- In perhaps the least shocking development in the history of sports, the Giants cut Plaxico Burress today. Good riddance. Sadly, he’ll be rewarded with a new contract from somewhere else soon, and it will be like nothing ever happened. Idiot.
The Carolina Hurricanes made a coaching change. They ditched Peter Laviolette, the winningest American born coach in NHL history, and the man who led Carolina to a Stanley Cup win. He was there for five mostly solid years, but they have missed the playoffs two years in a row and were barely holding on to a spot this year. In his place they have hired Paul Maurice. This a case of total deja vu – Maurice was the coach who was fired in Carolina to make way for Laviolette. The two men are the only two coaches the team has ever had. The other part of the move is that Ron Francis, the assistant GM and the all time scoring leader for the Hurricanes, moves behind the bench as associate coach. The move makes some sense. Laviolette is a good coach, but the team wasn’t going anywhere, so a change is good. Few players are still around from the first Maurice era, so he is as good as a fresh voice, especially when paired with Francis. The two will bring new energy to a team that desperately needs it. Maurice will also be hungry for redemption after a rough year in Toronto last year. I expect a decent bounce in the short term as a result of this move.
A few things occupying my thoughts:
Monday Night Football is just a couple of hours away. I am torn in the game. The big thing that stops me from backing New Orleans enthusiastically is the loss of Sedrick Ellis. I have no idea what the impact of his absence will be, but I am very curious to find out. He’s really coming into his own, and he would have made it much harder for Minnesota to run. Since they can’t really pass, that would have been important. This isn’t going to be a classic game, but it is certainly an interesting one to consider. Talented but terribly flawed teams.
I don’t know what it is tonight, but I am feeling testy. Annoyed. Short fused. I had a lot of vegetables with dinner. Maybe that’s the problem. Whatever it is, as I have been browsing through the sports betting news tonight a few things as stuck out to me as particularly grating:
Tony Dungy – The Colts’ coach said today that his star QB will be ready for the regular season opener. He may even be ready to play in the preseason. There’s nothing wrong with that specifically, and it may even be true. It’s just that Dungy drives me absolutely nuts, and it especially annoys me that he has been elevated to such a position by the media that I can’t dislike him without being a truly awful guy.
I love sports more than almost everything (I say almost because my wife occasionally reads this). That being said, a lot of what goes on in sports these days drives me insane. I can’t handle all of the peripheral scandals and issues that surround sports these days. I long for a time when we can just sit down and watch sports without having to worry about everything else surrounding the sports. Sports are supposed to be a way to escape obnoxious issues, but now obnoxious issues are overrunning sports. Changing that would be difficult (probably impossible) but here are 10 guys that could help my cause if they would just go away:
The Cards are solidly in charge of the NL wild card race right now, but their chances suffered a significant setback today. He is expected to miss at least three weeks after tests confirmed that he had strained his calf. He hurt it chasing down a ground ball last night in Cincinnati, and at first the team feared it was torn, so it could have been worse. Still, the team already has injury woes, and Pujols is obviously key to everything they do.
