 Major League Baseball Hit with Mascot Steroids Scandal
WASHINGTON, DC
-- Just when it looked like it couldn't get any worse for fans of America's pastime, Major League Baseball was again rocked by scandal today when Congress subpoenaed nearly a dozen of the game's best-loved macots for hearings on illegal steroids use. At the heart of the controversy are the Los Angeles Angels mascot bears Clutch and Scoops, whose positive test results added fuel to the fire started last month with the release of a tell-all book by Red Sox mascot Wally the Green Monster.
In the newly published tome How the Hairiest Mascots Got Hairier, Wally accuses several big name fuzzy guys of being on the juice. "I don't think anyone will be surprised when I say that the Pittsburgh Pirate Parrot didn't build up those muscles by merely tossing people overboard," reveals Wally in the book's introduction, "but when they learn that Mr. Met and the Colorado Rockies' Dinger have been on 'roids for years, a few heads might turn."
Not surprisingly, the Parrot, Mr. Met, and Dinger have all been called before Congress for the upcoming May 15 hearing. Also subpoenaed are the aforementioned Clutch and Scoop, Southpaw of the Chicago White Sox, and the San Diego Padres' Swinging Friar.
Many sports analysts have expressed surprise that Lou Seal, mascot of the San Francisco Giants, was not on the list. "Certainly he's one that is at the heart of the whole problem," said Tom Harrington, a Democratic Representative from Tennessee, "but we didn't want to turn this into a spectacle. What we are after here is real discussion on how we can stop this drug abuse amongst mascots; and it was felt by the committee that Mr. Seal's presence would cause too much of a media circus and distract from the issue at hand."
Whether or not any meaningful reform will be implemented to stop these furry funnymen from pumping up remains to be seen. But now that Congress has once again become involved in a private matter we can expect to hear a lot on the subject in the months to come.
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NHL Goes On Strike,
World Still Turns
SAN JOSE, CA -- When local sports talk stations carried the news recently that the San Jose Sharks would not be taking the ice this season, the question heard around sports bars througout the Bay Area was, "Aren't the Giants and A's playing preseason games tonight?"
The utter lack of concern and interest in the fate of the NHL season came as surprise only to the players and owners who have spent the first months of 2005 squabbling over contracts and pay. In small towns and big cities across the nation, the real concern centered around March Madness, the NBA, NASCAR, and even the NFL, which is in the middle of its offseason.
Many who are fed up with years of NHL squabbling but who still love the game on ice have offered up suggestions of a new hockey league. "You know, the only way to really straighten all of this out is to scrap the whole damn thing and start over," says Rayford Millington, a Detroit hockey fan who loves the Red Wings but hates the management of the team and league, "and the only way to really make the game appealing to the masses is to replace the current players with overgrown penguins."
These penguins have been putting in a lot of time on the ice as they prepare to take part in Rayford Millington's new-style hockey league.
OK, so maybe his solution is a bit off-the-wall, but the idea of starting over is one that has growing support. Even ESPN has gotten into the game. With the NHL lockout passing the 200-day mark, the sports network has offered up the ESPNHL, which can be viewed via a link under the features section on ESPN.com's NHL page. As the site explains:
"Instead of trying to fix the NHL, we took a different approach. We asked SportsNation to clear the ice and tell us what it would like to see in a league that started today. We then took the results from the December poll, as well as some commonly suggested NHL changes, and discussed them with members of the sports, media and entertainment industries."
The result is a league that is more plausible than the one proposed by Rayford Millington, but just for fun let's take a look at what Rayford's league would look like. Then, if you want to see something that could really happen, waddle over to ESPN.com.
The OPHL
(Overgrown Penguin Hockey League)
Millington's vision starts with the abolishment of players who demand high salaries and replacement of them with birds from Antarctica. "Who would be better at playing a game on ice?" asks Millington in his business plan.
While there is a certain logic to this argument, it is not one often seen outside of mental hospitals. What's more, there are other obstacles to overcome when turning to semi-aquatic birds for sporting entertainment. Among these are:
- How will the penguins hold sticks?
- Will refrigerated jets be required to move players from city to city?
- Will Pittsburgh have to change its team name to avoid possible litigation from other teams?
- How much will local law enforcement have to spend to keep PETA protests under control during games?
- Is it OK to feed players during games? What if the player is in the penalty box?
- Will the birds be allowed to fight?
- Would selling chicken fingers at the snack bar be slightly inappropriate?
"Those are all excellent questions," agrees Millington, "and represent just some of the details that I am working out as I approach FOX Sports about investing in the league. I have a feeling that this concept is right up their alley."
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Taking Cue from College Football, Computers Determine Final Four Matchups
ST. LOUIS, MO -- The upsets of #1 seeds Washington and Duke were the shockers of this year's March Madness NCAA tournament, at least until the Final Four matchups were released as determined by computer rankings.
Enamoured with the drawn out media coverage and sports talk discussion that followed the debacles of the NCAA National Championship Football games in 2003-2004 and 2004-2005, college basketball coaches decided to try the stunt with their own tournament this year.
Not surprisingly, the results have been controversial. While #1 seeds UNC and Illinois both made it into the big dance to be held at St. Louis's Edward Jones Dome, their opponents are not what fans expected. When Illinois takes the floor at 6:07 p.m. on April 2, it won't be against Louisville, who survived their Elite Eight contest against Washington but rather #7 seed West Virginia, who was knocked out of the tournament in the Sweet 16 round by Texas Tech.
"Apparently, the computers felt that West Virginia had been more impressive than Louisville because the Mountaineers scored 111 points against Wake Forest in the 2nd Round," explained Rick Stuart, a sports reporter with KYL Radio in Louisville. "As one person told me, that's a big number."
As much of a shock as this turn of events may be to Cardinals fans, it pales in comparison to the heartbreak being felt by Michigan State faithful, whose victorious Spartans were tossed out of the Final Four by a computer matchup that pits UNC against California State University, Sacramento.
"Sac State wasn't even in the tournament," points out Brian Franks, a member of the Michigan State coaching staff, "which makes this result all the more difficult to comprehend."
Reggie Warner, whose Sacramento State Hornets finished 12-16 and were not even invited to the tournament, was shocked to find himself playing in the Final Four.
Most sports analysts agree. Had the computers placed Kentucky in the game over Michigan State despite their 94-88 loss to the Spartans, there would have been debate but perhaps also some understanding. This kind of idiocy has occurred before in college football. But with the computers going completely off the board for this one, there is almost no one who is coming forward to defend the system.
"We've come to expect this kind of thing in December when schools battle for positioning in the final football rankings, but this is unprecented in basketball," laments Franks. "The only thing we can hope for now is that we can get an extra game added after the tournament is over, with Michigan State having a chance to take on the winner of the so-called 'National Championship' game."
Thomas Eddington, a reporter for the New York Daily Observer, believes that the Spartans and the Cardinals got just what they asked for when their coaches and athletic directors OK'd the use of computers in this year's tournament. "You know, they may be crying over the results now, but I think they're getting what they wanted all along: controversy," writes Eddington in this Thursday's sports column. "They wanted to stir up some excitement, and that's what they've done. I say let's take this computer thing and apply it to other sports, too. Hey, can you just imagine how cool this concept would be in the Olympics? And you thought that Russian-French judging scandal was big news."
Eddington's view may be shared by some, but certainly do not echo those of most basketball fans. And the ultimate irony in all of this is that one college sport that had a system that worked intentionally broke it while the other sport bickers year in and year out on whether or not to fix its antiquated Bowl system.
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