The Summer of Halladay

In 2008 teams such as the Brewers and the Dodgers made trade deadline additions to their rosters that put them in contention to win a World Series. While 2008's deadline rumors held players like Mark Texiera, Manny Ramirez, C.C. Sabathia, and Rich Harden, this year's rumors have been completely dominated by one man, Roy Halladay. 

The 2008 World Champion Phillies seem to be subject of all the Halladay trade talks. The Blue Jays G.M. J.P Ricciardi has said that the team has to be wowed by an offer in order to trade Roy Halladay, who has proven over the years to be one of the elite pitchers in the game today. If you look through the young talent that the Phillies have to offer, it is indeed wowing to the say the least. Among that talent is, shortstop Jason Donald, Stanford product Michael Taylor, and Triple A starter Carlos Carrasco. However, those three who have proven themselves as great minor league talents, are just the supporting cast in this summer saga, while the leads are Single A Blue Chip outfielder Dominic Brown and pitchers Kyle Drabek and J.A. Happ. The Jays seem to be most interested in the two young pitchers Drabek and  Happ who have both posted great numbers in '09,  Happ in the majors (7-1 2.97 ERA) and Drabek in Double A Reading (10-2 2.80 ERA). The Phillies seem to be willing to deal either of these two but not both in the same deal, while they seem to be trying mostly to keep Drabek who is the son of former Cy Young award winner Doug Drabek. While a great pitcher combined with a great farm system seems like a match made in heaven, the question is how far should the Phillies go. 

The Blue Jays need to deal Halladay, because no matter what, when the time comes he is not going to stay with the club, because he is a great pitcher who is hungry for a chance to win it all. The Jays first asked for all three of the players that I tagged as the top prospects in the mix, Brown, Drabek and Happ. The Phillies declined and countered with Happ, Carrasco, Donald and Taylor, but the Jays were not quick to pull the trigger on a deal that didn't include two of the three players that they asked for in the first place. What I think; he is not worth it. I am marveled at the fact that the Jays didn't accept the latest deal that the Phillies offered them. Halladay is great, but it was 2004, five whole years ago that he won the Cy Young award. I'm not saying he is slowing down, but it is a only a matter of time until he does, at which point the Phillies would have traded away the nucleus of one of the best farm systems in the game. As a die hard Phillies fan I would love to see Halladay in red pin stripes, but who wants this team that we have in Philly now, that can be pinned as the greatest team in Phillies history, to be followed by a period of losing seasons. Right now the franchise is in line to keep the success going even after this potent lineup is gone, but getting Halladay however puts that in jeopardy. While Halladay pads the chance that the Philies have to win the World Series for a second straight year, it buries any sort of five year plan that they team may have. 

JD

The Greatest Sports Moment of All-Time

DF-  To me what makes the greatest sports moment, is one that you can ask a kid who is 7 or an old man who is 80 about and they can sit in a room and talk about that same moment for hours. The moment has to be so special that even the sub-par sports fan would understand. With this criteria I had to pan through moments like Cal Ripken breaking the record for most consecutive games played, or 1982 Cal vs Stanford when "The band is on the field!", and even the vaguely titled yet so well known "The Catch" had to be eliminated. Thus the greatest moment had to be 1980 USSR vs USA hockey in the Olympics.

This was a moment that had everything. The underdogs of the USA somehow beat behemoths of the Soviet Union team. It was more than sports it was one nation against the other, this game meant so much more than just hockey, it was for national pride. This moment is the only time that a game which was slotted as the semi-finals, for all anyone cared was the finals. The USA could have lost 100-0 against Finland in the actual finals and no one would have cared. Something special happened during this game, there must have been some sort of solar alignment eclipse thing going on because not only was the game itself magical, but no sports call was better than Al Michael's "Do You Believe In Miracles...YES"

I challenge the readers of this to go to their local square, park, or just run to the dairy section of the super market, get up on the cheeses and yogurts with a USA hockey jersey and yell "Do You Believe In Miracles" and 9 out of 10 times at least one member of the crowd surrounding you will yell "YES". Try doing the same thing with any other moment in history. You couldn't jump up and say any other sports quote, because in the big long list of quotes this one took on a mind of its own. It means so much more, and that's why you can go into the supermarkets around the country and start a chant, because bringing back such a special memory can't get you in trouble, because chances are the people not yelling YES, are screaming it in their heads.

JD- They called Lou Gehrig the Iron Horse. Starting June 1st, 1925 Gehrig embarked on a streak that would take him all the way to April 30th, 1939, in which time he would never miss a game. On April 30th 1939 he stood on the field of Yankee Stadium and spoke the words, "Fans, for the past few weeks you have been reading about the bad break I got. Yet today I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth." His bad break, Multiple Sclerosis, better known now as the Lou Gehrig disease. Despite the fact that MS was eating away at him with every minute that passed, he found himself feeling lucky. Lucky because he had played basebal consecutively longer than any other play in the history of the game, playing for almost fifteen full seasons without ever taking a day off. It was a record that took so much determination, so much strength, and most of all so much passion for the game. A record in which no one would ever possibly be able to break, because there would never be another Lou Gehrig, there would never again be a figure that we could simply call baseball. Then in 1982 a man named Cal Ripken Jr. entered the league, he would not only eventually take the title of "iron," but prove the world wrong while doing so. 

Just 46 games into the Baltimore Orioles 1982 season a young infielder Cal Ripken Jr. was just merely 66 games into his career. May 30th seemed like just another game for Ripken, going 0 for 2, with a strikeout, and the final result for the O's a six nothing loss. What Ripken didn't know was that that game, that seemed like just another game, was the first of 2632 steps toward greatness. That was the first game of the streak that would eventually break Lou Gehrig's streak of consecutive games played, know as one of baseball's unbreakable records. The game he broke the record, well that is a whole different story, that brings us all the way from May 30th 1982 to September 6th 1995. 

Ripken had gone yard in each of the first two games of a three game set with the California Angels at Camden Yards. He followed suite in the series grudge match and finale with another home run, but that was hardly the story of the day. Just the day before Ripken had tied Lou Gehrig's elusive consecutive game streak record, and on September 6th 1995, he was going for sole possession. Ripken did it, he shocked the world, because he broke the record that seemed unbreakable. But certainly not anymore. Heroism was alive at Camden Yards, because someone had matched the greatness of Lou Gehrig, possibly the most respected player in the history of the game. But what made the moment so special, so priceless, so spectacular, was the way that Ripken chose to celebrate. He shared the moment with the fans, the ones who had been there cheering him, chanting his name, and wearing his shirt for 2,131 games straight as well. Ripken took a lap around the stadium, high fiving and shaking hands with all the fans that were lucky enough to push down to the first few rows. Ripken took a moment that was great for himself and his career and made it a moment for every baseball fan out there, he made it a moment for man kind. So it was the greatest moment in the history of sports, because he broke a remarkable record and did it with class, grace, and most of all with the regard to share with everyone else. Ripken did something that I can now safely say, will never be done again, but can you be so sure anymore?

DF & JD

Guilty Until Proven Guilty?

Welcome to the sport of cycling, if you don't know The Tour De France is currently going on, which is the Super Bowl of the sport. Cycling is a sport that requires more endurance than any other sport in the world, this no one can argue against. Stages that are about 160 miles long are bad enough flat, but they take their riders about a mile high where the air is thick and the roads are steep and even the decents aren't anything to look forward too. These nasty decents take a rider over 60 mph twisting and turning, with nothing but a skin tight suit that peels away against the pavement for protection. I used to watch every stage LIVE waking up at 8 to watch from the beginning of the coverage to the end. Then Lance Armstrong left...

When Lance left I stopped watching I saw no point, and I know that I was not alone in my abandonment of cycling, whose one shining moment is this 3 week long tour that is only given air time on Versus, all the way up on channel 603 on direct tv with the Spanish Channels. Once Lance left everyone was caught doping, all of the main contenders were suspended and a sport that was already without a leader was doomed. Then the next year and the next there was still a Tour De France riders still thrashed their bodies over this grueling course. These riders aren't doing anything for themselves either. Spanish riders push themselves in Spain to the point that their heart can literally no longer beat any faster. Meanwhile French riders push themselves harder to steal the win from the Spanish riders. You sit watching a world war unfold, as different rivals fight for not just themselves but their countries. Riders will go on break aways which is a small group that breaks away from the main field, these riders push themselves to escape with just one stage victory for their country, sacrificing their legs and most likely their ability to finish The Tour.

Now, enter Lance Armstrong for a comeback, a man whose 37 in a sport where the oldest man is 40. Currently he is third overall and on a team that is the equivalent of the Yankees (Astana for those of you who ARE cycling buffs). This 37 year old cancer survivor is a mere 8 seconds off the lead. What a story. What a Comeback. Yet everytime Brett Favre sneezes ESPN gives it more coverage. So everyday that I wake up at 8 to watch The Tour I ask myself is this really worth it. Will there even be a Tour De France when I tell my grand kids about this superhero Lance Armstrong a name that to them will seem as foreign as someone like DJ Mbenga, a back up center on the LA Lakers. The dirtiest sport in the world, with the cleanest hero, now I watch and wonder can one man ever be bigger than a sport? For the sake of the greatest athletes in the world I sure hope so.

DF

Rock the Vote '09: Then Cut the Vote '10

While fan voting is a fun way to pick the MLB All-Stars every year, the vote "stuffing" is also getting more and more excessive with every year that passes by. In a perfect world the All-Star picks would be made by the managers of the teams, therefore letting the most worthy players appear in the mid-summer classic. 

Texas outfielder Josh Hamilton who rode the DL for almost the whole year so far, is hitting .263 with only 6 dingers is starting in right field for the AL, while a player like Adam Lind who is hitting .308 with 18 home runs finds himself fighting for a spot in the Final Vote with four others, all four of which probably deserve a spot over Hamilton as well. I like Hamilton as a player, he over came a lot and has a good story behind his success but he has a lot more All-Star games to come when he is actually playing well, or playing at all. 

As much as I love my Phillies, the '07 MVP Jimmy Rollins stuck around in the NL shortstop race as well, and get this, he barely held on to the Mendoza line. As much as I appreciate what Jimmy does for the defending champs not only on the field but in the clubhouse, he was not worthy to even be on the ballot this year. When he lost the spot to the Marlins' Hanley Ramirez not even Manuel was unconscious enough to take him on as a reserve. 

Everyone's favorite cheater Manny Ramirez was sticking around for a while as a starter in the NL outfield. When he served his 50 game suspension it was just Manny Being Manny when he started to descend as his suspension began to drag along. Too bad, I think we were all excited to see if there would be a Mannywood section at Busch Stadium, one can only dream. 

Ichiro Suzuki was on the ballot for the Home Run Derby. I looked and tried to convince myself it was a typo, but after awhile accepted what my eyes were looking at. For someone who never hit more than 15 home runs in a season, it would be a crime for even Mariners fans to vote him in. 

While the year seems a little odd as far as voting goes, one thing that was right on point was the picking of Tim Wakefield. The veteran one pitch wonder has 11 wins so far this year and was well deserving of an All-Star appearance. Now who is going to catch  him? Joe Maddon is fumbling around his desk for Doug Mirabelli's number he knows he has it somewhere. 

While the '09 All-Star game, will like every year be a showcase of the league's best power, speed, fielding, and pitching, as the years roll on so does the purity of it all. However, the managers are the ones, while making their reserve selections, giving the guys shots that really have earned the chance. Such as Ben Zobrist and Aaron Hill for the AL, and Freddy Sanchez and Miguel Tejada for the NL, guys who are playing past their potential and may never have a shot to be one of the leagues best ever again. 

JD