Author: Vin

Vin is a Philly boy who shouldn't be invited into your house because he'll judge you on your book and music collection. He owns Dawkins, Utley, Iverson, and Lindros jerseys, which is all you really need to know about him. He can be reached at [email protected].

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All Other Sports

Odds and Ends: No headline could do this justice


We’re not even sure how to categorize this first entry. Normally, we don’t cover gym equipment unless some athlete is shilling it but this product (and the demo) is so bizarre it’s almost like an SNL skit. Ladies and… well ladies, if you’re tired of stairclimbers,treadmills, and simulated cross country skiing machines, Brookstone presents the OSIM iGallop. Just watch the demo. For some inexplicable reason, the marketers think a bunch of women dressed in cowboy outfits bouncing up and down in a room is appealing… hey wait a minute…

In other news…

[SFGate]: Rice signs a 1-day deal to retire as a 49er; no word on whether he’ll sign with Patriots

[Yahoo]: Lonny Baxter gets 2 months in jail for having some guns near the White House

[Rammer Jammer Yellow Hammer]: an Arrested in Toronto for Impersonating a Blue Jay

[10,000 Takes]: Pistons Hire Terry Porter

[Yahoo]: Carson Palmer will play Monday night

[Maxim]: Baseball’s Fattest Slobbiest Fat Slobs

Categories
All Other Sports

Apparently you can’t trust Jamie Gold



Make that $6 million

A television exec by the name of Crispin Leyser is suing WSOP winner Jamie Gold for half of his earnings. According to the lawsuit, Leyser was promised a split of the earnings in exchange for getting a couple of celebs (Dax Shepherd and Matthew Lillard) to play for Team Bodog, which is Gold’s team.

While there isn’t a written contract, Leyser received this message from Gold just hours before the final tournament table:

I promise you — you can keep this recording on my word — there’s no possible way you’re not going to get half after taxes.

So please just be with me. I can’t imagine you’re going to have a problem with it. I just don’t want any stress about any money or any of that [expletive] going on today, or even after the end of the day.

But please just trust me. You’ve trusted me the whole way, you can trust me a little bit more. I promise you there’s no way anybody will go anywhere with your money. It’s your money.

So if he can be trusted, why the need for a lawsuit? Shouldn’t he have have just forked over half the money? If there’s one thing we know, it’s that when someone says “trust me”, you should never trust them. Along the same lines, if someone says, “to tell you the truth”, it means they’ve been lying to you.

Links:
[MSNBC]: WSOP winner sued, may have to split prize

Categories
MLB General

The Full Count: Phillies making a run


1. Here we come: One of the quietest yet most important stories lately has been the Philadelphia Phillies’ transformation from losers to contenders. Though everyone thought they were out of it after they traded Bobby Abreu for future prospects, they have suddenly rebounded and are in the NL Wild Card race. The Phils have won 5 in a row and 8 of 10 after they beat the Cubs last night. Jimmy Rollins drove in a run in the ninth to win it 2-1, while Ryan Howard’s earlier homerun gave him 44 on the year. Brett Myers pitched fantastically to win his 9th game of the year, as the Phillies improved to 16-8 since the Abreu trade. They are 1.5 back of the Wild Card after the Reds lost yesterday.

2. Two teams, a half game: That’s all that separates the Twins and the White Sox in the AL Wild Card race after both teams won yesterday. The 74-52 won their only game of the series against the Tigers by a 7-5 margin. Jermaine Dye hit a three-run homer, his 35th of the year, while Joe Crede hit two out as well. Bobby Jenks saved his league-leading 36th game of the year. Meanwhile, the 73-52 Twins beat the Orioles 4-1. Matt Garza, who is temporarily replacing Francisco Liriano in the rotation, pitched his first good start after two poor outings. He allowed no earned runs in six innings as Torii Hunter homered and Michael Cuddyer drove in 3. Both teams are still well back in the division but one looks to make the playoffs as we head down the stretch.

3. An untouchable offense: Despite scoring a combined 15 runs in their last two games, the St. Louis Cardinals have dropped both of them. That’s because the Mets offense has been even better, and they showed that yesterday in a 10-8 victory. Jose Reyes homered, drove in 3, and stole two bases to give him a league-leading 52 on the season. Slumping David Wright, who is hitting .211 on the month, had two RBIs. The Mets roughed up Mark Mulder for 9 earned runs in his first start after a lengthy stint on the DL. The Mets have the second-best record in the majors, while nine AL teams have better record than the Cards.

4. Even more scoring: If you’re one of the few who think the Mets-Cardinals series just doesn’t have enough scoring, then you would have been satisfied by the Indians-Royals game yesterday. The Indians started the scoreboard with Travis Hafner’s 39th homer of the season in the first. But in the bottom of that inning the Royals answered in a big way, with 10 runs. But the Tribe scored in each of their next 4 innings, making the score 10-9. The Royals scored three more runs then to put the margin at 4. But incredibly, Cleveland scored 4 runs in the ninth to tie the game up at 13. They won in the 10th on Hector Luna’s two-run single. The Indians’ 15-13 win showcased what their problems have been this year. While they have scored the 4th-most runs in the majors, their pitching staff has been too inconsistent. While they have shut their opponents out 12 times, second-most in the majors, they have only recorded 18 saves, by far the fewest in the majors. What a strange season for such a capable team.

5. Setback for the Yanks: The Yankees won again yesterday, 9-2 over the Mariners. Chien-Ming Wang won his 15th start as four players had multi-RBI days. While they now lead the division by 6.5 games and have scored the most runs in the league, it isn’t all good news coming from New York. Mike Mussina, the team’s ace this season, is hitting the 15-day DL. While the Yanks initially thought he would only miss one start, manager Joe Torre and Mussina decided it would be best for him to go on the DL. Admittedly the injury won’t affect the potent Yankees that much over the 15 days he is out. But if Mussina declines in any way after his return or the injury lingers, it could be a huge blow for a team that is poised to make an October run.

Categories
MLB General

August 24 in Sports History: Pete Rose is banned


In 1989: Pete Rose accepted a lifetime ban from baseball from then-Commissioner Bart Giamatti for betting on baseball. Although he vehemently denied gambling, Rose still signed off on the ban. Giamatti, who admitted that the decision took an awful toll on his health, died shortly afterwards. Rose, who holds the all-time career hits mark with 4,256, was also declared ineligible for the Hall of Fame. In 2004, he finally admitted to not only betting on baseball, but also on the Reds, the team he was managing at the time. In his book, “My Prison Without Bars,” Rose told current Commissioner Bud Selig that he bet because he “didn’t think he’d get caught.” No player ever declared permanently ineligible has ever been reinstated into baseball.

In 1951: Nobody could pull a PR stunt like St. Louis Browns’ owner Bill Veeck. In a game against the A’s, Veeck held “Grandstand Managers Day“, in which fans made the final decisions for the Browns. Coaches held up placards, and fans would vote yes or no. The 1,100 plus “skippers” apparently made the right ones, as a few of the players they elected to play helped the Browns defeat the A’s 5-3. They also told players when to bunt, steal, and when to change pitchers. www.baseballreliquary.org

Categories
Arizona Cardinals

Odds and Ends: No Pink Taco in Arizona


Sorry Arizona residents, the Arizona Tourism and Sports Authority has nixed the $30M proposal by the Pink Taco restaurant group for naming rights to the Cardinals’ new stadium. This shouldn’t be a suprise as there was no chance of a stadium called The Pink Taco. It just couldn’t be done. When the Eagles lost their first two games in the new home, the newspaper headlines said “Stink at the Linc”. Imagine what it would’ve been if the Cardinals lost at home to, say, the Raiders or the Giants.

In other news…

[Yahoo]: FIFA threatens all Italian clubs with ban if Juventus challenges ruling

[The Prometheus Institute]: Five lessons on politics and economics to be learned from the world of sports

[Reuters]: Remember the NHL Agent a player tried to kill? Yep. Sexual assault

[MSNBC]: Justin Gatlin gets 8 year ban

[Physorg.com]: A Russian cosmonaut will whack a golf ball from the international space station

Categories
San Francisco 49ers

Kevan Barlow compares Nolan to Hitler



Kevan’s first Photoshop project

In a phone interview with the Contra Costa Times on Tuesday, Kevan Barlow ripped into Niners head coach Mike Nolan.

Nolan just doesn’t know what he’s doing. He’s a first-time head coach with too much power. He has too much power as a first-time head coach. He walks around with a chip on his shoulder, like he’s a dictator, like he’s Hitler. People are scared of him. If it ain’t Nolan’s way, it’s the highway.

Barlow accused Nolan of lying to him because a week before he was traded to the Jets, Nolan assured him that he would not be traded.


It was dirty. He had no respect for me or the organization. He doesn’t know about the 49ers way, and that’s too bad because even his dad (Dick) was coach of the 49ers. Bill Walsh set the standard there, and he ain’t living up to it.

Barlow said that about half the team feels the way he does. Ouch. It doesn’t sound like Nolan will be getting a Christmas card from Barlow this year.

Links:
[Contra Costa Times]: Barlow lashes out at Nolan
[Sportsline]: Jets’ Barlow apologizes to former coach Nolan for ‘Hitler’ remarks

Categories
New York Mets

Happy at least 48th birthday, Julio Franco


It’s amazing that in a league where the average career spans about 7 years, Julio Franco has been at it for 24 years (with a couple of stints in Japan and Mexico). He made his debut with the Phillies on April 23rd 1982. You want to know how long ago that was? Family Ties and Cheers debuted that year.

So congratulations to Julio Franco for… living and playing baseball. (By the way, here’s a very interesting look at the average length of MLB careers.)


Links:
[Yahoo]: Being Julio Franco
[Hot Foot]: Can I Call You Dad?
[Wikipedia]: Julio Franco entry

Categories
NFL General

All the NFL Power Rankings you need: Madden style


People (ok.. we) have been known to use Madden to simulate games for predictive/gambling purposes. It never really works but it’s kind of fun to do anyway. Well, the folks at Tecmo Blog have taken things waaaaaay too far and ranked all 32 teams according to their Madden 07 ratings for players.

You can read their methodology and comments here but here is the quick list. This list does bring up the question of how good can Madden rankings be if they have the Titans ranked above the Patriots and the Eagles? Also, is it acceptable to play with a team other than your own just because your team sucks in Madden? We say no.

Madden 07 Team Rankings
1. Steelers
2. Seahawks
3. Colts
4. Giants
5. Chiefs
6. Chargers
7. Falcons
8. Panthers
9. Bengals
10. Cardinals
11. Redskins
12. Dolphins
13. Broncos
14. Titans
15. Patriots
16. Eagles
17. Saints
18. Packers
19. Rams
20. Cowboys
21. Raiders
22. Ravens
23. Texans
24. Buccaneers
25. Bears
26. Jaguars
27. Vikings
28. Browns
29. Bills
30. Jets
31. Lions
32. 49ers

Categories
MLB General

The Full Count: Mets vs Cardinals as good as advertised



Bill Clinton approves this series

1. NLCS Preview?: In possibly the best overall matchup possible between National League teams, the Cardinals took on the Mets last night in Flushing. The result was better than anyone could have even anticipated, as the best offensive players for each side really took off. Albert Pujols hit a 3-run homerun in the third and followed it up with a fourth-inning grand slam. His 2 homeruns and 7 RBIs gave him 38 and 105 for the year, and he completely carried his team’s offense for the night. For the Mets, Carlos Delgado hit two blasts of his own, including a towering grand slam that gave him 400 career homeruns. But the Cardinals were still winning 7-6 heading into the 9th inning. That’s when Carlos Beltran stepped up. The slugger, who was 0-4 going into the inning, hit a walk off two run homerun to win the game for New York. It was one of the best games of the year in the NL, and there are still two games to go in this series.

2. NL West Showdown: We can’t believe we’re saying this after months of NL West bashing, but there is actually a watchable series in the division. The Dodgers are taking on the Padres in a battle of the top two teams in the West. So far, the Padres have absolutely dominated the season series over the division leader. They have taken 10 of 13 from LA, including a 1-0 win last night. Jake Peavy pitched a great game to continue his recent success, while Mike Piazza drove in the only run of the night. Peavy has had one of the more puzzling seasons of any pitcher. While he is third in the league in strikeouts and has a good 1.23 WHIP, Peavy owns an awful 7-12 record. That’s due in part to poor run support, and in part to Peavy’s underwhelming 4.35 ERA. But he won last night as the Padres won their third in a row to close the gap between them and the Dodgers to two games.

3. Next step: division lead: With the Cardinals loss, all the Reds needed to do was win to put them one game back of the division leaders. They did more than that. Cincy annihilated the Astros 14-0, crushing them in every way possible. Offensively they put up 4 runs in the second and 8 in the third. Brandon Phillips started the scoring with a solo shot, while Scott Hatteberg and Adam Dunn tacked on two more homers. Then Kyle Lohse, who had been simply awful before being traded from the Twins to the Reds this year, pitched his fourth straight quality start with 8 shutout innings. His masterpiece gave Lohse his first win as a Red and his ERA is now 1.65 with the team. Now at 66-60, Cincinnati is one game back of St. Louis and has the same amount of victories as the Cardinals. They are closing in on the team that has won two straight Central division titles.

4. AL Roundup: There were plenty of events in the AL yesterday as well. The Seattle Mariners ended an 11 game win streak with a 6-5 defeat of the Yankees. Adrian Beltre hit a walk-off homer, his second of the night and 15th of the year. The Red Sox continued their poor play with a 4-3 loss to the Angels, keeping them 6.5 back of the Yankees. Also, Kenny Rogers pitched 7 shutout innings for the Tigers as they beat the White Sox again, 4-0. Marcus Thames continued the Detroit tradition this year of unknown players stepping up, with a homer, a triple, and 3 RBIs. And finally, the Blue Jays improved after last night’s embarrassment, defeating the Athletics 4-3 as AJ Burnett won his 4th consecutive start. Fortunately, Jays manager John Gibbons didn’t challenge Burnett to a fight for the 3 runs he allowed.

5. Winning games, losing money: While the Yankees continue to spend, spend, and spend some more on free agents, few people think about whether the team has the funds to support their gigantic $200 million payroll. Well here’s the answer: they don’t. Yankees GM Brian Cashman (what a name!) reported yesterday that despite all the money the team is making, they are still losing money due to revenue sharing. Last year they made the most money in baseball with $277 million in revenue, but still lost $50 million overall. Perhaps this isn’t a good time to remember their $1 billion-plus new stadium that the team has to finance in part.

Categories
General Sports

Aug 22 2006 episode of Poor Man’s PTI

Welcome to another episode of Poor Man’s PTI. Things get a little off topic this week but we still manage to get some sports talk in..

You can download this week’s podcast directly (running time 41 mins) or subscribe to the feed.  

If you use iTunes, just click here and then click subscribe and iTunes will take care of the rest.

This week’s topics include:

  • Flavor of Love and the girl who shat herself
  • Yankees sweep the Red Sox
  • Ted Lilly vs John Gibbons
  • Cursing at the Little League World Series
  • Fantasy Football Talk
  • World Series of Strip Poker: “The more you weigh, the more you have to pay”
  • Foxwoods vs Mohegan Sun
  • Our upcoming NFL Picks Podcast
  • Entourage and the merits of HBO at 3AM

Hope you guys enjoy the podcast.  If you did enjoy it, please give us a good rating below so we can rise up in the rankings. If you didn’t, send us an email ([email protected]) and give us some suggestions. Thanks for listening.