1. Peter King's mailbag brings up the question of whether Pat Tillman should be voted into the Hall of Fame or not in his mailbag.
So one of the controversies of the day Monday, via e-mails and Twitter, centered on Pat Tillman and whether his valiant life, tragic death and turning down NFL millions to join the Army Rangers in the war in Afghanistan merits a spot in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
He absolutely does not deserve to be in the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He was a good player, but the Pro Football Hall of Fame is for players who excelled ON THE FIELD, not for players who did great deeds off the field. Character is a part of the judgment process (knowingly or unknowingly used in some respects I am sure by the committee), but is used in conjunction with what a player did on the field.
Cris Collinsworth has advanced this cause often since Tillman's death in 2004, and it has gained some traction. The Tillman story is truly an amazing one. He was a seventh-round pick of the Arizona Cardinals in 1998, worked his way into their starting lineup, made Dr. Z's all-pro team in 2000, played four years, and, on the verge of earning a $3.6-million free-agent contract in 2002, quit football to serve his country.
I am pretty sure Cris Collinsworth's opinion being in favor of it, being a late round pick and eventually starting for an NFL team, making Dr. Z's All-Pro team, and giving up a million dollar contract are not criteria to be in the Hall of Fame. So the fact Tillman has been awarded these honors does not sway me.
I couldn't feel more strongly about this. If you put Tillman in the Hall of Fame, every other NFL player who served in the military deserves an opportunity to have his name heard for enshrinement as well...or at least consideration for enshrinement.
Peter actually agrees with me on this issue, which makes me reassess my opinion. Of course, Peter does bring up some valid points.
The Pro Football Hall of Fame is for what men do on the football field.
In the 90-year history of the NFL, 24 young men who played in the league died serving the U.S. Google Bob Kalsu, the Bills lineman who died in Vietnam. If Tillman goes in, should the other 23 also be enshrined?
Do selectors (I'm one of the 44 with a Hall of Fame vote) stop at only military heroes, or do we enshrine other footballers who go on to do great things in life? Byron "Whizzer'' White went from running back to the Supreme Court. Should he get in? Jack Kemp, the great quarterback-turned-politician?
All very good points. I actually haven't even heard a good argument from someone who says Tillman should be in the Hall of Fame. Cris Collinsworth is absolutely wrong to encourage the enshrinement of Tillman. Not only would enshrining Tillman put a player in the Pro Football Hall of Fame for non-football reasons, it is also a somewhat slap in the fact to other NFL players who have served in the military. Why is Tillman more important than they are? Was his death more important for some reason than the other NFL players who have died in combat?
Let's leave it at the fact Tillman was a great guy, a great football player and a war hero. That should be enough.
MOSS WILL BE MOSS. "What do you make of the latest news regarding Randy Moss cutting ties with his agent? Is this a sign he wants out of New England after next season?''
--Jeb, Bath, Maine
PK: As far as the agent change, Moss told Ian Rapoport of the Boston Herald that he feels he's been short-changed in the endorsement department. I doubt he did that with an eye on breaking the bank in 2011, though I'm sure in eight months that will be his focus.
I can't believe Randy Moss would actually feel like he has been shortchanged in the endorsement department because of his agent. What a fucking crock. If anyone shortchanged his endorsement possibilities it was Randy Moss himself...by hitting a police officer with a car, his statement of "I play when I want to play," the general feeling that he actually does only play when he wants to, his history of marijuana use and when he pretended to moon the Lambeau Field crowd. Those events all affected how he was perceived by the public and probably hurt his endorsement opportunities. The guy he looks like in the mirror affected his endorsements, not his agent.
"Peter, regarding the New York/New Jersey 2014 Super Bowl, you state that you're against it because people will pay ridiculously high prices to sit in the cold and possible inclement weather for over 5 hours. My response -- then don't come to the game!! For too long, we have complained that at least 50 percent of those people who go to the Super Bowl have no idea what's going on. Maybe a Super Bowl out in the cold will only attract real football fans who have some knowledge of the sport and actually want to be there to see the game.
--Brad, New York
PK: I got your point loud and clear. But the one thing you must remember is the coat-and-tie set will be coming to this game -- or scalping their seats for $5,000 or $6,000 apiece.
Again, this is simple economics. The coat-and-tie set won't be able to get $5,000 or $6,000 for a seat if there is no one willing to pay that amount. It is not a given that scalpers will be able to get their asking price for the seats. If prices are lowered maybe other fans will be able to come to the game. It is a possibility.
When/If the coat-and-tie set don't like the look of the weather, they will either give the tickets away or sell them to someone. Assuming the Super Bowl is not as an attractive ticket due to the weather, this would presumably cause the price of the tickets to go down. Under the assumption the Super Bowl isn't a hot ticket, $5,000-$6,000 for a seat may an overestimate.
Will the average Joe pay that much to see a football game, albeit a historic one? I doubt it.
The average Joe may not have to pay that much. That's the point of the question. If no one wants to attend the game because of the threat of sleet, snow, or the fact it is in New Jersey, then the demand for tickets will go down and the price will go down as well. The point of the question was that if the lure of a Super Bowl ticket in bad weather causes fewer people to want tickets, wouldn't this lower the ticket price so that they would be more affordable to the "average" NFL fan and not guys like Gregg Easterbrook?
I'm not saying the price for tickets will go down no matter what, but one of the major concerns I don't have about the Super Bowl in New Jersey is ensuring the price of the tickets are high enough or ensuring the stadium is as full as possible. I don't care how high the ticket prices are and if the concern is whether those who can afford expensive tickets will make it to the game or not...well that is a concern I don't share. Many, many more people watch the game on television anyway and enjoy it, so it is not like the entire Super Bowl experience would be ruined if the stadium isn't completely full or there is some snow on the field.
Again, this is simple economics. The coat-and-tie set won't be able to get $5,000 or $6,000 for a seat if there is no one willing to pay that amount. It is not a given that scalpers will be able to get their asking price for the seats. If prices are lowered maybe other fans will be able to come to the game. It is a possibility.
When/If the coat-and-tie set don't like the look of the weather, they will either give the tickets away or sell them to someone. Assuming the Super Bowl is not as an attractive ticket due to the weather, this would presumably cause the price of the tickets to go down. Under the assumption the Super Bowl isn't a hot ticket, $5,000-$6,000 for a seat may an overestimate.
Will the average Joe pay that much to see a football game, albeit a historic one? I doubt it.
The average Joe may not have to pay that much. That's the point of the question. If no one wants to attend the game because of the threat of sleet, snow, or the fact it is in New Jersey, then the demand for tickets will go down and the price will go down as well. The point of the question was that if the lure of a Super Bowl ticket in bad weather causes fewer people to want tickets, wouldn't this lower the ticket price so that they would be more affordable to the "average" NFL fan and not guys like Gregg Easterbrook?
I'm not saying the price for tickets will go down no matter what, but one of the major concerns I don't have about the Super Bowl in New Jersey is ensuring the price of the tickets are high enough or ensuring the stadium is as full as possible. I don't care how high the ticket prices are and if the concern is whether those who can afford expensive tickets will make it to the game or not...well that is a concern I don't share. Many, many more people watch the game on television anyway and enjoy it, so it is not like the entire Super Bowl experience would be ruined if the stadium isn't completely full or there is some snow on the field.
2. I have always felt a little bit odd about Jay Glazer's MMA training of NFL players and his job as an NFL reporter. It just seems like a conflict of interest to me.
Jeff Pearlman does too.
When he’s not reporting on NFL players and teams, Glazer, ahem, works for NFL players and teams.
I have absolutely nothing against Jay Glazer and love how he scoops ESPN for stories, but I see a natural conflict of interest in Glazer being employed by NFL teams to train players in MMA and working in a field where he reports NFL-related stories. It just feels like a conflict of interest to me.
I know there are conflicts of interest throughout sports in regard to writers co-authoring books with athletes. It's not like Jay Glazer is the only one to do this. So it is not like Glazer is the only one who does this.
SportsbyBrooks makes this very point in this well-written article. I think there is a difference in writing a book with a manager or athlete and having a business relationship with an entire team of athletes. I also understand the teams in the NFL may not have a problem with Glazer's arrangement. That's fine, whether NFL teams think Glazer's relationship between his MMA business and teams in the NFL really doesn't have an effect on my opinion of this situation, nor should it.
SportsbyBrooks makes the point that Jeff Pearlman is essentially a hypocrite because Rick Reilly has written books with athletes and he used to work for SI. I know Pearlman mentioned in his post the policy at SI about accepting gifts from athletes or teams, but I don't think he was holding SI up as the moral center of sports web sites or magazines. I don't think the fact Rick Reilly has a close relationship with athletes when he was working for SI makes Jeff Pearlman a hypocrite or cause him to have any less of a point simply because he just happens to work for SI now. That's a weak point. Because Rick Reilly happened to share the same employer has Jeff Pearlman did doesn't mean Pearlman is wrong or SI didn't have the majority of their writers follow the policy they had. Reilly plays by his own rules. We have seen that from the self-plagiarized columns he puts out.
So I do get the opposite view of this and I know everyone doesn't have a problem with Glazer's duties for FOX and his MMA business. I don't have a huge problem, I just think it does bring up questions about stories that Glazer may not report and the fact he has a relationship with players and NFL teams where they can be his client and the subject of a news story by him.
He is a mixed martial arts trainer whose clients include two franchises (the Falcons and Rams) and, apparently, dozens of players, ranging from Ryan Grant to Patrick Willis to Matt Leinart. As in, they pay him for his services.
I know Jay Glazer is merely a reporter, but it feels wrong that he reports on the very same people who pay him to train them in MMA. I have always felt this way since I heard he was mixing his MMA with his relationships with NFL players. How can his reporting not be affected by the fact the Falcons pay him to work with their players on MMA?
This, journalistically, is a joke. An embarrassing, pathetic, worst-of-its-kind joke.
I wouldn't go this far. Anytime Jay Mariotti is still writing, he takes the cake as the biggest journalistic joke, but I would definitely agree that Jay Glazer has a conflict of interest. Perhaps if he didn't work directly with the NFL players and it was just his company that did the MMA training I would feel differently. That's not the case though. He is very hands-on and trains the players himself.
As clients, these players certainly expect—and receive—a high level of confidentiality. To work out under someone’s watch is to provide him with incredible access; access you don’t want displayed to the public.
It is not even the working out part of it as much for me, but more the fact these players pay him for a service and in spending so much time with them he probably does learn some stuff about them that the public doesn't know, but an NFL reporter would usually report.
So what if Glazer hears Leinart calling a hooker? What if he sees Cushing (funny example) poppin ‘roids? What if he doesn’t think Grant is an especially hard worker? Does he sleep on the information, or does he ruin his ties with the players by reporting it?
My question, and this is where the conflict of interest lies, is when is Glazer not a reporter and a MMA trainer and when is he a MMA trainer and not a reporter? The line is blurred to me. If he asks Brian Cushing how the team is looking and Cushing says terrible and gives a specific example about why, shouldn't Glazer report this? This is NFL news.
Glazer's answer to this is they don't discuss football. How can they not talk about football? Because I don't believe it would be possible. That's the biggest thing Glazer and his NFL clients have in common. It just seems like it would be a natural discussion.
The answer is obvious: He sleeps on it.
We don't know this for sure, but we could guess Glazer cares more about the Glazer MMA brand than his standing as an NFL reporter for FOX.
On his Twitter page, Glazer was bragging about attending Jared Allen’s recent wedding. A. If you’re covering the NFL, you don’t befriend (closely) a player, and you sure as hell don’t attend his wedding. Again, what if Jared Allen gets drunk and vomits all over the cake?
That's not really NFL news anyway.
What if he punches Brett Favre?
Then I want pictures.
This violates more journalistic standards than one can count. Even if Glazer is completely unbiased (a human impossibility), perception outweighs reality. How can anyone take his reporting seriously? How can anyone believe they’re getting the full story? All the details?
Therein lies my problem. I have always liked Glazer as the incredibly competent antidote to the ESPN NFL reporters. He is sort of a one-man wrecking crew when it comes to getting stories, but there isn't any way his two gigs don't overlap and don't eventually become a conflict.
Glazer did report over Twitter on Thursday the Falcons were suspending Quinn Ojinnaka, but this was going to be reported anyway and I am concerned with the stories that Glazer finds out about and aren't or won't be public knowledge at some point.
Glazer told the Times he’s not trying to be a regular NFL reporter; that he’s trying to “build a brand.”
This annoys the shit out of me even more. Then quit your gig as the FOX NFL reporter and start doing MMA training full-time. He is essentially using his job as the FOX reporter to get new clients for his business, which isn't an issue, except for the fact he very well could be violating some of the integrity of journalism when these two jobs overlap. I like Jay Glazer and I like to hear him report stories, but he is blurring some lines in my opinion.
How can FOX not care about this? I know they like the fact he scoops ESPN, but there will come a time when he has to report honestly on a player/team he is training. Even if he reports the entire story honestly, there will still be the feeling he hasn't done so completely because many people will think he knows more or is holding something back. The perception is the issue. That's the problem I see.
3. Now for the most controversial umpire call in many, many years. Yes, I am talking about Jim Joyce blowing the perfect game for Armando Galarraga with a terrible "safe" call at first base. It was a horrible call and I am amazed an umpire as good as Jim Joyce missed the call.
There has already been a web site dedicated to getting Jim Joyce fired, though I think the guy who writes there means it purely tongue-in-cheek.
I've been watching baseball for a long time and that isn't the worst call I have ever seen. I have seen worse, but it certainly is one of the most historic bad-calls I have ever heard. I am not going to tear Jim Joyce a new asshole simply because he has been a man and admitted he was wrong. I am beyond impressed with how Galarraga, the Tigers, and the Tigers fans took the bad call. There were fans who cheered when Joyce came on the field on Thursday, Galarraga didn't choke Joyce to death ( which I would most likely do), and the Tigers even were pretty calm about it in the clubhouse after the game. That's probably better than I could have done.
Joyce made a terrible call and he ruined history. The fact he came out and publicly admitted he missed the call and obviously felt incredibly bad about it, doesn't make up for it, but it at least shows he isn't the ego-driven type of umpire we have seen make bad calls recently.
Because we live in a 24/7 news cycle this has brought up a whole new set of questions about instant replay. I am in favor of expanding replay, just not to balls and strikes. I think each manager should have the ability to challenge one umpire call per game that doesn't have to do with balls and strikes. It doesn't take long to check on the instant replay for home runs and I really don't think this would slow the game up too much. I am not in favor of expanding replay much more than that.
Balls and strikes shouldn't be reviewable and I am not sure how it would be handled if catch was called in the outfield when it wasn't a catch. It doesn't seem fair that a runner may have been able to advance more than one base if a catch was originally called by the umpire on a fly ball, but it ends up being a hit on instant replay. I think in this case, the runners should get to move ahead one base. Baseball rules award the baserunner two bases on a ground rule double when many times if the ball had stayed in play a runner on 1st base would have scored. So there is a precedent in baseball for just awarding a certain amount of bases to a runner, even though he could have conceivably advanced further.
I am glad there hasn't been a huge outcry against Joyce, because he didn't mean to such a bad call and obviously feels terrible about it. I am glad MLB and Bud Selig didn't overturn the call and make it a perfect game for Galarraga. It's done already and I don't think baseball should set a precedent of overturning bad calls. Galarraga pitched a perfect game in my mind and changing a bad call by an umpire in a game is a slippery slope. Why is that game more important than a game in July between the Cardinals-Dodgers that may be decided by a bad call? MLB can't go back and change all the bad calls. It's better to just know Galarraga threw a perfect game, even though the record books don't show it. The record books also show Barry Bonds is the all-time home run king and we know that isn't true either.
4. Tom Brady seems to have a sort of disconnect with Patriots management over his training in California instead of being with the team. At least that is what Mike Silver is reporting.
Remember the MMQB from May 10, when Peter King painted Tom Brady as dedicated to the team even though he wasn't around the team for most of the summer? A player has a right to be away from his team if the mini-camps are optional, but Peter didn't really mention what the Patriots may have thought about Brady staying away from optional practices. Brady seemed pretty standoff-ish that people may think he isn't dedicated to the team, but I wonder what he thinks about the fact the Patriots may be a group that is concerned about his dedication?
New England’s most beloved sports hero will be a fixture at the Pats’ training facility in Foxborough, planning to hang around at least through the team’s June 15-17 minicamp.
Then Brady will likely return to Los Angeles, where he has spent the bulk of his time since the Pats’ 33-14 playoff defeat to the Baltimore Ravens last January, and where he and his wife, supermodel Gisele Bundchen, are having a sizeable home built.
This story, at least from my point of view, isn't that Brady is not in New England with the Patriots. Brady will still have a great year no matter where he trains, so there may be no problem on that end. The story is that Peter King painted a rosy picture (surprise, surprise) of Brady just wanting to be with this family and didn't mention the Patriots were fine with this or not.
This is one of the biggest problems I have with Peter King. He is supposed to be an NFL insider, doesn't he or shouldn't he know the Patriots aren't exactly thrilled Brady isn't staying in town with the team? Wouldn't that be a phone call Peter would make to find out what the Patriots think about this? Maybe he tried, but since Peter is so well-connected how did Mike Silver report this story, but Peter King wasn't able to? I know Peter King loves his puff pieces, but I feel like if he is going to report on Brady being in California, he should throw in some information about how the Patriots feel about it. He wouldn't have to make it a big expose or anything, but if Mike Silver can find out stuff like the following...
Make no mistake – there has been a cool distance between Brady, who turns 33 in August, and the organization over the past few months, and not just of the physical variety.
Conversely, the Patriots’ brass, now experiencing a third consecutive offseason in which their California-raised quarterback has spent a sizeable chunk of time away from the team’s facility, would probably welcome some assurances that the quarterback is content to remain on the East Coast.
To Brady’s credit, he is highly motivated by a desire to be close to his elder son, even though Kraft told ESPNBoston.com in March he’d prefer that Brady “be here the whole offseason” and it’s reasonable to conclude that coach Bill Belichick feels similarly.
These are the sorts of thoughts and quotes that Peter King should be bringing up, not necessarily to Tom Brady's face or drilling him with quotes from the Patriots. In an article when he is talking about Brady training for most of the summer in California, the point of view of Brady's employer would seem fairly important to know. I know Peter likes to write puff pieces about athletes and be everyone's friend, but my biggest complaint about him is that he does write puff pieces on athletes and teams he likes, and doesn't delve into other parts of the story that may slightly irritate someone. Maybe there is no issue with Brady and the front office, but if Mike Silver can bring this issue up, I think Peter King should do so as well when discussing at length the very subject that could cause the divide between the Patriots and Tom Brady.
Jeff Pearlman does too.
When he’s not reporting on NFL players and teams, Glazer, ahem, works for NFL players and teams.
I have absolutely nothing against Jay Glazer and love how he scoops ESPN for stories, but I see a natural conflict of interest in Glazer being employed by NFL teams to train players in MMA and working in a field where he reports NFL-related stories. It just feels like a conflict of interest to me.
I know there are conflicts of interest throughout sports in regard to writers co-authoring books with athletes. It's not like Jay Glazer is the only one to do this. So it is not like Glazer is the only one who does this.
SportsbyBrooks makes this very point in this well-written article. I think there is a difference in writing a book with a manager or athlete and having a business relationship with an entire team of athletes. I also understand the teams in the NFL may not have a problem with Glazer's arrangement. That's fine, whether NFL teams think Glazer's relationship between his MMA business and teams in the NFL really doesn't have an effect on my opinion of this situation, nor should it.
SportsbyBrooks makes the point that Jeff Pearlman is essentially a hypocrite because Rick Reilly has written books with athletes and he used to work for SI. I know Pearlman mentioned in his post the policy at SI about accepting gifts from athletes or teams, but I don't think he was holding SI up as the moral center of sports web sites or magazines. I don't think the fact Rick Reilly has a close relationship with athletes when he was working for SI makes Jeff Pearlman a hypocrite or cause him to have any less of a point simply because he just happens to work for SI now. That's a weak point. Because Rick Reilly happened to share the same employer has Jeff Pearlman did doesn't mean Pearlman is wrong or SI didn't have the majority of their writers follow the policy they had. Reilly plays by his own rules. We have seen that from the self-plagiarized columns he puts out.
So I do get the opposite view of this and I know everyone doesn't have a problem with Glazer's duties for FOX and his MMA business. I don't have a huge problem, I just think it does bring up questions about stories that Glazer may not report and the fact he has a relationship with players and NFL teams where they can be his client and the subject of a news story by him.
He is a mixed martial arts trainer whose clients include two franchises (the Falcons and Rams) and, apparently, dozens of players, ranging from Ryan Grant to Patrick Willis to Matt Leinart. As in, they pay him for his services.
I know Jay Glazer is merely a reporter, but it feels wrong that he reports on the very same people who pay him to train them in MMA. I have always felt this way since I heard he was mixing his MMA with his relationships with NFL players. How can his reporting not be affected by the fact the Falcons pay him to work with their players on MMA?
This, journalistically, is a joke. An embarrassing, pathetic, worst-of-its-kind joke.
I wouldn't go this far. Anytime Jay Mariotti is still writing, he takes the cake as the biggest journalistic joke, but I would definitely agree that Jay Glazer has a conflict of interest. Perhaps if he didn't work directly with the NFL players and it was just his company that did the MMA training I would feel differently. That's not the case though. He is very hands-on and trains the players himself.
As clients, these players certainly expect—and receive—a high level of confidentiality. To work out under someone’s watch is to provide him with incredible access; access you don’t want displayed to the public.
It is not even the working out part of it as much for me, but more the fact these players pay him for a service and in spending so much time with them he probably does learn some stuff about them that the public doesn't know, but an NFL reporter would usually report.
So what if Glazer hears Leinart calling a hooker? What if he sees Cushing (funny example) poppin ‘roids? What if he doesn’t think Grant is an especially hard worker? Does he sleep on the information, or does he ruin his ties with the players by reporting it?
My question, and this is where the conflict of interest lies, is when is Glazer not a reporter and a MMA trainer and when is he a MMA trainer and not a reporter? The line is blurred to me. If he asks Brian Cushing how the team is looking and Cushing says terrible and gives a specific example about why, shouldn't Glazer report this? This is NFL news.
Glazer's answer to this is they don't discuss football. How can they not talk about football? Because I don't believe it would be possible. That's the biggest thing Glazer and his NFL clients have in common. It just seems like it would be a natural discussion.
The answer is obvious: He sleeps on it.
We don't know this for sure, but we could guess Glazer cares more about the Glazer MMA brand than his standing as an NFL reporter for FOX.
On his Twitter page, Glazer was bragging about attending Jared Allen’s recent wedding. A. If you’re covering the NFL, you don’t befriend (closely) a player, and you sure as hell don’t attend his wedding. Again, what if Jared Allen gets drunk and vomits all over the cake?
That's not really NFL news anyway.
What if he punches Brett Favre?
Then I want pictures.
This violates more journalistic standards than one can count. Even if Glazer is completely unbiased (a human impossibility), perception outweighs reality. How can anyone take his reporting seriously? How can anyone believe they’re getting the full story? All the details?
Therein lies my problem. I have always liked Glazer as the incredibly competent antidote to the ESPN NFL reporters. He is sort of a one-man wrecking crew when it comes to getting stories, but there isn't any way his two gigs don't overlap and don't eventually become a conflict.
Glazer did report over Twitter on Thursday the Falcons were suspending Quinn Ojinnaka, but this was going to be reported anyway and I am concerned with the stories that Glazer finds out about and aren't or won't be public knowledge at some point.
Glazer told the Times he’s not trying to be a regular NFL reporter; that he’s trying to “build a brand.”
This annoys the shit out of me even more. Then quit your gig as the FOX NFL reporter and start doing MMA training full-time. He is essentially using his job as the FOX reporter to get new clients for his business, which isn't an issue, except for the fact he very well could be violating some of the integrity of journalism when these two jobs overlap. I like Jay Glazer and I like to hear him report stories, but he is blurring some lines in my opinion.
How can FOX not care about this? I know they like the fact he scoops ESPN, but there will come a time when he has to report honestly on a player/team he is training. Even if he reports the entire story honestly, there will still be the feeling he hasn't done so completely because many people will think he knows more or is holding something back. The perception is the issue. That's the problem I see.
3. Now for the most controversial umpire call in many, many years. Yes, I am talking about Jim Joyce blowing the perfect game for Armando Galarraga with a terrible "safe" call at first base. It was a horrible call and I am amazed an umpire as good as Jim Joyce missed the call.
There has already been a web site dedicated to getting Jim Joyce fired, though I think the guy who writes there means it purely tongue-in-cheek.
I've been watching baseball for a long time and that isn't the worst call I have ever seen. I have seen worse, but it certainly is one of the most historic bad-calls I have ever heard. I am not going to tear Jim Joyce a new asshole simply because he has been a man and admitted he was wrong. I am beyond impressed with how Galarraga, the Tigers, and the Tigers fans took the bad call. There were fans who cheered when Joyce came on the field on Thursday, Galarraga didn't choke Joyce to death ( which I would most likely do), and the Tigers even were pretty calm about it in the clubhouse after the game. That's probably better than I could have done.
Joyce made a terrible call and he ruined history. The fact he came out and publicly admitted he missed the call and obviously felt incredibly bad about it, doesn't make up for it, but it at least shows he isn't the ego-driven type of umpire we have seen make bad calls recently.
Because we live in a 24/7 news cycle this has brought up a whole new set of questions about instant replay. I am in favor of expanding replay, just not to balls and strikes. I think each manager should have the ability to challenge one umpire call per game that doesn't have to do with balls and strikes. It doesn't take long to check on the instant replay for home runs and I really don't think this would slow the game up too much. I am not in favor of expanding replay much more than that.
Balls and strikes shouldn't be reviewable and I am not sure how it would be handled if catch was called in the outfield when it wasn't a catch. It doesn't seem fair that a runner may have been able to advance more than one base if a catch was originally called by the umpire on a fly ball, but it ends up being a hit on instant replay. I think in this case, the runners should get to move ahead one base. Baseball rules award the baserunner two bases on a ground rule double when many times if the ball had stayed in play a runner on 1st base would have scored. So there is a precedent in baseball for just awarding a certain amount of bases to a runner, even though he could have conceivably advanced further.
I am glad there hasn't been a huge outcry against Joyce, because he didn't mean to such a bad call and obviously feels terrible about it. I am glad MLB and Bud Selig didn't overturn the call and make it a perfect game for Galarraga. It's done already and I don't think baseball should set a precedent of overturning bad calls. Galarraga pitched a perfect game in my mind and changing a bad call by an umpire in a game is a slippery slope. Why is that game more important than a game in July between the Cardinals-Dodgers that may be decided by a bad call? MLB can't go back and change all the bad calls. It's better to just know Galarraga threw a perfect game, even though the record books don't show it. The record books also show Barry Bonds is the all-time home run king and we know that isn't true either.
4. Tom Brady seems to have a sort of disconnect with Patriots management over his training in California instead of being with the team. At least that is what Mike Silver is reporting.
Remember the MMQB from May 10, when Peter King painted Tom Brady as dedicated to the team even though he wasn't around the team for most of the summer? A player has a right to be away from his team if the mini-camps are optional, but Peter didn't really mention what the Patriots may have thought about Brady staying away from optional practices. Brady seemed pretty standoff-ish that people may think he isn't dedicated to the team, but I wonder what he thinks about the fact the Patriots may be a group that is concerned about his dedication?
New England’s most beloved sports hero will be a fixture at the Pats’ training facility in Foxborough, planning to hang around at least through the team’s June 15-17 minicamp.
Then Brady will likely return to Los Angeles, where he has spent the bulk of his time since the Pats’ 33-14 playoff defeat to the Baltimore Ravens last January, and where he and his wife, supermodel Gisele Bundchen, are having a sizeable home built.
This story, at least from my point of view, isn't that Brady is not in New England with the Patriots. Brady will still have a great year no matter where he trains, so there may be no problem on that end. The story is that Peter King painted a rosy picture (surprise, surprise) of Brady just wanting to be with this family and didn't mention the Patriots were fine with this or not.
This is one of the biggest problems I have with Peter King. He is supposed to be an NFL insider, doesn't he or shouldn't he know the Patriots aren't exactly thrilled Brady isn't staying in town with the team? Wouldn't that be a phone call Peter would make to find out what the Patriots think about this? Maybe he tried, but since Peter is so well-connected how did Mike Silver report this story, but Peter King wasn't able to? I know Peter King loves his puff pieces, but I feel like if he is going to report on Brady being in California, he should throw in some information about how the Patriots feel about it. He wouldn't have to make it a big expose or anything, but if Mike Silver can find out stuff like the following...
Make no mistake – there has been a cool distance between Brady, who turns 33 in August, and the organization over the past few months, and not just of the physical variety.
Conversely, the Patriots’ brass, now experiencing a third consecutive offseason in which their California-raised quarterback has spent a sizeable chunk of time away from the team’s facility, would probably welcome some assurances that the quarterback is content to remain on the East Coast.
To Brady’s credit, he is highly motivated by a desire to be close to his elder son, even though Kraft told ESPNBoston.com in March he’d prefer that Brady “be here the whole offseason” and it’s reasonable to conclude that coach Bill Belichick feels similarly.
These are the sorts of thoughts and quotes that Peter King should be bringing up, not necessarily to Tom Brady's face or drilling him with quotes from the Patriots. In an article when he is talking about Brady training for most of the summer in California, the point of view of Brady's employer would seem fairly important to know. I know Peter likes to write puff pieces about athletes and be everyone's friend, but my biggest complaint about him is that he does write puff pieces on athletes and teams he likes, and doesn't delve into other parts of the story that may slightly irritate someone. Maybe there is no issue with Brady and the front office, but if Mike Silver can bring this issue up, I think Peter King should do so as well when discussing at length the very subject that could cause the divide between the Patriots and Tom Brady.
2 comments:
The basic difference between Tillman and the other guys is that I'm going to guess 1- They were drafted, he volunteered 2- They didn't give up millions of dollars. They were playing at a time when a person probably made more money in a real job then playing football. Make no doubt, the amount of money Tillman left on the table has a lot to do with the difference people see in him and guys who played 50 years ago.
I think Tillman should be in the Hall of Fame, but in a non-voting section. Something dedicated to him and the other veterans who played in the pro leagues and served the country. The Pro Football HoF is unique ( I think) in that it specificly is NOT about character. This came up about Lawerence Taylor and voters explained that the Pro Football HoF is entirely about on the field accomplishments.
As far as Brady and the Pats go. I've been hearing rumors for two years on the Net and from local sports folk that there has been a rift between Brady and management, which is one of the reasons he refuses to train with the team in the offseason except for mandatory instances. From what they have been saying, Brady took less money then he was worth last contract to help the team pay for a better team, and instead the Pats kept holding money every year and staying below the cap by quite a bit. Now that he's a potential free agent, they are trying to low ball him (as much as they can to Tom Brady) saying he's getting old, his value is decreasing as he ages, blah blah. I wouldn't be surprised to see Brady walk. Let the Brian Hoyer era begin!!!
Those are two differences I hadn't thought about regarding Tillman's candidacy. I don't think he should be in the Hall of Fame and I am not sure volunteering for the military would put him in the HoF.
If there were a separate wing for "good guys" or guys who contributed that had nothing to do with football. Outside of that, I don't know if Tillman could be put in the HoF if there wasn't a separate wing.
I hadn't heard anything about Brady not attending the training sessions over the summer, but I have sort of wondered at times why Brady wasn't a little irritated that he took a below market salary and the Patriots seemed to still try to save money under the cap. It wasn't a big deal, but he took less money so they could put a good team around him and they have done so.
They had better not low ball him this time since he took a below market value contract. Of course, the way Peter King was talking today they may just replace Brady.
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