Month: August 2008

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Green Bay Wins, Brett Favre Loses

I decided against posting on this issue until it was completely resolved and last night, just that happened.

After taking a beating in the press for not welcoming back Brett Favre as their starting quarterback, the Green Bay Packers accomplished what they originally set out to do – trade him to a team as far away as possible that they could only see him in the Super Bowl. They also secured the fact that he would basically not be traded to the Minnesota Vikings by having the Jets give the Packers three 1st round draft picks if they do decide to ship him in that direction. There is no doubt that he still has some talent left in him and Packers made that clear when they were ready to bring him back early this off season but when he kept going back and forth, the Packers decided to pursue to future in Aaron Rodgers.

I can’t blame the Packers for what they did because they had lived through the past few years not knowing whether Brett was coming back or not and for the first time when they had a definitive answer this early in the off-season, they needed to make plans for a Post-Favre Green Bay. It is understandable why the media is just in love with Favre who can’t seem to do anything wrong in their eye. He has never come out and said anything against them, he has always had a good relationship and it always helps that he has been more successful than not in his career.

He goes to a New York Jets team that was 4-12 last year and certainly raises their hopes of becoming a playoff team. The Jets vastly improved their offensive line which was their biggest weakness and for Favre who was sacked 15 times all of last season (Pennington + Clemens were sacked a total of 53 times). Favre’s deep ball should open up the running game for the Jets who are still vying for the second spot in the division as you can realistically expect the New England Patriots to win the division again. Continue reading “Green Bay Wins, Brett Favre Loses”

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Manny Being Manny… in LA

This is the third post I have titled “Manny Being Manny” in less than three months but it seems quite appropriate given the fact that Manny Ramirez is batting 10-16 (.625) with 2 HRs and 5 Runs and RBIs. All that is probably to be expected given Manny’s talent but what probably pisses off the Boston Red Sox the most was the fact that he wasn’t even trying anymore.

In the four games he has played for the Dodgers, Manny has gotten two infield hits (a weak grounder to SS and even an up the line grounder to the first baseman). Think about that! Manny got infield hits! Manny Ramirez who was paid an average of $20 Million over the past five years certainly proved his worth by making it to the All-Star game every year since 1998, bring home two World Series Championships and even a World Series MVP.

The one manager everyone said all along who could control egos and talent and find a way to get the team to succeed would be Joe Torre. Torre did it for 12 years under The Boss and now he’ll find a way to do it in LA where he knows Manny is playing for his contract, a supposed 4 year – $100 Million contract that some team will pay because his agent is Scott Boras. Manny does not want to cause any more trouble and wants to show that he has put that character behind him but that will certainly be a hard sell given the way he treated the Red Sox organization. The Red Sox front office is highly respected across the board in the MLB and they are all aware of the way Manny treated them and would show up on game day saying he had an unspecified injury on a knee and when pressed on the issue, couldn’t even remember which knee was bothering him.

Mike Golic from “Mike & Mike in the Morning,” the other day said that he would take a steroid-taker over a quitter any day on his team. Now that is quite a line to cross and you are certainly deciding which is the lesser evil. But if you are pressed on the issue and you had to take one of the two players… would you want someone like Manny Ramirez who you know will quit on the team in an instant if he is not happy or finds something that is bothering him or will you take a Barry Bonds (who has yet to be proven guilty for any steroid use) but I am only using him for arguments sake.

So is it Manny Ramirez and his on the field antics or will you take Barry Bonds with the entire circus that follows him off the field but one that you know will show up to play every day? I still don’t know which player I would take and I will probably think about this one the entire day but let me know who you guys would take. Manny or Barry?

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Tampa Bay Rays: This Team Is For Real

Can we all just stop expecting the Tampa Bay Rays to just disappear by the end of the season? A team that everyone was saying had to make a move at the deadline to acquire a bat to sure up their weak offense made no such move because they wanted to keep their prospects – and what do they do after the deadline? Go off and sweep the Detroit Tigers while outscoring them 20-10 in the three games.

Last time I wrote about them, New Beast In The AL East, they were in the midst of their longest winning streak of the season so far (7) which was promptly followed by their longest losing streak of the season – also at 7. If there was a good a time as any for a team to fold up and go home it was then. They had squandered a 4 game lead on the division and now were half a game behind the Red Sox. Since then, they have gone 11-5 and once again taken the lead of the division and have given themselves a 3-game cushion.

This team is here to stay and as if their pitching wasn’t solid enough, expect them to call up David Price who was a #1 overall draft pick not too long ago who is tearing up the minor leagues. He is 10-0 in the minors this year with a 1.97 ERA and has a 85/19 K/BB ratio with only 67 hits allowed in 86.2 innings pitched. That’s 8.87 strikeouts every 9 innings by the way and a WHIP of 0.99. Continue reading “Tampa Bay Rays: This Team Is For Real”

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How Does This Happen?

You notice stories like this all the time whether it was in a mall or in an airport and I just don’t understand how parents, not only all over this country but all over the world continue to focus more on getting to their destination on time rather than the welfare of their children. I especially like how the story points out that they made sure that their 18 suitcases for the entire family was accounted for but disregarded whether all the children had made it on board safely.

It was a 3-YEAR-OLD! You would think someone account for her amongst the two parents and four other children that were going. The scary part of all this (as if leaving a child at the airport wasn’t enough) is that they did not realize that the child was missing at all until notified by the airplane crew that their child had been safely found by authorities at the airport.

JERUSALEM – Israeli airport police say a couple going on a European vacation remembered to bring their duty-free shopping and their 18 suitcases, but forgot their 3-year-old daughter at the airport.

The couple and their five children were late for a flight to Paris Sunday and made a mad dash to the gate. In the confusion, their daughter got lost. A policeman found her wandering around the terminal, crying for her mother.

Israeli media report Monday that the ultra-Orthodox Jewish parents, whose names were not released, didn’t notice the child was missing until they were told, in the air, that she had been found at Ben-Gurion airport.

The child, accompanied by an airline staffer, took the next flight to Paris where she was safely reunited with her parents. Continue reading “How Does This Happen?”

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Amazon Marketplace: Customer Experience

My experience with Amazon Marketplace over the two years that I have been buying and selling things has been fantastic (outside of one jerk – who didn’t turn out to be such a jerk after all). I have sold things from books to XBox 360 games to, uhh, mostly books. Most of the times people will keep the order as they ordered but every now and then, and I have done this too, when you buy something and it just happened to be the wrong item that you ordered or it wasn’t what you expected it to be.

Yes, Amazon has a policy to return the items within 30 days of purchase but some people can be jerks about it and not give you an address or not give you a full refund back because the item is no longer in the exact condition and packaging as shipped.

However every now and then, you just get a customer who is nice during email conversations of the order, very pleasant when requesting information on the refund policy and very prompt on returning the item so it is feasible for me to re-sell it.

This post is to a Hannah L. from Duluth, Minnesota. The note was attached to the book that was returned around 06/07/08 and I only read it today because the book was sold.

By the way, the book was America’s Longest War: The United States and Vietnam, 1950-1975. Should you get a chance to read it, it’s a really interesting book.

Related Link: ABG Amazon Store, America’s Longest War