The SoapBoxers

Sports sometimes mirrors life. This past week we were given a number of opportunities to look at sports situations that turned back the clock. Allowed us once again to look at some of our heroes of sports and remember a time when they were on top of their respective pillars of greatness in their sports.

Lance Armstrong once again riding in the Tour de France. Armstrong had been in the top two or three spots much of the race. Earlier this week he fell back in the standings during one of the mountain stages, which were one of his strengths in past victorious races. Yes, age has caught up with the cancer surviving iron man of cycling. Armstrong himself has indicated he is likely now relegated to helping his teammate win the race. Our hopes were with him, he might still have a great stage in him somewhere, but for now we have to remember what used to be and what could have been.

Michael Vick was released from house arrest and now will take his appeal to Commissioner Roger Goodel to possibly be reinstated in the NFL. Vick’s story is a tragic one on many levels. A young player with a long career in front of him he became entangled in the underworld realm of dog fighting. Vick has paid for his mistakes by doing prison time, giving up millions of dollars in contacts and endorsement deals, and being tainted for the remainder of his career and life with a label he will never be able to shake. With Vick we have to remember what used to be and what might have been.

Tom Watson played a phenomenal Open Championship this week. He was at or neat the top of the leader board for the entire tournament. Everyone expected TW to be on top of the championship standings this week, and it was TW. Just not the one anyone was expecting. Watson was an 8 foot putt away from becoming the oldest person to ever win a golf major tournament and become only the 2nd player to win 6 Open Championships. The golf ball doesn’t know how old the person is who is hitting it….but it wasn’t to be. Tom reminded us of what used to be, and gave all the golf fans a shot of feeling what could have been.

Earlier this year Randy Johnson won his 300th game. Last year Dara Torres wowed us at the Olympic games winning three silver medals. Brett Favre is likely to come back and play yet again, un-retiring for the third time and playing for the Vikings if his shoulder heals well.

We all have our heroes, and every once in awhile, long after their moment in the sun has set whether for good or for worse, we get reminded and even given a glimpse of that hope, excitement and interest that we as sports fans all have.

As we celebrate the 40th anniversary of the United States landing on the moon, we are reminded of the heroes that generation. I am too young to remember the moon landing on that fateful day in 1969. Heck I wasn’t even born for that matter. What an incredible moment that would have been…to see something that had never happened before.

The excitement, the uncertainty, and the ability to root for something better than winning or losing…..

Here is wishing all of you to take a moment to remember what used to be and to dream about things yet to come.

Bill Gates made news last week when the news media caught wind of his latest idea. The Microsoft co-founder, who has focused much of his energy on philanthropy in recent years, (even convincing Warren Buffet to leave the bulk of his estate to the Bill & Melinda Gates foundation) appears to be trying to save mankind from hurricanes.

Gates and colleagues have filed five patents related to their idea. The basic idea is to have barges that are fitted with pumps that would exchange surface water with water from the depths. Ocean water gets considerably colder as you go deeper into the water. Since hurricanes grow stronger when they pass over warm water, the Gates plan is to cool the water in the path of the hurricane; starving it of the “fuel” it requires to grow.

Let’s tackle the major issues.

Will it work?

Writers in the comment-o-sphere (places where the public can leave comments) on the major media sites seem to have two basic thoughts. The majority view is that this is the dumbest idea ever. The minority view is that this is a brilliant idea.

Where do I stand? Somewhere in the middle, leaning a bit toward the brilliant side of the discussion. Bill Gates may be a lot of things, but he’s not stupid. I doubt that he would attach his name to something like this without some due diligence on the feasibility of success.

I know a bit more about the nature of hurricanes than the average person, but not enough to be considered an expert. I personally think there is a decent chance that this plan could reduce the strength of a hurricane. If this method could drop a hurricane’s strength from a category 4 to a category 3, this could result in massive reduction in property damage and loss of life.

Ken Caldeira of The Carnegie Institution partnered with Gates on the patent applications. Other scientists are more skeptical, although some have gone on record with their belief that there is a strong likelihood that the plan could work.

Who pays for it?

There will certainly be significant cost to this plan. Not only is the equipment certain to be expensive, but it is also quite likely that many of the barges will be destroyed when they are deployed into the path of a hurricane. They might be able to prevent the hurricane from building strength, but the current strength of the storm might overwhelm them as a storm passes overhead.

It’s difficult to imagine a scenario where a private company could fund this operation. My guess is that the most likely solution would be a government agency that licenses the technology and pays for all expense.

How, then, would this agency receive funding? My suggestion would be a surcharge against those entities that would stand to gain – homeowner’s insurance companies, as well as the government-funded National Flood Insurance Program. The amount of the surcharge would be based on the hurricane exposure that each company has. I won’t waste your time (or mine) hammering out the exact amounts.

Even if the plan does end up being expensive, it could still end up paying for itself. Hurricane Katrina (and the subsequent breaching of levees) killed 1800 people and caused an estimate $80 billion in damage. It would be interesting to see how much damage a similar storm would do if the Gates devices were in its path.

Should we do it?

One argument against trying to control hurricanes is that hurricanes are a natural part of the ecosystem, and that changing the intensity or frequency of hurricanes could wreak untold havoc on the ecosystem. Additionally, exchanging the surface water and the deep water could have a negative impact on the species of wildlife that happened to live in those locations.

I agree that these are valid points.

At some point, however, this is going to boil down to a decision about the value of a human life, relative to environmental impact. Most of us will probably agree that is acceptable to cause some degree of damage to the ecosystem in order to save thousands of human lives. On the flip side, many among us would not agree to massively damaging the ocean ecosystem (and countless living beings) in order to save a single human life. Here’s an extreme example – would you kill all of the dolphins in the world if it would extend the life of one person by one year? The tricky part is the middle ground. Exactly how much value should we assign to each human life?

Am I dodging the answer to that question? Yes, most definitely.

Weekend articles

Did you take a break from the internet this weekend?  You may have missed these articles on The Soap Boxers.

• Friday – Heidi and the Shark. This short story details the struggle between Heidi and a hammerhead shark on the high seas.
• Friday – Tribute to Jamie Moyer. We poke a bit of fun at the ageless wonder in the aftermath of his one hitter.
• Saturday – Saturday Stew takes a look at Harry Potter, Google, the New York Yankees, and more.  Help yourself to a bowl of stew.
• Sunday – In North of the Border, Tyson gives us an introduction to the Canadian Football League.

You might be wondering what the CFL stands for. It is the Canadian Football League, our low budget version of the NFL. I am definitely a sports guy but sports won’t be the topic of my choice too often. I do think though that the CFL is underrated in terms of talent and quality. Here are some of the need to knows:

Teams: There are currently 8 teams, 4 in the west division and 4 in the east division. In the west, you have the B.C. Lions, Calgary Stampeders, Edmonton Eskimos, and Saskatchewan Roughriders. In the east, the teams are the Montreal Alouettes, Hamilton Tigercats, Toronto Argonauts and Winnipeg Blue Bombers. The league has twice ventured into Ottawa, but has had limited success maintaining a successful franchise there for some reason. A new ownership group has been given the rights to a new team, but they won’t be rejoining the league likely for a couple more years anyways.

The CFL actually ventured into the States back in the 90s, but attendance and interest were major issues, and the foray lasted only a few years. The CFL tried out cities such as Birmingham, Shreveport, Memphis, Sacramento and even Las Vegas (where the team lasted only a year, attracting a pathetic 3,000 fan average a game) but could only find success in Baltimore (pre NFL days) where the team was pretty popular and even captured the league championship one year. Perhaps the most interesting failure came in San Antonio. The team lasted only one year, despite having some pretty well known NFL names running the show. Jason Garrett was the starting quarterback, Mike Riley the head coach, and Tom Landry the GM!

Rules: The biggest difference is that the CFL plays with only 3 downs. This increases the pressure to have solid yardage on first down. This is why a lot of Canadians find the NFL pretty slow paced. The extra down allows NFL teams to run more tedious, 2 yard rushing plays. The CFL field is 110 yards long, and end zones are 20 yards long. One of the more controversial rules allows for teams to score one point from missed field goals which sail through the end zone. Everyone up here is just waiting for the championship game, tied at 27, to come down to a last second field goal and have the kicker miss but still win the game by one point thanks to this ridiculous rule. Otherwise, there are more similarities than differences between the two leagues.

Attendance: You’ll never see the pure numbers of fans at games like you do in the NFL. For instance, maximum capacity of the stadium in Winnipeg and Regina (Saskatchewan) is right around the 30,000 mark. Edmonton’s Commonwealth Stadium is the biggest in the league, with a capacity of 60,081. One of the oddest attendance issues comes every season in Toronto. Despite the fact Toronto is by far the biggest market in the league, the team is always in the bottom half of league attendance. This even occurred when the team was a perennial contender, with Doug Flutie quarterbacking the team to championships in the late 90s.

State of the League: After the disastrous 90s, where the league needed a loan from the NFL to stay afloat, the league is in pretty strong health right now. Attendance league wide is fairly decent (minus Hamilton, where the team has been brutal for about 6 years in a row now) and almost every team turned a profit last year. Here in Winnipeg the team has erased a debt of over 5 million dollars over the last 5 years. The quality of play is very strong too, and the league has several marketable stars. It has been interesting to note how some ex NFL stars have struggled up here. Players such as Onterrio Smith, Andre Rison, and even Ricky Williams were not nearly as successful as they were in the NFL. Canadian fans always cheer for ex-CFLers to make it big in the NFL. One of the biggest success stories was QB Jeff Garcia, but of course there have been many others. The biggest salaries you’ll see up here are about 400,000-500,000 (Canadian) for starting quarterbacks; hence there financially there is plenty of motivation to try and catch on with an NFL team.

I still am a big fan of the NFL, but the CFL game will always be my favourite. I suggest giving it a chance if you ever have the opportunity. You might be pleasantly surprised.

Harry Potter

Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince opened in theaters at midnight on Wednesday. It broke the record for a midnight screening with $22.2 million is is well on its way to a huge weekend. I’m not fan of the Harry Potter series, but I am definitely a fan of the J.K. Rowling story. Rowling was on welfare before writing the Harry Potter series and becoming a billionaire. What a wonderful rags to riches story. We often hear stories about people who are on welfare for decades and have no real desire to work. Here’s a story about someone who took the assistance offered by the government, and used it to get back on her feet and become a success. The money the British government spent on welfare payments to Rowling ended up being a great investment – as they made it possible for Rowling to pay tremendous tax bills on her subsequent income!

Apple shuts down Palm Pre sync

When the Palm Pre launched, one of its features was the ability to pretend that it was an iPod, allowing it to make use of Apple’s iTunes software. There was some debate over at Lazy Man and Money regarding whether Apple would allow this to occur, or whether they would release a future update to block non-iPod devices. I thought that they would indeed block the Pre, and felt that they had the right to do this, asserting that it was not an unfair barrier to competition to force Palm to bundle a iTunes-like product with the Pre.

On Wednesday, Apple released iTunes version 8.2.1. According to Apple, “iTunes 8.2.1 provides a number of important bug fixes and addresses an issue with verification of Apple devices” – in other words, if iTunes can’t verify that your device is an iPod, you can no longer sync with it. Palm is suggesting that Pre own simply cease upgrading iTunes to retain the ability to sync.

Google

Google has announced plans to launch their own operating system, Chrome OS. Chrome OS will be a simple operating system that is based on Linux. Chrome is not expected to be as feature-rich as operating systems like Apple’s Mac OS X or Microsoft’s Windows. On the flip side, the computer should boot more quickly (fewer things to load) and run faster (due to the operating system requiring fewer system resources). Chrome OS will essentially allow a computer to run Google’s Chrome web browser. Will Chrome OS be a solution for everyone? No. But if you spend nearly all of your computer time in your web browser, it may be a good fit for you.

Google’s free web-based productivity suite Google Docs will face competition from Microsoft, as the software giant has announced plan to release a free web-based version of Microsoft Office next year. The web version won’t include all of the features that will be available on the desktop version of Office, but it might be a good solution for many people.

Bruno

The country of Ukraine has banned the Sacha Baron Cohen movie “Bruno”, saying that the movie is immoral. This will certainly be a death blow to the movie, ensuring lackluster crowds.

Oh, hey, just kidding. What I meant to say is that Sacha Baron Cohen will use this publicity to bolster his “bad boy” image, and that the banning will make more people flock to the theater to see what all the fuss is about.

Oops

Bank of America, which is not one of my favorite companies, charged a New Hampshire man 23 quadrillion dollars for a purchase at a local gas station where he often purchased cigarettes. The man was also charged a $15 “over the limit” free. After two hours on the phone, Bank of America removed the charge and the fee from his account.

Capitol Shooting

Officers shot and killed a man near the US Capitol on Wednesday. The man was trying to elude police. He jumped out of his car and began shooting at officers. I stumble across this sort of story occasionally, and always wonder what on earth is going through the person’s head. Do they think that the cops aren’t going to shoot back?

Sears Tower

The Sears Tower is no longer the tallest building in the United States. What happened? Did someone sneakily build a taller building? No, the Sears Towers was renamed Willis Tower as part of an agreement with Willis Group Holdings. The 110 story tall tower opened in 1973. Sears moved out of the building in 1992, but the Sears named has been retained until now. I wonder how many years (or decades) will pass before Chicagoans begin referring to it as Willis Tower?

Yankees

The Yankees recently signed Damian Arrendondo, a 16 year old shortstop from the Dominican Republic, to a contract worth $850,000. (Note: international players may be signed as young as 16). Major League Baseball invalidated the contract when it was determined that the player was not actually named Damian Arrendondo, and that he was older than 16. No word yet on whether he is truly a shortstop.

Why the fascination with ages of these kids? After all, if a player is good, he’s good, regardless of whether he is 16 or 18, right?

Not exactly. Take this outside of the baseball world for a bit. If a 1 year old can count to 10, he’s a genius. If a 7 year old can count to 10, you’re not impressed. Yet, it’s the exact same skill. It’s the same with baseball skills. A 16 year old may exhibit the exact same skills as an 18 year old, but the 16 year old is a better prospect because he’s ahead of his peer group in the development curve.

Last night, ageless wonder Jamie Moyer (46 years old) threw 7 innings of one-hit ball against the Marlins.  The Phillies bullpen finished the game without incident, resulting in a combined one hitter.

Today, we give you a tribute to Jamie Moyer.  Here are 10 things you might not know about Jamie:

• Jamie Moyer once threw a fastball.  Sure, it was in Little League, but it’s on his permanent record.
• Jamie Moyer started his career in Philadelphia. With the Athletics.
• Jamie Moyer threw the first pitch on opening day. It should be crossing the plate at any moment.
• The Liberty Bell cracked while ringing to announce Jamie Moyer’s birth.
• Jamie Moyer grew up in a family of carpenters.  He served his apprenticeship helping his uncle Noah build an ark.
• Jamie Moyer’s grandson can hit a homerun off him. Then again, Dustin Moyer-Pedroia is a pretty decent player.
• Jamie Moyer graced the cover of the first baseball video game – Pong.
• If Jamie Moyer is pre-approved for a scooter or power chair and Medicare denies his claim, the Scooter Store will allow him to keep his scooter or power chair at no cost.
• Jamie Moyer bought a brand new car when he signed his first professional contract. He still has that Model T.
• The Phillies might need to shut down Jamie Moyer late in the year. He’s trying to figure out how much money he can earn before he is forced to claim social security benefits as income on his 1040.

All kidding aside, I do wish Jamie continued good luck in his career.

Note to regular readers of The Soap Boxers: in case you missed it, here’s a link to today’s Fiction Friday short story, Heidi and the Shark.

I’ve implemented a bunch of changes.  I’m sure that everyone has noticed them.

No?

Ok, I’ll give a quick recap.  These are all pretty small changes, so they might be overlooked.  Some folks might find them useful, though.

• I’ve held the price of The Soap Boxers steady at $0.00!
• The author’s name in the byline is now a link that will take you take a listing of their articles.  In a similar vein, the right sidebar now has a “search by author” that does the same thing.  The author’s page will show you excerpts of each article, with 10 articles to a page.  I’m not sure how useful this function is.  I will be creating a special category for each author, so you could also just click on that category to accomplish the same thing.  The one exception is myself – there is no other way to view a listing of all of my articles.
• I have added the page numbers at the bottom of search results, category, discussion topics, and date searches.  This replaces the “older article” and “newer article” text.  If you don’t realize it, you can click on a category, discussion topics, or month in the left sidebar and you’ll be shown a listing of articles that fit that criteria.
• Search results, category, discussion topics, and date searches will now show 10 excerpts per page instead of 4
• At the end of the excerpts (when searching on author, category, discussion topic, date, or by using the search box on the top right), there is now a link where the reader can click to “Read Full Article”.  Previously, the course of action was not readily apparent (you were supposed to click on the title in order to view the full article.)
• “Discussion topics” was moved to the left sidebar.  This is a clickable listing of the topics that have been discussed most frequently.  The size of the words is proportional to the frequency of its use.
• New photo with the goatee

The Soap Boxers recently celebrated its 200th article!

Zach Johnson

Local favorite Zach Johnson (or ZeeJay, as I refer to him) stormed into contention on Sunday, shooting a 12 under par in the final day of the John Deere Classic to finish in a three way tie for second place.  This is not quite as impressive  as it sounds, as Zach (and the rest of the field) were forced to play 36 holes on Sunday.  23 of the players in the Deere then boarded a flight across the Atlantic so that they could play in this week’s British Open.  Oh, sorry, Goodman, The Open.

Matt Cassel

Chiefs quarterback Matt Cassel has cashed in on his strong 2008 season with the Patriots by signing a 6 year contract with the Chiefs that will pay him as much as $63 million – with $28 million guaranteed.  This seems like an awful lot of money to pay to a player who still just has one good season under his belt.  I’m really not sure how much downside there would have been by waiting until after the 2009 season – or even after week 8 of the season – to see how Cassel performs outside of New England.  Cassel is definitely a feel-good story, though.  He did not start even one game during college.  It wasn’t that he wasn’t a good quarterback; it was simply that he was sandwiched between Heisman Trophy winners Carson Palmer and Matt Leinart.  Only an injury to Patriots QB Tom Brady allowed Cassel a starting opportunity.

Pedro Martinez

 The Phillies signed Pedro Martinez to a one year, $1 million deal, with the opportunity to earn $1.5 million more through incentives.  Martinez currently has an ailing shoulder, but should be ready to go in early August.  His presence should give the Phillies a boost in their quest to repeat as world champs.  Pedro’s Hall of Fame caliber career has been derailed by injuries.  I doubt that the 37 year old can make a serious run at 300 wins – he currently stands at 214 – but getting above 250 should erase any doubts about his Hall of Fame status.  Interestingly, Pedro’s next loss will be the 100th of his career.

Danica to NASCAR?

Rumors have been swirling for quite a while about Danica Patrick jumping from Indy to Nascar.  The flames were stoked a bit when she visited Stewart-Haas racing recently.  The race team – 50% owned by 2 time champion and current points leader Tony Stewart – is believe to be interested in adding a driver next year.  Patrick would definitely earn a ton of sponsorship money from Stewart-Haas, and she might be able to learn a lot under the wing of Stewart, who himslf made the jump from Indy to NASCAR.

In other NASCAR news, Jeremy Mayfield has tested positive for meth for a second time.  Also, Mayfield’s step-mother – with who he has a very strained relationship – has filed an affidavit accusing Jeremy of a long history of meth use.  NASCAR is asking for Mayfield’s indefinite suspension to be reinstated.  A judge had previously granted an injunction against the suspension – although Mayfield was not able to race, because no team was willing to give him a ride.

NBA

You won’t  see a lot of NBA news in The Soap Boxers, mostly because Goodman and myself are not big fans of the defenseless game played by the professionals.  However, there are a few interesting stories this week.

The perennial losers known as the Los Angeles Clippers are interested in signing Allen Iverson.  A prolific scoring machine, Iverson has had a tendency to rub teammates and coaches the wrong way, downplaying the importance of activities such as “practice”.  The Clippers might give Iverson the best chance to keep his career alive, although the move might not make a lot of sense from the team’s perspective.

Magic backup center  Marcin Gortat was upset when the team matched the contract he had been offered by the Dallas Mavericks.  The NBA essentially has a right of first refusal, allowing teams to match another team’s offer to a particular player in order to retain the player’s services.  Gortat will be paid a total of $34 million over the next 5 years.  In Orlando, he will back up superstar center Dwight Howard.  If he had been able to sign with Dallas, he would have likely been the starter.  This story might not be done, thought.  It is possible that the Magic are signing Gortat simply so that they can trade him (perhaps to the Mavericks)?

Winter Olympics

The 2010 Winter Olympics are slowly approaching.  For those of you who have been wondering if there will be a “fantasy” style contest for the Olympics on The Soap Boxers, the answer is a resounding YES!  Get your cheat sheets ready.  Some aspects of the contest will include:

• A limit on the number of US athletes on your team
• Limits on the number of atheletes from medal-rich sports (speed skating)
• Points awarded based on gold, silver, and bronze medals.

I ran a similar contest with a few friends for the 2008 Summer Olympics – it was a lot of fun.

We’re still working on the exact schedule for the monthly columnists, so today will be a general news article.

Intruders broke into the home of Byrd and Melanie Billings on the night of July 9 in Beulah, Florida. Within a few minutes, Byrd and Melanie were dead, and the intruders had stolen some items from the residence (police have not released details about what items were taken).  Nine of their children were at home during the invasion, but none were harmed (and one ran to a neighbor’s house for help).

In the aftermath of this tragedy, we began to get an idea about the sort of people the Billings were.  68 year old Byrd and his 43 year old wife Melanie had a total of 4 biological children from previous marriages.  Blessed by financial prosperity, they adopted 12 or 13 more children (the accounts vary), many of them with special needs.  Instead of spending their money on fancy jewelry or trips around the world, Byrd and Melanie chose the enrich the lives of these children.  What a wonderful way to spend your life.

The police were aided in their investigation by the surveillance system that that was used to keep an eye on the Billings children as they moved throughout the house.  The surveillance system caught the crime on tape.  Seven people have been charged with murder, including a 16 year old who will be tried as an adult.  A father and son were among those arrested.  Authorities also have an interest in another person who may have aided and abetted.  The seven who are charged with murder could face the death penalty.

Two members of the group had military experience, and some members of the group may have done work on the grounds of the Billings home.  The inside information, coupled with the military experience, may help explain the very efficient nature of the attack.

At this point, authorities are saying that robbery was the motive, and they have not indicated that any other motives may gave existed.  If this crime was simply for financial motives, it is absolutely sickening.  Not that any motive would have been a good reason to kill them; but with purely financial motives, the criminals could have simply tied up to couple to prevent them from calling authorities.  To elevate the crime from burglary to murder makes no sense, on any level.  I do wonder if there might be a second motive, although I am not sure what that motive might be.

I’m not sure why the killer chose to spare the Billings children, but at least the monsters showed a tiny bit of compassion by allowing them to live.  Or perhaps they simply ran out of time.

I am not typically a proponent of the death penalty.  I have a couple of concerns with it, the most troubling being the fact that it is irreversible in the case that the wrong person is executed for a crime.  However, in this case, I believe that I could be convinced that execution is an appropriate punishment for the crime.

The American League won the All Star game, running their record to 12-0-1 over the last 13 All Star games. For the fourth year in a row, the margin of victory is just a single run. No AL player (or NL player, for that matter) has more than 1 hits, 1 run, or 1 RBI. The MVP is Carl Crawford, largely for his catch that robbed Brad Hawpe of a homer.

Here are my notes from the game.

• Pregame: 30 “Community All Stars” were recognized for volunteer work in their communities. The community All Stars had a chance to mingle with the MLB All Stars on the field for a few minutes. Pretty cool.
• 1st inning – Ugly defense by the NL. Wright throw pulls Pujols off the bag. Pujols makes an error later in the inning (although he may have been distracted by a base runner). Lincecum fails to cover first on a play. NL is lucky to get out of the inning with just two runs scored.
• 2nd inning: Obama drops by the broadcast booth. In general, I hate it when interviews occurs during the game action. In this case, I’ll make an exception, as Obama’s presence leads to three runs for the NL. Sadly, Obama can’t hang around the booth for the entire game. The Obama interview focused on sports, not politics.
• 3rd inning – Ryan Franklin and his pet goatee take care of the AL 1-2-3. That goatee is quite impressive. Unfortunately, the NL goes quietly in the bottom of the bottom of the third.
• 4th inning: Missed most of the 4th, as it was time to put my daughter to bed. While I was applying Orajel to her gums, she bit me rather viciously. Unfortunately, this is not particularly uncommon. She had a really strong bite. We have Orajel swabs – we’ll have to start using them. It turns out that I really didn’t miss much – a total of one hit in the inning.
• 5th inning: Joe Mauer drives a pitch to left field to drive home Derek Jeter in the top of the inning. It would be nice if the Twins could sign local kid Mauer (Cretin-Durham grad) to a long term deal. Great player. Edwin Jackson shuts down the NL in the bottom of the inning.
• 6th inning: Adam Jones puts a charge into a ball to right field, but Brad Hawpe settles under it to make the play. Josh Hamilton singles to right. With other deserving players on the bench, and with Hamilton off to a lackluster start this year, why is he still in the game in the sixth inning? A double play erases Hamilton and ends the inning. In the bottom, Adam Jones returns the favor by retiring Orlando Hudson on a fly to deep right. Albert Pujols ends his night 0-3 with an error – definitely not the show he wanted to put on for the home crowd.
• 7th inning: Adrian “Super Mario” Gonzalez replaces Pujols at first base. Gonzalez was a former #1 overall draft pick, but was traded away by a couple of teams before emerging as a star in San Diego (in spite of the severe pitcher’s park that he plays in). Brad Hawpe drills the first pitch he sees, but is robbed of a homer by Carl Crawford at the wall in left. Miguel Tejada then chases Adam Jones to the deep in right before Papelbon strikes out Werth to end the inning.
• 8th inning: Curtis Granderson triples off the wall with one out in the 8th. Victor Martinez is intentionally walked in order to set up a double play (by putting a catcher at first base) – and Adam Jones once again pops up in the spotlight. Maybe it’s just me, but he has been in the midst of some fun plays in the game. On cue, Jones hits a sacrifice fly that drives in Granderson to put the AL ahead. In the bottom, Adrian Gonzalez walks and Orlando Hudson singles, but Ryan Howard strikes out to strand them and second and third.
• 9th inning: K-Rod comes into the game for the NL. After two quiet outs, Justin Morneau hits a ball to deep center, where Jayson Werth gets on his horse to chase it down. Mariano Rivera comes into the game to try to finish it for the AL. BJ Upton grounds out, Brad Hawpe strikes out, and Miggy Tejada ends the game on a pop out.

Most of you know after reading my column week in and week out that it is no secret I am a golf fan. This upcoming week holds one of the best tournaments of the year in the Open Championship.

Now we as hearty Americans call it the British Open, but truth be told there is no need to throw the first word of that sentence out there. This is THE OPEN. Not the United States Open, the Canadian Open, French Open, Scottish Open or Australian Open.

THE Open Championship.

The oldest of what is considered golf’s majors first played out over the great course at Prestwick, just a wee bit south of Glasgow on the Ayshire coast. It was held the first time in 1860.

Willie Park Senior edged out Old Tom Morris that year. The prize was the Challenge Belt, purchased by the members of Prestwick Golf Club. There was no prize money, but the winner received custody of the Belt for the year. If a player won the Belt three years in succession, it would be his to keep.

This was eventually done by Tom Morris’ son Tommy Jr., or as he was more popularly known, Young Tom. In 1870, just 10 years after this tournament began, Young Tom won for the third straight time and the Moroccan red leather belt was his to keep.

No Open was held in 1871 mostly in part as no replacement award for winning had been commissioned.

Finally in late 1872 an agreement was reached between three clubs that were to host The Open — Prestwick, the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers (now based in Muirfield) and The Royal and Ancient Golf Club (more commonly referred to as St Andrews) They decided that the winner would receive a medal and that each of the three clubs would contribute £10 toward the cost of a new trophy, which was to be a silver claret jug, instead of another belt. Its proper name was to be The Golf Champion Trophy.

Today the winner each and every year hoists the Claret Jug after being announced as the champion golfer for the year.

This year my pick and nearly everyone else’s pick will be Tiger Woods. A host of others will be looking to win – can Padraig Harrington do it a third straight time?  Can Sergio Garcia break his string of top ten finishes and break through to win?  Will it be the hot hand of a player such as Martin Kaymer or Paul Casey?  What about one last hurrah for Colin Montgomerie?

That is what makes this so special,  many players, most of which the casual golf fan has never heard of, representing a variety of countries.  A diverse International field … This is

The Open Championship.

Tune in this weekend to early morning coverage each and every day, and see golf as it was meant to be played, in its purest form, among the links of it ancestral home on the Scottish Coast.