Yet again I've created a group where those of us who frequent this fine site can compete to see who has the best bracket in the NCAA Tournament. No experience w/ college hoops is required and in fact that may hurt your chances...

if you'd like to join:

1) Go to Yahoo! Sports

2) Group ID # is 151172

3) Password to join is "galen"

The more the merrier so come on and join the fun!

Once again I've created a group where those of us who frequent this fine site can compete to see who has the best bracket in the NCAA Tournament.  No experience w/ college hoops is required and in fact that may hurt your chances... if you'd like to join:

1) Go to Yahoo! Sports

2) Group ID # is 162086

3) Password to join is "nextyear"

 

The more the merrier so come on and join the fun!

VICTORY!!!!  It is now mathematically impossible for the Giants to finish with a better record than the Dodgers this year.  That makes it 4 years in a row and 5 out of the last 6 seasons.  Let's hope for many more!

Many more teams now eliminated from playoff contention: Padres are praying for next year, Astros are lost in space, Reds are not ready, and the Brewers have gone dry.  Four more to go in the NL!

In the junior circuit, the White Sox have been washed away, the Indians have lost their spice, the Mariners are out to sea, and Tampa Bay has been e-RAY-sed.  Only two to go!


AL Teams eliminated: Orioles, Royals, Blue Jays, A's, White Sox, Indians, Mariners, Rays

NL Teams eliminated: Nats, Pirates, Diamondbacks, Mets, Padres, Astros, Reds, Brewers

6 teams remain to be eliminated from post-season play.


Dodgers' best possible record: 101-61
Dodgers' worst possible record: 92-70

Pirates have walked the plank to the sea of elimination.  Nice that the Dodgers have so many games w/ them and the Nats (the first eliminated team).  The D-Backs have been de-backed and the Mets were finally put out of their misery. 

Since my last post, there are now 5 AL teams with no chance of post-season play: the Orioles and the Blue Jays have been shot down, the Royals dethroned, and the A's are getting their Z's. 


AL Teams eliminated: Orioles, Royals, Blue Jays, A's

NL Teams eliminated: Nats, Pirates, Diamondbacks, Mets

14 teams remain to be eliminated from post-season play.


The Giants' tragic number to finish with a worse record than the Dodgers is 11.

Dodgers' best possible record: 103-59
Dodgers' worst possible record: 86-76

This weekend saw our first team eliminated: once again the Washington Nationals will not be in the playoffs.  It looks to be a while before the next worst team in their division, the Mets, are eliminated.  The Pirates are 3 games from being elminated from the Wild Card and can't win the Central while the D-Backs and Padres are six games from being out of the Wild Card hunt and 2 games from missing out on the Division race.

Still nobody out in the AL.  Orioles are 2 games from being out of WC contention while they won't win the division.  Royals are out of the WC and one game from missing out on the Central Title.   A's are still in contention, at least for another week....

AL Teams eliminated: none

NL Teams eliminated: Nats

21 teams remain to be eliminated from post-season play.

The Giants' tragic number to finish with a worse record than the Dodgers is 19.

Dodgers' best possible record: 105-57
Dodgers' worst possible record: 82-82

It's late August and time for me to once again do my at-least-weekly posts on which teams are in danger of being eliminated from the possibility of post-season play.  Since all teams still have a mathematical chance, today I'll just look at the 6 last place teams.

In the AL, the Orioles, Royals, and A's are bringing up the rears.  The Orioles have a tragic number of 10 for the division but 18 for the wild card.  The Royals have the worst record in the AL but only 19 games back of their division-leader; a combination of 14 BoSox wins and KC losses will kill their post-season hopes.  The Oakland Moneyballs are the best last-place team in baseball but still 20 out of the Angels.

The 3 cabooses of the senior circuit are the Nats, Pirates, and Padres.  The Nats again have the worst record in all baseball and predictably are the closest of elimination: their tragic numbers are 2 for the division and 10 for the wild card.  The Pirates have 40 games to play and are less than 20 games back of division and wild card leaders.  The Padres are only slightly worse than the Pirates in the wild card race but have a tragic number of 13 wrt the Dodgers.


22 teams remain to be eliminated.

The Giants' tragic number to finish with a worse record than the Dodgers is 30.

Dodgers' best possible record: 111-51
Dodgers' worst possible record: 74-88

Bumped...Ironic isn't it? - P

I know some of you like to see what the sports fans across town are talking about so it won't surprise you that EJ Woods is no longer a great prospect but suddenly a bad person.  And what brought about this transformation?  Maybe it was the fact that he mentioned wanting to come to USC!  If you look thru the chatter about EJ you'll see the following:

1) where he was once one of the top DB recruits in SoCal NOW it's a joke that he wants to be like Troy Polamalu

2) where he was once a kid with a 'legal situation' NOW he's another punk

3) where he once was innocent until proven guilty NOW the only way he can get out of his trouble is thru corruption of the legal system

I suppose these kids across town are upset because they were just saying a few months ago that EJ wouldn't leave and they were happy with how 'crn' disciplined him.  at one point they wished EJ luck with his academic issues, now he's the plague and they can't get rid of him fast enough.

When people are looking for the truth, a lot of them end up cultivating conspiracy theories.

Here is an interesting comment from the Blog across towN. (my emphasis added)

Ten days ago, Yahoo Sports broke the story, which I thought was pretty big: A direct, specific allegation that Tim Floyd was seen giving at least $1,000 to Rodney Guillory as a payoff for directing OJ Mayo to the Trojans. Floyd has said nothing in the interim. Garrett has said nothing in the interim. USC’s lawyer said what lawyers always say – “We can’t comment” meaning she didn’t want to comment.
 
In the past ten days, the Times has done essentially nothing. There was a story on the story – with a question mark in the headline. Then there was a Q and A between Adam Rose (USC alum) and Craig Penrose (USC Alum). What a shock – Penrose saw absolutely nothing wrong. There is a nice children’s story called “The Emperor’s New Clothes” which was a lot like that interview. We also heard it a lot from Sgt. Schultz on Hogan’s Heroes.

That's from an email sent by one the resident legal scholars over there to Plaschke attempting to take the LAT to task for not "reporting" the Floyd story.

I'm wondering where they get was seen; where has that been reported? That's right, nowhere! This is an utter fabrication and exposes an obvious bias, not that we should be surprised.

But wait! It gets better: Plaschke responds not once but twice and his responses are surprisingly sharp and informative (emphasis added to drive the point home)...

From: “Plaschke, Bill” <Bill.Plaschke@latimes.com>
Sent: Saturday, May 23, 2009 1:08 AM
Subject: RE: USC Basketball

“the charges were made by a felon who is trying to sell a book…he is the only source…I’m not personally involved in it, but I’m guessing that we need more than one biased source to publicly crucify a man..if it were your reputation on the firing line, you would feel the same way..”

Ouch!

That is pretty significant, wouldn't ya say?

Here is Plaschke's second response after the sly old fella tries to bait Plaschke by "dressing him down" in response to Plaschke's response (again, emphasis added)...

“From: “Plaschke, Bill” <Bill.Plaschke@latimes.com>
Sent: Saturday, May 23, 2009 7:26 PM
Subject: RE: USC Basketball

So you think we’re NOT pursuing the story?..You think we HAVEN’T been calling people?…You assume that because we don’t write a story, we’re not checking out all leads?..We chase things hard, and it’s a sign of the potential weakness in this story that, for all our chasing, we have yet to find someone to corroborate.
…
Where have I been on this? I’m the Times’ lead general sports columnist, meaning I cover the biggest story. If you read our newspaper or website, you would know that the Lakers are my town’s biggest story. If I’m not covering them through the playoffs, then THAT’S a story.… I’m sorry you are so bitter about this, and cannot afford me the same respect that I have afforded you, but, hey, I understand, that’s how the world works these days

plaschke."

Game over!

The last paragraph is classic. Bitterness consumes this crowd to no end. After a while, listening to these guys is like hearing one hand clapping. I only bring it up because Plaschke articulates what many SC fans have been trying to say. I don't even consider myself a huge SC supporter; in fact, I was raised a UCLA fan by my UCLA-grad dad but some of the bile over at the Blog across towN is just pathetic. I don't want to be part of that crowd and just reading some of their posts is enough to make me feel like I need a shower. As Paragon has said many times, they have a great history and are a fine university with nothing to be ashamed of and plenty to celebrate. It's beyond me why some of their supporters act so insecure. But it's this kind of insecurity that makes fertile ground for these lame conspiracy theories.

I don't often agree with Plaschke; in fact, I frequently despise his goofy one-line paragraphs and may never forgive the way he ran a previous Dodgers GM out of town. But I have to admit he is dead on here. No worthwhile news organization is going to ruin their own reputation without having backed up a story of this magnitude with legitimate sources. And the LAT will not sit around and do nothing if there was a legit story of this magnitude. Plaschke does an excellent job of exposing this guy as nothing more than a hater with an agenda... is anybody here surprised?

Once again I've created a group where those of us who frequent this fine site can compete to see who has the best bracket in the NCAA Tournament that starts next week.  No experience w/ college hoops is required and in fact that may hurt your chances... if you'd like to join:

1) Go to Yahoo! Sports

2) Group ID # is 60188

3) Password to join is "floyd"

The more the merrier so come on and join the fun!

Since we just had signing day last week, this article I read a while back came to mind.  It's about predicting future success in two different jobs: quarterback and teacher.  It also came to mind a couple of weeks ago when Petros was talking about how the two big stars from the 2006 Rose Bowl haven't (yet) achieved the same success in the pro game.  It's a bit of a read, but well worth it:

Most Likely to Succeed

It's been a few weeks and we've one month left.  Some rankings have changed, so let's give it a go!

#1 Alabama is playing #15 LSU this week.  I heard something about there being some drama with this game...?  After this week, they have Miss St and Auburn; Bama did almost lose to Mississippi and Kentucky last month, so these games aren't gimmies. 

#2 Texas Tech gets #6 OK and #9 OK State before finishing with Baylor. 

#3 Penn St. gets Iowa and Indiana before #18 Michigan St. 

#4 Texas is done with ranked opponents, but have to face Texas A&M at the end. 

#5 Florida has no ranked opponents until the end of the month when they face #24 Fl State.

#6 Oklahoma will meet both #2 Texas Tech and #8 OK St after Texas A&M this week. 

#7 USC has #21 Cal this week and some big rivalry games at the end, ND and UCLA.  SC could be helped out a lot if Oregon and Cal both win out the rest of the year.  At least that's what Petros thinks...

#8 Utah is undefeated, tho they almost lost to Michigan in week 1.  They'll get #17 BYU after they party down at San Diego St. next weekend. 

#9 Oklahoma St. has another one of those big finishes to their schedule, with #2 Texas Tech and #6 OK coming up. 

#10 Boise St., Lords of WAC!  They're playing Utah St, Idaho, and Nevada before facing a competitor in Fresno St.  Hopefully they'll get their 7th bowl game in a row. 

If you like looking back, you can check out the last two posts.

Since my last post there've been a few losses in the top 5, which should not surprise anybody.  OK, LSU, and Missouri have all fallen and of them, I'd be surprised if OK wasn't the only one still in the top 5 seeing as how they lost to a highly ranked team.

Moving on to other top 10 teams and their remaining schedules:

#6 Penn State has tOSU as their highest ranked opponent but they did beat Oregon State earlier this year.  Their closest win was against #22 Illinois and they'll get #23 Michigan State at the end of the year. 

#7 Texas Tech needed overtime to get by Nebraska yesterday, which may not help them out a whole lot.  And they'll get both OK and Texas later this year, not to mention #16 Kansas and #17 OK State.

(in case you hadn't heard, #8 is USC.  hope you know their schedule)

#9 BYU will only play one ranked opponent this year, #14 Utah, in the last game of the year.  They've won all their games handily save for squeaking by winless Washington (who will probably beat Notre Dame!)

#10 Georgia was having a good year until they lost to #2 Alabama.  They'll play 3 ranked opponents in a row starting this week, #13 Vandy, #4 LSU and #11 Florida.  And then #20 Auburn before the end of the year.

#11 Florida took apart LSU last night so look to see them jump in the polls.  BUT, they already lost to Mississippi last month.  Before the end of the year they'll get #10 Georgia and #13 Vanderbilt.

looks to be an exciting 2 months!

Happy October, everybody!  There's about 2 months left and SC is ranked #9 so let's take a look at the chances for failure for the better ranked teams!

#1 Oklahoma handily beat their first 4 opponents.  They have 4 ranked opponents ahead of them: #5 Texas, #16 Kansas, #7 Texas Tech and #21 OK State. 

#2 Alabama has already beaten the highest ranked opponent of any Top 10 team with their victory over Georgia last week.  Looking to the future, they'll be playing #13 Auburn and ...

#3 LSU.  The Tigers will also get to meet #11 Georgia in a few weeks as well as #12 Florida before then.  Earlier, they won a close game w/ then-#10 Auburn.

#4 Missouri gets to play #16 Kansas at the end of the year.  In the first game of the year, they gave up a lot of points to #20 Illinois in a victory.  Future ranked opponents include #21 OK State and...

#5 Texas.  The Longhorns have maybe the most back-loaded schedule in the Top 5, facing #1 OK, #4 Missou, #21 OK State, and #7 Texas Tech on 4 consecutive Saturdays.  And then they get #16 Kansas later. 

lots of strong schedules out there, eh?

With SC falling this week, it's time to hope for the worst for the rest of the Top 10 teams.  Paragon posted about Florida falling today and you may have also noted that#9 Wisconsin fell to Michigan and with 2 Top 10 teams in the AL-GA game, that means that this week FOUR Top 10 teams will have lost.

and look at this...Bama's spankin the Bulldogs!

And in case you're wondering about the title, get to know schadenfreude!

GOODBYE, YANKEES!  Thus falls the 2nd of the Dodgers' mortal enemies, giving us something to console ourselves with should the Dodgers not win the World Series.

With the AL Wild Card race done the only excitement left in the AL is who will win the East (probably the Rays) and the Central (Twins or Chisox). 

4 more teams remain to be eliminated.

AL Teams eliminated: Mariners, Royals, Orioles, A's, Rangers, Tigers, Indians, Blue Jays, Yankees

NL Teams eliminated: Nationals, Padres, Pirates, Braves, Reds, Rockies, Giants!, Cardinals, Marlins

Dodgers' best possible record: 87-75
Dodgers' worst possible record: 82-80

VICTORY!!!  It is now mathematically impossible for the Giants to finish with a better record than the Dodgers this year.  That makes it 4 out of the last 5 years they have to look up at L.A. all winter long. 

Most teams now have 10 games left and by Monday there should only be a few left.  In the AL, Jays and Yanks should be gone soon and then it's just a matter of the Twins or White Sox winning the Central. 

The NL West is now down to 2 teams but all the NL Central teams still have a mathematical chance of getting the wild card.

8 more teams remain to be eliminated.

AL Teams eliminated: Mariners, Royals, Orioles, A's, Rangers, Tigers, Indians

NL Teams eliminated: Nationals, Padres, Pirates, Braves, Reds, Rockies, Giants!

Dodgers' best possible record: 89-73
Dodgers' worst possible record: 79-83

Two weeks to go and things are getting tight.  The Tigers, Indians, Yankees and Blue Jays are all in danger of being eliminated before the week is out.  This would make for a four-team race for the final three playoff spots, which could be exciting.

Nothing's changed in the NL:  Giants, Rockies and Marlins are still the teams w/ Tragic Numbers under 10.  But now we've a tie for the wild card.

12 more teams remain to be eliminated.

AL Teams eliminated: Mariners, Royals, Orioles, A's, Rangers

NL Teams eliminated: Nationals, Padres, Pirates, Braves, Reds

The Giants' tragic number to finish with a worse record than the Dodgers is 4.

Dodgers' best possible record: 90-72
Dodgers' worst possible record: 77-85

Congrats to the Angels for clinching, which eliminated the A's.  The Rangers can still win the wild card if they run the table the rest of the year.  Detroit and Cleveland are also on the cusp, with the Yanks and Blue Jays having Tragic Numbers under 10.

Still nobody has claimed a title in the NL but more teams are close to elimination.  Giants, Rockies and Marlins are now the teams w/ Tragic Numbers under 10.

13 more teams remain to be eliminated.

AL Teams eliminated: Mariners, Royals, Orioles, A's

NL Teams eliminated: Nationals, Padres, Pirates, Braves, Reds

The Giants' tragic number to finish with a worse record than the Dodgers is 5.

Dodgers' best possible record: 91-71
Dodgers' worst possible record: 76-86

No newly eliminated AL teams yet, tho the Indians and Tigers have joined the Royals, Orioles, A's and Rangers in the club of teams w/ a Tragic Number under 10. 

In the NL, the Braves and Pirates are very close so this week we'll see Sid Bream stumble around 3rd and finish them both off.  Other NL teams w/ Tragic Numbers under 10: Reds and Giants.

Teams already eliminated: Mariners, Nationals

The Giants' tragic number to finish with a worse record than the Dodgers is 11.

Dodgers' best possible record: 92-70
Dodgers' worst possible record: 72-90

After today's game, the Dodgers only face teams whose record is sub-.500.  "So what?" you may ask, knowing that last week the Dodgers were in the same boat.  But these four teams (Padres, Giants, Pirates, Rockies) are an average of 20 games under .500.  Hope this doesn't jinx it....

There are now 4 teams with Tragic Numbers under 10 in the AL: KC, Baltimore, Oakland and Texas, with the Royals closest to being gone within the week (tho the AL Central seems to want to be mediocre). 

The Nats are on the line of elimination as they only have a mathematical chance of tying for the division.  Other NL teams w/ Tragic Numbers under 10: Padres, Pirates, Braves, and Reds.  The lame NL West teams will probably all have a mathematical chance until the last day of the season.

The Giants' tragic number to finish with a worse record than the Dodgers is now 16.

Dodgers' best possible record: 92-70
Dodgers' worst possible record: 68-94

I been busy so I ain't been able to get this done.  Congrats to the Mariners for being the first team eliminated from playoff contention!  Let's look at the numbers:

Royals are next in the AL, with a Tragic Number of 8 for the Wild Card and 9 for the division. 

If the Dodgers can remember how to win the Nats will be eliminated from winning the Wild Card tooo-night.   The Nats' Tragic Number for the division is 4.

The Giants' tragic number to finish with a worse record than the Dodgers is 23.  That's way too high.

Dodgers best possible record: 94-68
Dodgers worst possible record: 65-97

Looking at last year's posts, I see that the D-Rays were first in line for elimination last  year and got eliminated in August the two previous years.  Nice work, Tampa, now get some fans to show up.

So far both games with Manny have not included Andre Ethier in the starting lineup.  Many of us feel that either (or both) the better qualified Ethier or Matt Kemp will be missing starts because Torre has some weird crush on the veturuns Andruw Jones and Juan Pierre (I guess they do have more postseason experience... or perhaps incriminating pictures of Torre).  How many of the remaining and (very obviously) crucial 52 games will either (or both) Ethier or Kemp not start because Torre is [insert synonym for 'dumb' here]?

There was a segment on blogs and their place in sports media on Bob Costas' HBO show last night.  Old Media wasn't well represented, from the accounts I've read.  Anybody see this?  If you're interested in blogger accounts of it, Fire Joe Morgan has a post as does Dodger Thoughts.  Deadspin, too, I guess, but that shouldn't shock you....

Paragon, I hope you don't mind me sharing this with the community... I know I speak for many when I say I hope your day is great and you can take a lot of time off to enjoy it!  We all appreciate everything that you put into this site and we hope you have many more of these days to come.    

Folks can use this thread to pass along their own greetings/appreciations/condolences.  

I'm sure many people here read Deadspin already but in case they don't, here's a post that has some great things to say about blogging and journalism:

http://deadspin.com/348383/the-super-bowl-bye-week-jamboroo-in-which-drew-pauses-to-make-a-serious-p oint-about-blogging-as-journalism-then-makes-chili

The thing that offends me most about the journalists' outrage at bloggers is the attitude of 'they aren't in our club so nothing they have so say is worthwhile'.  Meanwhile hacks like, well, most of them, continue to pretty much say whatever they want and automatically get legitimacy.  It's nice to see the hacks squirm because they know their jobs are in danger...

This isn't the right time for an Injury Clinic on the Knee Subluxation but I know some folks here are Laker fans.  I'm sure I'm not the only reader who would want to hear how bad these injuries are in your professional opinion:

Bynum doesn't like waiting game

Back when I was in NJ, one of my senseis suffered a hip sublux during a black belt test, didn't sound like a lot of fun!  I'd hate for Bynum's career to be in danger...

I'm sure all of you agree that two great baseball blogs out there are Jon's DodgerThoughts and Rob's 6-4-2.  But you may not agree that they both reached a low point of late with their attacks on the Mitchell report.  Jon seems to want to pretend it didn't happen and thinks deliberate cheating is comparable to honest umpire mistakes.  Rob  amusingly takes leave of his Objectivist ways to stand up for a union while saying that if people don't defend themselves, they deserve the benefit of the doubt.

Dave Zirin makes some great points, as always, tho you may not agree with his political analogies:

Dave Zirin: The Mitchell Report: Absolving the Owners

You know schadenfreude (SHAH-din-FROY-duh), the pleasure one gets at the suffering of others?  Well, for those of you who absolutely can't live w/o USC winning the BCS title, here's a little something to keep in mind for the rest of the football season.  Remember, any team can beat any other team on Any Given Saturday (esp. rivalry games), so here's a look at the upcoming schedules of the 10 teams ranked higher or close to USC in the 3 major polls with their AP ranking in parentheses.

LSU (1): the BCS title is theirs to lose, but they're meeting Kentucky and Auburn among their conference opponents.  

Cal (2) will play both ASU and USC before meeting Stanford.

Ohio State (3) Luckeyes will meet both Wisconsin and Illinois before their final game against Michigan, whose season has certainly gone uphill since week 2.

Boston College (4) gets to attempt to stop Notre Dame's winning streak and later gets Virginia Tech and FL State.  

South Florida (5) meets Cincinnati in a few weeks and does have a chance to go undefeated this year.  

Oklahoma (6) has lost to unranked Colorado and their only ranked future opponent is Missouri.  Do they still have a rivalry w/ OSU?

South Carolina (7) has lost to LSU and gets both Tenessee and Florida, as well as a rivalry game w/ Clemson.

West Virginia (8) gets Rutgers soon, which may give the Scarlet Knights a chance to get back into the Top 25.  They'll also face Cincinnati and have already lost to South FL (which isn't as bad as losing to Stanford).  

Oregon (9) gets a whole lotta Pac-10 opponents, including USC.

Missouri (11) gets OU next week and have big rivalries w/ both Kansas teams who they play at the end of November.

Virginia Tech (12) has already lost to LSU and they get Boston College AND FL state later.

One could also root hard for Stanford now, as their subsequent success makes the loss less embarrassing.  

A BCS title is not impossible.  A slim chance is better than none at all -- just ask the Colorado Rockies...

If you're still reading, you may want to see the musical Avenue Q as they've a hilarious song about schadenfreude.  I was lucky to catch the Tony-winning version when I lived near NYC a few years back...