This week, as pitchers and Molinas reported to Spring Training camps, I thought the best way to prepare for 2008 would be to look back at everything that happened in 2007. We will go team by team.

Red Sox
Curt Schilling agreed with every Jason Varitek signal en route to his first perfect game. Hideki Okajima pitched so poorly he was deported but the Sox were saved thanks to a 28-win season from #1 SP Jonathan Papelbon.

Yankees
Joba Chamberlain pulled a Rick Ankiel in the playoffs and blamed it on killer rabbits swarming him but was saved by an incredible post-season run from Alex Rodriguez. Rodriguez took a pay-cut following the season.

Blue Jays
Figuring there were no other ways to improve their starting rotation they hired a Devil Rays intern.

Orioles
All I know is that 2008 will be a great year for fans as Bedard, Tejada and Roberts lead the Orioles to the playoffs.

Rays
In a move that will take no more than 10 minutes to get used to, the Devil Rays changed their name to the Rays. Meanwhile, Elijah Dukes was named “Father/Husband of the Year.”

Indians
Jason Michaels was very excited that he would finally get to play a position without platooning with Kenny Lofton like he did in Philly.

Tigers
Despite all qualifying for “Alliteration Award,” Mike Maroth, Macay McBride, Virgil Vazquez and Jair Jurrgens were pretty ineffective.

Twins
No news here. Silva left, but nothing else really happened. Oh, and they replaced Luis Castillo with Alexi Casilla in order to ease the transition.

White Sox
Ozzie Guillen’s ratio of gay slurs to reporters decreased but so did their win total.

Royals
Brian Bannister failed an IQ test following the season however the team won the award for most last named of 4-5 letters.

Athletics
90 % of America forgot that they did not know the A’s 2006 manager upon realizing they could not name the 2007 manager.

Mariners
Richie Sexson broke Ichiro’s single-season singles record. Mike Hargrove, fresh off of a big win streak, was so happy that he signed a lifetime extension. I still don’t know how to pronounce Ryan Feierabend.

Angels
Reggie Willits is white?

Rangers
Deciding that scoring many runs in numerous games was an overrated tactic the Rangers scored 30 in one August game and only 117 in the other twenty-seven August games.

Phillies
They had so many starting pitchers prior to the season’s start that Adam Eaton, Brett Myers, Cole Hamels, Jamie Moyer, Jon Lieber and Freddy Garcia all re-enacted the Jean Claude Van Damme movie The Quest to decide who would go to the bullpen.

Mets
No instances of a player not running out a play were overblown at all which ultimately led to a hot streak at the end of the season and a no-hitter from Tom Glavine on the final day of the season.

Braves
Following an amazing (as usual) Buddy Carlyle performance, Bobby Cox took the team out to celebrate but was unnerved upon learning that 3 of his record 133 ejections did not count. Nick Nolte is currently gearing up to play Cox in the summer film Mr. 133.

Marlins
Hanley Ramirez fell into the sophomore slump causing Fredi Gonzalez to incorrectly spell his first name.

Nationals
Jon Rauch missed the entire season but the entire starting pitching rotation all became household names.

Cubs
Though hot at first, a Sweet Lou tantrum sent the Cubs spiraling downwards. The season was saved, though, when Steve Bartman, not his ball, was blown up.

Brewers
Fielder slightly improved upon his rookie campaign thanks to all of the quality time he enjoyed with his father, Cecil.

Cardinals
Chris Carpenter, as we expected, made many more starts than retired closer Troy Percival.

Reds
Brandon Phillips stole twelve bases on the same play that Adam Dunn set the record for fewest strikeouts in a season.

Astros
Craig Biggio legitimately helped his team win en route to collecting his 3,000th hit – a statistic that he would have had no shot at making the Hall of Fame without.

Pirates
Freddy Sanchez made the all-star team strictly based on 2007 performance. Sean Casey was digitally removed from the Bill Mazeroski promos and replaced with new acquisition Danny Kolb.

Dodgers
Mark Sweeney, Mike Lieberthal, Wilson Valdez, Brady Clark and Marlon Anderson all vastly outhit starting pitcher Brad Penny.

Giants
Matt Cain set the record for cheap wins, Tim Lincecum set the record for Most Normal Looking Delivery, and Barry Bonds retired prior to breaking the home run record, admitting that while he did not take steroids, he did eat a human being that used them.

Rockies
Clint Barmes missed most of the year due to working with scientists in order to create a synthetic staircase that will allow him to carry hams back and forth without any injuries. Meanwhile, Troy Tulowitzki was sent to the minors for not throwing hard enough to first base.

Padres
In the midst of a crucial game, the umpires halted play and began a “slow clap” in order to applaud Milton Bradley’s new change of attitude.

Diamondbacks
Their starting pitchers, in no way, were better offensively than their batters.

There you go – pretty much everything we expected to happen ended up happening and we can only hope that 2008 brings with it the same expected results!

Eric Seidman writes about sabermetrics at Statistically Speaking. His contact information can be found at Statistically Speaking and he welcomes all feedback. Feel free to e-mail or leave a comment.

Life couldn’t be better for Worcester Sharks forward Graham Mink.

Mink, a native of Stowe, Vt., is mid-way through a two-year, two-way contract he signed with San Jose on July 14, 2006.He’s coming off a season during which he set career highs for goals (31), assists (32) and points (63).

The Sharks finished a respectable fourth in the brutal Atlantic Division and gave division champ Manchester a tussle before bowing in six games in the first round of the playoffs.

But more importantly, the former University of Vermont star is more content with his life than he’s been in quite some time. And the reason isn’t only because of what he accomplished on the ice last season.

During the summer of 2003, while he was with the Portland Pirates, Mink spent 30 days in jail—the first five at the Chittenden Regional Correctional Center in South Burlington—and the remaining time at a minimum security facility—after pleading no contest to a reduced charge of simple assault (which is a misdemeanor). That’s a long slap shot from the original charge: aggravated assault, which since it’s a felony, might have landed him in prison for several years.

As a means of explanation:

On the night of Sept. 16, 2001, Mink and some college friends were about to call it a night while out on the town when they saw members of the hockey team getting into a scrap with fellow students.

When the incident escalated into something more than trash talking, Mink allegedly kicked a student named Shane Audette in the head at least twice. While Mink contended he did not kick Audette, he did admit to punching him more than once.

Audette suffered a broken eye socket and was knocked unconscious.

UVM then kicked Mink off the hockey team, at which time he decided to leave school and signed a free-agent contract with the Pirates.

“That definitely was the hardest thing I’ve ever gone through in my life,” admitted Mink. “It was a learning experience for me. It was an unfortunate situation where there was a lot of reaction and not a lot of thought. It was the first and only fist fight—not counting pro hockey—that I’ve been in.

“I was at the wrong place at the wrong time and made the wrong decision. But looking back on it now it enabled me to decide where I want to be in my life.”

The 30 days he spent behind bars afforded him ample time to do so although there was a temptation to climb the walls.

“There’s a lot of down time and I’m a person that needs to be busy,” said Mink. “I like to stay involved and keep my mind engaged. There isn’t any TV and you can’t do anything except sit there.

“Those 30 days allowed me to think and set a new course in my life and decide who I wanted to be and how I wanted to do that.”

While Mink appreciated the support he received from his family plus then-Washington general manager George McPhee and Tim Army, who was coaching Portland at the time, he was less appreciative of the treatment he received in the media.

“The hardest part about the whole thing was how the media up here tried to portray me in a negative light,” he said. “I’m not the type of guy who gets in fights. People who know me know that. It was tough to take.

“People pass judgment and you can’t defend yourself when you’re in a situation like that. But it became a real positive thing in the end because it made me decide who I wanted to be and how I would want to live my life.

“I wouldn’t want to go through it again,” continued Mink, “but it was a growth process and a learning process.”

Among other things Mink learned that he could develop an ulcer if he let what happened fester inside him.

“I’m not bitter or angry,” he said. “It was something that happened and I’m a stronger person because of it.”

Without question Mink feels AHL hockey in Worcester is stronger than ever—and definitely moreso than in Cleveland where the franchise was located before it moved east.

“You’ve got to play no matter what but in a place like Cleveland where they struggled to get people in the building it was tough,” he said. “They did develop these players very well. You can’t fault their methods but I think (San Jose) wanted to take it in a new direction and wanted some veteran players to help the coaching staff coach and teach.

“(President and CEO) Mike Lehr does a great job. They know what they’re doing. This area’s a hockey hotbed. If the team has success we’ll get more people to come into (the DCU Center)—especially if we can go deep into the playoffs.”

Ironically, the season before joining the Sharks, Mink went all the way to the Calder Cup championship with the Hershey Bears. But the 2005-06 season was his fifth in the Caps’ organization and he felt like he was skating on a treadmill.

“I loved being in Hershey and playing for (coach) Bruce Boudreau,” he said. “It was one of the best years of my life. But after winning a championship, if I wanted to make a run at the NHL (Mink has five NHL games with the Caps on his resume) I felt I had to try a different organization.

“I would have loved to have played again at Hershey but I wanted to give scouts a fresh look.”

Mink gutted it out during the Bears run to the Calder Cup because he came back too soon after a hernia operation. But, in 43 regular-season games, he posted 21-29-40 totals and in 21 playoff games his totals were 8-13-21.

“When you’re in the AHL and it’s year to year, that gets old after a while,” said Mink. “I told my agent I would like a two-year deal to be settled so I’d have a chance to reach a comfort level with a team and not be worried about who I’m with.

“San Jose was there from Day One. I heard a lot of great things about the organization and they’re all true.”

Just like life is truly fine for Graham Mink.

Mike Scandura writes about Boston Red Sox prospects at Sox on Deck. His contact information can be found at Sox on Deck and he welcomes all feedback. Feel free to e-mail or leave a comment.

My all-time favorite movie is Remember the Titans. No future movie will ever take its place at the top of my totem pole of films. Ever. This movie is untouchable because it tackles, no pun intended, many truly-based issues. It centers on racial conflicts in Virginia during the early 1970s. It focuses on high school football, a fixture in Alexandria, Va., at the time. But more so than anything, it displays how racism is overcome through football at T.C. Williams High School. To me, there is not a theme more compelling than that of people of obvious exterior differences coming together to accomplish a common goal (in the movie, winning the state title).

Remember the Titans won the Truly Moving Picture Award in 2000. This award is presented to films that “move you to laughter, to tears, to make a difference.”

I believe that award’s description relates back to a man who gave an exceptional under-10-minute speech at the ESPY Awards on March 4, 1993.

Jimmy Valvano, winner of the first Arthur Ashe Courage Award in 1993.

Early in his acceptance speech, Valvano told us there were three things we should do every day of our lives. “Number one is laugh. You should laugh every day. Number two is think. You should spend some time in thought. And number three is, you should have your emotions moved to tears, could be happiness or joy. But think about it. If you laugh, you think, and you cry, that’s a full day. That’s a heck of a day. You do that seven days a week, you’re going to have something special.”

Hmm, sounds awfully familiar to the description of the Truly Moving Picture Award that Remember the Titans won.

Neither Remember the Titans nor Jimmy Valvano are perfect, though.

Just ask T.C. Williams defensive end Julius Campbell (played by Wood Harris in the movie). During halftime of the state championship game, Julius intervenes on Coach Herman Boone’s (Denzel Washington) pick-me-up pep talk. “With all due respect, uh, you demanded more of us. You demanded perfection. Now, I ain’t saying that I’m perfect, ‘cause I’m not. And I ain’t gonna never be. None of us are. But we have won every single game we have played till now. So this team is perfect. We stepped out on that field that way tonight. And, uh, if it’s all the same to you, Coach Boone, that’s how we want to leave it.”

Like I said, neither the movie nor Jimmy V. is perfect.

Several times throughout the movie, the Titans force a fumble, pick it up and advance it down the field. However, 1971 high school football rules did not permit a fumble to be picked up and returned or advanced. Nitpicking, but a mistake nonetheless.

It is well-documented and well-known that Valvano had cancer and that it eventually caused his death. I was very young at the time, but it is less known that Valvano was a questionable coach and athletic director while at the helm at North Carolina State University.

A 1989 NCAA investigation found that players illegally sold shoes and game tickets. North Carolina State was placed on probation for two years and was banned from participation in the 1990 NCAA Tournament.

Also in 1989, a commission found that Valvano and his staff avoided rules to keep players eligible. After this incident, Jimmy V. was forced to resign as North Carolina State’s athletic director.

During the 1987-88 season, as many as four Wolfpack players plotted to hold down the scores of four games in return for money.

Under Valvano, North Carolina State basketball possessed one of the lowest graduation rates in the entire country. Current Wolfpack head coach Sidney Lowe was not a graduate of North Carolina State while there as a player. Lowe has since received his business administration degree from Saint Paul’s College (approximately 23 years after leaving NC State as a player).

I am sure elder sports journalists and fans know more of the truths of these stories than I do, since all I cared about at the time was Scooby Doo and the occasional Atlanta Braves game. Even so, just hearing of these four potential corruptions is disturbing.

Anyway, enough of the comparisons between Remember the Titans and Jimmy Valvano. That point has gotten across—Jimmy V. wasn’t perfect, but his 1993 ESPY speech was nothing short of perfection for the near 10 minutes in which he spoke. Similarly, Remember the Titans wasn’t perfect in that a rule was skewed (fumble being advanced). But in the end, the team finished perfect. Okay, now I’m done comparing the two.

It’s all about Jimmy V. and the influential impact of his 1993 speech from here on out.

And that impact can be described as a curve ball due to the reaction of the Madison Square Garden audience. Everyone in attendance knew he had cancer, but was unaware of how long, and inspirational, his speech would be.

“I flash back to Jimmy standing up there after struggling to get on the stage. I figured he would simply say thank you. He could barely make it to the podium, yet he electrified the audience with a brilliant speech. The crowd in the house and the TV audience heard something they will never forget—Jimmy V. was at his best,” said Dick Vitale in a column from July of 2002.

When Valvano related his first pre-game pep talk to that of Vince Lombardi’s, Lou Holtz chuckled and sat speechless (that’s odd) as Valvano directed a portion of his story at him. Holtz was laughing.

ESPN’s “utility” broadcaster (because he covers so much), Chris Berman, normally charismatic in speaking and in giving nicknames, was seen in the crowd smiling. But almost instantly, his face turned melancholy. Berman was thinking.

As soon as college basketball analyst Dick Vitale and Duke head basketball coach Mike Krzyzewski assisted Valvano to the stage’s podium, Joe Theismann, one of the toughest quarterbacks ever (ask Lawrence Taylor), was seen in the audience with tears in his eyes. Theismann, obviously, was crying.

So in a 10-minute span, three different recognizable sports celebrities had combined to laugh, think and cry. Seems Valvano’s message was crystal clear.

And his message was not basketball-related, even though he spoke briefly of his time as freshman basketball coach at Rutgers University.

His message was sheer inspiration. He encouraged us all to remember where we came from, where we are now and where we want to be in the future. Maybe his speech didn’t do it for you, but it really made me think of where I want to be in the future.

In regard to a career, I desire to be a sports writer. I started by posting and interacting with other sports gurus on discussion boards. I still do that, but less frequently due to the fact that I’m getting involved in the profession by writing for this Website, for example. As far as the future, I don’t know where this profession would take me, but I want to make it.

I wear two light blue bracelets (from www.jimmyv.org) that read “Don’t give up … Don’t ever give up” in honor of Jimmy V. and to remind me that nothing in life is handed to you. You have to work for what you want. You have to be dedicated. And as Valvano said, to get where you want to be in the future, “you have to have an enthusiasm for life. You have to have a dream, a goal. And you have to be willing to work for it.”

I have that dream, that goal. I’m willing to work for it.

I won’t give up … won’t ever give up. And neither should you.

Gary Lloyd writes about the University of Alabama’s athletics at Crimson Traditions. His contact information can be found at Crimson Traditions and he welcomes all feedback. Feel free to e-mail or leave a comment.

I’m starting to lose my mind just a little bit. Maybe that’s why I’ve been thinking about Bobby Fischer so much lately, even before his death January 17. Just last week, I was walking with my dad, and out of the blue said “Bobby Fischer is completely insane.” I don’t know why my mind drifted to a SportsCenter piece that I must have seen years ago, since I haven’t watched SportsCenter religiously since I was in middle school.

One definition of insanity is somebody who does the same thing over and over and expects different results. As a chess savant, Bobby Fischer did the same thing with different results every single waking hour of his life, repeating the same 20 starting moves and strategies over and over again, only to find some kind of new outcome at the end of the game.

He lived his life the same way over and over again, day in and day out, from the time he was 12 to the time he was 64, living a life of self-imposed exile and singular purpose with an all-consuming need to prove himself against those he hated and felt were out against him, and saw himself turn from a boy genius and national hero to fugitive and source of national disgrace.

It would be lovely to think of Fischer as an isolated case, but I fear that it isn’t true. In my lifetime, Mike Tyson followed the same type of path that Fischer did, from his success at an early age to his aggressive style to his sad collapse, indefensible actions, and status as a tragic figure at the end of his career.

More importantly, both Tyson and Fischer projected sure signs of serious problems during the height of their success that were first seen as nothing more than proof of their greatness. Both came from low-class environments without real parental love and supervision, and normally they would have just been left there to rot.

Fischer was a D-student at best with no discernible social skills who never knew his father, and Tyson was even worse off, growing up on the streets and constantly in trouble with the law, headed for a life in jail or worse; by 13 he had been arrested 38 times. However, both found solace in their gifts.

Tyson was discovered at 13 and taken out of school to focus on boxing, eventually utilizing his prodigious speed and strength to become the youngest heavyweight champion in the history of the sport and arguably the most convincing champion in the sport’s history, winning 19 of his first 22 fights by knockout, 13 of them coming in the first round. In his trainers, he found father figures. In his greatness, he felt adoration for the first time. Similarly, Fischer’s first chess tutor at 13 became a father figure to him, and he found solace in his talent, becoming the youngest international master in the history of chess at the age of 14.

Both became the best in the history of their respective sports through a mix of sheer talent and an all-consuming desire to destroy their opponent. Tyson’s early matches are an awe-inspiring display of power and savagery. Floyd Mayweather, the current marquee boxer, picks apart his opponents slowly but surely by drawing them to the middle of the ring, drawing them out of their comfort zone, and accurately striking them once or twice perfectly before returning to a defensive position; his dismantling of Ricky Hatton was a perfect example of this. His out-of-ring comments are a further extension of this strategy, deliberately pushing buttons and drawing opponents out of their comfort zone and into his.

Tyson’s fights from his glory years are nothing like the work of a master craftsman. He simply attacked and attacked with all his strength and fury until there was nothing less to attack—the clips show a man out of control, hoping only that his opponent will be even more defenseless in the maelstrom than he was. He didn’t want to win the fight. He wanted to be the last man standing. We should have been terrified. We were thrilled.

On the surface, Bobby Fischer could not have been playing a more different game than Tyson. Boxing, after all, is a variation on the original sport: beat another man until he can no longer beat you. Chess is a mental game with a myopia of rules and complexities, played at one’s preferred pace; it is so different than boxing that a computer can defeat the best players in the world. But in Fischer’s mind, the game was no different than Tyson’s: him against the world, with the world against him all the way.

Like Tyson, it was not a game to him but a war, and he said as much himself: “Chess is war on a board—the objective is to crush the other man’s mind.” Just like the hate that plagued Tyson was celebrated because of the fantastic pyrotechnics it produced, Fischer’s unhealthy hatred for his opponents was accepted because his target was everybody’s enemy, the Soviet Union.

Fischer had delighted at humiliating his opponents since his age of adolescent dominance, and in 1970 that pathology was conveniently pointed at communists. Fischer’s world-championship match with Boris Spassky became, along with USA 4, USSR 3, a mini-Cold War, a symbolic match with the weight of entire nations riding on it. During the rise of the Nazi Empire, the story was a boxing rematch between the African-American Joe Louis and the Aryan Max Schmeling.

The two men had a rivalry based on mutual respect and competition rather than the hatred for each other that they were supposed to feel; Schmeling was in reality no Nazi, and actually risked his own life to hide Jewish friends during the Holocaust. To Louis and Schmeling, the fight was a fight, and they became friends in their personal life. When Fischer died, Spassky simply said “Bobby Fischer is dead,” and hung up the phone.

When Fischer was placed in a similar situation, it wasn’t a game to him like it was to Spassky. He called the game “The Free World against the lying, cheating, hypocritical, Russians.” We cheered, and when he won we made him a hero. Years later, we would say that our hero had vanished decades ago. Bobby Fischer stopped changing at 13. It was the world around him that changed, and he never understood why.

Fischer’s style, like Tyson’s, was aggressive to the point of insanity. He was always attacking, always sacrificing any possible defense in order to make his opponent more vulnerable. Legend tells he sacrificed his first two games against Spassky in order to gain a mental edge for the final three games, which he won. When Tyson’s physical gifts began to deteriorate, he immediately fell from the top of the world of boxing, because he was no longer able to overpower his enemies, going for knockouts and headshots while leaving himself vulnerable.

In his life outside of the ring, Tyson, like Fischer, tried to buy friends and family with the wealth his talent had brought him, purchasing Bentleys for everyone he knew, dressing himself with the most extravagant trappings imaginable, and allowing Don King to usurp his money in order for his continued friendship. Likewise, as soon as Fischer came into money, he ditched the jeans and t-shirts of his Brooklyn upbringing for snappy new suits and watches, searching to leave behind the D-student who had never had a date, a friend or a father. Tyson never learned defense because he never believed there was anything worth defending.

In the early 1990s, Mike Tyson raped a beauty queen. We said we were shocked. We said we were repulsed, that Tyson had neglected all laws and regulations of society to overpower somebody into giving him what he wanted. On June 28, 1997, he did the same thing, reaching into himself and doing the one thing that had gotten him off the streets—using his rage to attempt to destroy his opponent any way he could.

Again, when he spit that ear out, we pretended that we didn’t know this man, that this was somehow different than the man who had punched a referee in order to more thoroughly beat an unconscious man in the ring and promised destruction to all those that stood in his way. He was the same man he’d always been, but everything was around him was changing, and now those that loved him were repulsed by him.

Eventually, Mike Tyson, lying beaten in Memphis at the hand of Lennox Lewis, found humility. He has relinquished his pride and given himself to a search for peace, whether it be in a mosque or on a rooftop with his beloved pigeons, the ones who always come back to him when he scares them away. He has put himself at the mercy of his creditors and our judgment. The ending of Mike Tyson’s story may not be a perfect one, but I pray that for him, it’s a happy one.

Bobby Fischer never got that ending. Tyson and Fischer’s paths diverge where Tyson decided to face his fate and be forced to relinquish his pride, while Fischer decided to run in order to keep his. In 1975, Fischer was set to defend his world title, but laid down a set of “non-negotiable” conditions that would have meant the match would have taken several months and included a stipulation that everyone in the room must have uncovered heads. The conditions were declined, and Fischer refused to play the match, which led to a forfeit of the title. Fischer then disappeared from competitive chess for 20 years, always claiming that he was still the rightful world champion and that all subsequent championship matches had been fixed.

This is the point where most people say that Bobby Fischer descended into madness. I disagree with that. Bobby Fischer resided in madness, in a world where everybody was out to get him and he could only achieve acceptance by being smarter than everyone else, by crushing the minds of his opponents. The only problem was that he was running out of opponents.

He joined a fundamentalist cult, giving them millions of his dollars so that they would treat him like royalty, and they whisked him around on a private jet and treated him like the prophet he always felt he was, the hero who defeated the communists. Then he decided they had double-crossed him and left, claiming they were “demonic.” He thought everybody was stealing from him, claiming millions of money owed to him because of his patents on things like chess clocks.

By the end of his life, the hatred that had always controlled Bobby Fischer’s life had become focused on the United States of America, but mostly on the vast Jewish conspiracy he felt controlled it.

It is at this point that I feel I must put a few things on the record. My great-grandparents fled Europe in order to avoid the Holocaust, an event that Bobby Fischer claims was a hoax designed by and for the benefit of Jewish people. Anti-Semites are among the lowest people to walk this Earth. However, I do not believe, as Jeremy Schaap understandably does, that the man who said the horrifying and often ridiculous things that Bobby Fischer did in radio interviews from 1999-2002 about the attacks on September 11 and Jewish people is a new and horrifying human being in no way associated with the boy hero of the cold war, below status as a human being or any sort of rational analysis.

To call someone crazy is to disassociate them from rational analysis, and surely his statements defy any sort of rational analysis or explanation. However, how he came to believe those things does not.

Jewish people would seem an unlikely focus for Bobby Fischer’s hatred; his mother was Jewish; he is Jewish; Dick Shaap, who was yet another surrogate father to him, was Jewish; his first chess teacher and mentor, Arnold Denker, was Jewish; and in the early 1990s, he lived and analyzed chess with the Jewish Polgar family. Bobby Fischer, like Mike Tyson, was cornered, in exile, about to become meaningless. So he did what Tyson did, what had always worked for him. He used his rage and went on the attack, lashing out at those he felt he had abandoned him, explaining Dick Schaap’s abandonment of him as the actions of a “typical Jewish snake” in an interview with Schaap’s own son.

Bobby Fischer did what he always did, what had made him a star and a hero, what had given him love, what had made him fit, the only thing he had ever known how to do well, and he ended up dying in infamy and disgrace at 64, alone. (The mother of his child has long been separated from him; while details are hard to discern because of Fischer’s secrecy, reliable sources say that he saw them “once every two months.”)

Success is a choice, says Rick Pitino. Michael Jordan chose greatness, the myth reads. An athlete who decides to smoke pot instead of practicing his jumper makes “poor choices.” Professional sports’ pariah is Michael Vick, the man who was more gifted than any football player in the history of the game, maybe any game. Michael Vick was afraid of his destiny, and chose to stay in the comfort of where he grew up, being the man he had always been, smoking pot and eventually throwing his career in the toilet because he wanted some cheap thrills.

Doc Gooden could have been the greatest pitcher who ever lived, but he decided to do cocaine. Bode Miller could have won gold for his country, but he wanted to party. Barry Sanders could have broken all the records there are, but he just wanted to be left alone. Larry Bird always thought that Kevin McHale spent too much time socializing instead of working on his game. LeBron James shouldn’t host the ESPYs or live in a house with a casino; he should work on his jumper.

We hate athletes who squander their potential by “making bad choices.” I don’t like them either, and hard work is always superior to laziness, but there are worse fates for young athletes. Mike Tyson and Bobby Fischer never had a choice. They were great because they needed to be, and the love of everybody around them came and went depending on whether or not they were great. Their games were their only solace, their only source of peace. They obsessed about them, falling deeper and deeper into a world where the games became a matter of life and death, of everything that there could be, and we cheered. When that world consumed them, we pretended we didn’t know them.

While I feel genuinely terrible for both Fischer and Tyson and pray that they find peace in this world or the next, I am not here to apologize for them, especially Fischer. If you believe as I do in the Anne Frank quote that all people are good at heart, then Fischer was as bad as a man can get, and deserves no sympathy or apologies for what he became—and whatever happened to Mike Tyson, he still raped that woman. Their actions were their own fault, and nobody else’s.

However, if we continue to impress the Jordan myth on young professional and amateur athletes, and tell them that their sole purpose on this earth is to become as good as they possibly can at the games they were born to play so that we can benefit from their lives as much as possible, to continue to deem phenoms like Michelle Wie or O.J. Mayo or Tony Romo gods and then turn on them in a second when they disappoint us by trying to have lives of their own, we will create more like Tyson and Fischer.

Our idols for young athletes are LeBron James, who has been playing basketball for a living since he was in fourth grade; Tim Tebow, who is a sophomore in college and married; Tiger Woods, who has had a club in his hand since he was two, and at 30, announced he had “found there was more to life than golf.”

Bobby Fischer is dead now, but his spirit lives on in every crazed sports dad that puts his kid through hours of backyard drills, in basketball prep factories that young men are plucked from their lives and put into in middle school, in every steroid taken, in every broadcaster that can’t believe a 23-year-old millionare could possibly go out and party, in every kid who yells at the umpire and breaks his bat when he strikes out, and every scout who sees that kid and notes his “competitive drive.” I’m not saying we should forgive Bobby Fischer. I’m just saying we should make sure we aren’t making more.

John Krolik writes about the Cleveland Cavaliers at Cavalier Attitude. His contact information can be found at Cavalier Attitude and he welcomes all feedback. Feel free to e-mail or leave a comment.

Jackie Robinson changed sports the day he stepped onto a major league baseball field and officially broke the color barrier. African-Americans quickly followed Robinson into the game and started the sea of change that would come to a head in the 1960s under Martin Luther King, Jr.

Alas, African-Americans today are moving away from the game that first offered them the opportunity to play at the highest professional level. 2006 represented the fewest African-Americans on the field since at least the mid-1980s, the first time that the Racial and Gender Report Card was initiated.

The report card, spearheaded by Dr. Richard Lapchick, shows baseball’s 8.4 percent of African-American players is a staggering decline in African-American representation in the sport. It was only a decade ago during the 50th anniversary of Robinson’s debut that African-Americans ranked at 17 percent of all baseball players.

In comparison, the 2006 report card for the National Football League has African-American representation at 37 percent. The National Basketball Association runs away with African-American diversity, checking in with 75 percent of all players being of African-American descent in 2006.

This is concerning because as African-American percentages in baseball decrease, the interest in baseball from the African-American community decreases. Baseball is realizing fewer revenues in a sport that champions itself as a pioneer in civil rights.

More attention and revenue is being given to other sports, primarily basketball and football, by the African-American community.

“The game suffers when it cannot field the best possible talent,” says Washington Nationals scout Mike Alberts. “If baseball could find a way to attract the African-Americans to baseball, it would raise the quality of play on field, revenue and attention.” [Ed. note 1.15.08 — this should not be construed to say that African-American players are better baseball players than others. Rather, what Alberts was communicating was that the more players that enter the field of baseball, the better chance that the quality of play will rise. This would be true if 100,000 players of any gender suddenly made baseball their sport.]

“Baseball has worked to make a global product,” Alberts continues. “MLB wants more people playing baseball all over the world.”

Joe Hungler of the Boys & Girls Club of Worcester, who oversees the RBI program in Worcester, Mass., says this issue is one of importance to baseball.

“Baseball should be worried because while the talents aren’t being wasted, they are being diverted from ‘America’s Pastime.’

“The electricity that a Bo Jackson or Michael Vick brings to the table equals ratings. People want to see the spectacular.”

If baseball is to be a global product, shouldn’t there be fair representation?

The issues surrounding the decrease in African-American diversity in baseball are many, but under the stewardship of commissioner Bud Selig, Major League Baseball has strived to increase its presence with regards to African-American diversity.

Reviving baseball in inner cities
This past year, the inaugural Civil Rights game was played on March 31 in Memphis, Tenn. where Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated. MLB also opened the MLB Urban Youth Academy in Compton, Calif. in recent years where it is one of the first professional sports urban youth academies in the world. It’s primary goal is to allow urban children the chance to play baseball and prepare high school baseball players for college and the professional ranks of the game.

MLB also has its flagship program which will celebrate its 20th anniversary in 2008. Reviving Baseball in Inner Cities (RBI) was designed to entice disadvantaged youth in inner cities to play baseball. The focus is to get those children involved in baseball early in hopes that they will remain involved in baseball as they get older. RBI is now represented in over 200 cities and helps 120,000 aspiring baseball players per year compete.

With 19 seasons under its belt, has the RBI program worked, and is there reason for the Urban Youth Academy to work? The declining number of African-Americans in baseball would seem to suggest no.

“The RBI program works,” says Alberts definitively. “It gives everyone a chance to play. It may not create any more major leaguers but that is not a fair way to judge the program. If we, myself included, only judged our playing careers on if we made the major leagues or not… it wouldn’t be fair.”

“MLB pumps a ton of money into the RBI program,” Alberts continues. “They go into inner cities, buy land and build parks. They hire ex-MLB players, usually minorities, to run free camps and clinics. It’s like AAU baseball without having to pay for it.” (The Amateur Athletic Association is a non-profit sports organization which you must pay to be a member of.)

Hungler agrees with Alberts. This year, the Worcester program sent a club to the regional tournament of which many participants had never played on an organized team, never left the state or never stayed in a hotel room. The Club also provided several week-long baseball clinics over the summer.

Hungler, who saw over 120 youth involved in baseball this summer, says that “many of these kids would not have participated if we hadn’t provided gloves and transportation.”

For all the good RBI does, there are still a few things that could be improved to make sure the program is consistent in what it can offer.

The first issue is finding volunteers to devote the time to training. “Finding committed volunteers each summer is a challenge,” Hungler says, because those volunteers have to be “trained in youth development as well as the basic skills of baseball.” Not only that, they struggle to find volunteers during the workweek. If there are no volunteers, the urban children cannot play.

Another issue is staffing. The Boys & Girls Club has low fees to join the club (the Worcester contingent is $10 a year) and the grant money that makes it possible to have such low fees allows the Club to hire quality staff. If this grant money disappears, this issue vaults to the top. The Club tries to find staffers who can return the following summer to keep the consistency of the program.

The final issue, and perhaps the most important way that RBI could be improved, is transportation. With the focus of the program on disadvantaged youth that more often than not have no mode of transportation to the fields, the Club picks up the teams that are playing. “This is a rising cost including vehicles, drivers, maintenance and gas,” Hungler says.

Despite those issues surrounding the program, Alberts and Hungler believe the RBI program works.

Dr. Richard Lapchick, architect of the Racial and Gender Report card feels the RBI program is working – to a limited degree. “It started late in the game and MLB is so far behind in terms of the numbers of African-Americans playing that it is going to take a substantial amount of time to catch up,” he says. “If this is a phase, it is a long term phase.”

What else is causing the problem?
If the RBI program isn’t causing the decline of African-Americans in baseball, what is?

There is no one single answer that stands out. Rather, there are a number of answers.

“For poor kids of any race, basketball is an easier sport to play,” says Hungler. “Twenty years ago, kids didn’t need $100 (aluminum) bats, $80 cleats, fancy batting gloves, $50-100 gloves. We had a cheap wooden bat, knock-off cleats and relatively inexpensive gloves.” He also cites the issue of field maintenance as a major strike against baseball, saying that many communities do not have many baseball fields and those that do have to worry about watering, mowing and weeding the field while a basketball court just needs tar and a hoop.

“It’s also much easier to play smaller versions of basketball or even flag football,” says Hungler. He compares this to the near impossibility to play baseball without at least six players on each side.

John Montes, the athletic director for the Boys and Girls Club in Chelsea, Mass., agrees with the issues Hungler cites. “Many youth organizations do not have access to baseball fields. Most youth organizations offer different types of basketball, flag football, volleyball, or soccer leagues, as well as the newfound interest of the internet and video games within the last 15 to 20 years.”

Northeastern University baseball coach Neil McPhee, who has been the coach since 1986, feels that “the upgrading of baseball fields is paramount. The conditions of grass fields in urban cities deteriorates so quickly that they become glass and rock filled playgrounds, not conducive to making kids enthusiastic about playing baseball.

“I think the best hope is to combine [the RBI program] with the resurfacing of fields in the newest technology of artificial grass with a crushed rubber infill, which plays almost identical to grass.”

Lapchick also concurs on the lack of playing fields in urban America and the ease basketball presents in such areas.

McPhee says that while this solution may seem simplistic, he feels it would be a boon to RBI programs and interest in the sport in general, promoting more diversity in baseball at all levels.

Is this the solution, though? Solve the fields and the players will follow? Or is there something else at play… such as college scholarships?

“The problem is the lack of baseball scholarships,” says Alberts, who cites the high volume of African-Americans playing basketball and football to the amount of money available in college scholarships, and says that this is true of all low-income children of any race.

It doesn’t help that the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) focuses most of its attention on basketball and football. In its 2002-2003 Revenues and Expenses report, the total revenues and expenses sheet lists football, basketball, other sports and unrelated as its breakdown. 70 percent of all revenues come from football, 23 percent from basketball, and other sports pulls in a scant five percent.

The NCAA clearly tilts towards basketball and football as its prime sports. The NCAA provides 85 head-count scholarships to football and 13 to men’s basketball. Scholarships in a head count sport cannot be divided between athletes; one scholarship for one person.

Baseball gets 11.7 equivalency scholarships. In equivalency sports, the scholarships can be divided among athletes but the scholarship limits make it hard for a team to be comprised of all athletes on full scholarships.

It is impossible to have all or the majority of a baseball team is on a full scholarship, while it is possible for a football team to have all of the team on a full scholarship.

“At 11.7 scholarships, it is difficult for coaches to spread scholarships among 30 or so players and get them to come to your school,” says Northeastern University pitching coach and former professional baseball player Mike Glavine.

“As a parent trying to help your child or a kid himself deciding his future,” Glavine continues, “the chances of receiving a substantial scholarship for college baseball are low.”

Lapchick says that the popularity of college basketball and football is evident in the career choices of African-American student-athletes. “(This) has resulted in (basketball and football) becoming the most desired route” for African-Americans, he says. “Less than seven percent of (college baseball) players are African-American.”

The director of the Worcester Boys & Girls Club Joe Hungler agrees that the opportunities offered by playing basketball or football are greater than baseball. “We discuss [with people who could play college sports] which sport they will have the best chance of getting a free education out of… for more of our kids, that choice has been basketball or football.”

Lapchick offers one potential solution to the problem of declining African-Americans: “Major League Baseball could increase its marketing in the African-American community of African-American stars at the college level and professional level.”

Little children follow in the steps of their heroes. “Hank Aaron and Willie Mays were heroes … just as Ken Griffey is a hero to some Little League players right now,” Alberts says.

Hungler thinks that the hero worship is important. “Role models matter and help give youth an opportunity to dream. I find it encouraging that players like Dontrelle Willis are concerned about the trend and are doing something about it.”

Lapchick feels there are two other key factors to the lack of African-American diversity in sports.

On April 15, 1987, the 40th anniversary of Jackie Robinson’s debut, Al Campanis, the Los Angeles Dodgers general manager for 19 years, appeared on Nightline and questioned that African-Americans “may not have some of the necessities to be, let’s say, a field manager, or, perhaps, a general manager.” (Campanis resigned his post two days later amid controversy.)

Lapchick also cited Barry Bonds as a major factor. “The fact that baseball’s biggest African-American star, deservedly or not, is one of the most vilified athletes ever in spite of the fact that he was chasing among the most revered records in the history of Major League Baseball” did not help baseball’s image to young African-American athletes.

The Chelsea, Mass. Boys & Girls Club director, John Montes, also feels that economics play a factor. “There is an economic hold over the inner city youth,” he says. “Baseball is more of a pastime where a father introduces baseball to their sons by playing catch in the yard. In these tough economic days, most inner city families must have [both parents working] and in some families a double income plus overtime in order to make ends meet” and no time to play baseball with their children.

What is the answer?
The question posed was if the RBI program works. The answer? No one knows. There are too many problems standing in the way of African-American diversity in baseball right now to accurately identify what works and what doesn’t. Lapchick feels the RBI program works to a limited degree, but this degree is clearly not enough to overcome the other problems plaguing baseball right now – but it doesn’t stop baseball from becoming increasingly diverse.

Since 1991, Latinos have grown from 14 percent to 29.4 percent, and the Latino base will only continue to grow. Japanese players are starting to regularly come over from their Japanese leagues, and other Asians are signing with major league clubs. And yet, African-Americans, such a rich part of baseball’s history and America’s history continue to dwindle in numbers in the game commonly known as America’s Pastime.

Is there any hope? Richard Lapchick says there might be, but not right now.

“It appears as if baseball will virtually skip a generation of African-Americans and if there is to be increases, it will be in the future and not in the short term.”

Evan Brunell writes about the Boston Red Sox at Fire Brand of the American League. His contact information can be found at Fire Brand of the American League and he welcomes all feedback. Feel free to e-mail or leave a comment.

The dark cloud that is hovering over Miami sports, mentioned in my last article, has been noticed by sports fans who live there or cheer for teams based in that area. But recently, there was a sign like a loud crack of thunder that made it clear one team is firmly underneath said cloud.

“The Tigers finalized their big trade with the Marlins on Wednesday, an eight-player swap that sent both coveted All-Stars [Dontrelle Willis and Miguel Cabrera] from cash-strapped Florida to go-for-broke Detroit.” [1]

On December 4, the Marlins traded two players that had been widely recognized as the faces of the franchise. In fact, the previous year Willis had officially been voted the “Face of the Marlins” by fans as part of an ESPN.com story. But, the stark realities of baseball in Miami faced the team, and the move had to be made to get value for the players in the form of young and cheaper prospects. And value they did get, in Cameron Maybin, Andrew Miller, Mike Rabelo and three other minor leaguers.

What are the stark realities? Let me inform you. The Florida Marlins are a team playing in a stadium not their own. Dolphin Stadium (even the name shows them they aren’t really wanted there) is owned by one Wayne Huizenga. Now, Huizenga has shown recently why he’s one heck of a football owner, but he’s already shown why he was a lousy baseball owner. Huizenga gave the Marlins one magnificent year, putting the Marlins in the top five of MLB payroll and winning the World Series. However, he was stunned that Miami voters were not ready to throw new stadium money at his feet after that glorious victory. He dismantled the team, lowering its selling price, and sold them off.

The team still plays in his stadium, under a lease that you wouldn’t want for a regular apartment. Under the terms of their lease, almost all the revenue the Marlins get from playing baseball there goes to Huizenga. They get a cut of the parking, concessions, marketing, etc. But in today’s baseball, unless your owner’s name is George Steinbrenner or John Henry, you need more than a cut (and the irony is that those two men make so much off their teams that they don’t need the much more than a cut they get).

Also, the stadium just isn’t suited for baseball. Don’t get me wrong; it’s designed to do just what it does, convert into a baseball stadium. But the sightlines are all wrong, and it takes a World Series for any team to draw a football stadium full of people. The Marlins need a baseball-only stadium where they can make the lion’s share of revenue.

Fortunately, it seems it may finally happen. After having deal after deal fall apart due to the state being unwilling to help with financing, the involved parties seem to have a plan that doesn’t need it. The plan involves changing the tax districts: expanding them so a variety of projects get funding. I feel it’s important to say that, because opponents of tax money going to a baseball stadium often say that it robs the culture of a city, things like roads or parks or places of art. Well, under this plan that could generate billions (with a “b”) of dollars in revenue, things like port tunnels, parks and art houses all receive funding as well.

The deal would give the Marlins a new 37,000 seat stadium, complete with a 6,000 car parking garage, at the site of the Orange Bowl. The Marlins will pay $155 million all up front, and cover cost overruns. The county pays $249 million and the city pays $121 million. The county has approved the deal, with the city set to discuss it on January 10, but expected to agree as well. [2]

The Marlins have built a winner, torn it down, built another, torn it down, built a good team, and now torn a key chunk from it. But the truth is that they had to. They could not afford to keep the players without the guarantee of a new stadium, and could not keep them and risk losing them for nothing.

Miller may become this team’s ace, not to mention the two minor-league pitchers included. Maybin could be a great addition in center field. Rabelo will be added to the mix at catcher. If this stadium deal goes through, the Marlins could have a great young team put together just in time to cut the ribbon at Marlin Stadium.

For updates on the stadium issue, be sure to stay tuned to Marlins Today, MVN’s coverage of the Florida Marlins.

[1] Associated Press, December 5, 2007
[2] Sun-Sentinel Blogs

Sean Fowler writes about the Miami Dolphins at The Phish Tank and about University of Florida athletics at From the Swamp. His contact information can be found at The Phish Tank and From the Swamp and he welcomes all feedback. Feel free to e-mail or leave a comment.

When it comes to sports, Miami used to be Mecca. To athletes, it doesn’t get much better! Great weather, beautiful people, and no income tax. That doesn’t get better for an athlete. And all the major sports teams in Miami have at one point been pretty good.

But now, the city of Miami is going through a very difficult time in the world of sports. In this article, I’m going to go over each team, try to explain what’s wrong with them, and how they can fix it, and try to make Miami into the TitleTown South it should be.

MIAMI DOLPHINS
High point: A 1972 season where the team went 14-0, the only undefeated season in NFL history (to date) and won the first of two Super Bowl titles.

Low point: Right now. The Dolphins are 1-14. They just lost to the Patriots in their last chance to defend the 1972 Miami Dolphins’ record personally. A loss in their last game of the season, at home against the Bengals, would make them just the seventh team to lose 15 games in a season.

Right now: See low point.

What to do: Over at The Phish Tank, I’ve written about this in detail. This is a team that has been worn down by years and years of bad drafting and free agent reaches. As a result, the team is old and has not very much talent.

This has to be fixed over time. Painful years of being bad, getting excellent draft picks with some quality free agents, letting the young picks take their lumps. The Dolphins have to get young and fast. John Beck is, I believe, the answer at QB. Ted Ginn is a super-speedster at WR and KR. The offensive line finally isn’t a joke anymore. Some pieces are here, but building will take three years at least.

And they have already made the smartest move; signing Bill Parcells to oversee the rebuilding. Parcells is a certified team-rebuilder, and knows what it will take to get this team back on top. He’s sort of a fast-forward button on the rebuilding process.

MIAMI HEAT
High point: 2006. The Heat drove through the playoffs, until running into a Dallas Mavericks team that the entire world picked to beat them easily. The Mavs made it look that way the first two games, before Dwyane Wade took the team on his back and the Heat swept the next four to win their first NBA Title.

Low point: Easily the Heat’s first season, which was actually played in the Western Conference. The Heat finished 15-67 for a dismal .183 winning percentage.

Right now: The Heat got out to a bad start, losing all their preseason games and their first five regular season games. With the postseason sweep by the Bulls last year and the last two games of last year, the Heat lost 18 straight basketball games before beating the Knicks 75-72. They then endured three more losses before beating the Nets 91-87. The Heat now sit at an embarrassing 8-21, following a loss on Christmas Day to the Cavs and then losing to the 76ers.

What to do: It’s harder to say for the Heat. The Heat are just a team that should not be as bad as they are. When the Heat won the title, it seemed like they were better than the pieces they had. Now, it seems that they are worse than the pieces they have. Shaq’s massive contract makes big fixes difficult; the Heat are currently left with just a piece of their mid-level exemption. If Shaq were to retire after the season, possible with his numbers declining rapidly and his dominance fading, the Heat would have much more leverage to build a new team around Dwyane Wade and Udonis Haslem. Shaq is still a strong contributor, and it seems like the Heat can break out of this funk whenever they want. They just … haven’t.

FLORIDA PANTHERS
High point: In 1995-1996, the Panthers went 41-31-10, for 92 points to finish third in the Atlantic Division. In the “Year of the Rat” the Panthers defeated Boston 4-1, defeated the Flyers 4-2, and won a very exciting Eastern Conference Finals, beating the Penguins in game seven. The Panthers ran into an excellent Colorado Avalanche team, and were swept in the Stanley Cup Finals.

Low point: In 2001, the Panthers ended up at 22-44-10-6 to finish with just 60 points.

Right now: After starting 9-12-1 (W-L-OTL) with 19 points, the Panthers have gone on an 8-4-2 run for a current 17-16-3 record and 37 points. They are tied for second in the competitive Southeast division with Atlanta, just four points (two wins) behind Carolina.

What to do: The Panthers actually did what they needed to do. They gave up on Alex Auld and Ed Belfour, and finally properly replaced Roberto Luongo by trading for Tomas Voukoun. This team has the talent to compete and they are even better than their record would indicate. They just need to learn how to hang on to late-game leads, finish out games, and they could go pretty far. The Panthers are 11th in an Eastern Conference where second place (New Jersey, 43 points) and last place (Washington, 32 points) are separated by just 11 points, and the standings are shifting nightly. So the Panthers could be a playoff team this year, as long as they keep this strong run going.

FLORIDA MARLINS
High point: 1997 was a nice season, but the Marlins were like the Yanks that year with the payroll. That World Series win wasn’t stunning. That’s what makes 2003 the high point. That team was not expected to win, and did anyway, by beating the Yankees. Game six at Yankee Stadium may be my favorite baseball game to watch.

Low point: The Marlins have had a lot of low points too. However, the clear winner is 1998. A gutted Fish team set to defending a title that almost none of their current players actually won. That team set a record for worst won-loss margin by a defending champion, going an embarrassing 54-108, .333 winning percentage, and an amazing 52 games out first place in the NL East.

Right now: The Marlins are coming off a disappointing year. Following a surprising 2006 where first year manager Joe Girardi kept the team in contention until the last stretch (then was fired over disputes with owner Jeff Loria), new first year manager Fredi Gonzalez wasn’t quite as effective. The 2007 Marlins went 71-91, seven games worse than 2006’s 78-84. There were questions concerning whether the Marlins could afford both Miguel Cabrera and Dontrelle Willis, or would have to trade one. They answered them by trading both to the Detroit Tigers for a king’s ransom of prospects.

What to do: Build a stadium. Willis and Cabrera were traded because the Marlins could not afford them, and that’s because the Marlins cannot survive in Dolphin Stadium. Not because of location, or size, or any of that. The Marlins do not own any part of it. They are a tenant. They pay rent, they pay Wayne Huizenga to play there, and get minimal returns on concessions and parking. They need much bigger cuts of that money to be financially viable. Take the Phillies as an example. They were awful. The second they signed for a new stadium, they went out and signed guys, spent money. They are now contenders.

And it’s happening. After getting repeatedly rejected by the state, the Marlins along with the city of Miami and Miami-Dade County have formulated a plan that could not only build the Marlins a retractable-roof stadium at the Orange Bowl, but a soccer stadium as well at the same site. The plan restructures the way tax money is distributed, ensuring that other art and recreational facilities receive their money and freeing up money to help the Marlins. County Commissioners will consider the deal on January 10th, but even the most skeptical observers are saying they think this may finally be the time. Owner Jeffery Loria has stated in the media, publicly, that if the team gets a new stadium, the economic realities would change. I give Loria the chance to stick to his word and spend on the team once they actually have sufficient stadium revenue coming back.

MIAMI HURRICANES
High point: The Canes have won five national championships, but the best may have been 2001. After getting BCS’d out of a national title shot, the Canes vowed to go 12-0 and make it a null point. But coach Butch Davis had left for the NFL, leaving Larry Coker to lead the team to their desired goal. The team spent the entire season as either #1 or #2, won most of their games fairly comfortably, and defeated Nebraska 37-14 to win the title.

Low point: Right now. Larry Coker was fired after a 7-6 season, with widespread buzz that Coker’s one title had been with Davis’ players and that he couldn’t recruit his own talent. Alum and defensive coordinator Randy Shannon took over. However, the Canes had a worse season than before. They went 5-7 and will not play in a bowl game for the first time since 1999. The lowest of the low point came during the Canes’ last home game. The Hurricanes were playing their last game in the Orange Bowl after the announcement that they would leave for Dolphin Stadium. With all sorts of Hurricane alumni there, with fans and sports stars alike remembering fondly the good times of the Orange Bowl, the Hurricanes were demolished and embarrassed by Virginia Tech, 48-0.

Right now: See low point.

What to do: Not that I as a Gator fan (check out my Gator columns over at From the Swamp) necessarily want the Canes to actually improve, but for the sake of the article, the Canes need to recruit better. Word is that Shannon might do that, but the Canes are having some trouble hanging onto their current recruits as each loss became more embarrassing and the Gators look better and better. Moving to Dolphin Stadium may help with some recruits, who like big crowds and will love playing at an NFL stadium. But others, those who love tradition, will be turned off.

Sadly, right now the strongest team playing in Miami may be Miami Northwestern High School. They finished their regular season 10-0 and won the state title, only challenged in the playoffs by Broward County’s best team, Deerfield Beach. NW could probably beat the Canes, and even give the Dolphins a good run. Hopefully, the teams that call Miami (or at least South Florida) home will turn things around, and make Miami the glorious sports city it can and should be.

Sean Fowler writes about the Miami Dolphins at The Phish Tank and about University of Florida athletics at From the Swamp. His contact information can be found at The Phish Tank and From the Swamp and he welcomes all feedback. Feel free to e-mail or leave a comment.

Maybe I’m in the minority, but I remember a better time in sports.

A time in which a baseball player’s ability was natural. A time in which people, not computers, selected which teams would play in bowl games. A time in which referees betting on their games would be the furthest thing from NBA fans’ minds. A time in which an NFL player fighting dogs was, to my knowledge, nonexistent.

I’m sure lots of things went on behind closed doors that I don’t know about, but at least those potential people weren’t dumb enough to get caught like most athletes and officials are these days.

That is essentially what I don’t understand—the stupidity of these proclaimed “role models.”

It almost seems that the best on the field or court act the worst off it.

Barry Bonds is the all-time home run king—with the aid of steroids or HGH, no matter how many times he denies it. The asterisk will always be immediately linked to Bonds, and his first-ballot career may end up without a spot in the Hall of Fame.

The previous home run king, Hank Aaron, was a real hero. Like Bonds, Aaron was booed and jeered during his time in Major League Baseball. But Aaron was booed because of the color of his skin, not what he might have injected into it. Hammerin’ Hank persevered through the hate mail and racist remarks and became one of the most respected players to ever play the game. Bonds is not widely respected as the home run king because of indictments on perjury and obstruction of justice charges.

Roger Clemens has been the best pitcher in our era—however, Clemens was a surprise name printed in the infamous Mitchell Report, and he more than likely will not have a spot in Cooperstown either. He has been heralded as one of the best pitchers ever in terms of longevity, but that thought is now tainted forever.

In regard to longevity, Nolan Ryan is the best of all-time. Ryan played an MLB record 27 seasons, accumulating 5,714 strikeouts during those years. The only question of Ryan’s career is his winning percentage. Performance-enhancing drugs were never mentioned in relation to Ryan in 27 years of pitching. Clemens, however, now has to bite the bullet and come to the realization that he may never be a Hall of Fame pitcher, despite trailing only Ryan in career strikeouts.

Michael Vick is the most elusive player in the NFL—yet he gives the bird (no, not the Dirty Bird) to fans and fights countless amounts of dogs at a house that he doesn’t even use himself. He promised everyone that “Michael Vick is innocent,” but he went to jail for 23 months because he was, in fact, guilty.

Randall Cunningham is the quarterback who paved the way for Michael Vick. Cunningham is the all-time leading rusher for quarterbacks in NFL history. Unlike Vick, once Cunningham’s career was done, he returned to UNLV to complete his degree and became an ordained Protestant minister in 2004. Vick, on the other hand, will remain in prison for roughly two years.

Tim Donaghy made a lot of money by passing inside information to gamblers—it’s just too bad Donaghy forgot he was an NBA referee. NBA Commissioner David Stern, who has been at that position for nearly 24 years, called the Donaghy debacle “the worst situation that I’ve ever experienced.” Luckily, it was an isolated referee engaging in illegal gambling.

Dick Bavetta, an endeared and honest NBA referee, is the polar opposite of Donaghy. He has been in the NBA since 1975, and has never missed an assigned game. He even officiated a game solo during the 1980s, a contest in which he had to eject Larry Bird and Julius Erving for attempting to strangle each other. The most recent memory of Bavetta is his charitable foot race against Charles Barkley at the 2007 NBA All Star Game in Las Vegas. See, Bavetta was racing to raise money for the Nevada Boys and Girls Club of America, whereas Donaghy was in Vegas to make money for himself illegally.

Florida State is considered one of the top college football programs in the country—but more than 20 players were suspended for the 2007 Gaylord Hotels Music City Bowl against Kentucky for their roles in an academic cheating scandal involving an Internet-based course. Whatever happened to studying? Plus, allowing college students to take the same Internet-based course is just asking for cheating.

All of these stories relating to Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Michael Vick, Tim Donaghy and Florida State occurred at some point in 2007. Not exactly the greatest year in sports, now is it?

A return to the days of sports stories essentially being game previews and recaps would be nothing short of amazing. Columnists would still engage in opinion writing, but their level of cynicism would surely decline. Sure, negativity would still exist in sports, but that discouragement would be due to acts such as a late hit out of bounds on the gridiron or a flagrant foul on the hardwood.

Columnists and writers today are forced to report on things such as steroids, dog fighting and illegal betting. And honestly, as an aspiring sports journalist, I don’t want to write about things like that.

I want to break down the effectiveness of Phil Jackson’s triangle offense or give praise to Adrian Peterson because he overcame adversity that he encountered during his childhood. Not write about steroids, steroids and more steroids.

I don’t want to know that Alex Rodriguez signed a 10-year, $275 million deal with the New York Yankees. No one is worth that much money for playing a game.

I don’t want to know that the Boston Celtics may have been throwing games during the 2006-07 season in an attempt to draft Greg Oden or Kevin Durant.

I don’t want to know that “student-athletes” are getting arrested or suspended regularly because they’re out on the streets when they should be living up to the first word of their given title.

I wish I was experiencing the days when Lou Gehrig was considering himself the luckiest man on the face of the Earth. The days when Al Michaels asked you if you believed in miracles. The days when Jimmy Valvano told you to laugh, think and cry every day.
When I think about most of the two-faced athletes kids are looking up to today, it makes me cringe. So many young fans only know what these guys do on their respective athletic stage.

And that is not fair to the kids.

Why do these athletes continue to do wrong when they know it is deficient not only for themselves, but for their fans? I am, without a doubt, under the impression that they are not thinking of their fans—they are only thinking of themselves, endorsements and contracts.

Maybe as the sports culture shifts I should shift with it, but I know for a fact this is not the best these athletes have to offer. I wish they would forget their crazy contracts and enormous endorsements and realize there are kids looking up to them.

To round out this column, I will leave you with two of my favorite quotes.

Famous UCLA coach John Wooden once said, “Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are.” Saying that, I bet the Wizard of Westwood is disappointed in the culture of sports and a few particular athletes.

The inventor of basketball, Dr. James Naismith, said, “I am sure that no man can derive more pleasure from money or power than I do from seeing a pair of basketball goals in some out of the way place.” Well, today there aren’t many “out of the way places” and even if there were, people would want to see the green before they see the basketball goals.

If Dr. Naismith were alive, he’d be disappointed in today’s sports culture. I’m sure John Wooden is disappointed. As am I.

As I continue to pursue the title of “sports journalist,” I sincerely hope the culture of sports flip-flops to the days of less controversy.

Hopefully my optimism will outweigh the pessimism of the sporting world.

But as professional and collegiate sports become more business, entertainment and controversy oriented, I can only think of one response to my optimism about the sporting culture in which we all witness.

Don’t count on it.

Gary Lloyd writes about University of Alabama athletics at Crimson Traditions. His contact information can be found at Crimson Traditions and he welcomes all feedback. Feel free to e-mail or leave a comment.

Thursday, the Mitchell Report was released to the public. George Mitchell, the former Senate Majority Leader who now holds the title of Director of the Boston Red Sox, was commissioned by Major League Baseball to provide a full and public report on the league’s steroid problem. I’m sure that anyone reading this has already heard about it, and heard various names mentioned in the report. I just spent a few hours carefully reading the relevant sections of the 409-page PDF file (available here), and honestly, I’m disgusted.

I have avoided writing anything for MVN on this issue up until this point. I love baseball. I believe that the game is pure and beautiful. It captured my imagination as a kid just as it captured the imagination of my father and my grandfather. Every single form of media—the newspapers, television programs, weekly magazines, and sadly, even the majority of Internet blogs and publications—has told me that I should be enraged by the steroids controversy. I believe that this anger is not only contrived—it is manipulative.

I’m going to argue for two things today. First, that one should not vilify the various players named in the Mitchell Report. Second, that the steroids controversy has done nothing to cheapen the game of baseball.

So, should we go riot outside of Roger Clemens’ house?

Obviously, the answer is “no,” but a lot of people are about to get very angry at a few star players named in George Mitchell’s report. To quote the commentators of ESPN’s Pardon the Interruption:

“How much of Roger Clemens’ career came on the up-and-up?”

“How much of it is legitimate?”

“He will never recover his reputation.”

A lot of people’s reputations are going to be destroyed by the media in the next few days. Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte, Eric Gagne, Miguel Tejada and others were named by George Mitchell as steroids and HGH users, and their families and friends will pay for it over the next few weeks, and maybe even longer. And they don’t deserve it one bit.

The Mitchell Report, despite all the hoopla, was very limited in size and scope. All of these revelations essentially stem from two people: Brian McNamee, a trainer hired by Roger Clemens and the New York Yankees, and Kirk Radomski, a clubhouse attendant for the New York Mets. In addition to that, we know about several names from the BALCO investigation, some second-hand confessions relayed to us by Larry Bigbie, and a handful of major league players who tested positive.

What does this tell us? It tells us that a lot of MLB players did steroids. We only know the identity of a fraction of steroids users—because you can be assured that every clubhouse in the game had guys like Radomski and McNamee. Steroids were a relatively cheap and an easy form of performance enhancement, and the benefits (money, fame, team success, job security) far outweighed the potential bodily harms in the eyes of users.

A lot has been made of the conspiracy theory that George Mitchell has Red Sox ties and that no major Red Sox players were named in this report. Despite the ridiculousness of this allegation, it illustrates a great point: we only have information from players who passed through the Yankees, Mets and those who passed by Larry Bigbie’s locker. George Mitchell went after what evidence he was able to find—which was limited, and relies upon hearsay from sources that have much to benefit from naming star players while they are being threatened with jail time.

We should not single out those who were caught for abuse, asterisks, ridicule or suspensions. Steroids were (and still are) an institutional problem in baseball, not a problem of individual players. Major League Baseball has instituted the harshest drug testing policy of any of the “Big 4” American sports leagues. The institutional problem is on its way to being solved. Any attempt to vilify individual players is nothing more than kicking the dog—it accomplishes nothing, but makes us feel a little better.

Have steroids cheapened baseball for us?

I got a text message this morning from a friend saying, “Roger Clemens is in the Mitchell Report! More records with asterisks. …” Clemens and Bonds could arguably go down as the greatest pitcher and hitter of all time. Should their records no longer matter because of all of this? I say that they should stay absolutely unblemished. Like it or not, cheating is a part of baseball. There are cheaters in the hall of fame. There are cheaters who hold big-time records in baseball. There are cheaters that we will never know about but nevertheless scored a few extra hits here due to a corked bat or hit an extra home run there due to sign stealing.

Whitey Ford is one of the greatest, if not the greatest, pitcher in New York Yankees history. His career .690 winning percentage is the highest in MLB history among pitchers with 300 starts, and he still holds the second-longest World Series scoreless inning streak. Whitey Ford has admitted to throwing every illegal pitch in the book—spitballs, greaseballs, scuffed balls; you name it, Whitey threw it. Does he deserve an asterisk? Gaylord Perry, who won over 300 games and was inducted into the Hall of Fame, and managed a career 3534 strikeouts. He was called “The Greatest Cheater of Them All” in Derek Zumstreg’s book, The Cheater’s Guide to Baseball.

Sammy Sosa used a corked bat. So did Norm Cash, who won the batting title in 1961. Does Cash deserve an asterisk? No, he does not. He doesn’t deserve an asterisk because we don’t know if that corked bat helped or hurt him. We don’t know if he bought two dozen hits or three hits. We don’t know if Barry Bonds would have hit 761 home runs without steroids or 589. We don’t know if Mark McGwire broke Roger Maris’ record because he used steroids or because from the time he was a freshman in high school he was the best home run hitter wherever he played.

We don’t know how many home runs Babe Ruth would hit if he played 19 games a year in Citizen’s Bank Ballpark, or if he had to face tougher competition from the negro leagues. We don’t know if Sammy Sosa’s home run surge was due to steroids or due to smaller ballparks, better equipment, a league-wide pitching deficiency, a corked bat or just a really strong year from the slugger. We don’t know if Roger Clemens would have won 330 games or just six Cy Youngs if he didn’t (allegedly) take steroids. And you know something? It isn’t that big of a deal.

I understand that the record numbers (755, 61) that we all grew up with seem sacred. If we don’t put asterisks next to the new marks, do we risk them being polluted for future generations? Of course we don’t. In the words of Keith Olberman, “History takes care of these things.” People will understand that sometimes mounds get lowered, equipment gets better, ballparks get smaller, wars interfere and things change in general. You don’t need to be a genius to know that Todd Helton’s .332/.430/.583 career batting line doesn’t come close to comparing to Jimmie Fox’s .325/.428/.609 career line, and baseball fans will sort things out.

People adjust. History adjusts. Records adjust. Don’t worry—the game will live on.

E.J. Fagan writes about the New York Yankees’ minor-league organization at Pending Pinstripes and about the New York Yankees’ major-league organization at The Bronx Block. His contact information can be found at Pending Pinstripes and The Bronx Block and he welcomes all feedback. Feel free to e-mail or leave a comment.

I constantly hear people clamoring for a salary cap in Major League Baseball. Fans have an image of a broken league where money rules all and the little guys just can’t win. However, the empirical evidence clearly states otherwise: that Major League Baseball is as competitive now as ever.

There are two (logically flawed) reasons that I’ve heard fans use to justify a salary cap:

1. High Salaries encourage high ticket and concession prices
2. A salary cap would alleviate competitive balance issues in baseball

Would a salary cap make it cheaper for me to go to the Stadium?

Baseball games are ridiculously expensive. It can cost a family of four close to four hundred dollars for an afternoon in good seats at Yankee Stadium. A salary cap would lower payroll expenses for MLB teams, so wouldn’t this mean they wouldn’t have to charge so much to compensate?

Unfortunately, that’s now how a business works. The Yankees will maximize revenue by charging the as much as people will pay for tickets – just like any other product. The high ticket prices in baseball stem from a supply and demand problem. Baseball stadiums haven’t grown much in size in recent years – Yankee Stadium held 55,000 in 1980, and 55,000 today. A lot more people want to watch the Yankees than did in 1980. Supply stays the same, and Demand increases, causing price to increase.

I think that an important issue arises here: who does a salary cap hurt? We’ll talk about competitive balance in a second, but let’s look at this just in the context of money. Fans play the same. Owners, theoretically, collect the same. However, the players lose out. Any salary cap would necessarily mean less money going to the players, money which they deserve.

I’m going to go out on a limb here at state that MLB players are underpaid. That’s not a popular sentiment among baseball fans – pretty much everyone reading this article would play for the Yankees for free – but its reality. The players are the product. Tens of thousands are willing to pay huge sums to come out and watch them play every day. Millions will watch them on television, buy their merchandise, and do all the things fans pay to do. However, the owners have a favorable system in place to hold down salaries – the draft, entry level salary structure, and a favorable arbitration system. When players are at the height of their athletic careers, between the ages of 25 and 29 for most, the free market cannot determine their salary.

Revenues have risen much faster than salaries in recent years. Over the past two off-seasons, the gap has narrowed, but the free agent problem persists. Miguel Cabrera was worth much more to his team than the 7.4 million he was paid in 2007. Owners certainly deserve some money – they take investment risks, provide facilities, marketing, and branding, but I don’t think anyone can argue that they deserve a higher proportion than the status quo.

Luckily, the salary structure of baseball has a very beneficial side effect: It ensures a competitive league.

Would a salary cap solve a competitive balance problem in baseball?

I’m going to tackle this in two steps. First off, I’ll ask is there a competitive balance problem in baseball? Second, I’ll ask what would a salary cap do?

There is no competitive balance problem in baseball. None at all. Parity in baseball is so healthy that personally, I think that it’s ridiculous that it’s even a question. The best team in the MLB last year had a winning percentage of 59.3 %. The Boston Red Sox – owners of a 140+ million dollar payroll, couldn’t even win 60% of the time The worst team in baseball, the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, managed a 40.7% winning percentage. What does that mean? I means that if I’m a fan of the worst team in baseball, I’ll still see my team win roughly 3 out of every 7 games.

Let’s compare this to the NFL – a salary capped leagues. In the NFL, the average winning percentage for a last place team was 27.3%. Two teams – the Oakland Raiders and Detroit Lions – weren’t able to crack 20%. The worst teams in Football win half as much as the worst teams in baseball. Five teams posted winning percentages over 75%. The NFL has some non-cap related issues here – namely the 16 game schedule, but it helps to put baseball in perspective. Imagine being an Oakland Raiders fan? Why even show up?

What about the playoffs? Since the Yankee dynasty was broken up in 2001, only five teams in the American League and four teams in the National League have failed to make the playoffs. Five years! Over 2/3 of baseball fans have had the opportunity to watch their team in October baseball in a very short period of time. I’m no expert on the NFL, but I’d wager that less than 2/3 of NFL teams in the past five years have made the post-season.

Winning in the playoffs? Since the Yankee dynasty ended, only three teams have managed to make two World Series – the Cardinals, Yankees and the Red Sox, and only the Red Sox were able to win. The Giants, Marlins, Yankees, Angels, Diamondbacks, Astros, Rockies, Red Sox, Cardinals, and White Sox are a diverse group. They come from large, medium, and small markets.

What would a salary cap do? Would a salary cap really make the Pirates competitive? No it wouldn’t. The only thing that would have made the Pirates competitive would have been intelligent management. Salary cap or not, poor organizations aren’t going to win ballgames. Teams that start Angel Berroa at shortstop for years, insist upon treating Mike Sweeney like a real hitter, or throw in Oliver Perez to a trade without the opposing GM asking for him are going to lose, and it’s their own fault. It sucks to be a fan watching your team waste away, but it has nothing to do with a salary cap. The Marlins are still going to maintain a pitifully low payroll compared to their competition whether their competition is spending 120 million or 95 million.

Eventually, smart people will replace stupid people in the Pirates organization, and stupid people will replace smart people in the Braves organization. It’s the nature cycle of baseball. We’re seeing one smart GM’s work with the Dodgers being dismantled by a stupid one, distributing talent throughout the league. We saw the Colorado Rockies build a team on scant resources into a World Series contender – one that should stick together for a few more years at least. We’re seeing the Arizona Diamondbacks, Milwaukee Brewers and Tampa Bay Devil Rays assemble potential powerhouses, using young and talented players combine with good scouting and good timing.

They are able to do so because baseball’s current economic structure allows them to do so. Player development is cheap – the salaries of two dozen scouts is often far less than the salary of one major league player. Returns on investment are high because young players are paid peanuts. Ryan Braun didn’t even make 380,000 dollars this year. Phil Hughes made less for the full season than Roger Clemens each start. Miguel Cabrera made half of what Scott Rolen makes. Clubs are able to control these players during the prime of their career – the average free agent doesn’t hit the market until he is 28 or 29 years old.

Free agency is a gambler’s market. Teams spend a lot of money on often uncertain investments. Mike Mussina was paid 19 million dollars in 2006 at the age of 37 because when he was 31, he was among the game’s top pitchers. Teams can spend a lot of money, but the reality of long term deals often means teams end up with dead weight on their roster – the Yankees have Jason Giambi, the Dodgers have Juan Pierre, the Athletics had Jason Kendall, and so on. Spending more money on free agents creates a system of diminishing returns – decreasing monetary advantage.

Money isn’t the problem. Management is. Baseball teams are getting smarter, which is highlighting the differences between the good managers and the bad managers. The Rockies learned their lesson. The Devil Rays are learning their lesson. The Baltimore Orioles, Texas Rangers, and San Francisco Giants clearly are going the other way. But that’s an issue for another day. It has nothing to do with a salary cap. Can’t we stop being distracted by this issue and focus on baseball?

E.J. Fagan writes about the New York Yankees minor league organization at Pending Pinstripes and about the New York Yankees major league organization at The Bronx Block. His contact information can be found at Pending Pinstripes and The Bronx Block and he welcomes all feedback. Feel free to e-mail or leave a comment.