The BBWAA needs to figure out the Hall of Fame Voting Process

The process of voting people into the MLB Hall of Fame has become worse than an absolute joke. We had a voter give his vote to deadspin.com, we had voters decide that they would not vote for anyone that was in their first year of eligibility, we had voters decide that they knew who had used PEDs and who hadn't, we had voters say that they weren't voting for anybody in the performance enhancing era, and we had voters who voted for Hideo Nomo. Let's start arguing against what this voting has become.

But before we do that, let's congratulate what the BBWAA did right. All three men that were voted into the hall of fame should have been. Tom Glavine, Greg Maddux, and Frank Thomas all were good enough and put up the statistics to be Hall of Famers. Glavine was a 305 Game winner, 2 Cy Youngs and was an All-Star 10 times. Maddux was even more spectacular with his stats. 355 Wins, 4 Cy Youngs and 18 Gold Gloves. Thomas was a Back-to-back MVP of tha AL and blasted 521 Home Runs. OK, since we have that good out of the way, let's start talking about the bad.

Found On Twitter This Evening

Enough said. #Broncos pic.twitter.com/UYkGPxHtnA

— Camille Serna (@milaboo01) January 13, 2014

All of the Chargers fans that came out of the closet (or jumped on the bandwagon) this week can go back to their lives. If they saved the receipts for all the merchandise they bought I’m sure they can get their money back. LOL!

Blow It All Up

I’m happy I have a well rounded sports fan’s life. If I did nothing else than follow the NHL I’d be looking for a tall bridge (Coronado? Laurel Street?) to jump off of soon.

The Leafs are in free fall. Coach Randy Carlyle (along with General Manager Dave Nonis) rid the team of talented support players over the summer, and the ones that remain for the most part have tuned him out. The team is badly underachieving, and on most nights are outshot by a near 2-to-1 ratio.

Changes need to be made, but Carlyle isn’t the only one that needs to go. Nonis and the rest of the half dozen general managers the Leafs employ have to walk the plank, too. Consider the following:

• The Leafs have had little to no cap space to work with this season. When injuries hit the team hard at center, Nonis had no other options but to recall players that either were not ready for the NHL (Trevor Smith) or were no longer NHL caliber (Jerred Smithson) to fill the void.
• Nonis signed David Clarkson to a seven-year contract, which would have been a great signing if he didn’t give him a contract that will pay him $7 million a year in his mid-thirties. If the season ended today, Clarkson would have been paid $562,500 per point for 2013-14.
• RFAs Nazem Kadri and Cody Franson had to accept lesser contracts this season due to Nonis’s cap mismanagement.
• Nonis gave Dion Phaneuf a seven-year contract extension that will pay him more than what Norris Trophy winner Duncan Keith will earn during that same time period.
• Nonis gave Tyler Bozak a lengthy extension, which is troubling since he’s the first line center by default. He’s a second-line center at best.
• Nonis jettisoned Clarke MacArthur, who is flourishing with the rival Ottawa Senators.
• Any prospect the Leafs have that’s worth anything is already in the Leafs lineup. All you have in the minors are warm bodies.

This team needs a change, but firing Carlyle isn’t enough. They need change at the top. Fire Carlyle. Fire Nonis. Fire the rest of the GMs in the fancy suites that have damaged this team for the rest of this decade.

Three-Peat For NDSU

On Saturday, while most of the fans were braving -50 and -60 Wind Chills in North Dakota, the Bison played the Towson Tigers in Frisco, TX. It was the closest game for the Bison during the 2013 playoffs. We only won by 28 points, 35-7.

This team is one for the ages. The Defense was ranked #1 in total defense, scoring defense, and turnovers among other things. The team went undefeated. It won it's third straight National Title. The coach is moving on to another challenge. 26 Seniors are leaving the team. Think that the dynasty is over? We will see. The Defensive Coordinator is taking over the program. The belief is that the defense will stay the same and if it does, the Bison will continue to be a favorite from the Missouri Valley conference to advance to the playoffs and make some noise.

The man that started it all 11 years ago is leaving for Wyoming. Here is how most Bison fans will remember the aftermath of the 2013 Championship Game:

 

Thanks for the memories, Coach Bohl. Go Cowboys!

NFL Pick 'Em - The Playoffs

The first round of NFL Playoff Picks are in and George is in the lead.  No bragging at this point--not yet, we still have several games to go. 

2013 NFL Pick 'Em Champion: The Zebster

The gang has concluded yet another year of successful team pick 'ems, with our host, Zeb, from outer Mainegolia, coming in as the 2013 champion with overall points (total correct picks for the season) totaling 165!  Zeb unseats Rick who was last year's champ:



  Zeb:  165 pts             RJ:  148 pts
  BK: 163 pts                George: 144 pts 
  Mike:  161 pts           Rick:  140 pts
  AA:  154 pts               Tom:  140 pts
  
Our Week 17 summary found Zeb with a near perfect 15 picks:

  Zeb:  15 wins
  Mike:  14 wins
  Rick:  13 wins
  BK: 12 wins
  AA: 12 wins
  RJ:  11 wins
  George:  11 wins
  Tom:  0 wins

Total Weekly Wins:  We have a tie between BK and RJ, both with 4 weekly wins.  We will use the first round of the Playoffs to determine the tie-breaker in this category.

  BK: 4 wins

  RJ: 4 wins
  Zeb:  3 wins
  George: 2 wins
  Rick 1.5 wins
  Tom:  1 win
  AA:  1 win
  Mike:  .5 win