NFL Relevance in Missouri & Thoughts on most other Sports

The NFL is relevant in Missouri again, and that excites me. Both the Kansas City Chiefs and the St. Louis Rams will be playing meaningful football games with playoff berths on the line over the next two weeks. It's been a while since meaningful pro football has been played here in December. It's good for the respective cities and the state itself for these two teams to become relevant once again in the sport that has, unfortunately in my mind at least, displaced baseball as America's most popular sport. Both teams control their own playoff destinies. 

For the Chiefs, the easiest way to make the playoffs would be to win their next two games which are both at home against Tennessee and arch rival Oakland. Do that, and KC has become AFC West champions. There are multiple scenarios where the Chiefs could go 1-1 over the last two weeks and still make the playoffs, but I'm not going to get into those. I hope they don't come into play, because the Chiefs should win both games left on the schedule, especially with the home field advantage that Arrowhead stadium gives them.

For the Rams, same deal. Win out and they're in. Sure, they would only be 8-8, but that would be stark improvement over what has transpired at Rams park over the last few seasons. Make or miss the post-season, this season has to be considered a success for the Rams and they most certainly have things headed in the right direction. They have their franchise quarterback in Sam Bradford and the Rams should be contenders in the coming years. However, the playoffs are still a very real possibility in the weak NFC West. They play at home this coming Sunday against the 49ers, a team St. Louis almost beat in San Francisco only to lose in OT, then a trip to Seattle ends the season. It won't be easy, but the Rams beat Seattle earlier in the year already in St. Louis. 

Regardless of what happens, its exciting, for me especially, as a fan of both of these teams, for some exciting and important football games to be played over the course of the next two weeks. Ideally, this trend of important football will extend for at least one if not both into January. 

Speaking of important football, the college football bowl season is in full gear. So, maybe not important football, but mildly interesting football. My beloved Missouri Tigers who finished above expectations at 10-2 this season travel to Tempe, AZ to take on the Iowa Hawkeyes and their prickish fan-base in the Insight bowl. Then, come January, the Arkansas Razorbacks take on another Big 10 squad, Ohio State, in the Sugar Bowl down in New Orleans. Here's hoping for both teams to win to make it a more enjoyable bowl season and a somewhat happier new year.

Keeping with the trend of making holidays happier, what sporting event could make for a better early Christmas present then the annual braggin' rights game between Mizzou and Illinois this Wednesday night in St. Louis? After nearly a decade consecutive losses, the Tigers beat the Illini last season to make Christmas just a little bit merrier. Even though Illinois is coming off a loss to the University of Illinois-Chicago, they are still a good team, and Mizzou could be without a true point guard for the game. Michael Dixon, while reinstated to practice this week, is still at this point at least, suspended from playing in games. Coach Mike Anderson did say that Dixon was a possibility to play Wednesday, but wasn't sure yet. During Dixon's indefinite suspension, freshman PG Phil Pressey had been starting, but he broke his ring finger in practice on Sunday and will miss at least two weeks. So, yeah. I hope Dixon plays. Besides, he scored a season high 16 against Illinois last season.

Finally, a few random thoughts. First, with the Milwaukee Brewers addition of SP Zach Greinke from the Royals, the NL Central has become a three team race. At this point, most baseball guys are picking St. Louis third in the Central behind the Reds and Brewers. I really hope the moves to bring in the veterans like Theriot and Berkman payoff for the Cards. 

My second full season as a hockey fan (though it's been much better than last as I actually made it to my first Blues game this season) was off to a great start, only to see the Blues get hit with a series of injuries that was just kind of unreal. At one point, six different first round draft picks were on injured reserve for St. Louis who got off to a fast start, but have been in a tailspin over the last month. Hopefully they can tread water just long enough to make another push when guys begin to come back from their various injuries.

Oh, and since this is an all sport inclusive post, it's good to see that the Bulls should finish in the upper third of the eastern conference. The injury to Noah will hurt, but this team is good enough in a somewhat weak, but getting stronger eastern conference. As for LA, the Lakers may be treating the season kind of like an exhibition (like those Celtics teams that have made the finals the last couple years) but I fully expect LA to win the West come spring time.

Finally, did anyone stay up for that eclipse last night? I did, and guess what? It...was...cloudy. I couldn't see it. Oh well. I've seen a lunar eclipse in my life already, and this one probably wouldn't have been much different.

Tiger Basketball and Baseball Talk in December

Man oh man. The 2010-2011 version of the Missouri Tigers basketball team has been fun to watch. Even their lone, heart-breaking, defeat was an heart stopping game from start to finish. While the Tigers haven't exactly played the nations toughest schedule, they haven't played the weakest either. Mizzou has played quality basketball teams in Georgetown, and Vanderbilt, and have another chance at a quality win or two with Illinois and Old Dominion on the horizon. At many times this season, however, it has been very apparent that Mizzou misses the veteran leadership that last year's group had in guards J.T. Tiller and Zaire Taylor. This year, the junior class, led by guards Marcus Denmon and Kim English and Forward Lawrence Bowers was set to take over and lead this team (the Tigers have only one senior, Forward Justin Safford, who is still, according to Coach Mike Anderson, only at about 75 or 85 % after an ACL injury sustained last season). Those three, combined with the continued development of sophomore PG Michael Dixon, and one of the nations premier recruiting classes (brothers Phil and Matt Pressey, Ricardo Ratliffe, Ricky Kreklow and Kadeem Green) had many forecasting the Tigers to finish in the upper half of the Big XII and a preseason ranking in the top 15 of both polls. While these young Tigers have shown many flashes of things to come, the team at times, has had breakdowns in fundamentals and problems taking care of the basketball, all of which are things head coach Mike Anderson values. In a couple of games, free throws have been an issue as well, be it not making them, or not getting to the foul line enough. The Tigers have had issues guarding the three point line, and have given up a lot of open looks at the basket. All of these things led to a loss to Georgetown, a closer than expected game at Oregon an overtime thriller with Vandy and close games all throughout with the likes of Western Illinois, Wyoming and LaSalle. While it would be easy to look at the results thus far and forecast problems down the road in conference play, I don't think thats the way to view this team. No, this team is young. Sure, with four (techincally six when one includes the JuCo players) upperclassmen, they're not young age wise, but they are young in experience. The three juniors are stepping into leadership roles for the first time in their college careers, while the JuCo players are getting their first taste of Division I basketball. This team will continue to improve and get better as players gradually become more comfortable in their new roles. Once this happens, look for the players who have been uncharacteristically struggling thus far (English, and Bowers head this list) to begin to play with more confidence and for the young players to continue to get better and show the talent that lead this group to be one of the more promising classes in the country. It's probably unreasonable to expect the Tigers to make a real serious run at the final four this season (though it's completely reasonable to expect them to be playing in the sweet sixteen) or even to win the conference (though it could happen) this team will be fun to watch, and will be able to play with anyone in the country. I've personally been pinpointing next season for three years now as the target year for Mizzou's first final four in school history, and as of now, I stand by that. But, I wouldn't be upset if it came a year early.

Just some quick thought on the St. Louis Cardinals off-season so far. After reading some extremely different takes (Joe Posnanski of SI and Jeff Gordon of the Post-Dispatch) on the recent trade of SS Brendan Ryan to the Mariners for a pitching prospect who was at high A ball at seasons end last year, I've developed some thoughts of my own; not just on that trade, but all off season developments thus far.

First off, I don't think the Cardinals are taking seriously the very real possibility that, at the current pace of things, franchise cornerstone Albert Pujols could be a free agent at this time next year. If that happens, teams led by the Angels, Mets, and yes even the Cubs (never count out the Yankees, but they're pretty set at the moment) could all very easily outbid the Cardinals for the three time MVP as it seems Pujols will probably not take a "hometown discount". Now, I know Cards GM John Mozeliak has said negotiations between the team and Pujols and his agent, Dan Lozano will be kept private. That being said, Mo hasn't held back when the two sides have met, he's just kept the contents of the meetings private. It just doesn't seem like there's a lot of urgency, especially on the part of the Cardinals, to get a deal done before spring training. Am I a die hard Cardinals fan over-reacting? Perhaps, but even still it's hard to ignore the warning signs that go back to last off-season. And make no mistake, with Pujols' (understandable) unwillingness so negotiate once spring training begins, if the team doesn't have a deal with him in place by the middle of February, the great Albert Pujols will become a free agent, and yes, that freaks me out.

As far as the other things, I was glad the Cardinals retained starter Jake Westbrook. This makes the starting rotation more of a sure thing heading into camp this spring then last, which is always a good thing. As far as the Hawksworth for Theriot trade and the Brendan Ryan trade, I'm luke warm. There are those that think the Cardinals are being extremely short sighted in the way they're building this team, as they also signed aging outfielder Lance Berkman. BUT one can't ingore that the team did seem to lose some sort of focus or intensity the second half of last season, and all indications are Brendan Ryan didn't fit in well in the clubhouse, and was not in the best standing of Tony LaRussa. TLR likes to have his kind of guys around, and let me tell you something, he's won in the past doing that. So what this comes down to is, the pressure shifts to the management. They got rid of a fan favorite, and have a veteran team, so now it's time to win. I'm a huge, huge supporter of Tony LaRussa, but a lot of the off season moves have been things that he wanted to see happen. If they don't win in 2011, I'll be the first to point fingers at him. So now, just go win baseball games and get back to the playoffs.

"Thoughts on Mizzou/Georgetown, Gary Pinkel and Big XII Football"

Anyone who knows even the slightest thing about me knows how much I love college basketball, and how passionate I am about my Missouri Tigers. While last nights game was not a make or break your season game, it was never the less a tough to handle, heart breaking loss. Like they’ve done every game through this early part of the season, the Tigers got off to a slow start and trailed the Hoyas of Georgetown by as much as 18 in the first half before trimming that deficit to 7 by the break. An incredible display of basketball in the second half by this young Tiger team showed how good this team can be coming all the way back to take the lead. However, the last minute and a half of regulation also showed they still have a lot of growing up to do. Frustrating stuff. It really came down to free throws. With a four point lead, Bowers missed both. Georgetown came down and scored. With a 2-point lead, Dixon made the first and missed the second, and on the last possession of regulation, the Hoyas buried an open three pointer to send the game to overtime on a broken play (Note to Kimmie English: never, never, never try to save the ball under your own stinking basket). As tough as this loss was to take, I know that many bright days are ahead for this team, and this program Mike Anderson has going at Mizzou.

To the real point of this post, I’m going to back off my Gary Pinkel dislike somewhat. Not totally, but somewhat. Coach Pinkel has the football program at Mizzou at a place where, growing up, I never thought it could be. The team, by many standards, actually over-achieved a bit this season by going 10-2 (winning 10 games for only the 4^th time in school history, 3 of those times under Pinkel) and nabbing a share, such as it is in the era of “lets give everyone a trophy”, of the Big XII North title. Still, there was that frustrating loss to Texas Tech that was full of questionable to downright poor coaching decisions, and it was that game that ultimately kept Mizzou from playing for the conference title in a year that it really seemed possible for a North team to end the South’s dominance. Still, Pinkel has raised expectations in Columbia to a level not seen really since the end of the Dan Devine era. Each year, you can more or less reasonably to expect the Tigers to compete for the North title, though starting next year in the new 10 team format, there are no divisions, and expect the team to go bowling come seasons end. Bowls, division titles and such were few and far between prior to Pinkel’s 5^th year at Mizzou. All that is well and good, but the important goal still remains of winning the league. Missouri hasn’t won the conference since grabbing a share of the Big 8 title in 1969. Until that drought has ended, Pinkel still cannot be credited with brining the Tigers all the way “back” and putting us truly on the map. Until he does that, as my good friend Nathan Yount said last night, the best one can say about Pinkel is “He’s alright”. He’s not bad, but he’s not great, and is on the brink between “alright” and “good”.  Starting next year, it will conceivably become more difficult to win the league. The new round robin schedule where everyone plays everyone will have Missouri playing perennial powers Oklahoma and Texas every season. Year after year. As nice a position that Pinkel has brought the program to, one has to wonder: if he couldn’t win the conference in the old Big XII, can he actually win one in this upcoming new version of the league? That remains to be seen. It’s ok to expect more. The program has been around for a long time, and Pinkel just completed a decade at the helm. At some point, if he hasn’t accomplished this goal, the university is going to have to move forward with someone else. Gary Pinkel has done some great things for the University of Missouri, but at some point he’s got to break through the glass ceiling. If he doesn’t in the near future, it’s time to give a chance to someone else to do so.

Finally, as a side note, I wish fans would be more educated about the bowl selection process and stop wining about where the Tigers go in their bowl game. I’ll grant you that there is a strong argument to be made that the Tigers got screwed in not playing in a BCS bowl in 2007 (the Orange Bowl), but since then one has no real beef. This year in particular, when you have four teams at 10-2, five teams that went 6-2 in the conference (the fifth being Texas A&M who went 9-3) Mizzou fans shouldn’t gripe. We didn’t play for the league title, and in a somewhat down year for the Big XII, it’s unreasonable to just expect to get two teams into the BCS. So with the winner of Saturday’s league title game between Oklahoma and Nebraska* locked into the Fiesta bowl and Texas A&M being chosen for the Cotton, there’s really just three other bowls of the leagues 8 potential bids that Missouri can grab. A&M got the cotton bowl because their fans travel insanely will anyway, and the game is pretty close to College Station. The loser of the title game will more then likely go to the Alamo bowl, which this year picks third, behind the Fiesta, and the Cotton. That leaves the insight (picks 4^th) and the Holiday (picks 5^th) as realistic landing spots for Missouri. While the Holiday was a good bowl last year, it’s not as good this year due to the shuffle in the selection order, so it would be better if Mizzou could nab the Inisght, but it will come down to Mizzou and Oklahoma State who are both 10-2. It’ll be interesting to see who get’s the call.

*I think all Mizzou fans should be rooting for Oklahoma in the title game this Saturday, based solely on the fact that Oklahoma isn’t the team leaving the conference. I don’t think it’s in the Big XII’s best interest for Nebraska to win the league and then bolt to the Big 10. I know to all you new Mizzou fans that Oklahoma has been the number one source of pain over the past few year, but Nebraska has inflicted just as much or more on the Tigers in the long history of the conference, and it’s foolish to think that Mizzou has a better rivalry with OU then with Nebraska, because we don’t. In football, besides Kansas, Nebraska has been Mizzou’s main rival, and they’ve beat us. A lot. So again, I hope the Sooners win for the sake of the conference more than anything else. Lastly, I think this is a fitting way for the Big XII era to come to an end. Nebraska and Oklahoma have been the leagues two best teams going back to the Big 8 days and before. They had an incredible, intense rivalry that took a hit when the Big XII was formed and they couldn’t play every year. It’s fitting that Nebraska’s final game in the league is against their ancient rival. I hope it’s another exciting chapter in what was once one of college footballs greatest rivalries. Now, for the first and last time in my life…Boomer Sooner.