A Few Thoughts

Yes I realize I have up set the masses, the tens of you who visit this site daily. For that I apologize. As a sidenote I do not have delusions of grandeur that people somehow get upset when I fail to post. But this is something that I do, something else that I do is have kids. That's right, for those of you loyal readers out there, brief mentions of my Pregnant girlfriend turned fiance turned wife have become those of the past. We had our daughter on the morning of May 28th, and that has turned into a full time job, on top of my other full time job, left little time for sports and more important posts. But I have been following and have some thoughts.

May 28th my daughter was born, the Cubs come back from a terrible late game defecit and continue to win, stretch the streak to 9 games, including a couple on the road to get to .500 on the road. I say she's a lucky charm, dad says she's the anti-Billy Goat. I guess her middle name should have been Namtrab (Bartman in reverse). He is so in love with this idea that he calls to make sure she is watching the games with me (rest assured she is, when she isn't sleeping with her Bears blanket and looking at her Cubs mobile). If anyone in the Cubs PR office is reading this, and you want a feel good story if/when the Cubs go to the World Series look me up. I mean if you can't find the obligatory Cubs fan in a wheelchair who is legally and almost fully blind who was "alive the last time the Cubs won the World Series". We'd be happy to sit at Wrigley in the post season.

Sticking with Chicago related news, Marcus Robinson is retiring as a Bear. Like Jim Rome I do not understand the whole "retiring as" thing. I mean if you go back for a full year and appear in a game or 16 then yes you retired with that team. Flying to Chicago to retire at Halas Hall means that the guy who played 6 (of 10 years) with the Bears retired in Chicago. The former Bear, Raven, Viking, and Lion is calling it quits. Yes he had a few really remarkable seasons with the Bears when they were less than formidable in the late 90s through 2002.

Also in Chicago professional sports related news, Cedric Benson is on a Big Brown like pace. He finished the 2nd leg of the Triple Crown getting his 2nd DUI in 5 weeks. The first coming on the water. Sources close to me tell me he is 2 weeks from getting his pilots license and will be gunning for the final, leg Piloting Under the Influence, by the end of June. Way to go Ced.

Michael Strahan retires and ends a very respectable, likely Hall of Fame career today. 15 successful years, capped off with the Super Bowl championship. The 2001 Sack leader and Defensive Player of the Year will most likely be showing off his Madonna sized gap in HD to all of our delights in a few short months. With Strahan and Farve retiring together, we can only assume the Farve will lay down shortly before Strahan approaches the podium at their enshrinement to get Strahan that one last sack.

I finally watched the Ron Santo documentary "This Old Cub" during the down-time last week. Done by Santo's son Jeff, and it was a really great documentary about Santo. For those of you who don't know about Santo, please look him up. He led a Hall of Fame career (inexplicably short of the Hall of Fame induction for some reason) at 3rd base for the Cubs in the 60's and 70's. He did it all while suffering from Diabetes. In the last few years he has had both legs amputated, and is still a champion. On a side note, while talking to Dad I found out he played cards with Jeff Santo a few times and told me that the first time Jeff played with his friends, Santo suffered a flood of money from his pockets the likes of Noah's Arc.

I also watched Juno. Overrated, I don't get the praise. I love indie flicks and weird humor, this however did not do it for me. The best thing I can say about it, I didn't feel like I completely wasted the 96 minutes, only slightly.

Floyd Mayweather continues to do his best Brett Farve impression, and retires again. We should see him in the ring shortly.

Remember when the NL Central was supposed to be the worst conference in baseball? Well there are 4 teams over .500 in the NL Central. The Nasti Natti is in last place at .469. The only conference with 4 teams over .500 is the AL East, which all 5 teams at .500 or better. The NL West, supposedly one of the best conferences in baseball has only one team (Arizona) over .500 the other 4 all fall under .476. The AL Central, also supposed to be one of the best conferences also only has one team over .500. The Sox at .581, the other 4 all falling below .492. So much for predictions. Speaking of which, please don't look back at the predictions that 4Real and I did prior to the season. In case you were wondering though, 4Real's predictions (LAA, CLE, BOS, DET) would be 2/4 today and my ALCS predictions would be 0/2. On the other hand my NL predictions are 3/4 and my NLCS predictions are still alive.

When does the hockey postseason start...wait...what? It did already? You're kidding me I guess they should publicize that a little bit better don't ya think?

Big Brown pulled up early, but was checked out and was not lame after the run at the Old Sandy on Saturday a.k.a the Belmont. With Big Brown being so damned dominant in Kentucky and Maryland, and a lack of top tier talent out there, coupled with the number one contender Casino Drive being a day of scratch, you gotta think we probably will never see another Triple Crown winner. These horses are just too frail, and it really makes Secretariat, Affirmed, and the 9 other Triple Crown winners look that much more amazing. Especially since 7 of the last 11 years we have had a Horse coming into Belmont with wins at Kentucky and the Preakness, and none have won. 3 of which (Silver Charm, Real Quiet, and Smarty Jones) finished in second and narrowly missed the bid. These horses are being bred to big and it's having a terrible effect on their lower extremities. We're going to see more things like Eight Belles beign euthanized on the track if something doesn't change. They are too big to run in events so closely spaced without coming up with, even the most minor, injuries. Steriods need to be banned in Horse Racing, enough said.

That's enough for now, I will try to get back into my old swing of things soon, but for now I hope this tides you over.