Ever get the feeling in baseball that the same teams are always in the conversation for post season play? Yankees, Red Sox, Cubs, Dodgers… it hasn’t changed all that much in the past 10 years or so. I’m not even old enough to remember when the Pirates were good, and barely remember Toronto when they were good in the late 80’s. Point is, this wild spending in baseball needs to be corralled. Look at the following chart – Five out of Six division leaders are also the team that has the highest payroll in that division.

With only a week luxury tax to prohibit rampant spending, teams in large markets able to generate able to generate revenue from non-profit sharing avenues are able to negate this cost quite easily. Further, any team not in contentino by the trade deadline trades away talented players for prospects so they can ‘rebuild for the future’. How well is that working out for the Nationals, Pirates, and Royals?

What we need is a fresh look at a legitimate salary cap, but with one major exception which would give advantage to the best run scouting and general management in the league, not the teams with the biggest pocketbook.

Institute a soft cap similar to the NBA where the cap is a percentage based on league revenue. This would encourage teams to do as much as they can to make money, something that shouldn’t need to be done, but its still a great incentive. Other exceptions built in are very advantageous to the teams which know how to use them well. Its mind boggling so just visit the wikipedia link to learn more.

The big idea I have is to reward teams with a keen eye for scouting and player development. Any kid a team signs to a minor league deal from the draft, or as a free agent, does not count against the salary cap in any capacity so long as the prospect remains with the club. What this does is place a bigger emphasis on player development and makes your young guys more valuable. A practical example of this is Dustin Pedroia of the Red Sox.

Old people tell great stories

They signed im out of Arizona St and brought him up through the minors. An AL Rookie of the year, followed by an AL MVP award show the Sox were both wise and committed to this player. The league should reward them by not counting his contract under the Sox salary cap.

There are flaws to this idea, and we could get into a whole debate about how effective this would be (would teams sign their home grown players to absurd contracts to keep them away from the big fish? how would free agency and trades in general be effected?) Bottom line is that in the current system the rich get richer and the poor need to rely on miracle seasons to compete.

The Goods is a classic movie designed to feed off the momentum of a particular actor in another role. Don Ready is as close to Ari Gold as you will find outside of Entourage. The supporting cast is solid which really drives this movie home. The only complaint is the lack of believability in some cases (he convinces a flight attendant to let him smoke on a commercial airline because in 1969 we put a man on the moon)

The plot itself is simple, but surprisingly well told. A down on his luck car lot owner calls Don Ready and asks him to help him sell cars. Don and his small team of go-getters are worried at first, due to the extraordinary amount of traveling they have been doing (presumably selling other consumer products) but they eventually warm up to this idea.

Hijinx and drama ensue at the dealership once the promotion is underway, so I won’t spoil that part of the movie for you guys. Just know that by the end Don is quite taken aback with all he has accomplished. The consummate salesman, he finds himself at the peak of his talent; even going so far to let a bright young Asian man be his understudy.

If you are an Entourage fan, or enjoyed Old School, this movie is for you. Otherwise, you will find the random humor, simple plot, and typecast actors to be an insult to your superior taste in movies. This is not a movie that will win any Oscars, but it is a movie you can see with your buddies and have some good laughs.

Read my review of Bruno based only on the trailer

First it was Brock Lesnar’s meltodown after his UFC100 fight with Frank Mir.  Then it was Lebron James storming off the court after his Cleveland Cavaliers lost to the Orlando Magic.  And now Tiger Woods is the lastest celebrity athlete to be admonished by sportswriters for his poor etiquette when he is losing, this time by Rick Reilly.

From Rick Reilly at ESPN:

Tiger Woods has outgrown those Urkel glasses he had as a kid. Outgrown the crazy hair. Outgrown a body that was mostly neck.

When will he outgrow his temper?

——-

He’d hit a bad shot, turn and bury his club into the ground in a fit. It was two days of Tiger Tantrums — slamming his club, throwing his club and cursing his club. In front of a worldwide audience.

——-

Put it this way: Will Tiger let his own two kids carry on in public like that?

——-

If my kids grew up to be the absolute best in the world at their profession, while simultaneously maintaining a high level of class with media and fans and building a comprehensive body of charity work that included a recent AT&T golf tournament for the troops, I’d actually let my kids carry on in public however the fuck they wanted.

I remember Tiger’s dad, Earl, telling a story. One day, when Tiger was just a kid, he was throwing his clubs around in a fuming fit when his dad said something like “Tiger, golf is supposed to be fun.” And Tiger said, “Daddy, I want to win. That’s how I have fun.”

Well, it’s not fun to watch.

Are you kidding me?  It’s not fun to watch people who want to win so bad it alters their psyche in clutch moments?  That transition from golfer to “killer” or Michael Jordan the basketball player to Michael Jordan the “assassin (in my best Marv Albert voice)” isn’t fun to watch?

To be fair Rick Reilly is not the first sportswriter to throw a fit over other people’s throwing a fit.  He was the tipping point that drew my most concentrated ire.  But it is articles like these that are great examples of why people are reading Bill Simmons instead of Reilly.  When I think of Rick Reilly anymore, I think of him as a sports fan the same way rap fans think of Bill Cosby.  He’s that old guy who keeps complaining about how things used to be, and how they should be, and how there’s just not enough manners and pudding pops going around.

People, just like everything else in the world, are a miasma of trade-offs internally.  The CEO of a Fortune 500 company may not be getting as much time with the family as people think they should.  People with a talent for critiquing things on their obscure website may also be functional alcoholics.  And people with an unusual passion for winning will at times have a hard time battling their heat-of-the-moment temper.  It comes down to realizing these things about yourself and finding the best balance you can.  And when it comes to Tiger Woods’ balance, I think it’s just fine where it is.

As has been publicized lately, Sarah Palin is juggling another ethics investigation regarding her public defense fund she started, the Alaska Fund Trust set up by some of her ardent supporters.  For those who are unfamiliar with the situation, or who think Palin is “that lady from SNL,” the rub is this:  Palin thus far has incurred 19 ethics investigations in the state of Alaska, most of them coming after she announced her vice presidential candidacy last year, and most of them being dismissed as frivolous.  Current trends dictate there are more to come.

Besides its geographic isolation and proximity to Russia, Alaska is a cute little anamoly for another reason, its ethics laws.  They currently sport some of the toughest disclosure laws nationwide.  They also don’t require ethics complaints to be kept confidential when they are filed against a member of the executive branch (such as Sarah Palin).  Normally cases are required to be confidential until they are deemed substantial (such as for the legislative branch members).  This means people can theoretically, and in recent days quite practically, use ethics complaints to publicly assail an unpopular governor at any time.  The governor of Alaska isn’t reimbursed for their legal defense, and as a result Palin started the fund.

So Palin raised money to deal with ethics complaints and their ensuing legal fees, only to have the fund derailed by another ethics complaint, stating she shouldn’t be able to raise the funds.  A vicious cycle, indeed.  I’m not a big fan of Palin, and the “Troopergate” scandal was well worth investigating.  Even the financial details of this fund are worth investigating, since there is a lot of money moving hands.  But the complaint about wearing a jacket with an Arctic Cat logo?  Or the complaint about her press release that mentioned John McCain? Get the fuck out of here.

Alaska’s ethics complaint laws need to be changed.  Governors should be reimbursed for legal fees that are proven to be unnecessary.  Complaints should also be kept anonymous until proven legit.  Palin needed this fund largely due to the fact she doesn’t have a ton of money yet.  She was one of the rare “every-day” people who found themselves in politics, and while the personal side of her folksiness was more haunting than it was endearing during John McCain’s presidential run, the financial side of that folksiness is now clearly being leveraged against her in unjust fashion.

Imagine if you could accuse someone of being a murderer, at virtually no legal cost.  Sure, the case would be thrown out, but you could publically say they were a murderer and tarnish their reputation.  You could accuse them of anything: rape, laundering, drug-trafficking, buying a Taylor Swift album, ANYTHING.  Then the case would go to court, you’d back off and say “just kidding,” and the accusation and ambient headlines would stick to your victim.  Normally this is called libel.  In Alaska, it’s called politics.  You can hate Palin all you want, and things such as mobilized large sums of cash and officers being fired are worth investigating.  But if it’s worth doing, its worth doing right, with the same due legal protections.

By now you’ve heard about and perhaps seen the Erin Andrews nude videos that caught fire on the net last Friday. Since then, a whirlwind of speculation and media frenzy unlike anything we’ve ever witnessed for a sideline reporter. Top stories on Foxnews.com and Yahoo.com prove this is much more than just a celebrity nip-slip; America is curious to see how Ms. Andrews will rebound, and what the outcome of this situation will be.

Think of the scene during Anchorman where Veronica Corningstone is fighting Ron Burgundy. All the women in the newsroom are pulling for Veronica because she is the first one to join the boys club of broadcasting. For years, sports reporting has been a male dominated venue with gentlemen like Craig Sager roaming the sidelines for the story. Women joined the club, but none as mainstream or attractive as Erin Andrews.

She’s now fighting not only for her own reputation and justice, but the legitimacy of good looking female sports reporters in the future. She has the chance to normalize the presence of attractive women on the sidelines of games, doing a legitimate job. Up until this point, blogs, and everyone but ESPN and other reputable news outlets, treated her job as a joke and her body like an object. Can she break down this barrier so that in 10 years a good looking girl can be on the sidelines of an NFL game who is liked for her reporting skills and not her outfits and hairstyles? I for one hope she does.

The next year will be very interesting, both from a legal perspective, and to see how Erin handles all of this. The best possible case would be a quick and minimally litigious settlement. Keeping the case out of the news is the best thing for her career. She needs to get back on the sidelines of college football and basketball this fall/winter and step up her game even more. The key will be not to change her approach, not to change what she believes in. If she wants to wear a nice outfit, she should feel she can without the scrutiny of the media referencing this incident.

What’s the worst case? Lets just say we wouldn’t be seeing Ms. Andrews covering sports on ESPN anymore. Lets hope instead she finds the justice she deserves and accomplishes everything she sets out to do. The rest of the pieces will fall into place.

Link from CNN.com

The Beastie Boys canceled all scheduled concerts and delayed their next album release while member Adam “MCA” Yauch is treated for a cancerous tumor in a salivary gland, Yauch says in a video statement to fans.

“The good news is that they did scans of my whole body and it’s only localized in this one area and it’s not in a place that affects my voice,” Yauch says. “So, that’s nice. That’s convenient.”

The illness will also delay the release of the band’s next album, “Hot Sauce Committee Part 1,” he says.

In the video statement to fans, Yauch mentions how the cancer is usually very treatable, which is good to hear.   Not that I would be gleeful if celebrities I didn’t like were stricken with cancer, but the Beastie Boys were one of my favorite bands growing up, especially as a precocious kid just entering high school.  Their eclectic mix of instrumental experimentation,  whimsical flow and New-York-centric lyrics made them one of the most influential groups in hip hop during the 1980’s and 1990’s, period.

We at Captain Polemic wish Yauch a full recovery.

P.S.  The re-mastered version of Ill Communications can be found on their site as well, it’s one of my favorites from them.  And there you have it, we’ve just made history folks.  My first shameless plug of things I like on this website.  Enjoy.

A gay penguin being harbored in a San Francisco zoo has attracted a following among the blogosphere regulars, and has broken the hearts of literally dozens of fans by leaving his gay penguin partner for some of the ol’ fashioned penguin pink.

Story From Yahoo! News:

After six years together, the relationship between a pair of gay male penguins at San Francisco zoo is apparently over, with Harry leaving Pepper for another penguin — Linda.

The Los Angeles Times reported Friday that the relationship between Harry and Pepper, who lived side-by-side, protecting eggs abandoned by other penguins, came to a shocking end when Harry moved into a neighboring nest with recently-widowed Linda.

Even the penguins have figured out that gays should be able to adopt.  That’s encouraging.

The development has sparked a variety of reactions in the blogosphere, where Linda has been called a “home wrecker” who “lives for her own happiness, no matter who gets hurt.”

John, writing on “The Frigging Loon” blog, said he was “heartbroken” about the split and that he hopes Pepper “finds another male penguin that is ten times hotter than Harry!”

I think people are investing a little too much of themselves into this.  Kind of like when all those people dress up their puppies for Halloween but get mad if you don’t know what their costume is.

With Pepper rejoining the ranks of the single, Christian website OneNewsNow.com took the split as a sign that “nature prefers heterosexual relationships.”

Flawless logic indeed.  Did they happen to mention some of the other sexual behaviors in animals that nature seems to prefer?  Such as competitive infanticide, harassment to miscarriage and the real kicker, pheromone based spontaneous abortion?

I’m just waiting for ABC or Disney to turn this into a movie or sitcom.  “Lovin’ the North Pole” or “Penguins Gone Wild,” perhaps.