Who's on the Chopping Block?

So many National Football League teams are playing under-par this year, making their fan base shrink and lose all hope.  Where other teams are shining in the spotlight.

Probably the most surprising bad team this year is the Philadelphia Eagles.  The Eagles coming into tonight's game are 3-7 and currently sit in last place in their division.  Its not hard to stay at the bottom because every team in the division (Giants, Cowboys and Redskins) are tough to play against.  The Eagles are run by head coach Andy Reid; some fans love him and some hate him.  I'm a Giants fan and I love him.  He is a great coach who has had success in his tenure, but when it comes to the playoffs, his team does not show up.  Almost everyone in Philly wants him gone after this year, and they might get that chance.

With suspended coach Sean Payton being a free agent coach after the season, the Eagles will definitely be a team trying to get him.  Payton is a young, skilled coach, who has won a championship with the New Orleans Saints.

Another coach who is on the chopping block is Dallas Cowboys head coach, Jason Garrett.  Garrett is a young coach who took over the position in 2010 after then head coach Wade Phillips was fired.  When Garrett first became coach, the Cowboys were on fire.  After his hiring, according to ESPN, Garrett led the team to a final record of 6-10, after starting the season, 1-7.  This year, the Cowboys are having a difficulty time keeping up with their division rivals, the New York Giants. 

The problem isn't the coach, its their players.  The first thing owner Jerry Jones needs to do is get a reliable and consistent quarterback.  Right now the Cowboys have Tony Romo as their main guy.  Romo has all the talent in the world, but cannot keep a rhythm when playing.  He will have one great game and then four or five bad games, its like a roller coaster.

The last coach I consider to be on the chopping block that needs much attention is Rex Ryan of the New York Jets.  Lets be honest, the Jets are playing horrible this year.  They don't know who their quarterback is: Is it Mark Sanchez or is it Tim Tebow?  I don't see any positives of Tebow, I compare him to NBA player Jeremy Lin.  He had one good year in Denver, that does not make him an elite quarterback.  Yes, Sanchez is having a rough year, but you cannot blame it on him alone.  The offensive line of the Jets are always being pushed back by the defensive lines of the other teams.  The problem I have with the Jets is that they keep talking.  If you say you're going to the playoffs and can beat any team, then show it.  Ryan needs to stop praising him and his team and start showing that they can be good.

My next blog is going to go in more detail about the Jets and why I believe there needs to be change.  Until then.

Sporty Nikki

Guess Money Can't Buy Championships!

Major League Baseball fans were shocked last night and this morning, when they turned their television sets on.  It was announced that the Miami Marlins and the Toronto Blue Jays have agreed to a colossal trade.

The trade is one of the biggest trades ever in the history of baseball.  According to Buster Olney of ESPN, the Marlins will send shortstop Jose Reyes, center fielder Emilio Bonafacio, catcher John Buck and starting pitchers Josh Johnson and Mark Buehrle.  They will receive shortstop Yunel Escobar, catcher Jeff Mathis, pitcher Henderson Alvarez and four prospects: Jake Marisnick, Adeiny Hechavarria, Justin Nicolino and Anthony DeSclafani.

The Marlins made headway last winter when they spent a ton of money on two players who are included in this trade: Reyes and Buehrle.  These two were only with the Marlins for one season!  Its no news that the Marlins want to give away payroll; they traded their one-time superstar shortstop Hanley Ramirez to the Los Angeles Dodgers mid-way through this past season.  Ramirez was to play right next to Reyes on the left side of the infield for years to come.  Well now both players are on two different teams on two different coasts in two different countries, so much for having a great left side of the infield.  Who will make the plays in the "5.5 hole?"

The Blue Jays are taking a big chance with all their new players.  What is nice for them is that they did not give up huge players of their own for the ones they received.  The only two that they gave up that has great potential are Marisnick and Nicolino, who according to Baseball America, are ranked number two and five of the top prospects respectively.

I think that the Marlins last winter wanted to show that they are willing to spend the big bucks like the New York Yankees or the Dodgers.  Sometimes deals don't work out the way you plan, look at the Yankees, they spent so much money on players like Javier Vazquez and Kei Igawa, and absolutely got nothing out of them.  Vazquez is out of baseball who pitched in 2011 for the Marlins and Igawa is currently listed as a free agent who hasn't played in a major league game since 2008.

I think that the Blue Jays will be a better team than last year, but they need to stay healthy.  If they can stay healthy, they can be a team to reckon with.  They have the scary players on paper, but like I said, they need to stay healthy in order to succeed.  They don't need to make the playoffs to succeed, but if they can have a winning season, the season will be considered a success.  First the Blue Jays need to find a manager, since their previous manager took over Bobby Valentine's job in Boston.  Wouldn't it be funny if the Jays hire ex-Marlins manager Ozzie Guillen?  If they did, the Jays would pretty much look like the Marlins of 2012.

The Marlins have a long way to go in bringing a World Series home to Miami.  They will need to reorganize their organization.  They have to figure out whats more important, pitching or hitting.  They tried both, but as we saw, it did not work.  I feel that they will try to gain pitching because their stadium is a pitcher friendly place, meaning it is hard to hit home runs in that place.  They will also have trouble making a profit.  Now with all the stars traded away, they don't really have more than one star.  They have been having trouble selling tickets in the past few years, and I see the same thing happening over and over again until they pick up a big name player, maybe Josh Hamilton?

Only time will tell, until then!

Sporty Nikki

D'Antoni over Jackson?

OR


News broke out earlier today that the Los Angeles Lakers hired a coach.

Everyone who is a basketball fan including myself, believed the Lakers would hire legendary coach Phil Jackson over Mike D'Antoni.  Jackson, a former Lakers coach, was open to returning as a head coach for the Lakers.  He retired from coaching after the 2010-2011 basketball season after the Lakers lost in the Conference Semifinals to the Dallas Mavericks, who went on to win the NBA Championship.

D'Antoni last coached for the New York Knicks last season before resigning as head coach.  While with the Knicks, D'Antoni and superstar Carmelo Anthony did not see eye to eye.  The style of coaching D'Antoni coaches is "west coast."  He never fit in well with how the Knicks ran their team; he was too harsh on his players as teams were not thrilled to play for him.  D'Antoni only had experience coaching one players on the Knicks when he took over: Amar'e Stoudemire. 

Do I think that D'Antoni belongs in Los Angeles?  I'm on the fence, I think the way he coaches will work, but with all the egos on the Lakers, I don't know if he will succeed.  He will definitely do better than previous coach Mike Brown, but I don't think he will do better than the legend Phil Jackson.  One thing that D'Antoni has is that he has coached a few players on the Lakers already during the Summer Olympics.  He also coached Steve Nash while Nash played for the Phoenix Suns.  Maybe D'Antoni can help the Lakers, he does have 76 games left this season.  Hopefully he can make some chemistry that the team is desperately looking for.

Only time will tell.  Until then!

Sporty Nikki

What is going on in the NBA?!

Taken from the NBA website.

Welcome back everyone!  As we know the National Basketball Association has started the new season.  We all know that the Miami Heat won the championship last season outlasting the Oklahoma City Thunder.  Yeah, yeah, whatever as I say.  Thats old news, I care about what is happening now and how my team is doing NOW!

Well lets see: my team (The New York Knicks) are currently undefeated.  With a record of three wins to zero losses, we are at the top of our division.  So far our defense has looked not good but fantastic.  We even beat the for-mentioned Heat to win the season opener, where else, none other than Madison Square Garden.  That was our biggest downfall last year, we never had a problem scoring, we just couldn't make the key stops on defense.  Every player is working together, there is no ball hogging as I like to call it.  Passes are being made, and there are less shots that make you wonder, "Why did he just shoot that?"  If the Knicks can stay healthy, they will get far this year, they might as well be known as the "dark horses" this year.

Taken from Google Images.

A team that made the headlines the most this offseason was the Los Angeles Lakers.  They weren't happy with the stars they already had, so they went after top free agent Steve Nash.  They did not sign Nash straight out, they did something with Nash's former team, the Phoenix Suns something we sports people call a "sign and trade."  What is a sign and trade you ask?  The definition is just the way the expression sounds.  According to ESPN, a sign and trade is when: the team that the player played for the previous season makes an agreement with both the player and the team willing to take the player and trades him to the other team.  To make it sound less confusing and with the real teams involved: The Suns and the Lakers agreed to a price in which both teams could afford under the salary cap.  The Suns then told Nash that he was going to be traded for a price.  Nash signed the contract to be on the Suns, but because he was a part of the Suns, the Suns were allowed to trade him away.

You might ask "why would the Suns sign a player only for that player to be traded soon after?"  Well, that is a good question.  Why would a team let go their "superstar" like Nash and not get anything in return?  By signing Nash and trading him to Los Angeles the Suns were able to get 2013 and 2015 first-round draft picks, 2013 and 2014 second round draft picks and $3 million.

That wasn't the only thing that the Lakers did this off season.  According to the NBA, a blockbuster trade was made in which the Lakers sent their "big" man Andrew Bynum to the Philadelphia 76ers so that they were able to receive another big man, Dwight Howard.  It wasn't the only the Lakers and the 76ers who were involved in the deal, the Denver Nuggets and the Orlando Magic (Howard's previous team) were also a part of the deal.  The main players who were traded away from their teams were Howard, Bynum and ex-76er, Andre Iguodala.  Iguodala ended up in Denver to play along players like Danilo Galinari and former first-round pick, Ty Lawson.

 Taken from the Lakers website.

So with all of these "superstars" on one team, one would think that the Lakers would be unstoppable like the Heat of last year, right?  Well that's not the case, in fact, the Lakers are horrible this year composing a 1-4 record.  The heads of the Lakers are not pleased with how the team is playing so much that they have fired head coach, Mike Brown.  ESPN reporter Ramona Shelburne reported the firing earlier today, and I am sure it shocked many if not everyone who is a fan of basketball.  What I have a problem with is that Brown was always compared to the great Phil Jackson.  Jackson is a legend; won multiple championships with the Lakers and developed stars like Kobe Bryant, revitalize the career of Shaquille O'Neal and many others. You can not compare Jackson to a young coach like Brown.  It takes time to be a good coach, Brown is a good coach, but will never be on the same level as Jackson.  The only coaches that are remotely near Jackson's level are Pat O'Reily, Pat Summerall, Mike Krzyzewski and Bob Knight.

Who will be the next Lakers coach?  Will he last long, only time will tell.
Until then,
Sporty Nikki

Oh Sandy...

Welcome back everyone, hopefully everyone is safe from this past weeks storm.  As many know, the East coast was decimated by Hurricane Sandy, last week.

There have been questions swirling around the sports world wondering if any sporting events would be played because of Hurricane Sandy.  There were some games canceled, but not everything.  The home opener for the Brooklyn Nets was postponed because there was no way fans could go to the arena.  The game was important because it would have been the christening of the arena.  You see, the Nets used to play in New Jersey and they recently moved to Brooklyn.  The game was to be played against the Nets' rivals, the New York Knicks.

The game was postponed until November 26, which upset many fans, myself included.  I bought tickets for that game because I wanted to go to the first game ever played in the arena.  I guess that it would be difficult to reschedule the game so quickly since both teams did not have a mutual day off before their next game.  The Knicks played the following night at Madison Square Garden against the Miami Heat and the Nets played against the Toronto Raptors on Saturday in Brooklyn.

There was a lot of scrutiny as to whether the Knicks should have played Friday night against the Heat, but the game did happen as planned.  I was at the game and there was not one single empty seat in the house.  The love of the game was felt every second of the game, people chanting, smiling and forgetting of recent events.  Everyone had a story, but the game helped everyone have peace even if it was only for three hours one night.  Knicks guard, Carmelo Anthony said a brief message to the crowd saying that we are strong and will overcome any challenges we face.  He noted that "The Garden" will donate $500,000 to aid families affected by the storm.  Heat star, Dwayne Wade pledged that he will donate money as well.  Below is a picture of Anthony with the rest of the Knicks team addressing the fans in the arena and at home.

The New York City marathon was also canceled because of the hurricane.  At first, Mayor Michael Bloomberg made sure that the marathon would take place.  When he saw that many people were angry about his decision, he changed his mind and said that he would postpone the marathon.  It was the right thing to do, people have no power to this day, and the city would use generators, when they could be used in households.  Radio talk show host, Mike Francesa made a desperate plea to the mayor to postpone the marathon.

The Bridgeport Sound Tigers showed a lot of passion and love to their fans this weekend.  They had two games and they offered free tickets on a first come first served basis.  It showed that teams do care about their fans and just want them to be happy.  I went to the game on Saturday and just like the Knicks game, there was an uncontrollable amount of love in the Webster Bank Arena.  Many had a heavy heart, but their hearts were filled with joy at the end of the night.

Even though a hurricane took peoples' lives and destroyed numerous homes, it did not kill the world of sports.  What we need to realize is that sports help people heal from tragedy, it gives us a few hours in the day to think positively, clear our heads.  It's even better when the home team wins, as did the Knicks and Nets in their home debuts.  Time heals everything, we can forgive mother nature for the horrible hurricane, but we will never forget what the result was.  Athletes go out and play for their fans no matter what the circumstance is, why, its because they want us to be entertained and be happy.

Lets take this time to be thankful for what we have, because some have no power and no homes.  To go see a game is a pleasure especially when something terrible happens in your life.  Don't take things for granted because anything can be taken from you in a single second.

Until next time!

Sporty Nikki