Book Review: "The Book of Basketball" by Bill Simmons

Remember when you were in high school and your English teacher made you write a paragraph, then cut it in half, and then cut in half again in an attempt to help tighten your work? Well Bill Simmons stayed up late watching Cheers the night before and skipped class that day. No one likes words more than Simmons, who, as his ESPN colleague Rick Reilly once said, might be the only columnist in history to have his column jump to another page.

But it might be just that, the tangential style that intertwines endless pop culture references with hilarious personal stories and occasionally well-researched topics, that has made him one of the most popular writers in the country today.

In his latest book, “The Book of Basketball: The NBA According to the Sports Guy,” you essentially get a 700 page Simmons column, complete with lists of the 96 greatest players of all time, the ten best teams in history and of course, around 1,500 words on how Kobe Bryant compares to Teen Wolf.

After reading the book in its entirety, I’m convinced of one thing: Nobody knows more about the history of basketball than Bill Simmons. At times, it reads as though he’s trying to prove that to you, particularly when he writes about the sport prior to 1975. He was born in ’69, so in those parts, he relies heavily on the hundreds of books he read to fill in what he didn’t witness first hand.

From there, it’s vintage Simmons. For a guy who calls the year he stopped writing and smoked way too much weed the best decision he ever made, the man has a remarkable memory. He tells the laugh out loud story of how his developing love for basketball made him wish he was black (haven’t we all?). And he comes off as guy who recognizes how privileged he was to grow up in a time where he and his father could afford season tickets to some of the greatest Boston Celtics teams in history. It’s actually quite endearing.

For those who read him regularly, the book meets all expectations. He even addresses some of his longstanding beefs with certain players or coaches. Early on, he describes how Isiah Thomas, a man he crucified over the years in his column, taught him the secret of basketball. The secret is a theme throughout the book; players and teams who understood the secret were rewarded. Those who couldn’t were guys like Vince Carter, who Simmons is harder on than just about anyone who ever played, with the exception of Kareem Abdul Jabar.

While some sports writers use lists as a lazy way of mailing in a column or giving length to a book, Simmons’ top 96 player list is the central premise and unquestionably, the best part of “The Book of Basketball.” Spanning 338 pages, from Tom Chambers at 96 to Michael Jordan at No. 1, he recreates the basketball Hall of Fame the way it should be, devising a pyramid that separates the players by level of greatness.

All of it, of course, is his opinion. But he backs so much up with statistics, knowledge and his passion to persuade everyone to think exactly the way he thinks, that you have to question yourself before you start calling Simmons a homer who let all that pot get to his head. Full disclosure: The minute I received the book, I skipped to see where he listed my favorite player of all time, Allen Iverson. He has him about 30 spots higher than I expected.

From there I was sold.

And chances are, you will be too. The book isn’t without its flaws. It occasionally reads like a 700 page book might and the pop culture references will surely be out-of-date by the time Simmons’ children are old enough to read it. But he also delivers the most entertaining history of an entire sport you’ll ever read. Baseball is a sport too stuffy, too set in its ways, to have a book written like this. Football is too much team, not enough individuals.

Basketball is just right. And Simmons was the perfect author to capture it all.

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In the court of public opinion, Donaghy might come out on top

The NBA may have scared Random House into putting the kibosh on disgraced referee Tim Donaghy’s tell-all book, “Blowing the Whistle: The Culture of Fraud in the NBA,” but that doesn’t mean the league and its current referees don’t have some explaining to do.

You know why?

Because nothing Donaghy claims seems unbelievable.

In excerpts released to Deadspin.com, Donaghy describes how some referees would place wagers amongst themselves on various aspects of a game, including who would call the first foul and who would give a technical foul to the league’s troublemakers. He also suggests that some referees would alter the way they blew their whistle depending on the amount of fouls a team’s star might have or whether or not a high profile, big-market team was playing.

Donaghy goes as far as writing that a referee’s relationship with a given player was so influential that he often made his picks or tipped off gamblers based on who was covering a certain game.

“Allen Iverson provides a good example of a player who generated strong reaction, both positive and negative, within the corps of NBA referees,” he claims. “For instance, veteran referee Steve Javie hated Allen Iverson and was loathe [sic] to give him a favorable call. If Javie was on the court when Iverson was playing, I would always bet on the other team to win or at least cover the spread. No matter how many times Iverson hit the floor, he rarely saw the foul line.”

“By contrast, referee Joe Crawford had a grandson who idolized Iverson. I once saw Crawford bring the boy out of the stands and onto the floor during warm-ups to meet the superstar. Iverson and Crawford's grandson were standing there, shaking hands, smiling, talking about all kinds of things. If Joe Crawford was on the court, I was pretty sure Iverson's team would win or at least cover the spread. “

For anyone who has watched, covered or played in the NBA in the past decade, Donaghy’s allegations are hardly shocking. He points to highly controversial contests - like the infamous game six of the 2002 Western Conference finals – as examples of referees making calls for the benefit of the league. In that game, the Los Angeles Lakers, the league’s most storied franchise, went to the foul line 27 times in the fourth quarter to force a game seven against the small-market Sacramento Kings.

At the time, even the most rational people -not just NBA conspiracy theorist- were questioning whether or not the fix was in. Even sports columnists in Los Angeles thought something was fishy. According to Donaghy, something was.

“In the pregame meeting prior to Game 6, the league office sent down word that certain calls-calls that would have benefitted the Lakers — were being missed by the referees,” Donaghy writes. “This was the type of not-so-subtle information that I and other referees were left to interpret. After receiving the dispatch, (Dick) Bavetta openly talked about the fact that the league wanted a Game 7.”

While none of Donaghy’s accusations are all that surprising, they do call into question the integrity of the league. Commissioner David Stern has always dismissed the former referee’s claims, calling them a desperate act of convicted felon. But that’s what good lawyers do. They attempt to make the opposition look weak.

But Donaghy isn’t trying to save his own butt. His reputation is irreparable. More than anything, he comes off as someone who doesn’t want to go down as the only fraudulent referee in the history of the NBA, not when he’s positive others were guilty too.

And here’s what makes him so dangerous: Nobody can disprove any of his claims. It’s his word against the NBA’s, and everything he says seems possible. Even likely.

He may be a desperate convicted felon, but in the court of public opinion, Donaghy has to like his odds.

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McGwire's resume speaks for itself

You know who has zero sympathy for Larry Johnson, the Kansas City Chiefs running back who questioned his head coach’s credentials on Twitter earlier this week? Baseball players. That’s because their hitting coaches have weaker job resumes than your average high school sophomore.

I’m not kidding. Have you done a background check on your favorite team’s hitting coach lately? More importantly, has your favorite team done a background check on its hitting coach? Eight teams have coaches who never made it to the Major Leagues, not for a single day. Even Pete Rose Jr. got a cup of coffee in the bigs.

Then you have the ones who actually did make it to the show. Most of them were journeymen and backups for their entire careers, and their numbers tell you why. Greg Maddux would be more likely to come through with a big hit than some of these guys. Case in point: Seattle hitting coach Alan Cockrell. Cockrell played for five different organizations during his 12 year pro career.

He collected just two hits in the Major Leagues.

There isn’t a hitting coach in baseball with a resume that compares to Mark McGwire’s, which is why I can’t understand why people are making such a fuss over Big Mac returning to the sport to coach the St. Louis Cardinals. If Jack Howell, a career .239 hitter, is allowed to teach big leaguers how to hit, surely McGwire must have something to offer, right?

And don’t tell me baseball just isn’t ready to embrace a steroid user. Not after I had to hear about what a warrior Andy Pettitte is after he helped the Yankees win the pennant on Sunday night. This year we watched Alex Rodriguez giving curtain calls, Manny Ramirez return to cheers after a 50 game suspension and David Ortiz receive standing ovations following the news that he may have cheated. Our nation’s biggest baseball hotbeds sent the message McGwire preached years ago: We aren’t here to talk about the past.

But at least McGwire has a past worth talking about. The same can’t be said for the majority of hitting coaches in baseball. If you take Don Mattingly out of the equation, the rest of the group combined to make eleven All Star teams. McGwire made twelve appearances himself, which happens to be twice as much as Donnie Baseball.

The biggest complaint, by far, is that McGwire was a one-dimensional hitter. Of course, no one seems to care that most of these guys were no-dimensional hitters. Rick Eckstein, the Washington Nationals hitting coach, was a .220 hitter in college and never played again. Joe Vavra, who coaches in Minnesota, had three career homeruns in the minors and never got past AAA.

The truth is McGwire’s .263 career batting average is actually respectable compared to his counterparts. Only eight current hitting coaches have higher career batting averages, unless you count Lloyd McClendon’s Little League World Series numbers. No one has more homeruns, RBIs or a better slugging percentage than McGwire.

There seems to be only one common trait that almost every hitting coach has, from Eckstein to Mattingly. They’re all inherently likeable. If they weren’t, they’d have washed out of baseball when their playing days were over. What keeps these guys around more than anything is the fact that players trust them and managers enjoy their presence.

And was there any baseball player in history more loveable than McGwire? Big Mac was Big Bird friendly his entire career, which is probably his only defense when it comes to the steroid use. McGwire’s roid rage came in the form of bear hugs and wide smiles for fans and teammates alike.

Once again, McGwire’s credentials are unmatched.

No matter what, it’s hard not to root for the guy. No athlete has watched his fame vanish the way McGwire’s did following his disappearing act in 2005. Once larger than life, he’s now just trying have a life in the sport he helped save 11 years ago.

And you can’t say he’s not qualified.

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Football can work in England. I'm sure of it.

It’s that time of the year again. The time when England 2.0 invades the motherland and tries to force our version of football on the unsophisticated British, who don’t much care for the booze, breasts and broken bones we root for every week each fall.

Oh wait. The Brits are human too?

That’s not what American sportswriters are telling us across the ocean. Almost unanimously, the media is against the NFL going global, mostly because they believe the rest of the world has no interest in the forward pass or our silly penalties, which result in a watered-down version of rugby.

I call bullshit.

What’s not to like about making an all-day event out of a two-and-a-half hour game? Aren’t the British as proud of their drinking ability as they are of their healthcare system? So you start with the tailgate and go from there. By the time anyone heads into the stadium, you’re so drunk you really don’t care what you’re about to watch. Ask the majority of college students over here who only attend football games so they can play beer pong for breakfast. The actual game is secondary.

Or maybe thirdary. We also run half-naked women out there just in case you get bored watching giant men run into other giant men. The benefits are two-fold. The men in the stands get to watch a live peepshow and the women get to watch acrobatic excellence. Both sides enjoy the performance.

Of course, you can also appreciate the game if you’re so inclined. What’s better than seeing some nancy boy quarterback getting crushed as he tries to run away from the defense? You can enjoy both sides. The hitting, which all men love, and the retreating, which the British know a little something about.

We haven’t even got to the best part yet. The gambling. The sole reason football has become the most popular sport in the United States. This is right up any Englishman’s alley, seeing as how there are more betting parlors in London than medical marijuana shops in Los Angeles.

You can pretty much bet on every aspect of a football game, including the score. See that’s where Americans get a bad rap. The rest of the world thinks we are obsessed with points, but that is only partially true.

Half of us like to bet the under.

And just wait until fantasy sports takes over the rest of world.

I’m convinced this football thing can work anywhere and everywhere. As it turns out, there are far more heavyset people throughout the world than there are seven footers, yet everyone still seems to have taken kindly to basketball. Football is far more inclusive.

Just don’t mention the head injuries…

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ARod went from despised to beloved in 2009

There are very few players in the history of baseball who could hit the kind of opposite field, flick-of-the-wrists homerun Alex Rodriguez hit to tie game two of the American League Championship Series Saturday night. And when you consider the near-freezing temperatures along with the rain that was falling at Yankee Stadium, that number can probably be counted on one hand.

Barry Bonds. Mark McGwire. Sammy Sosa. And ARod.

The connection is obvious. Call them the Mount Rushmore of the steroids era in baseball. Of course, they weren’t the only guys cheating, but no one benefited from performance-enhancing drugs more than they did. Bonds, like it or not, is the all-time homerun king. McGwire and Sosa helped save baseball in the late nineties. And Rodriguez signed an unprecedented contract that might remain a record for decades.

Yet while the rest of the group has essentially been blacklisted by Major League Baseball, Rodriguez might actually be more popular than ever. The man has given more curtain calls than Derek Jeter this postseason. He hit another homerun Monday night in game three, and is undoubtedly the favorite to win the MVP of the series if the Yankees go on to defeat the Angels. Suddenly, Mr. May is clutch and everyone seems to have forgotten the sheepish display he put on at the beginning of the season.

Oh right. The confession. When Rodriguez fumbled his story more than the balloon boy’s family, stuttering and crying his way to being one of the most pathetic stories of the year. Is it coming back to you yet? Remember when he stumbled through that interview with Peter Gammons, who isn’t exactly Walter Cronkite, back in February.

At that point, he had the public approval rating of George W. Yankees fans were more likely to cheer for David Ortiz than their third basemen. So what happened? How did ARod win over everyone, even those that couldn’t stand him before he came clean about his steroid use?

Part of it was that he assembled a PR team capable of making Charles Manson as loveable as Charlie Bucket. He was always image conscious, but this year he took it up a notch. He also was one of the most productive Yankees when he returned to the team in May following hip surgery. 30 homeruns and 100 RBI in what had to be the most demanding season of his career is an impressive feat.

But more than anything, the apology, as weak as it appeared, is probably what sealed the deal for Rodriguez. Keep in mind that he is the only one in the group to admit using steroids. Bonds still denies cheating today. Sosa stopped speaking English. And McGwire went into hiding - his hometown is now listed as Parts Unknown.

Rodriguez dealt with it the way his teammate Andy Pettitte did the year before. He was open and before you knew it, the case was closed. We’ll always know that Rodriguez admitted cheating, but no one will really care. He was honest and we like that in our athletes.

Forbes just released a list of the most popular athletes in our country and said that Americans like athletes to be trustworthy and sincere. Tiger Woods, Chris Paul and Tim Duncan were there, proving you don’t have to be all that interesting to be loved by fans.

Rodriguez didn’t make the list. But let’s see what a World Series ring does for him.

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Random Rumblings: Media had an agenda with Limbaugh

I agree with Rush Limbaugh about as often as he agrees with the President, but he was spot-on when he blamed the liberal media for thwarting his bid to own a piece of the St. Louis Rams last week. The controversy was your classic example of a media-created, media-driven story that only started to make headlines when the right players were asked the right questions about the conservative talk show host.

Think about it. The players who told the New York media that they would never play in St. Louis if Limbaugh had anything to do with the team were Bart Scott and Mathias Kiwanuka. These aren’t your average football players who can’t break double digits on the wonderlic test. Scott majored in business at Southern Illinois, one of the best public schools in the Midwest. Kiwanuka went to Boston College and is the grandson of a former Prime Minister.

There aren’t many guys in the league more capable of offering an intelligent, eloquent opinion than those two. In fact, as I wondered earlier this week, there probably aren’t many guys in the league who would have had an opinion on the subject at all. Would Eli Manning actually have anything valuable to say? How about Braylon Edwards? As long as it’s not Cleveland, he doesn’t care where he’s playing.

The guys that asked Scott and Kiwanuka about Limbaugh knew exactly what they were doing and their mission was accomplished. A firestorm ensued. The only real loser here is Limbaugh, which isn’t a bad thing. I’m certainly not going to shed any tears for a man who pollutes millions of minds each year, but the question has to be asked: If the media asked a guy who went to Florida State about Limbaugh, would the rest of us have been in such an uproar?

***Condolences must go out the family and friends of Jasper Howard, the UConn football player who was stabbed to death early Sunday morning. It’s too early to tell exactly what took place on the Storrs campus, but this much is clear: All colleges, particularly the ones with big time athletic programs, need to do a better job of monitoring the outsiders they let on campus.

As someone who has spent plenty of time making a fool out himself during Spring Weekend, I can tell you firsthand that there is almost nothing preventing anyone from heading over to Xlot or Celeron for a night filled with booze, couch fires and yes, plenty of fights. Sounds like something similar happened on Homecoming night. Only much worse.

***After being stripped of play-calling duties by higher-ups, is Jim Zorn the coach of Washington Redskins in name only?

***Anyone who had the New York Giants atop their power rankings heading into week six completely forgot that the team had play four of the worst six teams in the league and should have lost to an average Dallas team.

The best team in the league, New Orleans, set them straight on Sunday.

***Thank you the Philadelphia Eagles for making me the guy who couldn’t make it to week seven in my survivor pool.

***I think the Phillies and Dodgers could go the full seven games, but it’s hard to get excited for a race for second place, which is exactly what the NLCS is this season. No one is beating the Yankees.

***Connecticut star Maya Moore tipping (they called it dunking) a ball in the basket at midnight madness Friday night was the number one play on SportsCenter. Moore may very well end up the winningest college basketball player in history and has the chance to be the greatest women’s player ever, but she only makes SportsCenter when she’s trying play like the guys.

This is one of the biggest problems with women’s basketball. Those who enjoy watching the sport appreciate it for the play calling, the backdoor cuts and the excellent shooting. We don’t care if Moore can dunk or not.

***I’m not sure how far the USA soccer team can go at the World Cup, but I know I’ll be checking football odds at some online sports betting site to figure out if they’re worth betting on. After watching the late goal that helped the team tie with Costa Rica last week, it’s safe to say I’m pumped up for next summer.

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In weather like this, there's no such thing as home-field advantage

It is 72 degrees and sunny in Vallejo, CA today. According to idcide.com, the temperature rarely falls below 60 this time of year and you’re more likely to witness an earthquake than see more than an inch of rain fall in the month of October. Sounds like a nice place, right?

That’s where C.C. Sabathia grew up and there’s no question he’d rather be making his ALCS game one start in his hometown’s weather conditions. Instead, the biggest start of his career will come tonight at Yankee Stadium, where game time temperature will be somewhere around 40 degrees and rain is expected for the duration. It’s a night in which the game might normally be postponed, but the weather is expected to be worse the next few days and Major League Baseball doesn’t want to see the entire weekend washed away.

So the Yankees and Angels will meet in an environment more fit for playoff football, where the only people more miserable than the fans will be the players, who won’t be able to wear winter coats on the field. But while the Yankees have certainly played in colder weather, don’t expect the same October electricity that came from the crowd when the team was playing across the street. The energy that somehow managed to warm up the stadium on even the most frigid nights will be missing as more fans opt to watch the game from inside the bars, restaurants and gift shops instead of their almost-frozen over seats.

That’s been the problem with the new Yankee Stadium all along. It brought in a new crowd. A pretentious crowd. Because the team essentially priced out many of the diehard blue collar fans, the there are a lot less Bobby’s from Bronx and a lot more Robert’s from New Canaan attending games in the new stadium. There’s a good chance the crowd tonight will be as subdued as a tranquilized hospital patient.

If you couple the lack of excitement in the stadium with the fact that, like Sabathia, the majority of Yankees players grew up in much warmer surroundings, you have to wonder how much of a home-field advantage the team really has.

With the exception of Derek Jeter and Jorge Posada, who have played plenty of October baseball in the northeast, the Yankees lineup is filled with guys who grow up in the south or in Latin America, where wind-chill is not in anyone’s vocabulary. It’s the same problem every team faces at the beginning of each season. Most guys aren’t slow starters because April is their unlucky month. It’s just that most parts of the country are still really cold in April.

Of course, the Angels have to deal with same elements. But they aren’t the home team. Their job is to steal one on the road in what should be a hostile environment. That won’t be the case tonight. The Yankee Stadium crowd will be more interested in putting on their snuggies than watching baseball and juggernaut Yankee offense might very well freeze over.

Good luck, C.C. So much for that advantage.

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Is the NFL really against Limbaugh?

Remember when Major League Baseball started testing for performance-enhancing drugs and it seemed like every player was in favor of taking down any and all cheaters? Even the dirtiest guys in the game were out there talking about cleaning up the sport. Well that was your classic union play, the ultimate political maneuver. The players were forced to react that way because they had no other option. Coming out against drug testing was a PR nightmare. But do you really believe all those guys who made millions thanks to steroids were happy to see that money disappear? Me either.

NFL players are now facing a similar situation – not quite as large, but just as controversial. Rush Limbaugh, a man who reminds most minorities of the Cameron Alexander character in American History X, is a member of the ownership group interested in purchasing the St. Louis Rams. Of course, the very idea has brought out all of the usual suspects. Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson are in a tizzy. Jason Whitlock is against it. MSNBC has pounced on Limbaugh.

But while liberals everywhere are ready to stand up and unite against the controversial radio host, you have to wonder if the sentiment within the league is similar. Mathias Kiwanuka of the Giants and Bart Scott from the Jets said they would never play for a team owned by Limbaugh and Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay claimed he wouldn’t vote to allow Limbaugh into the league. But is this small group really speaking for the rest of the NFL?

The risk of acknowledging a willingness to play for Limbaugh is enormous. White guys would be labeled racists. Black guys would be called sell-outs. But that wouldn’t be true at all. Most of these guys are desperate for money, no matter who is writing the checks. The numbers don’t lie. 78 percent of NFL players go broke within two years of leaving football. I’ll repeat that so it really sinks in. 78 percent of NFL players go broke within two years of leaving football.

All things considered, it doesn’t seem like a smart financial move to alienate a possible employer because he thinks Donovan McNabb is overrated.

Not to mention, St. Louis is an attractive place to play for a lot of guys. Sure, right now the Rams look like a pee-wee football team, but we’re only a few years removed from the greatest show on turf. The ability to play eight games in perfect weather conditions is pretty appealing to offensive players. As numbers soar, so do contracts.

It all goes back to the money (just ask any player who has been involved in a contract holdout) and if Limbaugh and his ownership group have enough, I’m pretty sure 78 percent of the league would be willing to play for the Rams.

And I’m damn-near positive 75 percent of the owners would be willing to allow Limbaugh in if it means more money in their pockets. That’s what it takes to gain acceptance in the NFL. Yeses from 24 owners. For Limbaugh, winning over a group of mostly-conservative owners will be even easier than the players. He’s probably already won most of them over. That is what he does for a living after all.

In the end, it comes down to public relations versus looking in the mirror. The players and owners can all say one thing, but chances are they aren’t being honest. If they were, this wouldn’t even be an issue.

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Only one reason sports should upset us

Watching sports should be a lot more depressing than it is. Here we are sitting around eating chips and wings and drinking cheap beer while watching other men on television, making millions for playing a game. We’ve got friends. They’ve got entourages. We’ve got girlfriends. They’ve got groupies. We hate commercials. They make ‘em.

And as if all the perks that come with being an athlete aren’t enough, they’re better people than we are as well. At least that’s how the talking-heads see it. Michael Jordan is the greatest basketball player ever because he had the will power the rest of us lack. Brett Favre is still throwing touchdown passes because he’s got more heart than us mortals. It’s LeBron James’ courage that separates him from me, not his size or athletic ability. In fact, talent almost always finds itself somewhere behind determination, work ethic, drive, focus, intensity and confidence.

Really makes you want to pass up the Pabst and start pounding Prozac, right?

Well don’t, because the truth is most athletes are more flawed than a handbag from Canal Street. Case in point: Detroit Tigers slugger Miguel Cabrera and former Cleveland Browns receiver Braylon Edwards. Both players made news last weekend for foolish off-the-field behavior that resulted in the Tigers missing the playoffs and Edwards being traded to New York.

With his team needing to win its final two games in order to wrap up the American League Central, Cabrera focused on getting frat boy drunk early Saturday morning and then proceeded to go home and get into a fight with his wife. A fight that was serious enough for the police to be called to their residence and for Cabrera to be taken into custody.

Imagine the phone call made to Tigers team president Dave Dombrowski, who had to go pick up his star player at the station a few hours before the biggest game of the season. Probably took a lot of will power not to strangle Cabrera right there on the spot. But you have to protect your assets, even when they act like asses.

You know the rest. Cabrera took an o-fer (he didn’t get a hit all weekend) and the Tigers lost. A win Sunday forced a one-game playoff with the Minnesota Twins. Their season ended Tuesday night.

Roughly ten hours later, the Browns were completing a trade that sent their troubled star to the Jets. Edwards didn’t catch a pass in another Browns loss last Sunday and was determined to drink his woes away that evening. He complained to a local media member and then he punched one of LeBron James’ friends in the face.

That’s not courage. That’s beer balls.

But of course, Edwards got what he wanted all along. No thanks to hard work or perseverance, though. He whined and cried and became enough of a disturbance to the Browns that they sent him away, giving him a new lease on life with a much better team.

Now Edwards should get to the playoffs for the first time in his career. Maybe even the Super Bowl. That will probably earn him a new contract and the same praise another entitled crybaby, Randy Moss, got when he came to New England. They’ll call him rejuvenated, a player who just needed a change of scenery.

Life is even easier for Cabrera. He was reprimanded, but what can Dombrowski and the Tigers really do with him? This was only the second of an eight year, $153 million dollar contract and he’s guaranteed every penny no matter how often he shows up to the field hung over.

So as it usually plays out in these situations, the bad guys won. And that’s the only reason for being depressed when it comes to sports.

When athletes stop supplying but keep demanding.

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Random Rumblings: On the baseball season

• Is it me or was Major League Baseball about as predictable as Seinfeld reruns this season? You don’t even need 150 characters to break down the entire summer: Steroids. Rich teams won. Albert Pujols. National League stunk.
  
  Case closed.
  
  But for those who would like me to expand on a season that has played out almost the exact same way for the past decade, here goes nothing…
  
  
• The steroids controversy continued. Alex Rodriguez admitted using. Manny Ramirez was suspended. David Ortiz promised he would get to the bottom of his positive test and never spoke again. All three were welcomed back with open arms by their fans and all three helped their team reach the playoffs.
  
  The bad guys won.
  
  
• So did the rich ones. If the Tigers beat the Twins today, six of the top nine payrolls in baseball will have made the playoffs while none of the bottom twelve will have reached the postseason. The numbers don’t lie. You can pretty much count out almost half the sport on opening day.
  
  Contraction anyone?
  
  
• In order, the second, third, fourth and fifth greatest hitters of my lifetime: Barry Bonds, Alex Rodriguez, Manny Ramirez, Ken Griffey Jr..
  
  The best, and it’s not close, is Albert Pujols. The NL MVP hits the way Bonds did at the height of his steroid use, seeing one strike a night and usually crushing it. He’s more consistent than ARod or Griffey ever was and hits for more power than Manny ever did. And the man carries his team unlike anyone, at any time, ever has.
  
  
• Pujols is so good that we forgive him for playing in the AAAA League. It’s not his fault the National League has the Nationals, Pirates and Padres. And really, you don’t even have to look at the teams to tell how poor the NL was this season.
  
  Just look at two names: Brad Penny and Julio Lugo.
  
  
• You know what we stopped hearing this year? What a great game-caller Jason Varitek is. That’s what happens when you can’t even hit your wife’s weight over the final two months of the season.
  
  
• The Yankees and Red Sox had a little role-reversal this year. For the first time in over a decade, the Bombers were actually likeable. The zillion dollar additions of C.C. Sabathia and Mark Teixeira and the less pricey Nick Swisher helped the team win the AL East and actually loosened up the clubhouse in the process.
  
  The Yankees popped champagne when they clinched the division and set the all-time record for pies to the face following walk off wins in a season. Even ARod made friends.
  
  Meanwhile, the Red Sox dealt with Ortiz and his steroids, Daisuke being overpaid and overweight and Kevin Youkilis calling out the fans of Boston.
  Something just feels different this season.
  
  Even when everything else remained the same.

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