I have spent the last three days running football camp for the West Boca Dragons Tackle Football league. Working with kids 8 and 9 years old. It has reminded me how great a game football is. Yes there are concussions and it can be violent. But kids love football.
This video says it all. Be sure to listen all the way to the end. Enjoy!
Image by Getty Images via @daylife
Well I am not about to go write some hate-filled, vindictive, classless open letter to fans, but I can appreciate how baseball fans feel about the Yankees. LeBron James coming to Miami did not make my day either. You see, though I live in South Florida, I am and always will be a NY Knicks fans (Knickerbockers for those who don’t know).
Since the end of the Patrick Ewing era we Knick fans have been a miserable bunch. But lets face it, the Ewing era was just a tease as well. Though we came close, Michael Jordan was always there to put a dagger in our hearts. The one year he was off playing baseball, the Houston Rockets and Hakeem the Dream thwarted our championship plans.
The plain sad truth is that we have not won a championship since 1973. Before that we won one in 1969 and that is it. We ain’t talking the Celtics or the Lakers here.
I am also a NY Rangers fan. Though Messier bought a cup to the Garden in my lifetime, it was the only one in my lifetime. So between the Knicks and Rangers the sad, sad truth is they usually suck.
But I have my Yankees. Year in and year out they are always capable of winning it all. Sure, they spend more than anyone. But hey they don’t make the rules, they just play by them. I never quite understood the vitriol that other baseball fans have for the Yankees.
This LeBron thing though has showed me that side. WTF. The Knicks have purged their entire team. Knick fans have sucked it up for years so we could “free up cap room”. For what Amar-e No-D Stoudemire? I don’t think so.
This is just not fair. It is un-American. Who ever heard of turning down more money? I think David Stern should step in and do what is in the best interest of the NBA. Give NY a viable franchise for the good of the league. Order that LeBron come play for the Knicks! :-)
If not I will probably wind up buying tickets to take my kids down to the AA Arena to watch the Heat play.
The town of Milledgeville seems like a nice, sleepy little town in the middle of Georgia. They are not used to the kind of media spotlight that this whole affair brought down on them. But everyone from the DA on down seemed to handle it well. It sounds like Ben Roethlisberger's people did too.
I have to admit, when I first heard about this story, I thought we were going to be in for a circus right out of My Cousin Vinny. But it appears the only one that will really pay the price here is Ben Roethlisberger. For the second year in a row, he took his birthday to be an excuse for a Caligula-like orgy of booze and woman. At least he left the gambling off this time!
From a criminal point of view this case is closed for Ben, but the incident's repercussions are from from over. The Rooney's are itching to show that the Steelers will not tolerate this type of thing, regardless of how good the player is. They may not get the chance though, as the NFL may beat them to it.
As big a fan I am of the Steelers and Ben, I say it is well deserved. Ben needs grow up and get with the program. I hope he takes this for the lesson it is and the rest of his career is marked by him being a model citizen.
I wonder though if I am the only one who finds some of the details in the investigation here just a little suspicious. First the case of the "taped over" video of Ben in the club. Then the refusal to give police interviews by the woman, as well as the the now published letter where she does not want to prosecute any criminal charges. There has been no civil suit filed, not even talk of one.
Could it be that Ben's team of lawyers and investigators spread enough money around Milledgeville to make all of this go away quietly? I am not saying the DA or Police were bribed. But could the young 20 year old co-ed already have received a "settlement" for her trouble? The club owner? Who knows. If they did, more power to them.
Ben has plenty of money. It is shame that he had to spend it on this kind of nonsense though. He is going to lose more money in lost endorsements though too. If money means anything to Ben this whole thing should serve as a really expensive lesson.
But if he learns his lesson from it and we never hear about any off the field incidents again involving Ben Roethlisberger, it will be money well spent! Let his on the field exploits be the measure of the man.
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One of Albert Gonzalez, the TJX hacker’s cohorts was sentenced last week in court in Boston for his part in the big hack according to this article in Wired and Dan Kaplan’s report in SC Magazine.
Stephan Watt, 25 years old, was allegedly a close personal friend and confidant of ring leader Albert Gonzalez who is awaiting sentencing while undergoing psychiatric evaluation to determine if he is competent. Poor Watt was supposedly just a bit player in the scheme, though he did write the sniffer program that was used to get the credit card information. He supposedly did not receive any money directly from the crime. I don’t really believe that BTW.
Watt was sentenced to two years in prison and 3 years of supervised release. Plus he was ordered by the court to pay back $171.5 million dollars in restitution for his part in the hacking scheme of the decade, if not the century.
Watt’s lawyer had asked for a no-jail time sentence, claiming there client was just a minor accomplice in the grand scheme (pun intended) of things. He was motivated by friendship and intellectual curiosity, not greed according to his attorney. He had a bright future working at Morgan Stanley, Qualys and some other companies.
In the meantime he was living in an apartment that his Mom paid for. Isn’t that just grand. The big time member of the most notorious hacker ring ever living in a place his mommy bought him.
So I was thinking if Watt has to stay in the place his mom bought him and he did not make real money out of this scheme, where is he coming up with $171.5m? That ain’t exactly chicken scratch.
In reading more about Watt it seems he is in great physical shape and is 7 feet tall. There is the answer! Who else besides hackers have access to that kind of money? Professional ballplayers. A 7 foot white guy. He should be able to get a gig as a basketball player pretty easily. He probably can’t jump, but hey he is 7ft. With what they pay pro basketball players, he actually has a shot at paying that court ordered restitution off.
His Mom should pack him off with some basketball sneakers when he goes to serve his sentence. He should practice everyday for the next two years. When he comes out he can join some of the other delinquents who currently play in the NBA. He might even teach them how to hack into each others twitter accounts and stuff.
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Ask anyone who has done it and they will tell you. Raising children to become decent humans is probably the biggest job you are ever going to have. It is a constant struggle, especially with boys. Explaining why you do have to take a shower every night, brush your teeth and comb your hair gets tired after a while. The fascination with bodily functions and why it is not polite to speak about them in front of others is another fun topic. Being respectful and sensitive to others doesn't come natural either. Oh, by the way add doing well in school and developing emotionally and socially as something else parents have to watch and help with. I have so much more appreciation now for anyone who has accomplished this and the utmost respect for those whose children have turned out well. For me it is a constant struggle. I want my kids to grow up and be good humans. Every once in a while though they do or show me something that makes me think my wife and I are doing something right. It could be just dumb luck, but now and then you see a shimmer of what a diamond in the rough may be lurking underneath it all. I had one of those moments tonight. In spite of my best efforts, both of my boys are big Peyton Manning fans. The Colts were playing the Jacksonville Jaguars tonight and my oldest son Landon, 10 years old and I watched the beginning of the game together on the NFL Network (they need better announcers on that network by the way). Prior to the beginning of the game they made an announcement that out of respect regarding the tragic death of wide receiver Chris Henry of the Cincinnati Bengals today, they were going to observe a moment of silence. My son sitting at home watching TV turned, looked at me and said, “Dad come on we have to stand up”. I stood up with him and watched as he put his hand over his heart and closed his eyes. I could see him really thinking to himself about what a terrible thing this was to happen. He really looked very sad. At the end of the moment he looked at me and said “Dad he was only 26 years old. What a tragedy.” Landon doesn’t know Chris Henry. We are not Bengals fans. We really had no connection to Chris Henry before today. But the loss of a young life. The loss of an athlete was felt by my young son. He was dealing with it in an adult and human way. I grabbed Landon and gave him a big hug. I told him yes it was a tragedy. I also told him how proud I was of him and what a great young man he was growing up to be. Moments like those make me think in spite of everything, we are doing something right in raising these kids. They will be great humans! RIP Chris Henry.
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I grew up in the age of the newspaper. In our house we were lucky in that there were so many papers available to us. The NY Daily News, the NY Post and Long Island Newsday all had great sports sections. Even the NY Times had an occasional great sports story to read. I grew up reading some of the all time greats like Mike Lupica and Dick Young. I guess Ray Romano did too, because “Everyone loves Raymond” was him living his fantasy about writing sports, living in Long Island. I try to sneak in some sports here on the blog now and then, but lets face it, you don’t want me writing too many sports articles here (or do you?)
For a long time I read a lot of sports stories on the Bleacher Report. The Bleacher Report is “the worlds largest sports network powered by fan-generated content”. After so long reading and occasionally commenting on articles, I have begun to write some of my own on BR. It is pretty cool. I feel like Lupica or Young. It definitely is kind of living a dream for me.
I don’t have a lot of time to write sports stories. I try to do it at night before bed. So far I have 4 stories up. Two on the Steelers and 2 on the Yankees. You can read them at my profile page on BR here. I will keep doing it as long as I find it cool. Stop by and have a read. Of course would welcome your comments and ideas on stories.
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One of my favorite things about football season is when the boys don’t have any sports games to play and we go watch the Steelers at one of the local sports bars here in town. I dress both of them up in their Steeler jerseys, I put mine on, and we go for a boys day out. This year has been a difficult season. The defending Super Bowl champions have generally been a huge disappointment. This past week against the lowly Oakland Raiders the Steelers were once again in the lead late in the game, only to give up a big end of game touchdown and lose.
Yes injuries have hurt them, but it is no excuse. Their once vaunted defense is like Swiss cheese. Now with this latest loss their chances of making the playoffs are pretty much done. My family and I are still going to see them Jan 3 when they come to town to play the Dolphins, but what a disappointment .
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No matter what happens the NY Yankees are . . The Yankees. New ballpark - new pitchers, recession-depression, boom or bust, the Yankees just keep winning. Congrats especially to the core 4 of Jeter, Pettite, Posada and of course the incomparable Mariano Rivera.
For me this is the first time since 1978/79 (I know many of you weren’t born then) that my Steelers and Yankees were world champs at the same time. Thinking back to those years (I was in college) brought back many sweet memories. I hope it is a good omen for good things to come!
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Well it is August and baseball games are important this time of year. Yes a win is a win and games won in April count as much as games won now, I know. But the ones now just seem bigger. So though the Red Sox won the first 8 games played between them and the Yankees this year, they came into the new Yankee Stadium still trailing the Yankees for first place. They leave the stadium trailing by a lot more after being swept 4 straight. There were several important things about this series though beyond the Red Sox falling farther behind the Yanks:
1. This was truly the coming out party for the new Yankee Stadium. Before this series it was a very expensive, very fancy ball park. Now some of the magic is there. The Yankees have a phenomenal record at the park and Boston has to wonder if it will be a heart break palace for them in the years to come.
2. Alex Rodriguez while not having one of his best seasons actually had some clutch home runs for a change. His 15th inning game winning blast breaking up a 0-0 tie was a true clutch hit. The type of thing that has been lacking in all of his glory till now. Coming against the Sox, it is was big time.
3. Mark Teixeira established himself as the one that got away from the Red Sox. They were so close to signing him before the Yankees snatched him away. Now they know how big that was. Besides leading the league in home runs, he is a vacuum cleaner at first base and a clutch hitter who makes A-Rod a better hitter by hitting in front of him.
4. The Yankees off season spending spree on pitching paid off big time. AJ and CC both came up big time. Andy Petite pitched one of the best games he has pitched in years and young Joba though not throwing his best game was impressive as well. The Yankees now have the starting pitching and the bullpen (except for Phil Coke, not sure why they keep him) to play with anyone in baseball.
All in all it looks like it is going to be a great fall for Yankee fans. In the meantime I am putting away my broom after sweeping out the Sox. But don’t worry Sox fans you still lead the season seriers 8-4. Take solace if you can in that!
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