Billy Paultz Reconsidered

One staple of this blog in its original conception was supposed to have been to sit down late in the evening weekdays, with the family in bed, and sort of purge. For a variety of reasons (i.e. my disorganization and sloth) that hasn’t happened much. Tonight the domestic planets are aligned….
I’m doing a column for the […]

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I know he thinks he’s being funny, but still: Terry Bradshaw just picked the Giants because Eli Manning has the same TD/INT ratio as Rex Grossman did a year ago.
And we’re, uh, off…
This morning it was 18 degrees and windy as I walked from a building to my car. Actually ran. It took maybe 20 […]

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Observations in the wake of a wild football Sunday…
Chargers-Colts: OK, I was spectacularly wrong about the Chargers, who have both the hot team thing going on and the gritty underdog thing and are, remember, the same bunch that went 14-2 last year.
But would anyone on earth have given them a shot without Philip Rivers and LT […]

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Right after I shut down the computer last night, MSNBC went to a panel including Joe Scarborough, who said people shouldn’t be critical of the punditocracy getting the Hillary thing so wrong because it was like sportswriters predicting the Yankees would beat the Red Sox (in the 2004 ALCS) after having a 3-0 lead.
Ugh. This […]

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The Eagles had fewest takeaways in the NFL (which is at least partly luck), the fifth-toughest schedule in the NFL, the worst special teams in the NFL (easily addressable), their quarterback wasn’t remotely healthy until about week 12, their coach was dealing with a family disaster, and they went 8-8. They’re not as far off […]

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BPR is back after a holiday vacation with considerable blog stored in its hump…
Alamo Bowl: Please understand that This Space is not a fan of Anthony Morelli. He was not a good major-college quarterback, and wasn’t close to what Joe Paterno and his staff portrayed him to be.
His performance in San Antonio included a lot […]

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from computer woes with a fresh blogging spasm:
You’ve by now no doubt heard the doom-and-gloom about dwindling TV ratings for the all-star game. Here’s a different look at the same data- The all-star game will be, as it always is, the most-watched TV show of the summer. Despite Fox’s hideous coverage, it was the highest-rated […]

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Random thoughts on the “mid-summer classic”… 

Steel yourself for unctous video montages of ballplayers on cable cars. Suggested drinking game: Have one every time you hear “McCovey Cove.” …
The game is a sort of wan experience these days not because “the players don’t care anymore, etc.” but because it’s one of the many things in sports that’s […]

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Notes on a (triumpant?) return from vacation….

If somebody told you in April that in late June, Freddy Garcia, Brett Myers, Tom Gordon and Jon Lieber would all be on the DL, and Garcia and Lieber likely done for the year, you’d be wondering if the Phillies could catch the Nationals, not the Mets.

Considering their run-prevention […]

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ESPN could have had the Phillies vs. Justin Verlander (in his first start after a no-hitter) Sunday, but chose Mets-Yankees. Again.
Which brings us to a chicken/egg argument. The Mets, Yankees and Red Sox are the only baseball teams with national cache. Is the endless media hype of those teams a reflection of that or the […]

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