Finally the NHL can laugh at a sport about TV Coverage.

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The biggest international soccer game in the last 20 for the US team is not going to be on any English speaking TV network. The US vs. Mexico on August 12th will be broadcast in the US only on Spanish TV. The NHL’s deal with the Vs. Network doesn’t look so bad.

Maybe the Vs network was too busy covering the US Turtle Assoc. races to bother with US soccer. At any rate, any hope that the US performance in the most recent tournament has sparked massive interest in the sport can be put to rest. The question is with millions of young adults having played soccer in their very early life, why has soccer never taken off as a major sport?

The explanation is simple—we Americans don’t watch what we won’t win. In most of the world, the best athletes that a nation has become soccer players. Here, the best athletes play in the NBA, NFL, and MLB. As a result, we don’t win many international competitions. Americans don’t enjoy tuning in to see the US team get pounded by faster, more athletic teams from South America and Europe.

The MLS has done its best to try to tap … Read more at FryingPanSports

I'm ready for the baseball playoffs now.

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Inter-league play is over. The All Star game has been played. Now, I have had enough baseball and am ready for the playoffs. Baseball has only another 3 weeks until football and the NFL steals the spot light and doesn’t give it back. Baseball has a following but it is losing ground against other sports particularly football.

Proof of how totally football overshadows baseball can been seen most clearly in the steady decline of the TV ratings for the World Series. It has fallen about 50% in the last 10 years while the ratings for the All Star game have held fairly steady. Why? Because no one plays football in the middle of July.

Baseball has to take maximum advantage of the period when it is the only major league sport in the docket. The schedulers seem dedicated to having all the games between the Boston and the Yankees in the first few weeks of the season. But that is when both the NBA and NHL has its playoffs. A good marketing guy would never put their best games and highest draws on opposite a tough competitor. They should have waited until the MLB was the only show on TV.… Read more at FryingPanSports

Steve McNair was a star and not hero.

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There is a difference between a “star” and a hero. Titan QB Vince Young said at the funeral for Steve McNair that the former Titan QB was a hero to him. Vince, McNair was no hero.

Let me tell you about a real hero. Capt. William C. Smith was on Omaha Red beech 2 hours before the invasion of the Allies on D-Day. He won a Bronze Star with V for valor. He called fire from the battle ships and destroyers against the impenetrable Hitler defenses. For two hours it was just him and around 150,000 well armed and really irritated Germans. I know that fact because he is my father. Vince, THAT is a hero.

The men and women that risk their lives every hour of every day fighting terrorism are heroes and should be acknowledged as such. They all volunteered to go to war to fight so that we could have the freedoms we enjoy. They are real heroes.

The Police and Fire fighters that risk their lives every day to protect all of us are heroes. My brother in law Bill Balentyne has saved a half a dozen people’s lives as an EMT medic. He is a … Read more at FryingPanSports

Analysis: The UFL stakes everything on an NFL lockout.

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It was no accident that the UFL formed after the NFL owners officially pulled out of the existing collective bargaining agreement. The UFL owners saw an opening and wanted to take advantage of it. That is why they had to begin playing in 09. It is also why they cut back from a projected 8 teams to just 4 but will stage games in 7 cities. They want to be around in 2010 and 2011 just in case there is a strike.

Right now, things don’t look all that good for the fans of the NFL. There are several indicators pointing toward a strike/lockout. First, the NFLPA has a new Executive Director. DeMaurice Smith is new. He beat out a couple of former players that publicly took hard line stances against the NFL but he is going to have to prove that he is tough enough to keep the job. The NFLPA members have heard from other candidates that the new agreement will eliminate the salary cap, increase the percentage of total revenue that the players get and increase benefits. All this in the face of the toughest economy since the depression.

When Smith took his office, he said that … Read more at FryingPanSports

The NFL Drug testing policy is in jeopardy in the Courts.

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To many, the Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) against the NFL prohibiting them from suspending Viking DTs Kevin and Pat Williams for the first 4 games of the 2009 season might look like no big deal. Those people would be totally wrong. It is a huge deal involving several issues including the ability of the NFL and other professional leagues to suspend players for taking unauthorized drugs.

The drug involved in the Williams’ case is basically water pills. The NFL has put the drug on the baned list for two reasons. First, some claim the drug is useful as a masking agent for steroids and other performance enhancing substances.

The second reason that this and similar drugs are on the baned list is the safety of the player taking it. Don’t forget it was a Viking OT Korey Stringer in 2001 that died from heat stroke after reportedly taking water pills for weight loss. The Williams’ both claim that they were taking the drug for exactly the same reason and did not know that what they had taken contained ingredients that were illegal.

Another major issue for the NFL is that the Minnesota State court system has gotten involved in the … Read more at FryingPanSports

Analysis: Congress is using the right approach against the BcS

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I don’t often have good things to say about Washington D.C. or the US Congress. But in this case, they are using the right approach in challenging the BcS—Follow the money.

Sen. Hatch of Utah undoubtedly has his constituents in mind when he pushed for hearings on the BcS. I have no problem with that. The current economic problems could have been avoided had not Congress tried to force social engineering into legislation on the US financial system. At least Hatch is not trying to buy votes by giving away money!

Most major football colleges are public institutions. They get tax payer dollars to help finance their activities including many athletic departments. It is the popularity of college football that generates money for the BCS. Because the “lessor” conferences are not included in the automatic cut of the pot of gold that BcS generates, they don’t share in the bounty unless one of their teams is in one of the games. Then they split a team share and not a league share.

There are some aspects of anti-trust law that could be applied to the BcS. That however must focus on distribution of money and not forcing college presidents to … Read more at FryingPanSports