When Will Your Suffering End?
Well, that sure was a fun weekend of sports for the local fans.
Texas demolished Mizzou in Columbia, spoiling homecoming for the Tigers and finishing off their dreams of playing a meaningful bowl game this season. With the Big 12 North suddenly looking deeper — say hello to the Iowa State Cyclones! — just finishing over .500 will be a challenge for Missouri.
The Blues won Friday night, but then took a 4-1 beating from the Stars Saturday night. Along the way, casualties mounted. T.J. Oshie (appendectomy), Carlo Colaiacovo and D.J. King (broken hand) joined Barret Jackman (sprained ankle) and Eric Brewer (knee surgery, back surgery) on the injured list.
Then Rams fell to the Colts 42-6 Sunday, extending their losing streak to 17 games. This franchise has now lost 34 of 39 games, making it one of the most incompetent major professional sports teams in modern times.
As a capper, the Cardinals prepared to add Mark McGwire as hitting coach. If Big Mac continues to stonewall us on the whole steroid deal, then his return to uniform will provide a constant reminder of scandals past. That will be fun.
So, yeah, sports fans are feeling pretty low right now. The never-ending rain isn’t helping either.
ALSO, THE YANKEES ARE BACK
This just adds to the dismay of local fans. The New York Yankees, the ultimate sports overdog, are back in full force.
By outspending everybody by a LOT, they have finally won another American League pennant. This is an ominous sign for Major League Baseball.
With most teams constrained by revenue concerns in this tough economy, the Yankees will keep adding free agents like CC Sabathia and Mark Teixeira. Since the 2005 season, this franchise has invested $1,056,894,314 in new players.
This is a good time to be Matt Holliday and a bad time to be the Tampa Bay Rays.
MYSTERIES OF THE UNIVERSE
Questions to ponder while wondering if doctors can rebuild Sam Bradford’s NFL Draft stock:
- Are we to believe Rams had only one good play in their offensive plan for the Colts? Was there nothing left to try after that flea flicker to Donnie Avery?
- It’s great to have Big Mac back on board, but should fans be concerned if his protege Skip Schumaker reports to spring training weighing 260 pounds?
- At this time of year, don’t we all have just to suck it up and get back on the mound?
- Can’t the Houston Astros get anything right?
- By breaking D.J. King’s hand with his forehead, did Stars ruffian Krys Barch officially earn the designation of cementhead?
QUIPS ‘R US
Here is what some of America’s leading sports pundits have been writing:
Jim Caple, ESPN.com: “He is … the most interesting man in the World Series. I mean, can a player have a year more intriguing than A-Rod has? It began with the Joe Torre book, in which the former Yankees manager said teammates called Alex Rodriguez ‘A-Fraud’ and felt he was obsessed with Derek Jeter. That furor had just about died down when an excerpt from another book revealed that he had tested positive for steroids. After that came hip surgery that knocked Rodriguez out for the first month of the season. Then he homered on the first pitch after he came off the disabled list. Then he struggled for a while (his batting average was .207 in late June) before finishing strong to hit 30 home runs and drive in 100 runs (levels he’s reached for 12 consecutive seasons). And then — whew! — he entirely remade his postseason image from an autumn choker to the latest Mr. October candidate.”
Gordon Edes, Yahoo! Sports: “Alex Rodriguez is no longer the loneliest man in pinstripes. It all changed Sunday night, in that moment when Mariano Rivera struck out Gary Matthews Jr., and A-Rod thrust his arms overhead and ran toward the middle of the field on a parallel course with Derek Jeter. There they were met behind the mound by Mark Teixeira, the Yankee newcomer who had already done more than anyone to make A-Rod feel like he was finally home. Teixeira wrapped his arms around both Jeter and A-Rod in a spinning roundelay of joy. The player who had done so much to set himself as a man apart – with the biggest contract and the tawdriest headlines and the most famous girlfriends and then, this spring, the most spectacular fall from grace – had finally found himself in the vortex of a group to which he’d been denied membership for so long.”
Mike Freeman, CBSSports.com: “It was nice of the Los Angeles Angels to finally step aside and head back to the kids’ table. Time for the grown-ups to play, fellas. The Angels did provide a little bit of resistance to the Yankees if you consider spitting on a battleship resistance. The amateur nature of the Angels was never more apparent than the vital Game 6 when Vladimir Guerrero jogged toward first thinking he’d been walked when he hadn’t, Howie Kendrick dropped a routine play and Scott Kazmir made an inexplicable error in which his throw to first base was so lollipopped it looked like little rocket engines were attached to the baseball. How this series even got to 3-2 is an amazing thing seeing as the Yankees were playing the Baltimore Angels. The Angels had eight errors in the ALCS, one for every ratings point drop that would’ve occurred had they made the World Series.”
MEGAPHONE
“He played great. We’ve been looking for that since ’04, and we finally got to see it.”
Former Yankees great Reggie Jackson, praising A-Rod for Yahoo! Sports.
INBOX
What do we remember of the defenseman Mark Bergevin area with the Blues? Appearently, FanHouse’s Adam Gretz remember this particular play with video on YouTube to prove it.
Joseph Nee
Columbia, MO
Ah, great moments in Blues history . . .
Elsewhere on STLToday.com
Fans took the Colts loss worse than we expected, as you can read in Sunday’s post-game chat transcript. Fans who are still vexed can weigh in during today’s general sports chat.
We all knew the Colts would humiliate the Rams. That was a given. But can they regroup and take a run at the similarly feeble Lions?
Hockey Guy was glad to see the Blues dust off Alex Pietrangelo Saturday night, out of necessity.
The effort of Steven Jackson is awesome. He is a pleasure to watch week in and week out. The rest of Rams are a joke. Time for Devaney to resign. Chris Long, Jason Smith and thinking you can win with Marc Bulger show you
are a clown.
Don’t forget that the Chiefs lost 37-7 to the Chargers. It was a bad weekend.
As for McGwire, I don’t care about the steroids issue. If he gets better and more consistent results than McRae then I’ll be glad he’s back in a Cardinals uniform.
One more thing: The Yankees have their work cut out for them. The Phillies will be a very, very tall task!
Mark McGwire? Really?
I read that both Skip Schumaker AND Chris Duncan raved about his hitting techniques. I’ll give Schu a pass, but does it concern anyone else that CD recommends #5 as a hitting coach?
Just what a team that got embarrassed in the playoffs. Hope Albert is excited.
F.
Go Phillies.
Too sick to talk about the Blues. 43 years and counting….
Yeah Jer, counting the Chiefs loss, Missouri’s teams were beaten by a total combined score of 120-20. Yikes!
Who could have guessed the Mizzou wouldn’t show up against top competition?
or
That “coach” Stinkel would look like a kid lost in a store on the sideline?
Everyone knows (excpet the A.D.) how bad Zook is at Illinois but he as at least won a conference title.
Hey Tony, instead of checking the fire in your gut, why don’t you check the voices in your head? The biggest to do about nothing ever. Funny how this man just lies all the time and never gets called on it. He said just a few weeks ago that no changes would be made to the coaching staff. As we all know, that is so unlike TLR not to be honest.
How can this organization even think of bringing back #25 when he or the Cardinal ownership have never addressed this issue in the least. Boy, this won’t be awkward at all.
#25. I meant to write #25…but wrote #5. Somehow, I can’t write #25. Must be a deep psychological disconnect with McGwire.
Hey, I cheered when he hit #62. I even shed a tear. It was amazing. And I knew at the time he was on ANDRO…legal at the time.
But since then…..I don’t hate the guy. He made his choice. And he left the game, shamed. That’s enough punishment for me.
But why we’d invite the media circus to every game in 2010 is beyond me. We have TWO YEARS left with the best player of our generation and it’s going to be overshadowed.
Come on, St. Louis. You’re smarter than that…
Let’s be thankful that the Bucs and Titans are out there to keep every comedian on earth from making the Rams the butt of every joke. Suck it up boys and get a win next week. The Lions already got theirs!
Garry, that injured reserve list is enough to make you cry, ain’t it? Uggh.
At least Mizzou scored a touchdown and lost by two fewer points than the Sheep…LOL!
McGwire as hitting coach? He was a great hitter, but why will that make him a great hitting coach? I will of course give him a year to see what he can do, but my only concern is this: Do we want an untested hitting coach on a team that needs to win in 2010 so that AP will want to sign here for the rest of his career? We HAVE to have some success in 2010 or Albert may fly the coop…we can’t have that happen.
Drunk, isn’t it amazing the number of inept teams in the NFL this year? It’s unreal how bad the bad teams are…
I don’t know what to think of “…the Mark Bergevin area (sic) with the Blues.” Is it an area in the locker room? I’ve never seen it. Better yet: “What will we make of the Chicago-Bears-as-legitimate-playoff-contender” era? Now, was that game yesterday some fun to watch or WHAT??
…and speaking of fun to watch: The Mizzery Tiggers need to move up homecoming to September, so they can schedule another powerhouse like Furman, Bowling Green, or Wichita State like they always do until forced to play Big 12 schools with legitimate football programs. What were they thinking scheduling Texas? Their only saving grace is they always dodge playing both Texas and Oklahoma in the same year. Now, if they can cut out Nebraska, they can reduce the number of times they are humiliated yearly to maybe only two or three.
Is anybody else bothered by the looming prospect of the Cards’ learning how to hit from a probably steroid junkie with a lifetime batting average of .260 and who struck out once every four times he came to the plate? what can Maguire possible teach except how to swing for the fences with an uppercut stroke? Maybe it’s just me…..