My weekly review post of Sports and My Thoughts as they pertain to the "D" and Beyond for the week ending Thursday 12.22.16 . This was a week filled with all sorts of drama and ups and downs. In the "D": Have a Merry Christmas and Happy New Years and a Joyous Holiday Season!!!
Lions:
The Detroit Lions lost this past Sunday but still with 2 game remaining are in control of their own destiny. Detroit which is still in first place by a game in the NFC North will have its hands full in their last 2 games. Injuries are again mounting up at key positions but even more evident is the lack of a running game that is so very important in the Playoffs. Also the Pro Bowl selected Players were announced and not One Detroit Lions made the squad except for being potential alternates.
Red Wings: The Red Wings are 33 games
into the season and are currently in 10th place in the Eastern Conference and not in the playoffs. The Red Wings this year as it was last year have very little scoring punch. Scoring more then a goal or two a game is a huge undertaking and having to rely on their goalies to hold teams to one or 2 goals a game in not realistic.
Detroit is looking to once again make the
playoffs for a 26th straight year, the longest in all Professional
sports but it will be in jeopardy this season.
Pistons:
The Pistons are currently in 10th place in the NBA Eastern Conference
with a 14-16 record. Detroit is an up and down team this year and as of late are playing bad basketball being blown out and not giving a total effort game in and game out. HC Stan VanGundy continues to call out his team but he needs to take more accountability for this is a team he has assembled and yet they are not playing up to the potential they should be. The team is still trying to get used to each other and
hopefully will put it all together quickly and start winning on a
regular basis. The Detroit Pistons announced they will move back to the
City of Detroit next year and play in the new Little Caesars Arena with
the Detroit Red Wings starting next season.
Tigers:
The Tigers who finished the 2016 season one game out of the Wild Card
spot has announced it will be trimming payroll this upcoming season and
is looking to finally retool going forward. GM Avila announced the team
in looking to move anyone and everyone in hopes of lowering their
payroll and getting cheaper players and prospects. The Tigers for 6
years had a chance to make the World Series but fell short and now will
ask fans to watch mediocre baseball as the team trades away it marquee
players all the while raising prices for tickets, merchandise,
concessions each year as the team stuff their pockets at the expense of
its fans. This is a huge gamble for the Tigers going into the 2017
baseball season.
Spartans:
The
Spartans football team needs to regroup after a very disappointing season. HC Mark Dantonio says the areas of concern will be corrected by next season but I am concerned for Dantanio came out this week and said He isn't making any chances to the Coaching Staff. For MSU to remain an elite team in the Country, it is imperative that changes be made at the OC and DC coaching positions where He needs to bring in top Coaches. It was apparent the past few years and even more so this past season that both the Spartans OC and DC are not top Coaches and have been terribly out coached by their opponents on many occasions. I admire Dantonio's loyalty but this is also going to cost him and the team dearly going forward. The
Spartan basketball team has struggled this season and also with key injuries to its star players it is a good possibility this team with not make the NCAA Tourney this season. Coupled with the toughest preseason schedule in the Country, the team will be hard pressed to win 20 games this year.
Wolverines:
The Wolverines football team is getting ready for its Orange Bowl appearance when they face Florida State. Coach Harbaugh is still fuming over not being selected by the CFB Playoff Committee but he knows he has no one to blame but himself and his team. Also once again, Harbaugh's name is being mentioned for NFL HC jobs that are opening up, most noticeably the LA Rams HC position. The Wolverines basketball
team has opened the season with a 9-3 record over scheduled cream puffs
and the jury is still out as to how good this team really is this season. Coach Beilein
has done a good job at Michigan and I see
another 18-20 win season and a possible March Madness berth for the
Wolverines this up coming season.
Sports beyond the "D":
NFL:
The NFL Season is in week 16. The NFL is in disarray again,
between the botched stance on Domestic Violence, to the continued
mistakes by the Officials, to the low ratings, to the Players not
trusting the NFL or Commissioner Roger Goodell, to so on and so on and
so on, you get the idea!!!! NY Giants HC Bob McAdoo illegally used a walkie talkie during their game with the Cowboys 2 weeks ago, the NFL has dragged its feet in doling out the punishment for this because the Owners of the Giants John Mara and Commisoner Roger Goodell and very good friends and the Mara family wields great power within the NFL. The NFL needs to remember they fined and took a draft pick away from the Cleveland Browns when their GM did a similar thing. Time for the NFL (NOT our FAULT LEAGUE) to do the right thing. The Patriots and Cowboys are the 2 best teams in the NFL right now as
Dallas is led by 2 rookies in Prescott and Elliott and the Patriots
with Brady and many other veterans. Biggest disappointments so far are
the Carolina Panthers and Arizona Cardinals and the Jacksonville
Jaguars. Severe injuries, especially concussions are rampant nowadays
as almost all the replays show that either a players head is being
driven into the turf and also so many head to head deliberate hits as
well as hitting defenseless players in the head. And it seems the NFL
with all their new Concussion Protocol Procedures, they still cannot get
it right in regards to protecting a Player safely.
Entitlement is the new word for
both the Owners and the Players nowadays and that leaves the fans to pay
the price for this so called "Entitlement. As if the Owners and the
NFL do
not have enough money, the NFL is now going to play games in China as
well as the UK and Mexico. The NFL should concentrate on making the game
better and dealing with its current issues instead of trying to dilute
the game and water it down with thoughts of global expansion on the
horizon just to make more money
MLB Baseball: MLB
is now in the off season and players are already starting to move from
time to time during Free Agency. The Fall Team Meetings just ended in
Arizona and many teams have announced they are looking to trim payroll
and move aging veterans with huge contracts. It will be interesting to
see who the sellers and buyers will be and which teams are looking to
next season as their year to make a run at the World Series and which
teams are looking to shed payroll and retool for 3 or 4 years from
now.
NCAA: CFB Football Season is now into its Bowl Game Season. The
CFB Playoff format has Alabama, Ohio State, Clemson, and Washington as the
Top 4 in the playoff format. The 40 game College Football Bowl Season has begun and once again it is a diluted bowl season where teams will play in some of these ridiculous bowl just for the money nowadays. A disturbing trend that has started is star players such as Stanford RB McCaffrey and LSU RB Fournette deciding they are skipping their bowl games to get ready for the upcoming NFL Draft. Players dictating that they are not playing is selfish for they are letting down their teammates and Coaches and fans. An even more disturbing issue was the Minnesota Gophers football team saying they were going to boycott their upcoming Bowl game because the school suspended 10 players for an alleged sexual assaults. The school needed to do the right thing and forfeit the bowl game to let the players know they are not the ones who make these decisions but they caved in for it is all about the money the schools get from these bowl games. Also, Oklahoma should reprimand Coach Bob Stoops for he definitely put winning in front of doing what was right when a player (Joe Mixon) deliberately punched a woman in the face. And Louisville needs to fire the OC and make the school forfeit a few scholarships for illegally accepting the game day plan of Wake Forest.
NBA and NHL:
NBA season in underway and it seems like it will be an entertaining
season as most predict a rematch of the Cleveland Cavaliers and Golden
State Warriors. A few teams have jumped out early playing good
basketball, they are; Clippers, Thunder, Raptors, Hawks and Hornets. I
want to see as the season progresses how the Warriors will interact as
their is only one basketball to go around to all the players used to
shooting 20 plus times a night.
In the
NHL, the season is now about a month old and the Montreal Canadians and Pittsburgh Penguins are
the best teams in the NHL so far. The
NHL also announced expansion into Las Vegas in a few years and Seattle
is the next potential city to host an expansion team. I cannot
understand the rationale of expansion when their are quite a few team
struggling financially right now in the NHL.
Miscellaneous;
The biggest surprise so far this year didn't happening in the Sporting
World but it did happen in the 2016 Presidential Election where the
underdog beat the heavily favorite Candidate to become the next
President. Presidential Elect Donald Trump upset Hillary Clinton to
become the 45th President of the United States. The Nation and
the World now are on pins and needles and no one knows what or how the
next POTUS will act in the White House. There are protests all over the
Nation with chants of Trump is not our President but in reality He is
and those who are protesting, need to look at each other and ask which
of you did vote, for only 47% of eligible voters, voted in this election
and once again Polls leading up to the Election were terribly wrong. Now
is the time for all Americans to put away their differences and come
together as one and show the World why we are the greatest Nation but it
starts at the top with the POTUS all the way down to You and Me. Do
the Democrats regret rigging the DNC nomination for Hillary Clinton over
Bernie Sanders? And how do the Republicans feel now that Trump has
proved them all wrong especially those who went against him?
See My NFL and CFB updates www.cupofjoeinthed.blogspot.com @cupofjoeinthed on twitter
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