. Howard now just needs to grab 18 rebounds while keeping his field goal percentage high over the final two games of the regular season to become only the second player in NBA history to shoot 60 percent and grab 1,000 boards in the same year. Not too bad for a 21 year old.

Sunday’s Player of the Day: Kobe Bryant vs. Seattle 42 min, 50 pts (FG: 18-25, 3FG: 3-6, FT: 11-13), 8 reb, 3 ast, 2 stl

Monday’s Game to Watch: Phoenix (61-19) @ Houston (51-29) With the playoffs beginning in less than a week, it’s match-ups like these that really get you excited about the post season. The Suns and Rockets are currently the two hottest teams in the West as they enter the games with five and four game winning streaks, respectively. Houston has looked like a completely different team since Yao Ming returned to form and is providing the perfect compliment to Tracy McGrady‘s stat sheet stuffing ability. But the two superstars are going to have to be at their best when the All-Star adorned Suns come to town. Phoenix really has nothing to play for considering they have already locked up the second seed in the playoffs, but this will be a great chance to get a feel for their possible second round opponent.

Buzzer Beater: The Lakers have been in a free fall for the past three weeks, but in their next to last game of the regular season they finally locked up a playoff spot by beating Seattle 109-98. In the process Kobe Bryant became the most prolific scorer in league history not named Wilt Chamberlain by racking up his 10th game with at least 50 points as he racked up an even fity against the Sonics. Los Angeles has a tough road ahead of them with a first round match-up against Phoenix or Dallas but, hey, at least Phil Jackson’s streak continues as his teams have never missed the playoffs in his 17 years as a coach.

Categories
Washington Redskins

Top 10 Most Gruesome sports injuries: #2 Joe Theismann (plus BONUS injury!)

[Sportscolumn is running down the ten most gruesome sports injuries. Here’s #2]

If you haven’t seen the Joe Theismann injury by now, then you must have been living under a rock for the past 22 years. After all, it is the granddaddy of all of sports injuries and gets referenced after almost every major leg injury in sports to this day.

Who can forget seeing Lawrence Taylor snap Theismann’s leg during the Redskins/Giants Monday Night Football game back in 1985? It was a flea-flicker that went horribly wrong and ended with Taylor rolling up on Theismann and bending his leg backwards, not to mention his body, which resulted in a broken tibia and fibula. Theismann’s career was over before LT even got up and started frantically signaling for the paramedics.

The play doesn’t look all that devastating from the original angle, but once the reverse angle was feed to the national audience it became obvious that this was single handedly the worst professional sports injury ever witnessed. And no matter how many times you’ve seen the clip over the past two decades, it never gets any easier to stomach. Ironically, many people experience the same nauseating feelings when they think of his color commentary on ESPN.

Now, if Theismann grabbed our No. 2 spot on the list of gruesome injuries, then this guy has to be considered No. 2a. We don’t know who this guy is or when or where this happened, but the second we saw it, we knew it deserved some lofty recognition. So, here’s to you Mr. Mixed Martial Arts guy; this injury is truly one of the nastiest bone snappings we’ve ever been sickened by.

If you want to find some humor in the situation, just check out the guy’s opponent when he snaps his leg. The guy starts jumping up and down like he just delivered a knockout punch. Dude, you won because his leg cracked; you didn’t do jack!

Back to #3 | Forward to #1

Categories
NHL General

Odds and Ends: The NHL gets its very own Heidi game


If you’re a struggling network who is probably the NHL’s sole hope of getting popular again, you can’t afford to screw up the way Versus did. The finish of the instant classic 4 OT game between the Canucks and the Stars wasn’t seen in some markets because some affiliates inexplicably switched to an infomercial.


Versus has received reports that last night’s Dallas/Vancouver game was switched to an infomercial in the fourth overtime,” the network said in a statement. “We are obviously very disappointed to hear that some fans in a few select markets have reported that they did not see the end of this great game.

The game did run in its entirety on the Versus network feed, but based on the information we have received we are currently working with our affiliates in the affected markets to find out what caused the problem.

Sadly, we don’t even get Versus so we couldn’t even see the infomercial.

In other news…

[Mainichi Daily News]: Japanese fans tune in for Matsuzaka-Suzuki showdown

[Scatter O’ Light]: Reebok might want to fire some copyeditors

[Our Book of Scrap]: Has Major League Baseball Watered Down Jackie’s Honor?

[Sports By Brooks]: SHEFFIELD’S WIFE SEXED UP R. KELLY; FEDS SEIZED VIDEO

[Sports Review Magazine]: Larry David, New York Jets Consigliere?

[Steroid Nation]: The most famous player in NFL Europe

Categories
MLB General

MLB Power Rankings Roundup for Apr 13 2007

Well, after almost two weeks of ball, no one can agree on who the best team in the land is. While two sites in our survey say it’s the Mets, two others say it’s the Yankees and then we have one vote each for the Indians and the Red Sox.

The Braves, Angels and Diamondbacks are getting a lot of love this week, moving up significantly in a few of the Power Rankings, while the Phillies and Cubs were the big losers.

Here are the major Power Rankings this week:

Rank Sportscolumn ESPN FoxSports Sportsline USA Today TSN.ca
1 Yankees Mets Indians Red Sox Mets Yankees
2 Red Sox Yankees Yankees Yankees Yankees Mets
3 Tigers Tigers Twins Mets Angels Dodgers
4 Phillies Indians D’backs Tigers Red Sox Indians
5 Mets Dodgers Mets Indians Twins Padres
6 White Sox Braves Red Sox Blue Jays Blue Jays Red Sox
7 Cubs Angels Angels Twins Dodgers Blue Jays
8 Angels Blue Jays Tigers Angels Braves Twins
9 Dodgers Red Sox Padres Marlins Padres Astros
10 Padres Padres Braves Braves Tigers Braves
11-30 more more more more more more

Categories
MLB General

It’s not just cigars, human Cubans are illegal as well


Don’t let the title, money and perks fool ya, being a sports agent is a tough job. They are constantly on the prowl in search of today’s top athletes and will travel the globe to find them. But Gustavo Dominguez might have missed the memo on exactly how to recruit such superstar potential from abroad.

Dominguez was found guilty of 21 federal charges that include conspiracy, smuggling, transporting and harboring after he illegally smuggled five Cuban baseball players into the country. Apparently, Dominguez figured that if he got the prospects to the United States, they would be indebted to him during their possible pro careers. But now, all that Dominguez has to look forward to is a jail cell because most of the charges have a maximum penalty of 10 years.

Dominguez claims that he is innocent and plans to appeal the verdict, but the evidence against him just might be too strong to overturn. Especially considering that there is a paper trail which shows Dominguez’s client, Cubs catcher Henry Blanco, made payments of $225,000 to a known drug trafficker. However, Dominguez claimed that he paid the money because he was threatened by the trafficker to pay for another illegally smuggled client.

I believed my family was under threat — those kids are my life,” Dominguez said Thursday while testifying in his own defense. “I don’t care what you say, I will pay whatever it takes to get that piece of cockroach away from me.

Hey, we don’t doubt that the guy is probably a “piece of cockroach” but Dominguez basically shot himself in the foot by not informing the police of the threat and also by inviting the dude over to his house for a birthday party in 2004.

This never would have happened if he would have learned the ropes from Jerry Maguire. While Drew Rosenhaus might be one of the most annoying men on the planet, at least he knows not to get caught up in a human trafficking ring.

Links:

[Miami Herald]: Sports agent guilty in Cuban ballplayer case
[Reuters]: U.S. sports agent convicted of smuggling Cubans

Categories
New York Mets

Ex-Met is a cat killer



Who could get mad at a
face like this?

Some dudes have serious jealousy issues, but this is taking it juuuuust a bit too far. Even Jonathon Babineaux thinks this guy stepped out of line.

Apparently Joe Petcka, who used to pitch for the Mets minor league team, became jealous because he wasn’t the only object of his girlfriend’s attention. Now, any man would probably become a little upset if their girl wanted to hang to with some dude named Norman, but they would most likely understand when they found out that Norman was a kitty cat. Well, Petcka isn’t quite as understanding.

Petcka decided that he would simply eliminate his rival and so, while his girlfriend was at work, Petcka snuck into her apartment and he pounded that pussy mercilessly. And as a calling card, Petcka left the lifeless kitty under his ex’s nightstand. Norman’s autopsy showed that he had received three busted ribs, broken teeth, a broken leg, lacerated tongue and a punctured liver.

The charge against Petcka is aggravated cruelty to an animal, which could bring about a two year prison sentence.

Because the press is involved, the judge set up ridiculous bail,” Mr. Petcka’s attorney, Charles Hochbaum, said as he left the courthouse. “I’ve walked people out who killed people on less bail than this.

Petcka might have learned the behavior from being on the set of “The Sopranos.” Apparently Petcka thinks he’s an actor, but his Hollywood career is going about as good as his baseball career went. In other words, it’s basically non-existent. Maybe he could get his career off the ground if he could get his rage under control. In additional to recently killing a cat, Petcka was arrested on domestic assault charges a few years back after grabbing his girlfriend by the throat, throwing her out of his apartment and then slamming the door on her finger.

Hopefully, they will throw the book at this douche and send him up the river for the full two years which will give Petcka plenty of time to work on the nuances of how to portray a prison bitch.

Links:

[NYSun.com]: Actor in custody after the death of his girlfriend’s cat

Categories
General Sports

Michael Waltrip car wreck pics


There have been a lot of questions about the Michael Waltrip crash this week — why did he leave the scene of the accident? Why didn’t he call the police right away? Who was the witness who didn’t want to be identified? Was it a fine young thing he was with? Inquiry minds want to know!

What we do know is that he’s lucky to be alive judging from the photos of the car after the accident. It’s a miracle he walked away with only a few scratches.

More photos of Michael Waltrip’s wreck after the jump.

Continue reading “Michael Waltrip car wreck pics”

Categories
General Sports

The 30 sluttiest athletes of all time


We found this truly excellent list via Fark of the 30 sluttiest athletes of all time as ranked by Nerve. Wow. The things you learn on this list. By the way, the list itself is PNSFW.

Here are some highlights:

  • Arnold Schwarzeneggar teaches English by trying to make a woman blow a carrot (around the 4:30 mark)
  • David Cone once jerked off in front of a groupie in the bullpen
  • Chipper Jones is the baby daddy of a Hooter’s waitress
  • The British term for “running a train” is “roasting”
  • Some soccer goalie got “pegged” by his girlfriend
  • Joe DiMaggio was a frequenter of whorehouses

The usual suspects (Shawn Kemp, Derek Jeter, Wilt) are on the list too but it’s the random stuff that’s insane. Kudos to Nerve for including the Dikembe “Who Wants to Sex” Mutombo at #18.

And finally, watching this next clip will make you about 1.3% gayer but it is hilarious. We’ve never even heard about this before but it’s like what would happen if Will Ferrell was a figure skater…. wait a minute… that would be a great movie!