As a Father’s Day gift, the Indignant Wife got a babysitter for the Indignant Children yesterday afternoon, and we went to lunch and watched the film “Prometheus.” The wife thought that the movie was very slow; as a fan of “Alien” and “Aliens,” I LOVED it. But I’m confused. I saw a couple of articles last week saying that people didn’t know what was going on in the film; I admit that I think I’m pretty smart, but I certainly didn’t have any problem.
Spoiler alert!!!!
I chucked at the beginning of the film when we saw the first of the “Engineers” on a windswept plain. He looked like actor Woody Harrelson on steroids. Then we go to space. I loved the references to the other films – android “David” –same name as the kid android in A.I. The android sinking a basket while riding a bicycle, not unlike Ripley sinking a basket over her head in Alien Resurrection.
Did anyone really think that the old billionaire who financed the trip was dead? Of course, he was on the ship trying to find immortality. That the Alien spore was a bioweapon that turned on the “Engineers” then mutated into the monster we know so well from the other movies, was nicely done.
And all of the old Alien touchstones were there – strong woman (although Noomi Rapace’s character went through one helluva day with a self abortion of a monster then running around all over the place – she should have died at least 5 times); David getting his head removed from his body by the Engineer – like Ian Holm in the firm film and Lance Hendrickson in the second film. Of course, you had a human betrayed by the android as well like the first film, but helping our heroine survive like “Aliens.”
Visually, the film was a marvel – and I thoroughly enjoyed it. And it wasn’t that hard to understand.

I haven’t been as diligent in following professional tennis over the past few months, but I did get an opportunity to watch some this past weekend and I’d like to opine on the men’s and women’s champions at the French Open:
First, a tip of the hat to Maria Sharapova, who won the women’s singles and regained the number 1 ranking on the computer. Ms. Sharapova came on the scene like a rocket, winning Wimbledon at 17; gaining the number 1 ranking at 18, with her willowy blonde looks making her one of the most photographed women on the planet. All was well until 2008 when she injured her shoulder so badly that it required surgery. She didn’t play a tournament for a year, and when she returned, she was ranked 126th in the world.
Since returning, she has battled back to the Wimbledon and Australian Open finals in 2011 and 2012, but she lost both times. Not this past weekend; she took it to Sara Errano 6-3, 6-2 to win the French Open, giving her a career Grand Slam; only the 10th woman to achieve such a feat.
You have to give it to Ms. Sharapova; as she told SI.com, “I could have said, `I don’t need this. I have money; I have fame; I have victories; I have Grand Slams.’ But when your love for something is bigger than all those things, you continue to keep getting up in the morning when it’s freezing outside, when you know that it can be the most difficult day, when nothing is working, when you feel like the belief sometimes isn’t there from the outside world, and you seem so small. But you can achieve great things when you don’t listen to all those things.”
That is what makes a true champion, and she is one.
Then there were the men. Either way, history was going to be set: Rafael Nadal was trying to become the winningest player at Roland Garros’ clay – seven titles to break his tie with my all-time favorite Bjorn Borg. Novak Djokovic was going for a non-calendar grand slam – if he won, he would be the champion of all of the Grand Slams – the first time that has happened since a guy name Rod Laver (probably my second all time favorite) did it in 1969.
I got a chance to watch Nadal and Djokovic but by the time I started watching, Nadal was handily beating Djokovic. Nadal was returning Djokovic’s best shots, waiting for an opening, then hitting winners. He had Djokovic shaking his head. In the third set, I thought it was all over but the shouting, even after a rain delay halted proceedings. But Djokovic rallied, down 2-1, he rattled off six straight game wins, and it looked like Nadal would crumble as he had done before Djokovic in the finals of the last three Grand Slams.
The match was suspended and Nadal ended up winning, but I have to wonder whether Djokovic would have won if the rain hadn’t come and stopped play yesterday? If Djokovic had won the fourth set, it may have set up one of the greatest sets in history. Now, we won’t know.

I thought that by the time I got around to writing about it, the Stanley Cup finals would be over. The Los Angeles Kings had won despite being outplayed in 1½ of the games. But Kings’ goalie Jonathan Quick looked unstoppable, and the Kings played off of that to a 3-0 lead.
But then, the New Jersey Devils gained their composure and Martin Brodeur played at a high level for a 40-year-old guy (but not a surprise, of course, since he will be in Toronto accepting his enshrinement into the Hockey Hall of Fame whenever he decides he’s done). But the Kings have been lucky, and haven’t played very well in games 4 and 5 and unless they get it together, we will have game 7 hockey this week.
Long time readers know that I’m not much of a basketball fan, and still aren’t, but I admit to being disappointed that the Celtics ran out of gas and couldn’t finish off the hated Miami Heat. If the old men could have sent LeBron James home for another summer, it would have been fun to watch all of the bloodletting that would be happening on South Beach. Would Chris Bosh be history? Certainly, there would be a coaching change. All of the talk of guaranteed championships, ESPN specials, would be egg on LeBron’s face.
Fortunately, there is still one more series – the Heat face the Oklahoma City Thunder with scoring champion Kevin Durant and Michael Westbrook. The Thunder are young, hungry, and certainly aren’t intimidated by the Heat.
Let’s hope the young men knock off the slightly older men.

Tim Thomas is a nut. He is also a great goaltender. He angered many (myself included) when he refused to go to the White House because of President Obama. (I did love the Washington Capitals fans that held Obama face masks against the glass when Thomas came on the ice. It was better still when the Bruins got ousted by the Capitals.)
But Thomas has said recently that he is considering sitting out next season to spend more time with his family and his faith. At first, I thought that Thomas has really been sipping too much of the communion wine. At 39 years of age, he is much closer to the end of his career than the beginning, and he probably can’s expect to take a year off and then return to star status.
But, it appears to be a ploy. There have been trade rumors, especially with Tekka Rask a budding star, who has been patiently waiting for Thomas to come to the end of the line. Thomas just wants some say in where he plays, Boston or elsewhere. If this is true, Thomas is not as much of a nut.
As someone who has yearned to be a professional sportswriter for nearly all of my life, it pisses me off when someone who has “made it” makes a dumb mistake. One of those times came recently, when one of the hockey writers for the Chicago Sun-Times was conjecturing about upcoming free agent Zach Parise coming to the Blackhawks. OK – the odds are probably better that I’m going to signed by the Hawks, which would be something since I can’t skate, but OK, fans can dream. What made me angry was that he was projecting that the NHL salary cap would be around $70 million next season, giving the Hawks cap space to sign Parise.
There’s one HUGE problem with this scenario – the NHL collective bargaining agreement expires at the end of the season, and the league and the players’ union haven’t had one negotiating session. Considering that the last time the CBA expired, the NHL cancelled an entire season, and add the fact that the players’ union is now headed by Donald “Know No” Fehr who used to run the baseball players’ union, you can’t project next year’s salary cap since it will be strongly contested; in fact, the chance that there will be a season has to be looked at as questionable.
The writer doesn’t even mention this fact; just happy wishful thinking. It was lazy reporting.

I grew up watching boxing. I still love it, but since The Indignant Wife hates boxing, I haven’t watched very much for a very long time, but I see the 20/7 pre-fight series that run on HBO from time to time, so I kind of know who is fighting, and so I’ve heard of junior welterweight Manny Pacquiao
Pacquiao fought Timothy Bradley last Saturday night and lost in a split decision. As you can guess, I did not see the fight, but there’s a lot of outrage coming from the controversial decision. Boston Herald columnist Ron Borges (quoted by Peter King in his SI.com article today) wrote “A lot of things are legal in Las Vegas that are not legal anywhere else. Last night robbery was among them.”
It was reported that CompuBox, which charts how many punches each fighter throws in a fight, had Pacquiao throwing more punches that landed in 10 of the 12 rounds, with one round a draw. Surmised Borges: “That means Bradley somehow won a fight in which he was outpunched in all but one round.”
This fight has to be reviewed closely, especially since there was supposedly a flood of late money bet on Saturday on Bradley, which was strange considering Pacquiao was favored by the oddsmakers and most pundits.
This is FAR from the first smelly decision that boxing has tried to perpetrate on the public. In the old days, it was organized crime paying to throw a match. I think that fell out of favor by the 1970s, but the ridiculous calls continued; usually, it was done to build up a big money rematch. Maybe that’s what is happening here as well.
Some writers are saying that this travesty of justice is the final nail in the coffin of boxing. Others are saying that this will finally bring about the kind of investigation that has been needed for decades in the sport. Honestly, I think it is neither. Boxing is in trouble, but if talented, charismatic boxers, especially in the heavyweight class emerge, people will start paying attention again. After all, mixed martial arts is very popular, so people will pay to watch guys beat each other.
Will there be an investigation? Perhaps, but will there be a “smoking gun” of evidence to prove the fight was fixed? Is there the political will to drag people out from under their rocks and show how dirty boxing has always been and try to clean up the sport? I wish there was, but I doubt it.
Again, I don’t know much about this fight, but if Don King had anything to do with it, anything is possible.

As I have written here several times, I have long believed that more needed and continues to need to be done to protect professional athletes from head injuries, especially football and hockey players. CTE, or CTE or Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy has appeared in the brains of a significant number of NFL and NHL athletes’ autopsies, but the issue is that it can only be detected after death. Tests on live subjects and possible means of treating the disease are years away at best.
But still, numerous lawsuits are being filed by ex-players against the league saying that various health issues were caused by negligence on the part of everybody from the commissioner to trainers to coaches. Hall of Fame runner Eric Dickerson just joined all those other retired players in filing lawsuits against the league.
My point has been that since CTE was only discovered recently, it is impossible to blame the sport or the league for negligence of something no one knew even existed.. There is a big difference between knowing that football can be bad for you, and proving that the league somehow knew exactly how. (To me, I compare this logic to the tobacco industry that had numerous studies that showed that cigarettes were harmful to smokers’ health and they hid the reports for as long as possible. No such studies exist here.)
Long time readers also know of my fandom for the 1970s era Oakland Raiders, who were outlaws, who played hard and partied hard, but also won. So, I was interested in the article that was written by Terry Moore and posted on SI.com.
Mr. Moore interviewed Raider safety Lester Hayes and asked whether coaches, team executives or even leagues are responsible for the epidemic of long-term injuries to current and former players.
Moore wrote:”(d)espite his lifelong battle with stuttering, he said clearly, ‘It’s all on the players, not anybody else, because the players have the same gladiator genes that existed in Rome over 2,000 years ago. They have a love of football to the 10th power. So the players make the final call. Trust me. No matter what they are told by doctors or anybody else, they will fight to play.’”
We all know that there have been at least 12 suicides involving former NFL players during the last 25 years, including perennial Pro Bowl defenders Junior Seau and Dave Duerson within the last 14 months. According to the lawsuits players, this is all related to the league’s negligence in fully explaining the health risk of concussions to players, and the league is not allocating enough of its estimated $9 billion in total revenue each season toward the proper care of its current and former player.
Mr. Moore continues: “All Hayes knows is that, at 57 and in the midst of his decades-long run as a football youth coach in Modesto, his health is just fine after his 10 years with the Raiders through 1986. No knee or back troubles. Definitely no post-concussion woes. Remember, too, that Hayes played during that generation of Raiders teams noted for mixing it up so much that he said the collisions “sounded like a 12-gauge shotgun blast.” He contributed to more than a few of those blasts with noted enforcers for the Raiders such as Jack Tatum, George Atkinson, Ted Hendricks and John Matuszak. ‘Lord, have mercy. It’s so much safer to play in the NFL these days than during my time,’ Hayes said.
This is my big point – should the league do more to lessen head injuries to players? Yes, of course; and the league is moving in that direction. I don’t think that players can prove that they knew for a certainty that the hard hits lead directly to head injuries other than anecdotal stories. So, I don’t think that players can come up with a “smoking gun,” which is what I think would be crucial to win these suits. So, it comes down to the question – is this just a blatant money grab by former players who squandered their money away in hard living and bad investments? I’ve had a little bit of contact with Dickerson when he was playing and I wouldn’t say that he is the most altruistic and scrupulous person I’ve ever met, so I must question the motives of some of these players.

It is the nature of today’s culture and social media that any comment by anyone if grist for the universal mill. Now, you make a comment, or get drunk on the ground like Blackhawks forward Patrick Kane, and suddenly, it’s everywhere. Chicago White Sox announcer Ken “Hawk” Harrelson learned that lesson this week.
So, it was a slow news day earlier this week when the White Sox were playing the Tampa Bay Rays. In Tuesday’s game, Sox catcher A.J. Pierzynski tried to break up a double play by coming in spikes high on Rays second baseman Ben Zobrist. As anyone knows, Pierzinski will do almost anything to win; an attribute that makes him loved by the teams he plays for and their fans, and hated everywhere else.
Nothing else happened in Tuesday’s game, but someone was still PO’d about it because Pierzinski was plunked by a pitch, seemingly in retaliation. Neither bench was warned about ejections for retaliation by the umpires. In the fourth inning, Sox pitcher Jose Quintana threw a pitch behind Zobrist that landed against the backstop. Immediately, home plate umpire Mark Wegner ejected Quintana, and then automatically ejected Manager Robin Ventura.
That was the last straw for Hawk, who went ballistic. “What are you doing? He threw him out of the ballgame, you’ve got to be bleepin’ me!” Harrelson said. “What in the hell are you doing? What are you doing Wegner? You got to be kidding me. That is so bad that is absolutely brutal. That is unbelievable. I’ll tell you what, they have got to start making guys be accountable. That is totally absurd. Here’s an umpire in the American League that knows nothing about the game of baseball. They have got to do something about this. They have got some guys in this league that have no business umpiring. They have no business umpiring because they don’t know what the game of baseball is about.”
The rant has gone viral, being replayed on the airwaves and the Internet, and so, of course, MLB Commissioner Bud “Head In The Sand on Steroids” Selig contacted Harrelson to tell him, I think, to lay off the umpires. Harrelson told ESPNChicago.com (quoted on the Chicago Tribune website) that he got a phone call from Selig. “We had a talk,” he said. “Actually, Bud talked and I listened. If it was a prize fight, they would have stopped it in the first round. I also talked to (White Sox owner) Jerry (Reinsdorf), and I listened to him as well. That’s all I really have to say.”
Harrelson reportedly will address the rant on tonight’s broadcast, and I’m sure that he will give an apology, even though he probably thinks he has nothing to apologize for. And I would agree with him.
I saw a writer for Sports Illustrated basically say that Harrelson was wrong by the unwritten rules of baseball, but the big point here is that neither bench was warned after Pierzinski got hit by the pitch, so, the implication was that the Rays had the right to hit Pierzinski even one day later when no one threw at him during the game in which he spiked Zobrist. I bet that Harrelson was saying that when Quintana warned the Rays that future stray throws would be met by retaliation, he was also upholding the unwritten rules on baseball – throw at mine and you can expect a throw toward yours.
Is this right and proper? No, but like fighting in hockey, there are times when you have to stand up for a teammate, and if the officials are unable or unwilling to do that, it’s up to the players.
So, without the warning, when he automatically tossed Quintana and Ventura, Harrelson got pissed and rightly so in my opinion.