Wizard PG Gilbert Arenas got just 1 month in a half way house for gun possession in WDC. The usual penalty for someone that is not in either of the categories above is 3 months in jail.

Arenas brought 4 guns into the locker room and reportedly “threatened” reserve guard Javaris Crittenton in an argument over gambling debts. Arenas also will be on probation for 2 years, will have to do community service of 400 hours, and has to pay a fine of 5K to be paid to the Victims of Crime fund. Crittenton, who pulled a gun of his own, is also on probation from pleading guilty for a misdemeanor. Both players have been suspended indefinitely by the league.

There were several factors Judge Robert E. Morin sited in making his sentencing decision. Most important was that none of the guns were “found” to have been loaded. I can’t help but wonder how hard the police looked to see if there were bullets in them. The other factors were that according to Morin Arenas has no history of violence; no one was hurt; neither man pointed a gun at the other; Arenas legally owned the weapons in Virginia; and he took responsibility, cooperating in a police investigation and pleading guilty to a felony less than a month after the confrontation. Morin also sighted Arenas’ charitable contributions to the community as a reason to give the player a break.

This was not the first time Arenas has been charged with a gun violation. He served probation in California 7 years ago for a violation of gun transportation laws there.

If the gun laws are going to exist despite the 2nd Amendment, then both players should have received jail time. There is nothing that makes either of these two boneheads worthy of special consideration. Justice unevenly applied is justice denied. Throw the guys in jail and let them suffer what any one of us would for the same criminal act.

That’s what I think. Tell me what you think.

Your fantasy football doesn’t have to be over. Run a pro football franchise all year long for free at http://sportsims.net/. Tell them Coach Smith sent you.

Bill Smith is a former coach of several semi-pro teams, has officiated both football and basketball, done color on radio for college football and basketball and has scouted talent. He is a senior writer for http://NFLDraftDog.com and edits http://fryingpansports.com. He is a regular contributor on Cleveland Sports Radio http://www.sportstalkcleveland.com/ Monday afternoons at 1 Eastern. He has also published several novels on

http://www.eBooks-Library/Contemporary/Author.cfm?AuthorID=1003 and edits http://fryingpanpolitics.blog.com.

In general, I am not an Olympic guy. I usually don’t watch the Winter Olympics because I get cold looking at all that snow even on TV. The only thing that is white and should be on the ground is nice warm sand.

Given the severity of the winter in Ohio this year, I WANT MY GLOBAL WARMING AND I WANT IT NOW!

I am also a believer that the Olympics should be all amateurs and not professionals across the board. In the 1980 games, the gaggle of US college hockey players beat the best professional team in the world–the USSR Army team. The fact that the USSR team was allowed in the games was a joke. Would the Olympic committee have allowed World Heavy Weight Champion Mike Tyson to enter the boxing tournament? I don’t think so. Then why did they allow the USSR to bring in a professional team?

Now we have the NHL and NBA players involved along with the professionals in some sports but not others. I would prefer all amateurs. The problem is that in basketball and some other team sports, most nations do not have amateur organizations.

Hockey

The hockey has been outstanding. US vs. Canada was a great game. Some wonder why the Peacock put it on MSNBC. The answer is simple. They wanted the American public to have at least 1 reason to try to find it on the cable menu. From the prospective of the NHL, it should have been on the broadcast channel. The NHL needs all the exposure it can get and should have put pressure on NBC to get it a better channel.

Curling

With apologies to Harry Potter, I am sorry but anything that involves the use of a broom is not a sport. It is a cleaning activity.

X games sports

I will be first to admit I am an old fart when it comes to the X games stuff. The only advantage I have found to being over 60 is that I get discounts at the buffet restaurants. If I had any idea how painful old age would be I never would have signed up for it. But the X games should be on ESPN 7 and not in the Olympics. How do you include those things and eliminate baseball from the summer games?

That’s what I think. Tell me what you think.

Your fantasy football doesn’t have to be over. Run a pro football franchise all year long for free at http://sportsims.net/. Tell them Coach Smith sent you.

Bill Smith is a former coach of several semi-pro teams, has officiated both football and basketball, done color on radio for college football and basketball and has scouted talent. He is a senior writer for http://NFLDraftDog.com and edits http://fryingpansports.com. He is a regular contributor on Cleveland Sports Radio http://www.sportstalkcleveland.com/ Monday mornings at 11 EST. He has also published several novels on

http://www.eBooks-Library/Contemporary/Author.cfm?AuthorID=1003 and edits http://fryingpanpolitics.blog.com.

I have up to now written just once about the Woods’ issue. That was concerning his asking to be left alone about the issue of his infidelity. I don’t care about that because frankly I don’t think it is any of my business. Whatever happened is between Woods, his clients, his family and the women involved. Frankly I don’t care and have zero interest in any of it.

Woods is a public figure both because he is a professional athlete and because he is a spokesman for a number of public and private companies. He must accept the public scrutiny because he has received millions of dollars for hawking products. There is no question that he and his handlers had carefully crafted an image that was too perfect for any reasonable human to believe. That image was also damaged badly perhaps irreparably by what he did.

The media has made it worse by a factor of 100 by giving his statement coverage on every network then dissecting each syllable of his statement for hours on end. For those that had no opinion about Woods good or bad, this drum beat gives us a headache that Tylenol 45 could not possibly cure. That coverage will end up hurting him far more than the actions themselves including the bizarre events of Thanksgiving morning. His clients clearly insisted that he make the public apology. However, they should have known what affect the medial frenzy would have on him. He was smart not to answer questions because they would have involved the most lurid aspects of his sexual encounters.

P.T. Barnum once said that no one ever went broke under estimating the intelligence of the American public. I am not sure if that is true. Based on some of the people we elect to public office, I tend to believe it. I am sure however, that Tiger will live to regret the statement almost as much as he regrets his actions.

Your fantasy football doesn’t have to be over. Run a pro football franchise all year long for free at http://sportsims.net/. Tell them Coach Smith sent you.

That’s what I think. Tell me what you think.

Bill Smith is a former coach of several semi-pro teams, has officiated both football and basketball, done color on radio for college football and basketball and has scouted talent. He is a senior writer for http://NFLDraftDog.com and edits http://fryingpansports.com. He is a regular contributor on Cleveland Sports Radio http://www.sportstalkcleveland.com/ Monday morning at 11. He has also published several novels on

http://www.eBooks-Library/Contemporary/Author.cfm?AuthorID=1003 and edits http://fryingpanpolitics.blog.com.

It’s bad enough if you shoot your friend in the foot. When you intentionally shoot yourself in the foot, you deserve whatever pain results. That is exactly what the pinhead owners of MLB did in signing a new contract with the Umpire’s union without mandating more use of technology for calling balls and strikes.

Until a couple of years ago, the fans were convinced that the umps were blind but recent developments in TV coverage have removed all doubt. Fox and other networks provide a pitch by pitch analysis of the missed calls using computer technology. We can clearly see a ball that is way low being called a strike and a ball just below the letters being called a ball. The union has run the game for years. They have prevented any use of instant replay or other technology that has even been instituted in college football. The reason is simple. The union does not want to allow their dues paying members to look as bad as they are.

The problem is that it doesn’t matter how good the players are, it will be the umpires and their bad calls that will determine as many games in 2010 as they have in the past. Some say that Congress is deaf about what the people want or in the case of the Health Care debacle don’t want. MLB leadership is just as deaf.

By signing a new deal without forcing balls and strikes to be called by technology, MLB has told the fans that it doesn’t care about them or about the game. At some point, the fans are going to have to show the owners that we don’t care about them or their game. That is the only way that things are ever going to get any better.

Your fantasy football doesn’t have to be over. Run a pro football franchise all year long for free at http://sportsims.net/. Tell them Coach Smith sent you.

That’s what I think. Tell me what you think.

Bill Smith is a former coach of several semi-pro teams, has officiated both football and basketball, done color on radio for college football and basketball and has scouted talent. He is a senior writer for http://NFLDraftDog.com and edits http://fryingpansports.com. He is a regular contributor on Cleveland Sports Radio http://www.sportstalkcleveland.com/ Monday morning at 11. He has also published several novels on

http://www.eBooks-Library/Contemporary/Author.cfm?AuthorID=1003 and edits http://fryingpanpolitics.blog.com.

ESPN has been losing its edge since ABC took it over. But their coverage of their EW Shrine game was the worst so far. The bone heads at ESPN failed to give complete lineups with numbers. In a normal game, draft nicks like me could get the player numbers from the college pages of the ESPN website. But evidently they couldn’t afford to buy the game program from a local vendor after spending so much money on the big ESPN bus parked in the stadium. I have been unable to find the numbers anywhere on the net so far.

They did show the names and numbers of the QBs, RBs, and WR/TE. But those names are repeated regularly throughout the coverage. More than half the time, they did not give the name of the tackler which would have helped to identify some of the players on the D side. The O linemen were totally anomalous because even when they committed a penalty, the announcer usually ignored the name of the offender. Sometimes, the camera man would help us out with a closeup of the player.

So it was up to us to study the tape as closely as possible to get the numbers associated with the players. In a tradition of the game, the players regularly trade decals which further hinder recognition by the viewing audience.

As a service to our readers, I will provide the list of as many as I can to anyone that emails me at wesmith2001@hotmail.com. I will have a report on the results of my analysis of the play Wednesday here.

Now understand that ESPN stands for Economic Suspension of Programing for No reason. Anyone that bothered to tape a replay of a college football game has found how it takes 2 hours to see about 15 minutes of football. A typical broadcast contains the touchdown followed by a commercial break followed by the extra point. Then there is another commercial break followed by the kickoff. At that point a commercial break is interrupted by the phrase “due to time constraints we move ahead to further action…” That of course is followed by another commercial break.

This is the bottom line. IF ESPN wants to be the leader of sports broadcasting, it is going to have to tighten up its programming. If things continue to slide like they have been, it won’t be worth watching. Thank heavens that the NFL Channel is covering the Senior Bowl.

Your fantasy football doesn’t have to be over. Run a pro football franchise all year long for free at http://sportsims.net/. Tell them Coach Smith sent you.

That’s what I think. Tell me what you think.

Bill Smith is a former coach of several semi-pro teams, has officiated both football and basketball, done color on radio for college football and basketball and has scouted talent. He is a senior writer for http://NFLDraftDog.com and edits http://fryingpansports.com. He is a regular contributor on Cleveland Sports Radio http://www.sportstalkcleveland.com/ Monday morning at 11. He has also published several novels on

http://www.eBooks-Library/Contemporary/Author.cfm?AuthorID=1003 and edits http://fryingpanpolitics.blog.com.

Cowboy Coach Phillips—Some wins after Turkey Day. The Boys haven’t done very well in December. JJ told the Boys faithful that if Phillips doesn’t win in the playoffs, he will be history. Phillips needs some help selling his house ’cause that ain’t happening.

Browns coach Mangenous—One more really silly owner to bail his career out again. Holmgren is “Football Czar of the Month” in Cleveland. There is little chance that Mangini will keep his job past 4:01 PM Sunday January 3. He got the current gig just after getting fired in New York. He needs another very gullible owner.

Buc Coach Morris—A copy of The Idiot’s Guide to Pro Football. Morris is badly over his head in Tampa. He was not even qualified to be OC let alone HC. With the team 1-forever, he needs to learn the game a lot more quickly to keep his job for next year.

Saints’ DC Greg Williams—A head coaching job in the NFL. Williams never got a decent shot in Buffalo and has proven with both the Redskins and Saints that he is ready for a top job. With the number of teams that will be looking for new top guys after this year, he should get a chance.

Former Browns’ Coach Crennel—Renewal of the Coors beer commercials because he isn’t likely to get another job in the NFL. Crennel is too nice a guy to be effective as a head man. He has only had success only in a highly disciplined situation. He needs the commercials because he needs work even though he is still being paid by the Browns.

Ex ND Coach Weis—A Christmas Card from Holmgren. Weis’ best shot at an OC spot is with the Browns to help QB Quinn develop. They were very close in ND and if anyone can turn Quinn’s career around, Weis believes he is the one.

Ohio State Coach Tressel—A win in the Rose Bowl. The Big 10 has a bad record in bowl games with OSU at the bottom of the list. Having suspended several players, his chances are less this year than most. Another couple of losses in the post season and Tress may find out that beating Michigan may not be enough to keep his job.

Florida Football Coach Urban Meyer—A Tebow clone at QB. After winning 2 BcS Championships in 4 years, Florida will likely take a step back next season. They lose their star QB and most of the D this year. Given the development of the Bama team as well as a couple of other SEC teams, it will be very hard for them to get back to the national championship game.

For College Football fans everywhere–A real playoff.  We will not get a playoff until the big contributors to college programs tell the pinhead presidents “NO MORE MONEY UNTIL YOU SUPPORT A REAL PLAYOFF!” If you wonder what it will take, follow the money.

The Chicago Cubs—Some pitching and a shot at the World Series. It’s been over 100 years since Cubbie fans had a chance to say something other than “wait ’til next year.” Enough of that, let’s see some playoff baseball.

Cleveland Cavs–Some of the magic from last year but in the 2010 playoffs.  O’Neil has been OK but the team has not come together like they did last year.  They need to regain the chemistry they had last year but extend that in the playoffs.

Most of all—A very Merry Christmas to all of you. Thank you for taking the time to read this site. If you have any suggestions for more gifts for sports teams, let me know.

That’s what I think. Tell me what you think.

Bill Smith is a former coach of several semi-pro teams, has officiated both football and basketball, done color on radio for college football and basketball and has scouted talent. He is a senior writer for http://NFLDraftDog.com and edits http://fryingpansports.com. He has also published several novels on http://www.eBooks-Library/Contemporary/Author.cfm?AuthorID=1003 and edits http://fryingpanpolitics.blog.com.