JULY 23-29 NFL training camps open this week, starting Monday with the Arizona Cardinals and TheSportsNotebook will lead off the week with a look at how AFC teams spent their offseasons. Isaac Huss grades each AFC team in Monday’s piece, which serves as a companion to his NFC article which ran two weeks ago. Monday […]
In light of the November arrest of former defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky for child abuse, his subsequent conviction and life prison sentence, Paterno’s firing and this month’s release of The Freeh Report, it’s become impermissible to harbor so much as a kind thought for the now-deceased Penn State coach. To say anything remotely kind about Joe Paterno and his legacy, it is said by the mainstream media, is to be virtually synonymous with a defense of child abuse. Harsh, to say the least, and after reading the Freeh Report, I don’t believe it’s accurate or fair.
After a week off, the NASCAR Sprint Cup series resumes on Sunday at one of racing’s most hallowed locales—the Indianapolis Motor Speedway with the running of the Curtiss Sharver 400. It’s a time of maximum pressure on a lot of drivers, with just seven races to go to qualify for the Sprint For the Cup. And one of the drivers with pressure is last year’s Indianapolis winner, Paul Menard.
The San Francisco Giants have won each series they’ve played since the All-Star break and as they begin a key three-game set with the Los Angeles Dodgers tonight, the Giants have moved out to a three-game lead in the National League West. TheSportsNotebook takes a look at Frisco, how they’re winning right now and how the road ahead shapes up…
The Tampa Bay Rays are at the decisive point of their season in more ways than one. At 51-47, and hanging within 2 ½ games of a wild-card spot, the Rays have started a nine-game road trip by winning two in Baltimore, with the afternoon getaway game scoreless in the fifth and this article goes online. Up next is consecutive series in Oakland and Los Angeles, the two teams who currently both wild-card spots. Then add in the fact that Tampa is rumored to be shopping starting pitcher James Shields—to the Angels no less—as the July 31 trade deadline approaches. Assume for the moment that Shields stays put or the Rays get major league value in return. Can they turn their disappointing season around?
The action has picked up on the MLB trade market. The Pittsburgh Pirates acquired Wandy Rodriguez for their starting rotation. The Philadelphia Phillies removed Cole Hamels from the market by locking him up to a six-year contract worth $144 million. But no deal looks as combustible—for better or worse—than the Los Angeles Dodgers’ deal to get Hanley Ramirez from the Miami Marlins as part of a four-player trade. So TheSportsNotebook begins with the Ramirez trade as we evaluate all of the above moves…
The Detroit Tigers and the New York Yankees made significant moves yesterday as the busy part of baseball’s midsummer trading season has one week left. The Tigers upgraded their starting rotation and middle infield, while the Yankees acquired one of the game’s icons in Ichiro Suzuki. TheSportsNotebook evaluates both trades and how the new pieces will fit into their new teams…
Teams are listed by expected divisional finish (last year’s finish in parentheses), and include notable additions and subtractions from trades, free agency, and the draft. “+” denotes a team looks to be improved, whereas “=” shows a team didn’t sufficiently address significant weakness(es). Since this is the time of endless optimism, we’ll hold off on “-“ signs for now. Please also see the earlier NFL offseason report for the NFC.
JULY 16-22 The next two weeks have the baseball season in flux, as we wait to see which teams will trade off key pieces and which ones will beef up before the July 31 trade deadline. On Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, TheSportsNotebook will run trade-deadline related articles, as we evaluate the merits—or lack thereof—of different […]
The Chicago White Sox have been the active team in the weeks leading up to the July 31 non-waiver trade deadline. After first acquiring Kevin Youkilis from Boston to play third base, the White Sox struck this weekend when it came to the bullpen, bringing in Brett Myers from Houston in exchange for two minor-leaguers. TheSportsNotebook evaluates the White Sox bullpen in light of their new acquisition.
The NASCAR Sprint Cup series takes a break this weekend, but with just seven more races for drivers to qualify for the final Sprint For The Cup, TheSportsNotebook takes a step back and evaluates the big picture before racing action resumes next week… Before going further, let’s lay out how The Sprint For The Cup […]
The Atlanta Braves may have just lost two of three to San Francisco, but that’s just one hiccup on what’s been an otherwise strong run of recent play. The Braves begin a big four-game set in Washington tonight within 3.5 games of the Nationals in the NL East, and holding down the National League’s second wild-card spot by two games over the Dodgers. Atlanta went into the All-Star break by sweeping Philadelphia and came out of by sweeping the Mets, all helping separate themselves in the playoff chase within the competitive NL East. TheSportsNotebook looks at how the 2012 Atlanta Braves are doing it, as they look for redemption from last year’s collapse, and whether this hot streak can sustain itself.
