TIGER DOESN'T OWE YOU SHIT!

You know what? Tiger doesn’t owe you shit. Tiger doesn’t owe me an apology, he doesn’t owe you or the media an apology. The only ones that deserve an explanation are his wife, kids, and maybe those who know Tiger on a personal level. People who he buys Christmas presents for, or remembers when their birthdays are. As for us, well now he’s prepared a speech to “clear the air” a bit about his infidelity, sex rehab, and future.


I’m not going to comment on how his speech went, what he said because really I don’t care. I care when he will be playing golf again, and that’s about it. You know why? Because that’s all we ever cared about.

I’m betting you can’t name the top ten golfers from the 90’s, before tiger joined the tour. I’m actually betting you can’t name 10 now either. You and me both know that Tiger made an almost unwatchable sport watchable. He was to golf what Arnold was to Bodybuilding: a superstar who drew interest from everyday people. In the 70’s everyone knew bodybuilding existed, but until Arnold came around and started crushing competitions, it was not interesting. I feel the same about golf. What would golf be without Tiger? Be honest, have you spent more than 5 minutes watching a major tournament since Wood’s car accident?


All that we knew about Tiger was that he played golf since he was 3, and has been absolutely crushing the game and everyone he plays against. HE WAS CRUSHING TO BALL ON THE COURSE, AND ABSOLUTELY CRUSHING PUSSY OFF OF IT. Still, There’s no doubt in my mind he will go down as the greatest golfer of all time, ahead of Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer.

Nobody cared about tiger’s life off the links. He was sportsman of the year multiple times, won tournaments with a broken leg, and was larger than life. I couldn’t tell you what kind of Buick was being sold, but I knew Tiger endorsed Buick. He also endorsed Nike, Accenture “be a tiger” and Gillette, among many others. Tiger was the king of golf, an unlikely sport to present a universally recognized face to put on advertisements.






Would anyone really care if Phil Mickleson had 15 running affairs? What about Vijay Singh? It’s no secret that Americans have a sick obsession with watching their heroes fail. No one cares when Alex Sanchez gets caught for steroids, but Mcgwire, A-Rod? “CHEATER!” “A-FRAUD!” “LIAR!”.

We Americans get so giddy when we see our heroes get reduced to…human. Here’s the thing. They are humans who do one thing extraordinarily well. It doesn’t mean they’re a necessarily “better person” than us. Have you ever achieved world fame? You realize you don’t transcend your race if you get famous, right? Tiger was in a position of power and made choices I think a lot of people do and would make. People cheat every day, sleep around. Doesn’t make it right at all, but it happens, people make these decisions. I think it’s funny how everyone has an angle on this one. I see people with very personal problems of their own taking shots at Tiger all day every day, knowing he won’t respond.

I’m not saying he is justified in anything he did. I don’t particularly care either way about him. He is who he is, and nothing I do or say will change who he is. Understand that I’m not biased and I’m not standing up for his because he’s my idol, or anything like that.

When people are posting statuses all day, tweeting etc, and just bringing him down, well, it’s pathetic. Find some other way to bring yourself up than recycling a joke from some guy on the radio. I talk some shit too, in fact, I have on this blog, and I know it’s wrong, but good lord people, 3 months of non-stop shit talking?
Look- Don’t mock his composure during his apology, because you know what? When you fuck up, you don’t hold a press conference and apologize to people you don’t know. You don’t owe it to them, and Tiger doesn’t owe it to you. You never cared about his personal life before, you just care that you have a way to justify yourself as better than someone, and you feel a little bit of power there. You’ve got a theoretical “leg to stand on” against a celebrity.

 So all you haters, find some other way to feel good about yourselves. Oh, and I know you’ll be interested in his scores when he does decide to play again.

Moving Day

Today holds a big deadline in the NBA, and all of the trading was done by noon pacific. Two of the biggest trade pieces, Amar’e Stoudemire and Andre Iguadola both stayed on their respective teams, and many other moves sent mediocre players to new teams (many for the purposes of cap space for this summer’s free agents).

This NBA offseason holds one of the greatest free agent lists…ever: Lebron, Shaq, Carlos Boozer, Dwyane Wade, Chris Bosh, Amare Stoudemire, Paul Pierce, Ray Allen, Tyson Chandler, Manu Ginobili, Richard Jefferson, Joe Johnson, Tracy McGrady, Yao Ming, Dirk Nowitzki and Michael Redd.

Regardless, a few players changed teams, none more notable than Antwan Jamison joining the Cavaliers. This is significant because Lebron wanted Stoudemire more, and management didn’t give in. While there’s speculation that Jamison is a better fit for the team, and Amar’e would have been more expensive to re-sign, we all know that there’s one players in Cleveland that sells tickets and jerseys. News-Herald.com summarized this point perfectly:

“Everything the Cavs do, every move they make, every breath they take, must be done from the perspective of "What gives us the best chance to keep LeBron?"


From there, it's a short trip to: "What does LeBron want?"


If LeBron wants Stoudemire, then that should become the team's top priority. If LeBron wants Antawn Jamison more than Stoudemire, then acquiring Jamison becomes priority No. 1.


Heck, if LeBron wants Spud Webb, go get Spud Webb.


The whole basis of the Cavs' operation in the months leading up to LeBron's free-agent decision is, and should be, a desire to do everything organizationally possible to make LeBron want to stay in Cleveland. Implicit in that policy is the rather basic directive, "Give him what he wants."”

Everyone knows Lebron loves New York, and has said he wants to play there. If Cleveland wasn’t lucky enough to have had Lebron born and raised in Ohio, he would probably already be polaying in New York. Lebron knows he’s a superstar who’s bigger than any other player right now. He hugs Jay-Z after Knicks games, he is a celebrity who celebrities are in awe of.

It’s hard to imagine Lebron staying in Cleveland if they don’t win a title this year. That’s why management probably should have given him whatever he wants.

Other notable trades include “worst first overall draft pick ever” Darko Milicic for Brian Cardinal. Knicks get washed up Tracey Mcgrady, Rockets get the Kings up-and-comer Kevin Martin, and Sacramento gets… Carl Landry, Joey Dorsey, Larry Hughes (well done Maloof brothers, maybe this will be the trade northern Cal finds unforgivable).

The Mavericks pulled off the largest move of the year 4 days ago, getting essentially Caron Butler and Brendan Heywood for Josh Howard and throw ins. So far the Mavericks are 1-1 with these new players, but I’m sure they’ll end up disappointing Mark Cuban back into severe depression soon enough.

As ho-hum as all this trade talk is, I hope you could find some value out of this summary, and I’ll be back to rant on horrible northen Cal. sports soon enough.

Possibly the worst epic song ever

The keyboard melody is familiar. The power cuts by Eddie Van Halen are classic. Hagar’s voice is vintage Sammy. And I just had to stop for a second.


here's the song to refresh your memory
“Love walks in” by Van Halen has been recently re-introduced to me via a local radio station. I’ve seriously heard it 3 times out of a total of 45 listening minutes (over a week or so). Check out the lyrics, don’t they make you say, “wait, what?”


and then you sense a change

nothin' feels the same

all your dreams are strange

love comes walkin' in

some kind of alien

waits for the opening

simply pulls a string

love comes walkin' in

oh, sleep and dream

that's all I crave

I travel far across the milky way

to my master

I've become a slave

'til we meet again

some other day

where silence speaks

as loud as war

earth returns to what it was before

love comes walkin' in

baby, pull a string


I definitely had to find out what was going on in this classic (or used to be) song. Turns out Sammy Hagar believes he was raped by aliens 3 to 4 times.


"I'm a firm believer -- have seen, have felt, have been contacted three or four different times. I have received information that has been valuable in my life from those people, and they have used me. I'm gonna sound like a complete nut here, but they have used me in an experimental fashion" -Sammy Hagar


So there you go. Sammy tried to make the song more popular by adding “Baby pull a string” as if he was singing about a woman, but really the lyrics look like this:

and then you sense a change – you wake up out of place


nothin' feels the same – strapped to a table


all your dreams are strange – feeling drugged


love comes walkin' in – (the hook, or chorus. Out of place here)


some kind of alien – Definitely an Alien


waits for the opening – turns you over


simply pulls a string - draws the window shades to a close


love comes walkin' in – penetration/rapes the shit out of you






Next time you’re rocking out hard to this song… Don’t rock out so hard, k?

Propping a Boner

I’m sure that anyone reading my blog watched the super bowl yesterday, so I won’t recap the drives and the obvious outcome. I don’t find that stuff to be a particularly exciting or enjoyable read if you saw it live, and I have to assume that neither do you. I will say that the Saints were a great team to watch all year, and its good to see the “underdog” take this one. I’m also glad that the game went under the posted total of 57 points. It was absolutely absurd to see an NFL total go that high, and I cashed the under easily. I think people seem to forget that when the Colts or Saints win a game scoring 30-40 points, they usually hold the opponent under 20. The reason these teams score often is because of their ability to capitalize on drives, and force turnovers. Taking possessions away from an opposing team limits their ability to score, which is why you’ll often see 30-14 or 37-10 types of games. With both teams playing well and not turning the ball over (except for Porter’s 4th quarter pick-6), there were essentially less chances of a huge shootout or blowout type of game. Hope that makes sense. I believe that if you play that game 100 times, 75% of the time it goes under 57. That’s an astronomical number that Vegas knows people will bet on.



Now Things I do find interesting are the props. Proposition bets are things off the field that aren’t particularly related to the game. Like the side of the coin that will land on the coin flip (heads won it). The length of the national anthem (over 1:42?). How much time will be on the clock when the coach gets doused with Gatorade? (Under :45, actual time about :20) I’d like to recap the results of some of the funny/interesting ones ones.

In the party house I went to we were all watching The Who halftime show. There was one thing we all wanted to see: how many Windmills would the guitarist do? It’s Pete Townsend’s thing you know. The line was 6. if you bet over 6, you would have won. He had done 5 by the time song 2/5 was done in their medley. We were all talking about this one: someone, probably a temp/roadie intern type of guy, had to have said “hey Pete, they’re betting on how many times you’ll do the arm-windmill thing” Pete goes “really? What’s the number?”, “6” intern replies, “Oh” Pete says, “I’m gonna F***ing crush that”

The big tip-off should have been during the pre game show, when they showed light footage of their rehearsal, and in Pete’s 2 seconds of face time, he cranks out 4-5 windmills. That was the giveaway: This guy was here to set a breeze the entire staium would feel. Final number was like 20-something. Maybe it was his way of seeming really cool, and making up for not smashing the guitar afterwards (another yes or no prop). That one seemed easy. Ever since the Jackson nip slip, the Super bowl committee has booked people too old to do any really good damage to the audience. Yeah, Pete can swing his arm, but is he really strong enough to lift that thing and break it? Don’t think so, easy win. Here’s some more results:

How long will it take Carrie Underwood to sing the National Anthem?

Over/Under 1 minute and 42 seconds

WINNER = OVER (1:45), DUH! Singers love to draw that sucker out! Over has won the last 2-3 years in a row now!


What color will the Gatorade dumped on the winning head coach be?

WINNER = Orange (5 to 1) * third biggest long shot. Orange is a classic flavor though, and in my mind, players would probably prefer that flavor in the cooler over some of the other colors (blue, lemon lime) that were available.


How many times will Archie Manning be shown on TV: over/under = 4.5

WINNER = UNDER *contrary to heavy action on “over”. Mike Strap said it best “This is the superbowl, they have more important things to show that certain people in the stands.” Even if he is tied to both teams.



How many times will Kim Kardashian be shown on TV: over/under = 2.5

WINNER = UNDER *contrary to heavy action on “over”. This was sketchy from the beginning. This isn’t like Kurt Warner’s wife, who overcame cancer etc. This is the girlfriend of a Running-Back in a timeshare situation. Easy call on the under here.


Will Kim K. Be shown in saints attire?

Winner= NO, because she was never shown, and we’ll never know what she was wearing.


Who will the Super Bowl MVP “thank” first?

WINNER = “does not thank anyone” (2 to 1). This is surprising, Usually there winner is “God”, “Teammates”, “Coach”, “Fans” etc. Considering MVP was going to be a quarterback, and Drew Brees is a “religious” guy to be PC, I would have thought thanks would have been given to someone if not God at least. Big shocker here.


How many times will Katrina be mentioned during the game? Over/Under 2.5

Winner= Under. This was a bit surprising, but also nice not to hear about it the whole time. I thought the announcers did a great job.

What’s higher, the sum of Kim K’s measurements or Reggie bush total rushing/receiving yards +28?

Kim=34+26+39= 99. Reggie Bush 25 yds rushing/38 receiving =63, +28= 91

Winner=Kim’s Junk. This was a silly, but close one!

 

Will a player give the crowd the "middle finger"?

Winner= no. Easy 8-1 take here too. These teams are way classier than Rex Ryan!

If Saints win, will Reggie Bush and Kim Kardashian be engaged by July 31, 2010? No = -150 (meaning the chance has been placed at 40 percent)


We’ve got about 6 months before this one is settled!


I’m a little astounded at the number Reggie/Kim K bets, but LA is a big market and there are 2 big ties there. And after all, there were over 300 bets this year, and I’m looking forward to picking some of the 300 next year as well!

It Is What It Is

I hate this saying. Used to anyways. It’s one of those sayings that comes out of someone’s mouth, and you kind of think “wow, thanks for contributing absolutely nothing to the conversation.”


And yet, it’s absolutely irrefutable. You can’t argue that “it isn’t what it is”. History is concrete, cannot be changed (unless you exist in the world of LOST? But that’s besides the point.) “It is what it is” turns out to be moreso advice than anything. A way to ground ourselves, put things in perspective, a nicer way to say GET OVER IT!

There’s a point in life where everyone is completely surprised by something, expecting fully one thing to happen (based on past experiences) and another thing totally happens. When the Patriots lost a perfect season in the Superbowl, even Giants fans were surprised. This team won 18 games in a row and even beat the Giants earlier in the year. Everyone who watched should have known “past experiences don’t guarantee future results”. It is what it is.

Wes Welker shouldn’t have played that last, meaningless 2010 regular season game for the Pats. He did play. Now he gets to sit for 16 games and playoffs next year. It is what it is.

There was a prop line on a sport betting site, odds that the Manning’s would beat the Donald’s in a commercial depicting an Oreo eating contest. This commercial was aired recently, and the Manning’s “won” because the Donald’s were arguing while the quarterbacks were frantically eating. It wasn’t a fair contest, just one team obliterating another that wasn’t even playing. Why is this so serious to me? Because anyone who was in production on the commercial could have dumped their entire life savings on the Manning’s, and made 14% instantly. Odds were Manning’s to win -700 (bet 7$ to win 1$). It was fixed, and many people missed out. It is what it is.

I recently bet on the Warriors, 3 times actually. Lost all 3 bets. My experience tells me “every time you bet on the Warriors, you will lose”. In truth, though, Golden State is 26-20 Against the Spread. They have this public perception that they’re so bad, it doesn’t matter what the line is, they will still not be able to cover it. 20 times that was true. 26 times it wasn’t. It is what it is. (By the Way, tonight against Dallas they are getting 12 points).

People who are new to gambling often have a tough time accepting this saying. If once you play blackjack and double down, and win, you have a perception: every time you have doubled down, you have won. This won’t always hold true. As betting on the Yankees isn’t always going to be winning proposition, betting the Devil rays isn’t always going to be a losing one.

Maybe writing this is just a little therapeutic for me. There are perceptions I need to accept, and let go of. I believe everyone has a few they could afford to lose. Can you think of something you expected that never happened? Or something you didn’t expect coming to existence? It’s good to have expectations. Keeps us sane, allows us to believe something instead of being apathetic to the world. But it’s also important to realize that what’s happened? Well, it’s happened. It is what it is.