So much to write about and so little time. Let?s cut to the chase and look at some timely topics.
The Kansas City Royals have a decent team, but no one will confuse them with the old Bronx Bombers. The Royals addressed their lack of hitting by changing hitting coaches. But no matter how many hitting coaches the Royals try, scoring runs remains an issue. Could it be the problem isn?t the hitting coach?
Of course, it?s easier to change hitting coaches than find players who can actually hit.
Earlier this season, Dale Sveum became the sixth big-league hitting instructor employed by the Royals since the end of the 2012 season.
For Kansas City, job security and hitting coaches don?t go hand in hand.
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A lot has been made of the political pressure on the Washington Redskins to change their team name.
I can?t vouch for this rumor, but an unreliable source has told me that instead of dropping Redskins from their name, they are dropping Washington, because it?s embarrassing.
No. Not really.
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Fans of nearly every team in baseball, not just the Royals, have periods of frustration. For example, the Twins lost 2-1 in 10 innings earlier this summer at Boston?s hitter-friendly Fenway Park. Minnesota wasted a one-hit pitching performance through nine innings and then failed to take advantage of what looked like a game-winning home run in the top of the 10th.
When Boston?s David Ortiz and Mike Napoli hit back-to-back tying and winning home runs in the bottom of the 10th, it was the first time in Major League Baseball history that had happened after nine scoreless innings.
Boston swept the three-game series at home while scoring a total of five runs. That, too, is unprecedented in their history.
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Someone has said, ?The old ?hope that springs eternal? only applies to sports whose season begins in spring. In football, the equivalent concept is ?the hope that falls quickly.??
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Unless you are a Miami Heat fan, you had to enjoy the brand of team basketball played by San Antonio in winning the NBA championship in dominating fashion.
Roughly half of the Spurs roster was filled with international players, so in this case, you could legitimately call it a world championship.
Bill Simmons, writing on ESPN.com, said, ?(San Antonio coach) Gregg Popovich has done everything short of admitting publicly, ?I like having as many foreign guys as possible. They?re wired differently. They actually know how to play basketball. They didn?t just pop out of some AAU factory like the rest of these schmucks.??
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I don?t know what it means exactly, but Wichita State has finished higher in the national basketball rankings than KU or K-State at the end of the season the past two years. I?m pretty sure that hasn?t happened for a long time, if ever.
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One fascinating aspect of the World Cup is when refs add time to the end of the game but don?t have to tell players, coaches or fans when the thing will be over. Imagine if we operated that way in football and basketball?
