Adam’s Two Cents

Sorry about not getting on the last couple of days, taking care of some personal matters. With that said here are some takes on the news of the day.

Memphis’ 2008 Final Four run is going to be vacated after the NCAA learned that Derrick Rose cheated on the SAT. Now this might of some concern for Kentucky because the hired John Calipari, because this is the second time that a Final Four run has been stripped from his career. Now one was for cheating, and the one with UMass was because Marcus Camby signed with an agent. However, I would be concerned becasue apparently Calipari has a hard time keeping track of what his players and recruits are doing, or is just turning a blind eye. Does Kentucky really want that?

Soccer is getting attention for Burnley knocking off the all-mighty Manchester United. Good and not good for the popularity of the sport here in the States. Good in that it shows a little bit of parity, even though it’s Burnley’s first win in 41-years over Man U. And it’s bad because the only reason people are bringing it up is because of the big upset. If the upset didn’t happen, no one’s talking about it.

Well the Red Sox have regained the lead in the A.L. Wildcard race. Now with the Yankees coming to town, is this the turn of the momentum back in the Sox favor? How things change quickly in a week.

As for Tarkenton’s comments on Favre, I couldn’t have said it better myself.

Some quick hits to wrap up the weekend in sports.

Well the U.S. men’s soccer team gave us something to cheer for, and something to look forward to. Certainly the run in the Confederations Cup caught alot of people off guard, but the win over Spain was the one that shocked me. I mean to defeat a team who up until that point hadn’t allowed a goal, and for that matter hadn’t even lost a game in nearly three years. Well that should make the U.S. some what favorites in the 2010 World Cup.

Moving onto College Football. This past week the NCAA shot down the playoff proposal from the Mountain West Conference. That led to Air Force Head Coach Troy Calhoun comparing the BCS to communism. Hmmm…..that made me chuckle a little bit, on one hand Calhoun does have a point, the BCS does just allow whomever they want to play in their bowls.

Moving along to the NBA, the question now after the draft is how long will Blake Griffin be an L.A. Clipper before he gets traded. Over/under at two years.

Congrats to Joey Logano, in scoring his first win in the Sprint Cup Series at New Hampshire Sunday. Even if it did come via the rain, you’ll take them anyway you can get them.

One good thing for Buffalo Bills fans is that owner Ralph Wilson said that he is in no hurry to move more regular season games to Toronto. Which means that for the near future the Bills may not be moving to Toronto, but I still eventually think that the Bills will end up in Toronto in the not so distant future.

One thing popped into my head Sunday night watching the WNBA game between L.A. and Seattle. Now I had seen this all season but for once I started to think about it. The Sparks had Farmer’s Insurance on the front of their jersey’s instead of Sparks. Now like I said I had seen this before and brushed it off, then I started thinking about something Dan Patrick said a few years ago. Dan said after Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s news conference to announce sponsors for his car in 2008 that it was going to be the future of sports, that one day all of the franchise’s in every sport would have a sponsors logo, and I think he’s going to be right. It might just be in NASCAR and in the WNBA, but it’s spreading and will be here before you know it.

Here are some quick hitting takes. First off how’s your bracket’s doing? Mine you ask? Not so good. I started out good on the women’s side, nailing all but two first round games, then the wheels came off in the second round, mainly behind Rutgers thrashing of Auburn who I picked to go to the finals. On the men’s side I’ve been shakey all tourney long so no need to fear me beating out people for awards.

Anyway tonight provides some great sweet-16 matchups, North Carolina-Gonzaga is intriguing, as is the Oklahoma-Syracuse matchup. But, I am looking forward to the Michigan State-Kansas game for the simple reason that I had all Big Ten teams out by this point and Purdue and Michigan State made it further than I predicted. Purdue faultered and now it might be the Spartans turn, only time will tell.

So I read in my Sporting News e-newspaper this morning that the Clippers are looking into offering Isiah Thomas a job. Man somethings never change. The Clippers have always been bad, and from the moves there making, or getting ready to make, just seems like the “badness” with the Clippers will continue. If they’re going to get rid of Mike Dunleavy I agree with that, but to hire Isiah Thomas is asking to be set back five to 10 years depending on how long he stays. I mean past history has shown this guy might have played good, but he can’t coach or manage a team worth a rat’s donkey. He took the Pacers and ran them into the ground as a coach, and in New York, it was one bad thing after another. Isiah is the Matt Millen of the NBA.

Finally a good move by Joe Girardi as manager of the Yankees. He put Derek Jeter as the leadoff hitter, a place where he should’ve been long ago. Nothing like starting a game with the highest potential of getting a base hit. Maybe things will turn around for Girardi and the Yankees, then again they might have a long way to go.

It appears the Billy Gillispie era in Kentucky has come to an end. And the thought of Michigan football enters into my head. Yes Kentucky struggled under Gillispie, but has anyone ever heard of rebuild? But the good thing about basketball is that you can turn it around alot more wuickly than in football with the right guy. Wherever Gillispie goes, they need to have patients with him because he is a coach that rebuilds over time, not overnight.

The 49ers have figured out at least one player they won’t draft if he gets that far down the board. They brought in Matthew Stafford to visit, and the Niners brought in a psychologist and asked Stafford how he felt about his parents divorce. Apparently Stafford didn’t take to kindly to the questions, and coach Mike Singletary didn’t take too kindly to Stafford’s answer and ended up telling the press “if you’re going to pay a guy millions of dollars, and asking him about his parents divorce is going to be an issue, uhhhhh, then maybe he doesn’t belong here”. Nothing against Stafford, but I love Singletary’s straight forward-tell it like it is attitude.

Tiger Woods is near the lead in the Arnold Palmer Invite, and the heads of golf will be going to church to thank the man upstairs this Sunday, and the folks from CBS will join no doubt. And NASCAR heads into Martinsville this weekend. The smallest track on the circuit. I like Martinsville, and everytime NASCAR heads there they talk about the famous Martinsville hot dog, which gets me craving hot dogs, you’ll know what I mean when you google it.

Well have a great weekend and enjoy the sports.