School is back!

The boys of fall, as they are called, are back in action! College football has returned in full force as has the NFL. Let's review the big games from last Saturday. The game of the day had to be Alabama taking on Wisconsin in Arlington. The Crimson Tide handled the Badgers with ease, winning by a final score of 35-17. Many other teams played last week in less meaningful games. Ohio State whooped up on Virginia Tech and Arizona State fell to Texas A&M. But those were really the only other relevant games on the slate last week. One exciting game, however, was a game between BYU and Nebraska in Lincoln. The final play came down to a hail-Mary on the part of BYU. Whenever a game comes down to a hail-Mary very few believe that it will work. But this one time it worked, and BYU nation went crazy. Today, meanwhile, brings a larger dose of big games including that of 5 Oregon heading to East Lansing to take on 7 Michigan State at 8 ET on ABC. Others include 14 LSU going to 25 Mississippi State at 9:15 ET on ESPN, as well as 19 Oklahoma traveling to Knoxville to take on 23 Tennessee at 6 ET on ESPN.
In terms of the NFL, The Pittsburgh Steelers met with the New England Patriots in Foxborough in a game which the Patriots won 28-21. A fantastic victory for a team many call cheaters. The rest of this week's games should be impelling. Will we see a surprise team rise above the adversity and win? Who will be this year's Odell Beckham Jr.? Just wait and see.

Let's turn to baseball and away from the Padres. They have no hope to make the playoffs this year even though they are still mathematically able to make it. But will the Dodgers lose all of their games? Will the Giants lose all of their remaining games? No. Next year should be interesting, though. A.J. Preller has some work to do to resolve the inconsistent pitching (bullpen and rotation) and also inconsistent hitting. Not to mention, a decision will have to be made on what to do for a manager. Will he decide to keep Pat Murphy? Will he search elsewhere? My personal opinion is that I want to see Ron Gardenhire get a shot here in San Diego. Just somebody with playoff experience who can provide a spark for a struggling franchise. For the rest of the MLB, the season is winding down fast. The closest race at this point of the year looks to be the AL West with the Astros and Rangers looking to pounce. The Angels were the favorite this year but are now four and a half games out of first place. With as stacked of a division as that is, it will be tough to overcome that deficit.

Well that should do it for this week. Tune in next week to check up on more football and baseball!

Summer is gone

Well with work clogging up my time and not taking an off day in over a month, I have really been slacking on writing these blog posts. I promise I will do better.

Well in terms of the NFL, the great debacle over the past seven months has been that of deflategate: the story that wouldn't go away yet everybody wanted to see go away. Let's take a view at this. Commissioner Roger Goodell suspended Quarterback Tom Brady for supposedly instructing a member of the Patriots staff to deflate some of the balls in preparation for the AFC Championship game. As the results of the game show, the deflated balls had no impact on the outcome of the game, since all of the deflated balls were re-inflated or replaced at half time. But is Roger Goodell's disciplinary system too strict? Has the league become guilty before proving innocent? It seems like the tide has changed even so far back as the late 1990's steroid era in baseball when some players were juiced while others were not, and fans were okay with it. Now, everybody thinks the steroid users of that era are guilty even though some of them have not been proven that they have used steroids yet. Look at Barry Bonds. Sure, his body weight and physique by the end of his career was far different than that at the beginning of his career, but other than that, there is no evidence of him ever using steroids. Now we know that Alex Rodriguez used it and he has received just punishment from major league baseball. But in Brady's situation, Goodell showed that deflating of footballs is worse than domestic violence (Ray Rice only received a two-game suspension) or steroid use. Sounds fairly reasonable to me! Not!

Meanwhile, ever since the all-star break the San Diego Padres have been better, yes. But they have also flatlined in consistency. Now that I think about it, when have they ever been consistent? Sure we were 15-5 to start the year, but then things started to go downhill after a 14-1 thrashing of the Rockies back in April. I guess the only good news that we have recently is that Wil Myers will be returning to the roster soon. Brandon Morrow only made something like three or four starts before being placed on the DL due to shoulder inflammation and now Brandon Mauer is on the DL with right shoulder inflammation. There is no hope for a postseason birth anymore and the Dodgers have taken a six and a half game lead on the defending champion Giants. When it comes to the MLB, the world series champion is never really the best team, it is mainly the team with the least amount of injuries.

Well that should do it for this week. College football kicks off this week and there are a slew of games. The highlight has to be that of Wisconsin taking on Alabama tomorrow night at 8 ET on ABC. There are dozens of games on Saturday so check out espn.com for updates and scores of all your favorite teams! Have a great week!