MLB Stupid, CFB Stupid

Just a couple of sports rants here. Perhaps "annoying" is the more appropriate word for one of the two  mentioned in the post's title, but I'm sticking with "stupid."

Major League Baseball: They decided to add a second Wild Card team in each league, determining that the two Wild Card teams in each league would have a one-game playoff to decide which team moves to the Division Series. Then, they decided to rush to implement it this year. First, it allowed mediocre and underachieving teams like the Diamondbacks, Angels and, yes, Phillies to pretend they were actually contending at the end of the season.

Then, because they rushed it into effect this year, when the schedule had already been set and there was little flexibility for fitting another playoff game into the schedule, it was decided that the winner of the Wild Card game would start the best-of-five Division Series at home instead of flying to the city of their opponent, the team with the best record in the league. So that team got punished by starting with two games on the road followed by three at home, instead of the customary two home, two road, final game at home. I didn't realize it at first but the same rule applied to the Division Series involving the other division winners as well.

The result of this, besides a World Series between the Detroit Tigers and San Francisco Giants (Tigers in 5, by the way)? Home field disadvantage. There have been 33 games in the playoffs so far, and the road team has won 17 -- more than half. The two Wild Card games went to the road teams, and in the four Division Series the road teams went 11-9. Some sanity was restored in the League Championship Series as home teams won 7 of 11 games.

College Football: This is the one that's more annoying, and part of my problem is that, because I didn't go to college, I have no true rooting interest. I can sort of root for the local schools, but that only goes so far. What's made things worse is the big schools' switching conferences in recent years, chasing after more and more money. It's watered down or ended a number of traditional rivalry games, caused ridiculous anomalies such as the Big Ten conference having 12 teams and the Big East soon to include schools from places like Idaho and California, all of which makes it more difficult for the casual fan to keep track of. And (helped by the television networks) it's led to about thirty different games available on TV every Saturday, many of them being played at the same time on different networks. With all of this, when I do want to sit and watch a game, I have no idea which one I should watch, so I end up flipping back and forth hoping to find something compelling, usually without success.

And don't even get me started on the BCS or the eventual switch to a four-team playoff.

I'm An Exhibitionist

Tonight I went to see my picture at the opening reception for the Philly Photo Day exhibit at the Philadelphia Photo Arts Center. And here it is!

There were close to 900 submissions but they're helpfully arranged alphabetically by photographer's name, so mine is easy enough to find if you go. It'll be up until the 26th. It was interesting to see such a variety of photos, and yet similarities in a number of photos. City skyline shots, iconic buildings such as City Hall, the LOVE statue and the Clothespin, Pat's and Geno's steaks, a handful of shots from public transit (although I saw only one other picture showing the Market-Frankford tracks through the fence on the crossover between platforms). There were lots of quirky photos, photos of people of all ages, photos that were a bit tricked out to depict some special effect such as streaking lights, a few pictures from Occupy Philly, and so on.

And then there were two pictures of...TV screens at the moment the St. Louis Cardinals won the World Series. (One can be seen in the first picture above.) Ugh.

2011 World Series

It's the St. Louis Cardinals and the Texas Rangers this year.

Bleh. I don't want either team to win (although I suppose, if you held a gun to my head, I'd say I hate St. Louis and their phony fans and their slimy manager who supports the Tea Party nuts more than the team once co-owned by George W. Bush). I don't plan to watch very intently. It might be on in the background while I'm online or something but that's it. But since I've been making predictions for the playoffs, I guess I have to do it for this series as well, so...Rangers in 5.

Wake me up when pitchers and catchers report to Clearwater.

Some More Random Musings

Random funny picture.

A few randomly random items to hold you over while I gear up to write about those three movies I saw recently. Starting with some sports stuff...

• The World Series is over. Praise Jebus. So much for my prediction of Texas winning. The San Francisco Giants won in five games, in one of the least exciting Series I can remember. It got off to a decent start in Game 1 -- the Rangers scored single runs in the first two innings, and the Giants tied it with two in the third -- but after that it was virtually all Giants. They routed the Rangers in the first two games. The series shifted to Texas and the Rangers managed their only win, but the Giants then took the final two games. Except for that first game, there were no lead changes in the entire series. Once a team scored, they were ahead the rest of the way. The only interesting thing about tonight's game is that it was scoreless until the 7th. But at least George W. Bush's team lost.
• The Eagles had the week off. Just as well since the NFL is just bizarre. From week to week, you can't say for sure who's going to win a game, and the off-field stuff is mind-boggling. Just today, adding to the continuing Brett Favre drama in Minnesota is the Randy Moss drama -- the Vikings announced they would release Moss less than a month after giving up a 3rd-round draft pick to get him from New England, to the apparent consternation of the team's owner, who wanted Moss back.
  
  And remember all the drama over Donovan McNabb's being traded by the Eagles to Washington? Well, on Sunday, near the end of the game he was benched in favor of Rex Grossman with the Redskins trailing Detroit by 6. Rex freakin' Grossman! After the game Washington coach Mike Shanahan said that he benched McNabb because he felt Grossman was more comfortable running the two-minute offense. Today he said it was because...well, here's the quote: "The cardiovascular endurance that it takes to run a two-minute, going all the way down with no timeouts, calling plays, it's just not easy." So McNabb has gone from being a hero, the guy who would lead the Redskins back to glory, to a guy whose coach thinks he's not smart enough and/or out of shape! Wow.

My 2010 World Series Thoughts

Okay, so I didn't think either team would get to this point. That doesn't mean anything except that postseason experience isn't always so important. That won't come into play here, because the Texas Rangers have never been to the World Series and the San Francisco Giants haven't been here since 2002, almost a lifetime ago in baseball years. If my guess is true I won't be too happy because while they're the Texas Rangers, it's basically a Dallas team, and we all know Dallas sucks. Plus, the Rangers are the team that used to be owned by George W. Bush, and who wants him to celebrate anything? Unfortunately, Texas will win. Unlike the Phillies, the Rangers have hit well all year and continued to do so in the playoffs. The Giants can't match the Rangers' hitting prowess, and while they have a strong pitching staff, they don't have Cliff Lee. Rangers in 5.

I'll Miss You, World Series

There's a dual meaning behind the title of this post. The more obvious meaning refers to this year's Phillies. As I tweeted last night, after the Phils managed a measly three hits in an 11-inning loss to Atlanta, the more I watch this team, the more I feel that they're not going back to the playoffs this year. And it's not solely because of the injuries they've been bombarded with this year -- including, at the moment, three of the starting eight in their lineup (and don't forget Jimmy Rollins missed a lot of time as well). Sure, they miss Chase Utley (although he hasn't put up the numbers he's capable of) and Placido Polanco and Carlos Ruiz. And they've had pitchers on the disabled list as well -- at various times including Brad Lidge, J.C. Romero, J.A. Happ, Ryan Madson and Chad Durbin.

But the offense's floundering for most of the last seven weeks isn't just because the bench players filling in for the missing Utley, Polanco and Ruiz haven't put up the same numbers. Shane Victorino, Raul Ibanez, Jayson Werth, even Ryan Howard to some extent -- they all haven't produced the way they have in the past. A lot of good starting pitching performances have gone to waste. The bullpen still has its issues but they wouldn't be nearly as magnified if the hitters weren't so lousy.