A-Rod, A-Rod, A-Rod: Although twelve other players were given suspensions for their involvement with the Biogenesis of America clinic in South Florida, the totality of their punishment is dwarfed by the media attention devoted to Alex Rodriguez of the New York Yankees. And I guess given his outrageous contracts and ability to so far escape punishment for admitted PED use, it probably should. My big problem with it all is that as many alleged violations as he's committed, he still has a case to make that he's a first offender. I know that point of view will probably prompt criticism, but I didn't agree to the rules that baseball and the players' union established. My personal opinion is that all PED users should be banned for life, just like gamblers. But that wasn't the agreement. So you can't have it both ways. Bud Selig wants to say, "Well, this is really bad, so we'll throw the book at him." However, if you'd wanted to throw the book at someone, then you needed to put the book throwing into the collective bargaining agreement under section 23, paragraph 4, "PED's, book throwing at users", or something like that. Considering the way Major League Baseball mishandled this from the beginning, I think, unfortunately, that A-Rod has a point. I still maintain that through their tolerance of the issue until it became to big to ignore, MLB not only benefitted from PED use in the post-strike era, they actually encouraged it. Now we have what we have, an entire generation of otherwise gifted athletes like Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa who just had to get better, even though great was probably good enough. Even those that were deserving of the Hall of Fame prior to their PED use will never get in, a circumstance for which MLB is partially responsible. I don't have a problem with A-Rod fighting this to the end. After all, it's his career and his income at stake. For me, it's just something to write about.
Johnny, Johhny, Johnny: Heisman Trophy winner Johhny Manziel is a runaway train, and Texas A&M coach better pull the air brakes or stop stoking the engine. The only way to get this kid's attention will be to sit his spoiled you know what on the bench until he gets with the program. Football is a team game, even in the NFL, the next stop for Johnny Football, if he's lucky. And right now, I don't see much of a team focus for the guy who should be the leader. Was I 20 and in college, partying when I could and hoping to make it through class? Sure. But I wasn't a scholarship athlete, a quarterback no less, on a top ten football team. The only person hurt when I had to show up for a test with too little sleep and the taste of beer from the night before in my mouth was myself. For Johnny Manziel, it's not that simple. In addition, if he doesn't come clean and ends up playing in games that he is later ruled ineligible for, he's depriving 84 other scholarship athletes of making it to bowl game, or even worse for years to come. So as far as I'm concerned, he's a selfish spoiled brat whose enabler is named Kevin Sumlin. Come on Kevin, teach the kid a lesson and see if he's capable of finally learning.
Tiger, Tiger, Tiger: Okay, let's see what Tiger has done this year so far: 11 events, 5 wins, 2 other top tens, both in majors. Really? Do people not understand how remarkable that record is? Sure, no majors, but he did win the Players, by most considered the men's fifth major. His efficiency is remarkable, not to mention his golf. At the tender age of 37, he is only three wins away from matching Sam Snead's career win total of 82, most of which were against fields where there were no more than four or five players with a realistic chance to win. Nothing against Snead, a terrific golfer, but really now. The record that Tiger is about to set has almost no chance of ever being touched. He can realistically put up close to 100 wins before he's finished. To put it in perspective, Phil Mickelson, the second best golfer of the generation, has managed to capture 42 wins and 5 majors. That's an unbelievable career, and it's barely half Tiger's victories and a third of his majors. And get this, Tiger has done it in 304 events to Phil's 484. Tiger's winning percentage is an amazing .260. Heck, that's a decent major league lifetime batting average. Tiger is teeing it up against between 70 and 156 players every week, and manages to come out on top 26% of the time. And this year it's a staggering 45%. The player considered the best of all time, Jack Nicklaus, teed it up 594 times and won 73 times with 18 of those in major championships. His winning percentage? 12%. That's right. The greatest of all time with a winning percentage less than half that of Tiger Woods. Now to be fair, Jack probably had 50 or so ceremonial starts late in his career, so let's give him 540 competitive starts. Wow! We're up to a whopping 14%. You see where I'm going with this, don't you? Greatest of all time is Tiger Woods. Hands down. No comparison, except in the majors, and Jack didn't play against the world. There were very few international players outside of Gary Player and Tony Jacklin that could realistically compete for major championships. Jack's competitive landscape was a great deal narrower than Tiger's, and I know, because I've been watching it all since 1962. Case closed.
Johnny, Johhny, Johnny: Heisman Trophy winner Johhny Manziel is a runaway train, and Texas A&M coach better pull the air brakes or stop stoking the engine. The only way to get this kid's attention will be to sit his spoiled you know what on the bench until he gets with the program. Football is a team game, even in the NFL, the next stop for Johnny Football, if he's lucky. And right now, I don't see much of a team focus for the guy who should be the leader. Was I 20 and in college, partying when I could and hoping to make it through class? Sure. But I wasn't a scholarship athlete, a quarterback no less, on a top ten football team. The only person hurt when I had to show up for a test with too little sleep and the taste of beer from the night before in my mouth was myself. For Johnny Manziel, it's not that simple. In addition, if he doesn't come clean and ends up playing in games that he is later ruled ineligible for, he's depriving 84 other scholarship athletes of making it to bowl game, or even worse for years to come. So as far as I'm concerned, he's a selfish spoiled brat whose enabler is named Kevin Sumlin. Come on Kevin, teach the kid a lesson and see if he's capable of finally learning.
Tiger, Tiger, Tiger: Okay, let's see what Tiger has done this year so far: 11 events, 5 wins, 2 other top tens, both in majors. Really? Do people not understand how remarkable that record is? Sure, no majors, but he did win the Players, by most considered the men's fifth major. His efficiency is remarkable, not to mention his golf. At the tender age of 37, he is only three wins away from matching Sam Snead's career win total of 82, most of which were against fields where there were no more than four or five players with a realistic chance to win. Nothing against Snead, a terrific golfer, but really now. The record that Tiger is about to set has almost no chance of ever being touched. He can realistically put up close to 100 wins before he's finished. To put it in perspective, Phil Mickelson, the second best golfer of the generation, has managed to capture 42 wins and 5 majors. That's an unbelievable career, and it's barely half Tiger's victories and a third of his majors. And get this, Tiger has done it in 304 events to Phil's 484. Tiger's winning percentage is an amazing .260. Heck, that's a decent major league lifetime batting average. Tiger is teeing it up against between 70 and 156 players every week, and manages to come out on top 26% of the time. And this year it's a staggering 45%. The player considered the best of all time, Jack Nicklaus, teed it up 594 times and won 73 times with 18 of those in major championships. His winning percentage? 12%. That's right. The greatest of all time with a winning percentage less than half that of Tiger Woods. Now to be fair, Jack probably had 50 or so ceremonial starts late in his career, so let's give him 540 competitive starts. Wow! We're up to a whopping 14%. You see where I'm going with this, don't you? Greatest of all time is Tiger Woods. Hands down. No comparison, except in the majors, and Jack didn't play against the world. There were very few international players outside of Gary Player and Tony Jacklin that could realistically compete for major championships. Jack's competitive landscape was a great deal narrower than Tiger's, and I know, because I've been watching it all since 1962. Case closed.
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