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Sports Quote of the Day:
"A guy who gives you less than what he has to give is, one, telling you what he thinks of you, and two, telling you what he thinks of himself." ~ Basketball Quote by Pete Carill, Legendary Princeton Head Basketball Coach
Bear Down Chicago Bears!!! Bears-Panthers Preview.
By JEFF MEZYDLO (STATS Senior Writer)
VS. Looking to improve to 3-0 away from home for the first time in eight seasons, the Bears try to hand the Carolina Panthers a third straight defeat Sunday.
After scoring 21 fourth-quarter points to win 28-20 at San Francisco in Week 2 and beating the New York Jets 27-19 a week later, Chicago (2-2) allowed Aaron Rodgers to throw for 302 yards and four touchdowns in last Sunday's 38-17 home loss to Green Bay.
"It's always hard to go on the road, especially in the NFL, coast-to-coast and win two games," running back Matt Forte told the Bears' official website. "For us to drop two games at home, that leaves a bad taste in your mouth."
The Bears certainly won't panic considering they have a chance to open with three straight road wins for the first time since going 5-0 in 2006.
Cutler has been the poster boy for the Bears' inconsistency.
He's completed 67.5 percent of his passes in two home games but has thrown four touchdowns and four interceptions while posting an 84.7 rating. On the road, Cutler has a 63.9 completion percentage but has thrown six TDs without a pick for a 106.3 rating.
This will be Cutler's first road game against Carolina with the Bears. He posted a 69.5 rating while throwing a TD and two INTs in home victories over current Panthers coach and former Chicago defensive coordinator Ron Rivera in 2011 and 2012.
Forte has averaged 6.3 yards per carry in four games against the Panthers, and rushed for 166 and two TDs during a 23-6 victory in Chicago's most recent visit to Charlotte in 2010.
He gained 122 yards on 23 carries against the Packers after being held to 136 on 42 attempts in the first three games.
"That's how we should run the ball," Forte said after Chicago rushed for 235 yards last week.
The Bears could be in for more ground success against a Panthers team that ranks 27th in the league with 140.8 rushing yards allowed per contest. Carolina (2-2) ranked second at 86.9 last season.
"Stopping the run is simple," linebacker Luke Kuechly said. "If you're not in your gaps, they are going to rush you. If you're in your gaps, they can't run the ball. It's cliché, and as easy as it sounds, that's what it comes down to."
The Panthers have allowed 75 points the last two weeks after yielding 21 over the first two. They gave up an average of 201.7 passing yards in the first three games before Joe Flacco threw for 327 in last Sunday's 38-10 loss at Baltimore.
Getting the pass defense back on track might be difficult against a Bears team that boasts three players with at least 20 receptions, not including Brandon Marshall, who has 16 but with five touchdowns.
Tight end Martellus Bennett leads the way with 29 catches for 295 yards and four TDs.
Though Chicago's often-maligned defense held the Packers to 56 rushing yards, it gave up at least 300 through the air for the second straight contest.
With end Jared Allen sidelined by a bout of pneumonia, the Bears had one sack and struggled to pressure Rodgers after recording seven total sacks against the 49ers and Jets. Allen is confident he will be ready to face Carolina, which could be forced to take to the air often because of a decimated backfield.
With DeAngelo Williams (ankle) doubtful, Mike Tolbert (leg) on short-term injured reserve and the statuses of Jonathan Stewart (knee) and Fozzy Whittaker (quadriceps) uncertain, undrafted rookie Darrin Reaves is expected to start after he carried 12 times for 26 yards against the Ravens.
''I'm starting to be able to live my dreams out, and that's a good feeling,'' Reaves said. ''Not under the circumstances we have, with so many guys dinged up, but it's still a good feeling.''
The Panthers signed veteran running back Chris Ogbonnaya this week, but it's uncertain how much time, if any, he will see Sunday.
Cam Newton has yet to throw an interception in three games but has only three TDs through the air and has been sacked nine times. He's completed 55.3 percent of his passes with one TD and three INTs in his two losses to the Bears.
Rookie Kelvin Benjamin, however, has caught 21 passes for 329 yards and three TDs, including one in both of the last two contests.
Source: Chicago to host 2015 NFL draft.
By Rand Getlin
Chicago will be the host city for the 2015 NFL draft, a league source told Yahoo Sports on Thursday.
'Against Football' author couldn't live with loving the sport any longer.
By David Steele
The author of a new book, “Against Football: One Fan’s Reluctant Manifesto,’’ has been unabashedly for football most of his life. That passion, he says, is what drove him to write it.
But, Steve Almond, a New York Times bestselling author, said last weekend, opposing football and killing it are two different things.
“I have no interest in a boycott. I have no interest in abolishing it, or some kind of mass movement,’’ he told Sporting News after speaking on a panel at the Baltimore Book Festival. (Parts of his interview aired Sunday on WEAA-FM in Baltimore.) “It was a personal reckoning for me. I love the sport. Over the years, I just came to this feeling of like, ‘I can’t be a sponsor any more.’ But that doesn’t mean you don’t love it.
“That’s the curiosity of the book — how do you, in a certain way, step away from something you still love?’’
Almond wrestles with it every fall weekend, but has stopped watching games. It’s a battle, he said, between “two synapses that have been in my brain for a long time.’’ One feeds his love of the game and the Bay Area native’s hometown team, the Raiders.
“The other one basically says, ‘Wait a second, shame on you here,’” he continued. “There are things in this sport that don’t line up with your values when you’re not watching a football game, whether it’s the nihilist greed of the NCAA and the NFL, the rotten deal we make to consume players’ heroism and ignore the health problems that they have down the road … (or) gender issues and race issues that I don’t think are good, that I think create a lot of racism and bigotry.’’
There also is crime committed by players and the NFL’s poor, tone-deaf handling of it — an issue that went viral with Ray Rice and Adrian Peterson less than two weeks after “Against Football” hit the shelves.
It inadvertently boosted interest in the book, but Almond said it doesn’t overshadow the underlying problems he addresses.
“To me, those stories about individual players are guys who are in crisis,’’ he said. What struck him was another story that surfaced at the same time that spoke to a major factor in his disconnect with the sport.
“The NFL admitted in federal court that they expected 30 percent of their players to wind up with long-term cognitive problems,’’ he said. “Thirty percent, after years of denying and obfuscating and putting all this junk science in the way of it … I was having trouble believing it wasn’t some kind of massive prank.’’
In “Against Football,’’ Almond blends personal experience with developments in the sport over the decades, including recent ones like the Dolphins’ bullying scandal and the rape case involving high school football players in Steubenville, Ohio.
His most personal recollection is of his mother’s battle with dementia, and his connecting the dots to the fates of brain-damaged players and their loved ones. That was his tipping point, he said last weekend.
“What I’m consuming on Sunday for pleasure,’’ Almond said, “the end result is a bunch of family members dealing with what I was looking at in that hospital room, which is somebody whose selfhood had been annihilated.’’
The main question is whether football is just entertainment — albeit “wildly entertaining,’’ he said — or a “moral activity.’’
“It’s almost like everybody has to say a few Hail Marys and seek forgiveness before they sit down and watch a game,’’ he said.
His solution, admittedly a “reluctant” one, is to not watch the games.
Source: Chicago to host 2015 NFL draft.
By Rand Getlin
Next year's top NFL pick will be flashing the No. 1 jersey in Chicago. (USA TODAY Sports)
Chicago will be the host city for the 2015 NFL draft, a league source told Yahoo Sports on Thursday.
The three-day event, which reportedly will begin on April 30, is moving from New York, a site the league has used since 1965.
Los Angeles was the other finalist to host next year's event.
The league is expected to formally announce the draft's site at the fall meetings in New York, NFL.com reported.
Twelve cities were in the running to host the draft after the league failed to secure New York's Radio City Music Hall for the dates it wanted.
'Against Football' author couldn't live with loving the sport any longer.
By David Steele
Roger Goodell, Ray Rice, Greg Hardy, Adrian Peterson (SN Photo Illustration/Karla Eargle)
The author of a new book, “Against Football: One Fan’s Reluctant Manifesto,’’ has been unabashedly for football most of his life. That passion, he says, is what drove him to write it.
But, Steve Almond, a New York Times bestselling author, said last weekend, opposing football and killing it are two different things.
“I have no interest in a boycott. I have no interest in abolishing it, or some kind of mass movement,’’ he told Sporting News after speaking on a panel at the Baltimore Book Festival. (Parts of his interview aired Sunday on WEAA-FM in Baltimore.) “It was a personal reckoning for me. I love the sport. Over the years, I just came to this feeling of like, ‘I can’t be a sponsor any more.’ But that doesn’t mean you don’t love it.
“That’s the curiosity of the book — how do you, in a certain way, step away from something you still love?’’
Almond wrestles with it every fall weekend, but has stopped watching games. It’s a battle, he said, between “two synapses that have been in my brain for a long time.’’ One feeds his love of the game and the Bay Area native’s hometown team, the Raiders.
“The other one basically says, ‘Wait a second, shame on you here,’” he continued. “There are things in this sport that don’t line up with your values when you’re not watching a football game, whether it’s the nihilist greed of the NCAA and the NFL, the rotten deal we make to consume players’ heroism and ignore the health problems that they have down the road … (or) gender issues and race issues that I don’t think are good, that I think create a lot of racism and bigotry.’’
There also is crime committed by players and the NFL’s poor, tone-deaf handling of it — an issue that went viral with Ray Rice and Adrian Peterson less than two weeks after “Against Football” hit the shelves.
It inadvertently boosted interest in the book, but Almond said it doesn’t overshadow the underlying problems he addresses.
“To me, those stories about individual players are guys who are in crisis,’’ he said. What struck him was another story that surfaced at the same time that spoke to a major factor in his disconnect with the sport.
“The NFL admitted in federal court that they expected 30 percent of their players to wind up with long-term cognitive problems,’’ he said. “Thirty percent, after years of denying and obfuscating and putting all this junk science in the way of it … I was having trouble believing it wasn’t some kind of massive prank.’’
In “Against Football,’’ Almond blends personal experience with developments in the sport over the decades, including recent ones like the Dolphins’ bullying scandal and the rape case involving high school football players in Steubenville, Ohio.
His most personal recollection is of his mother’s battle with dementia, and his connecting the dots to the fates of brain-damaged players and their loved ones. That was his tipping point, he said last weekend.
“What I’m consuming on Sunday for pleasure,’’ Almond said, “the end result is a bunch of family members dealing with what I was looking at in that hospital room, which is somebody whose selfhood had been annihilated.’’
The main question is whether football is just entertainment — albeit “wildly entertaining,’’ he said — or a “moral activity.’’
“It’s almost like everybody has to say a few Hail Marys and seek forgiveness before they sit down and watch a game,’’ he said.
His solution, admittedly a “reluctant” one, is to not watch the games.
How 'bout them Chicago Blackhawks? Blackhawks not worried about preseason power play struggles.
By Tracey Myers
Special teams: they can make or break a game, swing momentum in your favor or send it over to the other team.
The Blackhawks are no different than any other team in that department. They want both their penalty kill and their power play clicking. As the Blackhawks conclude their preseason on Friday night when they travel to New York to take on the Rangers, their special teams are going in opposite directions. Their power play is 0 for 17. Their penalty kill is 18 for 19.
Now the Blackhawks have split their preseason games into two types: those with a bulk of their stars playing, those with job-searching younger prospects playing. Still, why so good at one and not so good at the other?
It’s just the preseason, so this is not a time-to-panic story. It’s more a what-gives story. As far as that barren power play, coach Joel Quenneville wasn’t too worried about it following the Blackhawks’ 3-1 loss to the Montreal Canadiens on Wednesday night.
“Today was the first day we really had a little more continuity with it,” Quenneville said. “It’s a start. There are some positive things tonight. Hopefully we can get better off it and get some production to reflect it. It’s early, and we just practiced it for the first time going into today’s game. So we’ll try to get some confidence in it going into the regular season.”
That’s true. The Blackhawks spent the early part of this week working on the power play, with Brad Richards now manning the point on the second unit. Still, the same holds true for the penalty kill in terms of when they really started to concentrate on it.
“We had our PK meeting the other day and worked on it Monday and Tuesday. It’s nice to have a group of guys who have been here and know the system,” said Ben Smith.
The killing units were adjusting, too, as they no longer have Michal Handzus on one of them. Handzus may have struggled his final season with the Blackhawks, but he was good on the penalty kill. Still, the kill has just plugged along in preseason.
So what’s the difference? Perhaps it’s just in the approach. The penalty kill works mainly on positioning and instinct, reading and reacting to what the opposition is doing. The Blackhawks have been doing that well so far this preseason.
“It’s in our system, in our positioning and it’s a read,” Smith said. “It’s being in the situation. It’s making mistakes and learning from them. It’s trying to put yourself in a good area: give them those shots from the walls and try to get into the lanes when they’re up top and try to fire pucks.”
The power play is about possession and, more importantly, getting shots on net. And this has been a problem for the Blackhawks for a season or two now: recording enough shots. It was an issue again on Wednesday night.
“We were looking for too many stick-to-stick plays and too many perfect plays we didn’t shoot the puck on the power play,” Quenneville said. “We could’ve gotten more momentum off it.”
The Blackhawks want both special teams working when the regular season begins. They have to keep the good habits they’ve developed on the penalty kill this preseason, bust out of the bad habits that have plagued their power play a few seasons. There is too much talent on both sides of their special teams not to get it done.
Why Blackhawks GM Stan Bowman felt bad for Teuvo Teravainen.
By John Paschall
There are high expectations when you come to the Blackhawks as a talented rookie.
Ask Patrick Kane or Jonathan Toews.
The dynamic duo burst into the United Center during the 2007-08 season and stole fans' hearts by demonstrating a seamless transition to the NHL.
Fast forward six years to the anticipated debut of center Teuvo Teravainen. Blackhawks fans hoped the Finnish star could fill the hole in second line as their play-making center.
But 'Finnsanity' or 'Teuvo Time' never came. Three games was all Teravainen got in the 2013-14 season as he was sent back down to the AHL's Rockford IceHogs.
Blackhawks GM Stan Bowman stopped by SportsTalk Live on Thursday and said the pressure put on Teravainen wasn't fair for the 20-year old.
"I did feel bad a little bit for Teuvo," Bowman said. "We're trying to be very patient with him. We are trying to make sure that people understand that there's a process that takes place with these players. We saw Kane and Toews come in together, and they were special players. But they were also coming into a team that wasn't as establish and it certainly didn't have the depth that our team does now. So I think that's a good thing though because it allows us to lower the expectations a little bit.
"But he's an incredible talent. I'm not trying to undersell what he can do. But we just have to realize that the team is not on his shoulders. He's going to be a part of it"
Just another Chicago Bulls Session… Bulls not biting on LeBron, Cavaliers bait.
By Mike Singer
Just because the power has shifted in the Eastern Conference doesn’t mean the Bulls are willing to admit it.
The new, LeBron-led super team in Cleveland is the early favorite to finish atop the conference. The Cavs traded for double-double machine Kevin Love and have tabbed effective-yet-unproven point guard Kyrie Irving as the conductor, the third in the triumvirate of stars.
Last year’s Eastern Conference finalists, Miami and now injury-ravaged Indiana, spent all regular season studying what the other squad was doing. Expect the same two-step from Cleveland and Chicago, beginning with their Halloween night tussle three days into the season.
Perhaps it was just vague preseason talk, or maybe it’s just early season gamesmanship, but hearing the Bulls respond to the “Cleveland” question was a master-class in deflection.
“People always bring up Cleveland but there’s a lot of other teams in the East that’s rebuilding that have good teams,” Derrick Rose said earlier this week from the team’s sparkling new practice facility next to the United Center.
“[Cleveland’s] a great team but you can’t overlook a team like Brooklyn that gets Lopez back, a team like Atlanta gets Horford back, Charlotte gets Stephenson,” coach Tom Thibodeau said on Monday. “Miami signs Luol. Miami hasn’t skipped a beat.”
Even Taj Gibson, the five-year vet who played a significant role against James and the Cavs in the team’s 2010 playoff ouster, wouldn’t concede that there are two teams best suited to compete for the Eastern Conference crown.
“Everybody’s talking about Cleveland and Chicago, but you’ve got to look at the Raptors, you’ve got to look at the Knicks, Brooklyn, the Hornets got better, Washington got better. The East is going to be deep this year,” Gibson said on Wednesday.
You can practically see the bullet points on Thibodeau’s dry-erase board.
This is the same Eastern Conference whose Raptors, last year’s No. 3 seed, wouldn’t have made the playoffs in the Western Conference. Its eight seed, the Hawks at 38-44, became just the 15th team in the last two decades to make the postseason with a sub-.500 record.
Will teams like Washington, Toronto and Charlotte take the next step in their postseason development? Perhaps, but no team outside of Cleveland added as much depth to the roster as the Bulls did.
The Bulls clearly won’t indulge the former rivalry until it’s time, and that’s fine because they have plenty to figure out on their own. Of chief importance is discovering what type of player Derrick Rose still is after two major knee surgeries that sidelined him for the past two seasons. The FIBA World Cup provided scant glimpses of his former self, and that’s about it.
They also added Pau Gasol, a smooth 7-footer whose mid-range game should complement Rose perfectly. Gasol won two championships and made the playoffs in six of his seven years with the Lakers. The Bulls will no-doubt lean on his vast Western-Conference playoff experience come April. The team also added Doug McDermott and forward Nikola Mirotic, both potentially key contributors, but only time will tell whether the rookies can crack Thibodeau’s notoriously short bench.
The point is that this year’s Bulls, the most talented team Rose or Noah have ever been a part of, have a ton of moving parts.
“I think we have a lot of talent right here,” Noah said on Monday. “It’s all about finding ways to jell, getting that space on the offensive end, finding the spots where guys are effective, and being the best that we can be and that starts with us. What’s going on around the league, those aren’t things we can control.”
Noah knows the type of potential the Bulls have, which is exactly why he won’t invite distractions.
Asked one more time about Cleveland and Chicago, the Eastern Conference’s perceived top two teams, and Noah couldn’t help himself.
“Is that what it looks like?” he said, eyebrows rising, lips curling. “Cool.”
Noah: Mirotic Is Bulls’ ‘Secret Weapon’.
By David Schuster
Nikola Mirotic, right. (Getty Images)
It’s just the second day of practice, and Joakim Noah is already calling rookie forward Nikola Mirotic the Bulls’ “secret weapon.” Soon enough, that secret may get out to the entire league because Mirotic — while it’s still really early — is already turning heads at the Bulls training camp.
Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau, never one for over-the-top or unwarranted praise when discussing rookies, heaped some on anyway when talking about Mirotic.
“I thought he had a really good first day, and after watching the film it was even better than I thought,” Thibodeau said Wednesday. “He’s going to be a good player.”
And Thibodeau wasn’t the only one to lavish complimentary words toward the 6-foot-10 Mirotic, who is 23 and has professional experience in Spain.
“He’s really good, and he adds a lot more then just being a great shooter,” Noah said. “You don’t think a stretch four can run the floor or block shots but he can. He’s a hell of a player.”
For his part though, Mirotic is just taking it slow and trying to learn. He calls Thibodeau a “demanding coach but one who I can learn so much from.”
A native of Montenegro, Mirotic’s English is getting better by the day, and he’s quickly acclimating himself to his new surroundings.
“Chicago is a great city,” he said. “It has everything here, great restaurants, museums and parks. So now I’m living downtown, and I’m very lucky to come here this year because of the new practice facilities. My wife and son are happy, so everything is good.”
One of the biggest questions going into this training camp is how Mirotic will fit in and if Thibodeau will find him minutes. Past history indicates that Thibodeau wouldn’t play either Mirotic or fellow rookie Doug McDermott all that much, but both have been impressive so far and in a season when the veteran players will need to get as much rest as possible, look for the two rookies to be on the court more than one would expect in years past under Thibodeau.
Epstein: Cubs Ready To Compete For NL Central In ’15. (Save this article because you'll want to look at it a year from now and say, "How did CS&T/AA know that the Cubs were going to be serious contenders for the NL Central or It' still the same old Cubs, CS&T/AA were just as wrong as the Cubs are bad." And guess what, we don't think we're wrong.) Chicago Sports & Travel, Inc./AllsportsAmerica editorial staff.
By Bruce Levine
Cubs president Theo Epstein. (Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images)
Cubs president of baseball operations Theo Epstein has a message for division foes and his fan base.
“The talent that we had on the field this year turned some heads,” Epstein said Tuesday in a season-ending press conference. “A lot of people around baseball are aware this place is going to get really interesting for a long time.”
Despite another last-place finish and the team averaging 92 losses in the Epstein regime, the arrow does appear to be going upward at Wrigley Field. Raw talent has made its way to Clark and Addison and appears ready to compete for something other than personal statistics. That said, the addition of veteran players is on the docket for next season.
“We are happy with the growth of our young players,” Epstein said. “We are excited about the future. Now comes the interesting part, where we have to convert that to winning. That means reaching the players we have, making the adjustments as quickly as they can, learning how to win and rounding out that talent with impact guys from outside the organization.”
Winning the NL Central in 2015 is the latest goal that Epstein has presented to the public. His praise and disdain for the rival St. Louis Cardinals and their success is a driving force for the baseball department run by Epstein and general manager Jed Hoyer.
“Well, how do you balance admiration and contempt?” Epstein said of the Cardinals. “I am a Cub, so I have to hate the Cardinals. However, I also admire the way they run their baseball shop. They are very consistent, they make really good decisions all the way back to George Kissell (a legendary player development coach for 60 years). They teach the game the right way. They stay true to that vision of how to play Cardinals baseball. They develop homegrown players who are loyal to it. In some respects — and I hate to say it on the record — we have to do some of the same things they do in order to be successful. On the other hand, I think we are building something that can go toe-to-toe with them and surpass them.”
Epstein took the challenge of winning in the NL Central one step further.
“We have a chance to win this division and win it on a consistent basis,” Epstein said. “We are going to need to in order to win the World Series. We all know who the good teams are now, but we are trying to look ahead a couple of years. It will be a high bar. I was in the American League East when it was the best division in baseball. I will admit coming to the NL Central that I thought there would be elements that would make it easier. I was dead wrong. This has a chance over the next five years to be the most competitive and the best division in baseball. It will be really rewarding to compete and win this division someday.”
MLB to test new 'pace of game' rules in Arizona Fall League.
Not so long ago, MLB took the step of forming a "pace of game" committee to address the mounting levels of down time in an average major-league contest. Now, that committee is ready to move forward with some potential changes.
In the Arizona Fall League, which begins play next week, MLB will test the following rule changes/rule enforcements, per a league press release:
•Batter's Box Rule: The batter shall keep at least one foot in the batter's box throughout his at-bat, unless one of a series of established exceptions occurs, in which case the batter may leave the batter's box but not the dirt area surrounding home plate. (Exceptions include a foul ball or a foul tip; a pitch forcing the batter out of the batter's box; “time” being requested and granted; a wild pitch or a passed ball; and several others.)
•No-Pitch Intentional Walks: In the event a team decides to intentionally walk a batter, no pitches shall be thrown. Instead, the manager shall signal to the home plate umpire with four fingers, and the batter should proceed to first base to become a runner.
•20-Second Rule [AT 17 SALT RIVER FIELDS HOME GAMES ONLY]: A modified version of Rule 8.04, which discourages unnecessary delays by the pitcher, shall apply. Rule 8.04 requires the pitcher to deliver the ball to the batter within 12 seconds after he receives the ball with the bases unoccupied. The penalty prescribed by Rule 8.04 for a pitcher's violation of the Rule is that the umpire shall call “Ball.”These are all common-sense steps, and this is actually pretty brisk work by the committee when it comes to advancing to the testing phase. Developing!
White Sox to focus on bullpen this offseason.
By Dan Hayes
Having watched too many winnable games get away in 2014, the White Sox intend to make the bullpen a priority this offseason.
Though several big names are set to become free agents next month, general manager Rick Hahn isn’t making promises to bring in a proven closer.
But Hahn didn’t hesitate to say the White Sox — who struggled to replace Addison Reed after he was traded last December — would work to improve a bullpen that blew 21 of 57 save opportunities this season while giving countless other games away. Hurt by injuried Nate Jones and Matt Lindstrom, the White Sox finished last season with a 4.38 ERA, which ranked 28th out of 30 teams.
“There’s zero doubt in our mind that we need to make some bullpen upgrades,” Hahn said Sunday. “We’ve talked about this for several years. I’ve never been of the specific mindset that someone has to be anointed ‘the closer,’ and only pitch in the ninth inning with leads of three runs or less. I don’t think that’s necessarily the ideal way to deploy what should be your best reliever. So, it’s not imperative in my mind we go out and sign or acquire someone who has 150 lifetime saves and say, ‘This is the guy.’ If that happen, from a market standpoint that player’s available and he’s available for a cost we see as reasonable, fantastic.”
There are several options were the White Sox to go that route, however.
Yankees closer Dan Robertson is eligible to become a free agent, as is San Francisco’s Sergio Romo, who has 78 saves but was demoted from the ninth inning earlier this season. Milwaukee’s Francisco Rodriguez is expected to hit the market after converting 44 saves this season and potential free agents Koji Uehara, Jason Grilli and Casey Janssen have closing experience too. Philadelphia would most certainly listen to offers for Jonathan Papelbon as well.
With a payroll of roughly $46 million before arbitration, the White Sox have money to spend. But Hahn may instead choose to spend it on several arms instead of one big ticket-item.
He intended to give the White Sox a similar setup this past season.
After he traded Addison Reed to Arizona, Hahn signed sinkerballer Ronald Belisario to pitch in the seventh inning. Jones, who led the AL in tight and close appearances in 2013 per MLB.com, would continue to pitch in high-leverage situations as would Lindstrom. Belisario would take over in the seventh inning and rookie Daniel Webb would be groomed for late innings spots.
But Jones left with an injury on April 3 and never returned, and the absence was too great for the White Sox to overcome. Whether it was Lindstrom, Belisario or Javy Guerra, the White Sox struggled to find someone who could consistently close out ballgames. Jacob Petricka and Zach Putnam combined to convert 20 of 25 tries late in the season, which is a good sign for the bullpen’s overall health.
But the White Sox need more options next season, pitching coach Don Cooper said, especially with Jones out until perhaps August after he underwent reconstructive elbow surgery on July 30.
“The last two seasons is not where we’re supposed to be,” Cooper said. “(Rick and Kenny Williams) have a pretty good idea what we may need, what holes do we have. Certainly going into it we know that we don’t have a clear-cut closer, but Petricka and Putnam have done a pretty good job of that on the fly, with very short notice.”
Without Jones, the White Sox were forced to rely almost entirely upon groundball pitchers. The relief unit also walked an MLB-high 4.51 batters per nine innings and struck out only 7.24, which ranked 29th.
They also struggled to prevent inherited runners from scoring as 32 percent did, which was tied for the seventh-worst mark in the majors.
Hahn cited the development of Petricka and Putnam as positives and White Sox manager Robin Ventura trusts them late in games. But more is needed if the White Sox want to compete next season, as Hahn said the other day.
“At the bare minimum we want more options,” Hahn said. “Obviously the bullpen is an important area that we need to upgrade this year. We enter this offseason with a couple of pieces that improved their stock over the course of the season.
“But the overall goal of the bullpen is going to be to acquire multiple options, potentially from the right and left side, many of which could be end-game options for us.”
A Look At The Problems In Sports Today. What's Your Take?
By Jack Anderson
21st century sports do not resemble what your father watched back in the '60s and '70s. It has been a wild ride full of steroids, scandals, crime, and the overall degeneration of athletes. True viewers are able to witness faster, stronger athletes participate in sports, thus making for higher quality entertainment—but at a price.
Today’s athletes are spoiled, selfish prima donnas solely focused on the next endorsement or payday. They hold out for bigger contracts, they cause internal disaster within organizations and prove to be a disgrace to the sport to which they owe their livelihood.
Present day athletes are all about themselves and their "me first, team second" attitude leads to issues in every area. Athletes will do anything, even if it leads to eventual trouble, in order to separate themselves from the competition. They take illegal substances so that they can maximize their performance on the playing field.
This doesn’t send a good message to anyone looking up to these athletes, especially young kids coming in and out of high school. They see these rich superstars dominating a sport and say, “Why can’t I do this?” They want that success so they do what their “idols” do. They take steroids. This can even result in others taking steroids even if they wouldn’t normally take them, because they have to keep up with the athletes who initially took them.
So steroids are an obvious issue among younger amateur athletes. However, there is also a growing problem with colleges giving illegal benefits and gifts to their prospective students, most recently seen with the allegations against OJ Mayo and USC.
Colleges are willing to disregard NCAA rules because there is so much money at stake when it comes to winning. Boosters and alumni are more willing to give to a successful program. The better the bowl game a college goes to, the bigger the paycheck they receive. So colleges are willing to stretch the rules if it means they achieve more success.
The athletes, dazzled with the prospect of getting an early start to the high life, naturally accept the benefits. In this material world, athletic programs and athletes are only concerned with one thing: money. If the college will deliver money to the athlete, then the athlete will play for them so that the team can deliver money to the school.
When money leads to disrespect for the rules, problems like we are seeing now occur. Amateur sports contain so many athletes aspiring to be highly endorsed superstars that they will do anything to have it as quickly as possible. This just further sets a bad example to our middle schooler's and so now we have prima donnas infiltrating our sports programs at every level.
Another factor in this could be the overexposure sports undergoes. We live in a world where we are updated by the minute about each and every move athletes make. ESPN virtually tracks LeBron’s every sneeze and Tom Brady’s every snore.
Young kids watch these athletes prance around and tell the world about their every heartache so they think, “I deserve this and I’m gonna do whatever it takes to get it.” When every athlete is involved in a scandal, kids begin to become desensitized. They don’t think the scandals are that bad and even think, “This is what I need to do if I want to become a superstar.” They think this way because of the overexposure sports receives.
When kids set their sights on superstardom and are willing to pay any price to attain it, this allows agents to exploit them as well. Agents have been flirting with athletes at younger and younger ages. They have begun establishing relationships with athletes as they enter college, trying to score them as clients before they are even allowed to have agents.
Again, despite all their warm sentiments of caring about the athletes, all these agents really want is money. They want to sign the big clients before they are open to the whole market. This forces other agents to join in because they can’t get left behind. So there’s no trust between these colleges, athletes, and agents, only one common desire for wealth.
Looking at examples of corruption in college sports one can see that things are simply getting worse. Maurice Clarett believed he could fight the entire NFL and force his way in despite his ineligibility. So did Mike Williams. Reggie Bush and OJ Mayo accepted gifts to play at USC while LeBron was driving a Hummer before he was out of high school.
The NCAA has rules in place and they often use them, but it doesn’t seem to affect the choices made. The colleges, players, and agents have the right to do what they want, but they must accept the consequences. They break rules and so they get punished. It’s as simple as that. The issue is that so many of the players have nothing to lose because they are often caught after they have entered professional sports, so they can’t be punished as severely.
Clarett and Williams paid the price for their stupidity, but Bush won’t lose his money. He might lose his Heisman, but who cares? He was still the best player in college football that season and he is still raking in dough. Losing a trophy doesn’t really matter anymore to Reggie. Same with OJ Mayo who is going pro and can’t lose anything. The only time the NCAA’s rules affect athletes is when the athletes are still in college.
The colleges are the only party hurt by the violations. The colleges can lose bowl game privileges and the like for their infractions and this appears to be the best the NCAA can do. But it really isn’t a enough. The NCAA needs to find a way to have the colleges instill their athletes with some integrity through sports and education.
College is a maturation period that so many athletes ignore as they try to jump straight to the big time. They are truly missing an important step in their lives when they disregard college. Colleges don’t help the problem when they initiate the athletes into the corruption. There needs to be a call from some figure in the sporting world to end the corruption. If this would happen it would raise some awareness that the colleges need to find a way to have student athletes embrace this important stage of their life and it use it to properly grow into mature professionals that can set a good example to the aspiring.
Chicago Sports & Travel, Inc./AllsportsAmerica Take: As much as things change, they remain the same. This article is right on. It's amazing that it was written six years ago and that we are still wrestling with the same issues in sports and society today as we were when it was written. When will it change? Change is constant albeit slow. It will get better because the public will eventually get tired of this craziness (in sports and society as a whole). Being an optimist, I feel it can only get better. As the saying goes, "Hope springs eternal." It will happen, I just don't know if it will happen in my lifetime.
Again, What’s Your Take? Marion P. Jelks, Chicago Sports & Travel, Inc./AllsportsAmerica Blog Editor. Please use the comment section below and have at it. Let us know your thoughts.
Golf: I got a club for that… Rory McIlroy wins peer-voted PGA Tour Player of the Year.
By Ryan Ballengee
Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland addresses the media during his press conference during the final practice round prior to the 2014 Alfred Dunhill Links Championship at The Old Course on October 1, 2014 in St Andrews, Scotland. (Photo by David Cannon/Getty Images)
When Rory McIlroy sank the final putt at Valhalla in August to win the PGA Championship, his fourth major title and second in a row, he locked up the PGA Tour Player of the Year award.
The formality of announcing the final vote of McIlroy's peers was done Wednesday, with the Northern Irishman landing the honor for the second time. He previously won the award in 2012 when he won his first PGA Championship title at Kiawah Island.
McIlroy won the Open Championship and aforementioned PGA, with the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational sandwiched in as part of a dominance-establishing three-event win streak late in the summer. In 17 PGA Tour starts this past season, McIlroy finished in the top 10 in 12 of them. In addition, he won the BMW PGA Championship in May, the European Tour's flagship event.
The PGA Tour does not release the final tally of votes cast by its players for the honor, but it's safe to say McIlroy was on an overwhelming number of ballots.
"It's a very important honor for players to be voted Player of the Year by your peers," McIlroy said in a Wednesday morning teleconference announcing the award. "They're the guys that you're trying to beat week in, week out, and the other guys see you put the hard work in, and to know that they appreciate what you've put into it and how well that you've played, it's a great honor and a great honor to win twice in the space of three years, and hopefully I can win it for many more years to come."
McIlroy joins rare company with the win, with the likes of Tiger Woods, Greg Norman and Nick Price as the only players to win the award multiple times since it was first awarded in 1990.
One big change is coming to the 2016 Ryder Cup selection process.
By Ryan Ballengee
Expect the PGA of America to make a number of changes to their entire approach toward the Ryder Cup.
What those changes will be and how sweeping we'll consider them remains to be seen, but PGA of America president Ted Bishop said Tuesday they will not be made in hasty reaction to the third-straight American loss and the ensuing vocal displeasure of Phil Mickelson about Tom Watson's captaincy.
However, one change, at least for 2016, is all but a certainty. The '16 PGA Championship will be played the last week of July to accommodate golf's return to the Olympic program later that summer. Traditionally, the season's final major is the cutoff to determine the players that automatically qualify for the American Ryder Cup team. With the change in date, a different event is likely to assume that important spot.
“There is no way, in my opinion, you can announce the automatic qualifiers two months before the Ryder Cup,” said Bishop.
That means it's likely the 2016 FedEx Cup playoffs will take on even more importance, with one event the last to determine which players qualify on points and another the final event to get into the conversation for the to-be-determined captain's wild-card picks.
Who will be the next captain of the United States Ryder Cup team?
"Word is the PGA of America gets three high-ranking officials in a room, throws out names of candidates and goes from there. In the past the candidates have won at least one major and the officials hope like hell it happens to be a PGA Championship winner.
Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't. I'm sure the process is more structured than that, but it doesn't appear that way."
Odds: 30 percent
Fred Couples
I'm not sure how Couples hasn't been picked for this position yet. He's captained three President's Cup winners and won the Ryder Cup as a player twice.
I'd be stunned if he didn't at least get a look in the next eight years.
Odds: 30 percent
David Toms
He seems to fit the template, that's for sure. Solid career, one-time major winner (the PGA Championship, no less!) in his late 40s. I don't know if he'd be good, but he'll certainly be considered.
Odds: 20 percent
Steve Stricker
It's almost too fitting for Stricker, a Wisconsin native, to captain this team in Minnesota. He's a veteran who says little but clearly has the respect of the younger guys -- even Tiger Woods goes to him for help.
Odds: 10 percent
John Daly
Hahahahaha.
Hahahaha.
Haha.
Odds: 0 percent
Bob Tway
Not sure why his name isn't out there more. He won a PGA Championship and his son, Kevin, was on the PGA Tour last season, so there's at least a connection to the younger guys in the game that still exists.
Odds: 2 percent
Phil Mickelson
Do you have any idea how badly I want the PGA of America to say to Mickelson, "Fine, you do it," and then for Mickelson to slap together a team (including himself) that wins 17-11 in 2016?
Can you fathom the ratings Mickelson going double birds at the new PGA of America president on the 16th green after shutting down Victor Dubuisson 3 and 2 and winning the United States' 15th point of the week would get?
Odds: 0.1 percent
NASCAR: The eight drivers most likely to advance.
By George Winkler
Using average-finish stats, here are your Contender Round favorites
When handicapping the 12 drivers in the Contender Round of the Chase Grid, it helps to put one foot in the past and one foot in the present to hopefully make a confident step toward the future. So what we've done is capture the past and present in the form of average-finish stats in order to predict the eight drivers who will advance to the Eliminator Round in the 2014 Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup.
The three statistical categories we examined are: average finish for the 2014 season, average finish in the past five races and average finish at the Contender Round tracks. These categories were chosen because they will help tell us who has been the most consistent driver this season, as well as who's hot right now and who has the best chance to perform well in the next three races.
By assigning a point value to how each driver ranked in each category (example: Jeff Gordon got 12 points for being the best driver in average finish for this season, while Kyle Busch got one point for being the worst), there is a total at the end and four drivers will be eliminated.
Sounds fun, right? Let's get to it:
Average finish this season
| Rank | Driver | Avg. Finish | Points |
| 1 | Jeff Gordon | 10.0 | 12 |
| 2 | Dale Earnhardt Jr. | 11.0 | 11 |
| 3 | Joey Logano | 12.2 | 10 |
| 4 | Brad Keselowski | 12.4 | 9 |
| 5 | Jimmie Johnson | 13.4 | 8 |
| 6 | Matt Kenseth | 13.8 | 7 |
| 7 | Kevin Harvick | 14.0 | 5.5 |
| 8 | Ryan Newman | 14.0 | 5.5 |
| 9 | Carl Edwards | 14.8 | 4 |
| 10 | Denny Hamlin | 15.5 | 3 |
| 11 | Kasey Kahne | 16.5 | 2 |
| 12 | Kyle Busch | 17.1 | 1 |
Inside the Numbers: It shouldn't surprise any NASCAR fans to see the names at the top of this list. Gordon, Earnhardt Jr., Logano, Keselowski and Johnson have all had great seasons, combining for 19 victories with each driver getting at least three wins. Keselowski leads with five wins, including at Richmond and in the Chase opener at Chicagoland Speedway. Logano and Gordon followed Keselowski by winning the Chase races at New Hampshire and Dover, respectively.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. started the season strong with a victory in the Daytona 500 and followed that up by sweeping the races at Pocono, but as we'll see in the next statistical category (last five races), he hasn't been the hottest driver among the Chase participants entering the Contender Round.
Average finish last five races
| Rank | Driver | Avg. Finish | Points |
| 1 | Joey Logano | 5.8 | 12 |
| 2 | Jimmie Johnson | 6.4 | 11 |
| 3 | Kevin Harvick | 9.0 | 10 |
| 4 | Jeff Gordon | 9.6 | 9 |
| 5 | Brad Keselowski | 10.0 | 8 |
| 6 | Kyle Busch | 11.0 | 7 |
| 7 | Ryan Newman | 11.4 | 6 |
| 8 | Dale Earnhardt Jr. | 12.0 | 5 |
| 9 | Kasey Kahne | 14.8 | 4 |
| 10 | Carl Edwards | 15.0 | 3 |
| 11 | Matt Kenseth | 15.8 | 1.5 |
| 12 | Denny Hamlin | 15.8 | 1.5 |
Inside the Numbers: Junior lands in the middle of the pack with an average finish of 12th in the last five races. That gives him five points in our formula, because he was better than only Denny Hamlin, Matt Kenseth, Carl Edwards and Kasey Kahne. Dale Jr.'s 17th-place finish at Dover followed an 11th at Atlanta, a 12th at Richmond, an 11th at Chicago and a ninth at New Hampshire. Not exactly bad by any means, but he isn't tearing it up, either.
Keselowski took home eight points in this category, which might be difficult to believe considering he won two races in this span. But a 39th-place finish at Atlanta to begin the five-race stretch skewed his numbers. If you discount that race, Keselowski's average finish over the past four races is an incredible 2.75 -- so he might be a little hotter than these numbers suggest.
Average finish at Contender Round tracks
| Rank | Driver | Avg. Finish | Points |
| 1 | Jimmie Johnson | 12.00 | 12 |
| 2 | Jeff Gordon | 14.20 | 11 |
| 3 | Brad Keselowski | 14.23 | 10 |
| 4 | Carl Edwards | 14.33 | 9 |
| 5 | Kevin Harvick | 14.57 | 8 |
| 6 | Matt Kenseth | 15.37 | 7 |
| 7 | Kasey Kahne | 15.40 | 6 |
| 8 | Denny Hamlin | 15.97 | 5 |
| 9 | Dale Earnhardt Jr. | 16.53 | 4 |
| 10 | Joey Logano | 17.63 | 3 |
| 11 | Ryan Newman | 19.73 | 2 |
| 12 | Kyle Busch | 19.90 | 1 |
Inside the Numbers: Johnson has by far the best average finish at the Contender Round tracks, more than two positions better than his Hendrick Motorsports teammate Gordon. So for those who don't want to see "Six-Time" become "Seven-Time," avert your eyes from this chart -- it's a sign that the No. 48 team could get stronger as the Chase moves on.
Kyle Busch has a history of volatility at these tracks, so you might want to choose someone else in the Chase Grid Battle Game presented by Toyota. Fans might be familiar with Busch's struggles at Kansas (average finish of 22.7), which is where his Chase imploded last season, but he's almost equally as bad at Talladega (21.4). Busch said he and crew chief Dave Rogers tried a different car in the spring race at Kansas, leading to a top-15.
The Final Outcome
| Rank | Driver | Points |
| 1 | Jeff Gordon | 32 |
| 2 | Jimmie Johnson | 31 |
| 3 | Brad Keselowski | 27 |
| 4 | Joey Logano | 25 |
| 5 | Kevin Harvick | 23.5 |
| 6 | Dale Earnhardt Jr. | 20 |
| 7 | Carl Edwards | 16 |
| 8 | Matt Kenseth | 15.5 |
| 9 | Ryan Newman | 13.5 |
| 10 | Kasey Kahne | 12 |
| 11 | Denny Hamlin | 9.5 |
| 12 | Kyle Busch | 9 |
There you have it, the eight drivers highlighted in the chart above are the ones with the best chance to move on to the Eliminator Round. Of course, we'll have to see how it actually plays out, but since this was fun, let's try it again when we get to the final eight to see who has the best shot of making the Championship Four.
MLS Snapshot: History! Fire set ties record. Union playoff hopes fade.
By Nicholas Mendola
Amobi Okugo’s 88th minute goal looked to boost the Union’s playoff hopes, but the fabulous tying Fire provided home heartbreak for Philadelphia at PPL Park on Thursday night.
Draws are pretty much losses for the Union right now, and they ran into a Chicago team that has now tied more games in a single season than any team in MLS history after Thursday’s 1-1 tie. Four minutes after Okugo’s heroics had the stadium rocking, Robert Earnshaw brough the boobirds out when he took advantage of a poor clearance from Union keeper Rais M’Bohli in the second minute of stoppage time to see the game out at 1-1.
The tie leaves the Union in seventh place and will make it highly-improbable they rise back into the top five. Meanwhile, Chicago remains in ninth place.
Andrew Wenger provided the game’s best chance in the early stages of the second half when he streaked down the right flank, but his pass to the middle of the field was hammered wide, point-blank, by Cristian Maidana.
The Union were forced to deal with a few tricky chances, but Amobi Okugo and Maurice Edu made them look fairly easy in defense. Jim Curtin’s decision to ask Edu to man the middle of the back line is a clear victory for Philadelphia (and sports bravery).
Sixty-first minute sub Brian Brown took a touch too many when Wenger set him up just outside the 18, curling a low shot well wide of Sean Johnson’s goal.
And then Okugo took advantage of a deflected cross off Brown, sending a ball into the center of the goal past Johnson.
But it wasn’t over, Philly goalkeeper M’Bohli clearance was picked off by Earnshaw. He raced in to chip the keeper with class, providing a bit of history to MLS.
Pac-12, Big Ten, ACC notify NCAA of proposals.
By The Associated Press
The five wealthiest college football conferences have notified the NCAA of their proposals to provide more benefits to athletes under the new governance model that allows the Atlantic Coast Conference, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12 and Southeastern Conference to pass legislation without the support of the other Division I leagues.
The autonomy structure went into effect on Wednesday, which was also the first day for the power conferences to offer suggestions about what rules they want to implement. The NCAA board of directors in August passed a proposal to give autonomy to the five major conferences. The transition to the autonomy structure will happen in January.
Those conferences endorsed changes that would increase benefits to student-athletes, all of which have been touted by conference leaders for several years, including:
- Funding athletic scholarships that would cover the full cost of tuition.
- Guaranteeing multiyear scholarships for athletes.
- Lifetime scholarship guarantees that would allow former athletes to return to school at any time and complete their degrees.
- Providing long-term health care and insurance to former athletes.
The conferences have also said they will review the time demands for athletes.
The Pac-12 says presidents and chancellors will explore how to implement the proposed reforms at its board meeting Oct. 27, including by each institution, conference-wide action or among the five major conferences.
Any rule changes that occur would not start until the 2015-2016 academic year.
Q&A: Hoiberg looks to continue Iowa State success, pursuit of Kansas.By Jon Rothstein | CBS Sports
Fred Hoiberg has made Iowa State into a nationally relevant program. The Cyclones have won games in the past three NCAA Tournaments and advanced all the way to the Sweet 16 last March before falling to eventual national champion UConn. CBS Sports Network and CBSSports.com's Jon Rothstein sat down with Hoiberg Thursday in Ames to discuss the expectations surrounding this year's team, chasing Kansas, and Iowa State's strong influx of transfers for the 14-15 season.
Jon Rothstein, CBSSports.com: You never want to live in the past, but how much did you wonder after last season's tournament how far your team could have gone if Georges Niang was healthy?
Fred Hoiberg: I think everybody in sports plays the “what if” game. I think we were playing as well as anybody in the country when Georges went down. I still remember going into our locker room and our trainer came up and told me his foot was broken. We had just beaten a heck of a basketball team in UNC-Central and we were moving on. It was such a bittersweet moment when I heard that because we knocked off a good team and we were playing really good basketball. Then you just find out that the guy on your team that's in the best rhythm is probably done for the season. I still remember the looks on our guys faces when I walked into the locker room and told them what had happened. I'll give them credit because they rallied and still beat a very good North Carolina team but when you take away one of your most important cogs --- especially your closer --- when you lose that element, it's tough. We found a way to survive but obviously UConn was playing great basketball at the time and we just weren't at full strength. Not that we would have won with Georges but we certainly would have had a chance. That's not taking anything away from UConn --- Kevin [Ollie] did a great job with that team. Would we have won it? Who knows. But we definitely had a chance with the way we were playing.
CBSSports.com: Iowa State has won games in each of the last three NCAA Tournaments. Did you think something like that was a realistic expectation when you first got the job here?
Hoiberg: I don't think I had a sense of expectations when I got here because everything was so new. I learned a lot from Bobby Lutz who I first hired when I got the job here and he was somebody who was a head coach and knew the college game really well. He had experience as a head coach at Charlotte and he really helped me with my learning curve. I was just trying to put us in position to get as much talent as possible as soon as possible. I didn't really have a sense of what was realistic and what wasn't because I was so much more familiar with the NBA. This right now is only my ninth year in college --- four playing and four coaching.
CBSSports.com: You mentioned the NBA. It seems like every spring and summer your name keeps getting mentioned for pro jobs. Why isn't that something you've explored yet?
Hoiberg: I have a unique situation here. I grew up here. I went to college here. My family is close and my wife's family is close. I know everyone in the community and my family is very comfortable here. My daughter has dreamed about one thing and that's going to Iowa State. The NBA is great and I love the NBA, but I love Iowa State and the opportunity I have here. We've really built something special and I think we've got real momentum to keep it going even more.
CBSSports.com: What about this team that you're about to coach this year is different from the past few teams you've had at Iowa State?
Hoiberg: The amount of options we have. The length that we have. We're incredibly versatile and we have a bunch of different guys that can score the ball and beat you in different ways. We're more of an attacking team this year instead of the spot up shooting type of teams that we've had the past few seasons. But the big difference for us is having a guy like Jameel McKay. The past few years we've been 6-6 and 6-7 at the four and the five and while we created mismatches and were hard to guard for opponents, we didn't have a rim protector like Jameel. He's going to help cover up a lot of people's mistakes on defense because he's going to block shots and alter things at the rim. He also plays so hard on every possession. People say playing hard is a skill and that's Jameel in a nutshell. He plays extremely hard and he plays extremely hard on every possession.
CBSSports.com: The one thing that's different about your program this season versus past years is the level of expectation. How much of an adjustment will that be?
Hoiberg: This will be the first year where I can't say somebody picked us last in the league and use it as motivation. The good thing about this group is they can handle expectations. It's not a team that I'm ever going to have to motivate to play hard. That's an unbelievable quality that all of these guys have. They're going to go out and compete every time they take the floor. Whether it's one-on-one at 10 o'clock at night or whether we're going to play the next team on our schedule --- they're playing hard. My biggest thing is getting everybody to accept roles and play less minutes because of our depth. We've got that type of depth this year where a lot of guys could play.
CBSSports.com: You got a taste of beating Kansas in a big spot last year when you defeated the Jayhawks in the Big 12 Tournament, but what would it mean to end their streak and win the Big 12 regular-season title?
Hoiberg: Well to win 11 straight titles in a conference of this caliber is an unbelievable accomplishment. I give Bill Self all the credit in the world for putting that program together and put them in a position to win the regular-season title year after year after year. I think a couple of years ago if a couple of bounces had gone our way, that could have been our year. We lost both games against Kansas --- we had a very tough ending at Hilton and then at their place Ben McLemore banked in a 25-footer at the buzzer to send the game into overtime which we eventually lost. But that was a year if the ball bounced a little differently --- and that's definitely playing the “what if” game --- but credit to Kansas, it found a way to win the conference again. And until somebody dethrones them, it's the team to beat. We both have great crowds and both play in great venues. You see sold-out crowds at both Phog Allen Fieldhouse and at Hilton Coliseum. It's a fun game to play and it's definitely one of our goals to beat them just like I'm sure it's a goal for other teams in the Big 12 as well.
CBSSports.com: Transfers have rehabilitated their careers at Iowa State. We saw it a few years ago with Royce White and we saw it last season with DeAndre Kane. Is Bryce Dejean-Jones next in line to join that list?
Hoiberg: We've got a couple this year. You look at Bryce, you look at Jameel, and you also have to look at Abdel Nader. We've got three guys who are transfers who will all have big roles on this team. Bryce is a guy who's in his third program now. He's done all the right things since he's been here and hopefully that continues to happen over the course of the season. He's a very unique player. He does things you can't teach. His athleticism, his ability to finish above the rim, and his ability to make tough shots is at another level. I'm excited for Bryce and certainly hope he has a great year.
CBSSports.com: You've made your reputation as an astute tactician but considering the level of expectations this year and the influx of talent you have to manage, are you going to be more psychologist than coach during the upcoming season?
Hoiberg: I think we're all psychologists in some form or fashion. My dad was a sociologist for years --- the study of people. That's something that hopefully was translated to the next generation (laughs). That's a big part of coaching right now. Managing personalities and getting guys to buy into roles and teaching them in the best way possible. It's been a big part of what we've done the past few years. You're always trying to get your guys to “buy in” and get them to play as hard as possible. I think that's a big part of being a basketball coach at any level --- having a little bit of psychology in your game plan every day.
Another city says it doesn't want to host the 2022 Winter Olympics.
By Danielle Elliot
The International Olympic Committee might not get to decide what city will host the 2022 Winter Olympics. Apparently, no one wants the honor.
Oslo, Norway, is the latest city to drop its bid, announcing on Wednesday that the government will not financially support it. Cost of the games was estimated to be around $5.4 billion.
That brings the list of dropouts to four, including Lviv, Ukraine (citing political unrest), Stockholm, Sweden (no government support) and Krakow, Poland (referendum vote revealed 70 percent of residents weren't interested).
"It's important to get broad support for such an expensive project and there is not enough to carry through such an expensive project," Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg told NRK television. "Without enthusiasm, it's not natural to carry this through."
Before the official bidding period even started, residents in Switzerland and Germany also voted against pursuing bids.
It's hardly surprising, considering the price tags of the Games: Russia spent a reported $51 billion in Sochi. Costs don't have to run quite so high – Canada spent $6.4 billion in Vancouver, Italy spent $700 million in Torino – but no matter what, it's a substantial investment, and people are clearly saying it's not worth the "honor" anymore.
Of the six original official bids, only Almaty, Kazakhstan, and Beijing, China, are still in the running.
Residents in Beijing don't have the luxury of voting on how the government spends its money, and the ruling party doesn't really have to worry about losing votes in Kazakhstan. China reportedly spent $44 billion hosting the 2008 Summer Olympics (an astronomical figure compared to the $14.2 billion that London spent in 2012).
Of note, the Summer Olympics and Winter Olympics have never been held in the same city. Beijing now has a chance of being the first, if only by default.
Almaty, which hosted the 2011 Asian Winter Games (the second-largest multi-sport international competition, behind the Olympics), is said to be the favorite. The IOC doesn't vote until July 31, 2015, though, so there's still time to back out. The host city has never been selected by default – but hey, there's a first for everything.
On This Date in Sports History: Today is Friday, October 3, 2014.
On This Date in Sports History: Today is Friday, October 3, 2014.
MemoriesofHistory.com
1951 - CBS-TV aired the first coast-to-coast telecast of a prizefight. Dave Sands defeated Carl Olson at Soldier Field in Chicago.
1951 - The New York Giants won the pennant by beating the Brooklyn Dodgers on a Bobby Thompson bottom-of-the-ninth home run.
1974 - Frank Robinson took over the management position of the Cleveland Indians baseball team. He was the first black manager in major league baseball.
1989 - Art Shell became the first African-American head coach in the modern NFL when he took over the Los Angeles Raiders.
1995 - O.J. Simpson was acquitted of the 1994 murder of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald L. Goldman. Simpson was later found liable in a civil trial.
2001 - ESPN began its 10th season of National Hockey League (NHL) coverage.
2001 - Barry Bonds (San Francisco Giants) broke Babe Ruth's major league single-season record for walks at 171.
2002 - The Texas Rangers put John Rocker on waivers for the purpose of his unconditional release.
2004 - Dale Earnhardt Jr. used a vulgar term during a live post-race television interview with NBC after winning a race in Talladega. On October 5, NASCAR penalized him $10,000 and 25 points in the Nextel Cup standings.
2012 - Miguel Cabrera achieved baseball's first Triple Crown since 1967. He lead the league with a .330 average, 44 home runs and 139 RBIs in the regular season.
1951 - The New York Giants won the pennant by beating the Brooklyn Dodgers on a Bobby Thompson bottom-of-the-ninth home run.
1974 - Frank Robinson took over the management position of the Cleveland Indians baseball team. He was the first black manager in major league baseball.
1989 - Art Shell became the first African-American head coach in the modern NFL when he took over the Los Angeles Raiders.
1995 - O.J. Simpson was acquitted of the 1994 murder of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald L. Goldman. Simpson was later found liable in a civil trial.
2001 - ESPN began its 10th season of National Hockey League (NHL) coverage.
2001 - Barry Bonds (San Francisco Giants) broke Babe Ruth's major league single-season record for walks at 171.
2002 - The Texas Rangers put John Rocker on waivers for the purpose of his unconditional release.
2004 - Dale Earnhardt Jr. used a vulgar term during a live post-race television interview with NBC after winning a race in Talladega. On October 5, NASCAR penalized him $10,000 and 25 points in the Nextel Cup standings.
2012 - Miguel Cabrera achieved baseball's first Triple Crown since 1967. He lead the league with a .330 average, 44 home runs and 139 RBIs in the regular season.
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