Archive for December, 2007

By Mike Stiriti

Sitting on my winning record and not picking Week 17 would be like a guy who has the batting title wrapped up by half a point and sitting out the last game of the season. Bush league.

I suppose I’ll regret making these picks if I go 1-15 and drop below .500, but if the Pats are going to go all out on the final weekend, so should I.

The Picks:

Patriots -14 over GIANTS
This game originally opened at -14.5. When Vegas opens a game at -14.5 it means 1 thing: They want you to take the dog. They want you to think “hmmm, the Pats will win, but probably just by 2 touchdowns. I’ll take New York.” RULE #1: If Vegas wants you to do something, do the opposite.

EAGLES -7.5 over Bills
Same logic as above.

BUCS +2.5 over Panthers
I don’t care if Tampa Bay has a playoff spot wrapped up. I don’t care if they will be sitting their starters. They are dogs at home and are a much better team. For the Panthers, 2008 can’t come quickly enough.

Bengals -3 over DOLPHINS
I’m tempted to use my Panthers logic here too, since Cincy is another underachieving team that can’t wait to get to the offseason. That said, the Dolphins can’t stop anybody and the Bungles can still put up points.

REDSKINS -9 over Cowboys
Definitely don’t know what to expect in this one. The ‘Skins have been up and down all year, while Dallas hasn’t looked great in December. TO won’t be playing and Washington needs a win to get in the playoffs, so they should take care of business.

PACKERS -4 over Lions
At Lambeau: check
Late December: check
Favre: check
Green Bay coming off an embarassing loss: check

Jags +6.5 over TEXANS
Picking a 7-8 Houston team to cover a 6.5 point spread against one of the best 5 teams in the league is like getting drunk and hooking up with a fat chick. Under normal circumstances you would never do it, but you think to yourself “hey, its week 17…what happens in week 17 stays in week 17…right? Right guys???” Wrong. Just because Jacksonville is benching its stars does not mean you should bench your inhabitions.

BEARS +2 over Saints
New Orleans needs a win for their playoff hopes, but the Bears are coming off an impressive thrashing of Green Bay. Hmmm…a dilemma. To break this tie I will use my “who would win in a mascot fight” theory. Since a bear would most certainly maul a religious person, I’m taking Chicago.

Steelers -3.5 over RAVENS
I don’t care if Pittsburgh plays their 5th string, Baltimore sucks. Good teams find ways to win games they should lose, and bad teams find ways to lose games they should win. Baltimore is a bad team.

Seahawks +2.5 over FALCONS
I don’t care if Seattle plays their 5th string, Atlanta sucks. Good teams find ways to win games they should lose, and bad teams find ways to lose games they should win. Atlanta is a bad team.

49ers +10 over BROWNS
The Niners look to be on the up and up, while Cleveland has all but pissed away their playoff chances. Look for Cleveland to pull it off, but it won’t be pretty.

BRONCOS +3 over Vikings
Mile High in the dead of winter still means something, especially against a dome team.

Chargers -8 over RAIDERS
If San Diego is going to do anything in the playoffs they need to keep their momentum going. I just hope they know that.

Rams +6 over CARDINALS
Stephen Jackson is more aware of fantasy football than any other player in the league. He knows that he has owners counting on him in championship games this week and he will play like a beast.

Chiefs +6 over JETS
THEY PLAY, TO WIN, THE GAME!

COLTS +6.5 over Titans
Here we go Jim Sorgi!

Last Week 7-8
Season 52-40-5

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By Craig Juer

Turns out I could be wrong.

Allow me to quote myself in a Dec. 2 post regarding the likelihood of the New England Patriots going undefeated.

No, the Patriots will not go undefeated, and here’s why: NFL teams don’t go undefeated.

I’ll be honest, at the time I thought there was certainly a good chance the Patriots would go undefeated. I didn’t consider it likelier of the two possibilities, but I wasn’t ruling it out – in my mind. In this forum, though, I was hoping to set myself up for some delicious vindication, just like I said to anyone who asked me on the street if I thought the Patriots would go undefeated.

In Week 16, perhaps Chris Berman will be on ESPN bemoaning Tom Brady’s second concussion in as many games along with Randy Moss’ banishment for a violation of the substance abuse policy, and we’ll be feeling silly for assuming the Patriots were likely to go undefeated.

We’ll be feeling silly! How sheepishly we’ll look back on our naïve perspectives once we realize the embarrassment of having asked such silly questions as “Can the Patriots win 16 consecutive games in the same calendar year against 13 organizations competing in the league that’s considered the most even playing field of any major team sport?” and “Will eight magic deer and a diabetic elf visit us in the night and reverse-burglarize our houses?”

But not me, of course. I, the skeptic, knew not to pursue the fairy tales that wishful thinking promotes. So there I sat, as first the Colts, then the Eagles, and finally the Ravens frittered away opportunities to spoil NFL history, surreptitiously aborting the sarcastic text messages with which my cell phone was prematurely cocked and loaded.

If I intended to stick to my convictions and deny, wholeheartedly, the likelihood that the Patriots would go undefeated, I’d be a fool not to place a serious portion of my gambling funds on the Giants’ money line this week. When Mike asks me, as he is sure to do this week, “Who beats the Patriots??” I’d stubbornly reply: “The Giants, of course! There’s no one else left, so it must be them.”

But I won’t. I fully expect the Pats to complete the perfect regular season. I think Bill Belichick’s Plan A, logically, would be to play his starters for the first half and hope his team has enough of a cushion at the break to throw it in cruise control/playoff preparation mode for quarters three and four while still finishing the season blemish-free. Conventional wisdom might say that if he was planning to do that, he wouldn’t have had Tom Brady drop back to pass 36 times in an equally “meaningless” game against Miami last week. The difference this week is, firstly, that the Giants are notoriously good at hitting the quarterback, and if there’s any one injury that would seriously threaten a Patriots Super Bowl run, it would be to Tom Brady.

The other difference is that some other teams have caught up to New England in securing their playoff credentials, and will be benching starters of their own. The Colts, who have emerged this season as the casual fan’s preference in their rivalry with the suddenly “sinister” Patriots, won’t gain a thing by beating the Titans and have already announced that they’ll be giving their backups plenty of action. The Giants themselves have nothing left to prove in the regular season and might give their starters some time off; certainly everyone on the injury report who would gut it out for a must-win scenario will be kept in street clothes. How prideful would the Patriots allow themselves to look if the requirement for completing the perfect season is to send out Brady, Moss, et al. against a sleepwalking Giants team with bigger aspirations in mind?

But in all likelihood it won’t come to that. The Pats’ starters are better than the Giants’, and their backups are better than the Giants’ backups. Belichick probably won’t have to spend much time worrying about how hard to push the gas pedal, because it ought to be a downhill ride after a short while. Either way, the Patriots have won enough rings that no one has the right to criticize how they go about preparing for the playoffs.

And yes, I’m rooting for the Giants. This is partially because I personally don’t like the Patriots, for several reasons (and I could and would debate any of them). They most certainly like to run up the score (opinion on this is a variable dependent on whether the beholder is a Patriots fan or isn’t one, I’ve found). Belichick, by most accounts, is a condescending dick to the media (try Googling “Belichick treats the media,”) and I happen to be a member of the media. Furthermore, there isn’t any player on the Patriots I care to root for; I can’t think of anything bad to say about Brady, but neither can I think of any reward in life that yet eludes him. Rooting for the Pats to succeed for Brady’s sake is like rooting for Mark Cuban to win the lottery. Randy Moss is a front runner, and that’s a depressing quality unless your team is good enough to “deserve” his best efforts (personality-wise, who would you rather have on your team: Moss or Steve Smith? I’ll take Smith 100 times out of 100). Tedy Bruschi seems like a solid guy and Troy Brown is a good story, but they aren’t the faces of the team in its current incarnation and neither are they hurting for Super Bowl rings. Cleveland, Seattle, Jacksonville, San Diego, Green Bay – those are teams I can get behind now that my own guys are eliminated. Derek Anderson, Matt Hasselbeck, Fred Taylor, Ladainian Tomlinson, Brett Favre – I wouldn’t mind pulling for them. How do you root for the team that already has (almost) everything?

But I’m not pulling for the Giants on Saturday simply because of my distaste for the Patriots. Sixteen-and-Oh will be a fantastic achievement, but of course it wouldn’t be if it happened every year (after all, no great fuss is made when a college team goes undefeated). In New England vs. History, I’m pulling for history, because then when New England wins they’ll have done something truly memorable. I’ll be able to tell my grandkids one day that I watched a team go undefeated in a 16-game season, and the entire time it was happening I was sure it wouldn’t. Take the conventional wisdom that says it’s impossible to go undefeated over 16 games, take the statistical probabilities that have doomed every team since 1972, and take the hopes of football purists everywhere and arm the Giants with them, and then, when the Patriots do pull off the “foregone conclusion,” what a spectacle we’ll have on our hands. What a fantastic accomplishment this will be.

Unless, of course, it turns out I’m wrong.

For more Craig Juer visit www.nvdaily.com

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By Josh Bard

I am taking the Chinatown bus to go visit some friends in NYC for the weekend. I am expecting a weekend to see some Christmas sights in the city (typical frustrated Jew), drink a lot (typical young professional), and watch the Patriots maul the Jets with some friends. Due to the aforementioned goals and the fact that I have to work til at least 2 PM on Friday, I have decided to risk health, sanity, and comfort and literally “let it ride” with the Chinatown Bus.

I went to buy my ticket from the small agency the day before. This should have been a little wary about the events of the future. Let’s just say I was second in line behind two police officers that were responding to a call that all of the bags had been stolen off the bus on the way down to DC this afternoon. This would have been enough of an omen for most people, but not me, I’m the edgiest sheltered white suburban today! I decided to only buy a one-way ticket.

Let’s get to the action:

Friday Afternoon (notes were taken on the bus, once it was too dark to see, I used my cell phone light)

2:30 I thought the bus was supposed to leave at 2:30 but apparently my intermediate language lesson wasn’t enough to realize that departing in Chinese really means boarding in English.

2:32 Firstly, I’d like to dispel any rumors that the busses smell like chicken coops. They most definitely are filled with odors more likely found at a stale aquarium or a polluted pond. If this is a coach bus, it’s fashioned in the Isiah Thomas line of coaches.

2:45 The bus still hasn’t left, but on the bright side there are lots of empty seats still left. I wasn’t expecting leg room but it would be a nice little plus.

2:52 First minor heart attack of the day: a seemingly scatter-brained yet official-looking Asian woman gets on the bus. I may get off the bus if they are telling me I must put my life in the hands of an Asian woman driver. How had I not considered this a possibility? Turns out she’s just doing a headcount, which she does very quickly, of course.

2:56 A woman who turns out to be the last to board sits down next to me, there goes the no-no. I really thought I was pitching the perfect game here; head down, earphones in, muttering, taking notes. In the future I think I would go with sneezing and maybe not combing my hair.

2:58 Doors closed. Commencing countdown, engine’s on. Check ignition and may God’s love be with you.

2:59 Ironically we have driven one block and just drove by a synagogue. I pray for my life.

3:40 I wake up from short nap with dry mouth, crick in my neck, a funny smell. Am I in a POW camp?

3:43 I can’t figure out where we are. I only see smokestacks and powerlines, it must be Baltimore because there’s not enough litter to make it New Jersey.

4:09 We’ve stopped in Baltimore to pick up more people. The LA riots had better organization than this ride so far. Its not so comforting when the people getting on the bus look surprised that they go picked up.

4:40 The two college girls behind me have finished their SECOND 20 minute conversation about texting. You know that debate about whether or not cell phones cause cancer? I may have to start rooting for cancer here. I am that frustrated already.

4:47 I’ve been working on a crossword puzzle that has turned into a little league game. It was going well and I was about three quarters of the way through before it was called due to darkness. I know I could turn on my overhead light, but on this bus I don’t wanna cause a stir. Its like jail and I want to blend in, not call any unnecessary attention.

4:56 Just passed Ripken Field in Aberdeen Maryland. I wonder what kind of Ironman record there is for these bus trips. I don’t want to meet the record holder.

5:20 Conversation topics between the two girls behind me thus far:
-Texting (see 4:40)
-Dave Matthews Band (“I hate when Dave plays music without singing in live shows, its like just play another song”)
- Chapstick (“Look I don’t want to share… its just… gross)
- Boys (No quotes here, it wasn’t funny or interesting enough)
Way to shatter those stereotypes ladies.

5:39 Who had Delaware in the pool for state in which we would have our first screeching stop where we all go flying?

6:00 Apparently the next stop is Philadelphia. Thanks for enlightening us on all of the trip details. This bus should be called Washibaltidelphiyork.

6:03 We just passed a strip club called Show + Tel which sounds a lot like the place my mom used to work, Show & Tell. Surely you cant make this stuff up, and don’t call me Oedipus. I am now nauseous for two reasons.

6:54 Welcome to the New Jersey Turnpike, the national syringe cemetery.

7:13 We have stopped again, this time on the New Jersey Turnpike at a gas station. This is the tipping point. Anyone who read Malcom Gladwell’s book The Tipping Point knows what I mean, especially since all the book does is restate the same point over and over and over again. Ironically chapter three of that mindless crap was my tipping point.

Anyway, I have now been on the bus for almost four hours and I am not even close to New York City. Me knees feel like they belong to Barbaro, my nose has ingested more waste than Lindsey Lohan’s, and there is a strong chance I will end up as the suspect of a double homicide of two teenage girls. My choices are stranding myself on the turnpike (which surprisingly doesn’t seem like that bad of an idea right now), knock my head against the window until I shatter the window or knock myself out, OR turn up my iPod, pull my hat down over my eyes and hope I sleep.

8:48 I am awake and everyone is getting out in Chinatown, for better or worse, I made it.

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By Mike Stiriti

After escaping WTF Week 9 at an even 7-7 I decided it was time for a little break from picking. During the hiatus I moved into a new apartment, ate some turkey and, believe it or not, started putting some actually money down on games. To my surprise I am actually up, with the help of my betting partner who will remain nameless due to his affiliation with the 4-letter network.

We gave the points and parlayed the 3 favorites on Thanksgiving, which set us up pretty nicely for the next few weeks. We have multiplied our deposit 6-plus times and are looking at a big weekend if a few teams come through (not to mention if Darren McFadden winning the Heisman, since I got him at 5-1 the day before the LSU game).

I figured that its silly to successfully pick games in private…its time to share the wealth.

Week 14 Comeback Picks:

JAGS -10.5 over Panthers
There is absolutly no way on God’s green earth that the Carolina Panthers win this game. They have a 60-year-old quarterback, no running game, no defense and have been inconsistent all year. Jacksonville, on the other hand, has a solid D, great running game and a QB that doesn’t make mistakes. It whether or not they cover may get a little dicey, I would probably buy a point just to be safe, but the Jags are a lock for the W.

Cowboys -11 over LIONS
I just can’t invision a scenerio in which the Lions D stops the Romo-TO-MB3-Witten train. If only Matt Millen drafted defensive players instead of the most hyped wideout available.

BILLS -7 over Dolphins
I still think there is a much better chance that Miami wins a game this year than there is for a Pats loss, but this won’t be the week. Buffalo is a better team than the Jets and the Jets just thumped the ‘Phins in Miami.

Giants @ EAGLES
I am not touching this game for 3 reasons:
1) Donovan McNabb may or may not play and he may or may not be a good quarterback.
2) Both teams seem to alternate winning games they should lose and losing games they should win, however I was unable to decipher a pattern.
3) Both QBs could be auditioning for jobs in ‘08 with the opposing team, and I’m not sure which underachiever will rise to the occasion.
(To clarify, I think both of these guys need to get out of Dodge. McNabb seems like a perfect fit for the Bears, while Eli would probably be more suited to a city like Indianapolis where nobody is mean. Since the Colts got the better end of the Manning gene pool I predict Eli will end up in a place like Miami or Atlanta.)

Raiders +10.5 over PACKERS
I don’t love this bet but I’m going to make it anyway. The Raiders have the 3rd best pass defense in the league and Favre is coming off an injury and limited practice. I’m playing my buddy Andy in our fantasy league this week and he is starting the runningback for each team, so I am basically routing for a muddy field and a couple sprained ankles.

Vikings -8.5 over 49ERS
2 words: Purple Jesus.

Steelers +10.5 over PATS
If me picking against them is what they need to get back to dominating then so be it.

Chargers PK over TITANS
Albert Haynesworth is back for Tennessee, which means they can stop the run again, but it won’t be enough. San Diego is finally realizing that it has talent on both sides of the ball and are playing their best football of the season. Vince Young is continuing to underperform, expect the Chargers front 3 + Merriman to be in his grill all day.

Rams +7 over BENGALS
I am 0-9 picking Rams games this year. Save your money on this one.

Bucs -3 over TEXANS
I’m not married to this one but I like Tampa’s D with Matt Scaub out.

Cardinals +7 over SEATTLE
The Cards have more to play for and they looked pretty good last week. Why not…

Browns -3.5 over JETS
The Jets looked great against Miami last week (which is like saying Tyson looked good against Peter McNeely, but whatever) and the Browns dissapointed me BIG TIME. I should take New York just to spite Romeo’s crew but I won’t do that. Just know this Cleveland: If you can’t win this game by a touchdown and give Derek Anderson some nice stats for my fantasy team, I am done with you. Like Freddo done. I mean it.

Chiefs +6.5 over BRONCOS
Denver is another team that smoked me last week and I refuse to give them any love. Plus, while I’m acting like an idiot I may as well pick 8 road teams in a row.

Colts -9 over RAVENS
The Ravens only win this game if they bench Kyle Boller in favor of Bart Scott. If he can throw a ball like he threw that flag he is their best option.

Saints -4 over FALCONS
When you have an opportunity to take the road team 12 times in one week you do it…makes life interesting.

Last week: The Browns KILLED us
Season: 45-32-5

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Just because we weren’t posting doesn’t mean we weren’t talking. The following is a forum discussion conducted by four future contributors of SportsFanParadise.com. We discussed ‘roids, Mel Gibson, Jessica Biel and the state of sports.

The Pundits:

Karaoke Craig Juer

Steve Gallen

Shaun Poore

Mike Stiriti

Will the Patriots go undefeated?

Shaun: I’ve been saying it all year and I’m not even a Patriots fan, no way in hell anyone beats them. The only team that could have a chance at beating them is a team that can score a ton of points, because nobody’s shutting down that offense. If anybody beats them its the Giants in week 17, only because the Pats’ starters will be benched that week.

Craig: No, the Patriots will not go undefeated, and here’s why: NFL teams don’t go undefeated. In no sport is Murphy’s Law as relevant as football. Shit happens. It’s impossible to predict when they’ll be beaten, because it will take a confluence of unpredictable circumstances. In Week 16, perhaps Chris Berman will be on ESPN bemoaning Tom Brady’s second concussion in as many games along with Randy Moss’ banishment for a violation of the substance abuse policy, and we’ll be feeling silly for assuming the Patriots were likely to go undefeated.

With that said, the Patriots have amazingly seemed to go 12 weeks without enduring peaks or valleys to their season; it’s merely been along, high plateau. So far, shit hasn’t happened. With THAT said, what would be better than if the winless Dolphins preserved their franchise’s crowning achievement by knocking off the undefeated Pats in week 16? That’s a sports movie waiting to happen.

Steve: Being partial to the Giants, I hope not, but my gut says yes. The Patriots remind me of that scene in “The Patriot” (ironically titled) when Mel Gibson and his sniper children ambush that wagon of British soldiers. After all of the Brits are dead, Mel is still busy choppin’ away at some guy’s face. Clearly the now faceless British soldier is dead, but Mel Belichick just keeps choppin’ away, taking out his anger at the Brits (or Roger Goodell and the Artist Formerly Known as the Mangenius) on this poor dead guy (hopefully not Eli Manning). The line week 15 against the Jets: Patriots -76, and I’m giving the points. If still undefeated, Brady plays week 17. They’re out for blood.

Should Barry Bonds serve jail time?

Steve: Barry Bonds should definitely serve jail time, and this has nothing to do with whether or not he did steroids. This has to do with how he has cut to the very core of our justice system and compromised its legitimacy. They have to go after Bonds, and he has to do jail time, or else all of the warnings they give you prior to testifying before a jury about lying and how they will not tolerate it will have no weight whatsoever. Letting him off on this sets a
dangerous precedent.

Shaun: No bonds shouldn’t serve jail time. Did Bill Clinton serve jail time? It was the same crime. Sammy Sosa went up and said he couldn’t speak English. Senator Ted Stevens went up and said the internet was a series of tubes. I could go on and on about how this is not a crime.

Mike: I’m with Shaun. I hate Barry Bonds, I think he is a miserable person. He is certainly an asshole as well as a cheater. But is he a criminal? Sure he wasn’t as truthful as he could have been in front of a grand jury, but I think we need to consider why he was there in the first place. How many tax dollars were wasted to convene a group of judges and congressmen to rule on a game? Baseball is just a game, meant for people’s enjoyment. It is not a federal issue. If Bud Selig had any balls this would have been dealt with years ago by Major League Baseball. The problem is that Bud, the player’s union and the owners all knew that steroid abuse was going on.
They should be the ones in front of the grand jury. Lets see how honest they are.

Is Tom Brady a better quarterback than Peyton Manning?

Mike: Yes he is. We always talked about what would happen if Brady had Manning’s receivers, and this year we are seeing it. He is going to shatter Peyton’s record of 49 TD passes and doesn’t look like he is breaking a sweat. Ironically, we are also witnessing what happens when you take Marvin Harrison away from the Colts. Even with Reggie Wayne and Dallas Clark (2 much better targets than anyone the Pats had in 2006, a season in which Brady was still pretty damn good) Peyton looks like a completely different player this year. He is throwing picks left and right and appears to be losing his cool under pressure, something #12 never does.

Steve: I still think Peyton is the better overall QB, though this is like picking between Scarlett Johansson or Jessica Biel for who I would like to be waiting for me at home naked right now. I don’t think Tom Brady gives his team a chance to win on a day he throws 6 picks like Peyton did against San Diego in week 10. Granted, we will never see that situation this year since he wins every game by at least 30. He’s good.

Craig: THIS IS PURELY UNINFORMED SPECULATION! But no, he isn’t. Tom Brady is a great quarterback in a great system. Peyton Manning IS the system. Once everyone is lined up and the ball is snapped, Tom Brady might be the best quarterback in the league. Peyton Manning’s responsibilities seem to be much greater prior to the snap, so I’m inclined to attribute more of what happens after the snap to him. In my opinion, if Manning had been wearing a Patriots’ jersey all these years instead of Brady, he would have accomplished more than Brady has.

If you owned an MLB team how much would you pay for A-Rod?

Craig: If I owned an MLB team, odds are I would know a great deal more about economics and assessing risk and reward scenarios than I currently do, so I would figure out what he’s worth in the context of my team. The market dictates that A-Rod is worth $25-30 million, and when you’re considering allocating such a large percentage of your operating expenses to 1/25th of your roster, it’s got to be a business decision more so than a baseball decision.

Mike: $0.00

Steve: You can ride two dominant starters to a championship. You cannot ride one dominant hitter. Spend the 275 million on pitching, and begin fitting yourself for a ring. That being said, no matter what you think of him, he is the best player of our generation, and possibly that ever played the game. He will help get the Yankees another championship sooner or later; it’s not his fault Chien-Ming Wang looked for like Hideki Irabu this year.

Will soccer ever be big here?

Craig: No, because it’s too boring to watch for the sake of watching. It’s not too boring to watch if you have a rooting interest - that’s why it’s popular around the world - but there are no traditions of fan-hood for soccer here. In other countries, where it’s popular, soccer started out as the only show in town before acquiring rooting factions. Here, everyone already has rooting interests in sports that are more interesting to watch. People won’t bother learning an acquired taste if there’s already other, better-tasting food available.

Steve: As a big soccer fan, I’d like to think that it will be big here, and to be honest, I think it has the potential to be the number 4 sport here in America (remember, NASCAR is not a sport). Football and baseball, clearly 1 and 2, no questions asked, and soccer will never reach them. Basketball is a definite 3 at this point, but I feel that the public is growing a bit tired of the NBA; I know I am. Nothing about an NBA game excites me, and I know I’m not alone in sharing this
sentiment. However, the reason soccer will never be as big as the 3 major sports here is TV contracts. There is simply not enough advertising dollars to be made by paying big bucks and broadcasting MLS games on major network television every weekend. Football, baseball, and basketball have ready-made commercial breaks built in to their rules, soccer does not. Soccer gets an Adidas bug in the upper right-hand corner of the screen for 15 minutes. And being the
money-hungry society that we are will prevent soccer from every really having a chance. It will have to make due with awkward ESPN2 timeslots and the Fox Soccer Channel, which is absolutely awful, but that’s for me to complain about another day.

Mike: Only if 3 things happen:
1) Make the goals a little bigger.
2) Turn the star players into celebrities. Put them in commercials or just get them on the Budweiser Hot Seat once in a while. The sport needs a Tiger Woods and Becks, Freddie or Landon Donovan just won’t cut it.
3) A major network needs to invest in it and get behind it. ESPN, CBS or FOX need to be actively promoting the league during football, golf and baseball. Until that happens the sport will get less interest than poker.

If Tiger Woods started his own tour would it take down the PGA?

Mike: Yes it would. The best players would play to win the most money, and the money would be on the Tiger Tour. The old school guys would be loyal at first, but once their PGA Championship trophy is meaningless because they didn’t beat anyone good they would make the switch. Thing is, Tiger cares more about shattering every PGA Tour record than he does about making money. He would never jump ship.

Steve: Absolutely. I just think he is a big enough name that if the Tiger Woods Tour was hosting a tournament at the same time as the PGA, who do you think Pepsi would want to throw their sponsorship dollar at? Do you think Gatorade is gonna spend millions to advertise at the Memorial when they could spend even more to advertise during the Tiger Woods F the PGA Classic that everyone and their mother will be watching on ESPN? I don’t think so. Once again, it comes down to sponsorship dollars, and Tiger Woods is the number 1 name to sell whatever you want.

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