It's been a busy week and a half in the sports world. The Blackhawks are not done dismantling their playoff team, though they have begun to make additions; the All-Star break is here for Major League Baseball and the White Sox are sitting on top of the Division by half a game; oh, and breaking news, the Cubs still suck. Perhaps the biggest news is the self-proclaimed King James snubbing a host of teams looking to upgrade this season for the now star-studded Miami Heat, making him arguably one of the most hated kings in a few centuries. Before we get into that, though, I'll start off with my early predictions for the NFC West.
Early Predictions:
San Francisco 49ers
Seattle Seahawks
Arizona Cardinals
St. Louis Rams
Every prediction I've read so far has the Seahawks finishing third behind the Niners and Cards, and perhaps picking Seattle as the second team will be almost as unpopular as picking the Raiders second in the AFC West, but I'm set to defend that decision. First off, I will say that there's no doubt in my mind that San Fran will win the division and St. Louis will finish last. San Francisco has kept a dominant defense in tact for the most part, and if their offensive line and running backs can perform at a high level it should be more than enough to carry the offense despite quarterback Alex Smith's progression. The Rams, on the other hand, have not done enough to upgrade. Their defense was woeful last season, and they have made few moves to remedy that. They have upgraded on offense in some areas, but not enough to compete at a high level with their opponents, not this year at least. The Seahawks, though, are looking to have some decent upward momentum this season. Pete Carroll may be pressed to prove he can make it as a head coach in the NFL, but he has much of the right personnel in place to back him up. They upgraded positions of need on the offensive line, secondary, and receiving corps in the early rounds of the draft, and added some help on defense in the later rounds in addition to acquiring some talented veterans. Their main competition figures to be Arizona, and neither one of their quarterbacks looks to be ready to lead that offense. Arizona will also have to rely on their running game, which is still a question mark, and there's no guarantee their defense will be keeping them in a position to win after key departures. As I said, the consensus seems to be San Fran, THEN the Cardinals, then the Seahawks, but I'm confident in my picks. Arizona looks to be slipping while Seattle looks to be doing some solid building. The biggest question, I think, will be if Seattle can win enough games to capture a Wild Card. It looks doubtful, but they could surprise people.
The All-Star break is here and the Sox are in first place, but in the words of Han Solo, "we're not outta this yet." There's still a lot of ball to play in Chicago and the going is going to get tough, but can the tough get going? I'll revel a bit in light of the fact that I predicted the elven game winning streak was not a flash in the pan, and after returning to the AL and putting together a seven game streak it doesn't look like that. There are a lot of questions, though. Losing has coincided with hitting slumps in this and past seasons, can the bats stay hot? Fielding isn't a concern for me, but can the pitching hold up, especially with the loss of Jake Peavy for the season? Finally, in past seasons the Sox have missed out on the playoffs due to poor play against division rivals, can they put the screws to Minnesota and Detroit? The next couple of months have plenty of games against those two teams, who are still in hot pursuit of the division crown, the Sox will have to put up or shut up against them. Lastly in Sox news, there's still talk of trading for a left-handed bat or someone to replace Peavy, but who are the Sox going to give up? To me, the only viable option is Konerko simply because of his age, but do you really want to dump a hot bat when the club is challenging for the division? Hopefully it all pans out for this club.
You know what grinds my gears? People who talk about Zambrano going to the Sox. The man is an incident waiting to happen, who had one outstanding season in his career and has been up and down in other seasons. He's fallen off lately, and frankly I don't think he's a starting pitcher anymore. In fact, I'd be remiss to put him in any bullpen, much less one that's working as well as the Sox'. Do us a favor and keep Carlos off the South Side, there's only room for one hot-headed Latino there and Ozzie's a lot more likable. Also, people who say you need an all-star QB to win in the NFL. I know that Peyton, Favre, Brees, and Warner are all forces at the position, but they do not represent the only way to win. I will go back to the old adage, defense wins Superbowls. Every season there are teams like the Jets, the Bengals, and the Ravens who go deep in the playoffs based on defense and running. Furthermore, there have been four Superbowl winning teams this decade that have won based on that strategy, and defense has played a major role in every Superbowl for at least that long. People are saying Alex Smith must lead his team in order to make a playoff run, but I say he only needs to play consistently. During the 2006 season, the Bears went to the Superbowl behind a dominant defense and run game, and despite inconsistent play from quarterback Rex Grossman. Grossman had a plus 100 passer rating in seven games, yet a sub 50 one in five. With better play in the Superbowl the Bears could have won. They didn't need him to have a plus 100 game, they just needed him to have a 60-75 game. Alex Smith doesn't need to be Tom Brady, he needs to manage the game. Quarterbacks like him can still win behind good defenses and running games in the NFL.
In addition to the losses they suffered a couple of weeks ago, the Hawks have now lost Niklas Hjalmarsson to the Sharks. Hopefully all this means that they'll be able to keep defenseman John Madden, who a lot of people thought was a surefire loss. Hopefully the players the Hawks are getting out of a lot of these deals will work out, but the only proven commodity so far seems to be Marty Reasoner, and he needs to stay healthy. On one hand, the Hawks have gotten where they are through developing unsung talent, and there's reason to believe they can do so with their new prospects. However, it does seem like they're going a bit too far in dismantling a winning team, and I will have to again question the logic of getting rid of Bfyuglien, to me he was just too key a player both in size and production to give up. At least the Hawks aren't becoming the Yankees of the NHL, or can the Yankees still claim the title of biggest spenders in sports anymore?
And finally, the big news of the week is Lebron, Bosh, and Dwayne Wade all signing with the Miami Heat. I, like the rest of the world outside Miami, felt a little sick when I hear Lebron announce it. Yes, the whole show was self-aggrandizing, but I could forgive him if he had decided to make Chicago a better team. Hell, even New York or Cleveland would have been better than this, but now he is poison, I don't ever want to see him in a Bulls uniform or hear one more comparison to Jordan. Some people are saying that Jordan had Pippen, but that duo is still not the same as the trio of Wade, Bosh, and James. Together, they average 86 points a game, that's enough to win some of the lower-scoring games if no one else on the team scores a basket. The Bulls also didn't go out and buy three of the top stars in the NBA, both Pippen and Jordan were on the Bulls their draft seasons and the Bulls developed them into stars. And if the TV special to announce this wasn't enough, the show the three of them put on in Miami was downright disgusting. One of the hardest things to swallow is that the Bulls targeted all three, not only lost all three, but lost all three to the same team. LA and Boston were already making a mockery out of the league by buying up a horde of big names, but Miami has taken it to another level. Hopefully teams like the Magic, Hawks, and Bulls can still compete in the post-season, but this is just another example of why the MLB and NBA need to restructure their cap rules, and why the NHL and NFL have such an advantage over the former two in terms of their level of competition.
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