Buehrle Throws A Gem

My favorite White Sock (is that the singular of Sox?) of all time was at it again yesterday. Mark Buehrle gave Chicago eight innings of one-hit ball, blanking the Tigers and improving his record to 5-0 on the year, with a 2.61 ERA in 38 innings of work.

I drafted Buehrle in the last round of my Yahoo! Fantasy draft, after John Danks and Gavin Floyd. The poor guy, who has been the Sox ace for, what, five straight years now, gets no respect because of his low strikeout totals. I say, so what if his K's are low? Fantasy wise, you know you're getting a rock solid mid-3's ERA and reasonably low WHIP to go with a good win total and a whole lot of innings pitched.

And from a real fan's perspective, I don't know that there is a better guy to watch at the ballpark or on TV. He just fires, fires, fires away. Last night's game took just over two hours - one minute less than his no-hitter against the Rangers in '07. By the way, that picture is of Buehrls with his wife Jamie (they just had their second baby in early March).

So here's to you, Mark Buehrle. Our White Sox would probably be sitting in the AL Central basement without your sterling work every fifth day. Keep it up, and hopefully Coop will get the young guys to come around soon! Has anyone seen John Danks' good stuff? I think he must have lost it at some point during the offseason.

Why I Love Derrick Rose, and You Should Too!

Derrick Rose put the Bulls back on the map this season. First overall pick, won rookie of the year and played with the Bulls a fantastic first round series that went all the way to 7 games against the defending champs. Some are calling the best first round series ever. (I can live with that. I would prefer calling it the best best of seven first round series ever) These are just some of his accomplishments in his Rookie year.

Still, all his accomplishments of his entire rookie season pale in comparison to his first day after his rookie season. The day after the 2008-2009 Chicago Bulls season ended, Derrick Rose was back in Chicago practicing at the Berto Center!

Why is this a big deal you ask? Well it’s what we always ask our athletes to do. Care and continue to work hard to improve their game.

It would have been very easy for Derrick to take some time off, and honestly who could blame him? He went from a University of Memphis team that played 40 games to a season where he played 89 games. That’s more then double; also, when you include the fact that NBA games are 8 minutes longer then the college game, the additional minutes on the body start to add up.

So Derrick had every reason to be tired and to take a few days off, but he didn’t. He very easily could have followed the path of Bulls teammate Joakim Noah and go back to college for a few days (which didn’t work out to well for Mr. Noah) but he didn’t, he went back to work. He knows he needs to work on his jump shot and that’s what he’s doing. Too often we hear the bad stories, like Noah’s, in sports and don’t praise athletes enough for doing what we as fans want, and expect our favorite players to do.

I for one love the fact that Derrick Rose is back in the gym, and for that reason, I will always be a fan of his.

Manny Tested Positive

Just a FYI for everyone out there. LA Times is reporting Manny will be suspended 50 games starting today.

http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-manny-ramirez8-2009may08,0,6324894.story

Huge Bleacher Report Opportunity

I just went over to Bleacher Report and found this. Pretty unbelievable–they are pairing with CBSsports.com to give one BR writer per NFL team the chance to cover their squad full-time over the course of the next season, starting in July 2009 and running through January. Pay is $400 a week. I'm completely serious.

What an unbelievable thing. Just another example of the Internet changing the way average fans and the media are becoming one and the same. The walls are really coming down.

(And no, I'm not going to apply. I'm so tempted, obviously, but already have a lease for next year, don't really want to leave Bloomington right now, even though covering the Bears would be freakin' amazing.)

Gotta give a lot of credit to the guys over at B/R for getting this huge deal. Awesome work.

The Wednesday NBA Update

Well, it has been a busy couple of weeks down here in Bloomington, and out there in the sporting world.

I definitely can't wait for Saturday to roll around. After that, all of the kids leave B-Town, and the Mother Bears schedule gets cut down, and I will have nothing to do but watch sports and write stuff on here.

Anyway. Game Two of Boston-Orlando is now tipping off on TNT. I watched about ten seconds of Game One - long enough to see a 65-37 score and assume it was game over Celtics. Apparently, that was not correct, as the Celts pulled back into things and lost by just five. This is a crucial game for them. In the Chicago series, Boston also dropped Game One before coming back and squeaking out a Game Two win.

Bennett Salvatore is on the officiating crew. No way Boston loses this one.

Meanwhile, Houston also pulled a Game One upset out west, taking down Kobe's Lakers in LA. I could really see this series going against Bryant and Co. On the upside, they have the best two-guard in the conference and also a killer big man tandem in Lamar Odom and Pau Gasol. Those two guys are so fun to watch–I have never seen two big men on the same team be better passers. However, the Rockets have a couple of great defenders in Ron Artest and Shane "MoneyBall" Battier. If they can't slow down Kobe, nobody can.

The Lakers obviously have an edge in coaching with the Greatest of All Time, Phil Jackson, The Zen master, on the bench. But Yao is a beast down low and can match up with Gasol.

I expect this series to go seven games. Of course, if it was up to David Stern, every series would go seven. Speaking of which, Salvatore just called a foul. Hmm.

Lastly, congratulations to LeBron James for winning the MVP. There was basically no doubt that he deserved it. What a player. In all seriousness, he is by far the best since Jordan (no disrespect to The Shaqtus), and at age 24 should already be mentioned in the same class as His Airness, Wilt, Magic, Bird, etc. Once he wins his first title this year, he's gotta be a lock for one of the Top Ten players ever, right?

Letter to David Stern: The NBA responds

Well i'm not that suprised my letter didn't make it to David Stern. But here's what they responded with. I wish they would have addressed the issue that Rondo basically said without saying that he comitted a flagrant. Oh Well. Here's what they said. Some canned response. Looks like i'm back to a Sportscenter NBA Fan.

Dear Stephen,
Thank you for contacting the National Basketball Association with your concerns regarding the foul committed by Rajon Rondo in the Chicago Bulls vs. Boston Celtics game on Sunday, April 26.
After careful review, the NBA ruled that the play in question will stand as called. In order for a foul to be considered flagrant, we examine whether or not there was a wind-up, a follow through, and the level of impact. The foul did not meet these criteria. Therefore, it has not been upgraded to a flagrant foul penalty.
Thank you again for your concern. We appreciate your feedback regarding this issue.
Sincerely,
NBA Fan Relations