Somebody Else Gets Jilted for a Change

After growing accustomed to being the stalking horse for a bunch of different free agents, it's nice to see that not only did LeCharles Bentley leave somebody else at the altar, but he also left one of that team's local papers with egg all over its face (via Deadspin.com).

WOW!!!

Now that's what I'm talkin' about. The Browns just inked three free agents, and I've never seen anything like this in all my years of following the team. The offensive line just got a whole lot better because the Browns grabbed center, LaCharles Bentley, who was probably the best free agent offensive lineman available. He's young, tough and nasty. More importantly, he knows how to block for the run. His acquisition probably signals the end of Jeff Faine's tenure in Cleveland.

But, the Browns didn't stop with Bentley. They also added Kevin Shaffer to replace L.J. Shelton at tackle. Shaffer and Shelton are similar players, but Shaffer's more of a hitter and has the potential to grow into a much better player than Shelton could ever become. He's another guy who seems to love to run block. Reuben Droughns has to be the happiest guy in Ohio right about now.

Lastly, the Browns picked up another weapon in wide receiver, Joe Jurevicius. Jurevicius may have some of the most reliable hands in the NFL. Do you think this pick up had to do anything with the horrible dropsies that have plagued the team since its reincarnation in '99? Jurevicius won't take balls away from Edwards or Winslow, but he's a hell of a third option or safety valve.

The best thing about the new guys is that Bentley and Jurevicius are both from northeast Ohio. That means that, without question, you know they hate the Steelers.

I'm betting that our usually pessimistic hornless friend even has to be happy about this news.

Browns Free Agency News

Lots of Browns news this morning. First, Steve Doerschuk reports in this morning's Canton Repository that the Browns may ink a new nose tackle as soon as today. The Browns are reportedly talking with Sam Adams, Ted Washington and Grady Jackson, with Maake Kemoeatu waiting in the wings. Any of these guys would be a huge improvement at a key position in a 3-4 scheme. Doerschuk also mentions WR David Givens and DE Trevor Pryce as possible near-term signings.

The Akron Beacon-Journal's Pat McManamon has a column today discussing the implications of the Browns' failure to re-sign L.J. Shelton and the leading candidates to replace him. McManamon identifies Brad Hopkins as the best available LT, with Jon Runyan, Jason Fabini, Damion McIntosh, Kenyatta Walker, Tom Ashworth and Kevin Shaffer also in the mix. This makes for a pretty lean market in tackles. In contrast, this year's draft is fairly deep at this position, and I still think the Browns should look there for a long-term fix.

Aside from a column from Tony Grossi rehashing how much money the Browns have to spend, The Plain Dealer has nothing of interest. The Plain Dealer sucks.

Meanwhile, in the Browns blogosphere, Ace Davis discusses players that the Browns will likely lose to free agency, while DawgBones.com talks about free agent and draft alternatives at the defensive tackle position.

The Cavs don't Care

How do you lose by 29 points to a team that has lost 18 out of its last 20 games? The answer is that you don't give a damn, which is exactly how the Cadavers played last night. It's pretty obvious that the Cavs have looked at the standings, and realize that they can limp into the playoffs by hovering around the .500 mark the rest of the way.

I guess they think that a couple of home playoff games and a quick exit will be enough to satisfy their fans, as long as the WiFi connection at The Q remains strong. You know what? Sports fans in this town have such low expectations for our franchises that they're probably right.

I became even more depressed about this team while listening to the Cavs post-game show on WTAM. In the course of discussing the fact that the Cadavers have been unable to find and keep a decent point guard since Mark Price left, a caller reminded everyone that they could have taken Jameer Nelson in the 2004 draft, but instead opted for Luke Jackson. Even after being fired, Jim Paxson is the gift that keeps on giving, isn't he?

Bonds Wags the Dog; Tribe Inks Peralta

In a baseball version of Wag the Dog, embattled slugger Barry Bonds appears to have decided to try to divert fans' attention from allegations of steroid use by trying to wrap himself in the flag. According to ESPN, Bonds told Rick Sutcliffe that he had decided to play for the U.S. in the World Baseball Classic, if the team makes it past South Africa and advances to the next round. This comes as news to U.S. manager Buck Martinez, who has enough problems to deal with without adding this three ring circus to the mix.

Whatever challenges Bonds faces, Sportsfilter.com points out that he can count on the support of former Oakland A's executive vice president Stanley Burrell, better know as MC Hammer. Read all about it on Hammer's blog. No word yet from Vanilla Ice on the Bonds situation.

Back on planet Earth, the Tribe signed a deal with Jhonny Peralta to extend his contract through 2010, with a club option for 2011. Let's Go Tribe has an in-depth analysis of the Peralta deal. Hats off to Shapiro again. There's risk in these long-term deals for young players (think Carlos Baerga), but they're the only way a team like Cleveland can hope to stay competitive.

A lot of fans think these "Blueprint for Success" deals with young players are designed to protect the Tribe from free agency, but that's not the case. Peralta's deal will expire--except for the club option--the year that he will become eligible for free agency. As the Let's Go Tribe piece does a good job of explaining, the real reason for them is to avoid the unpredictability of salary arbitration, for which players are generally eligible after three years in the major leagues.

Playing the Race Card

ESPN.com's Bomani Jones has an article in which he essentially argues that there is moral equivalence between the taint on Barry Bonds' records arising out of his alleged steroid use and the taint on Babe Ruth's records arising out of the systematic exclusion of African-Americans from baseball until 1947.

This is a preposterous argument. I'm sorry, Mr. Jones, but you neglect one important fact: Babe Ruth wasn't responsible for racism, segregation, and Jim Crow. In contrast, if the accusations about Bonds' steroid use are true, he's entirely responsible for the predicament in which he finds himself. Bonds made the decision to have somebody shoot steroids into his ass for seven years. Last time I checked, Babe Ruth didn't cast a vote on either the Dred Scott decision or Plessy v. Ferguson.

Oh, I know that Barry Bonds has elevated hatin' Whitey to an art form. Fine. We're all racist pigs who can't stand to see a black man break Babe Ruth's record--even though a black man already did that a generation ago. Whatever gets Barry through the night is fine with me. But in the end, Barry Bonds is lying in the bed he made, while you're trying to hold Babe Ruth responsible for America's original sin.

That's just stupid.

Shoppach's Role

Cleveland Sports Perspective raises the possibility that when all is said and done, Kelly Shoppach may end up being trade bait if the Indians are looking to make a move at the deadline. That's a possibility that Anthony Castrovince of MLB.com also mentioned at the time the Crisp deal went down.

Assuming that Shoppach makes the club (which I think is likely for the reasons Vinny cited in his Spring Training post), I hope that's not his fate. Victor Martinez is a legitimate star, but let's face it, his biggest value to the team lies in his bat. Like everybody else, I worry about what the wear and tear of catching every day is going to do to his offensive numbers.

Martinez caught 142 games last season and 132 games the year before that. That's 85% of the games the Indians played over the past two years, and that's a ton of catching. To give you some perspective, the highest career percentage for games caught belongs to Pudge Rodriguez, with 78.52%. (More information on iron men catchers is available here.)

I'd really like to see Martinez catch fewer than 120 games this season. Shoppach's the only guy on the roster with the defensive tools and offensive potential to allow him to do that. The guy's defense is supposedly first rate, and he's got a little pop in his bat. If Vinny's correct in his projection about Shoppach's offensive numbers, we could live with him catching 40-60 games.

Of course, there's one big problem in my brilliant plan: Martinez needs to be able to play some first base if the Indians want to keep his bat in the lineup, but he's played only 14 games at first base, none of them in the majors. Still, Shoppach has the potential to give the Indians options that other backup catchers on the roster don't, so if he comes through, I'd kind of like to see him hang around.

Buzzer Beater

A couple of months ago, I gave Damon Jones a hard time for his stupid comments about his shooting prowess. It's only fair that I give him some love for the buzzer beater. Clutch, Damon, clutch! His performance was made even more impressive by the serious off-court stuff he's confronting.

That's four in a row for the Cavs, who show signs of righting the ship. The need to get a win against the very beatable Orlando Magic on Friday, because they close out this road trip against two of the NBA's powerhouse teams, the Miami Heat and the Dallas Mavericks.

NFL Proves Its Still Sane

Well, the NFL passed its sanity test last night. The owners and players apparently decided not to kill the goose that laid the golden egg, so there will be no World Football Classic for the foreseeable future.

This is going to be perceived as a victory for the NFLPA, and may reflect a little bit of a shift in the balance of power. However, in the long-term, avoiding the end of the salary cap is a big win for the owners and fans. I'm not sure I completely understand how revenue sharing works, but 30-2 is a pretty strong endorsement, with only truly cheap (Mike Brown) and particularly curmudgeonly (Ralph Wilson) owners dissenting.

Now, the question I hope the media is asking: does this agreement take better care of the retired players who made the NFL what it is?

Sure, Bud, it's a Classic

U.S. loses to Canada in baseball. Yup, it's a classic alright. Good idea Bud. Think Dontrelle Willis might have done a little better with a little Spring Training?

Don't listen to any of your critics in the media. Forget what Steinbrenner says. Ignore David Wells' comments too. You're right, Bud. You're always right. They'll put it on your tombstone. If you hang around as commissioner much longer, they may put it on baseball's too.

Which MLB Video Game Should I Buy?

Here's a true confession: I love sports video games. I'm the proud owner of a Playstation 2, and can kick my kids' butts in Madden, NCAA Football and March Madness. I also like baseball video games, with EA Sports MVP Baseball being my traditional game of choice.

I buy a new baseball game every spring. A few years ago, the realism of the games left much to be desired. Every hitter would jack 600 foot dingers, and the games would end up with scores like 30-28. This was fun for a while, but the arcade stuff gets old faster than you might think. Over the past three or four years, however, EA Sports improved its baseball game dramatically, and last year's MVP Baseball 2005 was just awesome.

Unfortunately, EA's major league game isn't an option this year. MLB signed a semi-exclusive deal with Take-Two Interactive, making that company the sole third-party provider of an MLB licensed video game for the next several years. That means EA Sports is out of the baseball picture, and I'm in a bit of a quandry about which game to buy.

Take-Two's 2K Sports division is coming out with MLB 2K 6, which is going to be released in a couple of weeks. However, because Sony makes the PS2, it is considered a "first party" provider and has its own MLB licensed game, MLB 06: The Show. That game's been out for a month or so, but the reviews I've read on it have been mixed. I've looked at videos of the two games, however, and Sony's graphics seem much nicer than the ones I've seen for MLB 2K6. On the other hand, if the game play sucks, good graphics aren't enough to make a game worthwhile.

Of course, EA Sports hasn't abandoned baseball completely. If I want their software engine, I can buy MVP 06 NCAA Baseball. I've got nothing against college baseball, but it doesn't have the same appeal to me that college football does, so I don't want to buy two games.

I'm not sure how much longer I can stand the stress of this potentially life altering decision. Sure, I keep a brave front, but having a decision of this magnitude hanging over my head is definitely wearing me down.

Barry Bonds

Sports Illustrated has posted the whole steroids story on its website. You can read it here. The article suggests that it was jealousy of that creep McGwire that drove Bonds to use steroids for the first time in 1998.

It's almost impossible to measure the damage that Mark McGwire's self-centered pursuit of Roger Maris' record has done to baseball. The same goes for Bonds and Sosa, but as I've already said, McGwire's the bigger devil in my book. I'm no Pete Rose fan, but there's no way his trailer trash gambling and tax evasion antics harmed the game anywhere near as much as what McGwire, Sosa and Bonds have done.

If any of these guys get into Cooperstown, baseball should not only apologize to Pete Rose for its 18 year long moral orgasm over his gambling, but give him a ticker tape parade down Main Street and carry him into the Hall of Fame through the front door.

What the hell...

That's pretty much what Heath Ledger had to say to himself on Sunday night. After all, he kissed a boy for the sake of his art. What do you think he thought when he first read the script? Surely, he was thinking something like, "Well, I'm straight, but this could be the role of a lifetime, an Academy Award winner." Anyway, we all know he kissed a boy, but a funny thing happened. He didn't win the award.

Phillip Seymour Hoffman won it, and even though he played a gay man, I don't think he had to kiss any boys.

Some times life is funny.

Kirby Puckett

Hall of Famer Kirby Puckett died last night at the age of 45. He was the victim of a stroke, and is the second youngest member of the HOF to die (Lou Gehrig was the youngest). Puckett is the classic example how the media likes only one thing more than building someone into a larger than life hero, and that's tearing that person down.

If you read anything written about Puckett before 2003, you'd think you were reading about baseball's answer to Mother Teresa. Here's a 1987 puff piece from Sports Illustrated that's pretty indicative of how the media thought of him for his entire career as a player. Then there's this 1996 weeper from The Sporting News on the occasion of Puckett's untimely retirement from the game.

Puckett's good media vibe came to a screeching halt in 2003. That's when he was accused of sexual assault, and made the cover of Sports Illustrated as the subject of a scathing expose by Frank Deford. Deford's article laid bare Puckett's alleged marital infidelities, penchant for violence, and general nastiness, and concluded that he'd played all of us for fools.

The story did a lot of damage to Puckett. Although he was acquitted of the sexual assault charges, Puckett never returned to the limelight, and even moved away from Minnesota, where he was once a king.

Of course, any experienced PR guy will tell you that dying is an excellent career move for a celebrity, and that's sure turning out to be the case with Kirby Puckett. He's a pariah no longer, and while his past indiscretions get a mention on the jump page, they don't make page 1 of this morning's sports pages.

The prize for the most cynical obituary goes to Sports Illustrated. Not wanting to remind readers of its role in destroying Puckett's reputation at this particular moment in time, the magazine that did him in writes a generally fawning obit, and tucks in a single sentence referring to the accusations that landed him on its cover three years ago--without mentioning one word about its own cover story.

Maybe the most thoughtful and balanced thing ever written about Kirby Puckett and the media came from the late Ralph Wiley. It's available here, and is worth reading much more than any of the hollow, mass produced obituaries that are popping up everywhere this morning.