Author: clay

Categories
Denver Broncos

Broncos’ Super Bowl ring found in Sam’s Club restroom


Some people just seem to have all the luck, like David Diaz-Infante. The former Denver Broncos lineman was on both late 90s Super Bowl squads and had the rings to prove. We say “had” because the knucklehead basically gave one of `em away at a party in July of 2006.

It was a big party,” Deputy Police Chief John Ercul said. “Apparently he passed the ring around and let people look at it. It never did get back to him. The ring was reported stolen, and we did an investigation on it. A number of people were questioned.

Talk about a dumb move. “He passed the ring around and let people look at it”?!?! Does he let strangers at parties test drive his car as well? While that might be one of the stupidest things we’ve ever heard, it certainly isn’t the strangest tidbit in this jewelry caper. Luckily for Diaz-Infante, the ring was eventually recovered. Where you ask. How about in a mega market bathroom.

Ercul said a woman, whose name was not released, found it in the ladies’ room at a Sam’s Club and handed the ring, worth $50,000, over to police.

“He was very happy to get it back,” said Ercul.

Ercul said police will now focus their investigation on Sam’s Club to try find the thief. “We will follow up on that and see what we can find out. It’s going to be tough, but we’ll see if we can get to the bottom of it.

Found it in the ladies room at Sam’s Club, huh? You know if that was Larry David’s Super Bowl ring it would be going straight in the trash can.

Links:

[CBS4Denver.com]: Super Bowl Ring Found, Returned To Former Bronco

Categories
Dallas Cowboys

Forget the popcorn, get your tissues ready

The lingering image of last year’s playoff experience for Dallas was Tony Romo sitting on the Seattle turf with his helmet buried in his hands. This year’s postseason snapshot isn’t much better for Cowboys fans. After becoming the NFC’s first No. 1 seed to lose their opening playoff game since the new system was adopted in 1990, a teary-eyed Terrell Owens took the mic and defended his quarterback.

T.O. said you needed to have your popcorn ready on Sunday and he wasn’t lying. Unfortunately, all the crying in the world isn’t going to keep the media and critics from pointing fingers at Romo and his tryst with Jessica Simpson. The questions surrounding his preparation are sure to pop up, but he looked pretty sharp until his line became completely ineffective down the stretch and the obvious frustration set in. Regardless, the Boys are going home early AGAIN and, like the botched hold and shoestring tackle of last season, Owens’ quivering lip will haunt Cowboys fans until they get another shot to snap their current 12-year playoff drought.

Categories
General Sports

Mike Tomlin resurrects Coors Light’s ad campaign

We understand that everyone is getting sick and tired of watching those crappy Coors Light commercials where they interweave footage of press conferences with dopes drinking beer. After all, you can’t go a quarter without seeing Bill Parcells at least eight times. But don’t give up all hope on the campaign just yet. Turns out there’s a new version with Mike Tomlin making the rounds that will make you forget all about the horrible Jimmy Johnson hair pieces.

Links:

[Sportsocracy.org]: Mike Tomlin – Coors Light Parody

Categories
Detroit Pistons

Around the Rim: Rasheed indeed


1. Pistons’ slide ends at two
The Pistons desperately needed a win after dropping their previous two games, so when they traveled to San Antonio on Thursday, they didn’t bother asking; they simply took it. One quarter into the game, Detroit had already doubled-up the Spurs, 30-15, and they hardly gave an inch from there, winning 90-80. Rasheed Wallace was huge for the Bad Boys, scoring 23 to go with 15 boards, three assists, three steals and a pair of blocks. While the Spurs’ All-Star trio was healthy for the contest, they certainly weren’t firing on all cylinders as Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili combined for 21 points and six assists in the defeat.

2. Injuries were music to the Jazz’s ears

The Suns are good, but they’re not that good. With Shawn Marion, Steve Nash and Grant Hill all out of the lineup against Utah on Thursday, Amare Stoudemire was expected to pick up the slack. He did what he could, scoring 21 and grabbing 14 rebounds, but the Jazz finally showed a little pride and took the undermanned Suns behind the woodshed for an old fashioned beat down, 108-86. The knockout punch came in the third quarter when Phoenix could only produce five field goals and 12 points. Five players finished in double-digits for the Jazz, including Carlos Boozer (22 pts, 17 reb) and Deron Williams (17 pts, 11 ast) who both grabbed double-doubles in the contest.

3. Kings of the court, at least against the Grizz
Memphis and Sacramento played a nail-bitter in California and points were plentiful for almost everyone who stepped foot on the floor. Nine players scored ten or more points in the game, led by Rudy Gay’s 31. In the end, the Kings eked out a 116-113 victory with four starters hitting for at least 22 points. The Grizzlies have now lost 18 consecutive games in Sactown, going back to when they called Vancouver home.

Thursday’s Player of the Day: Rasheed Wallace @ San Antonio 40 min, 23 pts (FG: 9-15, 3FG: 1-4, FT: 4-4), 15 reb, 3 ast, 3 stl, 2 blk

Friday’s Game to Watch: Orlando (23-14) @ Denver (21-13)
The Magic already have 22 road games in the book this season and, surprisingly, they are dominating. With a 16-6 record outside of Orlando, Dwight Howard & Co. are far better on the road then they are at home (7-8). Denver is basically the opposite, owning a 14-5 record at home with a subpar 7-8 showing on the road. If O-Town wants to win, they’ll have to pay special attention to Allen Iverson tonight. A.I. scored his career-high 60 points against the Magic when he was still in Philly and in his last three games against Orlando he has topped 30. And if that’s not bad enough for the Magic, Iverson has scored a combined 103 points in his last three contests.

Buzzer Beater: Utah is desperate to get their players into the All-Star game. How desperate? Apparently, they’re desperate enough to bribe fans for votes.

First there was Chris Bosh, with his home-made “vote-for-me” video on YouTube. Now the Utah Jazz are weighing in as the season for NBA all-star voting nears conclusion, offering free hot dogs to fans in exchange for home-team votes.

The Deseret News reports that the Jazz offered fans free hot dogs in exchange for 10 ballots filled out at their home game last night against the Phoenix Suns – stuff your face, stuff the box.

Categories
All Other Sports

Brawl breaks out at Russian hockey game

When Russians play hockey, they play for keeps. And when they fight, they fight to win. Combine the two and you’ve got the recipe for a whole lotta blood on the ice.

Talk about an orgy of violence! If anyone ever decides to produce The Outsiders on ice then this is exactly what we’d expect to see at the end.

Links:

[Jerseys and Hockey Love]: Russian Hockey Fight

Categories
Boxing

Boxers try to land low blows, but fail miserably


Is it possible to be both a “pro” and a “Joe” at the same time? Even though Spike TV thinks otherwise, we’ve found proof that professional athletes can be very mediocre at other things. Take boxers for example. Some boxers know how to build excitement for a fight and then deliver what they promise, like the feud we saw between Ricky Hatton and Floyd Mayweather Jr. in the weeks leading up to their 10 rounder in December. Those fellas are “pros” through and through.

On the other hand, you’ve got guys like Edison Miranda and Jean Pascal. Both are excellent fighters in their own rights, Miranda with a 29-2 record (25 KOs) and Pascal with a 20-0 record (14 KOs), but the duo could use a lesson or two on the mic. The two aren’t facing each other, but both fighters are involved in separate co-main events at tonight’s Friday Night Boxing from the Hard Rock Live Arena. However, there’s been talk about a possible bout between the two in the near future and, thus, the smack talk is a flowing. But these guys could defiantly use some silver-tongue tutoring because they’ll never sell a pay-per-view with insults like these:

I’m going to give you a beating ahead of time,” Miranda told Pascal at a news conference Monday. “The first knockout is going to happen right here.”

Miranda never delivered the punch but tensions continued at another news conference Wednesday.

”Look at him, he’s ugly,” Pascal said of Miranda. “They call him the Pantera [Panther], but when I finish with him, he will be a little black kitten.

See, it’s not exactly on the level of Mike Tyson’s brawl with Lennox Lewis and subsequent verbal gold of “I f*** you `til you love me b****!”

Links:

[MiamiHerald.com]: Boxers trade verbal blows

Categories
MLB General

After all these years, the Famous Chicken is still finger-lickin’ good


Minor league baseball is always trying to pack the stands with some sort of gimmick or promotion. It seems like the ideas just keep getting wackier and wackier with every passing season. Of course, if all the front office knuckleheads would just stick to the basics then attendance wouldn’t be a problem. You don’t need to give away bobble heads of players or put together expensive postgame firework shows. Nope, just sign up the Famous Chicken to make an appearance and watch the dolla, dolla bills come rolling in.

Its appearance at minor league games, on average, increased attendance by 26 percent.

That’s pretty good when you consider, as the firm [Plan B Branding] reveals, that the Chicken’s appearance only cost teams 22 cents per fan. It’s also pretty good when you consider that the Chicken is more than 30 years old.

My favorite business story with the Chicken involves the day long ago that the man inside the costume, Ted Giannoulas, negotiated an attendance deal with the Padres. The rule worked that he’d get a piece of every ticket above a certain number of expected fans for the night.

The Chicken brought some 30,000 more fans to the game and Giannoulas came home with a $40,000 payday. As the story goes, he spent all that money defending himself in a lawsuit against KGB radio, the station that in March 1974, first put him in a chicken suit as part of a promotional gimmick.

And if you can’t get the Famous Chicken to pay your park a visit then we’d like to suggest this lady as option number two.

Links:

[CNBC.com]: The Ex-San Diego Padre Chicken Still Rules!!

Categories
Charlotte Bobcats

Around the Rim: Bobcats bounce Boston


1. J-Rich cashes in
The Boston Celtics are making a run at history and the Charlotte Bobcats with a 1-11 road record were supposed to be another notch on the belt of the Leprechauns. Well, what was supposed to be an easy win for Boston turned into a 12-point loss, 95-83, at the hands of one of the conference’s worst teams. Guess that is why they actually play the game. Jason Richardson blew up for 34 points and nine rebounds, sticking the dagger in the Cs hearts and twisting it several times during Boston’s attempts to make a comeback. “The Boston Three Party” was a man short on Wednesday as Ray Allen rode the pine with a pinched nerve in his neck, leaving Kevin Garnett (24 pts) and Paul Pierce (13 pts) with all the heavy lifting. So far, Charlotte practically has the Celtics number in their back pocket, winning in Boston and coming one last-second shot away from winning at home. Game three comes in late February in Beantown.

2. Portland’s prosperity

Brandon Roy fell to the court in the second quarter with an apparent knee injury, followed by Steve Blake’s calf clutching on the hardwood in the second half. But the good times kept on rolling as both players’ injuries turned out to be minor and the Trail Blazers picked up their 17th win in 18 games, downing Golden State 109-91. However, the biggest reason to celebrate in Portland wasn’t the victory or the victories or even the successful injury scare. Nope, the real reason for the Blazers smiles is because for the first time since 2001, Portland is atop their division. The Blaze currently owns a ½ game lead over Denver in the Northwest Division, but holding the position won’t be easy with a seven-game, East coast road trip on tap.

3. Suns win a track meet against Pacers
Indiana and Phoenix played five extra minutes and scored a whopping 251 combined points. Unfortunately for the Pacers, Phoenix ended with a majority of the points scored – 129 to be exact. Without Grant Hill who will miss some time (2-3 weeks) after undergoing an appendectomy, the Suns received a lift from Raja Bell (27 pts, 9 reb) and Leandro Barbosa. The Brazilian Blur finished with 27 points off the bench to compliment the double-doubles from starters Shawn Marion (23 pts, 12 reb) and Amare Stoudemire (25 pts, 11 reb). Led by Danny Granger and Shawne Williams who each scored 22 points, six players reached double-digits offensively for Indiana, but it just wasn’t enough against the short-handed Suns. In addition to Hill’s absence, Steve Nash departed from the game early due to a stomach flu, playing just 24 minutes.

Wednesday’s Player of the Day: Yao Ming @ New York 42 min, 36 pts (FG: 14-21, FT: 8-9), 11 reb, 3 ast, 2 blk

Thursday’s Game to Watch: Detroit (26-9) @ San Antonio (23-10)
It wasn’t that long ago when these two teams were hooking up to see who would be the NBA champions. Now, both clubs are just playing to get off the schnide. The Pistons own the East’s second best record, but are losers of their previous two games against Boston and Dallas. In order to avoid their first three-game slide of the season, the Bad Boys must win in San Antonio against a Spurs team bitter about another road loss. The Spurs are a league-best 17-2 at home and know they have to take care of business in San Antonio considering their sorry 6-8 road record.

Buzzer Beater: Good news in Clipper land. Looks like Shaun Livingston could be returning to the other L.A. team’s lineup at some point this year.

The medical team feels he’s going to make a full recovery,” team president Andy Roeser said at halftime of Wednesday night’s game against the Orlando Magic. “There’s a pretty good chance he’ll be on the court before the end of the season.

“The most significant thing is whether he makes a full recovery. It’s significant that we think he can make a full recovery.

Pretty amazing stuff considering it looked like Livingston was going to be made into glue after turning stomachs in late February of 2007.

Categories
College Basketball

Tyler Hansbrough proves white men can jump

UNC-Ashville’s Kenny George is a monster. The 7-foot-7, 360-pounder wears a size 26 shoe and has a wingspan of eight and a half feet. Like we said, he’s a friggin’ monster. Against North Carolina on Wednesday, George finished with 14 points, 11 rebounds and four blocks off the bench. But that isn’t the reason he’s making the news today. This is the reason he’s getting gobs of pub:

Yup, that was 6-foot-9 Tyler Hansbrough jumping over George with a single bound. Kinda like the negative image of this play:

Categories
College Football

"Rowdy" Razorback Darren McFadden gets cuffed outside a bar


Now that the college football season is over and done, the next date to circle on the calendar is NFL Draft day. And between now and then, you’re going to hear a lot about the Arkansas Razorbacks Mr. All-Purpose Darren McFadden. Well, the McFadden jabber has begun, but it’s not regarding his on-field prowess.

Razorback Darren McFadden was involved in a fight at a local bar and was placed in handcuffs. Around 12:15 Thursday morning, D-Mac got into an argument at a bar in downtown Little Rock.

The fight involved one of the bar bouncers. Authorities say that one of McFadden’s relatives was being escorted out of Ernie Biggs when McFadden and the people he was with got involved in a fight with Brant Hankins, the bouncer.

The argument went into the streets of the Rivermarket where the Little Rock Police Department put D-Mac in handcuffs for “agitated and provoking aggressive behavior.” Once he calmed down the handcuffs were removed.

So far, he has not been charged, but this could be a battery 3rd degree charge if Hankins presses charges.

According to SportingNews.com, Hankins was punched in the face as he escorted the group from the bar. It’s unclear if McFadden was the culprit in the punching, but cops say the two-time Heisman runner up was being pretty “rowdy.”.

There was a whole bunch of people there,” [police Lt. Terry] Hastings said. “They were inside and it spilled out into the street.”

Outside, McFadden was handcuffed by a police officer “because he was agitated and was provoking aggressive behavior inciting the incident,” according to the police report.

“We handcuffed him for a few minutes because he was rowdy,” Hastings said.

McFadden, who was the only person handcuffed, was released after he calmed down. Hastings said it was routine procedure to handcuff a person to gain control of a situation.

We know this is McFadden’s second bar fight in recent history, but we really hope this was just a random incident and not the beginning of a self-destructive pattern of behavior. This guy is way too talented to be on the wrong side of the law. Needless to say, the only time McFadden should ever be handcuffed is when NFL fantasy owners pickup his backup at next season’s draft.

Links:

[Fox16.com]: Darren McFadden in Fight at Little Rock Bar
[SportingNews.com]: McFadden handcuffed briefly in bar fight