*****
AT LEAST HE'LL GET SOME SLEEP
Finding Better Things to do on a Monday Night . . .
By John Doyle,
sportswriter2b.com
*****The 2004
NFL Schedule was released earlier this week, and once again, fans of the Defending Super Bowl Champion New England Patriots are getting screwed. As in 2002, the last time the Defending Super Bowl Champions were the Defending Super Bowl Champions, the Pats are playing on only TWO, count 'em, TWO Monday Nights. The very first Monday Night Football game of 2004, which traditionally features the previous season's Super Bowl Champion, will feature Super Bowl LOSERS Carolina hosting Green Bay, who have been rewarded with THREE, count 'em, THREE appearances on MNF this season. Other atrocities: the AFC will not make a Monday Night appearance until week FOUR (Kansas City at Baltimore), and FOUR teams other than Green Bay will appear on MNF more often than New England: Philadelphia, Dallas, Kansas City and St. Louis. All of whom, I should mention, have fewer Super Bowl victories than New England did last year.
This is a slap in the face to fans of the Best Run Franchise in Professional Sports, not to mention almost completely inexplicable. Is Boston not among the largest television markets in the country? Are not defending Super Bowl Champions supposed to be featured often on MNF? Did Tampa Bay not appear on Monday Night not once, not twice, but thrice last season?
To be honest, I don't know why I complain. In fact, I hate Monday Night Football. I loved it when I was living in New Mexico, and the game would be on at seven, just an hour or so after I would get home from work. But who needs to stay up until one in the morning on a weeknight?
And, to be fair, the Patriots are featured on the very first NFL game of the year, on Thursday, September 9, a game that will be featured nationally on ABC. I suppose that counts as a "Monday Night" game. But if you look at this 2004's MNF schedule, it seems to be tailor made for wussy boy John Madden, who is too scared to get his fat ass on an airplane. The MNF crew goes from Foxboro to Charlotte to Philadelphia to Washington to Baltimore in the first four weeks. They only hit the West Coast once, December 6th at Seattle.
*****
Red Sox have taken two from the Yankees. Sorry, can't get excited about this one until, oh, I don't know, the Sox do the same thing in the playoffs. But before this column becomes completely corrupt with negativity, you can't ask for more than what the Sox have given us in the last two days. Wake and Schilling looked great, A-Rod and Jeter looked like buffoons, and for now, all is right in Red Sox Nation.
I'll take in my first baseball game of the season on Tuesday night when I ride up to Maine to see the Sea Dogs take on the Trenton Thunder. Game time temperature is supposed to be in the thirties. Could be a test. I regret missing
the first Fisher Cats home game ever, but there is a long season ahead.
*****The Boston Celtics opened their 2004 playoff run this afternoon and lost (gasp!),
104-88 to Indiana. I love that Game Seven (in case you are planning a trip to Bizzaro World) is scheduled for Tuesday, May 4, a mere SEVENTEEN DAYS from now. Leave it to the NBA to not only contrive the postseason to include at least eleven teams that have no chance whatsoever at winning the title, but to make each round last three weekends to maximize the "drama."
The Sports Writer to Be might soon be losing the "to Be" from his title. Stay tuned . . .
^~^~^
Now THAT'S Sarcasm!
by John Doyle, sportswriter2b.com
There is dancing in the streets. Cars are being overturned. Church bells are ringing. Sports fans from Fort Kent, Maine to Greenwich, Connecticut rejoice. New England has seen all it believes in, every single one of its sporting dreams, fulfilled. If you wonder why the city of Boston--nay, the enitre six-state region--sounds different, feels different, it is simple.
The Celtics have clinched a playoff spot.
That's right--less than a week since the University of Connecticut (the crown jewel of New England institutions of higher learning) won both NCAA Division I basketball titles, the New England sports fan is once again basking in the glory of another highly successful, deeply motivated,
championship-driven bunch of young men.
How long New Englanders have waited for this day! Twenty-nine teams in the NBA, and only a mere sixteen make it to the post-season party. The Celtics have solidified themselves as a bona fide member of the NBA's elite.
And you know what the greatest thing is? The Celtics and their fans can bask in the glory of actually
accomplishing something. By being better than Cleveland, with the NBA's number one draft pick, Philadelphia, a team that made the NBA Finals three years ago, Toronto, which is named after a type of dinosaur, Atlanta, which hosted the Olympics, Washington, our nation's capital, Chicago, which at one time was good, and Orlando, home of the Gatorland Zoo, the Celtics have proven themselves to all doubters. No one thought they could do it--but they did.
And the way they clinched--surely this will be talked about for generations to come as one of the most breathtaking and spellbinding events in New England sports lore. The Red Sox' Impossible Dream season of 1967, last year's "Cowboy Up" Sox team that almost went to the World Series, Doug Flutie's pass against Miami, the Patriots' World Championships in 2001 and 2003, are nothing compared to what the Celtics had to go through, waiting around their hotel in Miami to find out that they fell ass-backwards into the playoffs despite having lost five straight.
Bring on the Pacers! Surely Jermaine O'Neal, Reggie Miller and company are just hoping to survive games 1 and 2, before they have to come to the Fleet Center and all the crazy fans! I certainly will not wait to gobble up tickets. Oh yeah, I will camp outside the Fleet Center tonight just to be first in line to fork over two-hudred and forty bones to see the Boston Freaking Celtics get mauled in the first round of a tournament they have absolutely no business being in.
Curse the NBA and their contrived, high-falutin buls--- joke of a postseason format.
Random Notes:
*****VERY interesting article in today's
Manchester Union-Leader concerning the
ongoing saga of former WMUR sports director Charlie Sherman. I have met "the Sherm" and he is a very friendly and jovial guy. But if I may, two comments; one, if I were an HR manager for a large or small company, I would clip the article and post it in the employee break room under the heading "this is why you should control your temper at work." Two, while "the Sherm" is, once again, a perfectly friendly and happy guy, his "I'm just a regular sports fan who happens to be a sports anchor" act was wearing thin. After thirteen years, you would think the guy would learn to read a TelePrompTer, and, oh, I don't know, WRITE THINGS DOWN before he went on the air.
*****
High School LACROSSE is underway in New Hampshire, and for the first time, the three Manchester public schools are represented on the pitch. I have never seen a lacrosse (or "LAX") game, but I have seen it on television. Seems like kind of a funny sport. I do not know much about it other than it was invented by native americans, is played on a high level at boarding schools such as St. Paul's, Phillips Exeter, Choate and Avon Old Farms, and is wildly popular in Canada. And I know Johns Hopkins has a kick-ass team. I cannot think of another sport where Johns Hopkins has a competitive team, but I guess those pre-med kids kick ass on the Lacrosse field.
*****Got a trip to Florida coming up, but if you run into my wife, don't say anything. It is a surprise. Don't worry, she doesn't read the blog. On a sports-related note, I do plan to catch the Braves and the World Champion Florida Marlins at Pro Player on the 24th. I wonder if there will be any tickets available?
*****Upcoming blog topics: why the NBA Playoffs, as a whole, suck so bad, especially compared to the NCAA Tournament, the rapid encroachment of advertising in sports, the season openers for the New Hampshire Fisher Cats and Portland Sea Dogs, a review of the book Bleachers by John Grisham, and why I believe, despite my general lack of interest in the NHL, the playoffs kick ass.
John Doyle is a sports blogger from Dover, New Hampshire
