5 Things To Watch This Weekend In Sports

1.  Final regular season games in the NHL on Saturday - Early you get Blackhawks/Redwings which will demonstrate skill and Flyers/Penguins which features bad blood and a meaningless game before their 1st Round series.  Late you get Kings/Sharks who played one of the chippiest regular season games that I have seen in years and Maple Leafs/Canadiens who do not like each other and will play a hard hitting game in my opinion.

2.  Thursday, Stan Van Gundy came out and dropped a bombshell about knowing that Dwight Howard went to management and asked for a new head coach.  Well, the thing is that Howard didn't know what Van Gundy had done and came to clown around in front of the press and got blindsided by the press.  Now, the question is what do the Magic do now with the behind the scenes rumors of Howard and Van Gundy battling coming out into full view?  If you are going to get rid of Van Gundy and you have about 10 games left, you need to get rid of him now so your team can gel behind the new head coach, whomever that may be.  I have a feeling that the Magic will have a new head coach by Monday morning.

3.  The first weekend of regular season baseball.  For now, the dreams of fans for each and every team getting to the playoffs is still alive.  Heck, even Pittsburgh Pirates fans are talking smack about how their team can be the surprise team of the year.  My son has become a Chicago Cubs fan.  Talk about wanting a lifetime of heartbreak and pain.  Oh well, he will learn.

4.  Bobby Petrino down in Arkansas.  If you don't know about this, Bobby Petrino was riding his motorcycle and crashed.  Seems like an open and shut case.  He is riding solo and went too fast around a corner and bit it.  He said that we was riding the motorcycle and the next thing he remembers is that he is looking up at the sky.  Well, now the story is changing.  First, he picked up a 25-year old football program employee who is an Arkansas graduate before he crashed.  The employee is the student-athlete development coordinator.  She is in charge of organizing the recruiting process for the football team.  And that isn't the worst part here.  The reason that Petrino says that he had people lie about him being alone on the cycle and didn't tell the AD about the employee being on the bike is that he didn't want "an inappropriate relationship to become public".  Translation:  The 52 year-old Head Football Coach and the 25 year-old Female in the football program had physical contact without pads or a helmet that is worn around the human skull.

5.  The Saints appeals of their penalties from Bountygate.  It is nice to see that the talk of eliminating people on the football field by tearing up ankles, ACLs and other injuries was alive and well during the playoff games this past year from the Saints.  The only thing that I gleamed from the audio tapes coming out that showed Gregg Williams doing his pep talk is that Joe Vitt deserved more than 6 games during his suspension.  He is the assistant Head coach and willingly sat there and listened to the "rogue" Defensive Coordinator do things that the Saints allegedly told him that they would not abide by.  Right.  And the Unicorn that I have in my backyard likes eating cotton candy.  The Saints and the employees that appealed should have their penalties upheld and the players should start receiving their penalties as soon as possible.  And to Saints fans:  Stop crying about how unfair this is.  Your team broke the NFL rules and now have to pay the consequences.  The bounty program was in place for 3 years.  Sean Payton is a repeat offender.  And Tom Benson is an owner who has only had success when his team is running as an outlaw program.  So take the penalties, be happy that the NFL isn't going to suspend most of the players and doesn't take an even more hard stance in light of all the things that stink coming from the Superdome.