A Tale of Two Cities

It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to, than I have ever known.

Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
English novelist (1812 - 1870)

Brett Favre's retirement is about a number of things - it's about one of the most prolific quarterbacks in the history of football hanging up the cleats; it's about the team's failure to land Randy Moss for the second straight year (no matter what might be said publicly to the contrary); it's about a change to the face of a franchise; and, mostly, it's about two cities and the divergent paths they took a little more than a decade and a half ago.

This is about Atlanta and Green Bay.

This is about the 1991 second round pick that became one of the most recognizable and most accomplished passers in the NFL over the better part of the last two decades. He won a Super Bowl, appeared in another, and appeared in 22 playoff games overall. Favre was traded by Atlanta to Green Bay between the '91 and '92 seasons for a first round pick.

With that pick the Atlanta Falcons picked running back Tony Smith. Smith played in 33 games over three seasons with six starts. He was primarily used as a kick and punt returner. His combined yardage for those 33 games - 2,267. That's 68 yards and a little more than two feet per game, almost all on special teams. He averaged fewer than ten yards per game as a tailback.

He had three total touchdowns. One for every eleven games in which he appeared.

Since the trade the Falcons have had eight different quarterbacks lead the team in passing, and at least sixteen different QB's have started at least one game for the team since Favre first started for the Pack in the third game of the 1992 season.

Favre has been great, albeit flawed. While he holds the NFL record for touchdown passes, he also holds the record for interceptions. Most fan bases would take that, I think.

He had his issues with pain killer addiction, but owned up to it in a way that is rare with professional athletes.

Through it all, Favre has had a Hall of Fame career.

There's no guaranteeing that Favre would have gone on to the career he has had would he have remained in Atlanta. I think it's unlikely. However, since Favre took over the starting reigns in Green Bay here are some basic facts about the two teams -

According to ESPN, Green Bay has the best record in the NFL since Favre joined the team. Their record with Favre as the starter - 160 -94. The Falcons during the same time period - 111-142-1.

For the better part of 17 years the gunslinger from Mississippi was the face of the franchise in the Frozen Tundra.

He is likable, and amiable in interviews, coming across with an "aw shucks" country charm that has allowed him to get free passes from the press and football announcers for his questionable decisions on the field. But his easy charm and the way he wears his emotions on his sleeve - shaving his head in support of his wife's battle with breast cancer, talking candidly about the passing of his father during the post game of a contest with the Raiders - made him seem approachable to the fans, not just of the Packers, but of football.

Teams in all sports look for that Face of the Franchise. Someone marketable, someone with star power and ability. In Favre's time, the Patriots had Drew Bledsoe who pulled the team out of the mud and put them on his back for the better part of the 1990's, and then Tom Brady, and to a lesser extent, Tedy Bruschi. The Red Sox have David Ortiz (would Big Papi have become Big Papi had he remained with the Twins?). The Yankees have Derek Jeter. The list goes on - Steve Nash, Peyton Manning, Jason Taylor. You say the names and people automatically think of the teams.

Sometimes the face is indicative of the team. Isiah Thomas was once a face with which teams wanted to be associated with. Same for Matt Millen. And even Michael Vick. All of that is less true now.

The franchise that traded Favre had no true Face of the Franchise until they committed to Vick in 2004. Thirteen seasons after their back-up left to become the face of another, Atlanta finally found their face. Now the face of their franchise is a convicted felon. That face followed them through a season without Vick appearing in a single game. It will likely follow them through one more season, until they find someone charming and marketable and can take the franchise to the next level...someone like a backup quarterback they once had.

Killing chances

I don't blame Bobby Petrino for wanting to get out of Dodge.

He was put in a no win situation. He was initially expected to win with (statistically) among the worst quarterbacks in the league. He was told to build his offense around Michael Vick. Weeks after taking over the team, the Falcons traded back-up and potential starting quarterback Matt Schaub to the Texans. Then the dogfighting scandal hit, and Vick was done.

Sitting on a rudderless team with petulant stars like DeAngelo Hall, all Petrino could do, if lucky, was tread water. If this team failed to win a single game, enough went wrong around the team that Petrino could have been held blameless.

Even with the limited tools at his disposal, he still managed to eke three wins out of the Falcons.

Regardless of all of the above, Petrino has just succeded in killing any chances for college coaches to move to the pro-ranks anytime in the near future.

Recent history will play big in the heads of the NFL's general managers as they search for their next head coach, and the combined 18-27 NFL records of Petrino and Nick Saban (15-17) will serve as a big warning beacon. The bigger warning beacon, however, will be how the two coaches unceremoniously left after denying interest in college coaching openings.

An interesting aside - the denial games both Petrino and Saban played with their NFL jobs are not common to NFL coaching job changes. As a matter of fact, the only instances in the NFL that I can think of in which this happened are with these two coaching changes.

Right now this is happening all over college football, where a coach signs a contract to work for a school, and leaves before even a year passes in the contract year. Sometimes it's been within weeks.

Saban and Petrino brought it to the ranks of the NFL. And the GM's aren't going to forget that anytime soon.

Double Jeopardy

As explained at http://lp.findlaw.com/:

''The constitutional prohibition against 'double jeopardy' was designed to
protect an individual from being subjected to the hazards of trial and possible
conviction more than once for an alleged offense. . . . The underlying idea, one
that is deeply ingrained in at least the Anglo-American system of jurisprudence,
is that the State with all its resources and power should not be allowed to make
repeated attempts to convict an individual for an alleged offense, thereby
subjecting him to embarrassment, expense and ordeal and compelling him to live
in a continuing state of anxiety and insecurity, as well as enhancing the
possibility that even though innocent he may be found guilty.''

In essence, the courts can only try someone once for a specific crime. This doesn't prohibit, however, the same charges being filed in regards to the same crime on both federal and state levels - which is what seems to be the direction that Virginia is going in with the Michael Vick dogfighting case.

That is not what I am referring to with Vick.

While it appears to be likely that Vick will face an indictment from the State of Virginia in addition to his federal indictment, I am talking about something different.

I am talking about the other indictment that could be handed down in Atlanta.

From 2004 through 2006 the Falcons won 11, 8, and 7 games respectively. In each of those three seasons, in spite of passing for more yards each year, his completion percentage dropped from 56.4 in 2004 to 55.3, and, ultimately 52.6 last season. Overall, he is a career 53.8 percent passer who has piloted the Falcons to two winning seasons. The only time that the Falcons have won more than nine games with Vick at the helm coincides with his highest completion percentage - 56.4.

Joey Harrington, for all the knocks he takes in the press, is the better quarterback. Over the last three seasons playing for Detroit and Miami - two teams no one could really consider contenders, Harrington has posted completion percentages of 56, 57, and 57.5 respectively.

If after six seasons of Vick, during which the Falcons could achieve ten wins only once, what will it say of Vick - the so called "most exciting player in the game," if Atlanta wins ten with Detroit's first-round quarterbacking bust at the helm?

Isn't that just another indictment of Vick?

His defenders point to the number of dropped passes his receivers had last season. They don't point to the fact that, until this past off season when the dogfighting was about to hit the fan, Vick didn't spend anymore time around Flowery Branch than the bare minimum required. He didn't spend the extra time developing that rapport with receivers that quarterbacks like Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, or Donovan McNabb do.

Whose fault is that? The receivers?

For all the hype, and the excitement he has caused on the field (and off), nothing ever justified Arthur Blank's signing of this man to the richest contract ever for a quarterback. As much as you may here players and coaches give proper respect to Vick's athletic ability - you never hear them talk about him as a great quarterback.

Why? Because defensive coordinators would rather face someone like Vick than someone like Brady or Manning. They know if they bottle up Vick, then they force him to pass. That's not a prospect that defensive coordinators in the NFL fear - not the way they fear what Brady, Manning, McNabb, Carson Palmer, Brett Favre, Drew Brees, or any one of a number of other quarterbacks can do if stuck in the pocket.

Don't be surprised if Vick faces another indictment by the end of the season - only this one will be on the football field.

Thoughts that hit on a lazy Sunday in Maryland...

Those that know me well know that I would rather be talking about what players are doing on the field, or when off the field, what they are doing to help - Saints defender Charles Grant buying the Saints administrative assistants lunch, Drew Bledsoe and his foundation, the work many Boston area pro-athletes do with the Jimmy Fund. There's a lot that many big-leaguers have to offer to the community, and many do.

Then there's what's happening now.

With Vick.

After today I am going to make an effort to stay away from this story as much as possible considering what the media saturation is going to be like. However, I wanted to touch on a few quick things that have not yet come up.

If indeed Vick is found guilty he could miss up to seven seasons, assuming he doesn't play this year. Or he could receive a suspended sentence, probation, or a number of other options. Assuming he remains free after a guilty verdict, whether on probation, or for some other reason, this opens up a whole new can of worms for the NFL and the Falcons.

The studies will start coming out of the wood-work. The studies that PETA, the SPCA, and every mental-health professional in the united states has on file that people who abuse animals are five times more likely to abuse people at some point in their life. Or people will begin creating psychological profiles of Vick based on passages like the following:

In 88 percent of 57 New Jersey families being treated for child abuse, animals in the home had been abused. An unpublished study by Frank Ascione of Utah State University found a strong pattern suggesting that child abuse victims are more likely to harm animals.

Ascione found that 25.5 percent of physically abused children were cruel to animals, 13.2 percent of sexually abused children were cruel to animals, and 34 percent of both physically and sexually abused children were cruel to animals, while only
4.7 percent of non-abused children were cruel to animals.

To put it bluntly, Vick can kiss endorsements goodbye if he is found culpable in any way, shape, or form - and with black community leaders like Al Sharpton and hip-hop mogul Bill Simmons publicly siding with PETA and calling for corporate America to cancel those deals, it's likely to happen anyway.

Just 'cause he was a running back doesn't mean he has to stick his foot in his mouth...

But Emmitt Smith went and did it anyway. I won't reprint Smith's statements, but he said, in essence, that Vick was probably going to end up taking the fall for everybody else because he was the biggest fish in the pond.

I don't know how they sounded when he said them, but the way they read comes off as a"Vick's being railroaded by the government" sort of sentiment. Of course it couldn't be because they believe that Vick could be bankrolling the dogfighting ring, could it? No...the money behind it couldn't be coming from the athlete with the $130 million contract.

Anyone else wondering if Emmit Smith's ESPN career will be over before it began? Come to think of it - with the way they're going, Smith is fine...it's not like he has sexually harassed any of the people behind the scenes.

Will the real slim shortstop please stand up?

Over the last six weeks the Red Sox have gone through their toughest stretch of the season. I'm not talking about scheduling - I'm talking about hitting.

They have been brutal, leaving an inordinate number of men on base. The clutch hitting has been non-existent. Baseball's best three-four combo in the game has been mediocre, and Kevin Youkilis - a big reason why the offense got along with Manny Ramirez and David Ortiz hitting like...well, Dave Magadan - has five hits in his last 31 at-bats over the last ten games. His average has dipped from .324 to .310 during that time.

However, following three losses, the Sox had three wins. Mostly due to timely hitting from the team's lightweights - Coco Crisp, and Julio Lugo.

Lugo has been something of a freak, and it's time for the real Julio to stand-up.

In spite of hitting below the Mendoza line for a greater portion of the season than any regular has the right to, somehow Lugo is tied for fourth on the team in RBI's with 47, and leads the team in stolen bases, in spite of the fact that his .291 on base percentage ranks him ahead of only Wily Mo Pena and Doug Mirabelli among position players on the team.

The freakish thing really is the last ten games, after he broke out of a slump that felt much too long. Over the last week and a half's worth of games, Lugo is 16 of 39 (.410), 7 RBI, and a grand slam.

To put that in perspective - Ortiz over the same time frame - 14 of 40 (.350), 9 RBI, and two homers.

Will the real Sox shortstop please stand up? I'd like to know what to expect for the second half.

The number 95 and other thoughts produced by the two cells that are left...

There are a lot of things that Michael Vick should be worried about in this case -

He should worry about the sheer amount of details in the indictment that include where and when dogs were purchased, the actual amounts bet on fights, locations of the fights, and the fact that there are at least four witnesses for the prosecution listed in the indictment.

He should worry that his cousin who was so ready to take the fall for him a month ago, even going so far as to have a press conference during which he admitted culpability and denied Vick has any knowledge, appears nowhere in the indictment.

He should worry about the timing and the fact that the Federal court in Richmond is known as the fastest in the country at pushing cases through the courtroom.

He should worry about the fact that it's the federal judiciary rather than some local like Mike Nifong who was incompetent or Surry County District Attorney Gerald Poindexter who was dragging his feet on the investigation, and likely to let it drop.

Most of all he should worry about the number 95. That's the percentage of criminal cases in federal court which result in a conviction. There are a number of other people who have a lot more money than Vick who are now behind bars after being dragged into the federal judiciary. Anyone remember Enron and their brain trust?

There are claims of racism already appearing in some quarters, others are alleging that it's because Vick's a celebrity, however, I put it to you, ask the average - and I emphasize AVERAGE - Michael Vick fan from a predominantly black community in Georgia to tell you who Ken Lay was...I give an outside chance at best that the individual will know who that was and that he was nailed by the feds.

Also, if this had been some white guy, Samoan, or even black guy who was a back-up lineman making league minimum with the Falcons, I guarantee he would be cut already. If anything, I would say that Vick's celebrity has thus far protected him as anyone of his previous transgressions - the water bottle, flipping off the fans, smoking the roach on the girlfriend's MySpace page - would have gotten a bottom of the roster player cut.

Baseball writers need to...

Get off the Bud Selig's back about attending Barry Bonds perversion of baseball's biggest record. I am no Bud Selig fan, but this constant whining from the writers - particularly the ones at ESPN - needs to stop.

Selig does not need to be there - get over it.

The vast majority of writers turned as blind an eye to the problem as any of the owners - at whom the writers point their fingers, seldom lumping themselves in as culpable. Now they seem to be beating on Selig as though making him the bad guy in all this gives them a pass on "celebrating the record" as it should be...to paraphrase ESPN's Buster Olney. Olney is among those that think it would be a travesty for Selig to not be there, because it would belittle the breaking of the record.

His argument is that it seems as though Bonds has become the scapegoat for the entire era and that people have forgotten that Bonds was not the only one on the juice, and that's not fair.

Nobody has forgotten that others were juicing - Sammy Sosa, Mark McGuire, and Rafael Palmiero are still talked about regularly. There are still whispers of why Pudge Rodriguez got a lot less pudgy when the testing was instituted and why Roger Clemens, after three years of decline in his 30's, suddenly seemed to be 25 again...after being on a Red Sox team with Jose Canseco

It feels to me like the baseball press is trying to make Selig the bad guy in this just so they can make themselves feel better about covering this travesty. The man has cheated the game and the its fans and the writers will once again be culpable in the sham that will be the home-run record.

I guess there are those that learn history and are doomed to repeat it anyway.

Dry rot in Flowery Branch

I touched on this a little bit last night.

Michael Vick has been indicted on Federal charges related to the dogfighting investigation. The charges include conspiracy and transportation across state lines in addition to the dogfighting charges. The conspiracy charge in particular has to be troubling to Vick's lawyers as Vick's defense has been that he was never at the property.

Under the federal conspiracy statute, he doesn't have to be directly involved. As long as he has been facilitating the operation, he's got problems - and it's one of the few charges where proving that link is made considerably easier for the government.

Additionally, this isn't the incompetent Surry County prosecutor they're going against. And the federal prosecutor's office already has close to half a dozen witnesses that put him not just at the fights, but as a major player in the dogfighting underworld.

Some of the reports say that Vick could be in court as early as the middle of November.

Reaction from league offices has been...less than satisfactory given their reactions to other repeat offenders (and make no mistake, someone who is on his girlfriend's myspace page smoking a joint, and later gets in trouble at an airport over a water bottle with a secret compartment before getting indicted by a federal grand jury is a repeat offender). For many, particularly animal rights activists, the wait and see approach being favored by the league at the moment is not going to fly. According to a report this morning by Steve Wyche in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

"We are disappointed that Michael Vick has put himself in a position where
a federal grand jury has returned an indictment against him," NFL spokesman
Brian McCarthy said in a statement. "We will continue to closely monitor
developments in this case, and to cooperate with law enforcement authorities.

"The activities alleged are cruel, degrading and illegal. Michael Vick's guilt has not yet been proven, and we believe that all concerned should allow the legal process to determine the facts. The matter will be reviewed under the League's Personal Conduct Policy."

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell has suspended Tennessee Titans cornerback Adam "Pacman" Jones for the season for repeated run-ins with the law. Chicago Bears defensive lineman Tank Johnson, who was cut by the team recently, was suspended for eight games, for his legal problems. So was Cincinnati Bengals wide receiver Chris Henry.

Though the strengthening of the player code of conduct was aimed to punish repeat offenders, Goodell could suspend a player on a first offense and has warned Vick as much.

Goodell, who took over as commissioner in 2006, met with Vick in late April, shortly after police raided a property Vick owns in Surry County, Va., and found evidence of dogfighting. At that time, Vick told Goodell that he was not involved in dogfighting. Vick also said as much publicly then, in his only statements on the issue.
If the facts prove that Vick was not honest with Goodell, that could factor into any punishment levied.

Blank also met with Vick in early May and in a "stern" conversation. Blank said the
talk was mostly one-sided but that he would trust and believe in Vick unless proven otherwise.

Part of the new player conduct policy deals with teams facing possible sanctions for not holding players accountable for negative behavior. That facet of the policy could prompt the Falcons to take proactive measures.

If the 27-year old quarterback does get suspended this season, and then convicted of the charges he faces - he could lose up to seven years of his NFL career to the dogfighting, effectively ending his tenure in the NFL. Personally, I believe that if he even had an inkling this was happening on his property (and I honestly believe he more than just had an inkling), Vick needs to be, I'd say thrown to the dogs, but I really don't think I should make a joke about this.

On a related note, what do you think Clinton Portis would say now?

Roger Goodell's gonna need shackles and a cattle prod before this is all over...

A banner day for the NFL -

Pacman Jones is trying to work out with the Titans (I'm sure Bud Adams is thrilled), franchised malcontents Lance Briggs and Asante Samuel failed to agree to contract terms with their respective teams, and now what every blogger has been waiting for - Michael Vick has been indicted on federal charges.

With an indictment now hanging over the head of the "league's most exciting player," Goodell will be forced to act. He cannot stand idly by when one of the league's most over-rated star players faces federal charges when he has handed out a one-year suspension to Jones who has had multiple run-ins with the police, but no convictions...and no federal indictments.

How Goodell handles this will send very clear signals to the press and to the NFL-fandom about who he really is. It's one thing to suspend a cornerback, a number three receiver, and a defensive tackle. It's another thing altogether to nail one of the league poster-boys to the proverbial wall.

Of course, in light of Vick's last year, Goodell might very well be happy to serve notice that being a poster boy is not...shall we say, a right for the highly talented. This might become the single most interesting decision to come out of league offices during the Comish's brief tenure.

Vick apologists go home and other QB issues

Andrew Perloff over at Sports Illustrated made a bold prediction about the Falcons this year. Less a prediction, really, than a statement that the Falcons "could go," 3-13 this season. This of course brought all the Vick apologists out of the wood work like little termites.

Vick's woes are everybody's fault but his own, including the fact that he has shown no progress in his development as a pro. One of my favorite statements on the forum responses to Perloff's blog regarding Vick was from some Falcons fan who claimed to have played QB in the CFL and AFL and stated that Vick only put the ball up 15-20 times per game.

Never mind the fact that his average attempts per game for his career is 23.4, and for the last two seasons around 25, according to this Falcons fan, Vick's completions per game, based on his completion percentage, would be between 8.07 and 10.76. Yeah, that's the guy I want under center. I'm not even going to get into his yardage numbers.

Hell, even at 23.4 per game, his completions still end up at a brutally low 12.6 per game.

On most teams that doesn't just get you benched. It gets you cut.

To put it in perspective - Tom Brady? 31.92 attempts per game and 61.9 percent completions, or 19.75 completions per game.

Ben Roethlisberger who is kept to a lower number of attempts, more comparable to Vick, because of the reliance on Pittsburgh's potent running attack? 25 AGP, 62.4 % completions, and 15.6 CPG.

How about Kurt Warner who was benched last season in spite of a completion percentage over 64? Who is in the twilight of his career in spite of two seasons where he averaged between 64.4 and 64.5 percent completions? Warner through his career has 31.75 APG, with a 65.6 % completions, with 20.8 CPG. And the prevailing belief is that he can't start in this league anymore.

So, I say it once again, until Vick shows me something...consistently, then just go home and be quiet, because Vick is the anti-A-Rod - a supremely talented athlete that puts up mediocre to poor numbers.

And before any of you use the argument about his rushing statistics last year, let me pose the question - just what did that 1000 yards Vick got on the ground get you? A playoff berth or a losing season?

Making a mountain out of a mole hill

Originally entitled by the NY Daily news, Manning Lobs Barb at Barber, the following was reported on SI.com under a slightly different title alluding to essentially the same idea...

Manning takes shot at Tiki
Posted: Thursday July 12, 2007 07:50AM ET
Eli Manning didn't hold back when asked about what he thought life would be like without newly retired running back Tiki Barber. "I don't think we're concerned," Manning said. "We're excited by the players that we have who wanted to return for this season, and who wanted to be a part of the Giants and play." When word of Barber's retirement leaked out during last season, many in the media questioned Barber's dedication to the team. Manning's parting shot, however, is the first time a teammate has openly criticized the Giants' all-time leading rusher.

Sure, this statement could be looked at a back-handed slap at the former Giants running-back, but it really looks to me like the press trying to create controversy where there isn't any. I'm not an Eli fan, but I really do feel this is reaching.

This strikes me as something along the lines of the following -
Spring 2006
Member of the press - "Hey David, what do you think the Sox chances are without Johnny Damon?"
Big Papi - "I don't think we're concerned. We're excited by the players that we have who wanted to return for this season, and who wanted to be a part of the Red Sox."

Is there anyone out there that would take that as a shot at Damon, or Ortiz just trying to build his new team-mates up? Anyone?

More quick hits

In the news for all the wrong reasons...again
It seems my favorite Atlanta Falcon punching bag, the highly over-rated quarterback Michael Vick appears to have run afoul of the law...again, this time he has been implicated in a drug probe which has revealed, at the very least, some sort of indirect support of the illegal practice of dog fighting at a home Vick owns in Virginia. Currently a 26-year old relative who was being investigated as a drug dealer in a narcotics probe lives at the home.

According to the report, "more than 60 dogs were found in three buildings. Some appeared malnourished, scarred and injured, officials said."

Unfortunately, since Vick was not there...and I don't believe this would be his primary residence, I have a hunch that this will provide him with plausible deniability, allowing him to walk away from this dog fighting and what is yet another drug-related scandal unscathed.

I think it's interesting that trouble always seems to be hovering around this guy - whether it's as Ron Mexico, flipping off the fans, or being detained at an airport...not to mention the MySpace photos with a girlfriend and the marijuana use comments contained therein. Sure, to be fair one has to ask, "is he an innocent target?" or, "is he somebody that keeps putting himself in position to be a target?"

Just plain sloppy...
Orioles announcer and Maine native son Gary Thorne screwed up...bad. Assuming he heard Doug Mirabelli right and Mirabelli did actually say that it was paint on Schilling's sock, as someone who has worked professionally as a journalist for over a decade, here are the questions I have -

If the story is true...
1. When he first heard this, as he claims, two years ago (to the best of his recollection), as a journalist why didn't he follow up on this and get confirmation? There were plenty of potential sources to confirm -

A. First baseman Doug Mankiewicz who had a very acrimonious departure from the Red Sox.

B. Former Sox center fielder Johnny Damon.

C. Former Sox first baseman Kevin Millar.

D. The doctor, Bill Morgan, who performed the procedure and later was fired by the Red Sox.

Those are the ones off the top of my head. Keith Foulke comes to mind as well.

2. Mirabelli has a reputation as a practical joker - always has had that reputation. Wouldn't that make it more important to a reporter to confirm a story?

3. Most importantly, why would any reporter sit on a story like this for two years?

Red Sox fan or no, as a journalist I know that's something I'm working on getting out quickly and I'm making sure I have corroboration for my story. This was just sloppy and irresponsible.

28th and wondering where to go...
Right now the Red Sox are third in the majors in ERA (3.21), the Yankees 27th (4.83), the Yankees are 4th in batting average (.275), the Sox are 13th (.259). However, from the 7th inning on the Sox are 5th (.277), and the Yanks are 8th (.263) in batting and the Sox are tied for 2nd in ERA (1.83) while the Yanks are 28th (5.03). All of this has translated into the best record in baseball for the Red Sox heading into the final weekend of April. For the Yankees? A better record than only the Royals, Rangers, Nationals, and Cubs. Technically, that leaves them in 28th overall in the bigs.

How loud will the thus far quiet George Steinbrenner become if the Yankees extend their losing streak against the Red Sox this weekend? If they are swept again? If they lose two of three?

It could get really ugly really soon in the Bronx.

I know that the Yankees started like this last year, but last year they had a deeper bench and the Red Sox pitching wasn't as good as it is this year. They can turn it around. The question is, will they in time?

The Weigh In and other Quick Hits...

Well, was at 187 this morning, down 6 pounds from the start of the contest. With my wife's 5.5 pounds that brings us to 11.5 - 4.4 more than the in-laws...booyah.

This week, look for my year in review as well as a look at preseason picks and a look forward to the playoffs.

Quick hits on the weekend -

Nick Saban is likely on his way to Alabama. I don't think you entertain a job offer two years into a five year contract unless you plan on leaving...not to mention the last time Saban said he wasn't going anywhere he was in Louisiana and months later he was in Miami.

I think, in addition to Arizona and Atlanta, Pittsburgh will have a new coach next year. Other teams that may soon be looking include the Giants, contingent upon the headway they make in the post season, and Miami (see above). I think Romeo Crennel gets one more season to make things work in Cleveland and, due to the long standing relationship, Art Shell gets another season in Oakland.

I hope, for the sake of Darrent Williams family, that the drive by shooting that killed him this weekend turns out to be nothing more than being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I figued that Tony Romo would come back to earth, but what the hell is going on with the Dallas defense?