Sports/Music Crossover: Aerosmith

Well, it was a bizarre day in the Music world as it was reported that Steven Tyler is leaving Aerosmith. I decided the timing was ripe for a sports/music cross-over posting to use some Aerosmith songs to talk about random sports-related stuff that is on my mind.

"Dream On" -Allen Iverson

The A.I. era in Memphis seems to have ended before it started. Despite obvious evidence (last year in Detroit) A.I. seems to think hes still an elite player and is above being a 6th man. When your not even starting for Memphis...the evidence is definitely working against stardom.

"Same Old Song and Dance" - Michael Redd

Redd has been the #1-guy on the Bucks for the last few years. He also has been highly injury prone and played a full season 3 times. New year...same ol result...Redd has already had his first injury and its not even mid-November.

"Make It"- Tyreke Evans

If his recent performance holds up, it looks like Evans will make it in the NBA barring injury and legal trouble. Evans has helped Sacramento not totally embarrass themselves thus far and helped the Kings improve slightly since losing Kevin Martin to injury.

"F.I.N.E"-Chris Kaman

Before the season started, Blake Griffin injured himself and hes expected to be out for another month. Kaman has been the winner (and my Fantasy team) in this situation as hes off to the best start of his career and busting out a 23-10 so far....

"What It Takes"-Cavs

What Cleveland needs to do to keep LeBron James on the Cavs. They do have a couple advantages. LeBron is a local kid and may not want to leave his roots. Also, the Knicks/Nets are both terrible teams. The Cavs may not have the best supporting cast but its an improvement from a couple years ago and the Knicks as a team are so ravaged beyond belief that not even LeBron can help them.

"Crazy"- Warriors

If championships were won on internal chaos, bad D and inflated egos...the Golden State Warriors would be defending champs. Last year Golden State was anything but golden regressing deeply from the team that upset Dallas a couple years ago. Looks like some things never change.

"Draw The Line"-Sammy Sosa

If your drawing the line between normal and bizarre, the recent Sammy Sosa pictures definitely cross that line. It already was a bad year for Sosa as a positive steroid test was revealed this summer. Its definitely taken a bizarre turn the last few days with pictures coming out with his skin appearing to be bleached....definitely falls under the category of if they wrote about it but didn't show any pictures, I probably wouldn't believe it....definitely one of those you couldn't make it up type of things....also the first and last time I mention it

"My Fist Your Face" John Riggins/Dan Snyder/Redskins

As bad as the Packers have been....I can at least think to myself things such as "At least i'm not A Redskins fan". In addition to routinely losing to the worst teams in the league (The Packers are at least 2-1 in this department).

Their coach, Jim Zorn defines ineptness. Their owner, Dan Snyder spends money in all the wrong places. One of their ex-players John Riggins has openly ripped Dan Snyder. I say they settle their differences and have a Family Guy-style fight (either in the veins of cleveland vs. quagmire or in the peter griffin vs. the giant chicken vein)...my vote is for option B

"Train Kept A-Rollin"-Saints/Colts

While both games were a bit close for comfort, the Saints and Colts kept a-rollin towards possible 16-0 seasons and their inevitable match-up in the Super Bowl.

"Rag Doll"-Packers O-Line

Cause, the Packers O-Line has been chewed up like a rag doll. Seriously, at this point there are probably high school teams in Wisconsin that could protect Aaron Rodgers better than the Packers. It reminds me of that NFL Draft commercial from a few years back where they photo-shopped the Texans "O-Line" out and showed footage of David Carr being sacked.

It was funnier a few years ago but considering ESPN will probably replace that footage with Aaron Rodgers getting sacked within a few months.....the comical value goes down. Through 8 games, Rodgers has been sacked 37 times...the single season record is 76.......this record could change hands by the end of the season.

The Obligatory Steroid Post: Sammy Sosa

As has been reported across much of the media, it was revealed that Sammy Sosa tested positive for steroids back in 2003, bringing up the obligatory talking heads talking about how past accomplishments are tarnished, these guys would be scrubs if they never touched steroids so on and so forth

In light of today's revelations, the time is right for me to discuss my take on steroid coverage and discuss my two biggest gripes with how it is covered by the media.

1)If preventing steroid abuse was a higher priority, this "scandal" would have broken in 1998 and not after Sosa and McGwire were past their respective peaks


To begin my argument about why I feel the "shock and horror" about players in the juicing in the 90s is not geniune can be traced back to the 1994 strike. Obviously, baseball struggled in the ensuing years after and needed something to draw the fans in....

Well to many this equates to players having the ability to hit a baseball long distances on a regular basis and wham! four years later Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa go on an epic chase for Roger Maris' single season home run record and baseball's popularity spikes big time.......

Now if MLB really didn't want players using steroids, we would have been hearing about all-star players juicing up before the home run records were being re-written.....not several years after the players involved retired.

2) The implication that the guilty parties would be scrubs NOT hall of famers if they did steroids......

Alright so juicing up may add a few years to your career, help you bounce back from injury hit a ball harder blah, blah, blah........what it does NOT do is give players better judgment on pitches to swing at, increase baseball IQ, know the difference between pitches, etc.......

How many of you people have heard about the exploits about juiced up players such as Manny Alexander, Chris Donnels or Jim Parque? Trick Question....you haven't heard about them b/c despite their steroid/PED use they were unable to attain substantial playing careers

I could list others who were juiced up but still did not reach the promised land...point being if some of these talking heads are to believed that steroids are some magical pill....these players would put up first-ballot hall of fame numbers.....However, since steroids are not some magic pill the only way these guys are getting in to the hall of fame is if they pay the cover charge......


Furthermore, while it was unfortunate steroid use was a product of the 90s....hitters were juiced....pitchers were juiced......so the steroid use likely balanced out on both sides......so yeah that's how I feel about steroid coverage and the end of my first (and hopefully last) post about steroids

Note: I found the player names (non-Hall of fame juicers) from the mitchell report page from http://www.baseball-reference.com/friv/mitchell-report-players.shtml


P.S. Artie Lange 1 Joe Buck 0

Also: I'll post my streak of the cash pick of the day tomorrow as the A's/Dodgers game is still in progress