Quick Hits - 9/20/11

Ok, so I spent the last few days up in New England for a wedding and a little vacation time with the wife so once again I find myself with far too much stuff to write about right now. So, similar to last week, here's a quick hit list of what's going on around the sports world and my thoughts in a sentence or two:

MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL

1) Why even show up when you're facing Justin Verlander? - The Tigers ace won yet again on Sunday tossing 8 shutout innings against the Oakland A's and improving to 24-5 on the year. Verlander, who now leads the American League in Wins (24), Strikeouts (244) and ERA (2.29) became the first pitcher since 1978 to win at least 24 games and strike out at least 240 hitters. Verlander may just start one more time this season as he's next scheduled to throw against Baltimore on Saturday.

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

2) Mariano All Time Saves Leader - Mariano Rivera struck out Twins rookie Chris Parmelee to cap off a 1-2-3 9th inning and pass Trevor Hoffman to become baseball's all time saves leader on Monday afternoon with the 602nd save of his career. Rivera now has 43 saves on the year and a 1.98 ERA. Don't overlook the importance of his supporting cast though. Setup man David Robertson has been sensational this year. He threw a scoreless 8th inning last night to earn his 34th hold, and lower his ERA to 1.13 in 67 appearances.

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

3) Tigers Clinch First Division Title Since 1987 - The last time the Tigers clinched a division, they had Jack Morris, Alan Trammell, Lou Whitaker, Frank Tanana, Matt Nokes and Doyle Alexander. That changed on Friday when Doug Fister helped pitch the Tigers to a 3-1 win over Oakland and they were able to clinch the AL Central joining the Phillies as the only two teams to have clinched a postseason berth thus far.

4) Boston Lead Down to Two - Following Tampa's taking 3 of 4 from Boston this weekend, the Rays were able to knock Boston's lead in the Wild Card down to 2 games as we enter the final week and a half of the regular season. Boston's stretch run got off to a rough start yesterday with a double-header in Boston that saw them lose the opener 6-5 and have to rally to win the nightcap 18-9 to maintain their two game lead over idle Tampa. Neither of Boston's starters got through 5 innings forcing the bullpen to eat 9 more innings between the two games. Tampa starts a 4 game series in New York against the division leading Yankees today. Speaking of collapses...

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

5) Atlanta's Lead is Down to Two and Half - Ex-Atlanta Brave Omar Infante homered off of Craig Kimbrel with two outs in the bottom of the 9th to give the Marlins a 6-5 win over the Atlanta Braves. That loss coupled with the Cardinals 4-3 win over Roy Halladay and Philadelphia means that the Braves lead in the Wild Card is getting uncomfortably small. The Braves have dropped 7 of their last 10 including a 3-game sweep at the hands of surging St. Louis while the Cardinals have won 8 of their last 10 including last night. The Cardinals would appear to have the advantage in schedule down the stretch as they have 3 at home against New York, 3 at home against Chicago, and then 3 on the road against league-worst Houston while Atlanta has 2 in Florida, 3 in Washington and 3 at home against the Phillies.

6) Strasburg Goes Six on Saturday - Stephen Strasburg made his longest start of the season on Saturday going 6 innings against the Marlins and giving up just 1 run on 4 hits. He needed just 61 pitches to get through the 6 innings, striking out only 3, but once again not walking a batter. In 3 starts with the Nationals, Strasburg has a 1.29 ERA and is holding opposing hitters to a batting average of just .188. He's walked none and fanned 11 in 14 innings of work. Strasburg is slated to pitch again on Friday against Tim Hudson and the Braves.

7) Kennedy Wins Number 20 -  Ian Kennedy became the first National Leaguer to reach 20 wins on Monday night tossing 8 shutout innings allowing just 1 hit, a single to opposing pitcher Jeff Karstens, and fanning 12 in a 1-0 victory. The game's only run came on a broken bat home run off the bat of Justin Upton, his 31st of the season.

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

EUROPEAN SOCCER

8) Manchester United Wins Again - 5 games into the season, United has a cool 15 points and have outscored their opponents 21-4. Wayne Rooney scored his 9th goal of the season and despite missing a 2nd half penalty, United still cruised to a 3-1 win over rival Chelsea. Manchester City finally failed to match United win for win drawing with Fulham 2-2 to drop to second place at 4-0-1.

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

9) Arsenal Having All Kinds of Problems - While everything is going right for United, Arsenal finds themselves in 17th place 5 games into the Premier League season with a record of 1-3-1 and following Saturday's 4-3 loss to Blackburn Rovers, they have now conceded 14 goals in just 5 matches.

10) Real Madrid Stunned by Levante - Real Madrid lost just 4 games all of last season in Spain while Levante finished in 14th place with a record of 12-17-9. None of that mattered on Sunday as Sami Khedira was sent off in the 40th minute and Arouna Koné scored midway through the second half to give Levante the surprising 1-0 win. Meanwhile Barcelona blew out Osasuna 8-0 behind 3 goals from Lionel Messi and a brace from David Villa.

Photo Credit: thetop.in

11) Stuart Holden Ready to Return - American Stuart Holden will return to the pitch today for Bolton Wanderers in their Carling Cup match against Aston Villa. Holden has been out of the lineup since suffering a brutal knee injury in March against Manchester United.

WOMEN'S SOCCER

12) Wambach Scores - USA draws with Canada - In the American women's first match since their crushing shootout loss in the World Cup Final to Japan, the USA drew with Canada 1-1 in Kansas City on Saturday. Abby Wambach converted an early penalty kick, her 123rd goal for the United States, but the Americans couldn't hold on to the lead conceding a late first half goal to Melissa Tancredi, and neither side would score in the second half. The two sides will meet again in Portland, Oregon on Thursday.

Photo Credit: nbcsports.msnbc.com

EUROBASKET 2011

13) Spain Wins Championship - Juan Carlos Navarro scored 27 points and Pau Gasol had a double-double with 17 points and 10 rebounds as Spain retained the European crown with a 98-85 win over France. France got 11 points and 8 rebounds from Joakim Noah, 26 points and 5 assists from Tony Parker, and 12 points and 7 assists from Boris Diaw, but the Spaniards just had too many weapons. Spain lost just one game the entire tournament, in the first round to Turkey, going 10-1 en route to the title. Russia, who also only lost once the entire tournament, defeated Macedonia 72-68 in the third place game behind 18 points and 7 rebounds from Andrei Kirilenko. Tony Parker led all players in scoring with 22.1 points per game while ex-University of New Orleans point guard Bo McCalebb averaged 21.4 points for Macedonia.

Photo Credit: fibaeurope.com

FANTASY BASEBALL
14) LBBL Finals - My bid at back-to-back championships has fallen short after dropping a 6-4 match to Itchy Buchholz in the semifinals. What's ironic about this is that I'm the one who actually drafted his team since he missed the draft. Last time I'm doing that... Ultimately what killed me though was our inability to hit. Last week the Flying Cave Donkies hit a collective .239 thanks to Joe Mauer (.167), Freddie Freeman (.118), Ian Kinsler (.154), David Wright (.207) and Carlos Gonzalez (.167). Considering that that's half of my starting lineup, it's not hard to see why we lost. It's all right though. I successfully made it through the season with my 'keepers' Bryce Harper and Stephen Strasburg, so if nothing else, at least the future looks bright.


NFL

15) Giants Defeat Rams On Monday Night - In a matchup between two teams that have been devastated by injuries, the Giants came away victorious against St. Louis 28-16 last night. Eli Manning threw for 200 yards and a pair of touchdowns including an acrobatic catch by Domenik Hixon as the Giants got their first win of the year. Sam Bradford, despite being without weapons Steven Jackson and Danny Amendola, threw for 331 yards in a losing effort.

Photo Credit: newyork.cbslocal.com

16) Jamaal Charles Injury - The season is over for Jamaal Charles. The Chiefs 24 year old running back, coming off of back-to-back 1000 yard rushing seasons is headed to the injured reserve with a torn ACL sustained in Sunday's loss to Detroit. Charles joins Pro Bowl safety Eric Berry and tight end Tony Moeaki on the IR as the Chiefs' season continues to go from bad to worse. Thomas Jones and Dexter McCluster are expected to carry the load at running back in Charles' absence.

 Sports & Such is now on twitter. Follow us @smittysports1. 
Got any questions/comments/requests? Email the blog - smittysports.blogspot@hotmail.com

Quick Hits - 20 Blurbs From Around the Sports World

Ok, so there's just a ton of stuff to talk about right now, and maybe if I didn't have a real job, I could spend all day writing about it. Unfortunately, duty calls, so here's a quick hit list of what's going on around the sports world and my thoughts in a sentence or two:

MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL

1) All He Does is Win, Win, Win - Justin Verlander Improves to 23-5 - The Tigers defeated the White Sox 5-0 Tuesday night to win their 11th game in a row. Verlander went 7 shutout innings and fanned six to win his 23rd game of the year and lower his ERA to 2.36. Just hand him the Cy Young Award now.

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

2) Mariano saves number 600 - 41 year old Mariano Rivera got the last three outs in the Yankees 3-2 win over Seattle on Tuesday to earn his 41st save of the season. He also became just the second pitcher in Major League history to eclipse 600 saves for his career and needs just one more to tie Trevor Hoffman's record. Anyone want to argue that he's not the greatest reliever of all-time?

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

3) Phillies first to clinch playoff berth - Roy Halladay tossed a 6-hit shutout for his 18th win of the season as the Phillies (95-51) defeated the Astros 1-0 today to become the first team to clinch a playoff berth this year. The Phillies have reached the postseason for 5 straight years and with a starting rotation of Halladay, Cliff Lee, Cole Hamels and Roy Oswalt, they're a team no one should want to play in the postseason. But it should be noted the worst team in the league, my beloved Astros, just took 2 of 3 from them. Go team go.

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

4) Tigers win 12th straight - Yeah, remember like 3 blurbs ago when I said they won their 11th in a row? Wednesday they made it 12 with an impressive come-from-behind win over the White Sox taking the game 6-5 in 10. Detroit trailed 5-2 headed to the 9th but pinch hitter Ryan Raburn homered off of Chris Sale to make it 5-3 and pinch-hitter Alex Avila hit a 2-run shot off of Sergio Santos to knot the game up at 5. Carlos Guillen then singled home the go-ahead run in the 10th to win it. Jose Valverde shut the door in the bottom of the 10th for his 44th save of the season. The Tigers hadn't won 12 games in a row since 1934.

5) Sox - Rays both lose, lead still 4 games - Boston blew a chance to gain ground on Tampa blowing a 4-2 lead in the 8th against the Jays and falling 5-4. Daniel Bard took the loss and over his last 3 appearances he is 0-3 with a 30.86 ERA. GAH. So that leaves Boston's lead over Tampa at 4 games heading into tomorrow's big 4 game series between the two clubs. Here are the pitching matchups:

Game 1 - Kyle Weiland (0-1) vs Jeremy Hellickson (12-10)
Game 2 - Josh Beckett (12-5) vs James Shields (15-10)
Game 3 - Jon Lester (15-7) vs Jeff Niemann (10-7)
Game 4 - Tim Wakefield (7-6) vs David Price (12-12)

6) Check Out Shelley Duncan - Who knew this guy could play defense? The Cleveland Indians left fielder made 3 terrific plays IN A ROW between the first and second innings and 4 good plays for the game creating his own highlight reel. Watch the expressions on his face after each play. Even HE can't believe he made them. Unfortunately the Tribe lost 9-1.

CONCACAF CHAMPIONS LEAGUE

7) Mexico Strikes Back in Champions League - Robbie Keane gave the Galaxy an early lead with a terrific individual effort on the road in Mexico, but Morelia struck back with a pair of goals in the last ten minutes to give the Galaxy their first loss in CONCACAF Champions League play. The Rapids were also dealt their first loss by Santos at home getting smoked by a score of 4-1. Brian Mullan, infamous for breaking Steve Zakuani's leg back in April, scored the lone goal for the Rapids. Toronto also dropped a match in Mexico today losing 4-0 to Pumas UNAM as Martín Bravo had a hat trick.

Photo Credit: 101greatgoals.com

8) Sounders/FC Dallas Stay Unbeaten - Seattle is only the team to win their first 3 Champions League matches following a 2-1 win on the road in Costa Rica over Herediano. Fredy Montero scored both Seattle goals as they sit in the driver's seat atop Group D. Dallas also stayed unbeaten but had to settle for a draw against Tauro at home. Daniel Cruz scored just 27 seconds into the match for Dallas.

UEFA CHAMPIONS LEAGUE

9) Manchester Sides Settle For Draws - Manchester City and Manchester United may both be unbeaten and untied in the Premier League, but both sides drew in their Champion's League Openers today. United fell behind on the road against Portuguese side Benfica early but equalized thanks to a goal from 37 year old Ryan Giggs. City also had to come from behind at home against Napoli getting a goal late in the second half from Serbian Aleksandar Kolarov.

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

10) Inter Upset By Trabzonspor - Trabzonspor isn't even supposed to be in the Champion's League this year. Fenerbahçe, the reigning Turkish Süper Lig champions were banned due to an ongoing investigation into alleged match fixing so Trabzonspor, despite getting eliminated from Champions League qualifying in the 3rd round, got a free pass. They're making the most of it too stunning Inter Milan 1-0 on a 76th minute goal from Ondrej Celustka despite getting outshot 19-7.

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

11) Real Madrid Among Wednesday Winners - Real Madrid picked up a 1-0 road win at Dinamo Zagreb despite playing a man down for the final 17 minutes after Marcelo's ejection. 23 year old Argentinian Ángel Di María scored the winner for Madrid. Bayern Munich also picked up a road win defeating Villareal 2-0 behind goals from Rafinha and Toni Kroos. Swiss side FC Basel was the only other winner today defeating Romanian Club Otelul Galati 2-1 at home.

INTERNATIONAL SOCCER

12) Argentina - Brazil Kick Off Copa Roca - Argentina and Brazil faced off and drew 0-0 in the first leg of the Copa Roca. The tournament which has been on hold for some 35 years is back, but only open to players playing domestically which means no Messi, Daniel Alves, Robinho, Gonzalo Higuain, etc. Still, Ronaldinho and 19 year old Neymar were featured by Brazil in the match. The second leg will be held on September 28th.

13) USA Sets Up Another October Friendly - The USA will take on Ecuador on October 11th in Harrison, New Jersey, 3 days after they take on CONCACAF rival Honduras in Miami, Florida. Ecuador is currently ranked 66th in the world and recently went 0-2-1 at the Copa America losing 1-0 to Venezuela, 4-2 to Brazil and drawing 0-0 with Paraguay. The U.S. is still looking for their first win under new head coach Jurgen Klinsmann. Speaking of U.S. head coaches...

14) Bob Bradley Set to Walk Like an Egyptian - The ex-U.S. National Team coach wasn't unemployed for long getting hired on to take over as the head coach of Egypt. Egypt has not reached a World Cup since 1990 and is currently ranked 34th in the world and 2nd in Africa ahead of Ghana and Nigeria.

EUROBASKET 2011 QUARTERFINALS

15) Spain Advances - Pau Gasol had 19 points and 16 rebounds and Juan Carlos Navarro finished with 26 points as Spain advanced to the semifinals of EuroBasket 2011 with an 86-64 win over Slovenia. Houston Rockets guard Goran Dragic led the way for Slovenia with 14 points and 5 rebounds in a losing effort.

16) Macedonia Shocks Hosts - Vlado Ilievski hit a huge 3 in the closing seconds to lift Macedonia to a 67-65 win over tournament host nation Lithuania. Bo McCalebb, a University of New Orleans grad, led all scorers with 23 points. Robertas Javtokas led Lithuania with 13 points on 6 of 6 shooting. Lithuania will now face off against Slovenia in the consolation bracket tomorrow while Spain and Macedonia will meet in the semis on Thursday.

Photo Credit: fibaeurope.com

17) The Other Quarterfinal Matchups - Tomorrow France, led by Tony Parker, Joakim Noah, Nicolas Batum and Boris Diaw, will take on Greece, and Andrei Kirilenko and Russia will face Nenad Krstic and Serbia.

FANTASY BASEBALL

18) LBBL Semifinals - The Flying Cave Donkies are hitting just .220 this week in their big semifinal matchup against Itchy Buchholz in a rematch of last year's Lushbucket Baseball League Finals. Come on guys, get it together!

NFL

19) Arian Foster Back in Practice - The Texans rolled in their opener 34-7 over the Colts, and now they're close to getting arguably their biggest playmaker - no disrespect to Andre Johnson or Matt Schaub - back into action. I'm telling you, this is the year the Texans are finally poised to win the AFC South.

20) Poor Brady Quinn - Kyle Orton is the starter in Denver, so he gets to play. Tim Tebow is the guy the fans apparently want to see, even though he's penciled in as the number three guy. Doesn't anyone want to see what Brady Quinn can do?

Photo Credit: broncoscast.com

 Sports & Such is now on twitter. Follow us @smittysports1. 
Got any questions/comments/requests? Email the blog - smittysports.blogspot@hotmail.com

Seven Stories from Sunday - Stosur wins U.S. Open, Sox Lose Again, Dirk and Germany Eliminated and More

STOSUR WINS FIRST SLAM

Photo Credit: blog.oregonlive.com

27 year old Australian Samantha Stosur defeated Serena Williams in straight sets 6-2, 6-3 to win the U.S. Open yesterday. It marked the first time ever that Stosur had won a Grand Slam having only ever reached one other final since her Slam debut in 2002. Meanwhile Serena, playing in her 17th Grand Slam final, struggled with her composure cracking a racket and getting into it with the officials following a controversial hindrance call in the second set. In the end it probably didn't matter much as Stosur played the match of her life and became the third woman this year to win her first Slam following in the footsteps of Li Na (French Open) and Petra Kvitova (Wimbledon). The men's final between Rafael Nadal and novak Djokovic will be this afternoon.

SOX LOSE AGAIN - LEAD CUT TO 3 1/2

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

Big Game James Shields lived up to his name yesterday coming within two outs of his 12th complete game and defeating the Red Sox 9-1 today to move within 3 1/2 games of the Sox for the AL Wildcard spot. The win completed a 3 game sweep for the Rays and extended the Sox skid to 5 games. Normally reliable Jon Lester needed 111 pitches to get through 4 innings and didn't come back out for the 5th trailing 4-1. With the game in the hands of the Sox bullpen, Tampa took advantage with B.J. Upton hitting a 451 foot grand slam off of Matt Albers in the 5th to put the game out of reach. If there is a silver lining it's that the Sox get to go back home for 10 games starting with a Tuesday tilt against Toronto where Tim Wakefield will once again go for win number 200. Tampa meanwhile starts an 11 game road trip in Baltimore today that concludes with 4 game series in Boston and New York that will really ultimately decide the fate of their season.

VALVERDE SETS TIGERS SAVES MARK

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

The Detroit Tigers won their 9th game in a row getting a 2-1 win over the Twins yesterday and extending their division lead to 10.5 games with just 16 games to play. Doug Fister, who was 3-12 with the Mariners despite a 3.33 ERA when he was acquired at the trade deadline, threw 7 scoreless innings and improved to 5-1 in a Tigers uniform. But the real story was closer Jose Valverde who broke Todd Jones' club record with his 43rd save of the season. Valverde is a perfect 43 for 43 this year in save opportunities and hasn't blown a save since September 2nd of last season.

SOONERS STILL NUMBER ONE

No surprise that the top 10 teams remain the same this week (albeit in a slightly different order). Idle Oklahoma remains at #1, but Alabama jumps LSU following their win over ranked Penn St. 27-11 and moves up to #2. LSU has more first place vote than the Crimson Tide, but still falls in the polls despite a 49-3 thrashing of Northwestern State. Boise State, Florida State, Stanford, Wisconsin, Oklahoma State, Texas A&M and Nebraska round out the top 10. New to the polls this week are Auburn, who returns after their narrow win at home over #16 Mississippi State, and Arizona State, who upset #21 Missouri in overtime 37-30. Missouri and Penn State were dropped out of the Top 25 this week.

INTER UPSET IN SERIE A OPENER

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

Not a good start to the season for Inter Milan as they conceded a pair of late goals and fell 4-3 on the road against Palermo. Inter defeated Palermo twice last season en route to a second place finish while Palermo finished 8th. Inter, who lost last year's leading scorer Samuel Eto'o to Russian club Anzhi Makhachkala, got a pair of goals from Diego Milito and a stoppage time strike from new addition Diego Forlan, but it wasn't enough. Fabrizio Miccoli netted a brace for the winners. Inter must now regroup in a hurry as they open up Champions League play on Wednesday against Turkish side Trabzonspor.

STRASBURG MAKES SUCCESSFUL SECOND START - NATS WIN

Stephen Strasburg only went three innings yesterday against the Astros before getting pulled by Davey Johnson, but was once again effective allowing just a run on 3 hits while fanning 4. Strasburg, who threw 56 pitches over 5 innings in his debut on Tuesday, needed 57 to get through 3 yesterday and got the hook despite being on a 70-pitch limit. Still, another productive step on the road to recovery and unlike his first start, the Nationals cruised to an 8-2 victory over the hapless Astros. The 23 year old has a 1.13 ERA through 8 innings of work with 8 strikeouts, and perhaps more importantly he's been activated by the Flying Cave Donkies for the semifinals of the Lushbucket Fantasy Baseball League as we look to put together back-to-back championships.

DIRK/GERMANY, HEDO/TURKEY KNOCKED OUT OF EUROS

Photo Credit: fibaeurope.com

Dirk Nowitzki may be a reigning NBA Champion, but his quest to win the EuroBasket 2011 Tournament has come to an abrupt end. Dirk averaged 19.5 points and 6.6 rebounds for Germany in the tournament, but was held to just 4 of  17 shooting in an 84-75 loss to Lithuania yesterday. Turkey was eliminated as well falling to Serbia 68-67 when Ersan Ilyasova missed a jumper at the buzzer. The Turks had NBA players Hedo Turkoglu, Ömer Asik, and the 3rd overall pick in this year's NBA draft Enes Kanter, but will still be heading home early. In yesterday's other game Spain blew out previously unbeaten France 96-69 as the French sat stars Tony Parker and Joakim Noah.

Seven for Saturday - U.S. Open, Red Hot Rooney, College Football and More

U.S. OPEN SEMIFINALS SET

Novak Djokovic capped off one of the more impressive comebacks in U.S. Open history rallying from 2 sets down to knock off 5-time champion Roger Federer in today's first semifinal. After rallying to even the match up at two sets apiece, things started to fall apart for Djokovic in the fifth set and he found himself down 5-3 and 40-15 with Federer serving for the match. But Djokovic dug in and just absolutely smoked a winner cross court to get to 40-30, and his next return drew an unforced error from Federer to send the game to deuce. The momentum shifted it seemed and Federer never was able to get back on track double faulting to lose that game and then getting broken again a little while later by the Serbian to give Djokovic a 6-5 lead. The 24 year old wouldn't miss the opportunity to close out the match and he advanced to his second straight U.S Open Final. Final score 6-7, 4-6, 6-3, 6-2, 7-5. I actually watched most of the fifth set of this one, and I've got to tell you, I was REALLY impressed with Djokovic's composure at the end. Fifth set of a 3+ hour match, and the crowd was certainly pro-Federer for the most part, he starts getting plagued by unforced errors and easily could have lost his composure or thrown in the towel, but comes up with just a RIDICULOUS shot (watch the video at about the 27 second mark) and rallies for the improbable victory. Djokovic, who has never won the U.S. Open, now has to get through Rafael Nadal in a rematch of last year's final on Monday. Nadal punched his ticket to the final with a 6-4, 6-2, 3-6, 6-2 win over 4th seeded Andy Murray. Although Djokovic has won all 5 meetings between the two this year, Nadal this owns a 16-12 edge in head-to-head matchups.

Photo Credit: smh.com.au

One the women's side, Caroline Wozniacki, the #1 ranked women's player in the world, leaves yet another Grand Slam without a title. Serena Williams, the last American standing, despite entering the tournament as the 28th seed, absolutely routed her younger opponent 6-2, 6-4 to advance to the finals in an attempt to win her 4th U.S. Open and 14th Grand Slam. She'll be opposed by Aussie Samantha Stosur who will be playing in just her second Grand Slam Final after ending cinderella story Angelique Kerber's dream run 6-3, 2-6, 6-2. The two women have met six times with Serena taking four of them including their one match this year. The women's final will be tomorrow on the 10 year anniversary of the September 11th attacks.

Photo Credit: guardian.co.uk

ROUGH DAY FOR BARCELONA

Photo Credit: soccernet.espn.go.com

The reigning champions of basically every soccer competition they've entered lately hit a bit of a speed bump today blowing a 2-0 lead and settling for a draw against Real Sociedad. Last year's 15th place finishers in La Liga got 2nd half goals just over a minute apart from Imanol Agirretxe and Antoine Griezmann. This shouldn't have come as a surprise though as last year Barcelona traveled to Estadio Anoeta and lost 2-1 to this same squad. But despite facing one of the only two teams that beat them in league play last year, they started the match with Lionel Messi, David Villa, Andrés Iniesta, and Gerard Piqué all out of the lineup. Now I get it that Barcelona is really good, really deep, and just totally stacked. So with Champions League play kicking off on Wednesday they probably wanted to make sure their big guns were fresh. And it's not like they put a bunch of scrubs out there - they still fielded a lineup with Xavi, Dani Alves, Cesc Fábregas and Pedro among others. But clearly they didn't get the result they were hoping for, and to make matters worse, Chilean midfielder and newcomer to the squad Alexis Sánchez left the match in the first half with an injury. All told, just a dismal day for Barcelona. And to cap it off, Real Madrid now sits 2 points ahead of Barcelona atop the table following their 4-2 win over Getafe.

ROONEY RED HOT FOR REDS

Wayne Rooney netted his second consecutive hat trick and now has 8 goals through United's first four matches as Manchester United thrashed Bolton 5-0 today at Reebok Stadium. The win improves the Reds to 4-0 on the young season and they've outscored their opponents 18-3 over that stretch. Rooney's been the real story though as with 8 goals, he now has more than every other TEAM in the Premiership with the exception of Manchester City (more on them in a minute). In 28 EPL matches last year, Rooney scored just 11 goals. I think it's safe to say that Wayne Rooney is back. He's even scoring goals for England again netting a pair against Bulgaria in Euro 2012 Qualifying last week.

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

Now over on the other side of town is Manchester City, the only other side with an unblemished record through four matches. Like United, City has been on a tear outscoring their opponents 15-3 through the first four matches after notching a 3-0 win over Wigan Athletic today. Two weeks ago against Spurs, they got 4 goals from Eden Dzeko, and today they got a hat trick from Argentinian striker Sergio Agüero. It's still early in the season, but if things continue to go this way, you should mark October 23rd on your calendar as that's when the two Manchester clubs will do battle.

WILD DAY OF COLLEGE FOOTBALL

Not much in the way of upsets this week, but boy were there same crazy finishes. 12th ranked South Carolina hung on to beat Georgia 45-42 in a game that featured a 39 point 4th quarter and 7 lead changes. South Carolina took advantage of 3 Georgia turnovers, returning 2 of them for touchdowns and another inside the ten to improve to 2-0 and drop the Bulldogs to 0-2. Defensive End Melvin Ingram had a 68 yard touchdown run on a fake punt and a 5 yard fumble recovery for a touchdown, and he also recovered an onside kick to ice the game.

Photo Credit: ledger-enquirer.com

Auburn dodged a bullet for the second straight week stuffing Mississippi State one inch from the end zone as time expired to win 41-34. Backup safety Ryan Smith stopped 240 pound quarterback just before the goal line sealing the win for the Tigers. Relf, who ran for over 100 yards on the day, ran the option on the game's final play and took the ball himself, but came up just short.

Michigan scored 28 points in the 4th quarter and the Wolverines and Notre Dame combined for three touchdowns in the final 1:12 in the first night game at the Big House. After Notre Dame took a 31-28 lead with 30 seconds to play, Denard Robinson drove the Wolverines down the field and hit Roy Roundree with a 16 yard TD pass with just 2 seconds left on the clock to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat and drop the Fighting Irish to 0-2. Notre Dame turned the ball over 5 times for the second week in a row.

Andrew Luck and Stanford eeked out a 44-14 victory over (basketball) powerhouse Duke in a nail-biter. Luck, thought by many to be the favorite to win the Heisman and go first in the 2012 NFL Draft finished 20/28 for 290 yards and 4 touchdowns. He now needs just 3 wins to overtake Steve Stenstrom as the winningest quarterback in Stanford history.

Photo Credit: shop.sportsworldcards.com

RED SOX IN TROUBLE?

Boston lost their 4th game in a row and 8th in their last 10 tonight dropping their lead in the AL Wild Card to just 4.5 games over Tampa Bay. The Rays have taken the first two games in their 3 game series, and it doesn't get any easier for Boston moving forward as they play the Rays 5 more times before the end of next week. Only they'll have to do it without Clay Buchholz and Josh Beckett leaving them a starting 5 that after Jon Lester includes Tim Wakefield (winless in his last 7 starts), Andrew Miller (allowed 11 runs in last 6 1/3 innings), John Lackey (allowed 4 runs or more in 8 of last 9 starts - worst ERA for a pitcher who qualifies for the ERA title in the majors - 6.30), and Kyle Weiland (12 runs in 16 big league innings). Time for that high powered offense to earn their paychecks. Tomorrow's game between Lester and Big Game James Shields is huge from a momentum standpoint

Photo Credit: redsoxhub.com

MISTERRRRRRRRRRRRRRR KENNEDY!

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

Who's leading the National League in wins right now? Roy Halladay? Clayton Kershaw? Tim Lincecum? Wrong, wrong, WRONG. The answer is Ian Kennedy who had just 10 wins TOTAL in 44 starts spanning his first four seasons. The 26 year old former Yankees prospect has really come into his own this year with a record of 19-4 and a 2.90 ERA. Kennedy was involved in the trade that brought the Yankees Curtis Granderson, so they certainly shouldn't feel cheated, but with New York's pitching rotation dealing with a lot of questions right now, you can bet they'd love to have a guy like this on their staff. Surprisingly, Kennedy has gotten very little buzz in the Cy Young conversation to this point. While I think Kershaw still has the edge over him, I feel like you should at least hear his name tossed around. Kennedy goes for win number 20 on Tuesday in L.A. against the Dodgers. Unfortunately for the fans, he'll miss Kershaw by a day.

EUROBASKET UPDATE

One match remains in the second round or EuroBasket 2011. Here's a quick look at the Group E and F standings. Teams highlighted in green have clinched a spot in the quarterfinals while teams in red have been eliminated. The top four teams in each group advance to the quarterfinals:

Group E

Tomorrow's Games

Serbia vs Turkey

France vs Spain

Lithuania vs Germany

Group F

Monday's Games

Slovenia vs Finland

Greece vs Georgia

Russia vs Macedonia

Wednesday Thoughts - Verlander Wins #22, Wake's Quest for 200 and More

DOUBLE DEUCE ACTION

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

The Tigers rallied to defeat the Indians 8-6 today as Justin Verlander won for the 22nd time this season. Verlander is now 22-5 and became the first pitcher since 2008 to win 22 games in a season. More importantly for the Tigers, today's win capped off a 3 game sweep of Cleveland and opened up an 8.5 game lead atop the AL Central. Verlander wasn't at his best today, surrendering a pair of two-run home runs to Shelley Duncan, but he was bailed out by a 7th inning Grand Slam off the bat of Victor Martinez as Detroit won their 6th in a row. Verlander has now won 10 straight starts, and he currently leads the league in Wins (22), ERA (2.44), and strikeouts (232). The last pitcher to lead the American League in all three categories, aka the Pitching Triple Crown, was Johan Santana back in 2006. The feat has only been accomplished 4 times in the American League since 1950.

WAKEFIELD DENIED WIN #200 FOR THE SEVENTH STRAIGHT TIME

Photo Credit: zimbio.com

Tim Wakefield, the 45 year old Red Sox knuckleballer, cannot buy a win these days. Despite being backed by the #2 offense in the Majors, Wakefield has now gone winless in seven starts since getting his 199th career win on July 24th. Tonight was especially brutal. Playing in Toronto, the Sox jumped out to an early 3-0 lead after just a half inning. But the lead would be short lived as Toronto would tie the game in the second, and then go up 5-3 in the third. Still, thanks to a 4 run 4th keyed by a Jacoby Ellsbury 3-run home run, Boston would retake the lead and Wakefield would actually leave the game up 8-5 after 5 innings and in position to get that coveted 200th win. Enter Boston's bullpen. Toronto got one back in the 7th to cut it to 8-6 and then the wheels absolutely came off in the 8th. Daniel Bard loaded the bases with nobody out, but then got back to back strikeouts of Dewayne Wise and Yunel Escobar. Then, just when you thought the Sox were going to escape unscathed, he issued back to back walks to Eric Thames and Jose Bautista to tie the game up at 8 and rob Wakefield of his win. Then, to add insult to injury, Matt Albers entered the game and immediately surrendered a 3-run double to Edwin Encarnacion. The Sox would go on to lose the game 11-10 and failed to gain ground on the front running Yankees. So hopefully for Wakefield and the Sox, the 8th time is the charm. Wake takes the hill again at home against the same Blue Jays team on Tuesday.

DID TIKI BARBER DESERVE BETTER?

Photo Credit: weblogs.sun-sentinel.com

Tiki Barber's agent is saying that he's 'flabbergasted' that his client didn't get a chance to win a job this season. Only the Miami Dolphins had Barber work out for them after the end of the lockout, but Miami opted to go with 31 year old Larry Johnson (who had all of 2 rushing yards last season), among others, instead. It should be noted that Johnson did not make the team after rushing for 46 yards and a touchdown on 12 carries during the preseason. We talked about Barber's chances of coming back back when he first announced his unretirement back in March. The reality is he's 36 years old, he hasn't played football since the 2006 season, and if he'd really shown something when he worked out for Miami, they would've given him a chance. Now I suppose it's possible that someone will still give Barber a chance this season. Injuries happen. Shoot, we saw the Saints go into a playoff game with something like 7 running backs on injured reserve forcing them to start Julius Jones. So maybe in that scenario, a veteran like Barber would make sense. But right now, how do you justify giving someone like Barber reps over anyone? So Tiki's agent might be flabbergasted, but I don't think anyone can really be all that surprised that people weren't chomping at the bit to sign Barber. Not yet at least.

QUARTERBACK SHAKE-UPS IN THE AFC SOUTH

Photo Credit: indystar.com

On opening day of 2010, you had Peyton Manning in Indy, Matt Schaub in Houston, Vince Young in Tennessee and David Garrard in Jacksonville. Oh what a difference a year makes. Peyton Manning hasn't yet recovered from neck surgery and will miss his first game since 1997. Instead the Colts will start the season with Kerry Collins, who led the Titans in passing last year and actually retired back in July. Vince Young is also gone from Tennessee as they'll start 35 year old Matt Hasselbeck whom they signed from Seattle during the offseason. Jacksonville's situation is perhaps the most bizarre. David Garrard was cut by the team this week just days before the season opener against Tennessee. Now, the Jags turn the team over to 30 year old Luke McCown who threw just 18 passes during the preseason and has played just 16 games since being drafted out of Louisiana Tech in 2004. Only Matt Schaub remains from last year's starters at quarterback in the AFC South. Is this the year the Texans finally make the jump to the next level as a result?

EUROBASKET 2011 UPDATE

Photo Credit: fibaeurope.com

Three games on the slate today as the second round kicked off. Spain got 43 points from the Gasol brothers (24 for Marc and 19 for Pau) as Spain overcame a solid performance from Dirk Nowitzki (19 points) and a double-double from Chris Kaman to defeat Germany 77-68. Tony Parker continued his strong tournament with 20 points, 6 rebounds and 5 assists to lead Spain past Turkey 68-64. And Lithuania reached triple digits while shooting 63% from the field to defeat Serbia 100-90. Here's an updated look at the standings of the second round for Group E. Keep in mind, matches played in the first round against teams that made it into the second round count against the standings. Group F plays tomorrow.

EuroBasket 2011 - Day 6 Results

Group Play wrapped up today in Lithuania with a full slate of games. Spain was dealt their first loss of the tournament at the hands of Turkey, but still captures the top seed coming out of Group A. France defeated Serbia 97-96 in overtime in a battle of unbeatens to win Group B. Macedonia defeated Bosnia and Herzegovina to finish ahead of Greece, also 4-1, in Group C. And Russia defeated Slovenia 65-64 in another battle of unbeatens to win Group D. The top three teams from each group will advance to the next round which will kick off on Wednesday. The remaining 12 teams will be split into two groups of six (Groups A and B form Group E and Groups C and D form Group F). Each team will play three matches facing off against the teams in their new group that they haven't played yet. However, the results against the teams they have already played will carry over and be added to the standings. The top four teams in each of these groups will move on to the quarterfinals.

Photo Credit: fibaeurope.com

Here are the results from Day 6:

United Kingdom 88 Poland 81
Turkey 65 Spain 57
Lithuania 98 Portugal 69
Israel 96 Italy 95 (OT)
France 97 Serbia 96 (OT)
Germany 81 Latvia 80
FYR Macedonia 75 Bosnia 63
Greece 74 Croatia 69
Finland 71 Montenegro 65
Bulgaria 79 Georgia 69
Russia 65 Slovenia 64
Ukraine 74 Belgium 61

Notable Performers:

Luol Deng - United Kingdom - 28 points, 14 rebounds, 6 assists
Andrea Bargnani - Italy - 26 points, 11 rebounds
Earl Rowland - Bulgaria - 25 points, 4 assists
Viktor Sanikidze - Georgia - 18 points, 9 rebounds
Rihards Kuksiks - Latvia - 27 points, 6 rebounds
Heiko Schaffartzik - Germany - 11 points, 10 assists
Marko Keselj - Serbia - 25 points
Tony Parker - France - 24 points, 6 steals
Bo McCalebb - Macedonia - 22 points, 4 assists
Viacheslav Kravtsov - Ukraine - 13 points, 16 rebounds

Final Round 1 Standings

Group A

Group B

 Group C

 Group D

Upcoming Second Round Matchups:

Group E (9/7)

Germany vs Spain
Turkey vs France
Serbia vs Lithuania

Group F (9/8)

Georgia vs Macedonia
Finland vs Russia
Slovenia vs Greece



Current Second Round Standings

Group E

Group F

EuroBasket 2011 - Day 5 Recap

With 1 game remaining in the preliminary round, we're down to 5 unbeaten teams. Spain defeated previously unbeaten host nation Lithuania to take sole possession of the top spot in Group A, France and Serbia are on a collision course atop Group B, and Russia and Slovenia are unbeaten atop Group D. Meanwhile, Luol Deng and Great Britain got their first win of the tournament over winless Portugal on a busy Day 5.

Photo Credit: fibaeurope.com

Here are the results from Day 5:

Poland 84 Turkey 83
United Kingdom 85 Porugal 73
Spain 91 Lithuania 79
France 91 Italy 84
Israel 91 Latvia 88
Serbia 75 Germany 64
Bosnia - Herzegovina 92 Croatia 80
Macedonia 72 Finland 70
Greece 71 Montenegro 55
Russia 89 Bulgaria 77
Georgia 69 Ukraine 53
Slovenia 70 Belgium 61


Notable Performers:

Luol Deng - United Kingdom - 31 points, 10 rebounds, 4 assists
Carlos Andrade - Portugal - 24 points, 10 rebounds
Lior Eliyahu - Israel - 26 points, 10 rebounds
Janis Blums - Latvia - 27 points, 6 assists
Pero Antic - Macedonia - 14 points, 19 rebounds
Enes Kanter - Turkey - 19 points, 5 rebounds
Andrea Bargnani - Italy - 22 points, 5 rebounds
Boris Diaw - France - 21 points, 4 rebounds, 4 assists

Kostas Koufos - Greece - 19 points, 4 blocks
Andrei Kirilenko - Russia - 25 points, 5 rebounds, 4 steals
Deyan Ivanov - Bulgaria - 23 points, 5 rebounds

Juan Carlos Navarro - Spain - 22 points, 4 assists
Dirk Nowitzki - Germany - 25 points, 6 rebounds
Mirza Teletovic - Bosnia - Herzegovina - 26 points, 9 rebounds
Ante Tomic - Croatia - 23 points, 3 rebounds
Goran Dragic - Slovenia - 18 points, 5 steals