The Arthur Pincus Blog

The Spring of Our Discontent

Arthur Pincus — Wed, 02 May 2007 21:17:57 GMT

That first month of the baseball season was pretty awful, don't you think?

Actually, pal, I think it was very awful.

My inner voice is right and the organization known as Major League Baseball had better pay attention.

When the news came on Sunday morning that Cardinals reliever Josh Hancock had been killed in an automobile accident, it marked an unbelievably terrible end to a miserable month.

Nothing else that happened can compare to the tragedy of an athlete dying young and we don't mean to equate anything with Hancock's passing, but there are clouds hanging over MLB that are obscuring the great game of baseball.

The biggest shadow is the steroids debacle. For all the claims that the MLB testing program is having some impact, when Kirk Radomski pleaded guilty to distributing performance enhancing drugs and it became known that he had testified before the Balco Grand Jury as part of his plea deal, the earth shook under this business's foundation. And cracks are starting to show.

Radomski cut his baseball teeth as a clubhouse ‘boy' at Shea Stadium for the Mets from 1985-95. Think about those Mets teams--Doc Gooden, Keith Hernandez, Darryl Strawberry, Kevin Mitchell, Lenny Dykstra, Wally Backman--all guys who had some connection to some form of behavior that entailed substance abuse. Do you think Kirk learned from them, or that they learned from Kirk? Betting here is it was a little of both. I spent some time in the Mets clubhouse in the late 80s and let's just say the credentialed media (of which I was one) had a hard time finding a place to do an interview or get a rundown on the game because the room was filled with assorted hangers-on, friends, family, and who knows what. All of them had visitors' passes giving them the run of the place. Manager Davey Johnson had no more interest in clearing that room than I did in sticking my noggin in front of a Gooden heater.

So now, 12 years after he left Mets employ, Radomski resurfaces. "He did his job in the clubhouse," former Met and now Red Sox batting coach Dave Magadan recalled the other day. "You threw the jocks on the floor. He picked them up. He was good at what he did." Some endorsement. He was good at picking up jockstraps. The other thing that Magadan recalled was this: "He was huge. I mean, huge."

And alongside, or looming over, the huge Radomski, is the big-headed elephant in the room, one Barry Lamar Bonds. MLB is trying its best to ignore Bonds, perhaps hoping he'll step in a hole and ruin his knee and end his career with 745 homers, second place and forgotten. Not gonna happen. By the way, who was it who wondered, as opposed to the question of which hat a player wears for his Hall of Fame plaque, what size hat would be on ol' Barry's plaque, the 7 ¼ of the early 90s or one that fits over his now enhanced pumpkin?

Barry's hitting homers at a Bondsian clip and the inevitable awaits. As we said before, deal with it Bud.

From lousy weather to lousy Yankees, this first month has displeased greatly. And before you Red Sox yowlers start crowing about the Yankees demise, can you really be so excited about Manny not being Manny and hitting .215 or Dice K's ERA growing with each start or with the tale of the bloody sock. Ahh, the bloody sock. Can there ever have been a more stupid story more over-covered and more mis-handled. This annoyance makes the news of Anna Nicole Smith's death look like the coverage of the Pentagon Papers.

What else? Did you know the other night in Baltimore the umpires awarded a run to the Orioles three innings after it happened.

What? Can't happen.

This time, inner voice, you're wrong. It shouldn't happen, but it did.

Baltimore was leading, 2-1, in the top of the third. Nick Markakis was on third and Miguel Tejada on first, when, with one out, Ramon Hernandez hit a line drive to center. Grady Sizemore made a diving catch. Markakis tagged up, headed home and appeared to cross the plate before Tejada was doubled off first. Plate umpire Marvin Hudson waved off the run. The Orioles disputed Hudson's call before the start of the fourth, and Hudson conferred with crew chief Ed Montague and the other umpires.

"We kicked it around and now I'm having a brain cramp on it," Montague said. So he sent umpire Bill Miller in to check the rulebook. " I said 'You know what cause we're debating. You go in. Lets make it 100 percent sure."' Miller checked the rule and apparently said the run should have counted. So naturally, they didn't count it...until three innings later. Hey Montague, that ain't a brain cramp--it's more like some mysterious amnesia.

Throughout that awful month umpires seemed to be making it up on the fly. One game I saw, Mets Manager Willie Randolph got tossed when first base ump -- Tony Randazzo, blew a call against his Mets for a third time. Later, Randazzo, playing catch-up, blew one in favor of the Mets enabling them to tie the Nationals in the ninth and then win in 12. Not exactly what anyone had in mind.

Speaking of the Nats, the good news for them is that they're not the worst team in baseball, just the National League. It's the old, reliable KC Royals who again are baseball's worst. Saw that KC was the first team to end three straight Aprils ten games under .500. Think about that before you go out to buy tickets for that KC-Tampa Bay Devil Rays series later this season.

Surely you check the disabled list. Randy Johnson, BJ Ryan, Chone Figgins, Jaret Wright, Mike Mussina, Jason Schmidt, Hideki Matsui, Kaz Matsui, Ramon Hernandez, Jim Thome and on and on. Some have been on the list; some are still on it and it makes you wonder: Why is everyone getting hurt? Weather? Roids withdrawal? Bad trainers? Bad karma?

Nobody's hitting with the possible exception of ARod and Vladimir Guerrero. And what's with the NL's two most recent MVPs? All world Albert Pujols is following his surly World Series act with a very ordinary start. He'll get better...we think. But in Philly things really couldn't be going more wrong. MVP Ryan Howard is batting .215 with three homers. Jimmy Rollins is a marked man for having proclaimed the Phils the team to beat. Rollins did have a good April and if that doesn't show that things are upside down, what does?

And we leave you with the spectacle of Phillies' manager (as of this writing) Charlie Manuel challenging some Philly sports-talk bozo to a fight. Hey, Charlie, don't keep fulfilling all those low expectations people have for you.

Love Hurts

Arthur Pincus — Mon, 23 Apr 2007 15:26:06 GMT

Hey, Nation, did you miss us?

It feels great to be back in my literary hole in the wall with a little bit of a new look and lots more chances to tell what I think, what I believe and what I know, sometimes all at once. With Sports Illustrated helping to drive the FanNation train, this will be a bigger and better place for all the Citizens and for sure it will be fun.

Taking a few days from the blog, got me thinking about something I really love—hockey. Yeah, that’s right, hockey.

To those who know and those who take a little time to learn, hockey is a beautiful sport—faster than any in which engines or horses aren’t involved, as physical as you’d like and, at its best level, more skilled than all the others. While you could argue those thoughts, here’s one thing you can’t argue: No sport shoots itself in the foot, no sport gets more literal and figurative black eyes, no sport makes lead out of gold more often than hockey does.

A few weeks ago, when the National Football League’s offseason news was more police blotter than free agents, we called for the NFL players to exert pressure on their own and support strong changes in behavior. We cheer the moves the NFL and its players have taken

Now it’s time for National Hockey League players to take their game and themselves in hand and stop acting so dumb.

Case in point: Saturday night Jamie McLennan comes on as a backup goalie for the Calgary Flames who are tied with the Detroit Red Wings in games at 2 apiece but trailing badly in Game 5 by 5-1 late in the third period. So 18 seconds into his first playoff appearance, McLennan gets ticked off because Johan Franzen of the Wings is spun around by a Flame defender and Franzen’s stick catches McLennan on the leg. This is in the course of the action and went unpenalized.

McLennan decides to take it to his own court of justice, and with his big goalie stick he spears Franzen in the belly. McLennan is tossed, and now he is suspended, suspended from a playoff his team is eliminated from, and the questions you hear are whether the five-game ban is too much or too little.

Who cares if it's too much or too little. Not enough people are talking about the sheer stupidity of what McLennan did. No one’s talking about the fact that a few years ago, McLennan was honored by his teammates, the media and the League with the Masterton Trophy, awarded to the player who best displays perseverance and dedication to hockey. This came after McLennan was stricken with bacterial meningitis, was in a coma and intensive care and lost 30 pounds and had to learn to walk all over again. I spent a lot of time with him the night he won the award and just thinking about that night and then thinking about the spear makes me shudder.

But McLennan has played 10 seasons since his illness and now perhaps ends his career with that slash. Hockey Night in Canada broadcasters called it imbecilic and that’s a good word for it. Asinine, despicable, outrageous all would do. Surely some who don’t get what’s happening on the ice might also call it criminal but we refrain.

Think about it, a player who was honored by the game for coming back from the actual edge of death to play and play well in the NHL, decided in a moment that he would ‘take out’ another player in a way that could have seriously injured that player. It boggles the mind. But that’s what hockey seems to always face.

Throughout the playoffs there have many opportunities for the hockey bashers to take their swings:

Anaheim’s Brad May was suspended 3 games after punching Minnesota’s Kim Johnsson. Johnsson, one of the Wild’s top defensemen. Johnsson missed the final game of that series with an injury while the Ducks got to replace the banished May on the roster.

The last period of a Rangers’ blowout victory over the Thrashers spins into a silly mess as the Thrashers, no chance in the game and little chance in the series, decide it’s now fight night. Even former 50-goal scorer Ilya Kovalchuk got in on the fun. Not smart.

I care so much because I worked in the game for most of a decade and came to understand what makes this such a wonderful sport. But I also know the players are the only ones who can change the behavior. Suspensions and fines from the League don’t do it. Frankly, the fans do keep coming and buildings are pretty much full. But in the US, nationally televised games are pretty much unwatched. Hard to find, for sure, but you’d track them down if you cared to.

The McLennan spear came at the end of an unsightly stretch of hockey from both sides, fights, throwdowns, cheap shots. All the kind of stuff to make a possible new fan a definite non-fan. Some of that junk involved Flames captain Jarome Iginla, who should know better, and some involved Red Wing rockhead Todd Bertuzzi, who apparently cannot know better.

Listen to Red Wings goalie Dominik Hasek. He’s a two-time MVP, six-time Vezina winner and he has the jam to make these comments: "I was really disappointed. Not a little, but a lot. Their goalie, what he did and Iginla, he's the captain of the team and should be in charge. Those last 5 or 6 minutes if you were watching on TV, I think it was sort of disappointing.”

To say Johan Franzen got payback by scoring the playoff winning goal in the second overtime of a beauty of a game very early Monday morning is to miss the point. It’s great for Franzen and his Red Wings teammates. But for a bit of luck, Franzen could easily have been in a Detroit area hospital, not at the Calgary Saddledome as Sunday turned to Monday.

Why should we care? It’s only hockey, you say? Many of you do say that. I know. I’ve heard it and I hear it. But if you would take a few minutes to hunt down the location on your cable where Versus resides and watch a playoff game or two, you’ll get it. That is unless you get a stick in the gut for your trouble.

Spend Bud Selig's Money

Arthur Pincus — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 23:53:38 GMT

Who was not stunned by the recent report that MLB Commissioner Bud Selig had been paid $14.5 million for running the business in 2005? We resist calling Bud Selig Baseball Commissioner because that would give him dominion over the game I adore and I'm not sure he's earned that along with his money.

But hearing that Bud is getting 14.5 million samoleans for this labor of love made me think that he could solve some of baseball biggest problems in a classic way--by throwing money at them.

His money.

So we offer this plan to help baseball, help Bud ease his financial burden (really, how do you spend $14.5 million?) and do some good. Best of all, Bud, the advice is free. Such a deal.

This is real money we're talking about--Barry Bonds money, Roger Clemens half-season money, Gil Meche and Ted Lilly money. It's so much money, it's more than half what A-Rod is making this year. Wow.

As baseball prepares to honor a man who cannot be honored enough, Jackie Robinson, most of these ideas are aimed at re-affirming the courage and commitment that was Jackie Robinson. While great, smart and talented Major Leaguers like CC Sabathia, Dontrelle Willis and Torrii Hunter are saying that attention must be paid to the African-Americans who are not playing this great game, here are some ways to pay attention and keep the game diverse and beautiful. These are also intended to get Bud in touch with the fans, those who would rather play it, watch it, talk about it than do anything else. By that I mean most of the Citizens of FanNation.

Here are 10 ways for Bud to earn his money, spend his money and gain the title he should really want bestowed on him by The APB (that's the Arthur Pincus Blog, folks)--Baseball Commissioner. One other thing, Bud, I'm pretty sure that the Citizens of FanNation will be along with some more great suggestions for you, too. Keep checking back. This really couldn't be better.

Take the kids to the games. Do you realize how many tickets $14.5 million can buy each season? We'll use just a little. First, Bud, you buy 20 tickets for every Saturday and Sunday afternoon game in every city every week-April through October. You aren't tapping into MLB's stash for these. You place a call to the ticket office (or have your secretary do it, that's ok) and say you want 20 for each of those games. By my disgraceful arithmetic, I figure this is going to cost between 500 and 600 thousand bucks (20 tix per game, at about $35 per for what I figure is about 800 games a season). You buy the hot dogs, too. Who goes? Kids. Black kids, white kids, yellow kids, brown kids. Boy kids and girl kids. Weak kids and strong kids. Able-bodied kids and disabled kids. KIDS. Two adults and 18 kids. You're one of the adults at least once a week. What's the worst that can happen? You'll see 26 more baseball games and meet a lot of great young people. Work with team community relations departments to find your guests.
Hire a meteorologist as your consultant. My old Bronx pal Harvey Leonard is a pretty good weatherman on WCVB, Channel 5 in Boston. You could do a lot worse. Have Harvey sit with your schedule guys and he'll explain that there is often bad April weather in Cleveland and Boston and Detroit and Pittsburgh and New York Chicago and several other northern cities without domes. And maybe your guys shouldn't be scheduling too many games in those cities right off the bat. Of course they have to play at home sometime but do you HAVE to bring in teams from the West (with domes like Seattle) or great weather (like Anaheim or Houston) to play in cities without domes (like Detroit) or with horrible weather (like Cleveland) for their only visit of the season? In April? If it was possible to create a new problem in baseball, you have gone and done it. Now fix it! Harvey can help you. Guaranteed--but you have to pay him.
Build 30 fields in your name in each Major League city (2 in NYC, Chicago, LA). Inner-city fields. Real grass or some science made stuff that drains well. Even you can't afford to pay for them all; start the fund, create the organization, provide your clout--and several of your dollars. Set up an endowment so maintenance is guaranteed. You want to know the kind of field I'm talking about? Leave MLB's Park Avenue office, get on the No. 4 or 5 subway and go up to 125^th Street and walk a couple of blocks to Marcus Garvey Park and watch an afternoon of baseball at Bill Shea Friendship Field, home of the Harlem Little League. You'll get it real fast. Ask for Mr. or Mrs. Raiford. They started the league and can give you lots of pointers. Or when you're in Houston, check out Diez Park, home of the East End Little League. Ask for Myrna Flores. She'll set you right.
Build 20 fields in New Orleans and throughout the Gulf Coast. Same fund; more fields. It's a city in terrible trouble and may never recover if people like us don't pay attention. Go down there with Jimmie Lee Solomon, your Exec VP for Baseball Operations and hook up with some youth league administrators. I'll get you some names if you need. Locate 20 sites for fields that need building or rebuilding. You can even catch a New Orleans Zephyrs game (they're the Mets' top affiliate) while you're there and get some gumbo and redfish and beignets.
You cannot, repeat cannot, ignore Barry Bonds' chase of Hank Aaron's home run record. I already stood on my soapbox about this and there's no need to go back. But remember the results of that Seton Hall Poll and how it will speak to the African-American community if you ignore Barry. You don't have to like him; you don't even have to really talk to him. Be there. We'll even let MLB pay your expenses so this is at no cost to your bottom line.
Bring Hank Aaron along with you on "The See Barry Do It Tour." Don't let him diminish his own greatness by an act of omission that some might read as pettiness. You pay his way. And there can't be anything better than being at a ballpark with Bad Henry.
Take in a game with Chicago Al and Lilwound at New Comiskey. Don't worry about those scary sounding names, they're perfectly harmless...I think. We're not talking about a game in Jerry Reinsdorf's luxury suite. We're talking about a game in the stands, night game, probably against the Tigers, late July. Meet them at Gino's East for Pizza then head to the park and talk to them, have a hot dog and a beer with them and hear what they think about your game. Then go for a few more beers afterwards. (Make sure you've got a car and driver for them and you, too.) These guys love baseball. No, it's not love, they're the next level above love and I don't know what to call it. Sit with them for one night and then tell me what you call it. Better yet, get four tickets and I'll join you. And I'll pay my own way to Chicago for that. Definitely. And later on, get in touch with Citizen Howard Camerik and have him put together a group to take in a Marlins' game; and head up to T.O. and watch Vernon Wells play centre field with A Baseball Geek named Pete Toms. I'm sure he'll come over from Ottawa for the day. There are Citizens in every city in FanNation who can help. They're there for you, Bud. Promise.
Fund the Allan H. "Bud" Selig Baseball Academy in any city of your choice. What's that? Milwaukee? Perfect. Set it up the way Ice Hockey in Harlem or Figure Skating in Harlem have been set up. Academics, baseball, ethics, baseball, culture, life, baseball. After the first academy's a rousing success, do the fund-raising for Allan H. "Bud" Selig Academy's all around the country. Don't only think Major League cities. Richmond's a good place. Work with the Arthur Ashe Foundation. How about Louisville home of the champ of champs Muhammad Ali? This sounds pretty good, doesn't it Allan H.?
Create and fund baseball ambassadors and here's 10 guys who should be on the list: Ozzie Smith, Dontrelle Willis, Torrii Hunter, CC Sabathia, Tony Gwynn, Cal Ripken, Felipe Alou, Dusty Baker, Don Mattingly and Vernon Wells. Give them real roles and get them out there, teaching people that playing baseball is more fun than anything. Have them show don't tell. When your fields open, have your guys there to throw out the first ball. When the Academies need someone to teach how to turn two, get the Wizard or Cal. Working a pitcher? Tony G or Donnie Baseball. Tracking a fly ball? Vernon or Torrii. Pitching in a pinch? CC or Dontrelle. Strategy? I give you Felipe Alou. Ethics? Any one will do.
Last, there's a nonprofit, I've gotten to know called Pitch In for Baseball. It takes donations of "gently used baseball equipment", cleans it up and warehouses it and then distributes it to youth leagues and teams that need the help. No charge. How about a nice donation to Pitch In for Baseball and a Public Service Announcement on MLB national broadcasts? A nice spot on the MLB website? That sounds good. And you can star in the PSA with your Ambassadors. Bud and the Ambassadors. It's jazz.

That's all Bud. I may have forgotten one or two or maybe a hundred things. And I really haven't spent all that much of your money. Still plenty left for you to have your regular brats lunch at Gilles Custard in Milwaukee. Let us know how it's going.

It's Baseball: Reason to Believe

Arthur Pincus — Tue, 27 Mar 2007 22:12:14 GMT

Imagine that you are a baseball fan living in Washington, DC. You waited almost 34 hopeless and hopeful years for a big league team. You waited while teams moved, teams were born by expansion, teams were almost contracted but none ever came back to that old baseball town.

And then, wonder of wonder, miracle of miracles, the Montreal Expos avoided the contracters' noose and survived. And one fine unbelievable day, the Expos became the Washington Nationals. And just like that the Nation's Capital seemed to have a big-league team again. Well, it had a team that played other major league teams on a regular basis, 162 times a season in fact. But who among us could really call what is being put on the field in DC a major league team? Take a look at these guys and you start thinking of the 1962 Mets or the 2002-2003 Detroit Tigers--a bad team of historic proportions. The only saving grace is Ryan Zimmerman at third base. First baseman Nick Johnson could almost be in that category but he's injured and gets hurt with regularity. And as a result Dmitri Young is going to be the first baseman and what a frightening prospect that is.

If you want proof of how bad these Nats should be, take a look at Sports Illustrated's baseball preview for the Nats: projected starting pitchers have a total of two big league victories last season. The next few seasons are sure to test the dedication of those fans who waited those empty years for a big league team to call their own. It seems they're still waiting. But like the rest of us they find reason to hope and they do have an opportunity to see big league teams in their road uniforms at least.

Imagine that you are a fan of the New York Yankees, easy to do at this low-rise blog, and you wake up one morning to find that Carl Pavano might be the Yankees Opening Day starter. That's C-A-R-L P-A-V-A-N-O, he of the season and a half on the disabled list; he of the distracted recuperation from a series of mysterious ailments; he of the Porsche wrapped around (beneath?) a garbage truck late one night in West Palm Beach; he of the failure to communicate with his team that he had the accident and was injured again. That Carl Pavano.

When Chien Ming Wang popped a hammy last week at training camp the Yankees decided that rather than upset the presumably set rotation of the now injured Wang, Andy Pettitte, Mike Mussina and Kei Igawa the team would just move Pavano from the fifth starter, one who we could have not seen at all till late April, to Opening Day. Sure, Joe Torre, it's just one game. You believe that? Didn't think so. Opening Day is a time for hope and dreams and not Carl Pavano. But there he may be. If you're a Yankee fan do you hope that Pavano holds up through the first start so you're blessed to watch him again and again or do you hope that his one true skill--getting hurt--shows itself so you don't have to think about him. Guess which way I'm leaning. But is Pavano as Opening Day pitcher any reason to lose hope in the Bombers? Nah.

Imagine that you're a fan of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays (I know there are some; I've seen some Nation profiles that verify this fact) and you see the team wearing that spiffy uniform patch marking the team's 10^th anniversary season and you remind yourself that your team has now gone nine full seasons AND NEVER WON MORE THAN 70 GAMES. The players change and still the DRays lose; the manager changes and still the DRays lose; ownership changes and still the DRays lose. You Devil Rays fans must know that your team won 41 home games in that dump of a stadium and still lost 101 overall (now that is hard to do); you probably also know that your team lost virtually half the games it held leads in.

And you may be filled with dread that the talent on this team (and there definitely is some) will give up the ghost and that ugly barn in St. Pete rather than wait for a pitcher, any pitcher to come along who can lead the pitching staff to the promised land or at least to 71 wins. How will it feel to see Scott Kazmir fulfill his left-handed promise on a team that has lost Carl Crawford or Rocco Baldelli? Could happen. But you must hope that it doesn't. It can't. Pretty please?

Imagine you're a fan of the Detroit Tigers and you look at your team's pitching staff that includes Jeremy Bonderman, Justin Verlander, Nate Robertson, Joel Zumaya and Francisco Rodney and you think, "man we could be good for a long time." And that is what these last days of March are really about. Hope and promise; anticipation and a bit of dread; a long, long time from April to October.

And so we tingle with excitement about Sunday night's opener that rematches the Mets and the champion Cardinals to resume what ended so brilliantly last fall in the NLCS. And then days of openers, home and road and a first real look at your team.

It's baseball, ladies and gentlemen. Baseball.

We're not going to take this any more

Arthur Pincus — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 21:23:56 GMT

You've seen the clip even if you haven't seen the movie "Network". Peter Finch, playing a TV news anchor named Howard Beale on the verge of madness, gets his audience to say they've had enough:

"I want all of you to get up out of your chairs. I want you to get up right now and go to the window. Open it, and stick your head out, and yell, 'I'm as mad as hell , and I'm not going to take this anymore!' I want you to get up right now, sit up, go to your windows, open them and stick your head out and yell 'I'm as mad as hell and I'm not going to take this anymore!' Things have got to change. But first, you've gotta get MAD!"

Beale kept shouting and his ratings soared. And though Beale wasn't talking about the National Football League, I am. And so I am opening my virtual window and shouting: "I'm as mad as hell and I'm not going to take this anymore!" We of FanNation have got to say "enough."

We have read enough about Titans' CB Pacman Jones and his multiple arrests and his suitcase stuffed with $81,000 that he rained all over a Vegas strip club. And we've had enough of Pacman happening to be in places where guns are fired and people are shot. And we don't really need to know how much Pacman is fined for spitting in the face of an opponent. We need to know that Pacman is taking a seat for a while, a long while, and that if he comes back to the game, he's on one strike and he's out.

Those activities are for one player for just a few months. There is so much more to be as mad a hell about.

We have had enough of Joey Porter. Joey gave his new team, the Dolphins, a cause to pause last weekend when he was arrested for b*tch-slapping Bengals lineman Levi Jones outside the Palms Hotel Casino in Vegas. Jones, remarkably, has not been one of the multitudes of Bengal players who have run afoul of the law in the last year, nine of them I believe. Apparently Porter and Jones got into some dice table trash talking, took it outside and tried to settle it like 6 year olds.

Several weeks ago, the League and the NFL Players Association seemed to make it clear that they are going to agree upon and then issue a new conduct policy for the players. And so we wait...and we're mad as hell.

Each day brings some new bad news. Jerramy Stevens, free agent tight end formerly with the Seahawks, was pulled over for driving erratically and charged with driving while intoxicated. He reportedly told the arresting officer that he had four or five margaritas. Nothing gets you more ready to drive your Beemer than that. ("Cheese ossifer, it was only four or five maruh-hitas. Thash all.") And when Stevens was searched, the officer found "a green leafy substance." This was after he almost fell down just walking from the car.

The Bears Tank Johnson may be safely out of trouble for a while but that's because he's in jail. While in the slammer, it's hoped that he will not be thinking about re-assembling his mini-arsenal of weapons police found in his suburban Chicago residence during last season. And while in the slammer he will not be cruising the kinds of bars he was in the night after that bust when his friend and roommate was shot and killed. But what happens when he gets out this summer?

Johnson's arrest doesn't seem to have gotten a message to NFL players about weapons either. And we're not talking about legal firearms, no matter how we really feel about that issue. This week, Gerald Sensabaugh, strong safety with the Jaguars, was pulled over for speeding (86 in a 55 zone) and when asked if he had any weapons in the car, he said yes, and it's not registered. Guess he and Stevens were hoping to get some points for honesty.

And, although we could unhappily and unfortunately make this list go on much longer, we'll only talk about one last run-in that an NFL player has had with the law. The Seahawks brand new defensive end Patrick Kerney was apparently asleep at his home in Atlanta last Sunday morning when a rape of a woman who was his houseguest allegedly occurred. Now Kerney has not been named as a suspect so perhaps he doesn't belong in this rant but here he is. Why? Because NFL players have to find a better way; they have to be able to steer clear of criminal activities of their own doing or those of others. The NFL and its teams and the Players Association have to do a much better job of giving the players coping methods that will keep them out of their cars when they've had five margaritas; that will convince them that they don't need to carry unlicensed firearms; that in any case (registered or not) football players and guns and alcohol (or green leafy substances) don't mix. The tragic death of Broncos CB Darrent Williams in a drive-by shooting in Denver following a New Year's Eve party should have been more than enough to teach that lesson but it doesn't seem like it was.

In his Super Bowl news conference NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell made it clear that changes in behavior had to come. He and PA Exec Director Gene Upshaw have apparently made headway in their discussions of some new rules on player conduct but we haven't heard anything yet. And it's time. It's beyond time.

We think that the only way the NFL will get out of this mess and really affect some change in behavior will be for the players themselves -- not just the executives of the players association or the executives at the League headquarters or even the team owners -- to get up out of their seats and open their windows and shout...

Hmmm: Doesn't it make you wonder?

Arthur Pincus — Tue, 13 Mar 2007 20:54:58 GMT

If you care about sports, and you must, your hypocrisy meters have to be stuck on high these days. For instance...

We have been hearing from California at Anaheim at Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim owner Arte Moreno, who has been talking about his new $50-million center fielder Gary Matthews Jr.

Matthews had the highlight season of a mediocre career in 2006, his contract walk year. From a player who couldn't make a brutal NY Mets team in 2002, Matthews made the AL all-star team with the Texas Rangers; from a player who never hit more than .275, Matthews hit .313; from a player who joined the Rangers on a minor league contract in 2004, Matthews used that season of dreams to sign with the Angels for $50 million for five seasons. And for the Angels, it was all good.

Then the "shocking" word came in the last few weeks of Matthews's name being involved with the newest steroids scandal bubbling all over the country, and soon it was all not so good. Moreno said he was upset with Matthews's no comment response and his hiring of a well known criminal attorney to represent him. But could it possibly be that the owner was really upset about being so dumb as to pay a mediocre one-year wonder 50 million bucks and then discover--to his amazement--that chemistry may have had something to do with the improvement.

At first Matthews said: "I do expect it to resolve itself here in the near future. Until we get more information, I just can't comment on it.''

To which Moreno's first comment was that the Angels would not ask Matthews anything further until HE was ready. Moreno said the new player was never asked if he used performance enhancers.

And then the stuff hit the fan and within days the conciliatory tone had turned bitter, perhaps coinciding with Matthews hiring celeb criminal lawyer Robert Shapiro. Moreno became quite critical of Matthews's failure to address Angels fans and members of the news media in a timely and a meaningful manner.

"I'm not a happy guy," Moreno told the NY Times. "I'm not in position now to say I'm sorry I signed him and I'm ready to invoke anything. My frustration is on the communications side."

"Address the press," was what Moreno wanted the player to do. "And say: ‘Yes, my name has been linked to this story. I'm sorry this has become a distraction and we're going to try to clear it up as quickly as possible.' I'm not asking him to admit to anything illegal."

"When he hired Shapiro, this doesn't send a very good signal," Moreno told the Times. "When 8 or 10 days go by and the only response is from a criminal attorney, what signals does that send to your fans?"

So Matthews finally "apologized" (through a statement released by his agent for god's sake) for the distraction but not for the reason for the distraction. And you have to wonder what the owner and general manager who originally decided that Matthews was worth this contract are now thinking. Stay tuned. Hypocrisy meters approaching high.

And then...I'm not sure if it's hypocrisy theory or conspiracy theory but do you think it's strange that a year after a mid-major school, which had not even won its conference title, went to the Final Four we find the number of mid-major schools getting NCAA bids seems to have shrunk? I know at least one of does. There's a sure way to keep the George Masons of the world from embarrassing the stuffed shirts and blowhards of the NCAA and their tournament selection committee: keep the George Masons of the world out of the tournament entirely. Make the world safer for the big majors.

And while we're at it, we bring you the recent news of Ray Ray McElrathbey, the Clemson football player. When we first met Ray Ray last fall, he was shepherding his kid brother Fahmarr to school and raising the youngster since their mother was a drug addict. Every so often a Clemson assistant coach's wife picked up Fahmarr from school or gave the kid a peanut butter sandwich so the NCAA had to decide if this was OK and that Ray Ray was not getting any extra benefit from his football scholarship. The republic was saved when it was decided that no rule had been broken. This week we learn that Ray Ray is currently academically ineligible to play football at Clemson although Coach Tommy Bowden thinks he might be able to right himself after spring break. Now why would it become public that McElrathbey's academics had fallen short (and we can't imagine how that could happen)? You don't have to read too many college football stories to see the academic privacy laws invoked. Yet here is Ray Ray academically outed. I feel the meter going past its upper limit.

And we leave you with the NHL's version of the "Twinkie" defense offered by the New York Islanders trying to keep their hatchet man Chris Simon from being suspended for the rest of the season. In this case, it wasn't junk food but a concussion that the Islanders claim Simon suffered when checked legally by the Rangers Ryan Hollweg last week. Simon's response (brought on or made worse, according to the Isles) was to take his stick and try to guillotine Hollweg. Only a slight misdirection led Hollweg's chin to absorb most of the blow and not his throat. That could have been the difference between a cut requiring a few stitches and a very serious injury. Now I always liked Chris Simon as I got to know him a bit and I know he's as tough as they come in the sport, but jeez...this was an act that could have had a far worse result for both players. Don't try to use the real serious issue of concussions as a way of keeping the player from being justifiably punished. The meter just blew.

Take a minute to meet Charlie Einstein

Arthur Pincus — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 21:13:04 GMT

I was a teenager when I first met Charlie Einstein through his writing and his work editing the "Fireside Book of Baseball", easily the best anthology of baseball writing ever been done. In fact, the first three Fireside books may be the best anthology of any writing I've ever seen. Charlie wrote regularly for Sport Magazine and something about his stuff always attracted me. He had no pretense in his writing and he seemed to find a unique way of looking at his subjects, a way no one else seemed to have thought of.

And several years later I met Charlie by his voice as we became telephone friends. He had just written the single best biography of an athlete that I have ever read, "Willie's Time", a biography/memoir of Willie Mays and a history of America's times while he played in the big leagues. Again, as different an approach to baseball and American history as there is. It was and is brilliant. I tracked down his phone number in Mill Valley, CA, and asked him to write something original for us at the NY Times to mark Willie's coming entry into the Hall of Fame. Asking Charlie to write something original was like asking him to breathe. There was no other way.

We became pals. Conversations never began with hello, but with his latest joke and he seemed to know every single one ever written or told. I thought he liked talking to me so that this California-based New Yorker's ears could get their regular fill of a Noo Yawk accent. He told me about being at the Polo Grounds the day Bobby Thomson hit his Home Run Heard Round the World in 1951. And he told me about Willie Mays, and New York City and the entertainment industry and gambling and the newspaper business and all kinds of stuff. We talked a lot.

He'd write regularly for us at the Times, always baseball because no one knew it better. He saw things and thought things about the game like no one else. One time he called and said: "Here's the headline, do you want the story?"

Usually you sell a story idea, the story's written and last it gets a headline.

Sure Charlie, I said, I'll bite. What's the headline?

"Baseball: So Good They Can't Screw It Up."

Perfect. He then proceeded to write a wonderful piece about all the things that Major League Baseball was then doing wrong and made his case that the game of baseball could and would survive the latest idiocy.

It was the night before Opening Day, a few years after Charlie and I became phone pals and as my family sat down for dinner, I reminded my girls, then 8 and 6, why tomorrow was so important. And then I got a copy of Charlie's latest anthology, The Baseball Reader, from my shelf and proceeded to read the girls Abbott and Costello's "Who's On First" routine. After some strange looks they started to laugh at the ridiculousness of it all--both their dad's performance and the old comedy act itself. I said to my wife that I hadn't talked to Charlie for a while and since tomorrow was Opening Day, I'd call him to mark the occasion. But I was too late. When I got to the office, there was a message from Charlie Einstein: He had just moved back east to take a PR job and he wanted to get together.

That began the greatest lunch date I'll ever have. We started a little club with Sports Illustrated's marvelous baseball writer Bob Creamer (he wrote "Babe: The Legend Comes to Life" and you must read that, too). On a regular basis we would get together and on a rotating basis each of us was responsible for three things: the reservation, an interesting fourth person to join us and the bill. I have to say, I liked having the fourth join us, but I really loved having lunch with just those two.

When you talked to Charlie, he'd ask questions you wish you had asked and give you answers you could only dream of coming up with. When I called to tell him I had taken a new job as Vice President Public Relations of the National Hockey League, he said: "Sounds good, but is there a President of Public Relations?"

He told me he played basketball as an undergraduate at the University of Chicago when the school was still trying to compete at a high level. Then he'd hold up this smallish hand of his and say: "This is a good reason why Chicago had to leave the Big 10."

In his matter of fact way, Charlie told about his show business roots, his father a successful radio performer and vaudeville comedian with the stage name of Parkyakarkus. Really! His half brothers changed their last name and became quite successful in show biz, too. One brother changed his name from Albert Einstein (can't imagine why) to become the actor, writer and comedian Albert Brooks. His brother Bob was a writer and performer on the old "Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour" and then adopted the persona of Super Dave Osborne or Marty Funkhouser on HBO's "Curb Your Enthusiasm" and Larry on "Arrested Development."

Charlie wrote about gambling as well and a book on blackjack got him barred for a while from the Vegas casinos as a potential card counter.

No more jokes, no more stories, no more calls now. I heard from Charlie's son Mike this week that his father had died at the age of 80.

I wanted to tell FanNation about Charlie Einstein and hope that a few of you will go out and get and read "Willie's Time". And that a few of you will find a library that has copies of the Fireside Books, which are almost impossible to get anywhere else even though there were some 85,000 published of the first volume. You will be rewarded.

Nuttiness guaranteed in the NFL

Arthur Pincus — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 18:45:25 GMT

God, it is said, must hate money for just look at who he (or she) gives it to.

Theology aside, we find proof in the adage in all kinds of news out of the National Football League.

For instance, here's a conversation we think may have taken place at Halas Hall in suburban Chicago the other day between GM Jerry Angelo and Coach Lovie Smith, each bearers of new, very long-term, very lucrative, very guaranteed contracts:

JA: Hey Lovie, it's Jerry. Now that we have those new contracts let's do something really nutty. Just for a goof.

LS: You mean nuttier than firing my defensive coordinator, hiring my buddy and telling the media to trust me? Nuttier than that? Sounds like fun, what do you have in mind?

JA: Trade Thomas Jones to the New York Jets for NOTHING.

LS: OOH.

And so it happened that Thomas Jones, starting running back in the Super Bowl and to my eyes about the only Bear besides Devin Hester who played a big game in the Big Game, went to the Jets along with a second-round draft pick and in return the Bears got, wait you'll love this, a second-round draft pick. Yes, the pick the Bears got is early in the round; the one they sent east is late. But still: Jones did have 1,200 yards rushing last season and the Jets were desperate for a new No. 1 running back. When last seen the Bears' anointed No. 1, Cedric Benson, was lying on the Dolphins Stadium wet turf with a knee injury.

So what gives? Smith, working at the lowest end of coaches' salaries in 2006, now has moved to the other end of the scale and has a guarantee of almost $5 million a year through 2011. Did the big money make him quickly dumb? Is that fair? Probably not, but what's the explanation that you'd accept?

Jones wanted out.
He was a malcontent.
He had far exceeded expectations and his usefulness was at an end.
Coach didn't like TJ's orange Ferrari.

Even with those reasons, you would think that Angelo, the GM with a new deal that guarantees him a slightly-above-the-poverty-level salary through 2013, could have gotten a bit more from a desperate team. These two guys have made a deal that is minimum risk for their security but might not be such a minimum risk to the team next season. And clearly the Bears are drawing some lines in the snow and telling players (and assistant coaches) not to cross. Ron Rivera, hailed by many (not you Chicago Al) for his work as Bears defensive coordinator, got back from one of his many unsuccessful interviews for a head coaching job and was shown the door.

To show that nuttiness goes both ways in Chi-town: Lance Briggs, all-pro linebacker, turned down a Bears offer of $33 million or so for six seasons and Angelo "slapped" the franchise tag on poor ol' Lance. For that, Briggs will be paid $7.2 million this season and is stewing about it. The streets in the NFL definitely go both ways.

A lot of the craziness we see each day comes from the rise in the team salary cap for the coming season to $109 million with free agents looking for a big portion of it and with the understanding that very little is guaranteed to NFL players.

This takes us to the KC Chiefs who have asked QB Trent Green to leave. Green made several mistakes that caused the Chiefs to let him go. First mistake: he's 37 years old. Second mistake: he had a severe concussion playing for the Chiefs last season and missed half the games and played indifferently after returning. Third mistake: he was to be paid (non-guaranteed) $7.2 million for 2007. No surprise that the Chiefs thought better of keeping Green around at that price when he wasn't likely to be the starter. But the Chiefs did agree to a contract for that with Green at one time. Remarkable that Green's concussion knocked some sense into the heads of the Chiefs' brass. Funny how that works.

And while we're on the subject of sense or lack thereof, we turn south to Miami, where the Dolphins last season had one of the NFL's best defenses and a weak offense; where their new coach Cam Cameron has great offensive credentials, and where they are no longer burdened by Genius Coach Saban's genius. So what do they do with the boost in salary cap? They give $20 million guaranteed and a $32 million contract to Joey Porter, who, of course, plays linebacker. Way to boost up that offense guys. Give Porter and his agent credit: the big-mouthed linebacker talked himself out of Pittsburgh and now he takes his act to Miami for guaranteed money that's four times what he would have made with the Steelers. And he has a whole new group of animal control officers for him and his dogs to deal with. Why the Dolphins thought this was a good decision who knows. It's nutty I tell you.

Other places, other looniness: the Denver Broncos signed RB Travis Henry, who somehow couldn't convince the Titans that he was worth the $8.3 million he would have been due this season. The Broncos welcomed Travis to Denver, apparently forgetting that they have made a market in creating mostly low-paid, mostly highly successful running backs because they have long had the best run-blocking offensive line in the business. (Consider Tatum Bell, Mike Anderson, Reuben Droughns.) So naturally the Broncos give Henry a $12 million guarantee and a five-year contract that could be worth $22.5-million. All this for a guy who has had major ligament damage in his ankle and had a four-game suspension for violating the league's substance abuse policy during his Tennessee years. Mahhhvelous.

A two-year-old bit of genius is keeping the Atlanta Falcons from getting any new talent for new (and hugely paid) Coach Bobby Petrino to play with. In 2004, owner Arthur Blank handed QB Michael Vick a $137 million contract and said, "Here Mike, ruin my team." That's r-u-i-n, not r-u-n. And so it has come to pass. The other day the Falcons made their one addition so far by signing FB Ovie Mughelli, formerly with the Ravens. Ovie has four seasons in the NFL and has a total of 50 yards rushing and 195 yards receiving. But you don't sign an all-pro blocker for his rushing skills so maybe he'd be a good addition to a team that has a stay-home QB who needs his protection. In case anyone hasn't noticed that ain't Michael Vick. "I told [Michael] as long as I'm playing, he doesn't have to worry about being touched,'' Mughelli said after signing. Uh, Ovie, dream on, pal.

One bit of crazy behavior that we encourage was given to us by the Dallas Cowboys who in the last few weeks have lost coach Bill Parcells, have surveyed the coaching options out there and decided that Wade Phillips was da man, have made clear (so far) that Terrell Owens, his damaged finger and his big yap will be back again. Then the other day they sign Leonard Davis to a $50-million contract along with almost $19 million in guarantees. This is all for a guy who mostly soiled the sheets for the Cardinals as the No. 2 pick in the draft and now comes to the Cowboys without a position. He might play guard, he might play tackle. And neither position is on the side that protects QB Tony Romo's blind side. This is a move that the inner Giant fan can praise. Hey, Jerry Jones, give Al Davis a call. He might trade you Randy Moss!

A Yankee Fan Declares

Arthur Pincus — Tue, 27 Feb 2007 21:31:38 GMT

It began with Yogi and Paul LaPalme and 13 innings on a beautiful June Saturday afternoon in the Bronx. It was the great green grass of the Stadium and the look of that courthouse looming just outside. It was the guy who sat near us in the left field stands who had the loudest voice I think I still have ever heard virtually talking to the players on the field from hundreds of yards away. It was the frieze hanging down above us in the upper deck even though I had no idea then that it was called a frieze. And it was all of the other sights and sounds and smells of my first game at Yankee Stadium. I was already a Yankee fan, a very, very young Yankee fan but well-focused already on this team and on that guy wearing No. 7 in center field. The Triple Crown year had just passed and we Bronx boys had a hero to root for. The team had beaten the despised Dodgers in the '56 World Series. Don Larsen's perfect game was a regular topic on Bolton Street.

And then we made that first trip by subway to Yankee Stadium. It was June 22, 1957, and the Yankees and the White Sox were dancing back and forth between first and second place. The Sox began the day a half game ahead. It was Ladies Day so my mom took me and my brother Steve and her best friend's son Mark out for all of our first Yankee game.

Mickey Mantle homered in the first, Moose Skowron a few innings later. But somehow, those White Sox scored runs without seeming to get hits, walks or even base runners and we went to extra innings. We begged to stay and we did (thanks, mom) and we were there in the bottom of the 13^th, probably the last inning we'd see that day no matter what. Yogi Berra led off against Paul LaPalme, a knuckleballing lefty in what was his final big league season. As if Yogi knew he had to get this game over so the kids in left field could go home happy, he swatted a pitch (memory tells me) off the bill of his cap and lined it about 297 feet down the right field line. The fence was 296 feet, the ball tucked inside the foul pole and we went home, tired, hoarse, stuffed and very, very happy.

And that's why you're reading this now--I'm a Yankee fan, now and forever. That means being a fan during the good times (not all of those ending in a World Series victory) and the bad times (not all of those ending in a loss). And while the football Giants are the team that makes me crazy (tragic, if you will) it's the Yankees that consume. Theirs is the first box score I read, the first game stories I devour, the first spring training day I care about.

How, I hear you asking, can you root for the Yankees? They spend more, they ruin things for the rest of the teams, they have an obnoxious owner, they have players who are often unpleasant, and they treat people (players, managers, ex-players, ex-managers) like crap. Yes, all true.

But still, there was Yogi and there was Paul LaPalme.

And through those early years, the Yanks were the only team in town. The Dodgers and the Giants left that fall. The Mets weren't born until 1962 and then what they played barely resembled baseball. Oh, we went to the Polo Grounds, too, to see the Mets, especially when the Giants were back in town with the magical No. 24 playing center field, or when the Dodgers arrived to give us a team to really hate. But it was the Yankees that we cared about.

We means most (but not nearly all) of my friends. Brother Steve, in fact, rooted for the faraway San Francisco Giants.

We were stunned when Bill Mazeroski's homer went over the Forbes Field wall to win the 1960 World Series for the Pirates, we reveled in Roger Maris and Mantle chasing Babe Ruth's season record in 1961; we loved the tense, rain-delayed seven game World Series victory over the Giants in '62; we were devastated in the Dodgers sweep in '63, and then we were overjoyed just to be there in '64 when the Yanks took the Cardinals to seven games, including that one won by the Mick's homer off Barney Schultz. If you saw that homer, you could never forget it.

And then the team got lousy. Not just bad but really, really lousy. But we stayed true hoping against hope, actually believing that Ralph Houk's return as manager in 1966 could save the team and the season (they finished 10^thand last, a game and a half behind the Red Sox, who were merely just another team the Yankees played in those days.)

A few years later I achieved a dream and covered some Yankee baseball as a very, very young reporter for The New York Times. Houk was still the manager and he welcomed all new reporters with a post-game seat in front of him and his spittoon as he talked over the game while spraying your shoes with tobacco juice. I loved it.

That was then. This is now. The next year George Steinbrenner bought the team vowing not to interfere with running it (actual fact). The team changed, their attitudes changed, players came and went and still we rooted for the Yankees. Bad seasons, bad players, good seasons, great players, it all didn't change our minds.

When Reggie Jackson hit those three homers off the Dodgers in the last game of the ‘77 Series, it meant our first championship in 15 years (when you started as a Yankee fan that is a very long time). As soon as the final out was made, my Times colleague and great friend Ray Corio called from his home to mine to share the moment. And when the Yankees ended the next and longer championship drought in 1996, I cried along with Joe Torre as I watched the victory celebration from my daughter's house in Tucson.

The "season" begins this week and the real season in another month. The news from Tampa is filled with players declaring or undeclaring their friendship for each other with tales of sleepovers past, with questions about the ultimate Yankee fate of two of our longtime favorites--Mariano Rivera, who is still a Yankee, and Bernie Williams, whose days seem done. It's all more than we might need to know and there is really no reason to care. But we do need to know and it sure feels good to care.

Ignoring Bonds makes no sense

Arthur Pincus — Mon, 19 Feb 2007 23:00:23 GMT

Let's get this straight: I can't stand Barry Bonds.

I thought he was an obnoxious, skinny, talented jerk when he started his big league career playing for the Pittsburgh Pirates; he was an obnoxious not so skinny but very talented jerk when he moved on to the San Francisco Giants and had some very big years in the mid-90s, and more recently he has been an obnoxious, grotesque-looking jerk as he has unbelievably pursued two of baseball's most honored records: the single season home run mark and now the career home run record.

And let's get this straight, too, Barry Bonds will break Henry Aaron's record this season and he'll hold the record for many years to come. The record will be his so get used to it. There will be no asterisk implying that Bonds's records were tainted. His still not completely proven use of performance enhancing substances was not against the rules of Major League Baseball when he did or did not use the stuff. I am repulsed by the idea that steroids took such a hold of my favorite sport but still there should be no erasing of his records by the suits at Major League Baseball, who are now so embarrassed by the chase.

Bud Selig, Commissioner of Major League Baseball, has made it clear that he might be too busy to attend the games when Bonds could break Aaron's mark. Something about re-arranging his sock drawer or shredding old credit card receipts or something like that.

Of course Selig and all his fellow MLB suits cheered wildly and madly while the bloated figures of Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa chased the single season record of Roger Maris in 1998, the year those two guys "saved" baseball. And they cheered wildly and madly when such "big stars" as Brady Anderson and Greg Vaughn and Luis Gonzalez hit 50 or more homers in a season, far surpassing any total they had previously reached. (When you look at those guys' career records, their one big year can only make you laugh.) The Golden Age Selig called it.

But lost in the hoopla of '98 was an envious superstar in San Francisco. Bonds saw it all, saw the adulation that McGwire and Sosa got in their homer chase and got jealous. So he went to the body changer. The very good player became the most effective home run hitter in baseball history. All this as he passed age 35. By the time he was 37, in 2001, his body and his swing produced the greatest home run season ever. But in addition to the homers he had an apparent growth spurt in his head. A longish noggin turned into a pumpkin shape. No one really doubted the source of his power. But, again, it was not against the rules.

Nothing really became against the rules in baseball when it came to steroids and other performance enhancing substances until March 17, 2005. That was when McGwire and Sosa and Rafael Palmiero and admitted juicer Jose Canseco stunk up a Capitol Hill hearing room with their "testimony" before a House Committee looking into steroids in baseball. After that the rules started to change drastically. The Players Association came to agree with the team owners that something needed to be done. (Perhaps, the specter of some further, more real, scrutiny from Congress had something to do with this.) The monster they had all created and nurtured and celebrated had to be somehow eliminated. Canseco? He was done already. McGwire, too. Sosa made an enfeebled return to play for the Orioles that season where he shared a clubhouse with the adamantly anti-steroid Palmiero. While Sosa turned into a weak-fielding weak-hitting disgrace, Palmiero managed to test positive for steroids after he swore to Congress that he never used the stuff. And then he blamed a supplement he got from a teammate. You gotta love that guy.

But it's Bonds we're here to talk about. Bonds didn't disappear. He stayed on, seemed to grow even bigger as he drew a huge salary and huge crowds to the Giants beautiful ballpark by the Bay. And he kept hitting homers. Oh, not as many as before but enough to make you wonder if he really could break Aaron's record.

And now here he is, 21 homers away from tying the mark, 22 from breaking it and Bud Selig, who as Commissioner of MLB oversaw all these goings-on and encouraged it and said that we were living in baseball's Golden Age while it was happening, now seems ready to hide from it all. After the Congressional fiasco he appointed former Senator George Mitchell to "investigate" baseball's steroid problem. Ha Ha Ha. Mitchell's a board member of the Red Sox, he's Chairman of the Board of Disney, which owns ESPN. He's the owners' guy. Do you really think he's ever going to find anything worth talking about? Will he ever be in a position to recommend changes? To recommend tossing a player from the game? Not likely.

So Barry's going to break the record and all Bud can do is sulk. Asked recently at a San Francisco area luncheon whether he would trail Bonds as he neared the record, Selig made his position pretty clear.

"I wasn't there when Roger Clemens won his 300th game. That's a matter I'll determine at some point in the future," Selig said. "Let me say it, and I'm not going to say anymore. That's it."

Roll back the calendar to April of 1974 when Aaron was putting the finishing touches on his pursuit of Babe Ruth. Selig then was a much younger owner of a big league team, the Milwaukee Brewers, and a good friend (as he is now) of Aaron's. I'm sure he was unhappy at the time with then-Commissioner Bowie Kuhn. That baseball survived Bowie Kuhn's sanctimonious stewardship proves what a great game it is.

As the 1973 season had wound down, Aaron stepped up his chase and remarkably ended that year one homer short of tying the Babe. Kuhn made it pretty clear that winter that he would not trail Aaron and the Atlanta Braves waiting for the big homer to be hit. He did, however, manage a smart move when he said the Braves could not hold Aaron out of a season opening series in Cincinnati to better insure his breaking the record in front of the home-town fans. (Just why Atlanta was opening that season on the road is another question that was never asked.) So Aaron played and on Opening Day he tied the record in the presence of Kuhn and Vice President Gerald Ford with a three-run homer in his first time at bat. No more homers followed that day. Aaron, 40 years old, sat out the next game and then played the final game of the Reds series and went 0 for 3.

The Braves went home for their home opener the next night, Monday April 8. There were almost 54,000 people in attendance and one of them was not Bowie Kuhn. When Aaron walloped an Al Downing pitch over the left field fence in the 4^th inning, Bowie was in Cleveland, ostensibly wrapping up a meeting with the Wahoo booster club. And Bowie never saw anything wrong with this.

Now Selig, by his statements and his expected inaction, seems to have relegated Henry Aaron's home run record to the status of Gaylord Perry winning his 300^th game, or Steve Carlton; or Don Sutton; or even Roger Clemens. By saying what he did, he has already diminished his friend Henry Aaron's accomplishment.

When I worked at the NHL, the 1993-94 season was marked by Wayne Gretzky's pursuit of Gordie Howe's career goal-scoring mark, kind of a Henry chasing Babe on ice. As the Great One approached career goal 800 (and Gordie's total of 801) Commissioner Gary Bettman hit the road. As his PR guy, I certainly wasn't going to let him pull a Bowie and to his credit he never thought about not being there either. And we were there that wonderful night in Los Angeles when Gretzky got the goal. Not being there was, frankly, unthinkable.

One more thing: last spring Seton Hall University and ESPN did a poll on people's attitudes towards Bonds and the use of steroids in baseball. One result in particular struck me: 35 percent of African-American respondents thought race was the most important reason for Bonds being the center of attention on the steroid question, while only 2 percent of non African-Americans felt that race was the reason for Bonds being "singled out." For a sport that has done its best to alienate fans of all races and for a sport that has seen its African-American fan base diminishing and its African-American player base shrinking as well, Bud Selig needs to find some way to hide his discomfort and displeasure and be there when Barry Bonds breaks this record. He did it all in the Golden Age of your game Bud, now deal with it.