There's been talk of tweaking the wild card system during the off season -

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20100916&content_id=14736870&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb

The most popular proposals seem to be adding a 2nd wild card in each league & having the 2 wild card teams play each other in a 1-game playoff or limiting the wild card team to only 1 home game in the 1st round series.

The problem with these ideas is that they're based on the assumption that the wild card team is always inferior to the 3 division winners. And this is clearly not the case. Just look at the Rays & Yankees.

Here's an area where I think the NBA actually got something right for a change. In the playoffs they seed the teams according to record. If a 2nd place team is better than all the other division winners, that team gets treated as such in the playoffs, which is as it sholud be.

A closely related topic is going back to a balanced schedule, which should also be done during the off season. Because I'm much more interested in giving the best teams the best chances to advance and face each other in the next round than I am in the artificial construct of division rivalries.

Your thoughts?

So I was drinking by myself again, while watching the ESPN repeating loop of that kid in Philly being tazed, when it occured to me - how many PR problems professional sports leagues face in this country could be solved by rethinking their attitudes towards alcohol?

May be, just may be, it might be time for MLB, NHL, NFL & NBA to stop selling beer at the games. Not just after the 3rd quarter or the 7th inning, but don't have it in the building at all. Of course this would mean losing all the beer sponsors. Is that a hit they'd be willing to take in return for good PR, the safety of fans driving home & (sometimes) the safety of players on the field?

Also there could be a new policy that any time a player runs into trouble off the field (ice, court) and public drunkeness is involved, an automatic quarter of a season suspension gets tacked on to whatever else the player gets (Hey, Big Ben, you might want to pay attention here!). That would be 4, 20 or 40 games, depending on the sport.

Clearly nothing would happen without getting the NFL on board, since they're the biggest dog in the yard. But they also seem to be the ones with the biggest problem in terms of player behaviour in this area.

Now I'm not saying I'm in favour of this idea. It's something I just thought of. It might breed more problems than it solves. Just something I'm throwing out there to see what you think.

But since we're talking about how PRIVATE organizations deal with their employees, customers & sponsors, please, no talk of "socialism", "big government" or "the nanny state". Other than that, have at it.

Inspired by Titov's worst-pick-for-best-song thread, here's a thread to bark at the moon about bad Academy Award picks in general. I'm sure you all have your favourites, so I'll get the ball rolling with a particularly egregiuos case that in my mind stands out above all the others -

The 1968 winner for best picture was Oliver!, a musical based on the well known Dickens story. It's not a terrible movie, the performances are quality & there are some catchy tunes. But in the end it's just another mid-to-late 60s cast of thousands musical and was in no way deserving of best picture compared to 2 of that year's other offerings -

2001: A Space Odyssey. Arthur C. Clarke & Stanley Kubrick team up to turn Clarke's novel into the ultimate head rush of a movie. The scene where Hal turns off the oxygen is more intense than any scene with a bunch of spaceships shooting at each other & more creepy than any monster ripping through someone's chest.

The Lion in Winter. King Henry & Queen Eleanor can't stand each other - or any of their 3 sons, Richard, Geoff & John. But one of them has to be the next king. And then there's King Philip of France looking to use this chaos to his own advantage... Cast full of super heavyweights. Peter O'Toole as Henry & Katherine Hepburn (best actress winner) as Eleanor, along with 2 newcomers who made nice careers for themselves afterwards, Anthony Hopkins as Richard & Timothy Dalton as Philip.

Well, that's my worst pick, have at it.

Mets 1Bman Carlos Delgado is out for at least 2 months and according to the yammerings on WFAN they don't seem to think they have an adequate stopgap within the organization.

Now the 1st choice is apparently Nick Johnson, and outstanding fielder & the price is right. But he does have a history of injuries & doesn't have the same presence in the lineup that Huff would give.

Doubtful they'd part with top OF prospect Victor Martinez, but pitching help could be available. So if the Mets start asking questions on Huff's availability, what should MacPhail's answer be?

http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/news;_ylt=AsDj4IbGHu82gZPPPLWJE8QRvLYF?slug=ap-bluejays-millar&prov=ap&type=lgns

Link speaks for itself. All this yammering is to get to 75 words. I didn't know there was anything wrong with Lyle Overbay. I guess the idea is to use him as a DH. If nothing else the price was right. With the Ray's improvement they've been bumped from their perennial 3rd place status. And before this move if they were to move out of 4th, 5th seemed more likely than a return to 3rd. From a Jays point of view, I would say of this move what the Governator said in T-2, "This does not help our mission."

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Back in the late 80s when the Yankees sucked (next on Yankeeograhpy, the Greg Cadaret story) - and even in the mid 80s when Mattingly, Winfield & Henderson would carry them through August before their pitching died - there was a penomenon known as The Columbus Shuttle, whereby one young player, usually a pitcher, would end up making multiple trips from the AAA Columbus Clippers & the Yankees & back again.

Sadly, the Clippers are no longer NY's AAA affiliate. The new team is in Scranton. But fear not! Fredo Steinbrenner has revived one of King George's old traditions in the person of Chris Britton, winner of the 2006 "Terry Forster Fat Tub of Goo" Award.

As of May 9, he has already been called up 3 times from Scranton. Here's wishing him luck in breaking the record which is 8 and if memory serves me right, is held by Steve Balboni & Ray Fontenot.

I'm sure many will think this is heresy, but I really, really, REALLY think teams that have put up new stadiums in the last 20 or so years should have taken a cue from Skydome rather than Camden Yards.

We're already had one Opening Day rainout & 2 others are being delayed. Now I love the old school charm of Camden Yards, but these days "dome" doesn't have to = "monstrosity". Safeco is proof that you can combine common sense with aesthetics. And while it's true that there's nothing better than a ball game played when it's in the mid 70s under a clear blue sky, it's also true than in most places those other 78 home games can be a real problem.

From a team's point of view there's nothing that screws up a pitching staff more than about a gajillion unscheduled double headers in Aug/Sept. And from a fan's point of view there's nothing more annoying than settling down for a game & getting Rain Delay Theatre.

But instead of moving foreward most teams that are building new stadiums seem to be regressing. 2 non-domes going up in NY. And 1 in Minnesota, of all places. Yeah. Good luck with that.

Sorry, but with today's technology & engineering there's just no reason for it. Rainouts have about as much place in the world of 2008 as meat rationing, scrap metal drives & John McCain.