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February 2008
The joys of spring training
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Furman Bisher
This was spring training, home delivered. Braves and Dodgers being televised, even before the first charley horse. Joe Torre in a Dodger uniform. (Had he taken the wrong plane? Was he dressed for a costume party?) Bobby Cox hadn’t been kicked out of a game yet, but why waste it on spring training. Besides, he hadn’t been feeling well lately. Larry Bowa in the Dodgers’ coaching box, giving you a live version of a “grizzled veteran.”
Thirty days from now, this would all be lost in the fog of time. Take no plunge in stock on what you see these spring days. It’s just the beauty of it all, families rolling in the grass on the bank above the outfield, mom, pop and their toddlers. Only when Chipper Jones or one of their other old favorites came to bat or make a play do they take notice of the game. A rookie strokes a line drive or makes a circus catch, they wonder who he is. By April he’d be down in Richmond or down in Mississippi. (Or a year from now, out in Gwinnett.)
Spring is a big faker. It teases the rookie with just enough of a taste of glory to give him false hope. Two years ago the bright hope of spring was … have you forgotten? Of course. It was James Jurries, a first baseman from Tulane. Jurries hit .413 and led the Braves driving in runs. You can’t find his name in the book now. Where have have you gone, James Jurries?
The infield is under remodeling. First base has been stabilized. Last spring there was only hope there, that Scott Thorman was ready. He wasn’t. Mark Teixiera is now open for business. Edgar Renteria is gone, and the Braves speak bravely of their future at shortstop, in the person of Yunel Escobar. Renteria was a tough one to give up, but baseball people have a way of logicalizing, and in this case they’ll cite numbers.
There was none better on the play up the middle than Renteria. On the other hand, he was next to the worst on plays to his right, going in “the hole.” Yes, he hit home runs and had a .332 average, tied for third best in the league. But Escobar is more athletic, has speed, steals bases, covers ground and can make that play in “the hole.” Managers always speak brightly of burgeoning youth, and Cox is no exception.
“We’ll miss Renteria,” he’ll say, and he means it, but he speaks of Escobar as a coming star, and the front office likes the bump it gets in salary save. Plus, it also likes the lively arm and strikeout pitcher it got in return, Jair Jurrjens, a Curacoan who is ready if he can be squeezed into the rotation. There, you see, is always the possibility that Mike Hampton’s arm will never be the same again. Hold your breath.
With Brian McCann, who needs another catcher? The restoration of Javier Lopez is in the works. (He’s one of two Javier Lopezes in the majors. The other is a Red Sox pitcher.) Once a player who had it all, Lopez disappeared into the wasteland at Baltimore. The fat contract the Orioles gave him developed into a bulging body. He lost it. He never had a bat in the major leagues last season, and coming home to the Braves like the prodigal son in the Bible, he got a new chance, worked his body into prime condition, and the new-old Javier has re-emerged. Stand by for the next act, of Javier Lopez as a backup catcher.
Well, it has been fun down there. I know by the radio, where Jones and Francouer and Glavine has been spilling out the secrets of their lives in (wow!) revealing interviews. My day will come in a couple of weeks, by which time the glow will have dimmed on some of the early bloomers, and there will be a more recognizable shape to the roster of twenty-five. For the time, there is pleasure in taking it in from afar.
And, by the way, does it look to you as if Francoeur has grown four inches and bulked up like Grecian god? Oh, no, no, none of that, just the admirable development of a growing boy with a great future out there. He plays Tiger Woods at his game; why doesn’t he bring Tiger to the ball park and give him a taste of his game?
Permalink | Comments (4) | Categories: Braves / MLB, Furman Bisher
Smoltz going his own way in spring
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
Lake Buena Vista, Fla. — Given the property is owned by a corporation devoted to fantasy, it followed Friday that John Smoltz was allowed to stand on a mound generally reserved for minor-leaguers and pitch in his own private Idaho.
“Strike!” yelled the umpire, Bobby Cox. (He was in the bag.)
This 23rd spring training will be like no other for Smoltz, assuming you can find him. He won’t pitch in an actual game for at least two weeks, maybe three. Until then, games will pretty much take place in his cranium.
It’s sort of like a self-imposed exile. The right-hander has tried to approach spring like a veteran pitcher is supposed to: just work on pitches and situations, forget about winning. But drive and ego invariably take over. “When you get the bases loaded and give up some runs, you just revert back to wanting to get guys out,” he said.
He said he considered “a shock collar.” Instead, he decided the solution was just avoiding going into the real stadium, except maybe to stretch. If this were football, he’d be the kicker.
His spring “debut” came on a practice field. He pitched two simulated innings against, well, five simulated major leaguers:
Gregor Blanco, Javier Guzman, Diory Hernandez, Brent Lillibridge and Brayan Pena. No Chipper Jones or Mark Teixeira, for as Cox said, smiling, “We want him to look good.”
It’s believed Smoltz allowed a run in the first inning. But there was some debate as to whether Teixeira would’ve caught two drives down the right-field line. It was sort of like debating who would win a fight between Superman and the Green Lantern.
“I thought when the crowd got into it, John really turned it up,” general manager Frank Wren said. He then left the field with his pet rabbit, Harvey.
It was one of the more bizarre scenes you’ll find in a pro camp. There was even a five-minute break between the first and second innings, just to give the imaginary home team a chance to hit. (Lasted five minutes. They stranded a base runner.)
The “crowd” included the Braves’ general manager, manager, pitching coach, hitting coach, bullpen coach, bullpen catcher, minor-league manager, a videographer (ordered by Smoltz) and some media members.
No anthem singer.
“I thought about singing it, actually,” Smoltz said later. “Me and Mac [Brian McCann], do a duet.”
Yes, well, there is a limit to even Disney fantasy. Then again, the Braves have learned not to say no to Smoltz. The team’s management and medical staff originally thought he was loony when he said he wanted to leave the bullpen and go back to starting. It turned out he knew his arm and the rest of his body better than anybody else.
So if Smoltz told Cox and pitching coach Roger McDowell he wanted cardboard cutouts on the base- paths and organ music to be pumped in during his warm-up tosses, they weren’t going to debate him. Fact is, Smoltz’s plan gave them extra time to evaluate some other potential starters — Chuck James, Jair Jurrjens, even Mike Hampton.
There’s also this: For as much as Smoltz is known as an all-out power pitcher, he is approaching 41. He needs to learn how to pitch like an old man because, relatively speaking, he is an old man.
“Every time I do something like this, people have said, ‘Oh, he’s reinventing the wheel. He’s got the stuff — just throw it.’ But they have no idea what I go through, both from a physical standpoint and learning what to do when the stuff’s just not there,” he said.
“It took me a year and a half to learn how to throw my slider outside. It took me another year and a half to master the other side [of the plate]. People think you learn a pitch and you master it in two months, but it just doesn’t work that way.”
He tends to start seasons slow, and then warms with the weather. His hope is that more early-season curveballs — of which he threw several Friday — will change that. His hope is that three or four imaginary games against an imaginary team can alter his reality.
“Despite what some people might think, I have a plan,” he said.
We’ve learned. Just go with it.
Permalink | Comments (25) | Categories: Braves / MLB, Jeff Schultz
Hank Aaron: Tiger Woods’ domination unprecedented
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
It takes greatness to put greatness into perspective. So as the PGA Tour becomes even more of a showcase for You Know Who with everybody else sitting a few monster tee shots behind, who better to describe the extraordinary ways of Tiger Woods than Hank Aaron?
At 74, and enjoying his 33rd year in retirement as baseball’s magic owner of 755 home runs, Aaron has made golf his sport of choice these days. “Well, I’m just a Saturday and Sunday golfer, and I’m not crazy enough to bet somebody any money,” said Aaron, laughing on Thursday after working out at Turner Field.
As for Woods, the winner of his past six tournaments overall, including three straight to begin this season, Aaron walked the course that day in Milwaukee 12 years ago when Woods made his pro debut. It turned the baseball Hall of Famer into a fervent Woods watcher and admirer. The Tiger Slam. The 13 major titles, including four at Augusta. The latest streak for Woods that continued after his annihilation of Stewart Cink in match play last weekend for a 63rd PGA Tour victory. The sliding past Arnold Palmer on the all-time wins list.
The inevitability during every tournament featuring Woods that he is not only going to win but romp.
It’s a combination that has Aaron calling Woods the most dominating athlete in sports history. “I don’t know of anybody who would be better,” said Aaron, a lifelong Cleveland Browns fan who even placed Woods ahead of the Browns’ icon of the 1950s and 1960s.
Yes, that guy.
“As great as Jim Brown was, and as great as Michael Jordan was, and as great as anybody you’d want to keep mentioning, I don’t know of anybody who was as great at his sport as this man is now,” Aaron said. “I mean, he’s totally incredible. He’s phenomenal. Sometimes I hear people say, ‘He’s lucky.’ Well, you can throw that talk out. You can be lucky and good, but he is absolutely good. Even when he’s way ahead, he wants to make every putt and every golf shot as perfect as possible.
“I don’t know of anybody who has ever played any sport who was able to concentrate as much on perfection at all times as Tiger Woods.”
Somebody was close: Aaron, who did everything well enough with his bat, glove, arm and legs for 23 seasons to rank with Willie Mays and any Yankee great among baseball’s most complete players ever for those who weren’t juicing. You also had the sensational likes of Muhammad Ali, Carl Lewis, Wayne Gretzky, Magic Johnson and Mark Spitz in other sports.
None intimidated their peers as much as Woods. Consider, too, that professional golf never has been deeper in players who are better than good. It hasn’t mattered, because Phil Mickelson, Vijay Singh, Ernie Els and the rest have needed to be better than great to approach Woods territory.
“Tiger is great, and there’s no question about it, but I think his competitors are so amazed by his greatness that they forget to play the golf course. They play Tiger Woods,” Aaron said. “I’ll tell you this right now: They’ll never beat Tiger Woods, because the only person who’ll ever beat Tiger Woods is Tiger Woods.”
That said, Aaron remained his eternally consistent self. For instance: He always has said records are made to be broken, including his old mark for homers that was surpassed last summer by artificially inflated Barry Bonds. As a result, it was logical for Aaron to say somebody will shatter Woods’ slew of records someday, but Aaron said as much with an asterisk as big as the one next to Bonds’ name.
“I think Tiger is going to put things so far out of reach for records that it’s not only going to take somebody very special to come along, but the game is going to have to change,” said Aaron, referring to the need of more explosive balls and new-age clubs to enhance a golfer’s game.
It’s just that all of those things also would enhance Woods’ game, which is a frightening thought.
Permalink | Comments (26) | Categories: Braves / MLB, Terence Moore
Kotsay won’t play in Andruw’s shadow
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
Vero Beach, Fla. — On the day Andruw Jones made his debut in another uniform, Mark Kotsay was given a day off. It’s the Braves’ sincere hope that this remains simple irony and not something more significant. Like, say, foreshadowing.
Kotsay is the Braves’ new center fielder. If he doesn’t have the most daunting task in professional sports, he is at least in that neighborhood.
What’s more difficult: Trying to make a full recovery from back surgery at 32, or replacing a 10-time Gold Glove center fielder and five-time All-Star who now plays for Los Angeles (Kotsay’s resume has neither gold nor stars)?
Actually, don’t answer. Kotsay has to do both. But his view on the situation is what you would expect from someone known for crashing into outfield walls.
“I like this situation,” he said. “For whatever reason, this is the kind of situation I thrive in. It’s true — I have a lot on the line. I have a lot riding on this year. But my attitude is, let’s play for something here.”
Braves manager Bobby Cox calls Kotsay “a dirt player.”
Kotsay puts it another way: “Andruw makes everything look so easy. I make everything look hard.”
Which is fine. As long as he’s making the catch look hard and standing easy, nobody will have a problem.
Jones is gone for economic reasons. Kotsay is here for economic reasons. That might be their only common denominator.
The Braves — following a self-imposed budget and determined to improve their starting pitching — didn’t want to take the payroll hit for what Jones’ one-year salary likely would have been after arbitration. So they let him go in free agency, where the Dodgers gave him over $36 million for two years.
Oakland was leery of Kotsay’s back issues and was going through another organizational churn: veterans out, prospects in. The A’s were so determined to get Kotsay out of their team, if not their books, that they agreed to pick up $5.35 million of his $7.35 million salary. The Braves traded away two young arms, though didn’t particularly value either that highly (Joey Devine and Jamie Richmond).
The team was just looking for a cheap and safe bridge in center field between Jones and prospect Jordan Schafer. Cheap, he got. Safe, not so much. Kotsay’s a gamble. If he can play 150 games, it pays off. If he’s closer to the career-low 56 he played last year, the Braves have a problem.
(Kotsay wasn’t injured Thursday. He reported early and played in Wednesday’s exhibition against Georgia. Long bus rides to Vero Beach tend to be bad for backs, so Cox rested him.)
Kotsay never had a back issue until 2003, when he crashed into the wall at Colorado while playing for San Diego, putting him on the disabled list with a sprain. The following year with the A’s, he played in 148 games and batted a career-high .314. But the back worsened the next two seasons. In 2006, he missed 25 of Oakland’s final 51 games.
He added yoga stretches to his conditioning program. But the herniated disc in his back wasn’t receptive. In March, Kotsay was forced to undergo surgery and spent over two months on the disabled list. He now admits he probably rushed it back in June, which explains why he played only 56 games before being shelved for the year.
And now?
“I feel great,” he said. If he didn’t say that, I’m guessing the Braves could void their $2 million contribution.
Openly, the team remains confident. Kotsay insists the memory of surgery won’t lessen his aggressive nature in the outfield. But the A’s clearly had doubts.
“The team had a long line of injuries last season,” Kotsay said. “It put a lot of stress on the organization. They made changes in the medical staff and the training staff. Whether it was anybody’s fault or just bad luck, nobody knows. But they just tried to get rid of guys with that cloud hanging over their heads.”
He expects some fans will have doubts. Vocally, also itchy trigger fingers. He knows that the, “Andruw would’ve gotten to that ball,” cries are on deck. If he cares, he’s hiding it well.
“The guy was here for 11 years,” Kotsay said. “He’s got [10] Gold Gloves. I don’t have any. The fans are spoiled and they’re going to want nothing but what Andruw was capable of doing. But I’m not here to please them. I’m here to do my job.”
If he stays upright, that will be a start.
Permalink | | Categories: Braves / MLB, Jeff Schultz
Big Tex + Big Season = Big Exit
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Two predictions.
Mark Teixeira will have a huge season.
Then he’ll leave.
As a free-agent-to-be, Andruw Jones seemed at an ongoing loss. (He hit .222, in case you’ve forgotten.) In conversation at spring training last week, Teixeira sounded like a measured man who has long awaited the opportunity. He will not hit .222. He might well hit .333.
Jones and Teixeira have the same agent, the famous Scott Boras. But the mighty Boras machinery is geared toward maximizing Teixeira in a way it never was Andruw. (Not to say Boras did all that poorly by the departed center fielder, who’ll make $18 million the year after he hit .222.) The big Boras free agent last fall wasn’t Jones but Alex Rodriguez. The big Boras free agent this fall will be Mark Teixeira.
“That’s just the natural progression,” Teixeira said. “When I was a rookie, there were a lot of [Boras] free agents. Every year there’s a new guy coming along. This just happens to be my year.”
Don’t look for Teixeira to disown Boras the way Gary Sheffield has, or to fire him the way Kenny Rogers did, or to go behind the agent’s back the way A-Rod did. Teixeira, see, is a truer believer. He calls Boras a “friend.” The two talk weekly. “There are always issues,” Teixeira said, “but a lot of it is, ‘How’s your family?’ “
As much as the Braves might try to keep Teixeira, there’s too much invested in this for Boras and his client to offer a hometown discount. (It didn’t happen with J.D. Drew, yet another Boras client, did it?) For the Braves to have any real shot, they’ll have to stop acting like a small-market team — Boras, as we know, loves bigger markets — and even then they’ll surely be outbid by one of the New York or L.A. clubs. That’s just the way this skewed system works. Or doesn’t work.
Don’t hate Boras for seeking to make his rich client richer. That’s his job. And don’t hate Teixeira if, after an All-Star or even an MVP season, he signs elsewhere for massive money. That’s the way of the baseball world, and Boras pretty much runs baseball.
Permalink | Comments (111) | Categories: Mark Bradley, Quick Hit
Hawks longer on talent, but short on time
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Marvin Williams was considered the most promising player in the 2005 draft, and if he hasn’t had — sorry for broaching this yet again — the galvanic NBA impact of a Chris Paul, it’s nonetheless true that Williams averages 15.8 points and 5.8 rebounds. And he’s now the fifth-best starter among Hawks.
You could — yes, this again — stock a playoff roster with the guys Billy Knight hasn’t drafted, but the greater point is that Knight has, at excruciating last, built a playoff roster for his team. Not many teams can boast five starters of this eminence:
— Al Horford, the third player picked in 2007.
— Williams, the second player picked in 2005.
— Josh Smith, the 17th player picked in 2004.
— Joe Johnson, the 10th player picked in 2001.
— Mike Bibby, the second player picked in 1998.
Asked Wednesday what he saw when he watched tape of the Hawks, Reggie Theus — Bibby’s coach with Sacramento and briefly a Hawk himself — said this: “I see a very athletic team, a very dangerous team. When they get it going, they can cause a lot of problems … They could be a very exciting team in the long run.”
Here’s the thing, though. The long run starts this minute. The Hawks awoke Wednesday 10 games under .500, which should never have happened. But now they’ve seen their last excuse shredded — the Hawks have a point guard! — and these next two months cannot be two months more of false starts and broken promises.
They could and should make the playoffs. They could and should become a rising force in the thin-gruel East. Then again, they could and should have done that already.
The trade with Sacramento has been characterized as Bibby’s chance to land with a playoff team, but the cold truth is that the Kings have a better record in a more difficult conference. The Kings do not, however, have better players. A lot of teams with better records have worse players than the Hawks, especially now.
Asked before his first home game in Philips Arena if his new team has the wherewithal to qualify for the postseason for the first time this century, Bibby said: “I think it does. We’ve just got to get on the same page. We’ve only had five games, and it’s still tough — we’ve only had one practice. But it will come.”
Asked the same question, Johnson said: “We do, but it depends on how bad we want it.”
It’s a cliché, sure, but it’s one of those clichés that has the benefit of being true. In calendar year 2008 the Hawks too often have played like a team that didn’t know how to win. Bibby could change that. He knows what he’s doing. He knows because he has done it.
And if you want to know if he, at the ancient age of 29, has anything left … yeah, he does. He showed that against the Kings, scoring 24 points and making 12 assists and steering the Hawks to their highest-scoring quarter of the season in his first quarter as a Hawk in Philips. (And Williams, who was ill, didn’t participate.)
To watch this team swooping and slashing and stacking 40 points on Sacramento in 12 minutes was to wonder if this is how it will be, and if it is there’s no doubt this team will be playing beyond its 82nd game. But what got the Hawks 10 games below .500 was the bizarre inability to consolidate a single gain. This powerful effort — the Hawks won 123-117 — cannot be a one-night or a one-month thing. This must be sustained.
Said Josh Childress, who scored 25 points and who’s yet another lottery pick (sixth overall in 2004): “We have to make it a goal and commit to getting a win by whatever means necessary.”
Sure, that notion could and should have taken hold long ago. But there’s still time, just, for this to work. There’s no longer any reason for these Hawks to stink.
Permalink | Comments (43) | Categories: Hawks / NBA, Mark Bradley
Author Heinz was at his best on boxing, war
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Furman Bisher
Too often, distinguished journalists move on without a proper benediction, like those who write songs but to the singer goes the glory. W.C. Heinz shall not be one of those, especially to those of us who strive along in his path.
Bill Heinz was one of America’s finest writers, not just of sports. Three decades or more ago, his name lit up the sky of journalism. Know who wrote “Run to Daylight” with Vince Lombardi? Know who wrote “M.A.S.H,” the book? Know who wrote “The Professional,” which Ernest Hemingway said was “the only good book about a fighter I’ve ever read” (in a note personally written)?
One and the same W.C. Heinz. There’s more, but first, I want to say this: That there are special persons who influence those who follow them, and those who aspire to their state in journalism, as out of reach as it may be. There was a time when my newspaper sent me to New York to cover major boxing events (Patterson vs. Johanssen, Ali vs. Norton, and so on), and it was on one of these adventures that I happened into Bill Heinz on the street, walking toward a press conference. We talked, and in the time that followed, we became acquaintances and he made this country rube feel like a friend.
He began at the lowest level, as a copyboy. (There are no such now.) He later went to Europe as a war correspondent and followed the 1st Army across France, through the Battle of Huertgen Forest, and on until V-E Day. When he came home, he was given his own column, and America was in for a treat. It was boxing that hooked him, and he came up through the age of Marciano, Pep, Sugar Ray and Graziano, and Stillman’s Gym, more a warehouse filled with sweaty hopefuls, became his campus.
When his newspaper folded, he moved on to freelancing and won award after award, including the A.J. Liebling Award for boxing writing. There wasn’t a subject he couldn’t move into with grace, and thus was led to Dr. H.R. Homberger, who had been struggling with a novel about the war in Korea in 1968. Bill took over, and thus “M.A.S.H” resulted, followed by one of the most successful television shows in history. It may be noted that the author is listed as Richard Hooker. That’s Bill Heinz, his pen name.
After the clock ticked on and journalism sank into its bottomless mire, he was in demand on television, but only occasionally did he respond. Writing was his art, and now a great artist has passed on. He retired to a farm overlooking the Vermont countryside at Dorset. After his wife passed away a few years ago, he moved into a retirement home in Bennington, and it was in a hospital there that Bill Heinz passed away Wednesday. He was 93, but his work is ageless.
Permalink | Comments (3) | Categories: Furman Bisher
Torn over thoughts on HGH testing
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
In Tom Glavine We Trust, particularly on issues involving labor and management in baseball.
After all, the Braves future Hall of Fame pitcher led the players’ mostly admirable charge against the Evil Owners during the 1994 strike before resuming his stroll to Cooperstown.
So I’m torn when it comes to how the game should approach this HGH thing regarding testing.
Chipper Jones brings up a wonderful point. In fact, he is just seconding the remarks of Derek Jeter. In sum, they say that if a player has nothing to hide, why wouldn’t he agree to a blood test for HGH and other performance-enhancing drugs?
Said Jones to our David O’Brien at the Braves spring home in Orlando: “The only people I would say who would object would be people afraid of needles, or who are on something.”
Makes sense to me. It doesn’t to Glavine, though, which is why I’m torn.
Said Glavine to O’Brien, “It’s (blood testing) potentially opening up a big can of worms. There’s the potential for so many problems with the way it’s handled, the way it’s stored. It scares me to think of somebody having my blood and the potential to tamper with it down the road, and you wouldn’t be able to do anything about it.”
That actually makes more sense to me, but only by the length of Louisville Slugger.
What a mess.
Permalink | Comments (40) | Categories: Quick Hit, Terence Moore
Woods putts distance between himself, world
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Furman Bisher
For the longest time, I have thought that Jack Nicklaus was the surest pressure putter I’d ever seen. Over the weekend, in fact, I saw him roll in a few, delivered by television, in the Skins Game played in Maui, and he is now 68 years old.
As it turned out, Tiger Woods was finishing off a show of his own in the desert suburbs of Tucson, devastating the field in the World Match Play Championship. This was, I’d presume, another step in Woods’ concentrated campaign to make this his year of the Grand Slam. This was no stroll in the park, at first. In fact, J.B. Holmes, the rustic from Kentucky, had him down by three holes with five to play. It was then that Woods snapped out of it, as if somebody had pushed his button. He putted Holmes into submission, and they weren’t tap-ins. Some were cross-country putts that left Holmes gasping.
The Arron Oberholser match was routine, “barely raising a sweat,” in the words of Doug Ferguson, the Associated Press golf writer. It is not to say that Woods rode a gravy train into the championship. He can be vulnerable. Last year, a left-handed Australian, the somewhat lank and ungainly Nick O’Hern with the broomstick putter, took him out in the third round. This time, here came Aaron Baddeley, a younger and handsomer Aussie. Twice Baddeley had his chance to close out the match, but twice he missed putts of some 10 or 12 feet that would have ended it.
From that point on, Woods turned the thing into a train wreck. K.J. Choi, the Korean who won Woods’ Washington tournament last summer, fell next, and the less one dwells upon the match with Stewart Cink, the better for the Georgia Tech alum. Back here in Georgia there was a colony of Cink believers who, with an ear to history, thought that this was his time to give his career a fresh launching.
You see, when they were collegians, the Stanford golf team came to Georgia for competitions. Woods was a freshman at Stanford, Cink an upperclassman at Tech. They were matched twice, and Cink won both. Nothing more realistic than fairy tale hope. Years have passed since collegiate days, and the two have taken off to different altitudes, one soaring, the other living happily ever after.
Woods turned it on once again Sunday against Cink. He sank putts halfway across Gila County. Even when the match was long since beyond a competition, he completed a week of putting the likes of which I don’t think I’ve ever seen. When he needed them, he made them. When he didn’t need them, he made them.
Then I opened the latest issue of Golf Digest, and there I found his recipe. “Making Putting Natural,” is the title. (Natural for him, maybe, but you and me?)
“Let your putter release to the hole with your right hand.” (That’s first. The problem is, I play left-handed.)
“Grip pressure varies from player to player.” (Mine is fairly light.)
“The shape of the stroke-path is another choice.” (This is heavy scientific stuff.)
“The key is to find what works for you.” (Now you’re talking.)
“I’ve started to monitor my stroke on a computer to make sure of my mechanics.” (This is sort of rising to another zone.)
“To practice the release, I focus on my right hand. I’m most consistent when my stroke path is one degree in to out through impact, with the putter face releasing.” (Now you’re way over our head?)
“I swing on an arc with the face rotating from open to closed.”
Well, there you have it. That’s about the best I can do for you. You have all his secrets. Most all. You don’t think it might be his readjusted eyes, do you? You know, the new vision he advertises.
Whatever, when it comes to that last great putt of all, I’ll go with Tiger.
Permalink | | Categories: Furman Bisher, Golf
Thrashers can’t pretend at contending
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
Three months after the deluded Bruce Levenson exclaimed, “Stanley Cup!” during a win in game No. 21 of an 82-game season, reality smacked a franchise and a shortsighted owner back to Fantasyland on Tuesday.
The Thrashers are not a Stanley Cup team.
They are not a playoff team.
They are not a team on the rise with structure or promise or any semblance of either.
If there was a blueprint in season one, or two, or seven, somebody must have spilled coffee on it. Because this can’t possibly have been the plan.
Season eight, and it’s another fire sale at the trade deadline. Is this what you signed up for? No? Then don’t blame Marian Hossa.
Regardless of what you may think of Hossa as a player — good, special or somewhere in between — understand that what happened Tuesday was less about a talented forward desiring to test free agency this summer than it was about making a statement on the Thrashers: their past, their present, certainly their future.
Money is always an element of these decisions. Hossa knew he could have landed a big contract in Atlanta. But in this case, it really wasn’t all about money. He wants to play for a Cup contender. The Thrashers aren’t remotely close, the nonsensical ramblings of an owner notwithstanding. The general manager, Don Waddell, entered his eighth trade deadline with another sub-.500 team and 62 points — closer to the team with the worst record (six ahead of Los Angeles) than the last playoff spot (seven points behind Carolina).
Gee. I guess it wasn’t all Bob Hartley’s fault.
Whether Hossa is worthy of landing an annual salary of $7 million to $8 million is debatable. He disappeared for stretches this season. He hasn’t driven to the net with the same zeal or consistency since banging his knee late last season. He has never been a factor in the playoffs.
But what he remains is one of the smartest players in the league — on and off the ice. He looked around. He wasn’t impressed. He liked the city. He liked his teammates. But a star with options wants to know there’s more. He didn’t like the direction. Could he have bypassed free agency? Sure. But why? There was no obvious payoff.
Waddell let center Marc Savard go in free agency two years ago. The team, already weak on the blueline, has had a void in the middle ever since. This was the second straight year the Thrashers seemingly were built to be average. It’s why Waddell had to scramble at the deadline last year to make the playoffs, dealing picks and prospects for Keith Tkachuk and Alexei Zhitnik.
Didn’t work this season. The Thrashers started 0-6, costing Hartley his job. Waddell stepped behind the bench and ignited the team to an 11-4 run. Some expected Waddell to eventually turn the team over to assistant coach Brad McCrimmon, but it never happened. After winning 11 of 15, the Thrashers won only 18 of 42 (18-20-4).
With playoff hopes dying again, Waddell did what he so often does — he dealt real players for magic beans and elixirs, with promises of a better tomorrow. Departing: Hossa and Pascal Dupuis. Arriving: a first-round pick, a top prospect (Angelo Esposito) and two other guys you’ve never heard of.
It’s Groundhog Day.
Hossa goes to Pittsburgh — the Thrashers’ alternate universe. The Penguins won two Stanley Cups and stayed competitive for several seasons before tearing down the roster. But after missing the playoffs for four straight years, they have been contenders for the past two seasons. And look at their lineup now: Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Ryan Whitney, Ryan Malone, Hossa.
Pittsburgh probably didn’t want to deal both a No. 1 and Esposito, but it could afford to. Amazing what happens when you draft and trade well.
Tragedy led to Hossa’s arrival from Ottawa three years ago. Dany Heatley wanted to live and work elsewhere after the one-car wreck that took the life of teammate Dan Snyder. Emotionally, Heatley was damaged goods. The trade was understandable. But the belief here was that if Heatley ever fully recovered, it wouldn’t matter how good Hossa was because Heatley would be better. He did. And he is.
Now Waddell is replacing Hossa for a pick and prospects. The trade is understandable because the Thrashers would’ve lost Hossa for nothing. But this isn’t a time to weigh the who’s of a deal. It’s a time to ponder the why’s. And nobody is yelling, “Stanley Cup!”
Permalink | Comments (82) | Categories: Jeff Schultz, Thrashers / NHL
Greatest Georgia sports highlights ever
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
ESPN has its countdown for the greatest sports highlight of all-time. It’s such a wonderful idea, why don’t we just tweak it a bit?
Let’s spend the rest of this column giving our countdown to the greatest highlight ever regarding a sports moment involving the state of Georgia.
The choices are many.
There were those other splendid times for the University of Georgia, ranging from Herschel Walker running over Bill Bates to the duo of David Greene to Verron Hayes crushing Tennessee’s face after breaking its nose with a “hobnail boot.”
You had Morten Andersen completing the Dirty Birds’ journey from nowhere to the Super Bowl with that field goal in overtime on the road against supposedly invincible Minnesota.
You had Spud Webb forgetting he was maybe 5-foot-7 to twist, soar and gyrate better than the likes of Dominique Wilkins for an NBA Slam Dunk title.
You had David Justice’s homer, and you had Tom Glavine’s one-hitter for eight innings to secure the Braves’ only world championship during their brilliant run of the 1990s.
For Georgia Tech, you had James Forrest nailing his game-winning shot at the buzzer from the ozone during March Madness.
Those were all electric moments, but none surpassed the top five.
No. 5: Hank Aaron’s 715
It was history. It’s still history. After all, even though the artificially enhanced Barry Bonds now has more home runs than Aaron’s final number of 755, Aaron remains the legitimate slugging champion as someone who used adrenaline more than steroids.
Which brings us back to 715, still a magic number. It snapped Babe Ruth’s lengthy record of 714 home runs, and it occurred at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium with the whole world watching. Not only that, here we are 34 years later, and they’re still replaying Aaron’s easy swing that sent baseball history into Chief Noc-A-Homa territory.
No. 4: Run, Lindsay, Run
So what was more famous — Georgia’s play for the ages against Florida or Larry Munson’s call? It’s a tie.
With the Bulldogs trailing inside the final minute and sitting deep in their own territory, Buck Belue found a streaking Lindsay Scott, who caught the ball around Georgia’s 25-yard line. Scott became a blur to Florida defenders. While Scott kept running and running, Munson kept imploring Scott to run some more.
On D Soon, the Bulldogs were running all the way to an undefeated season and the 1980 national championship.
No. 3: It’s Atlanta
Prior to Sept. 18, 1990, this mostly was Losersville, USA. The Falcons were heading to their ninth straight losing season in a non-strike year, and the Braves were heading to their seventh straight losing season, period, and the Hawks were the best pro team in town, only because they weren’t bad. They were just mediocre.
Then, just like that, three years after Billy Payne had some crazy idea about bringing the Olympics to Atlanta, the head of such things was standing before the universe to say: “The International Olympic Committee has awarded the 1996 Olympic Games to the city of … Atlanta.”
No. 2: Vick did what?
I was there, and I still can’t believe what I think I saw in the Metrodome. We’re talking about that game in Minnesota six years ago, when Michael Vick did more for the Falcons than rush for 173 yards on 10 carries. He produced a highlight for the ages.
In overtime, Vick dropped back to pass, scrambled to his left and shifted into three, five, nine extra gears to weave 46 yards through the entire Minnesota defense for the game-winning touchdown.
He broke tackles and defied gravity along the way. At least that’s what I think I saw.
No. 1: Bream did what?
I was there, and I still can’t believe what I think I saw at Atlanta Fulton-County Stadium.
You remember. The Braves trailed the Pittsburgh Pirates 2-0 entering the bottom of the ninth inning, but the Braves cut their deficit to one with two outs. David Justice was at third and the extremely slow Sid Bream was at second.
Francisco Cabrera slapped a single to left that scored Justice, and there was Bream charging around third in slow motion. Even so, his slide beat Barry Bonds’ throw at home plate to an explosion of noise. It was the loudest I’ve ever heard any baseball stadium. They wouldn’t quit cheering and stomping.
They still haven’t quit.
Permalink | Comments (146) | Categories: Terence Moore
Jones enters ‘08 feeling chipper
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Lake Buena Vista, Fla. — At a time when much of the baseball-watching world believed Chipper Jones had nothing left to show us, he showed us he’s still Chipper Jones. At 35 he had one of his greatest years, hitting .337 with 29 homers, driving in 102 runs and scoring 108. And where, he is asked, would he rank 2007 among his 14 big-league seasons on the scale of purely personal satisfaction?
“Fourteenth,” he says.
He’s kidding. Spring training 2008 has dawned with Chipper Jones feeling … well, chipper. Apart from the bruised thumbs suffered when he tripped over the opposing third baseman (more about that later), last season was free of the injuries that limited him to 109 games in 2005 and 110 in 2006.
A year ago we all were wondering if this demonstrably great player was near an end. Today, Jones says, “I want to play until I’m 40.”
About last season: “It was awfully gratifying for me to prove I could still play the game at a high level when a lot of people were writing me off and saying they should get rid of my salary.”
Some athletes pretend they don’t read and hear criticism. Jones admits he sees and hears everything. “I read y’all’s paper and go online and check out the rumor mill,” he says. (Indeed, he even participated, without being solicited, in David O’Brien’s AJC Braves blog two weeks ago. He logged in as “U Kno Who.”)
Does U Kno Who get mad when he sees someone post something less than positive?
“No,” Jones says. “I use it as positive motivation sometimes.”
The creeping consensus in spring 2007 was that Jones’ body was beginning to fail. Something was always going wrong — a hamstring, an oblique, a foot. What prevented him from believing he’d become decrepit was that it wasn’t always the same injury.
“Those last two years were really fluky [injuries]. It hasn’t been my body breaking down.”
Here he smiles in that wry Chipper way. “If Frenchy [Jeff Francoeur] takes a pitch and lets me steal third base [instead Francoeur grounded to third and Jones, running on the play, flipped over Pittsburgh’s Jose Bautista], I probably would’ve played 150 games last year.”
He played 134, his most since 2004, and he finished sixth in the Most Valuable Player voting, his best showing since he won the award in 1999. “Last year could have been my best all-around year. I was in the running for a Gold Glove — my errors were way down, and my fielding percentage was up — and I challenged for a batting title. And I hit .300 and drove in 100 and scored 100 just like I did when I was a younger cat.”
Sometimes it takes an outside observer to bring a familiar sight into sharper relief. Steve Phillips, once the Mets’ general manager and now an ESPN commentator, called Jones “the Derek Jeter of the National League” a couple of years ago, and Jeter is the most respected player in the sport. To be likened to him is the ultimate compliment. Jones took it as such.
“Jeter and I are good buddies,” he says. “We’ve squared off in a couple of World Series, and I think he’ll challenge 4,000 hits before he’s through. He’s a winner. I dare say I don’t think he’ll have any problem going into the Hall of Fame on the first ballot.”
And his own Hall prospects? “I’m one of the guys who, if I quit right now, I wouldn’t make it. I’m on the cusp. The next five or six years will tell the tale.”
Until July 2007, Mark Teixeira was one of those outside observers. Today he hits behind Jones and says, “He’s the most underappreciated player in the game … No doubt Alex [Rodriguez] is the most talented player I’ve played with, but Chipper is right behind him.”
And then: “Chipper could get a lot more attention in New York or L.A., but he’s a country boy who likes to hunt and fish.”
If Jones indeed plays until he’s 40, he wants it to be in the only place he has ever played. “I’ve always wanted to finish here,” he says. “Atlanta is a laid-back town, and I’m not a big-city guy. I know I could probably garner more attention and accumulate more accolades in New York, but that’s not me.”
There was a time when the young Chipper was as beloved by Braves fans as Francouer is now, but the inevitable familiarity (and a messy divorce) took some luster off the golden boy. Still, Jones says, “I think I have a really good rapport with fans. They certainly make me feel that way when I’m out in public. You can’t go to dinner or to a movie without people showering you with praise. You’re never going to please everybody, and I’m not going to try. But I think I’m good enough for the majority.”
So here he stands: Larry Wayne Jones Jr., age 35, about to go to work on another February morning, feeling rather better this February than he did a year ago. “Last year I was putting a little pressure on myself after what had happened. This year I’m a little more relaxed.”
But not fully content. If he has learned nothing else, Chipper Jones has learned that baseball is about today and tomorrow, not yesterday. “At the end of the day,” he says, “I’ve still got to keep putting up numbers to hold everybody at bay. At my age, if you have one bad year everybody thinks you’re washed up. And I don’t want to hear it.”
Permalink | Comments (62) | Categories: Braves / MLB, Mark Bradley
What’s it like to be Vince Dooley?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
Now Vince Dooley has a whole section of Georgia’s campus named in his honor, and a fancy statue is on the way. Then again, he has been a football coach, an athletics director, a state icon and often all of those things at once during much of the past 44 years for barkers in the Bulldog Nation from Athens to Rome to Valdosta.
Which begs the question: What is it like to be Vincent J. Dooley as an overwhelming figure to many?
I mean, how does it feel?
“I’m recognizable. I’ve come to that conclusion, at least in the state, so I don’t get surprised at it,” said Dooley, 75, pausing, before easing into a chuckle when contemplating whether he has become bigger than life. “I’m always aware that not everybody feels that way. Some people feel very strongly and passionately for me, which I appreciate. But I also realize that other people don’t feel that way.”
No question there. Some view Dooley’s legend as just a creation of a guy named Herschel. In fact, if you subtract those years with Mr. Walker from Dooley’s life, you have a coach with no national championship and a bunch of seven-victory seasons against few opponents worth mentioning outside of the SEC. There also is Dooley’s frosty relationship with Michael Adams. Let’s just say the Georgia president would prefer dining with Uga VI than the former AD that he forced to retire early.
Speaking of Uga VI, when compared to their fawning counterparts, most of the Vince Dooley haters in the state could squeeze into the doghouse of that Georgia mascot. “I probably see it more than he does,” said Barbara Dooley, referring to the masses that have elevated her husband into a little god since he arrived to coach the Bulldogs in 1963. Added the loving and vocal wife, “I get tickled when they are in his presence. It’s just different.”
So different that Vince Dooley says he doesn’t pay attention to it all. “I guess what I have done is come to grow into [the role of Georgia legend] and to accept it over a period of time, and I really don’t think much of it,” Dooley said. “Then if I ever feel like your head might be swelling, I always say a prayer of humility to remind myself who I am, and that settles it.”
This isn’t to say Dooley is oblivious to the eternal gawkers around him, especially with his recognizable profile and the coming of that statue that will sit at the corner of South Lumpkin Street and Pinecrest Drive. It’s an area that has many of Georgia’s athletic facilities, and after getting approved this month by Georgia’s Board of Regents, the area will be called “Vince Dooley Athletic Complex.”
Just like that, the visitors around Dooley will grow even more from a crowd to a friendly mob during just a stop to a Chick-fil-A in the state. He will spend even more time talking than sleeping on flights to and from Atlanta during his many travels courtesy of those wishing to shake his hand, hear his stories or tell him theirs.
Dooley laughed, saying, “Some people look at me, and they’re not really sure who I am. Or some people who haven’t seen me will say, ‘I’ve seen you somewhere.’ Some are more outwardly expressive than others by just calling my name out. Some kind of just look and then blurt out, ‘What is your name?’ Some won’t say anything, but you kind of feel that they’re maybe thinking who I might be. I’ve gotten used to it. But most all of them are very nice.”
So what about Dooley? Who causes his eyes to widen as much as many of those who saunter into his world?
Actually, the answer is that person who joins Dooley as the two biggest sports legends in the history of the state.
Hank Aaron.
“It was kind of a special thrill meeting him, and I guess you can say, ‘awe,’ because we’re both from Mobile,” Dooley said. “I used to always say that we both were from the wrong side of the tracks, because we both grew up with very, very modest means. But we were on different sides of tracks because of segregation back then. To follow his career and then to finally sit down and have dinner with Hank was a thrill.”
Dooley sighed, adding softly, “So, you know, if some people feel that way about me, I can understand how they feel.”
Permalink | Comments (17) | Categories: Terence Moore, UGA / SEC
Hard to feel too sorry for Joe Louis
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Furman Bisher
L
Look, nobody sends Valentine cards to the IRS — as in Internal Revenue Service. No contest, America’s No. l Favorite Enemy. But to blame this federal agency for the financial woes of Joe Louis, the great heavyweight, is sort of piling it on. It’s the popular way to go, for who’s going to make any defense for the IRS? Such is the theme of “Joe Louis: America’s Hero … Betrayed,” an HBO production given a preview in Atlanta this week.
Betrayal? I’m not positive that’s the proper term, in terms of the IRS. Yes, he was betrayed, but first by the various characters “in his corner,” so to speak. Jimmy Cannon, the columnist who first wrote of Louis, “He was a credit to his race — the human race,” also wrote that before the IRS ever got him, the bloodsuckers in his corner, the guys manipulating the books, split him up.
“He made four million dollars [in his ring career] but this was cut up many ways,” Cannon wrote.
You know what four million bucks looked like in those days? It was a king’s fortune, and yes, much of it never reached the champion’s pocket. I read this thing several years later, after Louis had defended his title against Billy Conn, and won twice, the two of them sat at a table in Las Vegas, both broke, both working as greeters at casinos on the Strip. The owner handed a stooge $300, told him to bet it for Joe, and when the stooge came back with a fistful of cash, the owner said, “Don’t let him near a table again.”
In my eyes, Joe Louis brought a fresh degree of popularity to the black athlete. No rip-rap, hip-hop and gangsta trash infected his life. He arose from Alabama poverty, did his stretch in World War II, fought Abe Simon and George Nicholson for the Army and Navy Relief Funds, and kept fighting on, mainly exhibitions, for spending money. But the more he made, the more he made for the IRS. They never let up, and that it is brutal, but that’s the USA. You earn it, you pay taxes.
Boxers have become virtually extinct in the order of sports prominence. Louis, though, represented another level, an American hero. A genuinely warm and likable fellow well met. Strange as it may seem, he had a warm friendship with Max Schmeling, the German heavyweight to whom he lost, then decked in the first round of the rematch. When Las Vegas staged a star-spangled event honoring Louis, Schmeling flew in from Germany to appear with him. And another time. They held a deep admiration for each other. When Louis died in 1981, through the influence of President Reagan, a place was made for him in Arlington National Cemetery, one of the most moving services I’ve ever attended. Supreme Court justices, congressmen, old sports stars wearing team jackets, entertainers, Frank Sinatra for one, came to the chapel. Joe Louis resting there among generals, admirals, leaders of men and winners of wars.
One of Louis’ other hazards to his bank account was the golf course. So often pride influences a serious player to assume a handicap that he can’t play to. Louis was not immune. It is written that Bill Spiller, the first black professional of note, once took him for $20,000. He played in several PGA pro-ams on the West Coast, as an amateur, while black pros were shunted aside.
Muhammad Ali sometimes took vocal jabs at this man he should have been applauding, instead leering and calling him an “Uncle Tom” in some of his degrading ragings. But as time passed, as Ali aged and came to his senses, he once whispered in Louis’ ear, “You are really the greatest.”
A stroke of irony is that Joe Louis’ most prominent legacy to sport of the day is centered in golf. He was born Joe Louis Barrow, and today Joe Louis Barrow Jr., an attorney in Denver, is president of the First Tee foundation. “My father gave a greater sense of hope for black Americans in the military beyond what he did in the ring,” he said, and First Tee is aimed at paving a path in golf for young Americans, black and white.
Joe Louis Barrow Jr. takes great pride in the father he came to know in his teens. “My parents were divorced when I was a child,” he said. “I’m tremendously proud of my father, and the sense of hope he gave black Americans.”
An American hero, beyond a doubt. But don’t blame all his travails on the IRS, not one of America’s favorite sets of initials.
Permalink | Comments (17) | Categories: Furman Bisher
College basketball insider
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Every Friday between now and the end of the regular season, we’ll look at who’s up, who’s down and what you should be watching as the season gets closer to the NCAA tournament and the Final Four.
THE TOP SEEDS
If the season ended today, here’s what the top four seeds in each region should look like:
EAST REGIONAL
1. North Carolina
2. Georgetown
3. Stanford
4. Butler
SOUTH REGIONAL
1. Tennessee
2. Duke
3. Xavier
4. Louisville
MIDWEST REGIONAL
1. Memphis
2. Texas
3. Wisconsin
4. Wash. State
WEST REGIONAL
1. Kansas
2. UCLA
3. Connecticut
4. Vanderbilt
RISING Louisville Louisville has won six in a row and eight of nine to climb into a first-place tie atop the Big East. The Cardinals have beaten Marquette, Georgetown and Syracuse — heady accomplishments for a team that lost to Seton Hall last month. It gets harder from here: Louisville plays at Pitt on Sunday and then must face Notre Dame, Villanova and Georgetown. The latter game, to be staged in D.C., could decide the conference title.
FALLING Oregon An Elite Eight team last season, Oregon is in real danger of not making the field of 65. The smallish Ducks are 15-11 and 6-8 in the loaded Pac-10, and they’ve lost seven of 10. Ernie Kent has called his team one of the nation’s best offensive units, but Oregon managed only 43 points in losing at Stanford two weeks ago. The Ducks fell to USC on Thursday and play UCLA at Pauley Pavilion today. Yikes.
WHAT WE’RE WATCHING No. 2 TENNESSEE at No. 1 MEMPHIS 9 p.m. today • ESPN It’s the 38th time No. 1 has played No. 2. The No. 1 team has won 21 times. It’s the fifth time teams from the same state have met when ranked Nos. 1 and 2 — North Carolina and Duke have done it twice, and Cincinnati and Ohio State did it in consecutive NCAA finals — and each time the lower-ranked team won. But not since 1990, when Missouri won at Kansas, has the No. 2 team won on No. 1’s floor.
MID-MAJOR OF THE WEEK Saint Mary’s (23-3) The Gaels drew notice in November when they beat Oregon, which seemed like a bigger deal at the time. They are tied atop the West Coast Conference with — who else? — Gonzaga, and they’ve already beaten the Bulldogs head-to-head. The teams play again on March 1, but such is the cachet now afforded Gonzaga and its formerly modest league that the WCC will probably send two teams to the Big Dance.
FUN WITH NUMBERS Memphis began the week ranked 328th among 328 Division I schools — i.e., dead solid last — in free-throw shooting. The Tigers have made just 58.8 percent of their foul shots. (Or, put another way, they’ve missed 41.2 percent.) They’ve gotten away with it so far, but it’s hard to imagine a team that can’t hit unguarded 15-footers winning six games over three weekends in the crucible of the NCAA tournament.
THE NAME TO KNOW Tyler Smith, Tennessee Not to be confused with teammates Ramar Smith and JaJuan Smith, Tyler will be the best all-around player on the floor tonight. The Iowa transfer leads the Vols in rebounding and assists, a parlay not often seen in a forward, and is third in scoring. Chris Lofton remains the nation’s best contested shooter, but T. Smith is the reason the Vols have risen to No. 2. “He’s a tremendous player,” says Georgia coach Dennis Felton.
Permalink | Comments (3) | Categories: Mark Bradley
Fixing Falcons not as easy as heads or tails
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
Given all the missteps the Falcons organization has made the past few years, it seemed strange that the first major decision facing the team’s new architect was whether to call heads or tails. (For this, Arthur Blank had to go through a search process?)
Amazingly, Thomas Dimitroff guessed right Friday. He called tails. Tails came up. Brilliant! The rest should be easy. Draft the right guys. Sign the right guys. Cut the right guys. Alter the course of history for a franchise that hasn’t made the playoffs in three years and has never had consecutive winning seasons.
Should be easy. Just keep flipping coins.
“Two weeks ago, I said, ‘It’s a done deal — tails,’ ” the Falcons’ general manager said by phone from Indianapolis. “Then [Thursday] night at dinner, I was sitting there with Mr. Blank and [coach] Mike Smith, and they said, ‘What’s the call?’ and I said, ‘Tails.’ But I thought I was actually supposed to flip the coin. So I went back to the room, and I was practicing flipping things. Sugar packs. Tea bags. Hotel room key cards. Anything.”
As long as Dimitroff doesn’t start testing schemes on an electronic vibrating football game, he should be fine.
The fact is, nothing can be left to chance. The Falcons can’t afford a lot of mistakes. The next two months will be the most important period of Dimitroff’s tenure, regardless of how long that tenure ends up being. This is when blueprint, structure and direction are set. These, sorry to say, are not coin-flip decisions.
“This is a very significant time for us,” he said. “This is when you start sending the right messages, not just to people in the organization, but to the support staff, personnel staff and most importantly to the players. You’re telling everybody, ‘This is what we’re doing.’ The tone and the culture are established here. You can’t be flippant. The decisions can’t be emotionally driven.”
No. Let’s leave that to DeAngelo Hall.
It’s unfortunate when an athlete’s talent comes with so little forethought or leadership. Hall, despite having a pretty good season amid the Falcons’ collapse last year, flashed his shortcomings often last season. He said the wrong things at the wrong time instead of doing what a veteran should do to hold a fractured team together. When others talked about ways to turn things around, Hall asked for a new contract. Often. Loudly. Obnoxiously.
Hall’s impeccable timing continued Friday. On the same day of a rare Falcons highlight, he was a walking, talking blast furnace, telling reporters to forget about a new contract — he just wanted out.
No need to flip a coin on this one. Hall likely was going to be dropkicked to the highest bidder anyway. This merely will add to the trajectory. The Falcons need to start over. If next year’s team ends up being young and hungry but fairly average, the last thing you want as a general manager or coach is to have a blowhard cornerback whining about his contract leading the charge, no matter how good he is.
This team suddenly is in the best of situations. If Dimitroff acquires a first-round pick for Hall as expected, the Falcons will have four selections in the first two rounds, pending other deals. With their first pick, there is a pretty good chance they will be staring at defensive tackle Glenn Dorsey, running back Darren McFadden or both. (Forget quarterback Matt Ryan. Remember where Dimitroff came from: New England, which took a future Hall of Fame QB with the 199th pick.)
Dimitroff also knows there are advantages to trading down to accumulate more picks. “If you look at my past in New England, I’m preconditioned to certain things, and I realize that trading down for added commodities is an effective way to build a roster,” he said. “If there’s not a player there at three we really like, I would definitely consider it.”
Now he starts playing the game. He’ll have conversations with other GMs. He’ll express interest in one player while preferring another. He’ll be coy in the media. It’s that time of year.
Does he see a clear definition among the top three players?
“No, not yet. But I will.” (Pause) “That’s where I’m going to be a little evasive,” he said with a laugh.
Does he have a philosophy on what type of player or position should be drafted early?
“Yes. But I don’t want to play that hand yet.”
He’s learning. He knows. He has to be careful. The man was practicing flipping sugar packets in a hotel room. How much room for error do you think he has?
Permalink | Comments (91) | Categories: Falcons / NFL, Jeff Schultz
Tech’s ultra-successful program that no one cares about
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
It is what it is. After all, you really would have to be a helluva engineer to know the answer to this question: Tell me the guy in the state of Georgia who was named coach of the year on a national level, another time for his team’s deeds within its district and fives other times regarding his various teams during conference play?
Here’s another hint: We’re talking about somebody who coaches a team that made 12 postseason appearances during his 14 previous years in charge, and that team has reached the ultimate playoff series in its sport thrice.
You’re wrong. It’s Danny Hall, the baseball coach at Georgia Tech, where nothing changed on Friday at Russ Chandler Stadium regarding his yearly mission during the start of his 15th season with the Yellow Jackets. In fact, Hall repeated what he said six years ago with a straight face after Tech officials spent $9 million on a new ballpark,
“They aren’t spending all of that money for us to get beat.”
Yes, courtesy of ACC expansion and enhanced programs in general, the conference isn’t Tech, Florida State and everybody else anymore. Yes, it’s tougher for Hall to predict the composition of his team each season since many of his freshmen recruits are drafted out of high school and a slew of his juniors bolt for the pros. Yes, Tech averaged nine players drafted after each of the past three years, and Hall now has a young squad with maybe six future big-leaguers.
“I mean, it is harder, but from my standpoint, my expectations don’t change,” said Hall before his Jackets’ season opener against Youngstown State. “I said it when I first came here, and that is, we want to win a national championship. We’ve had three opportunities of going to the College World Series, and we got beat in my first year here in the national championship game. But that is always going to be the goal.”
Too bad nobody cares.
Then again, when compared to All Mighty Football and a basketball program on campus that can generate more than a few pennies with a deep run into March Madness, nobody cares about college baseball that much anywhere.
Well, Tech officials do. There has been spoken and physical support through the years for Hall and Tech baseball from athletics directors Homer Rice, Dave Braine and now Dan Radakovich. “We also have received great support from [Tech president Wayne Clough],” Hall said.
It’s just that mostly everybody else couldn’t care less. “A lot of people in Atlanta have no clue how good our baseball program is and how good our players are, and that a lot of guys in major-league baseball got their start either playing in the ACC or playing at Georgia Tech,” said Hall, with the Braves’ Mark Teixeira among them after spending the 1990 and 1991 seasons with the Jackets. “I do think from the public’s eye — I wouldn’t say that we’re forgotten — but they don’t know what we have here.”
You have a baseball program here that has spent the 1990s and much of the early 21st century resembling the Braves. That mostly has been for the good. Just like the Braves, Tech has struggled to avoid postseason collapses in embarrassing ways, but just like the Braves, at least Tech has reached the postseason enough to collapse.
That said, the Jackets just missed the NCAA tournament last season despite a winning record in the league and a splendid RPI. That’s why among the Jackets’ goals this season is to control their fate by staying away from the bubble. So this was a wonderful start. Before a crowd of 1,158, they spent their season opener surviving the wetness, the cold and Youngstown State with a 14-0 victory Friday.
Now all that the Jackets have to do through the end of spring is keep finding ways to help Hall stop wearing the same ring every day after this season. “I think this is the last one I got,” Hall said, rolling the huge chunk of metal on his finger. “That’s 2005 ACC champions.”
Hall laughed, saying, “I’d like to take this one off and put another one on.”
Permalink | Comments (11) | Categories: Tech / ACC, Terence Moore
No slowing down for Chipper
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Lake Buena Vista, Fla. - At a time when much of the baseball-watching world believed Chipper Jones had nothing left to show us, he showed us he’s still Chipper Jones. At 35 he had one of his greatest years, hitting .337 with 29 homers, driving in 102 runs and scoring 108. And where, he is asked, would he rank 2007 among his 14 big-league seasons on the scale of purely personal satisfaction?
“Fourteenth,” he says.
He’s kidding. Spring training 2008 has dawned with Chipper Jones feeling … well, chipper. Apart from the bruised thumbs suffered when he tripped over the opposing third baseman (more about that later), last season was free of the injuries that limited him to 109 games in 2005 and 110 in 2006.
A year ago we all were wondering if this demonstrably great player was near an end. Today, Jones says, “I want to play until I’m 40.”
About last season: “It was awfully gratifying for me to prove I could still play the game at a high level when a lot of people were writing me off and saying they should get rid of my salary.”
Some athletes pretend they don’t read and hear criticism. Jones admits he sees and hears everything. “I read y’all’s paper and go online and check out the rumor mill,” he says. (Indeed, he even participated, without being solicited, in David O’Brien’s AJC Braves blog two weeks ago. He logged in as “U Kno Who.”)
Does U Kno Who get mad when he sees someone post something less than positive?
“No,” Jones says. “I use it as positive motivation sometimes.”
The creeping consensus in spring 2007 was that Jones’ body was beginning to fail. Something was always going wrong - a hamstring, an oblique, a foot. What prevented him from believing he’d become decrepit was that it wasn’t always the same injury. “Those last two years were really fluky [injuries]. It hasn’t been my body breaking down.”
Here he smiles in that wry Chipper way. “If Frenchy [Jeff Francoeur] takes a pitch and lets me steal third base [instead Francoeur grounded to third and Jones, running on the play, flipped over Pittsburgh’s Jose Bautista], I probably would’ve played 150 games last year.”
He played 134, his most since 2004, and he finished sixth in the Most Valuable Player voting, his best showing since he won the award in 1999. “Last year could have been my best all-around year. I was in the running for a Gold Glove -my errors were way down, and my fielding percentage was up -and I challenged for a batting title. And I hit .300 and drove in 100 and scored 100 just like I did when I was a younger cat.”
Sometimes it takes an outside observer to bring a familiar sight into sharper relief. Steve Phillips, once the Mets’ general manager and now an ESPN commentator, called Jones “the Derek Jeter of the National League” a couple of years ago, and Jeter is the most respected player in the sport. To be likened to him is the ultimate compliment. Jones took it as such.
“Jeter and I are good buddies,” he says. “We’ve squared off in a couple of World Series, and I think he’ll challenge 4,000 hits before he’s through. He’s a winner. I daresay I don’t think he’ll have any problem going into the Hall of Fame on the first ballot.”
And his own Hall prospects? “I’m one of the guys who, if I quit right now, I wouldn’t make it. I’m on the cusp. The next five or six years will tell the tale.”
Until July 2007, Mark Teixeira was one of those outside observers. Today he hits behind Jones and says, “He’s the most underappreciated player in the game … No doubt Alex [Rodriguez] is the most talented player I’ve played with, but Chipper is right behind him.”
And then: “Chipper could get a lot more attention in New York or L.A., but he’s a country boy who likes to hunt and fish.”
If Jones indeed plays until he’s 40, he wants it to be in the only place he has ever played. “I’ve always wanted to finish here,” he says. “Atlanta is a laid-back town, and I’m not a big-city guy. I know I could probably garner more attention and accumulate more accolades in New York, but that’s not me.”
There was a time when the young Chipper was as beloved by Braves fans as Francoeur is now, but the inevitable familiarity (and a messy divorce) took some luster off the golden boy. Still, Jones says, “I think I have a really good rapport with fans. They certainly make me feel that way when I’m out in public. You can’t go to dinner or to a movie without people showering you with praise. You’ve never going to please everybody, and I’m not going to try. But I think I’m good enough for the majority.”
So here he stands: Larry Wayne Jones Jr., age 35, about to go to work on another February morning, feeling rather better this February than he did a year ago. “Last year I was putting a little pressure on myself after what had happened. This year I’m a little more relaxed.”
But not fully content. If he has learned nothing else, Chipper Jones has learned that baseball is about today and tomorrow, not yesterday.
“At the end of the day,” he says, “I’ve still got to keep putting up numbers to hold everybody at bay. At my age, if you have one bad year everybody thinks you’re washed up. And I don’t want to hear it.”
Permalink | Comments (62) | Categories: Braves / MLB, Mark Bradley
Crumpler tries to heal, move on
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
Like any other player, Alge Crumpler returned to the Falcons’ practice facility after the season to clean out his locker. Unlike any other player, he seemed intent on wiping clean any evidence that he was ever there.
“I took everything,” Crumpler said Thursday. “I even took my pictures down. I didn’t want to have to do that Green Mile walk in the building later on, when the team did something.”
A staple in the Falcons’ offense for seven seasons, Crumpler’s tenure with the team officially ended last week. He was released with six others, the start of a roster flush by the new regime.
No specific reason was given for his release, Crumpler hearing the standard, “We’ve decided to go in another direction,” from new coach Mike Smith. But the biggest issue clearly is health, because it’s not any of those other things a coach wants in his locker room: talent, character, heart, desire, leadership, a sheer love for the game.
It follows that Crumpler is headed to an unusual event for four-time Pro Bowl tight end: the scouting combine. On Thursday he left Phoenix, where he has been working out, for Indianapolis, and will begin talking to prospective teams Friday.
“My agent was getting so many phone calls that I thought it would easier just to go there and meet with everybody,” he said, listing at least seven teams that he may meet with: Green Bay, Buffalo, Detroit, Seattle, Carolina, Tampa Bay and Tennessee.
“I’m not looking for the red carpet treatment. I’m just looking for a team I can win on. I’m not bitter. It’s not like I have to be in the NFC South so I can play the Falcons twice. I’m more concerned about the team that I’m going to play for.”
Winning has always been his primary objective. It’s why he took the last few seasons harder than most. It’s why he was stunned last April when he went to meet with new coach Bobby Petrino — whose name Crumpler won’t utter — waited for 20 minutes in the lobby, then was told to come back another day. He later received a phone call from assistant coach Hue Jackson, who said, “The coach wants me to take care of this.”
Crumpler: “I just wanted to know what my role was in the new offense. I wasn’t there to slow the train down.”
The problems with Petrino were easier to forecast than his health issues, or the extent to which the season would fall apart. In October, he vented following a loss at Tennessee, criticizing the offense and suggesting Petrino was phasing out veterans. The next day, he said, he told owner Arthur Blank of the communication gap between Petrino and the players.
“Arthur expressed that there needed to be an open door policy,” Crumpler said.
By the time the season ended, new regime or not, Crumpler believed he was done in Atlanta. So he wasn’t shocked last week. Smith phoned him twice — first on Thursday to say a decision hadn’t been made, then on Friday to deliver the news. “He wanted to do it face to face,” Crumpler said, “but I was in Phoenix. I appreciated the call. It’s something I know wouldn’t have happened under the old regime.
“My family was taken aback by everything, but I tried to prepare them. When the new coach was hired, I didn’t have any contact with him. When the new GM was hired, I didn’t have any contact with him. It was radio silence. I just had that feeling. I trust my gut on a lot of things.”
Now he’s trusting his body. He recovered quickly from arthroscopic knee surgery three years ago, playing in the Pro Bowl five weeks later. He expected a similarly short rehab period when he surgery in April, when doctors removed an osteophyte, commonly known as a bone spur.
But Crumpler labored. In August he went to see renowned orthopedist Dr. James Andrews. “He told me, ‘Oh, this is a six-month deal,’ ” Crumpler said. He was floored. In November, he saw two more specialists at Duke and in Cleveland, and was assured all he needed was rest, not further surgery.
Crumpler stopped just short of criticizing Falcons’ team doctors. “I’m not going to put it out there that I was misled,” he said. “I’ll just put it out there that there were different opinions. We’re talking about one team. I’m not going to let one team mess up the direction I want to go.”
He says he’s armed with medical reports and has been given assurances that he can make a full comeback. “I’m not trying to stir up any controversy but I understand how this business works — it’s a dirty business,” he said. “I’m not out to take shots at anybody. I just want to be prepared.”
He believes he can play “for four or five” more years. He said he harbors no resentment against the Falcons, but then adds, “Arthur and Rich [McKay] were getting advice from a guy who quit on us. His opinions of me weren’t good. But if I felt like I was anywhere close to retirement, I would hang it up.”
Teams will probe his knees. There’s no need to question his passion.
Permalink | Comments (57) | Categories: Jeff Schultz, Tech / ACC
Surely no one could do worse than Woodson
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Presumably buoyed by five days off and the ballyhooed addition of their long-sought point guard, the Hawks went back to work Tuesday night in Los Angeles. With 53 seconds remaining in the first half, they trailed 69-28. Think about that.
To be outscored by 41 points in 23 minutes — for mathematical convenience, we’re rounding off those seven seconds — means you’ve been beaten by 1.78 points in each of those 23 minutes. That’s the rough equivalent of yielding an extra two-point basket every minute you’re on the floor. In a league governed by a salary cap, that cannot happen through an inequality of resources. It can only happen when one team doesn’t try.
What those 23 minutes (plus seven seconds) told us is that the Hawks, even at the one moment in their recent history when they should have been primed, couldn’t bring themselves to compete. And this latest example wasn’t the fault of Mike Bibby, acquired over the All-Star break. It was, as ever, the fault of Mike Woodson, the wholly overmatched coach.
We flash back to Feb. 6. The Hawks beat the Lakers — the same team they trailed by 41 not two weeks later — at Philips Arena, and afterward Ed Peskowitz, one of the team’s several owners, could be overheard suggesting to a reporter: “We have arrived.” Being the Hawks, they haven’t won since.
Two nights later, they lost at home to Cleveland, which was missing four regulars. “We just didn’t come out ready to play,” Woodson told reporters.
The next night, the Hawks lost by 19 points in Houston after trailing by 25 at the half. His team, Woodson told the media, “should have stayed at the hotel.”
Does anyone listen to this man? Does anyone in power care whether the Hawks win or lose?
Whenever a coach says his team wasn’t prepared or didn’t compete, he’s indicting himself. The First Rule of Coaching — it’s in all the manuals — is: Get your team ready. After nearly four seasons on the job, Woodson can’t even manage that much.
If nobody could have won with the talent Woodson was handed in 2004, almost nobody could lose with the talent he has now. But he’s doing it. The Hawks are 7-18 since Dec. 29. They’ve lost 13 of 17 and six in a row. If the playoffs began today, they wouldn’t qualify.
In fairness to Woodson, he has had Bibby for only two games. That said, what about this coach makes anyone believe he can maximize anything? He has had the core group — Joe Johnson, Marvin Williams and the two Joshes — since 2005, and he has had Al Horford for 60 games. The Hawks have beaten enough good teams (Dallas, Phoenix, the Lakers) to show they can play with anybody, and yet they’re in danger of being 12 games below .500 when they return from this trip.
Woodson’s career record is 90-207. It’s apparent some Hawks have stopped paying attention, assuming they ever did. If he can’t get them to play hard coming off the All-Star break, when will he ever? And if the Hawks were willing to spend so heavily to land Bibby, why do they continue to tolerate this lack of direction?
They could have fired Woodson — his contract expires June 30, which means there are no full seasons to buy out — when they lost seven of eight at the end of January. They should have fired him over the All-Star break when they’d lost four in a row and fallen to ninth in the East. Instead they dealt for Bibby, which was fine on its face, but where’s the wisdom in handing Jeff Gordon’s racecar to Fred Flintstone?
Mike Woodson has had nearly 300 games to prove he’s capable of winning, and all he has proved is that he isn’t. While there’s still a season to salvage, the Hawks need to hand this roster to assistant Larry Drew and see if he can do better. Surely no one could do worse.
Permalink | Comments (238) | Categories: Hawks / NBA, Mark Bradley, Quick Hit
Can’t imagine Braves without Cox
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Lake Buena Vista, Fla. — The Braves held their first full workout Wednesday. The man who traditionally sends them out for the first workout with a little speech was home in Adairsville burying his mother-in-law. Technically those were still the Braves on the field, but can the Braves ever really be the Braves without Bobby Cox?
He was planning to return here Wednesday night, after the funeral for Dell Boswell, who died Monday after a long illness. “It feels weird [not being there],” Cox said by phone, “but it’s like I tell the players: With these types of matters, you’ve got to be there and take care of them.”
OK, so it was only a one-day absence for the best and saddest of reasons. But seeing the Braves without their manager made you wonder what it will be like when, soon enough, Bobby Cox goes away and doesn’t come back.
“It’ll be different,” Chipper Jones said. “It’ll be weird.” And then: “[Derek] Jeter and I were talking about that this winter.”
Just as Jeter hadn’t, until this spring, played for any manager other than Joe Torre, Jones has known only one big-league skipper. And, just as Torre no longer wears pinstripes and works in the Bronx, there will come a February when Cox doesn’t come to spring training and put on a uniform.
He has hinted this will be his last season. He has also hinted it won’t. Even if the exact date is uncertain, it’s clear this astonishing run is nearing its end. Cox is 66. He has managed the Braves since June 22, 1990. (He’d been the general manager since October 1985.) For nearly two decades the Braves have been managed by the best in the business, and pretty soon they won’t be anymore.
Said Tom Glavine, on his second life as a Brave: “I feel bad for the guy taking his place.”
Someone noted that Glavine, having gone five springs without hearing the annual Cox Speech, was unfortunately denied that honor Wednesday. “The pitchers got to hear it last week,” he said. ” ‘Be a pro; wear you uniform right; don’t be stupid; there are a few spots open, so work hard’ — it’s the same thing every year, but he still writes it down. I don’t know why.”
Let the record show that these words were spoken with immense affection. Cox, as has been noted, is a players’ manager. Cox loves all his players, and over time the number of those who haven’t loved him back, Glavine said, “can be counted on two hands.” And those guys never stick around long.
During his exile in New York, Glavine got the same question every former Brave gets: What’s it like to play for Bobby Cox? “Guys wanted to know if he’s as good as it looks, and I’d say, ‘He’s probably even better.’ “
Glavine has actually played for other managers, even other Braves managers (namely, Chuck Tanner and Russ Nixon), but a lot of guys in this clubhouse have known only Cox. “If I try to envision watching and rooting for a team that Bobby’s not a part of,” Glavine said, “I know I’ll feel out of sorts. But the reality is that it is going to happen someday and, as is unfortunately the case, we’ll probably be much more appreciative of him when he’s gone.”
There’s no reason to wait, no reason this manager should be revered only in hindsight. For all the good work done by capable hands these past two decades — Schuerholz and Snyder, Chipper and Andruw, Glavine and Pendleton, Smoltz and Justice, Maddux and McGriff — there’s only one man who can be said to symbolize the latter-day Atlanta Braves, and that man was elsewhere Wednesday.
“It all cranks up again tomorrow,” Cox said, and it does. But there cannot be many baseball tomorrows left for Robert Joe Cox, the managerial likes of whom we will never see again.
Permalink | Comments (49) | Categories: Braves / MLB, Mark Bradley
Lehtonen is Thrashers’ saving grace
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
Kari Lehtonen has faced 90 shots in his past two starts, 248 in his past seven and way too many this season for a team with a general tendency to keep its goalie just this side of extensive therapy and, maybe, a drool bucket.
But there is an upside to all of this. Lehtonen has not only survived, he has thrived, faculties and most major organs intact. If Ilya Kovalchuk has largely carried the Thrashers on the front side of the red line, Lehtonen is holding things together on the backside, even if “NHL Playoff Contenders For Dummies,” would suggest this probably isn’t the way to do things.
Sometimes, even flawed building projects can hang by a thread. It’s that blind squirrel/acorn thing.
“This year, certainly, the games have been tougher for the goalie than last year,” Lehtonen said. “We’ve been giving up more scoring chances. We were a lot better overall with our defensive game last year. That’s something I hope we can still turn around because you really need that in the playoffs, or just getting there.”
Getting there is going to be a problem. The Thrashers are approaching the trade deadline more famously as probable sellers (Marian Hossa) than buyers. Their erratic tendencies can best be summarized by their past two outings: a 4-3 shootout win in New Jersey, followed by a 4-1 loss to the New York Islanders, during which they were outshot 49-10.
The Islanders game set two team records and tied two others for shot infamy. If this franchise should be anywhere by now in its evolution, it’s past the point of establishing new lows. (The 39-shot differential in the Islanders game broke the mark of 27 set in a 1999 game, the expansion season.)
But there is this: They found a goalie.
Lehtonen has started to turn the corner in maturity, durability and certainly consistency. Going into tonight’s game at Carolina, he has allowed only 10 goals on 248 shots (.960 saves percentage) in his past seven starts. He has had really only one bad outing in the past six weeks.
The team’s play in front of Lehtonen (and backup Johan Hedberg) generally has been awful. The Thrashers are allowing a league-high 33-plus shots per game, and have outshot opponents in only eight of 61 games. Lehtonen isn’t a goalie so much as he is a rotating duck in a shooting gallery.
It’s so bad at times that defenseman Niclas Havelid admits, “Kari gives us some of those special Finnish words sometimes.”
Remarkably, he has remained sane, the result of increased patience and confidence.
“I guess that’s why it’s been easier for me to live in this roller coaster this season,” he said, “because as a goalie I feel I’ve been doing a pretty good job. But I know it’s only going to get tougher, and I really need to play at this level the rest of the year if we want to go somewhere.”
He is their only real hope. The roster has holes. If the team has a system under the temp. coach Don Waddell, it’s not working.
The effort is uneven — and players only seem to wake up after associate coach Brad McCrimmon plays bad cop and yells at them between periods.
Twenty-one games to go, and this is where the Thrashers are: Barely over .500 (29-28-4), at least as the NHL defines over .500. But look deeper. Their record is only that healthy because of a league-best record of 14-4 in relative gimmick hockey: 4-on-4 overtimes and shootouts (which are like deciding football games with field goal contests).
In regulation-time games, the Thrashers have the second-worst record in the NHL. They are only 15-28 in those games, just one win ahead of Edmonton (14-29). Goaltending becomes an even bigger factor than usual in overtimes (when more open ice creates more scoring chances) and shootouts (when it’s one-on-one).
In short, their margin for error is slim.
“When you have a goalie who can play the way Kari’s playing, you know he can steal games for you,” said Mark Recchi.
It’s not where the team wants to be. But it’s where they need their goalie.
Permalink | Comments (16) | Categories: Jeff Schultz, Thrashers / NHL
Bibby will be fine
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
These things happen. New guy comes to town. Hasn’t had time to get acclimated to a different system. Takes the court on the road in a hostile environment.
I mean, those were the suddenly rejuvenated Los Angeles Lakers who clobbered the Hawks Tuesday night at Staples Center.
Mike Bibby will be fine. It just might not be any time soon, especially with the Hawks playing his former Kings teammates Wednesday night in Sacramento and closing out a monster road trip with stops at Golden State, Utah and San Antonio.
Let’s put this into perspective. Chances are, the mostly stationary Shaquille O’Neal will struggle at the start with Phoenix’s approach of running before running some more. He makes his debut Wednesday night at home with the Suns against his old Lakers team.
Then there is Jason Kidd seeking to become the same engine with the Dallas Mavericks that he was for years with the New Jersey Nets. He also plays with his new team Wednesday night when the Mavericks face the Hornets in New Orleans.
The difference for O’Neal and Kidd is that they’re joining established rosters. The Hawks are the youngest team in the NBA again. Still, you would prefer that your new point guard with the fancy resume finish his first game with more than five points and a heel injury in 16 minutes.
If nothing else, a gimpy Bibby is better than a healthy Anthony Johnson or an even healthier Tyronn Lue.
Permalink | Comments (41) | Categories: Hawks / NBA, Quick Hit, Terence Moore
Johnson trusts his old offense
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Furman Bisher
Jack McCain, a cadet at the Naval Academy, had a political suggestion for his father, who happens to have his eyes on the White House, “Get Paul Johnson for your running mate,” he told Senator McCain.
Bully idea, lad. There’s just one hangup. Paul Johnson is already taken. He has signed on at Georgia Tech. When Dan Radakovich needed a new football coach, he wasted little time. He went through the required routine, contacted one of those search firms, and a week after the Army-Navy game the search firm called Paul Johnson. The deed was done. No lollygagging. (That’s an old term from Johnson’s boyhood world that means “foot-dragging,” or “dawdling around.”)
Paul Johnson had, in no mean sense of the term, overshot his life’s goal. He had grown up in this little western North Carolina town, Newland. “One red light, a drug store, a hardware store, Claude Hughes’ general store and Sweetsie’s Diner,” he said. “It’s gone a little resorty now, with skiing and golf all around. But the population is still about the same.”
Paul played football at Avery County High, where the coach was Elmer Aldridge. Every small-town boy has a hero, and Elmer was Paul’s hero. His ambition after college was to come home to Newland and be the next Elmer Aldridge. (“From the time I was in high school, that was what I wanted to do.”) In fact, after graduating from Western Carolina he did come home and was Elmer’s assistant for a couple of years. To show you how much Elmer meant to him, when the old coach passed away, Paul flew home for the funeral. It was no short hop. He had reached Hawaii by that time, and his story was just beginning.
After Hawaii, he did his first tour at Navy as an assistant. Then Georgia Southern called him back, this time as head coach, and two national championships followed. Then back to Navy, this time as head coach, and that looked like no bargain. Navy football looked like a tornado scene. The Middies had won only one game in two seasons, and had only two winning seasons in 20 years. What devious search committee could have possibly wished such a job on any human being?
His first Navy team stumbled out of the gate, but he never had another losing season, and in 2004 he was the Bobby Dodd Coach of the Year, named for the man in whose shadow he now performs, in the stadium bearing his name. A mountain boy following another mountain boy. The two grew up in towns about 50 miles apart.
So, here he comes. Paul Johnson and his trusty old offense. “A combination of the old wishbone, the run-and-shoot and some of our own ingredients,” he said.
You heard and read of all the trepidation that comes with it. That the pass is an obsolete weapon. Some Georgia Tech players have abandoned ship, including the dropback quarterback, Taylor Bennett. He gets his degree in May, but he’s still shopping around for a place where the ball goes airborne. Johnson accepts it philosophically. He understands.
“I laugh at all that. It’s what I’ve been doing for 20 years, from Hawaii to Georgia Southern to the Academy. I’ve won a few national titles with it,” he said. “People who don’t like it don’t understand it.”
Back in “olden” days, national titles were won at Texas and Oklahoma and other big-time schools with a similar offense. Darrell Royal and Bud Wilkinson were devoted apostles. Whatever one may fear, that will be the new offense at Bobby Dodd Stadium, so get used to it, and get ready to like it.
A little bit of Hawaii followed Johnson from the islands to Annapolis. (“I’ve known the sands of Honolulu, the waters of Annapolis and the gnats of Statesboro.”) His last quarterback was a Hawaiian whose name I don’t dare attempt to spell. His successor at Navy is an American Samoan, former assistant Ken Niumatalolo, but the break from the islands is complete. His “island” now is downtown Atlanta, and he is still unloading furniture and unpacking, and will be for quite a spell.
He is a realist. He never played the game in college. “It wasn’t difficult to give it up. I could see I wasn’t going anywhere, so I changed my direction.”
Tech’s call came at the opportune time. He had beaten Army six times, he had beaten Notre Dame after a long drought and had taken the Middies to five bowls in a row. Time to go. “I had done all I could do.”
Permalink | Comments (43) | Categories: Furman Bisher, Tech / ACC
James relieved shoulder’s treatable
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Lake Buena Vista, Fla. — For most pitchers, being diagnosed with a bum rotator cuff would come as the worst news possible. For Chuck James, it arrived as a tonic.
James started 30 games last season to indifferent returns. He wound up 11-10 with an ERA of 4.24, and on a team crying for a No. 3 starter those numbers weren’t good enough. He wasn’t nearly the pitcher he’d been as a rookie in 2006, and try as he might — and he tried hard — he couldn’t figure out why.
“It wasn’t a question of velocity,” James said Tuesday. “It was more the way the ball came out of my hand. Nothing was ever easy. I had to battle through every pitch every inning every time out.”
Knowing his team needed him to do better, James worked harder. His regular side sessions usually numbered 20 to 25 pitches, but by the end of last season he was throwing 75 pitches in the bullpen between starts. “I thought it was a mechanical thing,” he said, and if it was he was determined to fix it.
Turned out it wasn’t mechanical. The day after the season ended, he had an MRI exam. The film detected a tear in his rotator cuff. “It stinks to hear something like that,” he said. “But I was almost relieved.”
He’d known something was wrong, and now he had confirmation. And his doctors informed him that, in James’ words, “it was rehab-able” without surgery. He did some sort of rehab work five days a week over the offseason, and today he’s scheduled to throw off the mound for the first time. “I feel 100 percent,” he said. Then he smiled. “I’m saying 100 percent now, but I haven’t thrown off the mound yet.”
This is a huge spring for the wee lefty from Mableton. The Braves have augmented their skimpy rotation to the extent that general manager Frank Wren believes they’ll send three starters of major-league caliber to the minors before camp breaks, and James could be among that luckless number. “That’s the spot that’s open,” said James, speaking of the No. 5 slot. “There are a lot of young guys fighting for it.”
This isn’t to dismiss James, who’s 26 and who’s a fighter himself. Bobby Cox loves to tell the story about how Chuckie (as everyone calls him) was bitten by the same snake twice.
“It happened when I was in college,” Chuckie said, telling the tale yet again. “We were up at Lake Helen, and I thought I stepped on a pine cone. So I looked down to see what it was, and it bit me again. So I said, ‘I think I’m going to go inside.’ “
“It” was a copperhead, which is by definition a poisonous snake. Not until James’ leg swelled did he and a friend think to seek medical attention, but they couldn’t find a hospital. They wound up outside an emergency-care center, where a diagnosis was made by streetlight. Said James: “The guy told me if I wasn’t dead, I wasn’t going to die.”
The same James also suffered two broken wrists that same year when he tried to dive off a roof into a swimming pool and undershot. “There was water in the pool,” James has long insisted, not that any of his teammates are buying it.
This spring, there’s no guarantee Calamity James will be an Atlanta Brave come Opening Day. Assuming Mike Hampton is healthy — never the soundest assumption — the fifth starter figures to be James or Jair Jurrjens, the young import the Braves like very much.
“I’m not going to put pressure on myself,” James said. “If it happens [being sent to Richmond], it happens. Rehab was definitely a tough thing — I’m just thankful the offseason is over.”
Not that the winter was a total bummer. James’ number was retired by Pebblebrook High, his alma mater. (For the record, he wore both No. 3 and No. 6 as a Falcon, and he said: “They gave me the No. 3 [jersey], but they retired the No. 6.”)
As a Brave he wears a combination of the two, and he’s hoping No. 36 won’t be decommissioned anytime soon.
Permalink | Comments (16) | Categories: Braves / MLB, Mark Bradley
The Tuesday Countdown
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
10: Lindsay Lohan posed nude for New York magazine. I found this out because there’s a link on the cover of AJC.com. If you’re interested in updates on world peace, feel free to click the Nation/World link. You’ll find minimal traffic.
9: Spoke to Evander Holyfield the other day. In short, he’s not close to a deal for another fight yet — and, yes, there is going to be another fight. And about those Internet rumors that have circulated for weeks about a Holyfield-Mike Tyson III (cover your eyes) …
8: “There’s been talk of a possible big fight between Tyson and I,” Holyfield said. “But it’s not signed yet or anything like that. It would depend a lot on money. It’s not like I said I want it. It’s not like he’s saying he wants it. Somebody’s just kicking the idea around.” To the curb, please. To the curb.
7: The Falcons will flip a coin this week to determine whether they pick third, fourth or fifth in the NFL draft. It will be a big change for the organization, which normally doesn’t flip a coin until draft day.
6: Question: If Marian Hossa wants to play for a Stanley Cup contender and he won’t re-sign with the Thrashers before the trade deadline because he’s not sure about their direction, what makes anybody think he’ll re-sign here in the summer?
5: Slightly closer to sports than Lindsay Lohan: I read this story about a Tampa church suggesting married couples have, like, relations for 30 straight days. I printed it out and handed it to my wife. She got a good laugh over it. Still waiting for day one.
4: I’m sorry, Dogamanics. But this whole “furor” over Vince Dooley being honored by having only almost ALL of the athletic facilities named after him, but not Sanford Stadium, is beyond ridiculous. Let it go already. I get the feeling Michael Adams could say he really likes trees and half the population of Athens would rebel and scream that he was disrespecting silk plants.
3: This doesn’t necessarily take the luster off the Hawks’ trade for Mike Bibby, but I’m guessing the marketing department would’ve preferred coming out of the All-Star break with a home game instead of five straight games in the west.
2: Anybody else notice that spring training has opened, one of the greatest hitters (Barry Bonds) and pitchers (Roger Clemens) to ever play still don’t have jobs - but neither has officially retired?
- Any player mentioned in the Mitchell Report should take a lesson from Andy Pettitte. Hold a press conference. Come clean. Move on. Watch how quickly people forgive.
Permalink | Comments (11) | Categories: Jeff Schultz, Quick Hit
Bibby’s a gift to Woodson
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
Nothing against the six, nine, 387 or whatever number of other Hawks owners comprising Atlanta Spirit, LLC, but this franchise would be so much better with just the Gearons in charge.
Once again, Michael Gearon Sr., the insightful father, got it exactly right when discussing the present and the future of the Hawks. They just became significant, or beyond that, after swapping virtually nothing for Mike Bibby, a real point guard with credentials and more than a little zip left in his 29-year-old legs.
“I think everybody on our staff wants to see how we’re going to play when you put a guy out there who can really run a team, because that’s what we haven’t had,” said Gearon, who has spent three decades with the Hawks as everything from GM, president, chairman of the board to NBA governor. “But, listen. I don’t think it matters what moves you make. Fans just want to see one thing, and that is, what you do on the floor.”
To put it bluntly, Hawks coach Mike Woodson has to win.
Like now.
“You know, how does Ted Turner race when he doesn’t have a really great boat? Well, now you’ve got a good boat. You’ve got the pieces. I think now Mike has a team,” said Gearon, referring to Woodson, a career NBA assistant before joining the Hawks. He spent his three seasons in Atlanta before this one winning just 28 percent of the time courtesy of a young and flawed roster.
Even so, Woodson has impressed in several ways. First, he has ignored the whining among players over his supposedly demanding ways. “If they think this guy is tough, they should have been around when Hubie Brown and Mike Fratello were coaching here,” said Gearon, chuckling, before adding, “All of that [whining] by players means nothing to me.” Here’s what matters more to Gearon: The next time Woodson complains about his plight with the Hawks will be the first.
We’re talking about a screwy ownership situation, where one owner is suing the others for control of the team, and where the general manager has made bizarre moves and non-moves. “The guy never complains, never knocks a player in private conversations, never says a negative word about Billy [general manager Billy Knight], the owners, the players, anybody,” Gearon said of Woodson. “Any coach who came in here was going to lose games. Mike had a kid who was right out of high school [Josh Smith], and another who spent just a year in college [Marvin Williams].
“The Bulls, in their rebuilding process, they just kept churning guys. Elton Brand. Ron Artest. Tyson Chandler. We didn’t churn anybody. We had the guts to sweat it out and not panic.”
So much for the past. As for the Hawks’ present and future, Gearon expects results, which he should. Which means Woodson has to produce in a hurry. Which means his fate will depend on whether the Hawks spend their last 33 games ending the distinction of having the NBA’s longest current streak for a team missing the playoffs at eight seasons.
With Bibby, the Hawks aren’t so young and flawed anymore. He is a real point guard for a franchise that kept ignoring such a thing (Chris Paul, Deron Williams, Mike Conley Jr.) in the draft. If you add Bibby to All-Star Joe Johnson, along with the athletic and capable likes of Marvin Williams, Al Horford and the two Joshes (Smith and Childress), the Hawks suddenly are competitive in the wobbly Eastern Conference. Their 21-28 record puts them just 2 1/2 games from the sixth playoff spot, which they would prefer. You can make the postseason as the seventh- and eighth-place teams. It’s just that you’d get the Boston Celtics and the Detroit Pistons, the only monsters in the conference.
Even with Bibby, the Hawks aren’t ready to slay a Goliath in the playoffs, but this gets them closer to a slingshot.
“This is his opportunity,” Gearon said of Woodson. “It’s something that he deserves, and he finally got it.”
Or he’ll quickly get it.
Permalink | Comments (48) | Categories: Hawks / NBA, Terence Moore
Upstart steals the stars’ stage
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Daytona Beach, Fla. — More than simply the golden anniversary of the Great American Race, this Daytona 500 came earmarked as the rebirth of NASCAR. For a sport that has seen TV ratings and attendance drop the past two years, what could be a bigger pick-me-up than having the most beloved driver open a season by claiming the sport’s biggest prize?
Dale Earnhardt Jr., as you’ve heard, has a new home (Hendrick Motorsports, the Yankees of NASCAR) and a new number (88) and a new car (the unsightly Mountain Dew AMP/National Guard Chevy). He had already won twice here this month — first in the Budweiser Shootout, then in a Gatorade Duel — and already the conspiracy theorists were in a full lather: No way a sluggish sport wouldn’t, ahem, do everything in its power to juice the Nielsens and give the people what they wanted.
Instead, the 200th lap of the 50th Daytona 500 sent up this hearty salutation:
Hellooooo, Newman!
A lot of drivers could have won this race. Kyle Busch seemed to have the best car but could make no push at the end. Clint Bowyer, who finished the 49th Daytona 500 by sliding across the finish line on his roof, had the lead on the 183rd lap but got nudged by Juan Pablo Montoya and wrecked again. (This time the shiny side stayed up.) Earnhardt had all the karma and, sure enough, had the lead with 20 laps to go, but he got fleeced by Bowyer and a half-dozen others on a re-start, and there and then the people’s choice stopped being the Chosen One.
“We got pretty good at the end of the race,” Earnhardt told MSN Radio, “but I made some poor choices.”
And then this 500 seemed to fall to Tony Stewart, the certifiably great driver who has unaccountably never won this race. On cue, he took the lead on the penultimate lap with a vintage move, and now you could hear NASCAR officials thinking, “Well, if it can’t be Junior, we can certainly live with Tony Stewart.”
The end in sight, the great driver got outdriven. With two turns to go, Ryan Newman got a massive push from teammate Kurt Busch on the high side and hurtled past a stunned Stewart, who would say afterward: “It’s one of my most disappointing moments in racing. … Anybody who didn’t win this race tonight is disappointed. It breaks your heart. You’re down here for 10 days trying to win this race.”
Instead he lost it to a driver held in high esteem by insiders — a goodly number of jaded writers applauded when Newman took the checkered flag, thereby violating the ironclad rule that’s there’s no cheering in the press box — if not by the masses. He’s not a glamour boy like Jeff Gordon or Jimmie Johnson, not a bad boy like Stewart, not the Intimidator’s boy like Dale Jr. (He is, however, a Purdue graduate with a degree in vehicle structural engineering.)
Newman hadn’t won since September 2005, 81 races ago. “Probably the most awesome thing that’s ever happened to me,” he called the victory. And then he thanked his team owner, the venerable Roger Penske, finally a Daytona winner after 3-1/2 decades of trying, and he credited Kurt Busch with providing “the push from heaven.”
Stewart might be calling it something else. It was widely reported that Stewart punched Busch during Speed Weeks, and the two have had more than their share of run-ins. With another driver bearing down, would Stewart have stayed so low on the track?
“Maybe he did think twice before he jumped up high,” Busch said, “that it was me up there. Instead of worrying about who it was, he should have just gone there.”
But he didn’t. Tony Stewart, who’s known as Smoke, got smoked on the last lap. If the 50th Daytona 500 didn’t yield the coronation NASCAR might have envisioned, it nonetheless produced yet another stirring ending. Better still, it forced the conspiracy theorists to pipe down.
Permalink | Comments (10) | Categories: Auto Racing, Mark Bradley
Sports heroes twice honored
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Furman Bisher
It happens once a year. And has been happening since the year Bobby Jones, Ty Cobb, Bobby Dodd and idols of sport opened the gate. Ofttimes, halls of fame create as much bickering and ill will as adulation. In fact, the very location of the physical site of the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame itself has been the center of an ongoing hassle. You’ll find it in Macon, located there through the influence of state politicians who felt their part of the state needed to share in some of its attractions.
So the facility was built, at a cost of something about $8 million. An endowment is required to keep the doors open and the place operative. It’s an attractive facility, begging more advanced curator treatment, but the vision of speeding motorists from Ohio, Connecticut and points north veering off I-75 to view the historic sports figures of Georgia has never materialized.
This year there has been change. Due to the vigorous efforts of Loran Smith, Wendell Couch, D.L. Claiborne and other Georgians, the induction ceremony was moved from Macon to the Cobb Galleria. Indications were, the place would be sold out, some 1,200 patrons at last count. There were nine inductees, and out of loyalty, Macon was not shut out. The honored nine were transported to the capital of Bibb and inducted there, then serenaded at the festive hall in Cobb.
Just how this will affect future inductions is yet to be determined. For certain, not much can be done about the present location of the Hall. Too much has been invested in it — unless some insurance company is searching for new headquarters. So, the Hall busied itself with its annual mission Saturday night. You’ve read, of course, voluminous essays on two inductees, the great Southern voice of baseball, Ernie Harwell, and the booming golfer from Augusta, Jim Dent. This was just another of many inductions for Ernie, including one in his hometown, Washington, Ga., Friday. Jim has been a member of the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame for several years. Their feats have been registered.
There are the others: Herb St. John, an All-America guard at Georgia on Wally Butts’ mid-’40s teams; Earnest Byner and Richard Dent of NFL football; Tree Rollins of NBA basketball; Elmore Smith of Macon and NBA basketball; Norman Carter of high school basketball and L.C. Baker of coaching, at Booker T. Washington High School.
L.C. Baker relates to an age when “coach” referred to the person who was the whole staff, and usually every sport. His football teams won 222 games and were unbeaten for 17 of the 37 seasons he was at Washington. The major star of his tour was Donn “Big Train” Clendenon, later the Mets’ hero of the World Series in 1969. He passed away ahead of his time a few years ago.
The other Dent, Richard, came out of high school in Atlanta, then via Tennessee State, became a Chicago Bear, five times All-Pro and MVP in Super Bowl XX, when the Bears emasculated the Patriots. Known as “Sack Man,” for that was his specialty.
In Rollins, the Hall reaches new heights. Tree becomes the tallest member of the Hall, achieved the altitude of 7 feet, 1 inch growing up in Cordele. And from there, navigated his way through Clemson, to the Hawks.
That brings me around to Earnest Byner, who grew up in Milledgeville, played at East Carolina, then moved on into the NFL for 13 seasons between the Browns, Redskins and Colts. For all the 7,948 yards he gained, 56 touchdowns he scored and telling blocks he leveled, he is cruelly remembered most in Cleveland for a fumble. The Browns were on the goal line in Denver, threatening to put the game away, when Byner fumbled, the Broncos recovered and a date in the Super Bowl for the Browns was lost. It was a crushing blow for Bud Carson, the Browns coach, and he never got that close again. A few seasons later, the Browns took Byner back, and the short and sturdy ball-carrier retired in good graces. Sorry, but that was the story. Far as Georgia is concerned, all is forgiven.
Permalink | Comments (4) | Categories: Furman Bisher
Billy Knight finally makes a play
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
Given how he generally has operated, Billy Knight has left many with the impression that he wakes up in the morning, looks in the mirror, remembers who he is, maybe eats a Pop Tart and then goes back to sleep.
I’m not sure what happened Saturday. To borrow from Roger Clemens, maybe this time Knight looked in the mirror and just “misremembered.”
Who is that, and what did he just do?
The Hawks are suddenly a factor. Why? Because Knight, their general manager, acted like a general manager. He acquired a starting point guard (a little late, but let’s not quibble). He admitted a draft mistake (dumping Shelden Williams). He dealt two other players (Tyronn Lue and Anthony Johnson) who were not meant to start NBA games.
Five days before the trade deadline, Billy Knight was a player.
We pause now for a moment of reflection.
Mike Bibby is a legitimate starting point guard, and he, therefore, makes the Hawks a legitimate playoff team.
Maybe you would like to sit down.
“He embodies all the things we’ve wanted in a veteran point guard, and he’s also a guy that’s known for taking and making shots,” Joe Johnson said after learning of the trade with Sacramento.
I believe Johnson then fainted, and is questionable for Sunday night’s All-Star game.
Billy Knight woke up.
Billy Knight was proactive.
Billy … Knight.
It’s noteworthy that Johnson used the word “veteran” before point guard in his praise of Bibby. It was Johnson who vented before the season about the dormancy in the Hawks’ front office. He came to Atlanta for a lot of money. But he also expected Knight would do more to provide a supporting cast, draft picks notwithstanding.
“I knew it was a rebuilding situation where they had a lot of young guys,” he said on the eve of this season. “… But at the same time, there were supposed to be some more pieces, some more free agents. They talked about it again this past summer. But as you can see, nothing happened.”
It probably wasn’t the Knute Rockne speech that the Atlanta Spirit was looking for.
But finally … something … happened.
This is Knight’s mulligan.
He drafted Marvin Williams ahead of Chris Paul and Deron Williams in 2005. He drafted Shelden Williams ahead of several beating hearts in 2006, most notably Brandon Roy, who was Rookie of the Year.
He signed Speedy Claxton to a $25 million contract. For the kind of money, Claxton should at least be paying for his own doctors and therapists. He started 31 games last season. That’s 31 more than he’ll start this season.
Lue and Johnson are backups at best. Acie Law may be a fine point guard one day. But one day won’t be in 2008.
This season was going nowhere. Now, it may go somewhere.
Yes, the Hawks would have a healthier record if Knight had pushed the button on a deal like this before the season, or at least before things started to unravel six weeks ago. After a high-water mark of 14-12, the Hawks went 7-16 and dragged into the All-Star break at 21-28.
Fortunately, they play in the Eastern Conference, where a team can lose organs but remain alive in the playoff race. They currently rank ninth in the conference standings, but this trade potentially makes them better than at least three teams ahead of them: Philadelphia, New Jersey and Washington.
Billy Knight did this. Billy Knight — whose own job has been on the line as much as the maligned coach, Mike Woodson. And if the onus suddenly is on anybody now, it’s Woodson, because he just lost any excuse to no put a winning team on the court.
Bibby, at 29, is not the dominant player he was when he led Arizona to the national championship. But he’s well above average. He’s well above anything this franchise has had at point since at least Jason Terry and more likely Mookie Blaylock.
He has played only 15 games this season because of a thumb injury. Know what? He could land at Hartsfield with only nine good fingers and it wouldn’t matter. He has averaged as much as 21 points a game (two years ago) and has a career assist-to-turnover ratio of 6.2-to-2.5.
He is what the Hawks have needed. The void suddenly is filled. Somebody finally woke up.
Permalink | Comments (80) | Categories: Hawks / NBA, Jeff Schultz
Gut-check time for Tech
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
This is the game. This is the one at Alexander Memorial Coliseum Sunday against shaky Miami that will tell us whether Georgia Tech’s splendid run for nearly three weeks before Thursday’s disaster at Clemson was a fluke.
Then again, maybe that disaster at Clemson was the fluke.
Whatever the case, the Yellow Jackets are 11-12 overall, 4-5 in the ACC and making inquiring minds want to know if they’re preparing to struggle or surge with the conference tournament approaching in less than a month.
This is the game, all right. In fact, this is the week, since wretched Virginia comes to town after Miami to give Tech a chance to get decent again in a hurry.
That is, if the Jackets are capable, which is questionable. Their disaster at Clemson that evolved into an 82-67 loss showed early and often that they remain a rebounding-challenged bunch. It’s just that the Jackets do have Matt Causey as that special guy out of nowhere. They also have enough talent in the likes of Jeremis Smith, Anthony Morrow, D’Andre Bell and the rest to keep Tech coach Paul Hewitt from trying to strangle himself during games with one of his yellow ties.
“Yeah, I’ve got a lot of optimism and hope for what this team is capable of doing, because one thing they’ve shown me, and that is, I think we’ve played very hard, and I think we’ve gotten better each time,” said Hewitt, before mentioning Tech’s games against Kansas, Indiana, North Carolina, UConn and Vanderbilt, with Duke ahead on the road. He added, chuckling, “I don’t think the coach put them in an enviable spot with some of the teams we’ve played, because I did the scheduling.”
It’s scheduling that would be just fine with Javaris Crittenton running things from the backcourt. Instead, after his first and only season at Tech, Crittenton bolted for the pros, and Hewitt was left with starting a fourth different point guard in as many years for a roster with two other crushing defections: Thaddeus Young also opted to dribble for money after his freshman year, and Mouhammad Faye transferred to SMU after refusing to embrace the “student” part of student-athlete.
You know the rest. You suddenly had uncertainty for the Jackets, and nothing has changed. They played their season opener against what the late Al McGuire used to call a “hyphenated school,” and they lost to such a school, which never is good. Worse, they did so against UNC-Greensboro on their usually accommodating home court. Kentucky also lost to a hyphenated school (Gardner-Webb) while serving as host. So, these things happen.
The same goes for Tech losing six games to teams in the top 25 at the time. Overall, those beating the Jackets this season are a combined 211-79.
That said, how did they look so wretched against a Georgia bunch with barely a pulse? And why were they listless and clueless at Clemson? “Those two games were weird. Just weird, and I kind of said to myself after both of them, ‘That wasn’t our team out there,’?” said Hewitt, who still believes his real team was the efficient one that won four of six games, including three straight ACC games on the road, before traveling this week to their basketball version of Death Valley.
So this is the game.
“The one thing that always gives me hope and promise with this team is that, even after we’ve had some discouraging losses,” said Hewitt, pausing, to reflect on the North Carolina game, when the Jackets nearly ambushed the Tar Heels at rocking Alexander Memorial Coliseum before a gaffe at the end. “That could have been an absolute back-breaker for these guys. They came right back against Virginia Tech, built a 16-point lead and held on. Then we go on the road and beat N.C. State. And then we go on the road and beat Virginia in overtime. Even the Kansas game, we lost, but we came back and played well.”
Sounds good. Now we’ll see what that actually means, starting Sunday.
Permalink | Comments (24) | Categories: Tech / ACC, Terence Moore
Reputation, past performance mean little to Dimitroff
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
It tells us much about the new order of business that the rookie general manager’s first big personnel move was to dump two All-Pros. It tells us Thomas Dimitroff isn’t cowed by reputation, by history or by hierarchy.
Cutting Alge Crumpler made fiscal and physical sense: He’s a 30-year-old with a bad knee. Cutting Rod Coleman was instructive for the simple reason that Coleman was Rich McKay’s best free-agent acquisition. When you start by jettisoning a big-name guy brought here by your predecessor (who’s still technically your boss), it tells us you don’t much care whose feathers get ruffled.
The worst part about last fall’s epic plunge to 4-12 was the revelation that this vaunted roster was a house of cards — or, more precisely, one card bearing No. 7. Without Michael Vick, little else worked. There were too few playmakers, too many mediocrities.
It’s Dimitroff’s mission to trim the fat, and he began by cutting seven men Friday. It’s believed more cuts, perhaps involving bigger names, are imminent. And here we see why it was essential that an outsider be put in charge of personnel — as we know, Arthur Blank loves his players, and with such an affectionate owner a roster can easily become a retirement home for men who technically haven’t retired.
Said Dimitroff, speaking Friday after the names of those seven former Falcons were released: “I step back. My decisions are totally on me. I look with a clear eye. I put nothing in consideration of the past.”
The new GM didn’t see Crumpler as the one guy who consistently got open for Vick. (The new GM knows Vick only as someone who’s incarcerated in Kansas.) The new GM saw instead a tight end whose receiving yards had dropped from 877 in 2005 to 444 last season. Yes, Crumpler is a famously nice guy, but the 2007 Falcons had lots of nice guys, and you know where they finished? Last in the NFC South.
Said Dimitroff: “We did many comparatives involving free agents and the draft,” and those comparatives surely indicated that the Falcons could find players comparable to Crumpler and Coleman. After Friday’s paring, the team will have at least $17 million to spend in cap money, a figure Dimitroff called “a good start.”
The same three words apply to the man himself. Because he looks 20 years younger than he is, because he’d trained as a scout and not as an administrator, the fear was that Dimitroff might be so deferential to his elders that he got nothing done. Early returns indicate no such deference. He was the driving force behind hiring Mike Smith as coach, and Dimitroff, speaking of his first round of cut recommendations, said: “There was no objection [from Blank and McKay]. It involved sharing.”
One thing Dimitroff wasn’t willing to share was his intention regarding the draft. Does the absence of Coleman mean the Falcons are apt to take Glenn Dorsey with their first pick? Dimitroff: “Can I say, ‘No comment’?”
Or would the team in dire need of a quarterback prefer Matt Ryan? “It’s totally contingent on prospect evaluation,” Dimitroff said. “If a guy has all the traits to be a cornerstone quarterback, I would not hesitate to take him at 3, 4 or 5 [in Round 1].”
And if it means taking a step backward in 2008 simply to tailor the roster to his liking … well, Dimitroff didn’t seem opposed to that, either. “My aim is to put a team on the field that’s very aggressive and very passionate, a team that is beginning to believe in itself. That’s the first goal. The starting point is to have that in place.”
He said nothing about going 10-6 or making the playoffs. Rather, he spoke of establishing a template, of setting a new tone. Toward that end, nothing resonates like the rustle of a veteran cleaning out his locker. They’ll be hearing that sound often in Flowery Branch, where there’s a new man in charge, a bold man who cares nothing for yesterday.
Permalink | Comments (90) | Categories: Falcons / NFL, Mark Bradley
Arrogant Clemens looks like liar, not McNamee
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Furman Bisher
America got a long look at a one-shot television show the other day. It should have been called Inside Congress. Re-titled, it may turn out to be the Self-Destruction of Roger Clemens. Most disturbing to the tax-paying citizen was something the chairman, Congressman Henry Waxman, said in a state of irritation, addressing Clemens, the baseball pitcher.
“Only reason we held this hearing was because Roger Clemens insisted on it,” he said.
You mean, all any irritated American has to do is call Congress and say, “I want a hearing.”
As the hearing unfurled, there was little doubt that Clemens had been undone by solipsism. A victim of self. A man wallowing in his own conceit and feeling of invulnerability. He had visited some of the congressmen in their offices the day before, which some might be construed as tampering with a jury. Signing autographs, posing for pictures. These were his guys, then the lights and the cameras were turned up.
He stumbled through his introductory recitation, cold, steely, challenging. “I have never taken steroids and HGH,” was his punch line. Brian McNamee, the beleaguered one, came next and did you notice that Clemens’ former personal trainer first apologized to baseball? Humility is often more convincing than arrogance.
Clemens’ weapon was power. Big man kicking a little man when he was down. This is a plot that never sells. What carried a lot of weight within the hearing, and over the telecast, was something McNamee said in his written opening:
“When I told Senator Mitchell I injected Roger Clemens with performance-enhancing drugs, I was telling the truth.”
You can see no reason for McNamee to lie. You can see reason for Clemens to lie. His legacy, his ego, his place in pitching history, his ticket to the Cooperstown Hall of Fame. He said at one stage, “I’ll never have my record restored.” Solipsism again.
Congress gave Clemens a taste of what was to come right out of the box. Congressman Elijah Cummins came at him with an assortment of wrenching questions. No soft pitches there. That should have told Rocket that he was in for a tough day, more to follow. Another congressman from Indiana, Dan Burton, laid down a withering barrage at McNamee, who took it calmly. Throughout the day he never lost his cool, while behind Clemens his hovering team of legal beagles did, to the point they had to be dressed down. Lawyer questioning was not allowed by the rules.
If you care to dig into performance evidence, check into Clemens’ record in the middle of his career. With the Red Sox in 1993 he had his first losing season, 11-14 and a high earned-run average. Following season 9-7, then 10-5, with rehab time in the minor leagues. Then another losing season, 10-13 and another high ERA, Now as a free agent he signed with the Toronto Blue Jays, and who should he find there but Brian McNamee in some kind of training capacity. Ah, Brian McNamee, who became his personal trainer.
Sudden return to glory. He won 21 games, his earned-run average dropped to 2.05, a plummet, followed by another 20-win season in 1998. The Rogers Clemens story was being revived and re-written. And quietly carrying the torch was Brian McNamee, former catcher on the St. Johns University team in New York.
Back in the congressional hearing, this was not the way Clemens had seen his hearing developing. (In fact, it would seem to me that this was a case for the Department of Justice, not some for congressmen to be threshing about on out tax money.) Rising higher in esteem as it all unfolded was the figure of Andy Pettitte, Clemens’ close friend, and one who often fell under the influence of Clemens. He confessed to the use of some form of enhancing stuff. He stood out like a white knight, and there sat Clemens, now an unfrocked former hero. The plot is just beginning to thicken, and I go back to something written earlier:
I can see no reason for McNamee to lie. I can see all sorts of reasons for Clemens to lie.
Permalink | Comments (63) | Categories: Braves / MLB, Furman Bisher
No one is safe in Falcons’ rebuilding project
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
By the time this is over, when the locker room in Flowery Branch looks like Main St. in Tombstone, there are going to be players and agents who will say that Thomas Dimitroff has blood on his hands.
Don’t listen.
A team falls apart. A franchise crumbles with it. The win column shrinks from 11 to 8 to 7 to 4. Home games slide so far off the radar that the marketing department can’t even fabricate numbers about a season-ticket waiting list any more.
If there is any absolute about the state of the Falcons these days, it’s this: Nobody is indispensable. Some teams have a nucleus to build around. The Falcons barely have an embryo. So if you see suspicious looking wires running from the locker room to Dimitroff’s office, and the general manager pushes down on the plunger as early as today, don’t feel the need to cover your eyes.
You’ve already seen the worst.
You’ve seen the games.
Some general managers have options when they start a rebuilding project. But when you’re looking at a condemned city block, it doesn’t make sense to level every second building. Dimitroff is about to pick the only real option he has: Just level everything and start over.
Don’t think of the Falcons losing so many “good guys.” Think of it as a necessary turning of the page. Arthur Blank, by all appearances, has taken a step back. Dimitroff has assumed construction duties from Rich McKay. Mike Smith is the new coach, replacing some passing apparition from the nether world.
A new structure and a new plan require new heartbeats. Some players will keep their jobs, either because they’re actually pretty good or at least have the potential to be: Michael Boley, Roddy White, John Abraham and Jerious Norwood among them. But most will fall into one of two categories: 1) Bad; 2) Average or below, and possibly not worth what ever they’re being paid. The number of players Dimitroff and Smith keep from the second category depends largely on the draft and what bargains they can find among street free agents
The endangered list reads like the jersey rack at a fans-wear store: Dunn, Brooking, Milloy, Crumpler, Coleman. You know them, you love them, but trust me — you can live without them. If you start to feel bad when the plunger is pushed, just think about the 24-3 loss at Minnesota that opened the season, or the 34-point loss at Tampa Bay, or the 20-point home loss to New Orleans. Think of the second-half collapses that buried playoff hopes in 2005 and 2006.
Yes, there were significant issues: The dog-fighting quarterback. The draft busts. The injuries. An increasingly lax attitude under Jim Mora. Discontentment and disorganization under Bobby Petrino. But when there are so many fizzles and so few victories, it becomes clear that the team lacks more than just talent. It lacks bonding agents. In short, none of the veterans so often cast as leaders were able to lead this team to much.
The Falcons won four games with them. They can win four games without them.
Dimitroff will have nine picks in seven rounds this draft, including four among the first some-100 players taken (pending compensatory picks). They could have a shot at either Arkansas running back Darren McFadden or LSU defensive tackle Glenn Dorsey, or both. Either would be a rarity — a building block.
There is a decision to make on cornerback DeAngelo Hall, who, for all the baggage, probably is the team’s best player. Tight end Crumpler would be the best talent on the offensive side of the ball if he weren’t injured so often. The question is whether it’s worth the risk releasing the tight end, only to suddenly have his knees not creak on another team’s roster.
But beyond a select few, most of these cuts won’t be difficult. Sentimentality became a non-factor a long time ago. Cover your ears, but not your eyes.
Permalink | Comments (155) | Categories: Falcons / NFL, Jeff Schultz
Some fans dishonor Dooley with honor
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Even when Georgia tries to do right by Vince Dooley, someone will insist it’s wrong. It has been this way since 2003, when Michael Adams erred in forcing Dooley out, and it is, regrettably, that way still.
Dooley’s many friends and admirers did him a disservice in that supercharged summer of ‘03, when they overplayed their hand to the extent that the man himself had to ask them to stand down. (It was at the Bulldog Club of Atlanta’s meeting that year that Mark Richt, who had just orchestrated Georgia’s first SEC football championship in two decades, wasn’t given the privilege of speaking last. That went to Dooley, lending the night the feel of a political rally.)
By now, we know where the Dooley zealots stand: They love him and hate Adams. They’re entitled to those feelings, but they help nothing by seeking to create a “cause” where none exists. The school has moved to build a garden — Dooley’s a big gardener, as we know — featuring a massive statue of the coach, and also to rename the part of campus where most of Georgia’s sports facilities are housed the Vince Dooley Athletic Complex. A nice gesture, right?
Not enough, two of Dooley’s former players told the AJC’s Chip Towers. Too little too late, said Buck Belue, and in the wrong place to boot. And what, Jeff Harper wanted to know, about renaming the stadium for Dooley?
I haven’t been the biggest fan of Adams, but at such moments I have some sympathy for the president (who can be both ham-handed and imperious). His fight with Dooley damaged him beyond repair — he was booed heavily during halftime at the Sugar Bowl — and nothing he does now will ever placate the Vinceniks.
By reacting so adversely to what should be a warm fuzzy moment, Dooley’s advocates have all but guaranteed that there’ll be no edifice-renaming — whether it’s Sanford-Dooley Stadium or Dooley Field at Sanford Stadium — until Adams is gone. The president, see, retains a considerable amount of pride.
I’m on record as saying the big hedge-holder should eventually become Sanford-Dooley Stadium, but I cringe every time his forces conjure up some fit of pique. Dooley was a great coach and a splendid AD, and he remains a prince of a guy. That said, a man of such grace would be the first to remind folks that it’s unseemly to look askance at any honor.
The best course is always to smile and say thanks, which is exactly what Vince Dooley did. “For me personally,” he told Towers, “I’m just appreciative and really humbled by the whole thing.”
Be magnanimous in any victory, however small, and maybe the next president will see fit to do something bigger.
Permalink | Comments (162) | Categories: Mark Bradley, Thrashers / NHL
Clemens the biggest loser of Steroidgate
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
There were a couple of winners after baseball’s latest trip to Capitol Hill on Wednesday for Steroidgate. None was named Roger Clemens, by the way, whose arrogance at the end of the hearing resulted in the committee chairman gaveling the desperate pitcher into silence.
And those winners?
Bud Selig and Barry Bonds, in no particular order.
Let’s start with Selig, the frequently blasted commissioner, who ignored public giggling to hire former Senator George Mitchell to investigate the use of performance-enhancing drugs in baseball and issue recommendations for the future. Mitchell’s findings weren’t definitive, which they weren’t meant to be, but they were impressive, especially since he had no subpoena power and zero cooperation from baseball’s players association.
Consider, too, that after Wednesday’s four hours and 41 minutes of testimony between often warring Republicans and Democrats on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, both sides came to a consensus: Selig, through the release of the Mitchell Report, provided exactly what Congress wanted when it summoned baseball officials and players to Washington for the first time three years ago to turn their steroid crisis around.
The Mitchell Report gave examples of baseball’s issues with performance-enhancing drugs, offered ways to solve them and watched the owners join the usually defiant players in accepting the report’s suggestions.
As for Bonds, he wins, because he suddenly is invisible. Nobody is talking these days about how he surged past Hank Aaron last summer for most home runs in a career by using juice more than adrenaline during his latter years. That’s because everybody is talking about the guy who has replaced Bonds as the poster child for the steroids era, and that’s Clemens.
It’s about time. While Bonds was doing all sorts of unnatural things in the batter’s box after reaching 40, Clemens was doing the same on the mound. It’s just that while Bonds had critics in stereo when it came to his alleged use of performance-enhancing drugs, Clemens’ critics were in mono. The contradiction was unfair, and it also was unseemly, but committee member Elijah E. Cummings spoke for many over the past few months when he said to Clemens during the hearing, “You’re one of my heroes, but it’s hard to believe [you].”
Actually, it’s impossible to believe Clemens, and this goes beyond the testimony of Brian McNamee, Clemens’ former trainer who joined Clemens at the hearings as the congressmen’s primary guests. Backed by syringes and other medical paraphernalia, supposedly saved from his days with Clemens, McNamee said calmly and strongly that he injected Clemens with performance-enhancing drugs on several occasions. Clemens denied as much, and he was bolstered by McNamee’s shaky reputation with the truth. “I view you as a [former] police officer who was a drug dealer,” committee member Christopher Shays told McNamee.
Shays mostly is correct about McNamee, but Andy Pettitte is among Clemens’ closest pals. He’s also a former teammate and noted straight shooter. He supported many of McNamee’s claims in a deposition. So did Chuck Knoblauch, another former Clemens teammate. There was even a deposition from Clemens’ former nanny who suggested that McNamee is more believable than Clemens on a crucial matter surrounding Clemens’ possible appearance at an event hosted by Jose Canseco, among the kings of steroids users during that time.
In response to Pettitte’s deposition, in which Pettitte also said under oath that Clemens admitted to HGH usage in conversations, Clemens said of Pettitte that he either “misheard” or “misremembered.”
Those are the clever words of the guilty. In fact, it was apparent early into Clemens’ frequently bumbling testimony that he should have pulled his version of a Mark McGwire or of a Sammy Sosa. In March 2005, McGwire kept telling this same committee that, “I’m not here to talk about the past,” and Sosa kept pretending that he couldn’t speak English.
Said an irritated Henry Waxman, who banged that gavel after Clemens kept interrupting the committee chairman’s closing speech, “The only reason we held this hearing today was because Roger Clemens insisted on it.”
Looks like this accomplished but tainted pitcher just flung a fastball over the backstop. You know, by showing up.
Permalink | Comments (74) | Categories: Braves / MLB, Terence Moore
Put Dooley statue at Sanford Stdium
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
You can’t honor Vince Dooley enough at the University of Georgia.
That said, this is enough.
For now.
Those in charge of such things will place Dooley’s name over the portion of the UGA campus that features most of the school’s athletic facilities. They’ll also unveil a fancy statue that depicts Dooley being carried on the shoulders of two Georgia players after their national championship game following the 1980 season.
First, this is a wonderful start for somebody who coached the Bulldogs for 25 years and served as a productive athletics director at the university from 1979 to 2004. Second, more accolades for Dooley will automatically happen.
Over time, Dooley will evolve into Georgia’s Ronald Reagan, with this and that named in his honor around Athens faster than a Herschel Walker burst against Tennessee or Florida.
Here’s the only thing that should change for the moment: Put the Dooley statue at Sanford Stadium, not at the proposed Vince Dooley Athletic Complex.
Other than that, members of Georgia’s Board of Regents deserve a complimentary bark or three for their efforts.
Permalink | Comments (38) | Categories: Quick Hit, Terence Moore
Tiger, TV rule the PGA these days
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Furman Bisher
FOR WHAT IT’S WORTH: (Not restricted to the pulled hamstring, strained oblique, inflamed tendon and sweatshop class alone, as you shall see.)
• As it must have come to your attention, we now have two PGA Tours: (1) The tournaments Tiger Woods plays in, and (2) the ones he doesn’t, in which television slumbers. In another way TV rules, as when the Tour decided to limit the number of players who can make the cut without strangling weekend telecasts. Players may make the official cut but be cut anyway because of the limit put on the weekend field. At the AT&T Crosby — I’m a stickler for history — J.B. Holmes and D.J. Trahan, winners of two earlier tournaments, made the cut, but were cut. Make sense? Of course not.
• Not to brand the Braves’ Class AAA club in Gwinnett with any bush-league label, but for public-relations and media purposes, would it not be wiser to give the team its own definitive name, such as Gwinnett Crackers? Revive the memory and do honor to the historic Atlanta minor-league franchise, and do away with a lot of headline confusion.
• No mystery why Woods and several other top-rated pros stay away from the Bob Hope Classic and, as it has developed lately, the AT&T Crosby at Pebble Beach. Small wonder that a carload of pros choose not to put up with a collection of amateurs for three or four days and the obnoxious semi-unknowns masquerading as celebrities. One day you saw more shots hit by Dan Marino — no unknown, he — than any of the pros. At Pebble Beach, one so-called celeb was identified as “male model of the year,” another simply as “an entertainer.” Whoopee! In the old days, Crosby’s celebs had names and faces.
• Did any of those celebrated Super Bowl commercials make you want to buy anything? Most of those I noticed should have come with identifying commentary. Tell the truth, two days later I couldn’t remember the name of any of the products that I saw. Yeah, I know, advanced dementia.
• Somehow or another, when reviewing the various talent misjudgments of the Hawks, one of the most glaring of them all is passed over. Pau Gasol was drafted third in the first round in 2001, then traded away (with two other players) for Sharif Abdur-Rahim, long gone from the scene. The tall European, meanwhile, has become an NBA stalwart for whom the Lakers just traded.
• Did you notice that some of the networks are doing away with female sideline football reporters — known to some as “eye candy” — and in some cases, not just the females? Their hasty interviews have been mainly a distraction, rather than enlightenment. Joe Paterno once turned one aside and said, “I’ve got to get to the locker room and talk to my team.” Now, if they can do away with those dugout “interviews” with major-league managers while the game is in progress. Cheers for Bobby Cox, who declined.
• How many times have you heard errant golf shots described as “unforced errors”? Sorry, but aren’t all wild shots “unforced”?
• Is it true that ESPN is talking about retooling its “Monday Night Football” cast again? Seems they can’t get it right, and Mike Tirico, Tony Kornheiser and Ron Jaworski don’t come off well. They’ll never have it as right as they did when the booth was manned by Frank Gifford, Don Meredith and Howard Cosell. It wasn’t a combination that liked each other very much, and that probably added to the atmosphere.
• When Cecil Travis retired from baseball, after a long career with the Washington Senators, what did the ballclub present him as a farewell gift? A milk cow. Try that on some of these self-exalted stiffs these days. Oh, and did you notice that Craig Biggio was rewarded by the Astros with a job as “assistant to the general manager”? Some teams have as many as of three of these, and I’ve often wondered: What does an assistant to the GM do? Go for the coffee?
• Did you pick up the hot tip delivered by one of the tour caddies the other day? How he shines shoes: Peel a banana, rub the inside on the shoe just as you would use wax. Presto! Shoes shined.
• Probably sounds a little retarded, but I’m probably the only person in the country who has a dial phone (two of ‘em), a typewriter and a pencil trimmer. And still using them all, now and then. (But no paste pot, once an old newspaper standard.) … Selah.
Permalink | Comments (5) | Categories: Furman Bisher
Spending government time on steroids justified
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
It started as a sports icon having his legacy soiled by a drug investigation, something we’ve almost become immune to. Then this thing mushroomed and mutated, as if somebody fed the Roger Clemens novella, well, performance-enhancers.
Days of odd silence were followed by almost maniacal denials, choreographed press conferences and secretly taped phone conversations. The trainer says he also injected Clemens’ wife with HGH before a sexy swimsuit photo shoot. An old box of used syringes and gauze pads, presumably stored in the attic next to Norman Bates’ mother, is turned over as evidence.
So far, no blue dress.
On Wednesday, Clemens has his day in court, or at least Congress, when the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform investigating the illegal use of steroids in baseball congregates in Washington. The central figures will be Clemens, seven-time Cy Young Award winner and lock Hall of Famer, and Brian McNamee, the trainer who says he helped him attain that status by injecting him at least 16 times with steroids and human growth hormone.
It’s doubtful the hearing can match the buildup for theatrics. But if every member of Congress seems to be wearing a new suit and a manicure, there’s a reason.
“I will withhold judgment on whether this hearing is useful and appropriate until I see how it plays out,” Georgia congressman Lynn Westmoreland, who spoke with Clemens last Thursday in the congressman’s office, wrote in an e-mail to the Journal-Constitution. “For the past year, the committee has held a lot of high-profile hearings that attract cameras. I don’t think we’re doing anybody, including the committee, any favors if this turns into a circus. This isn’t SportsCenter. The country would be better served if we focused on widespread use in baseball as opposed to potential wrongdoing by individuals.”
As far as this being circus, we’re way past that. Confirmation came when Clemens visited House members last Thursday and Friday and several asked for autographs and posed for pictures. Westmoreland said he was not among them, commenting: “This wasn’t a Fantasy Baseball Camp. For me personally, I didn’t think it was appropriate to ask for a picture or an autograph. Besides, I’m a Braves fan.”
They might as well sell popcorn in the Rayburn Office Building today. But as to whether this is worth it: absolutely.
Many believe Congress and sports shouldn’t mix. The problem with that position is it’s based largely on some idealistic notion that Major League Baseball is some rec league. Sports leagues today are billion-dollar entities. They have television contacts, collective bargaining agreements, corporate partnerships, licensing agreements, drug issues and, yes, even anti-trust exemptions. Teams aren’t in this for participation trophies.
MLB and the Players Association ignored the use of performance-enhancing drugs for years. Why? Because they made money. If hitters and pitchers were illegally juiced, guess what: They made money illegally. Because regardless of when rules were passed and when testing began, it was never legal to obtain and ingest performance-enhancing drugs without a prescription.
Owners and players only feigned concern and only when it became a public issue. But testing grew teeth only after congressional involvement. To do nothing could be viewed as tacit approval. Also, while athletes like Clemens, Barry Bonds and Mark McGwire are scrambling to protect their legacies, this isn’t about outing anybody. It’s about putting an end to the illegal distribution and use of PEDs, and diminishing their use among youths.
Do members of Congress see these hearings as chances to mug for cameras? Sure. But that doesn’t make them wrong. Similarly, many assumed Jose Canseco was lying about everything, merely because he was out of the game and wanted to sell his book. But most information in recent investigations has come from obscurities or relative lowlifes: Canseco, McNamee, Kirk Radomski, Greg Anderson, Kimberly Bell — and now John Rocker.
Did anybody expect revelations to come from foreign ambassadors and heads of state?
McNamee says he not only injected Clemens, he also injected the pitcher’s wife, Debbie Clemens, before a Sports Illustrated swimsuit photo shoot in 2003. I understand that liars, cheaters and thieves often have creative minds. But how do you make that up?
When the Mitchell report came out two months ago, it listed 85 players as having been connected to PEDs. Logic dictates that number represents a fraction of reality. Bonds was included only because of grand-jury testimony in the BALCO investigation. McGwire wasn’t even listed. Clemens wasn’t so lucky. McNamee says he did it. Clemens says he didn’t. Somebody’s lying. History tells us it’s probably the athlete.
We’ve seen others finally fess up. Some, like Marion Jones, had meltdowns during public confession. Others, like McGwire, went mute. Rafael Palmeiro just crawled back under a rock.
Maybe you don’t like it. But it’s justified. And if it means a room filled with clowns, elephants and a pitcher being shot out of a cannon, so be it.
Permalink | Comments (44) | Categories: Braves / MLB, Jeff Schultz
Swimsuit Issue has legs
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
THE TUESDAY COUNTDOWN…
10: Sports Illustrated’s annual soft-porn swimsuit issue hits the newsstands today with lingerie model Marisa Miller on the cover. Given that we’re all about “hits” here at blog central, I’ve included a link to her image page. As far as Google recommendations, you’re on your own.
9: Now, you might ask: What does Marisa Miller have to do with sports? Well, nothing. But it hasn’t stopped Sports Illustrated from putting out this issue since 1964. (I was 5 at the time. My mother bought me “Highlights.” And she’s French!) But I did read Miller’s Wikipedia bio, and it turns out she enjoys surfing, football, muscle cars and boxing. So that more than qualifies for a spot in the Tuesday Countdown, if not a Congressional investigation into HGH.
8: The most telling comment/no-comment on our Sekou Smith’s Hawks trade/no-trade analysis came from Joe Johnson, who said: “Right now, so many teams are making so many big moves. I don’t know what anybody is waiting on. I’m sure there is stuff out there for every team, but I’m done pressing the issue.”
7: It was Johnson who probably caught some heat just before the season, suggesting the Hawks were too young and management didn’t do enough to bring in some veteran help for the roster. Of course, what he said was the truth, and it’s now being borne out (record: 21-26 going into tonight’s Detroit game). The NBA trading deadline is in nine days. But please hold it down. Billy Knight’s trying to sleep.
6: I know a lot of people are upset about Congressional involvement in sports. (Not me. More on that later in a Roger Clemens column. Oooh, cross-promotion.) Personally, I have a much bigger problem with Georgia politicians having a conniption over the state offering Florida Gator license plates and trying to mandate that Florida reciprocate. I mean, can you forget about the barking for a minute and just fix the water problem and the potholes? If you want to know why so many laugh at Southern states, here’s Exhibit A.
5: I think it’s great that Georgia is proposing to name a sports complex for Vince Dooley. Just one question: Will there be a ribbon-cutting ceremony, and, if so, does Michael Adams allow Vince to hold the scissors?
4: A stat to chew on while the Thrashers scramble to try to make the playoffs: Washington fired its coach after a 6-14-1 start. The Capitals named long-time minor-league coach Bruce Boudreau as the replacement, and they’ve gone 21-11-4 since. The Thrashers fired Bob Hartley after a 0-6 start. Don Waddell, rather than promote assistant Brad McCrimmon or name another replacement, decided to coach the team himself, and has gone 27-21-4 (including 16-17-4 since an 11-4 start).
3: John Rocker says he used steroids. OK, that explains at least some of the psychotic episodes.
2: Has there ever been a lower-profile series of coaching hires in the NFL? Consider: Mike Smith (Falcons), Jim Zorn (Washington), John Harbaugh (Baltimore) and Tony Sparano (Miami). Oh, and Jim Mora for the Seattle job in waiting.
1: Victoria’s Secret should be out with its NFL preview issue by next month.
Permalink | Comments (5) | Categories: Jeff Schultz, Quick Hit
Little gained by removing Felton … for now
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Recent developments notwithstanding, Dennis Felton doesn’t think his basketball program is on the wrong track. On the contrary, he said Monday, “I do believe we will win championships at Georgia.”
In a 25-minute phone conversation, Felton admitted this season has been “a setback.” He also regards it as an aberration. “We’ve made really good progress until this year, and if we had our team intact I just know we’d be in a much better place to earn a bid to the NCAA tournament. This is the first time we’ve taken a step back on the court.”
Felton arrived in April 2003, replacing the disgraced Jim Harrick. The new man was handed a program facing deep-dish NCAA probation. “We were walking into a severe challenge,” Felton said, “and we were met by several more along the way.”
Still, Felton has been in place for 4 1/2 seasons, and his teams haven’t yet managed an NCAA berth or a 20-win season. (Even the overmatched Ron Jirsa generated one of the latter.) Felton’s latest team is 11-10, having lost five in a row. His record at Georgia is 69-73 overall, 24-48 in SEC play. And it must be noted that Baylor, which underwent an uglier scandal in 2003 — a player was murdered by an ex-player and the coach was taped trying to cover things up — is 17-5.
“This season in particular, I wanted us to be in a better place,” Felton said. “But things changed dramatically when we lost our two best players.”
Mike Mercer and Takais Brown were suspended due to academics last fall and were later dismissed from the team. “They’re not here because it had to be that way,” Felton said. “They gave me no choice.”
Such has been the story of Felton’s tenure: The biggest talents don’t stay long, if at all. His most heralded signee, Louis Williams of South Gwinnett, opted for the NBA. Robert Dozier of Lithonia signed with Georgia but landed at Memphis after his SAT score was flagged and is today, in Felton’s words, “the second-best player on the No. 1 team in the country.”
Since the last of Harrick’s holdovers departed, Felton has largely made do with players of unquestioned tenacity but limited ability — such as Levi Stukes and Steve Newman, seniors last season, and Sundiata Gaines and Dave Bliss, seniors now. Given Georgia’s toughened academics and Felton’s no-nonsense approach, will the Bulldogs ever attract the recruits necessary to win at the highest level?
“We are building our talent,” Felton said. “Howard Thompkins [a signee from Weseleyan High School in Norcross] is arguably the best power forward in the country. He can make a huge impact, much the way [Vanderbilt’s A.J.] Ogilvy and [Kentucky’s Patrick] Patterson have done. He can make the skillful plays we need our talent to make. And Dustin Ware [a point guard from Kennesaw] is precisely what we need.”
Last week, starting guard Billy Humphrey was arrested for the second time in three months. With the dismissals of Mercer and Brown and the headlines generated by Humphrey, does Felton feel embarrassed?
“I go through the gamut of those tough emotions — I’m extremely disappointed and very frustrated. And, with the negative connotations for the program, yeah, I’m embarrassed. But I’m not at all embarrassed by our intentions and our effort behind those intentions to make everything go right. And I’m not saying it’s all right — one time’s too many, two are too many — but these were the first two times in five years we’ve had a brush with the law. I’m not embarrassed by our track record.”
Given the inherent obstacles faced by any coach coming after Harrick and relative lack of interest in Georgia basketball, Felton hasn’t been subjected to much scrutiny. That has begun to change. Some folks, this writer included, are wondering if it should take this long to fix a busted program.
“We’ve had some awfully tough luck,” Felton said. “That’s slowed us at times in what we were moving toward. But most explosive successes come after great adversity. I’m not trying to compare myself to Mike Krzyzewski, but both he and his great rival Dean Smith faced enough adversity in their early years to make people question whether or not it could be done. Obviously somebody was wise enough to be patient.”
The belief here is that nothing would be gained by changing regimes now. The belief here is, as it has been all along, that Felton is a good coach. But a good coach must eventually find a way to override rotten luck, or else he becomes an ex-coach. The belief here is that Dennis Felton has until 2009 to get it going, or else he’s gone.
Permalink | Comments (98) | Categories: Mark Bradley, UGA / SEC
Little gained by removing Felton … for now
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Recent developments notwithstanding, Dennis Felton doesn’t think his basketball program is on the wrong track. On the contrary, he said Monday, “I do believe we will win championships at Georgia.”
In a 25-minute phone conversation, Felton admitted this season has been “a setback.” He also regards it as an aberration. “We’ve made really good progress until this year, and if we had our team intact I just know we’d be in a much better place to earn a bid to the NCAA tournament. This is the first time we’ve taken a step back on the court.”
Felton arrived in April 2003, replacing the disgraced Jim Harrick. The new man was handed a program facing deep-dish NCAA probation. “We were walking into a severe challenge,” Felton said, “and we were met by several more along the way.”
Still, Felton has been in place for 4 1/2 seasons, and his teams haven’t yet managed an NCAA berth or a 20-win season. (Even the overmatched Ron Jirsa generated one of the latter.) Felton’s latest team is 11-10, having lost five in a row. His record at Georgia is 69-73 overall, 24-48 in SEC play. And it must be noted that Baylor, which underwent an uglier scandal in 2003 — a player was murdered by an ex-player and the coach was taped trying to cover things up — is 17-5.
“This season in particular, I wanted us to be in a better place,” Felton said. “But things changed dramatically when we lost our two best players.”
Mike Mercer and Takais Brown were suspended due to academics last fall and were later dismissed from the team. “They’re not here because it had to be that way,” Felton said. “They gave me no choice.”
Such has been the story of Felton’s tenure: The biggest talents don’t stay long, if at all. His most heralded signee, Louis Williams of South Gwinnett, opted for the NBA. Robert Dozier of Lithonia signed with Georgia but landed at Memphis after his SAT score was flagged and is today, in Felton’s words, “the second-best player on the No. 1 team in the country.”
Since the last of Harrick’s holdovers departed, Felton has largely made do with players of unquestioned tenacity but limited ability — such as Levi Stukes and Steve Newman, seniors last season, and Sundiata Gaines and Dave Bliss, seniors now. Given Georgia’s toughened academics and Felton’s no-nonsense approach, will the Bulldogs ever attract the recruits necessary to win at the highest level?
“We are building our talent,” Felton said. “Howard Thompkins [a signee from Weseleyan High School in Norcross] is arguably the best power forward in the country. He can make a huge impact, much the way [Vanderbilt’s A.J.] Ogilvy and [Kentucky’s Patrick] Patterson have done. He can make the skillful plays we need our talent to make. And Dustin Ware [a point guard from Kennesaw] is precisely what we need.”
Last week, starting guard Billy Humphrey was arrested for the second time in three months. With the dismissals of Mercer and Brown and the headlines generated by Humphrey, does Felton feel embarrassed?
“I go through the gamut of those tough emotions — I’m extremely disappointed and very frustrated. And, with the negative connotations for the program, yeah, I’m embarrassed. But I’m not at all embarrassed by our intentions and our effort behind those intentions to make everything go right. And I’m not saying it’s all right — one time’s too many, two are too many — but these were the first two times in five years we’ve had a brush with the law. I’m not embarrassed by our track record.”
Given the inherent obstacles faced by any coach coming after Harrick and relative lack of interest in Georgia basketball, Felton hasn’t been subjected to much scrutiny. That has begun to change. Some folks, this writer included, are wondering if it should take this long to fix a busted program.
“We’ve had some awfully tough luck,” Felton said. “That’s slowed us at times in what we were moving toward. But most explosive successes come after great adversity. I’m not trying to compare myself to Mike Krzyzewski, but both he and his great rival Dean Smith faced enough adversity in their early years to make people question whether or not it could be done. Obviously somebody was wise enough to be patient.”
The belief here is that nothing would be gained by changing regimes now. The belief here is, as it has been all along, that Felton is a good coach. But a good coach must eventually find a way to override rotten luck, or else he becomes an ex-coach. The belief here is that Dennis Felton has until 2009 to get it going, or else he’s gone.
Permalink | | Categories: Mark Bradley, Mark Bradley, UGA / SEC
No successor-in-waiting planned for Braves, Cox
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
Since the incomparable Bobby Cox is entering his 27th year as a manager in the major leagues, including more than two decades with the Braves, it’s logical to wonder if his bosses are tempted to lose their minds.
They’d do so by contributing to this epidemic of naming a successor-in-waiting for an incumbent, mostly because everybody else is doing it.
Few sports executives match Braves Chairman Terry McGuirk when it comes to solid thinking. Even so, we held our breath after asking McGuirk the question of the moment: Are Braves officials ever planning to announce that this poor soul or that one is going to follow in Cox’s Hall of Fame cleat steps — you know, long before Cox stops making them?
Without hesitation, McGuirk said, “It never crossed our minds. We’ll have to deal with replacing Bobby someday. It’s incomprehensible to think about dealing with that right now.”
Good. If anybody should manage forever, it is Cox, still sharp and enthusiastic as ever at nearly 67. I mean, what planet are those other executives visiting regarding this kooky trend for hiring future coaches or managers? Supporters say it gives players and potential ones for these teams a sense of stability. Well, such only is the case if those players actually like that successor-in-waiting. And what if you’re Florida State, and you’re locked into Jimbo Fisher to follow Bobby Bowden, which is the case, and then Mark Richt decides a few years from now that he really would bolt Georgia for Florida State?
Fisher or Richt.
That’s a tough one.
“It really does seem odd when hierarchies in sports are set up so transitions are already in place before they actually occur,” McGuirk said. “Then again, that does seem to be a new phenomena, and it’s one that we’re not familiar with.”
Instead, the Braves are among the shrinking majority when it comes to that trend. It’s worse among college teams, especially in basketball. Syracuse’s Jim Boeheim has anointed the legendary Mike Hopkins as his successor, and Arizona’s Lute Olson has appointed Kevin O’Neill, already on the job until Olson returns next season after an emotional divorce. Plus, you had a bunch of sons who were designated to replace their fathers, and those sons eventually did so, with Pat Knight for Bobby and Tony Bennett for Dick and Sean Sutton for Eddie.
In college football, Rich Brooks is warming his Kentucky seat for Joker Phillips, and Joe Tiller has somebody named Danny Hope standing by as Purdue’s future head guy.
Even NFL executives are embarrassing themselves, with Jim Caldwell, whose Wake Forest teams finished a combined 37 games below .500, slated to follow Tony Dungy with the Indianapolis Colts. Then there is Jim Mora, a bust with the Falcons, named as the heir apparent to Seattle’s Mike Holmgren, owner of three Super Bowl trips with the Green Bay Packers and the Seahawks.
Just guessing, but Cox won’t manage forever. Which means he will need a successor at some point through conventional means.
Who? Terry Pendleton, the former Braves standout turned batting coach? How about one of Cox’s former coaches who became a manager elsewhere, such as Ned Yost, Jimy Williams or Fredi Gonzalez? Maybe John Smoltz or Tom Glavine would consider the job after retirement.
“Well, I think it’s gotta be somebody, hopefully from within the organization and a type of guy who would try to emulate Bobby, who would try to be like him, but nobody actually can be Bobby Cox,” Tom Lasorda said over the phone from his Los Angeles home. He was a long-time manager in the minors for the Dodgers, plus a coach in the majors for four seasons, before he replaced Hall of Famer Walter Alston with the big boys in 1977.
In fact, many figured during the early 1970s that Lasorda was a successor-in-waiting for Alston, but Lasorda shouted long distance, “Nobody in the organization ever said that to me. I wanted that job real bad, because I paid the price to get it by managing eight years in the minors and six years in the Dominican League. I thought my contributions and my feelings would grant me that job, but I didn’t have any guarantees.”
That’s opposed to now, when guarantees are everywhere. Lasorda added boldly for those among the enlightened, “I don’t like this trend at all.”
Permalink | Comments (83) | Categories: Braves / MLB, Terence Moore
Pollack at peace despite uncertain path ahead
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
Given the uncertain odds of his future in football, there seemed a certain symmetry to David Pollack’s escape plans this past week. He spent a few days with pals in Las Vegas.
“It was OK, but it’s not really a place I would frequently visit,” he said by phone Saturday, after touching down in Cincinnati. “We just kind of hung out in the casinos and walked down the strip.”
Did he gamble?
“Not much. I’m a firm believer in not paying for the chandeliers in the casino.”
He is 25 now. In many ways, however, he’s the same goofy kid who came out of Shiloh High School in Snellville, went to Georgia and turned into an unexpected icon. He’ll crack on you one minute, and then turn serious when talking about faith or family.
He laughed when I suggested he should just forget about football and come back to run for mayor of Athens, and then said, “It’s amazing. I’ve never watched presidential debates before, but I’m turning into my dad more every day. I’m sitting there, watching debates and CNN steadily, and thinking, ‘What’s happening to me?’ I’m like, ‘Dude, quick, turn on SportsCenter.’ This growing up thing is weird.”
To watch Pollack play football at Georgia was like seeing a kid run into a toy store. To know his situation now is the mother of all reality checks. Life and sport took unexpected turns 17 months ago when, on his second play of the second game in his second NFL season with Cincinnati, he suffered a fractured vertebra in his neck during a tackle. He was taken off the field from a stretcher, and that was his last time between the sidelines.
Surgery and extensive rehabilitation have followed. Pollack is back doing extensive workouts, playing racquetball, running sprints, seven to nine hours a day. “I’m like Rocky in Russia,” he said. “I’m getting Rocky hard. Sometimes I even box a little, and we play the Rocky theme music.”
In the movies, maybe Pollack comes back, goes to Pro Bowls and lead the Bengals to a championship. He knows real life doesn’t always work that way.
Friday was supposed to be decision day. But a meeting with a Los Angeles spine specialist was canceled because of the doctor’s scheduling conflict. Pollack — who went ahead with the Las Vegas portion of his week — hopes to meet with the specialist in the next few weeks.
He needs to know, either way. There can’t be any gray area. He said a doctor must tell him he can play football again “and not be at a greater risk” for a spinal injury. Otherwise, he is done.
“Even if I can’t play football again, I feel blessed that I’ve been able to play a kids’ game this long,” he said. “The experiences along the way have made me a better person, a stronger person. You learn a lot about life and who really cares about you when things like this happen.”
He hears it all. Some want to see him back on the field. Others tell him to walk away. He understands both sides.
Full disclosure: Last year, I wrote a column telling Pollack that resuming his career wasn’t work the risk. I don’t have a medical degree. But I know what this game does to even strong and healthy men who haven’t had a broken neck. I know he can have his pick of next careers: broadcasting, training, coaching. I know he wants to have a family. (“I want a lot of babies with my beautiful wife,” he reiterated Saturday.)
“My wife and mom and dad and brother, they would never give me their opinion,” Pollack said. “They wouldn’t want me to be persuaded by them. I have some friends who talk to me about football and get excited about me playing again. Then I have some who don’t ever want me to step on a football field again. Some fans say they can’t wait for me to come back. Some say, ‘It’s OK, we still love you.’ I take everything as a compliment.”
Deeply spiritual, he says he prays daily, not to play football again, but for direction and strength.
He was pulling into his driveway in Cincinnati as we finished speaking. Earlier, after dialing his cell phone, I was sent to on-hold music: Ray Charles singing, “Georgia on My Mind.”
He had always planned to return here after football. If that comes sooner than expected, so be it.
Permalink | Comments (68) | Categories: Jeff Schultz, UGA / SEC
Pull for Vick if he’s learned lessons
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
It’s time to start cheering for Michael Vick again. This doesn’t apply only to those who have ignored everything to hug the most polarizing force in the history of Atlanta sports, but to everybody.
We’re talking about everybody, ranging from those who thought Vick was a running back disguised as a quarterback to those who cringed over his involvement in the fighting and killing of dogs to those who never liked the guy, period.
There is a condition associated with our request, and it is a reasonable one for the former Falcons icon-turned-prison inmate courtesy of his self-inflicted mess over those dogs: He has to realize he received three lifeboats in recent weeks despite repeatedly lying to the feds.
First, after serving time in his native Virginia, Vick was transferred to Leavenworth, but not that Leavenworth. He’s in a minimum-security environment with no prison bars, military-style dormitories and inmates resembling Jim Bakker more than Charles Manson. Second, he has the ability to slice up to a year from his 23-month sentence through the completion of a generous drug-rehabilitation program. Third, a judge ruled that he can keep most of the $20 million bonus money that the Falcons wanted to strip from his bank account for wearing No. 33765-183 these days instead of No. 7.
So Vick can continue to sink by ignoring those lifeboats, or he can climb aboard and hope to sail toward continuing his NFL career someday. “I just feel like Mike is sitting there in prison and stewing and feeling that there isn’t another kid that will come out in this draft who possesses the ability that he has,” said Jamal Anderson, the Falcons running back great, who occasionally sent encouraging text messages to Vick before his incarceration.
That’s because Anderson still has emotional ties to the franchise despite six years of retirement and a successful post-playing career in entertainment.
Added Anderson, “You have an athlete in Mike who throws like Steve Young or John Elway, who runs like Barry Sanders, who is as fast as Deion Sanders and who is playing the quarterback position. I love it, because the pundits sit there and say, ‘Oh, when he gets out of prison, he’ll be 29 or 30.’ No, no, no. He’ll be mad, and he’s not going to be able to wait when he gets out, just to prove something. That, then, will be the most dangerous Michael Vick we’ve ever seen. That’s what I’m hoping for.”
Hope is one thing. Results are another, which Vick must produce in positive ways from now through the aftermath of his prison release. Then he must do something that he should have done years ago along the way to celebrity, and that is, he must divorce himself from the posse.
It’s the posse that contributed to Vick’s issues spanning from that dogfighting thing to that water-bottle thing, to most of those other silly Vick things. It’s the posse that ultimately deserted Vick when the feds came knocking. It’s the posse that Anderson has seen other prominent folks befriend since he grew up watching his father serve as a bodyguard for the likes of Muhammad Ali, Donna Summer, Sugar Ray Leonard, Diana Ross and Mike Tyson.
It’s also the posse that Anderson featured during his days of turning the Falcons into the Dirty Birds.
“Mike and them screwed up in a major way. There’s no doubt about it, but sometimes it’s like, ‘OK, I’m trying to help my friends generate some money,’ but all of that other stuff, gosh, just nip it in the bud, man,” Anderson said. “It’s tough, and that’s the sad part about being the major figure attached to some of these things. When you’re the hero of the family and of the community, and when people grow up with you, it’s like we’ve all made it.
“We, particularly in the minority community, feel this great responsibility to take care of every one around us who always has looked up to us. You just have to monitor everybody around you, or they can bring you down.”
Somewhere, Vick is nodding with such a thought, or he should be.
Permalink | | Categories: Falcons / NFL, Terence Moore
Getting acquainted with the Braves
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Furman Bisher
The clubhouse was a-bustle with Braves. Spring training was in the air. You could smell it, a sort of masculine fragrance that flows out of a gym laundromat. It formerly was Camp Leo, now under new management and operating as Camp Roger. Mazzone was long gone. McDowell was in command, but there’s one difference there. Roger never comes at you like a commander.
Walking in just ahead of me was an athletic figure with a duffel bag over his left shoulder. A little later he would appear in the clubhouse with a wrap around his left elbow as big as the duffel bag. Mike Hampton was just reporting from Arizona, where he had spent the off-season giving his arm one more winter under repair. The second in a row.
The last time Mike Hampton threw an official pitch for the Braves was Aug. 19, 2005. He was hammered by the Padres and left in the fourth inning. Since that time, he has collected an enormous amount of money while his left arm was being surgically repaired, but not all Tommy John surgeries are as successful as it was on the pitcher whose name will forever be branded in sports medical history. But not every patient runs into the setbacks that Hampton did. Once last spring, just as he was warming up for his first start since August ‘05, then again back in the fall, when he made his first start for Navajoa in the Mexican League. One inning, a false step, a pulled hamstring — everybody has them, but only athletes seem to pull them — and now on the mend again.
This is the pitcher who could have made all the difference in the Braves’ past two seasons. Might have added two more pennants to that line of 14 mounted over left field at Turner Field. A pitcher who has won 138 major-league games, but only 22 for the Braves. And for a fellow who looks husky enough to pin a bear. A linebacker in high school who attracted college scholarships.
“I’m five feet, ten inches tall,” he said, “and I decided that I had a better future as a lefthanded pitcher than as a five-foot, ten-inch linebacker.”
A decision wisely made, from the point of personal finance. “I’m due one [a break] now, and they [the Braves] are due one,” he said. “Just don’t do anything stupid.”
So, perhaps this was looking at the pitcher who finally can repay his debt to the Braves. Hampton is one of several key pieces that will have to fall into place for the Braves to find their way back to the playoffs. Edgar Renteria was a sore loss to the offense and, with his glove, to the pitchers. Now it will be seen how Yunel Escobar stands up under the stress of a full season. Andruw Jones is gone, and in no way is Mark Kotsay capable of filling in his figures, even those of a below-standard season. The bullpen still has holes to fill. Peter Moylan is solid as a middle man, and after a season short on lefthanders, they have Will Ohman, Royce Ring and Jo-Jo Reyes on hand. All with hope but everything to prove.
Catching is solid. Brian McCann is an all-star beyond reproach, and after seasons of muddling about, Javier Lopez, once the star, comes home to apply for the job as backup at a wage considerably marked down. No matter what, down the road Clint Sammons is one for the future.
This, though, is getting ahead of the game. This is merely loosening-up time. Getting acquainted. For some, first look at the inside of a major-league clubhouse. None of them has lost a job yet, these are just applicants dropping in to show their stuff, get a feel for it all and hopeful candidates for Camp Roger’s Best-in-Show.
Permalink | Comments (11) | Categories: Braves / MLB, Furman Bisher
Tech’s turnaround may not be too late
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
Paul Hewitt, who was fairly well beaten up publicly for the first three months of this season, finally admits what we could have assumed: He was blindsided by losing two freshmen to the NBA after last season.
The problem isn’t that Hewitt can’t coach. The problem is that college basketball coaching has become less about X’s and O’s than about avoiding the temptation of recruiting too many one-and-done playground legends — and anticipating when you make that mistake.
Georgia Tech plays Saturday at Connecticut (17-5), having already played nonconference games against Notre Dame (17-4), Indiana (19-3), Vanderbilt (19-4) and Kansas (22-1), all Top 25 opponents.
“You look at our schedule,” said Hewitt, “and we’re like a mid-major team, for crying out loud.”
Yes, and notwithstanding a recent turnaround that has jolted Tech’s once-dead NCAA tournament hopes, the misguided schedule-maker who set up all of this was Hewitt. He laughed, in that I-know-I-have-only-myself-to-blame kind of way.
“I don’t know what I was thinking,” he said. “Well, I know what I was thinking. But I was wrong. I thought I’d have at least one of those guys back. There was a point last year when I thought both would be back. I thought it would be good to have a strong schedule. It would challenge us.”
The referenced absentees: Javaris Crittenton and Thaddeus Young, both freshmen, both starters, both of whom turned pro after relatively average seasons, individually and team-wise.
Hewitt: “We all knew there was a chance they would be gone. But as the year went on, the way it was going, I thought they’d be back. You throw in Mouhammad Faye [who struggled and eventually transferred] and Ra’Sean Dickey [academic and injury problems], and we’re a different team than what I expected.”
There is an upside to all of this. In the past three weeks, the Yellow Jackets have evolved into as mentally and even physically tough a team as Hewitt has had in three seasons. Only supremely talented or resolute teams win road games in the ACC, and Tech has won three straight.
The Jackets are now 5-4 on the road this season. In the previous three seasons combined, they were 5-24. They haven’t won this many road games since going 7-5 in 2003-04. That season they went to the Final Four.
No, that doesn’t mean we’re projecting a duplicate feat this March. Nor even a win Saturday. But it does suddenly make Tech a team worth watching. After consecutive losses to Georgia and Miami dropped them to 7-8, they won four of six. The losses: to North Carolina by one point, to Maryland by two. In the last two wins, they trailed by double-digits in the second half at Virginia and Wake Forest.
Hewitt knew there would be early struggles, even if he could not have foreseen face-plants against UNC-Greensboro and Winthrop. The changeover largely began when Moe Miller took over at point guard.
“Moe has gone from being just a sweet kid to understanding that you’re either going to hit somebody or get hit,” he said.
After several body blows, here’s where Tech is: still six feet deep in a 12-foot hole. But at least now there’s a season to salvage. Maybe even a tournament bid.
How many wins will it take?
“I don’t know,” he said. “We just have to keep playing well. What you don’t know is who else is going to be in contention. I don’t know what it’s going to take because I think this year more than ever it’s going to be impossible for the selection committee to get it right. If you asked me that question five years ago, I’d say 17 wins. But the criteria now is so up-down.”
He’s not surprised his team has turned it around. He just didn’t know when it would happen, saying, “I knew we were running out of time. We still have very little margin for error. But with the way we’re playing now, the Connecticut game is actually like a Godsend for us. If you win it, you’re right there. If you lose it, well, people will say, ‘Go back and finish your conference.’ “
Godsend might be overstating things. But at least the rest of the season isn’t looking like a funeral procession.
Permalink | Comments (17) | Categories: Jeff Schultz, Tech / ACC
Don’t let controversy take away from Knight’s legacy
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
This retirement from coaching is only temporary for Bob Knight. Even at 67 and counting, he’ll resurrect his motion offense and man-to-man defense with somebody else’s college basketball team, and we’ll all be the better for it.
The tossing of that chair across the Assembly Hall court. The punching of that policeman in Puerto Rico. The controversy over his rape remark during that Connie Chung interview. The headbutting, the cursing, the kicking, the grabbing and even the allegation of choking his own players. In general, the slew of things that tarnished Knight’s legacy after 42 years of coaching were self-inflicted. It’s just that they also were overrated when compared to the big picture of somebody who was much more than his three NCAA titles, an NIT championship, an Olympic gold medal and a record 902 victories.
I mostly saw another Bob Knight before, during and after I covered his Indiana teams of the late 1970s for the Cincinnati Enquirer. Those Hoosiers featured Hawks coach Mike Woodson as their star and leader. Not only did Woodson join me in seeing that other Knight more often than not through the years, but so did my youngest brother, Darrell, a superlative baseball player for the University of Wisconsin during that same decade.
With emotion in his voice, Darrell said on Thursday over the phone from his home in Cincinnati, “To me, Coach Knight is one of the greatest human beings I’ve ever met, and everything that I heard about him before I met him was absolutely false. I still remember that encounter like it just happened a few minutes ago.”
Here’s what happened: With Indiana preparing for a basketball game at Wisconsin, Darrell strolled by the Hoosiers’ team bus while leaving one of his baseball practices. Everybody was aboard, except for Knight, clad in his famous red plaid jacket of those days. Knight began to take his first step on the bus to join the rest of them, when Darrell said, “Hi, Coach Knight,” as Darrell continued walking.
Knight turned and signaled for Darrell to come closer. “I didn’t know if he was going to chew me out for something or what,” said Darrell, laughing, who spent the next 20 minutes back then listening more than speaking. No doubt, Knight knew Darrell was a Wisconsin player of some kind by his letterman’s jacket, but the conversation never involved baseball, basketball or anything with athletics.
First question from Knight: What year are you in school? Then came how are you doing academically? That’s great, but are you taking advantage of all the learning opportunities you have at such a wonderful academic institution, and what are you planning to do with your degree after graduating? “He was like a guidance counselor with a bunch of great insight,” Darrell said. “I mean, here he was taking all of this time with me, and he didn’t even know me from Adam.”
Now Darrell is a national sales manager for a provider of products and services that specializes in packaging, supply chain and marketing solutions.
That sage disguised as a coach would be proud. In other words, so much for horror stories of old that could be entitled Knight Of The Living Dead. Not that those horror stories didn’t exist, particularly at Indiana during Knight’s most notorious stretch, for some, as head coach — between his Army start and his Texas Tech finish.
They just didn’t happen to me.
Once, during the early 1990s, I got a phone call at my Atlanta home in the middle of the summer from the Indiana University basketball office. “Could you hold the line for Coach Knight?” a woman said, as I snapped to attention.
“Thanks for the column on the whip,” Knight said, referring to one of his controversies that really wasn’t. During a practice at an NCAA regional that spring, Knight created a national furor with a mock whipping of Calbert Chaney, one of his black players. I wrote that you can accuse Knight of many things, but you can’t accuse him of being a racist. “You had the wisdom to get it right, and if you ever need anything from me in the future, give me a call,” Knight said, before hanging up.
I never told Knight that Darrell was my brother, by the way. Knight didn’t need to know, because he couldn’t care less.
Permalink | Comments (51) | Categories: Terence Moore
Hawks have what it takes
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Full credit to the Hawks: They stared down a really good team in the fourth quarter and won a really big game. Watching, it seemed clear to me that I hadn’t overrated the Hawks’ talent. If you can beat the Lakers, you should be able to beat anybody. And you shouldn’t be under .500 at this late date.
We can whine forever about the absence of Chris Paul/Deron Williams, and here’s my latest installment: Did you see what Paul (42 points, nine assists) and Williams (29 points, 11 assists) did for their respective teams in overtime road wins Wednesday night? That said, the hand-wringing over the lack of a point guard obscures the greater truth: The Hawks might not have drafted the right players, but they’ve drafted enough good players. (Shelden Williams notwithstanding.)
Joe Johnson scored 28 points and had five assists against the Lakers. Josh Smith nearly had a triple double. Al Horford, who’s already the third-best player on this squad (meaning: better than Marvin Williams), had 15 points and 20 rebounds. Big-time performances in a big-time game against an opponent Mike Woodson called “the deepest team in the West.”
No, Billy Knight didn’t hand Woodson a perfect roster. There are no perfect rosters. That’s why there’s a coach. It’s his job to maximize what he has, and Woodson has enough to be competitive. I had no problem with his tactics Wednesday — he had the right guys on the floor at the right time, and his men defended beautifully, holding the Lakers to eight points over the final six minutes — but a game like that made the skeptic in me wonder why there haven’t been more games like that.
“We’ve beaten the Lakers and Phoenix and Dallas,” Woodson said. “We’re capable of beating anybody.”
And that’s the point: Through 46 games (counting the suspended one against Miami) and occasional great successes, the Hawks still don’t appear to know how good they can and should be. They pulled together at the end against Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol, but too many times they’ve come apart.
Other NBA teams see the Hawks’ potential and say, “I hope those guys never figure things out.” I say there can be no more excuses for failing to figure things out. This team needs to climb back above .500 and stay there. This should be a winning team.
Permalink | Comments (72) | Categories: Mark Bradley, Quick Hit
Dogs too good for own good
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
Athens — Mark Richt said he was crushed, heartbroken, even “sickened” (yes, he used that word). Because, yes, there must be nothing worse for a college football coach than to actually have too many coveted recruits wanting, begging, pleading to come to your school.
“People tell me it’s a good problem,” Richt said Wednesday. “But it’s sad, having to tell kids there’s not a spot for you.”
They certainly can relate to this sort of thing at Vanderbilt, East Carolina and New Mexico. We all will be there one day. The lottery numbers will hit, and my wife will be forced to tell the Jaguar dealer, “I’m sorry, but we’re going with the Porsche.” And she will weep.
Wednesday was national-letter-of-intent day for college football. Now, as projections go, gauging the futures of 18-year-old flankers and safeties is no closer to exact science than throwing a Ping-Pong ball into a wind tunnel and picking a direction. But when most scouting services list a school as second or third in the SEC and fourth or sixth nationally, it says something about perceptions. Also leverage. Also Porsches.
Richt doesn’t really recruit anymore as much as he opens the door.
Georgia isn’t building. Georgia is now your basic five-bedroom, four-bath dream home with a pool, Jacuzzi and home gym. It just needs a little upkeep and the occasional add-on, like a home theater or a game-breaking receiver.
The Bulldogs nearly went to the national title game last season. They have a chance to go next season. They are led by Richt, who can be considered rare for a college coach: He hasn’t leveraged his success for a paycheck on another campus or an ego stroke in the NFL. Georgia also plays in the SEC, a recruit magnet.
The Dogs used only 28 official visits to fill 24 scholarships. (Three others were used for potential walk-ons.) Receiver A.J. Green, the best player in the Dogs’ class and one of the top 10 in the nation, was so committed that he told Richt he wasn’t even going to waste his time making an official visit.
“I had to beg him to come on the official visit, just so his mom could have a nice weekend,” Richt said.
Georgia had 20 commitments by December. Several top players who waited before making a decision were shut out. Recruiting coordinator Rodney Garner never has seen anything like it.
“It’s unusual, especially when you have a class of 24,” Garner said. “There were a few kids where we were like, ‘We’d love to have you. I can’t believe we’re having this conversation with you today. I wish we were having it back in October or November, and then maybe we would’ve had room to take you.’ “
Jamie Newberg of Scout.com said, “I wrote something the other day, and I had to try to find somebody to put under, ‘The big fish that got away.’ I had trouble coming up with somebody for Georgia.”
When asked to compare recruiting at Georgia now with his first year in 2001, Richt said: “It’s different. It just seems like we’re getting a lot more of those really high-level kids who want to come here.”
Georgia screams success and stability today. Richt can point to SEC titles and Sugar Bowls. He can walk into a recruit’s living room, look a parent in the eyes and say, “I’m not going anywhere.” As Garner said, “He can say, ‘My mom’s moved here; my dad’s moved here; my sisters have moved here; my brother just moved here this summer; [his wife] Katharyn’s dad lives up in White County.’ People know he’s serious.”
When Richt was at Florida State, he tried to recruit two quarterbacks, Danny Wuerffel and Danny Kanell, the same year. “Wuerffel was like, ‘If you take me and only me, I’ll come,’ ” he said. “We had to decide, but we couldn’t do it. Not long after that, he committed to Florida.”
The Seminoles had to settle for Kanell, who threw a school-record 57 touchdown passes and played in four BCS bowls.
Everybody has his own level of regret.
Permalink | Comments (57) | Categories: Jeff Schultz, UGA / SEC
New plan at Tech negates ranking
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
The worst is over. Georgia Tech won’t soon have to slog through another recruiting year like this. Any coaching change is rough, but a system change — especially to one that de-emphasizes the pass — is frightful.
Not many coaches run the ball the way Paul Johnson plans to run it. That makes for a recruiting list tailored to specifics. The folks who compile the precious rankings don’t care if a school gets what it needs. Recruiting rankings are aggregate things: They measure who gets the most guys with the most stars behind their names. Those stars tell us something, but not nearly everything.
Scout.com has Tech’s class rated the 38th-best in the land, eighth-best in the 12-team ACC. Rivals.com has it 49th nationally, ninth in its conference. Coming in this winter of transition, such tepid assessments should neither surprise nor disappoint. The Jackets will do better next year, once prospects get an idea of what Johnson wants and what Tech does. “Once you get something on record,” he said Wednesday, “you have something to show guys.”
There is, however, a caveat: Due to their newly idiosyncratic scheme, the Jackets under this coach might never be seen to have recruited as well as they actually have.
Dropback quarterbacks needn’t apply. Indeed, the passer who’d committed to Tech and Chan Gailey — Sean Renfree of Arizona, who wound up signing with Duke — reneged posthaste. “Honestly, he needed to change,” Johnson said. “He didn’t fit what we do.”
And then: “If a wide receiver wants to catch 80 balls, he’s probably not going to come here. And if that’s all he’s concerned about, we probably don’t want you anyway.”
Perhaps the Jackets under Johnson will sign a tailback on the order of Darren McFadden. Perhaps not. Big backs tend to want the ball 25 times a game, which mightn’t happen here. The spread option, see, spreads the carries. This isn’t an offense for one feature back; it’s an offense for a running quarterback and a clever fullback and slotbacks who can scoot. Sure enough, Tech got a couple of the slotbacks Wednesday. Neither, however, was a five-star or even a four-star guy.
Johnson, you should know, puts little stock in the rankings. “I trust myself as an evaluator,” he said. “I trust my staff. If we believe someone’s going to help us, we’re going to give him a look.”
Signing day, as we’re constantly reminded, has grown to outsized proportions. Traditionally understated Tech rented the Opera, an ornate Midtown nightclub, for its “celebration” Wednesday night. (What happens if the Jackets’ haul ever cracks somebody’s top 10? Does Disco Dan Radakovich foot the bill for a dinner-dance at the Piedmont Driving Club?) Amid the hullabaloo, we often forget that signing day is but a vehicle, not the destination itself.
It doesn’t matter who signs if he doesn’t fit the system. It doesn’t matter who plays where if the system is flawed at its core. The belief here is that Johnson’s offense, which flourished at Georgia Southern and Navy, will function at Tech. He’ll have more size than at Southern, more speed than at Navy.
Johnson again: “I have no doubt our system can work. It’s a matter of how quickly we can get it installed.”
That stands to be the way of Tech’s new world: Seemingly lesser recruits signing to play for a man who knows exactly what he’s doing.
If you’re a fan, you need to decide whether to place your trust in that coach or in an outside evaluator who doesn’t much care what happens at Bobby Dodd Stadium on autumn Saturdays. Were I a fan, I know which way I’d lean.
Permalink | Comments (103) | Categories: Mark Bradley, Tech / ACC
Without Vick, Falcons’ fans vanish
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
In news worthy of a yawn, the Falcons just announced that they’ve sliced the price of tickets for next season in the nose-bleed section of the Georgia Dome.
Nice try.
I guess.
First, we’re talking about the nose-bleed section. Second, if the Falcons can do something about putting a Michael Vick clone in one of their uniforms, they’d have a better chance of putting more fannies in their stands.
The Falcons have to win, too, which they did just four times in 16 games last season before home crowds that were mostly invisible at times.
Anyway, prior to last season, all of those sellouts during Arthur Blank’s six years as Falcons owner weren’t about the momentary lowering of ticket prices in the Georgia Dome’s extreme upper deck. They weren’t about offering more tailgating opportunities for fans. They weren’t about colder beer and warmer hot dogs.
They were about Vick, period.
Consider this: After the Falcons sold every ticket at the Georgia Dome before their 2003 season, they were among the NFL leaders in no-shows during the regular season. That’s because Vick broke his leg in the preseason and didn’t return until late in the year.
It’s all about Vick for the Falcons. It’s always been all about Vick for the Falcons, and maybe you’ve heard: Courtesy of the feds and dogfighting, Vick and his quarterback magic aren’t available to the Falcons or anybody else for a while.
So I guess the Falcons could slash ticket prices and give a Michael Vick bobble head doll for every game. Then again, that only would work if the Falcons could give Vick’s head, body, legs and everything else for all of those games.
Permalink | | Categories: Quick Hit, Terence Moore
Keeping sports in perspecitive
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
THE TUESDAY COUNTDOWN…
10: First, something even more important than the Super Bowl, although my old pal probably would disagree. The day before the big game, ESPN’s Len Pasquarelli checked into a hospital because he wasn’t feeling well. He ended up having quintuple bypass heart surgery, which really messed up his weekend plans. He’s doing well today, except for the part about missing the game.
9: Len and I were co-workers at the AJC (we were hired the same day in 1989) and have been friends for over 18 years. So this story didn’t surprise me: He looked and felt so bad during a meeting of Hall of Fame voters Saturday in Arizona that he was implored by others to just fill out his ballot and leave. Typically, Len refused, sticking it out through the rounds of voting before leaving. There are three levels of dedication for reporters: 1) Working lazy; 2) Working hard; 3) Working Lenny. Take a rest, my friend.
8: Couldn’t find the Boston Globe’s prematurely planned book on the Patriots, “19-0,” which was on Amazon.com last week. But you can still buy a commemorative 19-0 gold coin for $33.95. Alleged retail value is $149.95. Don’t know what the melt-down value is. (Here’s the link: http://www.amazon.com/England-Patriots-19-0-Super-Champions/dp/B0013HT0FU/ref=sr—1—2?ie=UTF8&s=sporting-goods&qid=1202225014&sr=8-2)
7: I’m not necessarily predicting the decline of the Patriots, Red Sox and all of New England’s sports team. But given the years of suffering by Boston fans prior to the Pats’ and Sox’ rise, could there be a more appropriate signal for a collapse than this Super Bowl loss?
6: Given all of Bobby Knight’s career mandates about hard work, dedication and respect for your peers, I have one question: Where does quitting in the middle of the season fit in?
5: In case you’re wondering about Pat Knight’s qualifications to be the head coach at Texas Tech, he once coached the Wisconsin Blast of the now defunct International Basketball Association. Also, there’s his last name.
4: Good news for Michael Vick: a judge’s ruling allows him to keep $16.25 million in bonuses, which means he can move into a much nicer cell block in Leavenworth.
3: Florida State president T.K. Wetherell said he doesn’t trust the athletic department to investigate itself of academic fraud. I’m not sure, but I think Bobby Bowden may retire in about five minutes.
2: Don Waddell has said he still expects to sign Marian Hossa, which I guess explains why he was scouting in Montreal the other night. Wait. Huh?
1: So much for one-game perceptions: Early odds on Bodog.com lists the Patriots as 4-1 favorites to win next year’s Super Bowl, followed by San Diego (6-1), Indianapolis (8-1), Dallas and New York (each 10-1). The Falcons are tied with Kansas City, Miami and Oakland — at 100-1.
Permalink | Comments (43) | Categories: Jeff Schultz, Quick Hit
Braves pitching looks solid
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
So: You’re the newly minted general manager of a club that has finished third two seasons running, and your biggest rival just traded for the best pitcher in baseball. Your reaction?
“My reaction is that I can only take care of the Atlanta Braves,” Frank Wren said Monday. “I can’t control what other teams do.”
It’s a boilerplate response, but it’s also the only one that makes sense. Of all franchises, this one should know that seeking to match a divisional opponent pitcher for starting pitcher is the road to ruin. (Remember Len Barker, imported in 1983 at the massive expense of Brett Butler and Brook Jacoby because the Dodgers had dealt for Rick Honeycutt?) And it is, after all, only February.
Pitchers are gathering daily at Turner Field for the early-throwing camp — Andruw Jones, who’s neither a pitcher or even a Brave, made an appearance Monday to hit in the cage — and the big news is that the Braves no longer feel pressed to rustle up more arms to fill out their rotation. Said Wren: “I like the health of our guys. We’ve got some depth coming in.”
And then this: “I think we’ll send at least three major-league starters to Richmond.”
That’s a change. Last summer the Braves couldn’t put three major-league starters in Atlanta; this time Wren feels he has eight or nine guys capable of filling the five spots. Which means the Class AAA R-Braves, in their final season before resettling in Gwinnett, could well have the rotation to win the International League again. (The Governors’ Cup makes a lovely parting gift.) It would also mean that the parent club should be able to keep pace with the Mets and the Phillies in the NL East.
Said Wren: “They’re both good clubs, but I think we match up really well with them.”
You know Tim Hudson and John Smoltz. That’s two. You remember Tom Glavine. That’s three. Assuming he’s healthy, Mike Hampton would make four, but that’s the same assumption that undid the Braves these past two seasons. The difference this time? Said Wren: “We’re covered very well.”
He mentioned Jair Jurrjens, who arrived in the Edgar Renteria trade with Detroit. Signing Glavine was the transaction that commanded all the ink, but getting Jurrjens, who’s 22 and who started seven games for the Tigers in 2007, was a smaller move that should have a much longer shelf life. Jurrjens has a big-league arm, which is more than could be said for Mark Redman.
A sign of changing times: Chuck James, by default the No. 3 starter last season, might not make the 25-man roster this March. He’s in a fight with Jurrjens and Jo-Jo Reyes and Buddy Carlyle and Jeff Bennett to stay off that last train to AAA.
“We were in the mix to try and acquire more pitching last winter and all season long, but there really wasn’t anything out there,” Wren said. “We just didn’t have the depth to weather any storms. I’m most comfortable we can weather those storms now.”
Wren looks and sounds excited, which you’d expect. He waited nearly eight years for John Schuerholz to vacate the chair. Waiting wasn’t always easy, especially when speculation arose that Dayton Moore, the farm director who has since become the Kansas City general manager, had become the heir apparent. But here Wren is, and for his patience he was handed a four-year contract and an act that can’t possibly be followed.
When last the Braves had a new GM, they went from sixth place in the NL West to the 10th inning of Game 7 of the World Series. From there they finished first over each of the next 13 completed seasons. “I’d take half that,” Wren said, laughing. “I’d take a quarter of that.”
Let’s start with one. By jaded local standards, it has been a long time — two years and counting — between division titles. It has been so long that we around here might actually appreciate the next one.
Permalink | Comments (52) | Categories: Braves / MLB, Mark Bradley
A Super Bowl beyond compare
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Furman Bisher
Let me first say this, that after all these years of Super Boredom, I have just watched the most memorable Super Bowl of them all. A jewel. A Super Bowl that lived up to and far exceeded all the others beyond all measures. An Everest among Rockies. Not a Brady, but another Manning masterpiece. Not Peyton this time, the kid brother Eli, who grew 10 feet tall in one evening in Arizona.
I’m sorry I wasn’t there. It would have been worth the trip and all the excesses. Even Arlen Specter, the senator-cum-commissioner, couldn’t make a dent in this spectacle. Nothing could let the air out of Tom Coughlin’s balloon. Here’s to the weathered old coach, run out of Jacksonville, having to make a case for himself with the Giants to hold his job one more year, then taking his show on the road and stealing the locals’ thunder. Tampa Bay, Dallas, Green Bay in a blizzard — Barnum and Bailey never had a better run. There was no wiggle room. Win or go home.
This one, No. 42, was different. Coughlin’s crowd didn’t have to win this one. They had already overshot every goal set for them. They were facing the most perfect team in the history of the NFL. Tom Brady was Mr. America, be-dimpled features, excessively handsome and charming as a knight. Bill Belichick, grumpy, usually dressed in the style of the non-extinct Maytag repairman, and a push for the image established by Vince Lombardi. Poor old Tom Coughlin, he had no chance in a Mr. Personality contest. By the time he got to Phoenix, the crystal trophy (named for Lombardi) had virtually been awarded to the Patriot from Boston.
What happened will be dissected, bisected and autopsied until football is played on Mars. Yeah, you have to hand it to Manning, the back-up brother. All the other Giants could do was hold the fort until Eli found his game. And I’ll say this, when Brady connected with Randy Moss for a 14-10 lead, I thought it was over. These were the great Patriots, who might win by three touchdowns. Ha!
Who could ever forget those last few minutes, when Eli squirted out of a threshing mess of Giants and Patriots, tore loose from some guy who had hold of his shirt, then threw a pass that David Tyree didn’t catch, but balanced on his headgear like a circus seal. Then the dagger, Eli’s pass that Plaxico Burress caught for the last touchdown. Brady had a few rockets left in his arsenal, but the Giants’ defense wasn’t losing this one.
In the final summation, with all due respect to Eli and his cast, this one belonged to the defense. To Michael Strahan, to Osi Umenyiora, to Justin Tuck, to Antonio Pierce, to James Butler and Kawika Mitchell and all the trench warriors. They didn’t get to Phoenix to play dead for New England. They smothered Laurence Maroney and the running game. (His net was 36 yards, wasn’t it?) True, they couldn’t keep Wes Welker under control, but his damage was only a sting, not a bite. Moss was constrained, just as he was throughout the postseason.
Only in the latter stages of the season did Coughlin have all his Giants in health. You had to check through the press guide to come up with some of the stars, Steve Smith, Ahmad Bradshaw, Kevin Boss, Brandon Jacobs and Tyree, not to mention that all this was done without Jeremy Shockey. (Some critics said Manning was better off without him.)
Eli didn’t come out blazing. Not until he got the Patriots off on an 83-yard drive to take the lead did he begin to show his authority. That was his launching point. He was in the game. He and his defense were now on the same page, and the rest of the evening would be theirs. I’ve seen 40 of these, a great deal of them a sorrowful conclusion to the draggy, party-laden Super Bowl Week. It will be a long time before you ever see another like this, if ever.
Permalink | Comments (19) | Categories: Furman Bisher
Patriots didn’t deserve historical feat
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
Glendale, Ariz. — They spent nearly every moment of Super Bowl Week talking about history. In fact, Tedy Bruschi, the eternal linebacker and resident historian for the New England Patriots, evolved into the unofficial spokesman for his team by declaring, “I’ve been in a lot of big games, but all of us would agree that this is the biggest game of our lives.”
So, when the confetti didn’t fly for the insufferable Patriots after the final gun on Sunday at University of Phoenix Stadium, where the Giants resembled that New York team of yore known as Joe Namath’s Jets with a chilling upset, Bruschi was proven correct. This was about history, because the Patriots are history for many reasons.
First, the Patriots lost. In case you haven’t heard, they hadn’t done so in 18 previous games this season. As Giants wide receiver Plaxico Burress said between tears after scoring the game-winning touchdown during the wackiest final minutes in Super Bowl history, “Can somebody give our defense some credit?”
No problem there. The New York defenders spent their portion of a 17-14 victory knocking the royalty and everything else out of Tom Brady, and he’s usually the Patriots’ unscathed king of comebacks at quarterback. Instead, Eli Manning continued his coming out party this postseason along the way to significance or beyond as an NFL player. He joined his older brother, Peyton, in discovering ways to de-throne Brady when it mattered most.
It took a while, because despite his various bruises, Brady became Brady again late in the fourth quarter. He pushed the Patriots 80 yards to the end zone for a 14-10 lead inside the final three minutes. Then Manning countered with an 83-yard scoring drive that ended on a 13-yard pass to Burress in the corner of the end zone with 35 seconds left to play. Not long before that, there was Manning’s 32-yard prayer to a leaping David Tyree on the drive after Manning somehow dipped and swirled away from a slew of New England defenders who rarely miss in the clutch.
“That escape by Eli and the throw that is caught by David Tyree, that ball was challenged,” said Giants coach Tom Coughlin, enthusiastically, failing to keep an epidemic of smiles from gracing his usually stern face in the aftermath. “That wasn’t like he just jumped up in the air and caught the ball. You had two people, ripping for the ball, and he brings it down. That might be one of the great plays of all time in the Super Bowl.”
It was history. Not like the other way that the Patriots are history. Even beyond what the Giants accomplished with a lot of defense and enough of Manning, the Patriots are history, because the unraveling of their Spygate mess will negate everything they’ve done during the past seven years. The three world championships after four Super Bowl trips. The comparisons of the suddenly tainted Brady to the eternally sainted Joe Montana. The undefeated regular season to match those of the 1934 and 1942 Chicago Bears, the 1948 Cleveland Browns and the 1972 Miami Dolphins.
Suddenly, those things mean nothing, and the Patriots can blame Bill Belichick, their gifted but flawed head coach. He is so obsessed with secrecy that it is impossible to separate fact from fiction regarding the Patriots’ use of a hidden camera to steal signs from the Jets during their season opener at the Meadowlands.
Thus Spygate. Worse, reports keep surfacing about the Patriots dropkicking NFL rules in clandestine ways regarding other games through the years. As a result, U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter is threatening to call hearings on Capitol Hill even beyond his expected huddle with Roger Goodell over why the NFL commissioner destroyed tapes and notes from Spygate.
That said, the Patriots still had a Super Bowl to play with that other so-called history in mind.
The fraudulent kind.
Said Jim Kiick, a member of those 72 Dolphins, who remain the only undefeated team ever to capture an NFL world championship, “We never were against the New England Patriots. We have our (own) accomplishments. We’re not comparing ourselves to anyone else from other generations. The Patriots are a great football team. Unfortunately, they didn’t win this Super Bowl.”
With apologies to Kiick, it is fortunate that the Patriots didn’t win.
They didn’t deserve it.
Permalink | Comments (119) | Categories: Falcons / NFL, Terence Moore
Fire Billy Knight first
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
This should not be taken as an endorsement of Mike Woodson, because it’s generally not wise to endorse a coach with a career record of 88-201, unless, like, your name is Mrs. Woodson.
But in light of the relative deathwatch that’s hovering over the Hawks’ coach, a question: Has everybody lost sight of the bigger picture?
The NBA trade deadline is Feb. 21. Notwithstanding Saturday’s 104-92 win over the seemingly comatose New Jersey Nets, the Hawks are in need of a new plan and a makeover. The last plan and makeover by the all-knowing (just ask him) general manager, Billy Knight, has gotten them to 19-24. Now, you might believe that 19-24 represents significant underachievement for this roster. But I’m inclined to think Woodson probably was on the mark when he said before the game, “I thought we’d be at about .500 right now.” (That should pump up second-half ticket sales.)
So ask yourself this: With the trade deadline approaching, what would better serve the Hawks’ future: 1) Firing the coach; or, 2) Firing the general manager? (I know. You want the obvious third option. I want world peace. Don’t get greedy.)
If only because of timing: Fire Billy Knight first.
Let his replacement analyze this mismatched roster. Let his replacement orchestrate moves before the deadline. Let his replacement make the call on Woodson, whether that’s on his first day before lunch, or next week, or following the season.
When you build a new house and things start falling apart in three months, you don’t phone the plumber, or the electrician, or the sheetrock guy. You phone the builder who handed you the blueprint, then hired the plumber, the electrician and the sheetrock guy.
It works the same in basketball. How do you dump the coach before you dump the general manager who not only hired him, but also passed up Chris Paul and Brandon Roy in consecutive drafts? I realize the whole point guard thing has been beaten to death. But Paul and Roy both were named to the All-Star Game last week. So the two being ignored by Knight in consecutive drafts is sort of timely.
A new coach might help you in the short term. But Knight shouldn’t be given that hammer.
Yes, Woodson’s record in three and a half seasons is a cartoon-like 88-201 (.304). But it’s not as if he has been a drag on Knight’s career. Knight’s cumulative record in four and a half seasons: 116-255 (.313). Woodson would have to win another 26 in a row just to surpass the winning percentage of Lon Kruger (69-122, .361). But Knight is making Pete Babcock — who made the playoffs eight of 13 seasons — look like a visionary.
The fortunate upside to the Hawks’ record is they play in the Eastern Conference. They’re not dropping out of the playoff race any time soon. But this is when serious teams with serious general managers make moves. Los Angeles just completed a deal for Pau Gasol. Other teams are circling the Nets for Jason Kidd (who drifted through Saturday’s game like his head was elsewhere).
If you’re an Atlanta Spirit partner, do you going to trust Billy Knight to make a move?
Asked before Saturday’s game if a trade could send the right message to players in the locker room, Woodson said: “It could. We’ve kind of sat intact with this team for the last four years, when you talk about Josh Smith and [Josh] Childress and [Tyronn] Lue. There’s never really been a major trade since I’ve been here. I’m not saying that’s the answer. All I’m saying is, if something makes sense that can better your team, you have to do it.”
Woodson’s lifeline is remarkable. This same ownership group trusted Don Waddell to fire Bob Hartley because they were convinced the Thrashers’ coach had lost the team six games after a playoff season. Given Woodson is still employed, we have to assume he is somehow held in higher regard after over 200 losses.
But since they have waited this long, they might as well make the move that makes more sense. Fire the builder, not the plumber.
Permalink | Comments (119) | Categories: Hawks / NBA, Jeff Schultz
Earlier losses leave Tech no wiggle room
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Georgia Tech isn’t the team it was a month ago, but what happened back then still counts. The Jackets have left themselves much ground to cover and only so many games to get there.
“What we’d done the last two weeks was nothing more than small steps,” Paul Hewitt said Saturday, his team having fallen to Maryland. “It’s disappointing to lose a chance to build on what we’d done.”
At the rate Tech is traveling, it could be a pretty tough out come March. But the Jackets lost so many in November and December that they’d put themselves in the distressing position of having to take every remaining home game just to get to 15 victories. On curious cue, they responded to their first three-game winning streak of the season by …
Losing at home.
If it wasn’t a bad loss in and of itself — Maryland has a nice team and a coach who has won an NCAA title — it was, in the grand scheme, a crusher. Here it is February, and the Jackets again have more losses any other ACC team. Their not-bad RPI (No. 54 as of Monday) will avail them nothing if their actual record doesn’t support it.
Saturday offered an opportunity to consolidate recent gains, to nose two games above .500 for the first time all season, to rise to 4-3 in ACC play. Saturday brought the chance to show that Tech, for all its early failings, has become one of the five best teams in the nation’s proudest conference. Instead it reverted to distressing habit. It simply failed to guard anybody.
“Today we played very poor defense,” said Hewitt, sugarcoating nothing. Maryland made 64.3 percent of its first-half shots, which wasn’t that difficult given that 13 of its 18 baskets were dunks or layups.
In a game they needed in the worst way, the Jackets began in the worst way. They fell behind five seconds in. They trailed by 10 points after four minutes. “The game’s 40 minutes,” Maryland coach Gary Williams would say, “but sometimes you can win them in the first half.”
Knowing what was happening, Hewitt called two timeouts in the first eight minutes and kept jerking guys in and out — only one starter, the singularly tenacious D’Andre Bell, played more than half the first half — but nothing clicked until the game was all but gone. Tech made run after impassioned run in the second half, same as against Kansas and Florida State and North Carolina on this floor, but the end was also the same. That’s five homecourt losses on the season, the four most recent by an aggregate 10 points.
“If we’d won,” Hewitt said, “it would have been nothing but luck.”
And that, pending a bold and sustained reversal, would seem to be the story of this odd team. Tech has left too much to chance, too much undone. It’s chasing the season in the same way it has chased too many games. It keeps dropping hints that it has enough resources to be better, but it has also dropped 10 of its first 20 games.
Credit Hewitt for not allowing this season to spiral beyond all hope of rescue. Over the three-game run, Tech moved the ball in its sets better than at any time since this coach arrived from Siena, and it finally started to defend to Hewitt specifications. But when you win three straight and you’re still only 10-9, your problem isn’t so much the future as the past. You’re trying to outrun what you’ve done. Or, more to the point, what you’ve failed to do.
A case can be made that a 10-10 team doesn’t even belong in any rational NCAA discussion, but there’s a counterargument: Namely, that the Jackets have shown enough against a strong schedule to suggest that this should be one of the 65 best squads in the land. There’s still a chance they could play themselves into the Big Dance, but that chance took a major hit Saturday.
Ten regular-season games remain, six on the road. Tech surely needs to win seven of those 10. A team that represents a school steeped in mathematics must know how cold those numbers look.
Permalink | Comments (20) | Categories: Mark Bradley, Tech / ACC
Tradition says Giants, but Patriots too good
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Furman Bisher
This begins with a confession. I’m an underdog guy. Never pick the favorite. Tiger Woods, Duke basketball, Yankees baseball, the Celtics when Red Auerbach was in the chair, or Jack Nicklaus in his prime. That’s going for the soft landing.
So I sat down to pick the winner of this Super Bowl, and there was no doubt. The Giants. I don’t like picking against the Mannings, anyway. Good family. Fine parents. Solid upbringing. No other family has ever sent three quarterbacks to the NFL, from Archie to Eli. So it was a foregone conclusion, the Giants.
I’d had some luck along this line a long time ago. I was one of five guys who picked the Jets to beat Baltimore in Super Bowl III. It’s registered in the Hall of Fame at Canton. Had nothing to do with football wisdom. Another underdog, just to be different. Not three cheers for Joe Namath.
This time, doing my usual inventory, studying the two quarterbacks, everything kept coming back to Tom Brady. Sixth-round draft choice. Not the same kind of hot-rock as Namath. More I read, more I checked, there was no getting away from Brady, or Bill Belichick. Say what you will, no Belichick, no Patriots in the Super Bowl.
Belichick was bred to coaching. His daddy, Steve, was an assistant at Vanderbilt to Bill Edwards, who became the victim of a war between two sports editors in Nashville. That’s where the baby Belichick was born. Steve eventually landed at the Naval Academy, and young Bill grew up studying football over Steve’s shoulder — scouting, offense, defense, every trick of the trade. As a player, he wasn’t much, a center and tight end at Wesleyan University in Connecticut.
Flash forward: The more I read and heard from these broadcast cats who played it, know it, and babble ceaselessly about the game, you became immersed in Tom Brady-isms. “An off-field extension of Belichick,” I read.
“Brady is playing the quarterback position right now better than anybody I’ve ever seen.” John Madden said that, big blusterer that he is, and it isn’t easy to brush it off.
Something I read of Brady himself caught my eye as well: “I remember sitting up 10 rows from the top of Candlestick Park looking down with binoculars at Joe Montana and Steve Young. I was this kid with a dream, and now, all of a sudden, I’m the one on the field.”
I read on and on until I was overwhelmed about all that supporting cast he has been provided with. Wes Welker, for instance, not 6 feet tall, out of Texas Tech, not known for producing catchers, makes 112 receptions, a “possession” guy, I guess you’d say. Vital to the offense, makes the catch while the defense double-covers Randy Moss. Jabar Gaffney, out of Florida; Kyle, the other Brady, a tight end; Ben Watson, out of Georgia; and as usual, the overlooked fullback, Heath Evans. He came up from Auburn.
You’ve heard it said of these workaholics before: First to get here, last to leave. “He’s here at 6 in the morning and sometimes he’s here until 6 or 7 at night,” Welker told a writer with the bellicose name of Jim Corbett.
I was muddled, but not as much as a writer named Nate Davis. Nate wrote a piece headlined “Why the Giants Will Win,” then on another page picked the Patriots.
You may recall that about a year or so ago, Tom Coughlin was about to get run out of New York. Too tough, a grinder, and who can remember that frostbitten face on the sideline at Green Bay, when the Giants upset Brett Favre. You’ve got to like it that he not just survived, he punched his ticket to Phoenix. This is the kind of guy you’d like to pick. Up from a count of eight, fights back and now has his chance at a knockout. Sorry, I lost my courage. My venturesome spirit has vanished. Patriots, maybe three touchdowns. Selah.
Permalink | Comments (19) | Categories: Falcons / NFL, Furman Bisher
Dishonest club wrong team to make history
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
Phoenix — As a JFK assassination buff, I never was an Arlen Specter fan. He concocted the “magic bullet” theory, which claimed that one rifle shot inflicted seven wounds on a president and a governor and emerged unscathed after zigging when it wasn’t zagging in midair.
Yeah, that made sense.
Now Specter is a U.S. senator instead of a member of the Warren Commission, and I like him. That’s because he finally has gotten it right after all these decades when it comes to conspiracies. It’s the revolting one surrounding the NFL and the New England Patriots. Courtesy of commissioner Roger Goodell using his version of the “magic bullet” theory to describe this ongoing Spygate mess, the Patriots are a Super Bowl victory away today at University of Phoenix Stadium from continuing as the biggest frauds in league history.
So where to start? I mean, you have nose guard Vince Wilfork’s $37,500 worth of fines this season to lead a group of cheap-shot artists on what supposedly is a disciplined team. You have the disingenuous claims of guys who say they are above responding to this and that before they tell on themselves. (For instance: They’ve whined all week about the Giants arriving for Super Bowl Week in black. “Yes, you are supposed to wear black to a funeral,” said the Patriots Randy Moss. “We’ll see who has black on after the game.”) You have those lies about Tom Brady’s supposedly bum shoulder, but despite the Patriots listing it for more than three years on the NFL’s injury list, Brady has started 126 consecutive games, the third-longest streak in NFL history.
Let’s return to Specter, though, who wants Goodell to come before the Senate Judiciary Committee to explain why in the name of Richard Nixon the commissioner destroyed all of those tapes and notes after the Patriots were nailed earlier this season to initiate Spygate. More specifically, the Patriots were caught in their opener in the Meadowlands using video equipment to steal signs and whatever else from the Jets.
Logic would say that the Patriots and their CIA wannabe coach, Bill Belichick, had done those things and whatever else many times before. Logic would say that since Goodell’s stated mission in life is to “protect the shield,” he was obsessed with covering up the Patriots’ numerous bad deeds. After all, not only are the Patriots seeking to join the league’s all-time elite with a fourth world championship in seven years, they can finish an unprecedented 19-0 with a victory over the New York Giants.
Logic would say that Goodell wished to keep the world from discovering a grassy knoll on his watch along the way to folks declaring the Patriots as frauds.
Which the Patriots are. Among other accusations within the past few days, ESPN.com reported that former video guy Matt Walsh has evidence that Belichick was doing ugly things in the shadows during Walsh’s seven year with the Patriots’ through the 2002 season. Interestingly, that was the season after the Patriots began their streak of dominance with an upset of the St. Louis Rams in the Super Bowl.
“It could be zero in the loss column for them, and they could beat all of those teams for an entire season, but the reality is, people always will have thoughts of ‘What happened?’ and ‘Yeah, really,’ and ‘Tell us the real story?’ ” said Michael Irvin, the star receiver on three Super Bowl champions for the Dallas Cowboys. “All stories get greater later. So even though [the NFL and the Patriots] claim that it only happened in the first quarter in the first game of this season, it’s going to get greater later.
“Thirty years from now, we might even have them spying and stealing signals in some of those Super Bowls. When it comes to their whole season, it’s going to be tainted, and that’s just the truth.”
That’s because we’ve yet to hear the truth on the matter.
Instead, we got whatever Goodell was talking about on Friday regarding the NFL and the Patriots during his state of the league address. Questions on Spygate were asked more than a half-dozen times during Goodell’s 50 minutes before the national and international media. To paraphrase: He said he destroyed the tapes and the notes from the Patriots to make sure that if such material surfaced again, he could tell that it wasn’t leaked by the league.
He said Spygate wasn’t a big deal, because he said many teams have cheated in sports throughout history and that he disciplined the Patriots (large fines to Belichick and to the team and the stripping of a first-round draft pick) for getting caught. He said there was no evidence of the Patriots ever cheating in a Super Bowl. He said this was just a one-time thing by the Patriots.
He also said Oswald acted alone. Well, not really, but he wanted to.
Permalink | Comments (214) | Categories: Falcons / NFL, Terence Moore
It’s Brady, by a bunch
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
Phoenix — Some numbers lie, but not these: 42-58.
That’s opposed to 100-26.
It’s Tom Brady, stupid.
All of this talk about New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick sitting among the NFL’s transfiguration of coaches with Lombardi, Walsh, Brown and the rest has nearly everything to do with his quarterback who can perform miracles with his right arm and clever mind.
Without Brady, Belichick is just another retread in a hoodie. Without Belichick, Brady is helping somebody else look better than they really are.
“Well, that’s a tough one, because I think it’s hard to be as good as these guys have been [in New England] without either a great head coach or a great quarterback,” said the older Jim Mora on Friday between duties for the NFL Network during Super Bowl Week involving the undefeated Patriots against the New York Giants.
Mora knows something about great quarterbacks. He once coached Peyton Manning. Said Mora, “As good a coach as Belichick is, without a guy like Tom Brady, he wouldn’t be playing in his fourth Super Bowl in seven years. It’s really hard to win in the NFL without somebody special at quarterback. I mean, if he had just a guy there, he wouldn’t be doing what he’s doing now as far as winning all of these games. His record with Brady as a starting quarterback is outstanding.”
Outrageous is a better word. Without Brady, Belichick is the 42-58 bust of a head coach that he was with the Cleveland Browns and during his pre-Brady days in New England with Drew Bledsoe. With Brady, Belichick is 100-26. Which means that if Brady is prolific again on Sunday at University of Phoenix Stadium to push the Patriots to an unprecedented 19-0, Belichick is slotted with the immortals. Whether Belichick deserves it or not.
No question, Paul Brown needed Otto Graham. The same went for Vince Lombardi and Bart Starr, Chuck Noll and Terry Bradshaw, Tom Landry and Roger Staubach, Bill Walsh and Joe Montana, Jimmy Johnson and Troy Aikman. It’s just that never has an NFL coach needed a quarterback such as Brady to validate his worth more than Belichick.
For verification, we needn’t go further than the Patriots’ locker room.
“I say [the importance of Brady and Belichick] go hand in hand because Coach Belichick does a lot of good things with the gameplan and everything,” said Patriots offensive guard Logan Mankins, before doing the unthinkable after a pause. He deviated from the unofficial mandate from Belichick to his players to avoid taking a stance on anything with even the hint of intrigue. Be bland, Belichick always suggests, but Mankins was bold, adding, “I would have to go with Tom [as the biggest key] to our success.
“There have been a lot of good coaches that had average quarterbacks that didn’t win many games. You have to have a field general in someone like Tom Brady that can make every play and the right plays when you need them. Everyone follows Tom. He’s a good leader.”
Guess Mankins won’t be around New England much longer. Hey, the Falcons need offensive linemen.
This isn’t to say Belichick doesn’t have his strengths. He has plenty. “Every time I see him, whether it is 5:30 or 6 o’clock in the morning or 10 at night, he’s always in his office,” said Patriots safety Rodney Harrison. “I’ve never seen him sit down in the cafeteria and have a decent meal. I just see him grab some chips and poke them in his mouth and keep moving. He is a different [type of] man. To me, he is so bent on attention to detail.”
So it figures that Belichick has the final say on every personnel decision for the Patriots. He was responsible for the nice acquisitions before the season of Randy Moss, Wes Welker and Adalius Thomas. He brought in the veteran and effective likes of Rodney Harrison, Corey Dillon and Junior Seau before that.
Here’s the biggest thing: Belichick spent his first draft with the Patriots using a sixth-round pick on somebody.
You know who.
Permalink | Comments (22) | Categories: Falcons / NFL, Terence Moore
Super Bowls that lived up to name
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Furman Bisher
Seldom … in fact, rarely ever, does the Super Bowl game live up to its stupendous name. Perhaps it’s the boredom that sets in after the usual two weeks of waiting, treading water, running in place, so to speak. Even when the pause is reduced to a week there is no perceptible letup in the gush of soothsaying, the analyses, the broadcast, telecast and newshound search for the startling angle. It merely means that it is all squshed into seven days instead of fourteen.
So for years there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth among the media herd about how dull it all was, and that the game itself was just a big letdown. For the longest time the third bowl game was held up to be the centerpiece of all Super Bowls. The Jets, champions of the AFL, beat the Colts, champions of the presumably impregnable NFL, and it was a startling upset. Joe Namath had predicted it, casually, and had quarterbacked it, and became the man who put the old-school NFL in its place.
First place, the Colts were without the wounded Johnny Unitas — which says straggling offense — until it was too late, and for some cause or another, made enough mistakes in one afternoon to lose a war. Flopped around like a bunch of sick whales. Over the years I have seen 40 Super Bowls, enough to reach the point I have trouble arriving at the Roman numerals that designate 42. XLII, OK? (It that’s not right, sue me.) It now falls my burden to come up with the five best of them all. Actually, I could pick the five best playoff games I’ve seen quicker than five best Super Bowls. Snow-blown playoffs in Buffalo, frozen tundra in Green Bay, steely, windy afternoons in Pittsburgh, under the blessed cover from the snow in Minneapolis — ah, yes, the afternoon the Falcons made it by the grace of a field goal that one Johnson missed and an Andersen made — and I could go on, but this is about the Super Bowl, not getting there:
• Jan. 22, 1989: 49ers 20, Bengals 16 — The first game that popped into my head. It was the finish, Joe Montana taking charge with about three minutes left and 92 yards to go. He lit up Joe Robbie Stadium as Dolphin Stadium was called then. Montana, cool and confident, should have been the MVP, but Jerry Rice had caught so many passes it was hard to pass him over. This was the time when, in the huddle, Montana glanced into the stands and said, “Isn’t that John Candy up there?” Relaxing stuff. Then threw the winning pass to John Taylor, crossing in the zone, and the 49ers won with about 30 seconds left. Thriller, like not many others.
• Jan. 21, 1979: Steelers 35, Cowboys 31 — Terry Bradshaw threw the pass that Lynn Swann caught, under heavy cover in acrobatic style, for the touchdown that broke the hearts of Cowboys. This really was a nail-biting thriller between two of the greatest teams the NFL ever saw. This was the catch that eventually got Swann into the Hall of Fame, though truth was, John Stallworth was just as great, or greater.
• Jan. 11, 1970: Chiefs 23, Vikings 7 — Say whatever you will about Namath and the Jets, a year later this was the game that really established the AFL. Played in cold weather in old Tulane Stadium, Hank Stram’s play-action offense on stage, the Chiefs didn’t just win, they mauled Joe Kapp and the Vikings. The Chiefs’ QB, Len Dawson, was playing under the cloud of some kind of gambling suspicion that was eventually dismissed, but it hung heavy over Dawson’s head that day.
• Jan. 14, 1973: Dolphins 14, Redskins 7 — It wasn’t that this was a game heavy in on-field drama. First, it brought the Dolphins’ perfect season to a climax, only one yet with the Patriots’ pending. Secondly, it was just how close it came to being an absolute disaster, charged to one of those European placekickers. Leading 14-0, the Dolphins settled for a field goal and Garo Yepremian, a balding little man, took his position. The Redskins blocked the kick into Yepremian’s face, startled, he caught the ball, then tried to throw the first forward pass of his life with his little hands, Mike Bass intercepted and ran it back for a touchdown. The Dolphins’ defensive guys were furious. They wanted the shutout.
• Jan. 30, 2000: Rams 23, Titans 16 — I guess you could say this smacks of home-cooking. The game was played in Georgia Dome, while Atlanta lay under a coat of ice — and for that unworthy reason, the Super Bowl hasn’t been back since. Kurt Warner turned in an MVP performance, but Steve McNair nearly matched him in the end. Time running out, the Titans quarterback completed a pass to Kevin Dyson, and as the receiver tried to claw his way into the end zone, Rams linebacker Mike Jones nailed him a yard shy. Thrilling, nail-biting finish.
Permalink | Comments (6) | Categories: Falcons / NFL, Furman Bisher
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