Did anyone misplace some strips?

The Steelers brought back their Jersey from 1934 and they looked amazing. Now I might be the only person out there who actual liked them but they were very cool. How often do you see strips on football jerseys? The Steelers played the Redskins this past Sunday. To put it kindly, the Skins were stepped over and left in the dust. Nothing seemed to go right for them from the start, Griffin was fine but the receivers couldn't catch a thing. Their gloves must have been greased or something before the game. Oh, while I'm on the topic, the Skins have brought back Chris Cooley. I am mildly peeved at the Skins for letting him go and than bring him back part way into the season. If the only reason they cut him was to reduce his pay is just plain ridiculous. Yet again this is sports, people not politics. If you want mess with politics go somewhere else and stop messing with the sports world. Yes I'm glad Cooley's back but I almost wish he was on a better team. The Skins, after a good start to the season but have started to slip into the old ways of the team. The defence needs work and the offence definitely needs help to keep the rookie QB safe. Possibly if they can pull their act together they can have a decent season for once this year. DeAngelo Hall was ejected from Sunday's game and is facing a possible fine and/or suspension. It took Big Ben as well as several Redskin players to get him to head to towards the bench. He still "tried to explain" his side to the refs before being ejected. He just didn't know when to cool it. Here's a Pic of the Steeler's uniforms in case you didn't see them.

The Patriots played the St. Louis Rams in London, England. The English must have a soft spot for the Pats since their are banners from all over London (This is slightly biased since I just see things from the Pats on my feed and nothing from the Rams. There could be just as many Rams signs as Pats). I did not see this game but from the highlights it was very event that the Rams were out matched. Rob Gronkowski may have taking the end zone dance a bit to far during the game although it did make for great entertainment for us. I always like to watch the London game and it's great that we're sharing our sport but, this is one thing that I don't think will catch on besides more fans. I don't think that there's enough people out there who would be willing to play. I diffidently do not want this to become an Olympic sport like commissioner Goodell wants. It just wouldn't be fair to the other countries since we've had a several years experience in how the sport is played and actual playing it. The only other country to my knowledge that plays American football is Canada and they play it on a shorter flied that's also wider.  I just don't think it would be a good sport to add to the Olympics. I love football and all but just not in the Olympics.

Now I don't talk about college football that often but in this case I felt I needed to. The UMD Terps' have lost four of their four quarterbacks. No that's not a type-o. All four of the QB they recruited to play are now out with season ending injuries. Junior C.J. Brown who was supposed to be the starter this year tore his ACL  during an preseason drill. Freshman Perry Hills tore his ACL trying to make a tackle in the N.C State game on Oct. 20. Sophomore Devin Burns took over for Hills after he was injured until he broke his foot later in the game. Finally Freshman Caleb Rowe tore his ACL in the Boston College game Oct. 27. So the Terps have no option but to turn to two former quarterbacks. Freshmen: Shawn Petty, who was recruited as a linebacker; and Brian McMahon who plays tight end. They both played quarterback in high school and were good at it. Just not enough to get recruited as one. Petty will start Saturday against Georgia Tech for his first college QB debut and McMahon will be his back-up. They don't have a third string quarterback. I don't know if it's just dumb luck or a curse but most teams have a lot of injuries just not all to quarterbacks. Or at least this many in one season. Hopefully they won't need a third string, because they might be hard pressed to find one. They're probably lucky that they had two players who played quarterback in high school. Otherwise they may have been walking around the locker room with a clip board asking if anyone had played quarterback when they were younger. Maybe this will be the end of bad luck for the Terps or at least as far as quarterbacks go.

Adam LaRoche received a Gold Glove and is now a free agent. I hope he decides to come back to the Nationals or finds another good team to play on were his skills will be used to the fullest of their potential.

The Reason I Hate Over-Time Games

First I want to thank the Washington Nationals for an amazing season. You guys should hold your heads high, you proved the "experts" (insert finger quotes) wrong. The best part? You had a awesome time doing it and had some of the best players on any team in the league. So thank you for showing me that D.C. sports have a chance at winning a major title.

NHL News. There is none. At all. Besides that they can't come to an agreement so they've had to cancel games through November. Ovie and four other Washington Capital players are playing or seeing family overseas. So unless they put their egos in a box and lock them up before too long we won't have a 2012/2013 season.

NFL News. The New England Patriots played the New York Jets last week. Any NY vs. NE game , in any sport, is going to matter a lot to fans on either side of the game but when it's the Jets and Pats, it really matters. Maybe it's 'cause the Jets have a Yankee-esque air about them, the kind that turns everyone away like a bad smell. So when I turned on the game, the Jets were up by a field goal. Tom Brady had to march the Pats all the way down the field with enough time to score at the least a field goal. Brady did what he does best under pressure, does what needs to be done. The Pats get down the field just barely, the last two plays of the drive were played in the last 10 seconds of the game. The stress was horrible. It was like the whole world would end if the field goal missed. Thank goodness it didn't. The game went into overtime and the Pats had the ball first. These new overtime rules are pointless and confusing. It should be the first one to score wins not who ever has the most points at the end wins UNLESS one team scores a touchdown or a safety. What? Who came up with that? In this case it didn't matter, the Pats scored a field goal and let the defence go to work. They did their job and kept the Jets out of the end zone, not even close to it. Pats win 29-26.

The Redskins are failing, with all the hype about this season it's really flopping. They lost to the Giants, 27-23. The Skins were the only team to beat the Giants twice last season.

The Steelers haven't been great but haven't been bad, yet they're not mediocre. All their games have (except for two games) been close, won or lost by a touchdown or less. They won today, it came down to the end but they pulled a win out of it, 24-17.

Update

A quick update on the post I did last night. The owners and refs have come to an agreement. The 'real' refs are expected to officiate tonight's game (Ravens vs. Browns). Both sides had to give but really the owners gave a bit more. They had to, to get the refs back. Tonight I want to see improvements in the calls and cleaner plays. Maybe now the coaches won't need to blow their heads off, although some may still but that's just how they are.

Here's a video about the replacement refs that I found last night after I wrote the blog post. It's hilarious.

This is getting out of hand

In the world of baseball, the Nationals have been steadily marching towards the playoffs all season. The team has home-run junkies playing in every game and the pitchers are starting to come into their own. Combine great sluggers and great pitchers you get what the Nats have become. A quick note on Harper, I've read many articles recently about Harper's temper and the concern that it could be a bad thing. The thing is that he only gets angry at himself, around anyone else he's chill even if they're blowing up at him. A little anger at yourself for messing up is a good thing, it makes you better. If he keeps the anger to himself and refrains from hitting bats against his head he'll be good. Who knows maybe his fire will ignite the rest of the team.

I'll sum up the score from the past 3 weeks of football real quick.
Patriots: 1-2-0. Pats 34 Titans 13, Cardinals 20 Pats 18, Ravens 31 Pats 30.
Steelers: 1-2-0. Broncos 31 Steelers 19, Steelers 27 Jets 10, Raiders 34 Steelers 31.
Redskins: 1-2-0. Skins 40 Saints 32, Rams 31 Skins 28, Bengals 38 Skins 31.

The NFL needs to get their act together. Why? Well, if you hadn't noticed, the games are falling apart at the seams. Players fighting with each other and the temporary refs can't make timely calls which is leading to more problems. The players are pushing the limits of the rules since the temporary refs don't know them that well. The refs are making the wrong calls left and right. Everyone knows it too, the players, coaches, owners, fans, even non-football people know. Players are being hurt; look at the Steelers/Raiders game on Sunday. Darrius Heyward-Bey (Raiders WR) was hit hard in the end zone. It was clear to me that it was a defenseless receiver hit but there was no call on the play. Or the Broncos/Texans game, where part of Matt Schaub's ear lobe was ripped off. The sport is just going to get worst if something's not done. Coaches are blowing up - Kyle Shananhan got an unsportsmanlike conduct call  in the Bengals game and was fined $25,000 by the NFL, Bill Belichick shoved a ref after a clearly bad call in the Ravens game just to name a few. To sum up, players are getting hurt, hot-head coaches are ready to blow, fans are tired and concerned. The NFL and the 'real' refs are back in talks trying to work out a deal. Hopefully they'll have worked it out so the refs can be in for this weekend's games. My fingers are crossed.

A quick note on hockey. The NHL is currently stuck in a lock-out. Some of the players are now playing with European teams. I'm mildly concerned about that since not all the teams over there have short term contracts or outs for NHL players if and when they resolve it so they can come back to the NHL. Another thing, not all the teams offer to cover the NHL players if they get hurt (which isn't a problem with all their money) but if they do get hurt it could be serous. Not all players have gone over seas, some have stayed here and are buying ice time at the practice arena to train with teammates. Hopefully they won't have to cancel the season.

Confused Anyone?

As the preseason in football comes to an end teams are ready for the real season to start. The Washington Redskins played their last preseason game last night against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. No starters played during the game, only second and third lines played (whoa, that sounds like a hockey term). One thing about the back-up players for the Skins that differs from so many of the other teams in the NFL is that most of the guys (unless they were just drafted) played last season because of all the starters that had injuries. So they have the experience to play in an NFL game and they're just making the coaching staff's jobs harder. All the teams need to have their final 53 man roster by Friday. They can sign some of the players to the practice squad after the final cut. The players in last night's game proved that the Skins finally do have more than one talented player.

Speaking of talented, Chris Cooley was released by the Skins on Wednesday. Cooley has been one of the bright spots on the roster for years, he was one of the players that kept fans watching and hoping that something would change. Fans kept watching to see him make the big plays, even if he had a bad year something inside still told you that it wasn't the end. I really didn't see what the Skins saw to cut him, if only that he was older side of the players on the team (the average age of a player on the Skins is 21). This season was shaping up to be one of his best. There's one thing I don't understand (besides this whole thing in general) is the fact that he announced it by himself, no Snyder or Shanahan in sight. He was the only one at the press conference. I don't know if that how he wanted to do it or not but the team could have sent someone form the coaching staff out there with him. Give him the respected he deserves, he has stay with your lousy team for eight seasons after all. I don't think this is the end of Cooley in the NFL, he most definitely could be picked up by another team who sees that he still has something left. So Cooley, you will be one of the greats of the Redskins in my mind and in many others. Wherever you go in the NFL people will be pulling for you (unless it's with the Cowboys, then all bets are off). Instead of HTTR (Hail to the Redskins) I say HTCC, Hail to Chris Cooley. Oh, the Skins did win 30-3.

Some in the baseball world were convinced that once the Nationals started to slide that they wouldn't stop till they hit rock bottom. Well, they didn't slide that far and they didn't even come close to hitting rock bottom. They lost five game straight before winning yesterday against the Marlins 8-4. Harper added another first to his growing list with two homers in the same game. I can understand how people could start to panic. This is the best season the team has had in years and after all those bright spots in seasons past but to be let down later on can wear on a person. This season was different, it wasn't just a bright spot it was a mega-watt light bulb shining in their faces. So when it came loose even for a little bit you begin to panic thinking that the bulb was fading when it just need to be fixed. As soon as it was fixed the light was back, nothing had happened to it, it was still as bright as ever. So if you're a Nats fan who was concerned that things were about to start coming apart at the seams, take a chill pill, Johnson knows what he's doing.

One last thing. I don't know, I don't think anyone knows but Lance Armstrong and his doctor if he used drugs. It doesn't matter if he did or didn't, what matters to me is that an agency thought that they had the right to take away all his titles. (I mean it's still really wrong to use drugs to get better at a sport but that's not the point of this post.) The USADA shouldn't have that kind of power. They should give their opinion to the Tour de France and other races and let those organizations make the choice to take away the titles from an athlete or not. Let the race officials choose, not some guys in lab coats and business suits. I'll leave it at that.

The NFL regular season starts on Wednesday Sept. 9th Cowboys vs. Giants at 8:30.

My Top Olympic Stories

First off I want to congratulate all the athletes who competed in the Olympic Games. Whether they won or not, they got to share in one of the most amazing athletic events on Earth.

Story #1: The Greatest Olympian Ever

Michael Phelps over the course of 4 Olympics has won 18 gold, 2 silver, 2 bronze, for a total of 22 medals (Sydney 2000, Athens 2004, Beijing 2008, and London 2012. He raced in Sydney but did not medal). In Beijing, Phelps won 8 gold medals, the most anyone has won during a single Games. Over the course of his career, he set 39 world records and holds seven currently. Sadly, this was the last contest of his career. Phelps won't be competing in the Rio de Janeiro 2016 games. Now some people don't like Phelps, which I can understand. He did make some majorly bad choices in his life and most of the problems he ran into where if his own making. Yet he over came them, all of them. He came back and still won, he proved to me that he IS the greatest Olympian ever; and honestly that's all that matters. Feel free to tell me your opinion but mine is still out there. Agree or disagree with me you still have to admit that he has had some amazing races.

Story #2: Pushing the Envelope

"Having a disability doesn't have to be a disadvantage." 

                                                                                  - Oscar Pistorius

Oscar proved that having his legs amputated at a young age won't stop him from running at the highest level. To even compete in the Olympic trials his prosthetics were tested to death, making sure that there was no way that they gave him an advantage. But in the Games themselves, he didn't medal. In his solo race he made it into the semifinals but didn't make it into the finals. The winner of that semi traded name tags with Oscar as a show of respect for what he did. In the 4x400m relay race the South Africa team was initially knocked out when another relay runner ran into the South African runner (who did something to his elbow, it was never clear to me what exactly the injury was). The South Africa team filed for an investigation and it was proven that the other runner was across the line in South Africa's lane, so they were put in the final as an additional team. The South Africa team just didn't have enough to help give Oscar a chance at a medal. He ran the anchor leg of the race but the three runners before him struggled. Once the baton got into his hand he ran like the wind going from 8th to 5th by the end.

Sure he didn't win a medal in these Games but he tried, did his best, and loved every minute of it. So way to go Oscar, you showed everyone that just because you have a disability it doesn't change anything.

The Olympics at Warp-Speed

The Olympics are winding down, and I have to say these Games have been one of the best Summer Games. The contestants are faster, stronger, and just better overall than they were at the Beijing Games four years ago. Take for example the men's 800m race last night. The guy who came in last would have won gold at Beijing, that's how much faster they are this year. Now it could just be me but a lot of records are being broken during these Games. The winner of the 800m broke his own world record that he set qualifying for the Olympics. The U.S. team has the most medals (last time I checked) with 94 total, China's next with 81. Great Britain, the host team, struggled during the beginning of these Games hardly ever coming close to the podium, but it all changed quickly about halfway into the first week. The heavy hitters of the GB team came out and started getting medals for their country.

The show of sportsmanship in these Games have been outstanding. In one of the men's hurdles races (I forget the distance but it doesn't really matter all that much) the Chinese hurdler ran into one of the hurdles. He hopped in pain on one foot to the finish line where two other hurdlers (from Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago if I'm remembering right) helped him to where the medical  staff waited. I have not seen one sore loser, there have been some very disappointed losers but they accept the fact that they lost and they move on for the most part.

Tonight, track and field has been exciting. The U.S. women's 4x100 relay won gold after trying for so many years and in the process set a new world record. The U.S. team in the men's 4x400 grabbed the silver when the Bahamas runner just passed the U.S. runner in the last 100m. Oscar Pistorius ran the anchor leg for South Africa, but unfortunately he never really had a chance. The three runners before him just weren't as fast as everyone else in the race, but I consider him one of the best runners in the Olympics. If only because he pushed what was considered the norm out the window.

In home town sports:

Football is back. The preseason started last night and the Redskins, Steelers, and the Patriots all won, 7-6, 23-21, 7-6 respectively.

Alexander Semin signed a one year deal worth $7million with the Carolina Hurricanes. The Capitals will be better without a brooding player who isn't willing to adapt his playing style. We already have to deal with one moody Russian. That is all I have to say about him.

The Nationals swept their four game series with the Astros as the should have. If you didn't know, the Astros are the worst team in baseball.

I'll have some of my top Olympics stories up later.
(Lighting does strike twice)