EL HOMBRE KNOWS SPORTS
The clock is ticking on the first round of labor negotiations between NFL owners and league’s Players Association, and they have the potential to be as acrimonious as a chance meeting between Jim Bunning and common sense. It’s now certain the 2010 season will not feature a salary cap, the only thing ever invented that keeps Green Bay on an even footing with New York. There probably won’t be a collective bargaining agreement between the two sides in the near future. And the way things are shaping up, talks are likely to be as friendly and civil as a food fight in Miss Merrie’s pre-school lunch room.
Expecting a signed, sealed deal after such a short period of bartering is borderline crazy, since there are so many big issues to deal with, and each passing day brings more certainty that the league is looking to slap the players around as if they all played for the Detroit Lions. Despite annual revenues of about $7 billion, TV contracts that would make the International Olympic Committee envious and a seemingly endless demand for apparel and other branded items, the NFL is crying poor. It wants to knock down the amount of “gross revenues” devoted to player salaries – even though the definition of what’s in that pot is already quite fluid – and it’s trying to make contracts even less secure for athletes than before. If the owners thought they could get away with it, they would try to jam baseball’s old reserve clause into the deal, the better to rob players of their rights completely. Old False Face and Little Danny would love to have year-to-year deals for their hired hands, all the while selling piles of tickets and bloated party passes to fans who have been conditioned to worship the logo, not the player.
Anybody who followed the recent releases of top-shelf running backs throughout the league understands exactly what the owners are after. Within the span of a week, LaDainian Tomlinson, Brian Westbrook and Thomas Jones were all jettisoned by their teams, even though all had time and money left on their contracts. Part of it was the nature of life for NFL running backs, who like roasting chickens, have little plastic sticks in their backs that pop up when they are fully cooked. All three are north of 30 years old and therefore practically crippled and wheelchair-bound in the eyes of league execs. Why pay them big money for their diminishing skills when younger backs can produce nearly as well (if not better) for much less whip-out?
Such is the state of the professional football contract. And such is the cause for concern among all players. The NFL wants even more control over its labor costs, which is pretty amazing considering teams can cut players with no obligation once the guaranteed part of the contract is satisfied. No other major sport operates that way. If a baseball player signs a 5-year, $45 million contract, he gets it all, so long as he doesn’t retire or celebrate the New Year by firing a gun in a crowded nightclub. He could inject himself with HGH in the batter’s box, and it wouldn’t matter. He still gets paid. The same goes for NBA and NHL players, none of whom is protected by a particularly robust union. The NBA deal, which was forged after a historic cave-in by the drunken-sailor-spending players, allows for serial hounds like Me-Mac to get eight figures, even when they haven’t won a single playoff series during their careers. NFL players, on the other hand, have little or no leverage against the most successful league on the planet.
The good news for those who support the union’s cause is that new NFLPA president DeMaurice Smith appears to have the fortitude necessary to stand up to the greed mongers who own the teams. Smith has put the chances of a work stoppage in 2011 at “14” on a scale of 1 to 10, so maybe the players will dig in and get a fair deal. Of course, that assumes they have saved enough of their million-dollar salaries to see them through six months of labor unrest. If you’ll remember, it was a spendthrift attitude that forced NBA players to capitulate during their last work stoppage. Well, that and the Great Entourage Uprising of 1999, when dozens of hangers-on and childhood pals revolted when struggling, striking NBA players had to cut back on their cell-phone service and forced them to switch to Korbel from Cristal in the clubs. The NFL has controlled its world pretty well the past several decades, and with commissioner Paul Tagliabue, a conciliatory presence, gone and wartime consigliore Roger Goodell in the top chair, a hard line could prevail again. Whatever the case, don’t expect to see your favorite pros on the field when the 2011 starts. They’ll be too busy cracking heads at the bargaining table.
And that could be uglier than any late hit, clothesline tackle or crackback block. Players had better hope they’re able to walk away from the collision with everything intact.
* * *
EL HOMBRE SEZ: Stop the presses! Cowboy Quarterback revealed that he hasn’t made up his mind yet about playing in the 2010 season! When will people stop talking to the drama queen and just wait until he shows up or doesn’t show up for training camp? It’s beyond old. This has now become part of the purview of Zahi Hawass…You have to love baseball. Nearly six months after he and his Milwaukee teammates celebrated a walk-off win over the Giants with a choreographed home-plate celebration, Brewers slugger Prince Fielder was drilled by San Francisco pitcher Barry Zito in the first inning of the teams’ Cactus League game Thursday. “My fastball was running in, and it just got away from me,” Zito said. Beautiful. The best part? Fielder took the plunking in stride. Less than a month until Opening Day…Hats off to Texas A&M-Commerce football coach Guy Morriss, who praised his players’ decision to steal all of the copies of the school’s weekly newspaper from racks around campus, after the paper ran – as is standard procedure – an article detailing one of their teammates’ arrest on drug charges. Morriss said, “I’m proud of my players for doing that. This is the best team building exercise we have ever done.” The Lions were a mediocre 5-5 last year, which for Morriss represents a huge step forward. He was a combined 27-54 during seven years at Kentucky and Baylor. Maybe his “team building exercises” should focus on blocking and tackling, rather than theft. Nice example to be setting, coach. You’re a real prize…The prigs who were upset by the Canadian women’s hockey team’s celebration after it won the gold medal need to be transported back to the Victorian Era, the better to match their hidebound values with a time period more suited to their stodgy personalities. So what if some young women’s revelry included beer and cigars – after fans had left the building? So what if an 18-year old woman drank some beer, in a province where the legal age of consumption is 19? Think that’s the first time it’s happened? Worse is that the head of the Canadian Hockey Federation (or whatever it’s called) actually apologized to the cranks for the fun. Every single day in Canada includes beer and cigars, so what’s the big deal? Here’s hoping the nasty whiners all get eaten by polar bears. (Just kidding. Sort of.)
* * *
YOU GOT A PROBLEM WITH THAT? El Hombre has always been of the opinion that Allen Iverson’s NBA tenure has been characterized by a sad waste of his talent, which likely would have produced a championship had it been used for good, rather than his own self-aggrandizement. That said, there is no joy in the news of the past week, which included reports of Iverson’s removal from the NBA world for the rest of the season – due to the continued illness of his daughter – the divorce papers filed by his wife, Tawanna, and reports that the mercurial guard has been battling gambling and alcohol demons for quite a while. Although it was tough to watch the remarkable talent prefer scoring over team play while in his prime, these dispatches are quite disturbing. One hopes they don’t presage a post-retirement catastrophe, in which a man who once had everything is laid low by an inability to handle the end of the line. Never one for off-season conditioning, Iverson always relied on his rare skills to carry him. Now that he is older, slower and fighting injuries, he doesn’t have the history or predisposition to overcome nature’s cruelties with hard work. As a result, his last days in the NBA will be remembered for controversy (in Denver and Detroit) and atrophy (Philadelphia, Part II), rather than triumph. If this is indeed it for Iverson, let’s hope he can forge a successful second chapter and that his daughter’s good health returns.
* * *
AND ANOTHER THING: It’s conference championship time once again, and that means the annual diatribe against the concept in general, which renders an entire regular season of play meaningless as leagues chase two hours of TV time during a four-day single-elimination format designed to punish their best teams. What could be worse than trampling one’s peers for two months, only to go cold for a game and lose the opportunity to play in the NC2A tourney, all so the league office can bask in espn’s annual dispatch from its corner of the world? It’s awful, and it isn’t fair. But that’s the contrived nature of college basketball these days. And, coming soon to a couch near you: The new, 96-team tournament, an idea that will make New Coke and the Germans’ decision to wage WWII on two fronts look like great decisions. Thank goodness for the Ivies, who choose their champion the proper way. Then again, what do those eggheads know, anyway?
* * *
ONE MORE FOR THE ROAD: It makes El Hombre truly sad to report that loyal reader and bon vivant Jeff St. Amour is fighting a rival tougher than any curveball he ever faced. Jeff, a great fan of Villanova, devoted father and husband, sharp businessman and great friend, has some steep odds stacked against him. But if his resolve is anything like his engaging personality and that boyish twinkle in his eyes, he’s a good bet in this scrap. When you hit your knees, send one up to the Big Skipper for Jeff. He will certainly appreciate it. Here’s to you, Jeff. You have a lot of people pulling for you.
-EH-
Showing posts with label Brian Westbrook. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Brian Westbrook. Show all posts
Friday, March 5, 2010
Friday, October 30, 2009
King Cole's Crossroads
EL HOMBRE KNOWS SPORTS
Last year this time, Cole Hamels could have walked into the office of Mayor Michael Nutter and demanded to be made dictator of Philadelphia, and Nutter would have had to comply. Hamels could have insisted city residents wear Cowboys jerseys, sing “Meet the Mets” as the recessional hymn at any church service in the area and replace the statue of William Penn atop City Hall with a bust of Terrell Owens, and no one would have argued. Such is the power of a World Series MVP.
What a difference a year makes.
Hamels may be the reigning World Series MVP, but his star has faded considerably in the eyes of Phillies fans, who approach his start in Game Three of the series against Big Brother with more than a mild sense of trepidation. In the interval between his outstanding performance last October against the Mephistopheles Rays and Saturday night at 7:57, Hamels has resembled only sporadically the dominant ace who propelled a team to its first world championship in 28 years. In fact, Hamels goes to the mound as the fourth or fifth-best starter, in many minds, on the Phillies, given his travails this season, which have included a lack of control, the inability to finish off good hitters, a drop in velocity, a propensity for reacting to small bursts of misfortune by throwing tantrums and losing focus and generally resembling a struggling young pitcher, rather than an established ace.
Instead of using last year’s prosperity to vault him among the game’s elite pitchers, Hamels has instead regressed. Some believe he is injured, and if that is the case, he deserves a huge benefit of the doubt for putting up more than 205 innings in a compromised state. But Hamels and the Phillies insist he is healthy, and given his history, that’s easy to believe, because Hamels has never been known for his high threshold of pain. No, this is likely something different – and more troubling. Hamels’ season has been characterized by bursts of strong pitching, interspersed with nightmarish sequences in which the runs pile up, sometimes both occurring in the same game. Worse, Hamels often reacts to these worrisome stretches by melting, rather than rallying. His most noteworthy bit of distemper came during the NLCS, when he stalked about the mound area after Chase Utley threw a ball past Ryan Howard that would have completed a double play. Hamels then punctuated the outburst by throwing his mitt in the dugout after the inning was completed.
Beyond the obvious inability to control his emotions, Hamels’ eruption demonstrates something more disturbing. Talented, confident athletes usually respond to misfortune by hunkering down and taking control. By acting out, Hamels betrayed a lack of self-assurance, as if he were acknowledging that he is working on a thin margin and anything unexpected could derail whatever progress he had accumulated. He wasn’t just petulant; he was insecure. That self-doubt is what has to concern Phillies fans more than anything else, and one must believe it’s why skipper Charlie Manuel chose to pitch Hamels against Microsoft at home, rather than in The House That Avarice Built. Hamels has thrown better in front of the Philadelphia crowd than he has on the road this season, and Manuel is doing everything he can to create an atmosphere conducive to a strong start.
It’s not like he hasn’t had some success this year. In five starts from Aug. 26 to Sept. 17, Hamels went 3-1 with a 1.45 ERA, struck out 38 and walked just seven. It was right out of the October, 2008 catalog, when Hamels went 4-0 in five starts, with an ERA of 1.80, 35 Ks and nine walks. And it reinforced that Hamels is likely not hurt. More than anything, he is lacking a guaranteed out pitch, and that is allowing hitters to wait him out on his strong, but not nightmarish, fastball.
Compounding the concern about Saturday’s game is Hamels’ mound opponent, Andrew EuHGHene Pettitte, who has pitched in more post-season games than any other hurler and who loves the big stage more than Elton John and Chad Ocholoco combined. You know Pettitte won’t care if the entire Citizens Bank Park crowd dresses up like giant syringes or Roger Clemens or giant syringes sticking out of Clemens’ calloused hindquarters. He will throw his six strong innings and move on.
Hamels, on the other hand, must match Pettitte or risk putting the Phillies in a hole. He certainly has the track record, but his post-season performance this season (1-1, 6.97 ERA) is hardly reason to believe he’ll rise to the occasion. Should Hamels unfurl a gem, he will regain his status as post-season stud, erase much of the stench of his previous work and perhaps earn the right to start Game Seven in the Bronx, should things advance that far. Struggle, or worse, fall apart, and he’ll enter the ’10 season required to answer questions about which was more indicative of his future: 2008’s dominance, or 2009’s uncertainty. In effect, his pitching Saturday night will re-establish him as the King of Philadelphia or just another pitcher with one shiny item on an otherwise mundane resume. No pressure, Cole. None at all.
* * *
EL HOMBRE SEZ: Cleveland Browns fans have planned a “late arrival” protest for their team’s Nov. 16 Monday night game with the Ravens. They’re hoping a TV shot of a nearly-empty stadium will put pressure on ownership to fix some problems. Organizers can count on one group to support the cause: the players. They haven’t shown up all year…In his new autobiography, Andre Agassi details his dislike of tennis, his crystal meth use, his agonizing hair loss and his marriages to Brooke Shields and Steffi Graf. In a related story, Pete Sampras is planning a book that will discuss life without a personality…The NC2A’s decision to suspend Oklahoma State wideout Dez Bryant for a year was another example of the organization’s continued war against student-athletes. Yes, Bryant lied about his meeting with Deion Sanders, but the NC2A’s discipline proved why he did it. Bryant was afraid he’d get smacked down for telling the truth. While schools spend money like crazy and prostitute themselves to corporations for a buck, the NC2A looks away. Meanwhile, a college kid works out with a former pro, and he is banished. Disgusting…Great news for all of you who believed syrup of ipecac was a little too powerful as a vomit-inducing agent. Fox is putting a camera on Cowboy Quarterback for Sunday’s entire Packers-Vikings game. Watching just a few minutes of that should inspire nausea sufficient to expel any toxin or poison that has invaded a person’s body.
* * *
YOU GOT A PROBLEM WITH THAT? The Eagles’ uninspiring 27-17 win over the lousy Redskins last Monday showed just how far the team has to go before it can be considered anything more than a wild-card contender. The Birds’ offense is a mess, especially if Brian Westbrook’s concussion keeps him out of this week’s game (it should), not that coach Andy Reid uses him all that much. Injuries along the offensive front have been a problem, and that much is out of Reid’s control. But the play-calling, the incessant use of the “Wildcat” formation to no productive end and an unwillingness to commit to the run have conspired to strip the offense of a personality. Right now, it seems as if Reid is trying to make every play a big play, rather than creating a rhythm that allows for consistent movement and production. Some of the blame has to be directed at QB Donovan McNabb, whose completion percentage (57.3%) would be the second-lowest of his career, not counting his rookie season. But for the most part, the blame lies with Reid, who looks like someone trying to show everybody how smart he is, rather than putting together a solid gameplan every week.
* * *
AND ANOTHER THING: You have to love the NFL. No matter how much evidence gets thrown in its face about the absolutely devastating effects of pro football’s collisions on players down the road, they continue to stonewall. The most recent example of the denial came Wednesday, when commissioner Roger Goodell testified before a House Judiciary Committee and refused to acknowledge that repeated blows to the head cause long-term damage and contribute to emotional instability. Of course, Goodell said that more research was needed and that the league was committed to that. Good for you, Rog! He even had players’ union chief DeMaurice Smith along for the ride. Smith actually echoed Goodell’s nonsense, even though he represents the players whose brains are being damaged. If you have the time, check out Malcolm Gladwell’s excellent article on the topic in last week’s New Yorker. In it, Gladwell sees the actual brain damage that multiple high-speed collisions spawn and checks out a University of North Carolina program that registers the g-force severity and frequency of hits sustained by players during practices. It’s eye-opening stuff and enough to make you understand how the NFL is in no way interested in rectifying the situation, particularly if it takes away from the violence. How many more suicides and sad, demented former players will it take to change the stance? Unfortunately, it looks like too many.
* * *
ONE MORE FOR THE ROAD: Great job by Majoke League Baseball commissioner Bud Sellout on Mark McGwire’s return to the game. Sellout offered an enthusiastic endorsement of the former slugger and suspected steroid cheat’s joining the Cardinals as a hitting instructor. Anybody who saw McGwire’s pathetic performance in front of Congress or took note of his invisibility knows the guy has something to hide. By letting him come back to baseball with no admission of guilt, pledge to help educate youth or any remorse whatsoever amounts to efforts to sanitize his image in pursuit of Hall of Fame votes. Sellout has tried to convince people (and anyone who believes him is a complete sap) that he cared about erasing steroids from the baseball landscape, but this is another example of his desire to evade the topic. McGwire should not be coaching, not without addressing a long list of mandates regarding his past. Don’t expect Sellout to enforce that. He’s too busy piling up the salary increases.
-EH-
Last year this time, Cole Hamels could have walked into the office of Mayor Michael Nutter and demanded to be made dictator of Philadelphia, and Nutter would have had to comply. Hamels could have insisted city residents wear Cowboys jerseys, sing “Meet the Mets” as the recessional hymn at any church service in the area and replace the statue of William Penn atop City Hall with a bust of Terrell Owens, and no one would have argued. Such is the power of a World Series MVP.
What a difference a year makes.
Hamels may be the reigning World Series MVP, but his star has faded considerably in the eyes of Phillies fans, who approach his start in Game Three of the series against Big Brother with more than a mild sense of trepidation. In the interval between his outstanding performance last October against the Mephistopheles Rays and Saturday night at 7:57, Hamels has resembled only sporadically the dominant ace who propelled a team to its first world championship in 28 years. In fact, Hamels goes to the mound as the fourth or fifth-best starter, in many minds, on the Phillies, given his travails this season, which have included a lack of control, the inability to finish off good hitters, a drop in velocity, a propensity for reacting to small bursts of misfortune by throwing tantrums and losing focus and generally resembling a struggling young pitcher, rather than an established ace.
Instead of using last year’s prosperity to vault him among the game’s elite pitchers, Hamels has instead regressed. Some believe he is injured, and if that is the case, he deserves a huge benefit of the doubt for putting up more than 205 innings in a compromised state. But Hamels and the Phillies insist he is healthy, and given his history, that’s easy to believe, because Hamels has never been known for his high threshold of pain. No, this is likely something different – and more troubling. Hamels’ season has been characterized by bursts of strong pitching, interspersed with nightmarish sequences in which the runs pile up, sometimes both occurring in the same game. Worse, Hamels often reacts to these worrisome stretches by melting, rather than rallying. His most noteworthy bit of distemper came during the NLCS, when he stalked about the mound area after Chase Utley threw a ball past Ryan Howard that would have completed a double play. Hamels then punctuated the outburst by throwing his mitt in the dugout after the inning was completed.
Beyond the obvious inability to control his emotions, Hamels’ eruption demonstrates something more disturbing. Talented, confident athletes usually respond to misfortune by hunkering down and taking control. By acting out, Hamels betrayed a lack of self-assurance, as if he were acknowledging that he is working on a thin margin and anything unexpected could derail whatever progress he had accumulated. He wasn’t just petulant; he was insecure. That self-doubt is what has to concern Phillies fans more than anything else, and one must believe it’s why skipper Charlie Manuel chose to pitch Hamels against Microsoft at home, rather than in The House That Avarice Built. Hamels has thrown better in front of the Philadelphia crowd than he has on the road this season, and Manuel is doing everything he can to create an atmosphere conducive to a strong start.
It’s not like he hasn’t had some success this year. In five starts from Aug. 26 to Sept. 17, Hamels went 3-1 with a 1.45 ERA, struck out 38 and walked just seven. It was right out of the October, 2008 catalog, when Hamels went 4-0 in five starts, with an ERA of 1.80, 35 Ks and nine walks. And it reinforced that Hamels is likely not hurt. More than anything, he is lacking a guaranteed out pitch, and that is allowing hitters to wait him out on his strong, but not nightmarish, fastball.
Compounding the concern about Saturday’s game is Hamels’ mound opponent, Andrew EuHGHene Pettitte, who has pitched in more post-season games than any other hurler and who loves the big stage more than Elton John and Chad Ocholoco combined. You know Pettitte won’t care if the entire Citizens Bank Park crowd dresses up like giant syringes or Roger Clemens or giant syringes sticking out of Clemens’ calloused hindquarters. He will throw his six strong innings and move on.
Hamels, on the other hand, must match Pettitte or risk putting the Phillies in a hole. He certainly has the track record, but his post-season performance this season (1-1, 6.97 ERA) is hardly reason to believe he’ll rise to the occasion. Should Hamels unfurl a gem, he will regain his status as post-season stud, erase much of the stench of his previous work and perhaps earn the right to start Game Seven in the Bronx, should things advance that far. Struggle, or worse, fall apart, and he’ll enter the ’10 season required to answer questions about which was more indicative of his future: 2008’s dominance, or 2009’s uncertainty. In effect, his pitching Saturday night will re-establish him as the King of Philadelphia or just another pitcher with one shiny item on an otherwise mundane resume. No pressure, Cole. None at all.
* * *
EL HOMBRE SEZ: Cleveland Browns fans have planned a “late arrival” protest for their team’s Nov. 16 Monday night game with the Ravens. They’re hoping a TV shot of a nearly-empty stadium will put pressure on ownership to fix some problems. Organizers can count on one group to support the cause: the players. They haven’t shown up all year…In his new autobiography, Andre Agassi details his dislike of tennis, his crystal meth use, his agonizing hair loss and his marriages to Brooke Shields and Steffi Graf. In a related story, Pete Sampras is planning a book that will discuss life without a personality…The NC2A’s decision to suspend Oklahoma State wideout Dez Bryant for a year was another example of the organization’s continued war against student-athletes. Yes, Bryant lied about his meeting with Deion Sanders, but the NC2A’s discipline proved why he did it. Bryant was afraid he’d get smacked down for telling the truth. While schools spend money like crazy and prostitute themselves to corporations for a buck, the NC2A looks away. Meanwhile, a college kid works out with a former pro, and he is banished. Disgusting…Great news for all of you who believed syrup of ipecac was a little too powerful as a vomit-inducing agent. Fox is putting a camera on Cowboy Quarterback for Sunday’s entire Packers-Vikings game. Watching just a few minutes of that should inspire nausea sufficient to expel any toxin or poison that has invaded a person’s body.
* * *
YOU GOT A PROBLEM WITH THAT? The Eagles’ uninspiring 27-17 win over the lousy Redskins last Monday showed just how far the team has to go before it can be considered anything more than a wild-card contender. The Birds’ offense is a mess, especially if Brian Westbrook’s concussion keeps him out of this week’s game (it should), not that coach Andy Reid uses him all that much. Injuries along the offensive front have been a problem, and that much is out of Reid’s control. But the play-calling, the incessant use of the “Wildcat” formation to no productive end and an unwillingness to commit to the run have conspired to strip the offense of a personality. Right now, it seems as if Reid is trying to make every play a big play, rather than creating a rhythm that allows for consistent movement and production. Some of the blame has to be directed at QB Donovan McNabb, whose completion percentage (57.3%) would be the second-lowest of his career, not counting his rookie season. But for the most part, the blame lies with Reid, who looks like someone trying to show everybody how smart he is, rather than putting together a solid gameplan every week.
* * *
AND ANOTHER THING: You have to love the NFL. No matter how much evidence gets thrown in its face about the absolutely devastating effects of pro football’s collisions on players down the road, they continue to stonewall. The most recent example of the denial came Wednesday, when commissioner Roger Goodell testified before a House Judiciary Committee and refused to acknowledge that repeated blows to the head cause long-term damage and contribute to emotional instability. Of course, Goodell said that more research was needed and that the league was committed to that. Good for you, Rog! He even had players’ union chief DeMaurice Smith along for the ride. Smith actually echoed Goodell’s nonsense, even though he represents the players whose brains are being damaged. If you have the time, check out Malcolm Gladwell’s excellent article on the topic in last week’s New Yorker. In it, Gladwell sees the actual brain damage that multiple high-speed collisions spawn and checks out a University of North Carolina program that registers the g-force severity and frequency of hits sustained by players during practices. It’s eye-opening stuff and enough to make you understand how the NFL is in no way interested in rectifying the situation, particularly if it takes away from the violence. How many more suicides and sad, demented former players will it take to change the stance? Unfortunately, it looks like too many.
* * *
ONE MORE FOR THE ROAD: Great job by Majoke League Baseball commissioner Bud Sellout on Mark McGwire’s return to the game. Sellout offered an enthusiastic endorsement of the former slugger and suspected steroid cheat’s joining the Cardinals as a hitting instructor. Anybody who saw McGwire’s pathetic performance in front of Congress or took note of his invisibility knows the guy has something to hide. By letting him come back to baseball with no admission of guilt, pledge to help educate youth or any remorse whatsoever amounts to efforts to sanitize his image in pursuit of Hall of Fame votes. Sellout has tried to convince people (and anyone who believes him is a complete sap) that he cared about erasing steroids from the baseball landscape, but this is another example of his desire to evade the topic. McGwire should not be coaching, not without addressing a long list of mandates regarding his past. Don’t expect Sellout to enforce that. He’s too busy piling up the salary increases.
-EH-
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