Just a note to anyone reading this blog: I have never written a blog before, so I range through several topics that are interesting to me without any real coherent force binding the thoughts together. I hope that that is fine for everyone, as it gets even more chaotic with my changing writing style as I am oft to try new things or be creative. I've already had one person comment that I should save it for my creative writing class. I also will admit that I can be a little late in my writing; I am busy with college and it takes a bit to write a good post, so I might be a few days behind a good story. One last note-I renamed my blog "Coma Slide," a name that only the lacrosse players (and then only some) reading this will understand. I had a more artsy creative name before, but I thought it was not fitting for a sports blog. In lacrosse, a slide is a shifting of the defense to help someone out when they lose their assignment. Picture someone attacking the goal from the outside; if he burns his defender, another defender needs to "slide" over to pick him up, denying him a clean shot on the goal. A "Coma Slide" occurs when the defense slides directly across the crease, usually as a last ditch effort to stop a goal. Picture an attackmen bringing the ball up from behind the net, trying to get enough of an angle to get a good shot off on the goalie. As soon as he gets above the goal-line, the defenseman on the other post slides across and attempts to hit him as hard as he can. Usually, the attackman will not be able to see the sliding defenseman; the combination of a big hit and having it come from the blind side is what makes it a coma slide-the intention is to hit the player hard enough to put them in a coma, although it is not meant literally to harm anyone. I employ the reference in the sense that I hope to have the strength of a logical argument on my side, thereby in any sort of debate being able to close the door and prevent a point from being made. No violence necessary, and I don't mean to insult anyone by any of my counter arguments, most of the time I just have a different opinion.

Having read about the NFL's decision regarding Ricky Williams, I think it is a shame. A shame not just to waste all of that talent and natural ability, but also a shame that the NFL was so strict in dealing with him. I understand that Ricky screwed up before; his recreational marijuana use caused his disgraceful retirement a week before the season began in 2004. That poor decision cost the head coach his job and has since shaped Miami in becoming the team that it is now. Ignoring that, all reports that I have read have made mention that this time he did not knowingly take any substance or drug and that he was not caught smoking again. That is why all of the coaches tried to defend him and everyone made mention of his standup character after he returned from his hiatus. Last season he stepped into the locker room knowing that he was going to be watched, but he was successful in turning the attention into a positive and leading by example, working harder than anyone else on and off the field. Many of you have differing opinions of the man, but I see him as a tragic hero forever chained to the game that he loved and loathed so much. The beating his body took, caused by his great ability to give it-for every run and broken tackle that he made, he received pain and attention, two things he did not want. The pain was a part of the job, but he suffered through more than his share of it. He carried 383 times in 2002; he followed that with 392 in 2003. To put that in perspective, only one other person has reached 380 since 2002-Jamal Lewis did so during his record setting season. To say that the beating he took from the numerous carries was not a factor in his recreational drug use is like saying that corrupt CEO's were not responsible for Enron. He used marijuana for many different reasons; on top of whatever else he used it for, it was also his self medicating way of dealing with his social anxiety disorder. At this point in time, it does not matter how or why he struggled so mightily with a marijuana dependency (or at least a strong affinity towards). What matters is his future, and his future is in doubt. He has been suspended for the entire year, both thrusting Ronnie Brown into first round fantasy draft territory and also leaving the possibility of another return in doubt. People point to his increasing age (He will be 30 when he is able to play again, ancient in running back years) as an indicator that he will never play again, but I think the very reason he was driven to leave the league might very well keep him in it. All of the carries that he had and all of the beating that he took caused him to realize that he did not want to suffer for the rest of his life because of his profession-he did not want to run himself out of existence or become the Ali of football. That is partially the reason for the sabbatical, if you would like to call it that, and with a year off, three quarters on and another year off, he is better for two reasons. One, even though he will be 30, the reason 30 is thought of as an old age is because of the consistent wearing down of the body. In his case, instead of further wearing his body down, he has found himself again and has treated his body with plenty of rest and holistic medicine. Those two years off will definitely help his body heal and restore after many years of football, giving him slightly fresher legs than when he left. The second and more important reason this has helped him: during his original year off, he lost a lot of weight and came back to the league much lighter. In 2005, he no longer attempted to run through the defenders, instead using his speed and elusiveness to scamper around them. He was not as dominant at first, needing to get his legs under him, but his talent was there nonetheless. You need look no further than at his rushing towards the end of the season; in the last three games, he shined. Against the Jets he rushed 14 times for 70 yards, a full 5 yards per carry. He stepped it up the following week against the Titans, enjoying a 172 yard romp through their defense. He finished with the season finale, running a hard-fought 108 yards against the New England Patriots. What this means to me is that he is not done-I can only hope that some other team agrees with me. I want to see him come back and show his talent again; show his shiftiness in eluding defenders and thereby allowing himself to extend his stay at the professional level. If nobody else will take him, I hope that Belichick will make another smart move and sign him, ignoring the growing concern like he did with signing Corey Dillon. As debatable as that move was, it led directly to a Super Bowl, and I think Ricky Williams has that level of ability even now.

Now that the frenzied news coverage of Reggie Bush's alleged violations has died down, I have finally been able to watch ESPN without throwing things at the television whenever they waste my time discussing it. I will mention that this will be a tangent from the actual topic, but I will also warn you that you might begin throwing things at your computer very soon, because now it is my turn to talk about it. As to the actual alleged violations, whether Bush's family did accept free rent for a house they lived in, I really don't care. And neither should you. I don't think that anyone should care, there should have been no news story, no coverage anywhere of this sort of thing happening. Why? Because it should be legal. Or more properly, because the reasons they accepted the generosity should be negated by allowing NCAA players to profit from their playing. That is what I am endorsing here: players that play well, that awe us with their athletic ability and win games that somehow matter to us, players that sell tickets and in many other ways profit their respective universities, those players should profit as well. I read an interesting article about the profit individual players like Reggie Bush can generate for their schools; an economist created a formula that took into account all of the various ways a school made money. According to this formula, Reggie Bush accounted for $500,000 of profit, without even including merchandise sales. The NCAA itself is the main beneficiary, basically exploiting the college athlete as a way to receive corporate sponsors. There is an estimated 3.5 billion dollars being created just by Division I football and basketball programs, yet the NCAA refuses to pay their players. The argument made is that all of the money is spent on enabling NCAA events to happen; all excess money goes to lower profile sports that wouldn't otherwise have any funding. Often mentioned, along with this argument, is that the NCAA is not going to hand out salaries to the college players; "We have a model for paying players. It's called professional sports," NCAA President Myles Brand says. While I agree with that observation in some aspects, I will quickly point out the inherent exploitation: The model for paying football players, the NFL, does not permit athletes to be drafted until three years removed from high school. If this was not the case, if players were offered the choices of either going to college or playing professionally, then I would wholeheartedly agree with Myles Brand's comment. As it stands now, however, there is a transitional period where potentially amazing athletes cannot profit from their playing- instead they are forced to take on a great deal of risk and responsibility while playing in college. I am not against this situation-I think that the three years in college help athletes both mature physically and as a football player, thus creating better prospects and also giving the NFL teams a better glimpse into the true talent level. On top of being inefficient, it would be near impossible for scouts to pour through all of the local high schools and try to choose which players would be good candidates for the NFL. Major League Baseball does this to an extent, scouting high school players along with college, but they have the luxury of sending their draft picks to the minor leagues. Teams make judgments based on high school or college performance and then gamble on selecting players, assigning them to increasing levels of competition in order to hone their game and mature them to be ready for the Major League level. Now contrast that to College Football-in effect, College Football acts as the Minor Leagues of the NFL. Players are not signed, nobody has gambled as yet; those two distinctions are actually what separate the two and also allow the NFL to be a cleaner operation with less overhead. It benefits them to not need a minor league system-instead they choose from the best of the football prospects and throw them directly into action. That is one of the differences between baseball and football-football players need a couple years of physical development, but at that point in time they are ready to take on the challenge of competing at the professional level. Baseball players do not need as much time to physically develop, but oftentimes it takes years for them to develop as a player capable of competing at the highest level. Now that I have laid some framework for my argument, I will stray back on topic and attempt to drive my point home. I am not encouraging the NCAA to pay a salary to the players; spreading money over that large an audience would hardly benefit anyone. At first I thought that the universities themselves could pay their players, but that creates a greater gap between large market schools that have a lot of revenue and the smaller but still competitive schools that do not. There is also the concern of who would be paid; would only the top players be given money or would the entire team benefit? Money based on merit could also happen-corporate sponsors could set up individual payouts or stipends to players winning league or conference honors. The best solution, as far as I am concerned? Corporate Sponsors giving endorsement deals based on merit. Endorsements are currently not allowed and justifiably so-if playing for a large market team like USC could get more endorsements, more players would follow the money to USC and enlarge the talent gap between large and small market schools. No, instead of popularity-based endorsements, merit-based endorsements blur the line between big and small school appeal. A company could buy the rights to the Heisman winner, for instance, not ensuring any one player in particular but guaranteeing a top player overall. To make it more profitable, all of the runner-ups would be given endorsement deals too, thereby increasing interest in the competition and allowing companies to advertise certain players in certain regions for greater effect. The point to all of this is not the commercialization of college football-that has already happened. The point to this is allowing the players that have set themselves apart as players to benefit; guidelines would be created to tolerate a select few endorsements deals, thereby allowing the biggest names to profit before they reach the Professional level. As the system is now, the NCAA acts as a policing organization, not allowing any money to trickle down to the players. While not supporting illegal booster programs, I think that something should be done to benefit the top players; players that oftentimes do not have much money and would love the chance to stay in college and compete yet still make enough money to help their families.

The New York Yankees. The Boston Red Sox. The "Greatest and most intense rivalry in baseball," courtesy of wikipedia. "Evil Empire" vs. "The Bloody Sock." And me in the middle of it. You see, I am one of a very small and rationalizing minority that can actually say with a straight face that I am a Yankees Red Sox fan. I don't hide it, I don't mince words when I say it, I do so in the pained yet practiced way that a child might try to swallow cough syrup without ever tasting it, knowing that the dreaded aftertaste will soon follow and leave me wishing I had just let myself cough. Sharing my allegiance-confusion with people has never been a positive; the best case scenario is a look of disbelief from most men and a nod of agreement from some girls that I know that good naturedly think that there is an actual baseball team by that name. The majority of people that I have shared that information with respond in a much more negative way; one friend by attempting to kick me out of her apartment, while my girlfriend threatened to break up with me. I can happily say that my girlfriend was able to look past my deficiency and I convinced my other friend that I should stay, probably by waving something shiny or offering to mix her a drink. I am sure you are wondering how an American citizen without the influence of drugs or alcohol could make the claim of being a Yankees Red Sox fan, and I will try my best to outline for you the only way that I know of becoming one, which is of course by being me. It all started when I had the fortune (or misfortune as my girlfriend would say) of being born in the great state of New York, right in the middle of the Capital District. Growing up playing baseball, I was forced to brave a sea of choices and pick the team that best suited me. I took the easiest route I could and instead of braving the ocean and deciding on my own, I stuck to my little harbor and chose what my father liked, the New York Yankees. I didn't want to pick something else for fear of ridicule and excess decision making, so I was happy to fall in line with my father and brother and idly root for the Yankees. My interest grew and I began to actually like them, even before they became the Dynasty. I remember pretending to be asleep as a child, not wanting to leave my room, and my dad would always trick me and have my brother ring the doorbell and tell me Don Mattingly was here to see me. Somehow, even while I knew that he was a celebrity and there was no way he would be here, even with the game on the TV and the image of Don Mattingly at first base, the possibility that it could happen was always forefront in my mind. The excitement that I felt wanting it to be true caused me to jump out of bed and go running to find only my brother laughing at me with the door open and nobody there. There was a slight twist to all this, a loophole that was created as a child and would be exploited as an adult, or else I would always and forever be a Yankees fan and hate the Red Sox. The loophole was created by my uncle, an avid Red Sox fan with a beautiful Boston accent; his brother had a radio show and always had season tickets to the games that he didn't always use. Not having children of his own at that point, my uncle invited us out to see a game and I got to spend an afternoon with him being boisterous and rooting raucously for the Red Sox to defeat my beloved Yankees at Fenway Park. To offset this, my dad took me down to New York City and I saw the rivalry from the New York perspective, thus furthering the identity diffusion that I was stricken with. I even got to see the rivalry down in Florida for Spring Training; I rooted for the Yankees but never too hard. And then, right in the midst of my development, I moved to Maine. I was now in New England, the heart of Red Sox Nation, and all through my teenage years I was forced to lie and tell people that I was a Red Sox lifer and that I had forsaken my childhood team. I knew I liked the Yankees but I had to keep it to myself for fear of being labeled as an outsider. Maine is a tough state to move to- if you were born in New Hampshire, even if you lived all of your life in Maine, people would still consider you an out-of-stater. That label can follow you everywhere, but I was able to minimize its effects by not mentioning my Yankees affiliation and by adopting the New England Patriots as my own, a team that I sincerely cheered for and cared about. (That was possible because of Bill Parcells, as crazy as that sounds-when he left the Giants for the Patriots, my heart left with him, and I have been a fan ever since.) The most difficult thing about this was the timing of it all. If I had moved 6 years later or several years before, I would probably have successfully rehabilitated and become a Red Sox fan and loved it. But I moved in the summer of 1996, just as the Yankees were on the on their way to their first World Series of my existence. The entire time I was enthralled, in a way missing home and cheering for the Yankees because of it. During the playoffs, I believe I can honestly count myself as one of a dozen Yankee fans in the entire state of Maine, not counting a few moose that didn't know any better. The reason this is important was because of the affirmation of my allegiance it caused. A win would produce a feeling of happiness in me; therefore, the Yankees caused me happiness. At the same time, even if I had wanted to root for the Red Sox, each and every time that I tried they lost miserably and it made me associate the Red Sox with losing. I bought into the team at that point; I could have wrestled myself and my heart away from them, allowed myself to take the easy route and just enjoy the Red Sox, but the feeling of despair I got the next year when we didn't win just furthered in me the connection I had with the Yankees. I was not dependent, I was not ignorant or die hard or anything of that nature, I just knew that I enjoyed when the Yankees won. So in 1998, when we again got to the World Series, my dad was able to get my brother and I tickets right in the middle of the die hard fans, the crazy ones out in the left field bleachers. I loved it, the game was great, El Duque pitched amazing, but I could easily see the chasm that separated me from the rest of the fans around me. Where they amused themselves with chanting and hanging an effigy of Kevin Brown, I was happy just watching the game and not clapping, not yelling, just intently thinking about what was going on. I wasn't a fan at all, I didn't blindly dive into the raw emotion that was all around me, instead I would pick and choose what I felt and what I wanted to be a part of. That indecisiveness is what clinched it, even as I knew I was a Yankees fan, there was leeway enough for me to add another team to the end. Yankees Red Sox fan; at that point it didn't quite fit, but a couple more years removed from living in New York, a couple of more years of watching games with my uncle, I came to see it differently. The Yankees got my hopes up, they almost beat the Diamondbacks, but didn't; they almost did a lot of things, but didn't. The almost-victories put them back where the Red Sox had been-I didn't chose either really. I was apathetic, a non-baseball fan, the same kid who once brought a book and read the entire duration of a game in Montreal, missing out on being one of the first to witness Pedro Martinez being a dominant pitcher. In 2003, the rivalry became even more heated, only to end unceremoniously by Aaron Boone, someone my girlfriend still reviles with all of her heart. That ending, and the sadness that came upon the entire campus afterwards; both things affected me. At the same time that I was happy that the Yankees had won, I almost wish the Red Sox had gotten a chance. And then we lost to the Marlins, just like the Diamondbacks, in a Game 7. All the talent that Steinbrenner could purchase did not give us a win, all the heartache I felt when Boston lost I felt again. 2004 was going to be different, 2004 was the year the Red Sox could do no wrong, everyone in New England wrote about how good the Red Sox were and how they were going to finally put their problems behind them; Grady Little was no longer around to keep Pedro out too long, so they were guaranteed a win. During the regular season, they did a good job, but everyone knew it didn't matter; the playoffs were all that mattered. And so we waited, and I finally realized something-I wanted them to win. I wanted them to finally win a championship; I empathized with the average fan and didn't want to see the 1918 sticker on any more cars around here. But by the time they were losing to the Yankees, three games to none, my apathetic nature revealed itself again. Instead of feeling down, I started to realize that maybe, just maybe, being a Yankees fan did not make me spawn of the devil. I could come to grips with it, I could accept myself for who I was, and that seeing us win did in a way make me happy. I wouldn't be "that fan"; I was at a bar when a person broke into cheers for the Yankees when they tore open Game 3, god rest his soul, but I would be the fan that quietly smiled and hoped that nobody saw. And we all know what happened next. Or, in case some of you are like my friend who nodded in agreement, you don't, so I will explain-the Red Sox got their act together, stepped up to the plate and followed Ortiz in winning the next 4 in a row. And here I was, having rooted for them to beat my Yankees yet feeling down about it. I was confused, a mess, a disoriented fan who just didn't want to have a vested interest in anything. But in the World Series, I rooted for the Red Sox, and they rewarded me with a victory. It wasn't as sweet, but it was something. I met my girlfriend last spring, before any rivalry between the two really mattered. By the time she knew that I was a Yankees Red Sox fan, it was too late for her to really do anything-she wasn't going to really break up with me, she just wouldn't tell her mom about it. But then she did, and her whole family accepted me for what I was, or wasn't, and they looked instead to my unwavering loyalty to the Patriots as showing me to be a kindred spirit. In gratitude for her generosity, I have started to lean more and more towards the Red Sox, and right now, I would say I am almost split dead even. Not quite, I still like the Yankees, which is why they come first, but I like the Red Sox quite a bit too. Actually, what I really like about the Red Sox is I admire the way Epstein is building a talent base using the minor leagues, not just throwing money at talented veterans. Boston's payroll is still up there, but they are starting to learn; as good as Johnny Damon is, getting Crisp is a good deal and that mentality will give them a Dynasty soon. The Yankees haven't been a Dynasty since they started buying free agents-they built their Dynasty with young Yankees, guys that came all the way through the system and made it big. Jeter, Williams, Rivera, Pettite. There are more, of course, but the Dynasty itself was forged by people with a common purpose, men who fought together all the way. I hope the Red Sox stick to their strategy; I hope they stay young, or get younger, and let their prospects come up and shine. The fact that it makes me excited gives my girlfriend hope for the future; hope that I can finally feel like she does. But I am still conflicted; I still have wavering loyalty to both teams, and am happy in my decision to split the difference. Oh, did I mention that I like Oakland a lot too?