Tampa Bay Sports Blog

I got a ton a phone calls and text messages yesterday when the Bucs released Brooks, Dunn, June, Hilliard and Galloway. Thank god I was at work or I may have done something stupid. I can understand or deal with all of those moves except for Derrick Brooks. Why Brooks? Is there a plan to bring him back? I can’t fathom this and I really don’t know what to say about it yet. I will try to get my head around it this weekend, but I just don’t see the sense in it right now. I have to throw a tantrum before I go to work now, so I’ll catch up with you later.

Technorati Tags: Cato June, Derrick Brooks, Ike Hilliard, Joey Galloway, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Warrick Dunn

I finally got my twitter feed working again!

I’m not going to pile on an already bad team here, they know they suck. I just am confused as to what they are trying to accomplish on the ice. I’ve only seen bits and pieces of the Bolts over the last couple weeks and I finally watched a couple full games last night and this morning. After watching I am completely lost at what the Lightning are doing on the defensive end still. I have questioned their defensive scheme and plan since last season and things look the same.

I get confused because of this. Any team in any sport that is bad can improve by working harder and sticking to the plan on defense. I’ve posted the video of the Jason Strudwick goal from last nights game against Edmonton as an example. The team still bunches up around the goalie too much, doesn’t attack on the wing and gets caught standing around too often. It’s just an ugly thing to watch right now and I am finding it harder and harder to stomach these games.

The one bright spot over the last month or so has been the improved play of Steve Stamkos. Stamkos is starting to look like the player we hope he can become and he should improve dramatically over the next couple years as he gains some much needed size and maturity.

I will always be a fan of this team, but it may be time to start getting nasty with these guys.

Technorati Tags: Edmonton Oilers, Jason Strudwick, Steve Stamkos, Tampa Bay Lightning

Rafer Alston came over to the Orlando Magic last week in their big trade deadline deal and looks like he’s going to fit in nicely. He has played two games, starting one, and helped the Magic get victories against the Heat and Bobcats. Alston is a true point guard and increase scoring opportunities for everyone else. The deal came shortly after the Tyronn Lue deal and that’s what leaves me scratching my head. It’s obvious at this point that the Magic threw everything they had into the Alston deal and are counting on him to lead them to the promised land.

Prioritizing these things, I like the Alston deal. It will help the team this year and should help in the next season or two, assuming that Alston takes the back seat to Nelson next year with a good attitude. The Lue deal still irks me and is one of the dumbest moves the team has made to date. Lue already played here and didn’t work out. He is younger than Anthony Johnson yet looks less athletic. He wasn’t an upgrade over Johnson and dealing away Keith Bogans for him was completely stupid and was a knee jerk reaction to Jameer Nelson going down that shouldn’t have happened.

All that being said, every team makes dumb decisions sometime and the Magic at least made the deal for Alston to attempt to fix things. I would still rather see Bogans coming off the bench in playoff time, but that doesn’t matter now. The one thing we all need to see is how well Alston plays against Boston, Cleveland and Detroit. Those are the teams that matter and that is the only thing that will show us how well this deal will work out.

The Magic head to Chicago tonight and I’ve got a feeling we’re gonna see another big game from Dwight so tune in and see if I’m right.

Technorati Tags: Boston Celtics, Charlotte Bobcats, Chicago Bulls, Cleveland Cavaliers, Detroit Pistons, Dwight Howard, Jameer Nelson, Keith Bogans, Miami Heat, Orlando Magic, Rafer Alston, Tyronn Lue

Dwight Howard lost the dunk contest tonight to Nate Robinson. He should have and he took part in his own loss. He didn’t lose because he was bad and he didn’t lose because Nate Robinson was so good. He lost because he decided to stand still under Robinson as he dunked over him. Nate Robinson played Lex Luthor to Dwight Howard’s superman and Dwight took part in it. I’ll throw the video up for you tomorrow, but it was fairly nice. The NBA skills competition overall tonight was terrible though. Dwight brought me back last year with his performance in the dunk contest so I decided to watch al of the competition this year. Oops, my bad. It sucked in every way and I will not watch next year’s unless there are naked women promised. If you didn’t watch any of it and decided to do something as exciting as staring at an unlit light bulb, you had more fun than I did. I’ll post a video of the dunk that Robinson won on because it was good and Dwight took part in it, but the hype surrounding the entire thing was silly. I would have rather listened to  Charles Barkley discuss his hideous betting techniques for a month than watch the couple hours of the crappy skills competition that I watched tonight. Off to my temporary Valentine’s place now, talk to ya tomorrow!

Technorati Tags: Charles Barkley, Nate Robinson, NBA, Valetine's Day

Another quick note here. Dwight Howard needs to top the actual best “dunk” from last year to win, not the best “dressed” dunk. The superman thing was cool, but it wasn’t a dunk, he threw it in. The backboard tap was the sickest thing anyone saw and that’s what he needs to beat. I don’t know how he can beat it by way, but that’s what it’s all about. Look at what I’m talking about below.

Technorati Tags: Dwight Howard, Orlando Magic

It shows the state of the athletes in the NBA when a guy like Daequan Cook wins the 3-point shootout. I didn’t expect Rashard Lewis to win, I would have been just as disappointed if he did, but I did expect the guy (Jason Kapono) with the best shot to take it. That was the ugliest thing I’ve ever watched. Hope the dunk contest is better. Dwight needs to represent!

Technorati Tags: Daequan Cook, Dwight Howard, Jason Kapono, NBA, Orlando Magic, Rashard Lewis

The Rays have had a fairly busy offseason and now look pretty well set for the upcoming 2009 season. They have signed a few minor league free agents over the last few weeks to fill things out, including Morgan Ensberg. Ensberg wil most likely end up playing 3B in Durham but is a very nice low risk acquisition. He looked like an up and coming power hitter 6 years ago and hit 94 homeruns from ‘03 to ‘06. He fell off after that and has hit 13 homeruns since with Houston, San Diego and the Yankees. He could win a bench job and could  be needed if injuries hit either Evan Longoria or Carlos Pena. I like the move with Ensberg.

All in all, it was a pretty good offseason for the Rays. I love the Matt Joyce/Edwin Jackson swap and I really think the Rays stole one there. Joyce will most likely start the season in the minors also as the Gabe platoon (Kapler/Gross) will hold down RF until the Rays feel he’s ready. When you look at how the Rays handle their organization they have seemingly set themselves up pretty nice. Joyce can stay in Durham and develop until either he’s ready or Gross/Kapler can’t handle the job. King David can also start in the minors and develop a little more while Jeff Niemann and Jason Hammel fight it out for the fifth starter/long reliever role. Make no mistake here as Price will take over for whoever wins this starter job, but it could work out to be a nice showcase for these guys. If someone goes down in the rotation these guys could be valuable, if not they could maybe bring a couple decent prospects back in a deal and stack up the farm system a little more. A nice situation here on the surface.

All the moves the Rays have made this offseason make sense and have seemingly improved an already good team. I also like the Brian Shouse move and think he’ll be an improvement over Trever Miller. There’s a lot of ex-Brewers on the roster, aren’t there? The Rays couldn’t be more lucky with the Bradford injury coming now either could they? Not that injuries are lucky, but it narrows down the bullpen battles in the short term and gives them another arm coming back in May or June that could step right in and be productive as we have already seen from him. I may pick on the Rays here and there for some moves, as any fan will, but it’s hard to argue with what they’ve done here and I have never gone into any prior season with more confidence and so little to bitch about as this one. It should be another great season and I am looking forward to seeing how the Sox and Yanks match up to our AL Champs.

Technorati Tags: Boston Red Sox, Brian Shouse, Carlos Pena, Chad Bradford, David Price, Durham Bulls, Evan Longoria, Gabe Gross, Gabe Kapler, Houston Astros, Jason Hammel, Jeff Niemann, Matt Joyce, Milwaukee Brewers, MLB, Morgan Ensberg, New York Yankees, San Diego Padres, Tampa Bay Rays

It’s time for the Bolts to admit that this is a rebuilding year and just start heaving the young players into the lineup to take their lumps. It’s time for the youngsters to show and prove. I have seen enough from this team this year to know that they are not going to improve behind the constant shifting of players in and out or behind some of the veterans that were supposed to fill team needs. Mike McKenna is exactly what this team needed right now. A young guy with some fire in his belly who can give this team a youthful shot of exuberance and excitement. It’s now known that Mike Smith is suffering from post concussion syndrome and I don’t see any need to rush this guy back. They need to let the young guys take over between the pipes and see who can hold their own in this league. We all know that Mike Smith is the guy and he will be until someone dethrones him, which is highly unlikely, so there should be no worries about that.

Follow the Rays my children. Get young, fiery and put some guys out there who will learn and develop. Find the guys who want to earn a job on this team and give them all they can handle. I have to think at this point that a someone like St. Louis would rather be on the ice with some young inexperienced guys who want to be there than some experienced players who are going through the motions.

It’s time for reality to set in on everyone. This team is not making the playoffs and need to start building toward the future. More playing time is needed for the youngsters and less for the so called veterans. Everyone loves the Mike McKenna story and the Lightning need to start chasing more of those types of stories than whatever they’ve been chasing so far. We need the youth movement to happen and we need it now.

Technorati Tags: Martin St. Louis, Mike McKenna, Mike Smith, Tampa Bay Lightning, Tampa Bay Rays

There were a few crazy things that went on over the last couple weeks that I wanted to touch on and didn’t have time, but nothing got my attention more than the A-Rod deal. There has already been a tremendous amount of backlash on this situation and some of it is just funny. The dumbest thing I’ve seen written so far is what Bill Madden of the New York Daily News wrote about releasing A-Rod (hat tip to Mets Police for that one). Madden wants the Yankees to cut A-Rod, no matter the cost, in order to make a statement. The Yankees have more money than any team in baseball and they show it consistently with their ridiculous spending sprees, but not even the Yankees can justify writing off $270 million. This has to be the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen a legitimate reporter write. The Yanks already looked like idiots for paying Rodriguez the amount of money they did before A-Rod was a known steroid user. If they get nothing out of him AND spend that money they would look worse, not better Bill. There is no statement they could make that is worth a quarter billion dollars.

I want to take this A-Rod thing in a different direction though. I’m not going to defend him, but the fact that the test that he popped on was supposed to be anonymous and got leaked is an atrocity and will do nothing but worsen the already rocky relationship between the players union and MLB. We haven’t heard A-Rod come out and say anything yet, but it’s coming soon as he has a ceremony in his honor upcoming at the University of Miami. In the aftermath of all of this I think Rodriguez could use this scenario as an opportunity to better his relationship with other players and actually boost himself in the eyes of others.

Follow me here. In my opinion this is what I think he should do. First off, he needs to come out and admit to doing steroids in the past in order to keep up with what he thought other players were doing. I could be wrong, but I don’t believe his contract can be voided if the test he was positive for was supposed to be anonymous. If he does this he can take some of the stink off of him in the eyes of the public and immediately turn the Government away from him. If he lies, the Government will want him to come in and testify under oath and go after him similar to Bonds, Clemens, etc. This has to be his first step toward redemption.

The next thing I would like to see Alex do is demand that the rest of the tests be destroyed and insist that no one else’s name be leaked and tarnished. If he falls on the sword and leads the charge against those who leaked this info he could become a much more popular figure within the players fraternity. Nearly every player would applaud and respect him for doing such a thing. It would also show some backbone and fortitude, which is something he gets knocked for lacking.

I would also like to see him lead the charge against Bud Selig and lobby to have him removed as the commissioner of Major League Baseball. What has gone on under Selig’s watch is atrocious and he needs to be held accountable for it. Rodriguez is the latest casualty under the mismanagement of Bud Selig.

I don’t feel sorry for Alex, the Yankees or anyone else in this, but the fact that the test he has popped for was supposed to be anonymous and just used “to measure the amount of users there were” is unacceptable. This is the same thing as police versus criminals. There are supposed to be rules limiting the cops to what they can do in order to catch a criminal and that’s why we call it justice. The smart criminals stay ahead of the cops and the good cops figure out how to catch them, legally! That’s the game and that’s how it’s played. There are always some cops and some criminals playing outside the lines, but the rules are in place to help maintain order. This situation with A-Rod is exactly the same. Alex will have to come to grips with the fact that his legacy is tainted and that it can’t be fixed on the field now. He can raise himself up in other ways now by not only holding himself accountable, but forcing those that caught him to be accountable also. Bud Selig gets too much credit for his newfound tough drug policy these days. Did everyone forget that MLB and Bud Selig had to be dragged in kicking and screaming by Congress in order to finally do something about it to begin with? Selig has done some stupid things as commissioner, as most any commissioner will, but this needs to be his final blunder.

You shouldn’t be the highest paid commissioner in sports if you’re going to allow crap like this. This was flat out wrong and shady. There is no argument for Selig either because this is his baby. He can’t play ignorant because he should have been monitoring this as close as possible. Alex Rodriguez’s life as he knows it is over. If he thought people were negative toward him before, just wait and see how he gets treated now. There is no excuse for what he did and he has created the attention himself by being the most greedy athlete we’ve seen to date, but he can still come out of this ok if he owns up to it and grows a pair (hard to do on roids, I know).

I’m going to get sick of this story pretty quick, but I do want to see how it plays out.

Technorati Tags: Alex Rodriguez, Barry Bonds, Bud Selig, New York Yankees, Roger Clemens, Tampa Bay Rays, University of Miami