Hey Look, I'm Posting During the Week! And Complaining, Of Course

On TV and in the movies, whenever people have mirages it always seems to come while the sun is beating down on them in the middle of the desert. So it’s no surprise that the mirage of the Cubs season would come during their purported hot streak.

Yes, it’s true that the Cubs have gone 9-3 to claw their way back to .500 and the possibility of contending for a playoff spot. Hoo-doggie, better wake the kids so they don’t miss this.

You see, it’s also true that the Cubs HAD to go 9-3 to get back to .500 after a horrendous 7-13 start. And the hallmarks of the start are still there: They still don’t get any clutch hitting. They still leave too many men on base. Their starting pitching, other than some meltdowns from their supposed ace Carlos Zambrano, has been solid, but they still have question marks on defense, particularly up the middle.

What really makes this a mirage, though, is that they’ve done it against inferior competition. Let’s break down the hot streak: 3-0 against the Washington Nationals, the worst team in baseball; 2-0 against the St. Louis Cardinals, who were very flawed even before the death of Josh Hancock; a mere 3-3, including a lost series at home, against the Pittsburgh Pirates, who are under .500; and one win against a good team, the Milwaukee Brewers. Even that came after two losses against the Brew Crew, which conveniently came outside of the hot streak.

Some would say you have to beat the bad teams to be one of the good ones. Fair enough. Now let's see how they do against the other good ones.

Later this month the Cubs play the Mets, Dodgers and Padres. In June they have two series each against the Braves and Brewers, and another one against the Padres. If they’re still at or above .500 on July 1, I’ll be impressed. My guess is that they’ll be about 35-44 en route to a 77-85 finish.

Sports Notes, 5/5/07

Yes, I know it’s Saturday, not Sunday, but so much has happened while I’ve been working! So try to look at this posting a day early instead of six weeks late …

-- Your move, Lance Briggs.

-- Dude! Lou Pinella had his blowup before I could even throw together a “When Will Lou Pinella Have His Blowup” pool!

-- Four straight over the defending NBA champions? Damn, now I’m going to have to start watching basketball.

-- Oh, and don’t look now, but … Bulls vs. Heat in the regular season: 3-1 Bulls. Bulls vs. Heat in the playoffs: 4-0 Bulls. Bulls vs. Pistons in the regular season: 3-1 Bulls. But now I’m getting ahead of myself.

-- It sure is a good thing that I saved my ticket stub from Mark Prior’s first start on May 22, 2002, because that’s going to be worth thousands of dollars oen day.

-- Try to look at it this way, Cubs fans: This team was going to go 77-85 with or without Prior and Wood.

-- Speaking of: Which would be more remarkable, if the Cubs and Sox made the playoffs in the same year or if they had the exact same sub-mediocre record? ’Cause I see a 77-85 freight train crashing on the South Side, too.

-- OK, what Brian Urlacher did was wrong, but 100,000 is a lot of dollars to have to pay for wearing the wrong hat. I mean, it’s not like what he did was as wrong as what Tank Johnson did.

-- Or Pacman Jones.

-- Or Chris Henry.

-- Or, ahem, Greg Olsen.

-- We’ll finish with a confidential note to Mark C. in Dallas, who wrote in whining that Don Nelson sets the bar too low for himself by taking on teams that aren’t expected to win: SCOREBOARD!!!!

Mayweather vs. De La Hoya: I Got I Don’t Give A Hobo’s Crap

So I hear that two guys are going to try to pummel each other into unconsciousness on Saturday night in what some are seeing as the last-ditch, hope-against-hope attempt to save what’s left of the noble pursuit of pummelling others into unconsciousness.

As you’ve probably surmized by now, I never really got into boxing. But the point of this post is, it’s clear now that I’m not the only one.

I saw some guy named Bert Sugar, billed as a “boxing historian”, talking on ESPN about the significance of this fight. He said that whereas boxing was once among the top three sports in America, along with baseball and horse racing, “it’s now generous to call it the eleventh of the top 10.”

He’s right about the first part. The second, actually, might be a little too generous.

When I was a kid, the primary sports pantheon was a Big Four: Baseball, football, basketball and hockey, in that order. It was understood that meant the professional versions of each – college football and basketball were on the next tier down. By now, with the proliferation of sports participation and media coverage of sports, there’s not so much of a tier system as a straight hierarchy, wherein all sports are competing for the same fans and dollars, and some do better than others.

If I had to rank the sports according to which is most beloved in the American psyche, I think it would be in this order: Pro football, pro baseball, college football, pro basketball, NASCAR (ugh), college basketball, pro golf, hockey, women’s college basketball, pro tennis, women’s pro basketball, and then, checking in at No. 12, is boxing. (Reader Interaction Alert: Feel free to write in and tell me why I’m wrong, hint, hint.)

And even that might be generous. I’m pretty sure that boxing would be ahead Major League Soccer, but I’d be willing to believe that international soccer is higher than boxing in Americans’ hearts. Heck, I’m also fairly certain that some people out there would rather watch a World’s Strongest Man competition than boxing. I know I would opt for an old American Gladiators rerun, or even Arena Football.

As an aside, I see NASCAR – the sport where fans who apparently have even fewer I.Q. points than teeth throw beer cans at the driver of a moving racecar – going the way of boxing, sooner rather than later. And, inbred fans aside, it’s nobody’s fault but NASCAR’S. You can fine Tony Stewart all you’d like, but that doesn’t make what he said any less true. At best, he pointed out an unintended consequence of a policy that really is hurting the sport.

But is anyone surprised that the Sport of Hillbillies is about to bumblefuck away all the appeal that it worked so very hard for so many decades to build up? We’re here to talk about what happened to boxing.

Let’s see. Mike Tyson, a common criminal, bit off part of his opponent’s ear in the ring. Yeah, that was a defining moment. Press conferences break down into fights, audiences break out into fights, fan men randomly drop into rings with no warning. It’s just kind of a joke of a sport these days.

Without question, though, the saddest thing that happened to boxing is Muhammed Ali. Well-spoken, principled, and a savvy competitor in his day, Ali should be the sport’s elder statesman -- but he can’t because he’s withering away from Parkinson’s disease, induced at least in part by too many blows to the head. Every second of every interview Ali musters up the courage to give is a stark reminder of why boxing should not be allowed.

So that brings us to tonight’s abassadors, Floyd Mayweater and Oscar De La Hoya. Why they are the appointed saviors I wouldn’t know, although I have at least heard the name Oscar De La Hoya before, and that might have something to do with it. The hype would lead me to believe that this is supposed to be a very even fight, but the odds suggest that De La Hoya is actually much more likely to knock out Mayweather, whereas Maywather is more likely to win if the fight goes the distance.

Or not. I really wouldn’t know, because I don’t follow this stuff, because I don’t give a hobo’s crap. All I know is that one guy's going to win, the other guy's going to lose, and for me the sun will rise in the east tomorrow either way.

But look on the bright side, boxing fans: You guys still beat pro bowling.