Frank: Hey, remember how I waswondering when our epic 100th column would appear? I went to my files andpinned it down.
Artie: Great! When's the bigevent?
Frank: Last week.
Artie: Well, it saves on partyexpenses.
Frank: Even though this isColumn 101, we can review some of the themes we've presented for almost twoyears.
Artie: Um, such as?
Frank: That everyone involvedin running big-time sports seeks to move as much money as possible from ourpockets to theirs.
Artie: Not original, butalways true. Hey! I know another theme, but first we need to mark the passingof Hall of Fame pitcher Robin Roberts, whom I saw a couple of times at County Stadiumgoing against our Braves. That's Hall of Famer Robin Roberts, who had fewercareer shutouts (45), a higher ERA (3.41) and one fewer win (286) than…
Frank: Devoted readers knowwhat comes next.
Artie: That's right: BertBlyleven, who amazingly remains a non-Hall of Famer!
Frank: But he was only fivevotes short in last December's voting. When he succeeds this year, it'll join along line of our predictions to come true.
Artie: My memory's fuzzyagain. What were some of those predictions?
Frank: Well, I know youpredicted the Packers would play in the last Super Bowl.
Artie: And they darn near did,if losing in the first playoff round qualifies as "darn near."
Frank: The highlight of mybrilliance came in deserting my own team, the Yankees, last season. I said theywouldn't make the playoffs, so of course they went all the way.
Artie: I sure hope that's notan omen for our joint prediction that the Brewers will march back into theplayoffs this October.
Showing Some Sense
Frank: I know a recent exampleof our sage advice being accepted by a sports authority.
Artie: No kidding? Whichadvice was that?
Frank: The NCAA was thinking ofpumping up the Division I basketball tournament to a whopping 96 teams. We saidthat would be crazy, devaluing one of sports' most exciting events with atleast 25 undeserving teams.
Artie: We were OK with addinga handful of teams to the current 65. There are always a few teams that getscrewed by the 31 automatic spots for conference champions—but only a few.
Frank: And what did the NCAAdo? It added three teams to make it 68.
Artie: No need to thank us,NCAA. Sage advice is our business.
Frank: It's unclear howthey'll fit 68 teams into six rounds. But we can only do so much; themuckety-mucks have to figure out the details.
Artie: The NCAA figured oneout just fine. By opting out of the previous TV contract for the tournament,they got a new deal from CBS and Turner that's worth $10.8 billion.
Frank: Not that it's about themoney.
Artie: Somewhere in that $10.8billion they should be able to find a consulting fee for us.
Bowlfuls of Nothin’
Frank: At least holding thetournament to 68 keeps NCAA basketball from being the postseason joke that NCAAfootball is. There are more than 340 Division I basketball programs, so a96-team field would have had about 30% of them reaching the playoffs. Thatwould be nuts—but not as nuts as what happens in football.
Artie: You mean the endless,meaningless bowl games, ain'a?
Frank: There are only 120Division I football programs. But the NCAA recently said there would be 35 bowlgames next season—35! Which means 70 teams, almost 60% of the total, will getan extra game, and extra dough. But how many will deserve it? Last season eight teams went 6-6 but got intobowls; now there's talk that even a couple of 5-7 teams might qualify.
Artie: Let ’em go ahead. Iwon't be watching.
Frank: The newest bowl issomething called the New Era Pinstripe Bowl, which will be at Yankee Stadium.
Artie: That's the YankeeStadium that's in the Bronx, where it tends tobe cold in December? The Yankee Stadium that doesn't have a retractable roof?
Frank: True and true. Thisbowl will feature the third-best team in the Big East…
Artie: Cripes, do theyactually have four football teams in that hoops loop? Seems like Marquette might be thefourth-best, and they haven't had football in 50 years.
Frank: The opponent will bethe sixth-best team in the Big 12.
Artie: Holy cow, I mightrethink this. Or not.
Morons, Beware
Frank: How about the greatTaser incident last week?
Artie: I would love a Taser.Man oh manischewitz, do I ever have a list of candidates that deserve a goodjolt.
Frank: I let that sit. Butwhat about the teenager in Philly who called his father from the ballpark tosay he wanted to run on the field. The dad said he shouldn't, so of course hedid, and he got Tasered. Was that excessive force?
Artie: Not at all. Whensomeone runs on the field, no one knows his agenda. Does he just want to makehis buddies laugh or is he maybe packing a knife or a gun?
Frank: It hasn't happened yetin baseball, but a stabbing ruined Monica Seles' tennis career. Remember thefather-son team of Chicagoidiots…
Artie: You're being redundant.
Frank: …who pummeled Royalscoach Tom Gamboa in 2002? And I was covering the Brewers in 1999 when another Illinois drunk jumped on Houston's Billy Spiers in right field. Gamboaand Spiers weren't seriously hurt, but they could have been.
Artie: Fans, stay off thefreakin' field. There's another of our themes.
Granny Knows Best
Frank: And here's more goodadvice: Hitters, stay off Dallas Braden's freakin' mound.
Artie: That's the DallasBraden nobody heard of until he picked a fight with Alex Rodriguez last month.
Frank: The Oakland left-hander got riled when A-Rod,jogging back to first base after a teammate hit a long foul, went up the moundand directly over the pitching rubber.
Artie: In other words, whenA-Rod, for reasons known only to divas, did something nobody ever does inbaseball.
Frank: Exactly. I know itsounds silly to talk about the "unwritten rules" of the game...
Artie: Remember Davey Lopes,when he managed the Brewers, yelling at Rickey Henderson for stealing a baselate in a San Diegoblowout in ’01?
Frank: Some fans called Lopesa crybaby for invoking the "unwritten rules." But I think he wasright, if only because the guy involved was the self-obsessed Henderson, whowas just padding his stats.
Artie: Self-obsessed, you say?I wonder who else fits that description.
Frank: A-Rod, even though he'son my favorite team. I know Braden was dumb to overreact, implying there'll besome future showdown, but when A-Rod said he didn't realize what he'd done I said,"Baloney." The Yankees were losing and he was trying to get intoBraden's head.
Artie: Successfully.
Frank: Yeah, but he was justbeing a jerk. I heard some caller on a radio show claim that what A-Rod didhappens all the time. That's baloney too. I've seen something like 1,000major-league games in person and I've never seen it done.
Artie: A guy might run nearthe mound, but not up and over it.
Frank: Never. And by the way,the Yankees still lost.
Artie: Well, people knowBraden for something else now—the 19th perfect game in big-league history.
Frank: After he dominated Tampa Bayon Sunday, A-Rod tried to make nice, sort of.
Artie: While Braden'sgrandmother said, "Let's forget it, uh-huh—and stick it, A-Rod."
Frank: Stay tuned. The Yankeesreturn to Oaklandon July 5.
Artie: If Braden doesn't beanA-Rod, his grandma might.
