Bad times at the Star-Telegram

The Fort Worth Star-Telegram just fired 22. Including three sports folks. Right after they worked them to death for the Super Bowl.

Also, there's apparently some bad blood that they gave Randy Galloway -- who hasn't done a thing worth while in 20 years and is half the writer Jenn-Engel-Floyd is -- a huge raise not to go to ESPN.

Little did they know that the Star-Telegram could do better than Galloway. As could ESPN.

Sucks for those now looking for a job.

Happy Super Bowl!

UT, World Wide Leader become lovers

Yesterday, it was announced that The University of Texas and ESPN have joined unholy forces for the much-anticipated Longhorn TV network.

The deal will net UT $300 million on a 20-year deal.

As expected, there's criticism. Hell. UT could dissolve all of its athletic program and give all money to handicapped students for a free education, and people from Texas A&M, Texas Tech, Oklahoma or wherever would bitch that UT was being too philanthropic.

UT not starting its own network, if it can get away with it, is like UT intentionally not recruiting the best players just to let Baylor, Kansas State or Colorado catch up.

That's ridiculous. Any program that can have its own network -- or recruit a five-star kid -- should do it.

Why? Because its awesome. For one.

Two, that $300 million will be used to buy some rowing oars, some cleats, football pads, baseballs, eye black, tackling dummies, batting cages, towels and Gatorade.

However, never could you spend $300 million on athletics. The dirty little secret in college sports is that these institutions are very much involved in ... WAIT FOR IT! ... education.

It sounds naive, but it's the truth. Don't get me wrong. I'm not dumb enough to think UT doesn't care about its football program. Nor that K-State doesn't care about basketball or TCU, baseball.
But these colleges and universities are really into education. The amount of money that they pour into research, equipment, updating technology and supplying certain services for an expanding study body is astonishing.

In fact, if you went to the heart of what UT was all about, football is probably No. 1. Research is probably No. 2.

The football team makes up 50-100 members of the student body, which totals 51,000 students. The handful of football players that go into the pros are a pleasant byproduct. However, the other 50,990 students that will enter the workforce, make a ton of cash and then send copious amounts back to their alma mater means even more.

That $300 million will go more into computers, beakers, petri dishes, incredibly expensive biology instruments, books, software and all that bookish shit.

ESPN makes up Dez Bryant trade rumors

ESPN recommends trading Josh Hamilton too

ESPNDallas.com -- or, as I like to call it, Dallas Morning News East -- put themselves into the media spotlight after they decided to make a bunch of shit up.

The Big Lead dives headfirst into the hubbub that was the Dez Bryant trade rumors.

Apparently, Brian Broaddus went on the Ben & Skin Show (by the way, I love their charactitures because Skin has hair now and Ben is not longer fat) the other day and floated the "thought" that the Dallas Cowboys might consider trading their star receiver stud.

Then ESPNDallas.com -- notably Calvin Watkins and Tim McMahon -- took the reins and wrote ad nauseum about Bryant's availability via trade through various unnamed sources.

Then, Ben & Skin get McMahon and Watkins in to discuss the deal.

Frankly, it's irresponsible on ESPNDallas' part. I realize they're not longer in the print edition and everything's so free and easy on the Internet. However, I don't think the writers there have forgotten certain journalistic ethics that still remain pertinent to the web. Then again, Watkins has made his name with "unnamed" sources, so I shouldn't be shocked.

Two, it's retarded. The Cowboys aren't trading Bryant. Why should they? Because it was his fault the offensive line detriorated, Tony Romo was driven into the ground and the secondary blew up? No.

Also, how many times have all those blowhards railed on Jerry Jones for missing out on Randy Moss, why would you miss out again on a star receiver, a known product. Someone you know can change the face of your team.

I don't know what came over those guys. I doubt Dallas Stars talk is getting a ton of ratings. Then again, ESPN probably isn't getting a lot of ratings in Dallas-Fort Worth anyway.

Maybe they can make some more stuff up. Report on it.

Colin Cowherd, somehow, is not wrong

ESPN's Colin Cowherd is a fucking retard. But even the blindest squirrel finds a nut.

He said:

"It's interesting. Everybody thinks their town is a great sports town. We don't have a single e-mail form Dallas today about the Rangers. Yeah, I was reading a column earlier this week, Oh, they love the Rangers here. No, they conditionally like the Rangers. If the Rangers get red hot, it's sort of like Colorado with baseball. Colorado and Texas are football states, Broncos and Cowboys. They'll like fall in love with their team in August if they start playing well, but I mean, you know, Texas right now, watch the ratings fall off the cliff. It is a football town."

He's right. This town could give two shits about the Texas Rangers and only care to show up to games (well, about 25,000 of us) when the Rangers are in remote contention.

In one year, if the Rangers are second in the division and the Cowboys are 5-3, it'll go back to the way it's always been. A football town.

Dallas-Fort Worth isn't sophisticated enough for football. It's a fragmented area. Too spread out. It's full of transplants, young people and troglodytes. It's also a town of frontrunners and the biggest band of bandwagoners since the Californian gold rush.

Baseball isn't elitist or for just "smart" people. It's for patient people. It's for people that like subtle nuances and drama. It's for people that like going to the ballpark and looking at stats until their eyes bleed.

It's basically a nerd's sport. And Dallas-Fort Worth aren't nerds. If anyone tries to deny this, they are A) idiots, B) in denial or C) not lived here long enough.

Cowherd's still an assface, though.

The Dallas Cowboys stink and it's the media's fault

James, shirtless, blameless

I was disappointed in the Dallas-Fort Worth media after Dallas Cowboys head coach Wade Phillips completely skated during his Tuesday afternoon press conference.

He was like Nancy Kerrigan out there. Or Chris Farley in that figure skating skit from Saturday Night Live.

I thought they'd grill him on his team quitting, on the defense allowing a billion yards and 41 points, on being 1-5 and virtually eliminated from the playoffs.

Nope. He got to talk about how good the special teams were and how hard they played to get back into the game against the New York Giants Monday night.

Maybe they feel bad because Phillips is sure to be fired. Maybe they're pansies. Maybe.

In another story, Bradie James, the middle linebacker who has avoided criticism the past four years because he "plays hard" had some comments to the media about the media.

Said James:

“Guys have gotten into a rut, to be honest with you. It’s a lot of negativity and a lot of criticism and people don’t respond too well to criticism, no way, shape, form or fashion about it. But the way you play, criticism sometimes is warranted, and that’s what we have to understand.”

Well, I guess the "rut" James refers to is losing and all that entails: penalties, missed tackles, miss coverage, miss blocked, turnovers and mistakes. Disappointed in James here. He seems like a stand-up guy that accepts responsibility no matter what. Guess not. Guess losing turns everyone into animals.

According to Tim McMahon of the World Wide Leader in a bit of editorializing, "There are players in that locker room who are so sensitive that they allow criticism from the media to affect their performance."

That is amazing. It's amazing that there are athletes that allow this to happen negatively. It's surprising that players pay attention to the media. Most of the time, coaches and players treat media like idiots. So I'm supposed to believe that Mike Jenkins is picking up The Dallas Morning News and reading the letters to the editor.

I guess it happens, but it's inconceivable that they're listening to "Murray from Forney." Nut up guys.

A big 'fuck you' to the East Coast

I listened to The Sports Guy's -- Bill Simmons -- latest podcast and I actually got angry.

Simmons' podcasts are quite amazing. I mean, the world's largest media-business conglomerate allows this guy to talk to his friends about sports for an hour (or so) a week.

The other times he gets to talk about what TV shows he watches.

He doesn't need to write anything. He travels to attend high-profile sporting events, talks to his buds and lives in Los Angeles and gets paid an obscene amount of money.

Anyway, one friend is a New York Yankees fan. They talked about the Yankees losing 4-2 in the ALCS. Leave it to a bunch of East-Coast fuckfaced douchebags to be assholes on the Internet.

They called Colby Lewis -- the guy that dominated the Yankees in two starts -- "Hiroshama Carp." They called Mitch Moreland "Toby" after hit .389 with three RBI and three runs.

Forget that for six games, the Rangers beat the shit out of the asshole Yankees for all but 10 innings. Forget that the Rangers were simply and undoubtedly better.

I hope another East Coast team never wins another championship in any sport. Including the MLS.

Keep it coming with the jokes assheads. Keep it coming.

Jon Daniels, in profile

JD

ESPN's Jerry Crasnick wrote a wonderful piece about Texas Rangers general manager Jon Daniels today in light of the game tonight.

I think this puts it in perspective:

The Rangers, who'll meet the New York Yankees in Game 1 of the American League Championship Series on Friday night, are a monument to creativity, patience and front office teamwork.

For the record, I stated publicly only once that I thought Daniels should be fired. I'd like to think I was in the minority in this category.

Daniels drove most fans mad with those early trades. But in hindsight it didn't seem that long for him to turn it all around.

Crasnick details Daniels' early struggles and then the deal that changed everything (the day the young Daniels pantsed veteran GM John Schuerholz in the Mark Teixeira deal ... how good would Atlanta be today with Elvis Andrus and Neftali Feliz?).

The ultimate bottomline is that the Rangers are not in the playoffs (more or less the ALCS) without Jon Daniels.

He's probably the Executive of the Year. I would suggest for a three-year period, nobody in professional sports have had a better run. He's basically hit it out of the park in every facet of his job:

Hiring
Ron Washington, Scott Servais, Mike Maddux, Clint Hurdle and Thad Levine
No, he might not have hired all of these guys (hell, he could've fired a couple of them), but he kept them around. Crasnick notes the duality of Daniels' methodology not depending solely on scouts or stats, but combining the two to make good decisions. He also notes how Daniels invited all the scouts and development guys for an on-field recognition before Game 3. A class act.

Drafting
Tommy Hunter, Julio Borbon, Michael Kirkman, C.J. Wilson, Derek Holland, Mitch Moreland
A good way to replenish the farm system, every spring, take the best and brightest of America's high schools and colleges. And these are guys on the team today. Without Daniels' brilliant drafts, we don't have the talent to get Cliff Lee, Bengie Molina, Josh Hamilton or Jorge Cantu.

Latin America
Martin Perez, Alexi Ogando, Omar Beltre, Jurickson Profar, Tim Stanford
Many of the steps Daniels and Co. have made in Latin America and even in the Pacific Rim and Australia are not realized yet. Omar Beltre and Alexi Ogando are the biggest steps, and even their impact is not fully realized, although they are noticed. A bunch of kids are in the minors right now. A couple (like Martin Perez) could be seen in Arlington as soon as next year.

Trades
Josh Hamilton, Cliff Lee, Neftali Feliz, David Murphy, Elvis Andrus, Nellie Cruz
The man's turned this team over with some very salty trades. Would much rather have those guys than the guys we sent.

Free Agents
Vladimir Guerrero, Kenny Lofton, Eric Gagne, Milton Bradley, Colby Lewis
These low-risk/high-reward deals define Daniels' tenure. From the beginning, he found these veterans considered past their prime and offered them one-year, $5 million deals. Enough to get them to bite. Early on, he would use their good starts by sending them to contenders for prospects. Around the time of Bradley, he used them to get good. With Lewis and Guerrero, he used them to win a division.

Scrap Heap Finds
Darren O'Day, Andres Blanco, Matt Treanor, Marlon Byrd, Ramon Vasquez
It's uncanny the dudes Daniels and his scouting crew have found over the years that are either been useful or downright fantastic. I point to Byrd and O'Day with the latter. The Mets would kill to have O'Day back, who was basically left on waivers and the Rangers took the bait. The Phils had hopes for Byrd, but injuries ate up his time there.

Patience
Nelson Cruz, Josh Hamilton, Ron Washington, Chris Davis, Michael Young
Make all the moves you want, but if you don't have patience, you'll always keep turning over the next rock for the quick fix. Remember, Cruz and Davis were yo-yoed from the minors to majors several times. Cruz was placed on outright waivers. Still, they stuck with them and nurtured them and then pushed. Sink or swim, bitches. Furthermore, Daniels could've fired Washington or done something with Hamilton after his whipped cream incident. When Mike Young bitched about another year of rebuilding and a move to third, Daniels could've overreacted badly. With all the ownership issues and the team unable to buy balls for practice, Daniels might have packed it in and waited for the New York Mets job.

He didn't. Daniels was a better man than any of us and that is the reason the Rangers play tonight at 7 p.m. And it's why we're not general managers in Major League Baseball.