Well, as you probably know, I wrote for a couple of sports television shows, but I also did Internet reports on the NFL for a friend of mine in England. Well, hoes in Ireland now, but he’s still in the business, so he asked me to do a piece on this Sunday’s “Big game.” (Isn’t that the silliest thing – the NFL not allowing companies to use the words “Super Bowl” without paying royalties? Everyone knows what the television commercials and grocery store sales ads and others re talking about and it would seem like free publicity to me, but the No Fun League doesn’t want anyone taking anything from them. Funny – it doesn’t seen to hurt the World Series.)
Anyway, here is the site location:

http://bettingnews.boylesports.com/us-sports/nfl-odds/super-bowl-xliv-tips-030210.php

I know it’s more betting related, but I give what I’m asked for. We may end up doing this next season as well.

I admit that I have an addiction to DVDs. I have more movies than I can watch; more television shows then hours in a day. Every week, another package comes to my house with some video entertainment in it. Many are for The Indignant Daughters, but most are for me. The way I see it, I don’t have time to see most films in the theater and if I buy a film for $25 (counting Blu-Ray), I would have spent $11 for the ticket, another $10 on snacks, and another $5 for parking, and that’s not counting if The Indignant Wife or the kids come along. Making it worse, my annual sojourn to Toronto for the International Film Festival; there I see films that I wouldn’t even know existed, and often, they end up in the house too.
But there are two popular movies that may not be coming home and both involve black people: namely “Precious, …”; and “The Blind Side” Both films are successful, both have won Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild Awards, and both have been nominated for Academy Awards. But I don’t want to see them, much less let them in my house – but for different reasons.
“Precious” is the story of an obese teenage mother raped by her father and mother and her struggle to survive and attain her dreams. It is a powerful film, I’ve heard, but I just can’t decide whether or not to see it. It’s not because I believe that harrowing stories about African-Americans shouldn’t be made, or that it “paints” a bad picture on us. Just the opposite – I think that these stories should be told, and much more often. It’s just that I’ve seen women like this – I know people who were in similar straights, and I don’t think I need to see it. And I certainly can’t see myself watching it more than once. I want to support African-Americans in the arts and give them money, but personally, I am conflicted. I know that I will see it someday; perhaps on cable.
I’m less conflicted about the other film. A neighbor lent me the book “The Blind Side” about a white family that adopted a young black man and helped him through school and onto college. But, as the book makes clear, this would only be noteworthy because the young man is Michael Oher, a 380 lb, nearly 7 foot athlete who appears to have been born to be a football left tackle (the man who protects a right-handed quarterback’s “blind side”).
In real life, the family was headed by a couple who were alums and big boosters of the University of Mississippi, and I always felt while reading the book, that they were trying to get this kid help so that he could enroll at “Ole Miss” (which he did). While the white family did a great job in getting Oher educated; getting him tutors; taking care of him; I always felt an ulterior motive, especially when they thought about adopting more black kids in the future (with the subtext that they would all be athletes). I felt that even though they did a good thing, they were doing little more than running a scouting combine for Ole Miss.
Oher is now a successful tackle with the Baltimore Ravens, but the movie, from what I’ve heard, doesn’t center on him, it centers on the mother, played by Sandra Bullock. I’ve never been much of a fan of Ms. Bullock except for her breakout role in “Speed” in which she convincingly played a damsel in distress/love interest. She apparently takes over the movie. The mother in the book, while certainly a key person, was not at all the center of attention.
Which brings us, of course, to a major narrative problem; the white person at the center of any film about non-whites. Why is it that in so many movie, particularly mainstream Hollywood movies about ethnic people, there has to be a white person to “narrate?” I am thinking of Candace Bergin in “Gandhi,” or Peter O’Toole in “The Last Emperor.” Mr. Oher’s story is compelling enough (and in many ways similar to the story in “Precious”) that maybe he should be the center of the story? Or is this film’s message to make white people feel better about themselves?
And, of course, there is the “magic” Negro angle. In too many movies, blacks are the virtuous, preternaturally intelligent, almost mystical beings who help the white protagonists. Will Smith in “The Legend of Bagger Vance;” Michael Clarke Duncan in “The Green Mile,” Ruby Dee as “Mother Abigail” in “The Stand” play these roles, that while decent enough, don’t portray real black people at all, just myths. The Oher character here fits in the same role.
The Indignant Wife has mentioned that she might want to see “The Blind Side,” which means that I may have to see it someday. It is directed by John Lee Hancock, who directed one of the best sports films ever (and the best “G-rated, live action movie I’ve ever seen), “The Rookie” with Dennis Quaid, and I tend to want to see movies from directors I’ve enjoyed in the past. But I can’t say I’m lining up to see this. I’ve never ever seen an interview with Michael Oher; perhaps its because of his background and basic shyness; but I wonder what he thinks of the movie?

I don’t like all of the attention given to high school football players on “National Signing Day,” which was this past Wednesday. Insteead of just reading in the papers who the top local guys decided to play for in college, it is now a television event, with the ESPN “U” channel devoting 10 hours of coverage to show announcements, interview athletes and coaches. It’s a bad side show, but I must admit that I did read about who is coming to play at Northwestern.
But USC coach Lane Kiffin is pushing the envelope in a ridiculous way. Kiffin, who has made a name for himself as the infant terrible of football coaches, first as fired head coach of the Oakland Raiders, then going to the University of Tennessee where he got into verbal battles with Florida coach Urban Meyer and officials of the SEC; then caused students and alums to cry and damn near riot when he bolted after only one year to USC.
Well, the Dennis Rodman of football coaching this week made another headline – making a scholarship offer to a 13-year-old seventh grader for the 2015 freshman class. Admittedly, this is not just any kid – his name is David Sill. A clip on YouTube says that this kid from Bear, Delaware is “the best young phenom since Tiger Woods.” (No puns, please.)
The kid has spent time at DreamMaker, a quarterback camp established by QB guru Steve Clarkson, whose past students include Matt Leinart, Jimmy Clausen and Matt Barkley. He has been followed since the age of 11, and is already 6-foot tall and has more growing to do. Colleges and the NFL drool over big quarterbacks. And this isn’t the first time Kiffin has done this - last year, he offered a scholarship to 13-year-old Evan Berry, the younger brother of star Tennessee safety Eric Berry. The Berrys’ father, James, played at Tennessee, and Evan has a twin brother named Elliot, so, it makes sense that if you have an athletic father and older brother, perhaps you try and lock up one of the twins and perhaps get the other one as well.
But it’s sick. Sick for parents to send an 11-year-old kid to quarterback school. It’s sick for scouts, both paid and unpaid (the football version of pimps) looking out for children who may (the key word being MAY) be a top prospect some day. How many of these kids will end up injured, or not living up to the expectations? What happens if the kid isn’t interested in sports, or grows tired of it? And let’s not forget the skewed view of reality these kids get – do they ever really grow up and be normal, or at least happy? The poster boy for this of course was Todd Marinovich, a young kid groomed to be a quarterback his whole life by parents and coaches, and was drafted by the same Oakland Raiders and was a bust. He got into trouble with the law before disappearing into oblivion (at least from public view).
I don’t have boys, but I do have two beautiful girls who may want to play sports one day. The key word here is WANT – I don’t need them to “fulfill some fantasy” of mine to be rich and famous or play a sport. I hope that I’m secure enough in myself to not push them to do anything (other than homework).
The NCAA will probably institute new rules prohibiting coaches from doing this before Kiffin offers a scholarship to the unborn progeny of Tom Brady.

This past weekend and for the past three decades or so, I have ignored the Pro Bowl. Back when I was in my teens, the Pro Bowl was a must see, but it really hit the skids this year. This is saying a lot for a guy who watches a lot of NFL football - I saw more Raiders, Browns, and Bucaneers games than anyone should have to without being sentenced for a crime.
Of course, one problem has been that this is the only All Star Game in professional sports that was played after the season was over due, in great part, to the brutal nature of NFL football, and to the regimen that the game requires. In an attempt to deal with that this year, Commissioner Roger Goodell and the assorted brains with the league moved the game to the empty week between the Conference championship games and the Super Bowl. Of course, this means that the players from the 2 Super Bowl participants don’t play. The league figured out that most of the players from those two teams usually skip the All star game anyway.
Due to injury, however, many of the best players, particularly quarterbacks, opted out of playing. So, instead of Manning, Brees, Favre, Rivers or Rothlesberger playing, you had people like David Garrard and Matt Schaub playing. Schaub was deserving, as was Aaron Rodgers, but there were many better quarterbacks this season than Tony Romo and Garrard playing in the game was a joke.
The biggest knock on the game, of course, is that football is a contact game, and players are not going to hit each other with any authority for an “exhibition.” The best football players, especially in the trenches and on defense, play with huge chips on their shoulders and they try to knock their opponents on their asses. But not in a game where there’s no substantial money involved; where players know that injuries can happen at any time that can end careers and big money ; and the game is played at the end of the season, when everyone is tired, banged up, and just ready to go and heal up for next season. Plus, they didn’t even play the game in Hawaii anymore. It was played in Miami, site of next weekend’s Super Bowl.
I haven’t seen the ratings, but maybe the Pro Bowl has outlived its usefulness? I have long proposed that there be just one week between the conference finals and the Super Bowl, simply because we don’t need 6,000 journalists asking the same questions to 150 players and coaches on both sides. With the bye week, the NFL season already extends into February; we don’t need a second rate, half assed all star game played by disinterested players, for disinterested fans.
So, it’s time to cancel the Pro Bowl. The NFL and sportswriters can still vote for All Pro players and name the best at each position for both conferences, but do we need the seventh best players at each position sleepwalking through a meaningless exercise?

I have tried to avoid the full contact fighting sports. The Indignant Wife hates boxing, so I don’t even follow that anymore, but even if I was still watching boxing, I can’t see myself following two men beat themselves senseless in a miniature “Thunderdome” cage like a old wrestling match. If I want to watch that, I’ll go to a downtown Chicago bar about 1:00 AM on a Saturday morning and watch the drunks fight each other.
But I do have to talk about the latest fighter on the ultimate circuit – former running back Hershel Walker. The 47-year-old Walker fought in a match last Saturday night, and according to what I’ve read, won the match. I’ve seen pictures of Walker and video of him doing push-ups and doing things that I’ve never been able to do, even as a much younger man.
But Hershel Walker has always wondered, I think, what to do with himself besides football. My friends and I always joked back when Walker was playing because he said that when he was finished, he wanted to work for the CIA. We laughed because 1) it would be awfully hard for a man who has been in the spotlight in college and in the pros, to try and be a clandestine field officer; and 2) we thought that Walker has never been “the sharpest knife in the drawer” and that was before getting pounded in college and professional football, so how was Hershel Walker going to turn into 007?
Apparently, we were right on the second point – that Walker was much more comfortable showing his physical, not mental agility. So, like George Foreman, he is trying to beat Father Time, and unlike Ed “Too Tall” Jones, actually make a successful transition from football to a fighting sport. I only hope he doesn’t get what’s left of his faculties knocked out in some cage.

Well, now we know who will we will get tired of reading and hearing interviews with before the February 7th Super Bowl. Peyton Manning will lead the Indianapolis Colts into Miami for the second time in four years to play the New Orleans Saints, the franchise’s first ever appearance. As I think I wrote a few weeks ago, I don’t hate either team, so this is a match-up that is fine with me. Coming into the playoffs, especially with the Bears not competing, I started rooting against certain teams. As long as I draw breathe, I will hate the Green Bay Packers, so I was very happy when they lost. I’m more than tired of the NFL’s coaching version of Gollum (from Lord of the Rings), Bill Belichick and the New England Patriots, so I was actively rooting against them.
Then came this past weekend - coming into the Sunday games, I really had no great feeling between the Colts and the New York Jets, but as the game went on and the Jets took an early lead, I was worried that the Jets would make the Super Bowl. First, New Yorkers don’t need any reason to be obnoxious, and the Jets in the Super Bowl would have given them anyone reason to brag. Also, I feared that the Jets didn’t deserve it – they just got hot at the right time instead of being the best AFC team.
Fortunately, I didn’t need to worry – the Colts defense clamped down on the Jets and Manning shredded the Jets’ formerly number one rated defense to end up winning convincingly. By the way, one of the local Chicago sportswriters (I think it was a new guy) wrote one of the dumbest things I’ve read recently. He wrote that Peyton Manning needed to win another Super Bowl to solidify his legacy and Hall of Fame standing. Stupid! Peyton Manning has a Super Bowl victory (unfortunately over my favorite Bears), and he is rapidly putting up passing statistics that rank with the very best. On top of that, he is a “friendly” personality both to the press and to the average fan, which can be validated by the number of quality of his commercials. Considering that two of the best quarterbacks in the history of the game – Dan Marino and Dan Fouts – have one Super Bowl appearance between them and neither have a Super Bowl ring, but both are in the Hall of Fame, it shows that while having a title helps a QB get into the Hall, but a quarterback is not penalized if he played on bad teams (see also Peyton’s dad, Archie Manning).
The second game was the true gem – everyone knew that the Minnesota-New Orleans game would be a shootout, but the game actually justified the hype. Brett Favre had a big game for the Vikings, but, as was their nature during the season, turnovers hurt them badly. It is awfully hard to win a football game with 5 turnovers, two of which came in the Red Zone. Saints QB Drew Brees threw 3 touchdown passes, but most of the Saints’ points came off the turnovers. Vikings running back Adrian Peterson is one of the best runners in the game, but he fumbles too much, and until he can keep the fumbles to a minimum, he cannot be considered the best in the game. And Favre, for the second time in three years, threw a big interception in the NFC Championship Game (the first came two years ago against the Giants when Favre was still with the Packers). The Vikings were driving for a game winning field goal when Favre showed questionable judgment and gave it to the Saints, who went on the win in OT.
Like the Packers, since the Vikings play in the Bears’ division, I wanted to see them lose. Add to that the Brett Favre “am I retiring or aren’t I” stories, and I was really rooting against the Norsemen.

There are a lot of groaning White Sox fans this week as a result of the question as to whether the Sox would resign former designated hitter Jim Thome. Thome was traded to the Los Angeles Dodgers at the trade deadline last year to give him a chance to win a title with that team. As we all know, that didn’t happen, and the aged slugger remains a free agent, and by all accounts, Thome is a great person, a great teammate and would like to return to his home state of Illinois.
Sox Manager Ozzie Guillen was quoted in the paper that there was no greater fan of Thome than himself other than Thome’s wife, but Guillen nixed the trade for good reason. The stated reason is that Guillen refused to guarantee that Thome would get a large number of at bats, but let’s be honest – if Guillen carries 12 pitchers, which he likes to do, after you get to the eight position players and at least one extra catcher, that leaves 3 roster spots. Thome, as terrific a player as he is and has been, can’t play the field anymore, and is a very slow runner.
The Sox have Mark Kotsay, Andruw Jones, and regular first baseman Paul Konerko who each can play the field, are a little bit faster runners than Thome, and can play the field – giving Guillen many more options, can give the regulars a day off, and can still keep their bats in the lineup. Today’s Tribune says that the White Sox will miss the big thumper in the lineup, and that is true, but I think that the Sox will generate more runs with better base running, than always counting on the home run.
In this case, the local newspapers got ahold of this story and made a mountain out of a molehill, but if you want the White Sox to have a better chance to win, sometimes a tough choice has to be made. I love Jim Thome as a player to – a class act by any criteria and a Hall of Famer, but he may not be best for this team.