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“Lots of Turkey-Lots of Football”

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Now that was a pretty good Thanksgiving we had around the TV set and in stadiums. A weekend full of football and fine food.

CHARGERS…The team is playing well, and yes a (5-6) record, has put them into second place in a collapsing AFC-West. They’ve only beaten two teams with winning records, the failing Cowboys and Bills, But they are getting big plays from Philp Rivers and Keenan Allen. The quarterback has stopped turning the ball over. His receive has 23-catches the last two games. And the pass rush remains fierce. Of course they cannot run the ball a lick, but they are keeping the QB-clean, at least better this year, than the past four.

BRONCOS…Oh it’s easy to blame the young QBs, and then fire the offensive coordinator, Mike McCoy, but fans should be firing shots too at General Manager John elway. His decision on the players on the roster. The leaky offensive line. The lack of a quality tight tend. The lack of burners at wideout too.

CHIEFS….Everything has gone off track for Andy Reid. Alex Smith used to manage games. Now they need him to win games. And his offensive line is poor. They dont have enough quality at wide out opposite opposite Tyreek Hill. The run game has gone away. This is a tailspin of epic proportions.

RAIDERS…They could still be dangerous before this is all done, but then again, maybe not, when you consider they have just one interception on the season, opposing QBs hitting on 73% of their passes, and a running game that is spotty at best.

CFL…They played the championship game in the snow last night in Ottawa, with Calgary-Toronto fighting to move the ball on a snow caked field, in the cold, and wind. Fun to watch, not much fun to play in but the sold out-stadium, loaded with bundled up fans, enjoyed

AZTECS…A (10-2) season is a success. Up next, maybe a chance to beat a 3rd team from the PAC-12, if the Aztecs wind up in the Foster Farms Bowl against Washington State, as has been rumored Sunday night. It was a vintage Rashaad Penny day, 203-yards, as State pulled ways from a really poor New Mexico team. Really disappointed only 28,000 fans (more likely) 24,000 showed up. The town still has not embraced a really good San Diego State program.

MOUNTAIN WEST…Only this conference, which has a history of bad decisions, could out do itself in what is happening. Fresno State beat up Boise State on Saturday night…and now will face them again this coming Sunday in the championship game. Last year, the Aztecs played Wyoming twice in a 3-week span in winning the title. Where to play the game? Home town advantage? Neutral sight? Warm weather Sasn Diego? Would anyone come? And of course the on going debate about the lousy TV deal with CBS.

USD…The little train that could, did it again.. The Toreros thumping of Northern Arizona in the opening game of the FCS (1AA) playoffs. Superb defense by the Toreros, strong passing game from QB-Anthony Lawrence, and a (10-2) record as they head to North Dakota State for next weeks second round game.

ALABAMA…The Crimson Tide fell apart, got beat up, were dominated, and just do not look like a typical Nick Sasban team.

AUBURN…Some month of November down there on the plains. The Tigers knocked out #1-ranked Georgia a couple of weeks ago, then duplicated it again on Saturday against Bama. Got both those wins at Jordan Hare Stadium. The wheels could fall off the carriage next week in the rematch in the SEC title game against Georgia.

NOTRE DAME…Guess they were never for real, getting beat twice in the last three weeks. So much for being ranked in the top five.

OHIO STATE…Hughe comeback win over Michigan, though costly injuries along the way. The emotional win over Penn State then the ambush loss at Iowa. And of course Urban Meer complaining about the sidelines situation in Ann Arbor saying might have caused in QB’s knee injury.

MIAMI….Cold weather…over-confident…how do the unbeaten Hurricanes lose on the road to sub-500-Pitt. Maybe they were never a dominant team, but the rankings have been littered with upsets every week.

GEORGIA…This may be big boy football at its best. The Bulldogs are three deep at running back and will be favored in the SEC title game and will be in the final four for the playoffs.

CLEMSON…Not blowing anyone out, since the departure of Deshaun Watson and Mike Williams and Wayne Gallman, but here they are (11-1), waiting for an invite to the final four.

OKLAHOMA…The Sooners are (11-1) and explosive and will be a work warrior come playoff time.

THE QUARTERBACKS….Waiting game about to begin with Josh Rosen-UCLA and Sam Darnold-USC to see if they leave school for the NFL draft, or come back for another year.

THE COACHES…Some weekend too, for coaching changes. Texas A&M, Florida, UCLA, Tennessee, Nebraska, Arizona State, Oregon State, Arkansas, all dumping coaches with big buyouts, and now filling jobs in a 72-hour span. At last count, 17-Division 1-football jobs opened up, and quickly to be filled up .

UP NEXT…The final CFP rankings…and the Bowl choices. Going to be a fun December.

Some Thanksgiving, full of turkey and football.

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Lee Hamilton
4:32 PM (5 hours ago)

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“Death Sentence in Baseball”

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It happened a year ago to the Cardinals.

Now it’s happened again, this time to the Atlanta Braves.

A year ago, MLB unloaded on the St. Louis Cardinals, when their scouting director was caught hacking into the Houston Astros scouting files, stealing information from their computer system.

It has led to a jail sentence for the head of scouting, a massive fine to the Cardinals.

The St Louis official took scouting reports…internal memos….emails between Astros club officials….medical reports….notes on trade conference calls and contract negotating lists plus more.

it was pretty sleazy.

And now the hammer has fallen on the Atlanta Braves, for ‘egregious’ violations of the new International Signing Cap rules.

Braves GM-John Coppolello was suspended for life by baseball for 3-years worth of violations.

Dealing in Latin America has always been sordid, and baseball has had its hands full setting up rules for agents, trainers, black market drug dealing, falsified documents, birth certificates and more.

The Braves had developed a rogue blueprint of violating the spending cap.

They could write ‘bonus checks’ for agents, to convince the Latin American players to sign ‘below slot’ contracts, so the club could overspend to sign another player in a bidding war.

They gave kickbacks to agents who delivered a package of players, a star, and a couple of others, at under slotted figures.

They tampered with 14-and-15 years olds, advancing them money, to guarantee when they turned 16-they would sign with Atlanta.

They bought cars and apartments for families of player, who would sign for below slot amounts, but would make it up with the perks the club was giving them.

They did the same deals for US-draft picks on at least once occasion.

They filed phony documents three years in a row detailing how much they spent on International signings-misreporting each year, so they could spend more the next year.

And then it all came tumbling down. Turned in by honest Latin American scouts, and execs from other clubs who had suspicions after the Braves signed blue chipper after blue chipper.

Atlanta will pay a severe price, worse than the Cardinals exec paid.

The GM is gone for life from the game.

His lead assistant is out of baseball for a year.

As many at 10-international scouts, couriers, will be disciplined.

The top 12-international players the Braves signed over the last thee years, have been declared free agents, including 4.5M-shortstop Kevin Maitan.

The top four players in the class of 2016 have been declared free agents.

The Braves had had their international signing pools slashed by 50% for three straight years. They have 2M a year to spend, most everyone else in excess of 5M

They will be limited to giving only 10,000-dollar bonuses to any player over the next four years. The going rate of big money Latin players are 3-to-4M per year.

They will be banned from signing the top player they had tampered with, when he became eligible in 2019.

They’ve been stripped of a high pick in the 2018-US based draft.

It’s pretty severe, but then what Atlanta’s GM did was pretty severe too, in terms of violations.

It you aim’t cheating, you aim’t trying, the old phrase goes. You get caught cheating in baseball, you might get your hands cut off.

Braves GM-John Coppolello should introduce himself to Pete Rose, both on baseball’s suspended list. They can have coffee with Chris Correa, the Cardinals scouting director, once he gets out of prison.

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“SDSU Athletic Department Fumbles Ball-Again”

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Disappointing. Disgusting.

San Diego State is about to wrap up another very good football season, and aside from fans and alums and the media in town, no-one know much about what Rocky Long has accomplished on Montezuma Mesa.

And for the second year in a row, a record setting running back will finish up his career, with very little acclaim, outside the 619-760-858 area codes.

Last year at this time, DJ Humphrey was on the brink of wiping out all the time career rushing record held by Ron Dayne of Wisconsin.

The big play-little guy wound up going north of 6,000-yards rushing to enter the NCAA college football record books.

He got little national acclaim, and not much national recognition though he did experience a trip to the Heisman Trophy ceremony, where he finished out of the running for what has become a quarterback award.

A great player, granted not likely to get much fame in the NFL, where bigger is better.

And now with a game left in the regular season, much the same is happening to Rashaad Penny, who is atop the nation in all purpose yards and in rushing.

He is a big time back, built in the lines of Hershel Walker, and though buried here in the Mountain West Conference, with a bad TV contract, that no one watches around the nation, he too is getting little to no recognition.

The Humphrey-Penny issues are much like the early 1990’s debate that circled around the three years of exploits of Marshall Faulk, who was an electric-iconic player.

He got some national recognition, for big games against USC-UCLA, but his team never won a WAC title, and he never got an invite to New York.

Time to call it as it is.

San Diego State’s Athletic Department has failed miserably to promote its great ones. Not Pumphrey and now surely not Penny.

They pump out volumes of Emails to local media about women’s basketball, soccer, lacrosse and all other sports, none of which get air time, little of which merits more than a sentence or two in the Union Tribune.

Why would you ignore a national push to help Penny’s name get out there, for his work on the field, and to publicize not just the player, but his school.

No we have to spend time talking about the school mascot, and the nickname, and non revenue sports.

College football is king lots of places.

The Aztecs marketing and sports information people seem tone deaf..

Penny in the LA Times. Penny in the San Francisco Chronicle Penny in the New York Times. Penny in the major dailies across the country. A conference call a week with a couple of key national football writers.

You flood those TV networks…ESPN-ESPN 1…Fox Sports-Fox Sports 1….CBS with videos of the kid’s highlife reel.

Sports Illustrated, Sporting News, Bleacher Report and their websites wouldn’t want to tell the story of the star running back in the shadows of big time football?

And then there are the major college websites to spread the word.

I was aghast to get the lists of finalists for various awards, and Rashaad Penny’s name was not to be found on the Doak Walker award list, nor the Maxwell Club award.

Last year they raised a special banner on top of a dorm promoting Pumphrey for the Heisman. It was really cool to see and photograph.

Nothing this year on Penny. Nothing creative utilizing his name “A Penny goes a long way”…..”A Penny for your Heisman thoughts” etc.

You can whine about East Coast bias…or ESPN’s failure to cover the country, but it’s San Diego State’s job to get the message out to anyone-everyone.

No they’d rather swamp me with press releases about women’s cross country.

Shame on marketing. Shame on Sports Information. Where are your priorities.

Rocky Long does not tolerate Aztec turnovers on game-days. His athletic department has blown their responsibility to get Rashaad Penny national recognition for a brilliant career.

SDSU fumbles the ball “again” on another star football player on the stage that really counts….nationwide recognition..

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“Chargers Win-Thank Goodness for Smart Guy Head Coaches”

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For one night, and for this morning…the Chargers feel good about themselves.

They got a win, continuing their effort to put themselves back into the AFC-wildcard race.

They ripped apart a Buffalo Bills team, putting on a dazzling display of defense, and unleashing Keenan Allen and Melvin Gordon on the offensive side of the ball.

The Chargers caused the 54-24-beat down, but they had help.

Just like a couple of other wins the Chargers got, they had help too.

Stupid head coaching decisions by head coaches on the other sideline. Game time decision, game planning decisions, likely reasons why the Chargers may have been given 3-gifts that turned into victories.

Buffalo’s rookie coach Sean McDermott, upset at the poor play of his offense, in back to back losses, decided to bench starting quarterback Tyrod Taylor.

Yes scoring and offensive output was down. And yes, Taylor threw for just 56-yards into the third quarter last week, when he was benched.

But in going to rookie Nathan Peterman, a 5th round draft pick, the Bills threw the kid QB to the wolves, Joey Bosa-Melvin Ingram.

The end result was 4-interceptions on his first 9-passes. 5-interceptions overall in a deplorable first half. The kid QB overwhelmed with all the things he was seeing across the line of scrimmage.

All that led to good field position for the Bolts, two defensive touchdowns from the Chargers, and an outright slaughter on a Sunday.

This loss is pinned on a stupid move by a rookie coach. Taylor came back and played well in the 2nd half, but his team was buried by then..

What Buffalo did equalled the foul ball decisions of two other coaches made in early season games the Chargers wound up winning.

You do remember the win in New York against the Giants. The game in which New York led 9-0 into the second quarter, only to have head coach Ben McAdoo start throwing the ball, exposing Eli Manning to hits, sacks, turnovers.

The Chargers won the game, but really McAdoo hand delivered it to them. When he changed his game plan, even with the LA defense on its back heels and reeling. The Chargers won, the Giant lost.

And ditto in a Bolt win over the Raiders up in Oakland. QB-Derek Carr, just coming off an injury, ran a 5-yard, short passing offense. Keep the game close to the vest, don’t expose Carr to hits.

But close to the vest does not work with Philip Rivers on the other sideline. The Chargers did just enough to win. Oddly the next weekend, the Raiders came out throwing , hit big plays, torched a team and win.

Add in some play calling, in which teams don’t attack the Chargers shortcoming, covering tight ends, crossing patterns etc. It makes you wonder what game films coaches look at in determing game plans.

So the Chargers are (4-6) heading to Dallas for Thanksgiving day.

But reality is 3-of those wins were gift wrapped by opposing coaches.

Makes you think of Kyle Shanahan’s play calling faux-pas last year in the Super Bowl.

Head coaches, smart guys, well not everywhere in the NFL.

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“Baseball in Miami-No One Cares”

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I would have never thought it would happen in that market.

Baseball in Miami was always something special, not just because of the sunshine, but because of the chemistry make up of the community.

The Cuban population base, loved baseball back on the island.

Those who moved to South Florida from the Dominican and Puerto Rico have grown up on the sport.

South Florida is the home of a lot of transplanted retirees from the Northeast, you know, Yankee-Met fan…Red Sox nation and the like.

I would have thought the Florida Marlins-Miami Marlins would have been a raging success.

Bu no, hasn’t worked out that way at all.

Oh yes the Marlins went to a World Series, sipped the champagne, got rings.

And they had some spectacular players, headed up by Gary Sheffield and a great manager in Jim Leyland..

And they had big money owners led by owner of the Dolphins, who said he loved he game, then lost his taste for it.

But they also played in an aging stadium. And it always rained in the afternoon. And it was hot and humid lots of the time.

And then there were the firesales of players, when Wayne Hizuenga did not like the budget payroll trends he was seeing across the game.

The city and county built a shiny new stadium on the sight of the old Orange Bowl.

They developed some really good young players, like the late pitcher Jose Fernandez, Marcel Ozuna, and this year’s MVP-Giancarlo Stanton.

But it’s all going to go away again.

Jeffrey Loria has sold the club, taking his bad leadership qualities and terrible won-loss records, with him and a big profit too.

Left behind for Derek Jeter and the new ownership group is a high payroll, low attendance figures, and a monster contract owed to Stanton.

Loria gave him a back-end loaded deal that still has 10Y-285M left on it.

Jeter says the club has bled dollars, and must reduce the payroll. Another firesale is coming, and the Marlins are attempting to find a buyer for Stanton’s contract, which includes a no trade clause. They need to lop off some 40M from that payroll.

Once they get done shipping players out in the next couple of weeks, the roster will likely look like an expansion franchise…again.

This firesale may be more painful, because they are moving a superstar, with 59-hoers and an MVP trophy.

But the fans won’t notice. They don’t come to games. They don’t watch on TV.

Despite all the young talent stockpiled, in that colorful new Stadium, right near Little Havana…Marlins baseball is just not very important.

I would have never thought that would happen, not in that city, in that state, with that cross-section of population from other countries that love baseball.

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