Many people have commented on ways to better the competition but I have been thinking about the rest of the blogers, you know us los^H^H^H, umm… the rest of us.

Why doesn’t Fox Sports, on the FOXBlog’s Blog, offer up topic suggestions for the community?  Not requirements but suggestions.

Perhaps, for next week with the Conference Championship games deciding who plays in the Super Bowl they could have a post suggesting: 

Bloggers, this week four teams will play out for the chance to play in Super Bowl XV in Detroit.  These games have turn in memorable games like the Ice Bowl, games that included ``The Drive’’ and ``The Fumble’’, and introduced football fans to the tuck rule.

Have a favorite memory about a game that decided who went to any championship game or series?  

Let everybody here about it!

Post your story and comment here about it here.

 Just a thought.

You're travelling through another dimension, a dimension not only of fonts and graphics but of typos and mindlessness; a journey into a wondrous websites whose boundaries are that of imagination. There is a post up ahead - your next stop, the Fox Sports Blog Zone!

''Fox Sports Blog, Internet, Next Great Sportswriter Contest. A little website of images, sentences, postings, and the topic is sports. At the next updated posting and wave of comments, it will be precisely beer-thirty. on Fox Sports Blog... This is Fox Sport Blog on Internet time, in the last calm and reflective moment - before the monsters came."

When the day was young ....

“He admitted himself that he's only 15 years old.  The rules state you have to be 18 years old to even enter the competition.  So to all of you who call ME the ####, look to the guy who just took 1 finalist spot away from someone else out of however many thousands who would have been legally eligible to compete.”

“I think I just chucked up my college education...”

“Well foo, you didn't bash me in this post, so it wasn't as funny, but you make a valid point...If I wasn't eligible for a contest and took one of the finalist spots away from someone who was, then I would feel like a total ####.”

“As someone who didn't make it to the final 16, I was beaten by the better man. It takes a man to admit he was underage, although only after you had lost your spot.”

“Or.. Instead of complaining about it, you can motivate yourself to improve your skills, seeing that we were all beat out by a 15 year old.  You make the choice: Sit and complain or work and get better.”

“I really didn't expect to be a finalist and so I didn't think my age would ever be an issue. When I was announced as a finalist, I strongly considered dropping out because I was under-age. But in the end, the selfishness of a 15 year old did me in, and I decided to keep going to see how far I could get.”

“Too little too late. You took a spot from a legitimate blogger, who could have advanced to round 2.  Thanks for owning up to it, but you cheated not only the contest but all of us others.”

But then a question of recycling comes up ....

“Blatant plagiarism, even if you feebly and unsuccessfully try to "take it back," is the lowest of lows.”

“This was a great find. I can believe that plagiarism is going on in this contest...but I can't believe someone actually found the specifics.”

“But wait! the second underscore is the FOX blogger's version of the "second bullet theory".”

“I can smell a lie like a #### in a car...”

“He is only hurting himself by not responding and now only posting comments by his approval. Actions speak louder than words sometimes.”

“Not to ruin everyone's fun, but did anyone here not think Fox was just going to decide who won this thing and that it is what most originally thought it was...A PUBLICITY STUNT.”

“I just wish someone would come out and say "Hey, this is all a sham" or "Hey, you guys think too much!"”

“I only have one blog site on here.  If you want to know who I am and what I do for a living, my web site address is in my bio.  I am not "having fun" with anyone, nor am I trying (or would I even have the ability) to sabotage anyone.”

“I didn't do this and no one's listening to me, and now if that judge who posted that notice is real, I just got eliminated for something someone else has done to me. I did not do this.”

“I am guilty of PUI myself - Posting Under the Influence...Friends don't let friends drunken post. I got your back.”

“ I've commented on a few blogs now, asking the question "Where are the judges?". There has been a laundry list of items that should've been addressed to this point.”

“Personally I would take Mad Cow disease.”

“Wow... at this point i dont think we can really trust what anyone says they saw or when.”

“We've all been waiting for you to weigh in on this.”

“If he is guilty, then he will be disqualified.”

"The tools of conquest do not necessarily come with bombs and explosions and fallout. There are weapons that are simply thoughts, attitudes, prejudices - to be found only in the minds of bloggers. For the record, prejudices can kill and su####ion can destroy, and a thoughtless, frightened search for a scapegoat has a fallout all its own - for the children, and the children yet unborn. And the pity of it is that these things cannot be confined to the Fox Sports Blog."

My parents always taught me to try and be a good member of the community, you never know who you might have to hit up to borrow a couple of bucks.

After I wrote my post comparing the first years of Charlie Frye and Eli Manning I wanted to read up about what people thought, on here, about Eli Manning.  Since I am from Cleveland I only get to hear what the media says about him and  watch a few games on TV.

After first I trying searching through the categories and trying to find blogs that might mention him, but it was a taunting task that required too much work and brain power.

The search functions on this web site leave a bit to be desired if you just want to search the blogs.

I decide to check and see if Google had started to index this site and as luck would have it, Google had.

Great News.

If you want to search these blogs, you can just goto http://www.google.com and in the search box type:

 site:blogs.foxsport.com words to search for

For example if you wanted to see if anybody has been crazy enough to mention the band Skid Row you could type:

site:blogs.foxsport.com skid row

You will find out that somebody has, that nut being me.

It takes a few days for the latest information to be indexed, but it does a fairly good job of keeping up.

Hope that helps some people out, otherwise I exposed myself for the geek I am for nothing.

You hear the term all the time, “Now I want to get paid.”  It comes is many different forms but the basic idea is there.  Athletes, or even front office people and coaches, will talk about their success and their desire to get compensated for it.

From a simple investigation is seems harmless enough.  Pay your dues and get your paycheck, the American way!  Being the best always has had some association of great pay.  This is, of course, the silliest idea in the world.

Do you really think the best garbage man in the United States is the highest paid?  Ask any teacher if the best teacher in the nation has the biggest contract.

My guess is most fans already know the answer.  This is much of the cause for the outage when somebody involved with sports wants to get paid.

I am not discounting the notion that the best should not be paid the rest.  I am all for the best garbage man to be paid accordingly.  When not encourage the best teacher to continue teaching instead of finding a better paying job outside of the classroom.  It is a terrific sentiment but most of us know that in practice it is not reasonable. 

Many other factors come into play.

Do not think that holdouts are something I am against.  Holdouts, which are individual strikes, have been a main stay of American labor history.  Ask any union and if you wish to be serious and listen to them they can give you valid reason for strikes that reach beyond pay.  Issues such as health care, worker protection, and safety are concerns that weigh into consideration for any strike, as they tell it.

Holdouts and request for more pay are not specifically bad.  I ask for more money at work all the time but I have never added that I would refuse to show up for work until I got my raise.  (Maybe because I simply hate looking for a job, even though I know changing jobs is a great way to get a raise).

The problem starts when players think that being good gives them some right for more money and is a very simple way to get people to turn against you, quickly.  When demanding more pay these people have to remember there are a large number of people at home that think they are the best person in their job and know they are not the best paid. 

But then that raises the question of what really is the best.

Ask 100 people who the best quarterback in NFL history is and I’ll get 22 answers (okay that was the average from the 4 times I have done it in my lifetime).  Ask a room of baseball fans between the age of 85 and 20 who the best pitcher in baseball was and see if you get one answer.  While you are at it, ask people who the best band or musical artist is.

Go ahead, I’ll wait.

Being the best is really, expect in rare occasions, a very subject opinion – yes I understand that this completely goes into the face of my “best teacher or garage man argument above” but it still works – and if somebody wants to stand up and call themselves the best it goes directly against the basic fact that everybody knows; you are not the best ‘cause that guy is better.

Proof? I was at the bar watching TV when Terrell Owens first said he wanted to get paid more money for the 2005 season.  Right next to me was a guy that said, “Why, you weren’t even the best wide receiver in the Super Bowl.  Another receiver won the MVP,” and he was wearing an Eagles Owens jersey! 

People want us to accept that this is entertainment and the same rules don’t apply for those ``in the business’’.  Then want us to accept that we should support something that directly goes against what everybody knows; you can’t just call yourself the best and the best don’t always get the best pay.

For anybody that thinks different ask the next athlete that wants to get paid because he is the best one question. “I am sure there is one person with whom you shared the best sex of your life, how much did you pay them?”

Cleveland is a unique town.  When Moses Cleaveland, yep with the extra ‘A’, first found the town bordered by Lake Erie and a crooked river with a perchance to catch on fire in 1796, who would have thought that many years later I would be sitting behind a keyboard posting ramblings for the world to ignore.

Cleveland ethnic history is interesting, while largely Eastern European still has a great mixture of people.  Yes Cleveland had, and continues, to have issues between all those races – including race riots during the 60’s – but we all usually get along pretty well.

What does this have to do with sports?  More than I originally thought.

By chance I was watching the local news and in the sports segments that happen to show Mike Brown, coach of the Cavs, and Romeo Crennel, coach of the Browns.  I noticed something; they are both black.  That leaves Indians coach Eric Wedge in the minority.

Interesting, I thought to myself.  Why haven’t I heard about this more?  Cleveland is not known as the most progressive city but I find it interesting.  Then, when I thought about it, it just didn’t seem that strange.  Cleveland’s sports teams have a history of diversity. 

Here is a bit of Cleveland sports history you just don’t hear about much.

In 1947, Cleveland Indians owner Bill Veeck purchased the contract of Larry Dolby from the #### League.  Dolby was the first black player in the American League and started for the Indians for many years.  When he passed away a while back I was fairly shocked at home many people just didn’t know about this.

In 1961 John McLendon was named coach on the Cleveland Pipers in the American Basketball League, the first black head coach of a professional basketball team.

In 1975 the Cleveland Indians made Frank Robinson the first manager of a major league baseball team.

In 1967 the first black mayor of a major American city was Cleveland’s Carl B Stokes.  (Yes not sports history but still significant)

While Miguel Angel Gonzalez did manage the St. Louis Cardinals for 23 games between 1938 and 1940, Al Lopez was the first Latino named as a full time manager in 1951.  He managed the Indians to 111 wins in 1954.

Marion Motley and Bill Willis were the first African Americans in the AAFC, which folded into the NFL for the 1950 season.  Marion Motley was the first African American to win a stats title in football when he won the rushing title in 1946.   Bill Willis and Motley were the first African Americans to win all league honors, also in 1946 I in AAFC.  Both players played for the Browns.

Former Cleveland Brown, Ozzie Newsome, was the first African American general manger of a football team.  He became the GM of the former Cleveland Browns, the Baltimore Ravens, in 2002.

Football’s first African American coach was Fritz Pollard in 1921 for Akron.

While I am sure other cities can claim a history, I think Cleveland has a proud list of accomplishments and I am sure I am missing a few things.

So when I was chatting with my dad and we discussed this he simply said to me, “Well my boy you probably didn’t notice because it just isn’t that unusual for a Cleveland sports fan.”

But I have to wonder when the issue of diversity in sports comes up some history from the Northeast Ohio area is not mentioned.  It would seem to be that the little town that General Cleaveland, of the Connecticut Land Company, found all those years ago has contributed quite a bit towards the diversity that all sports are trying to find.  Maybe in trying to find out how to achieve better diversity in sports it might be a good idea to see what was happening in Cleveland during those years from 1945 to 1970.  It seems to be that something right might have been happening during those times.

Now don’t get me wrong I don’t think that Cleveland was a perfect place during those times but something was there.  Maybe trying to look at why some of those events took place might help in the understanding how to make things better.  Maybe looking into Cleveland’s history can contribute to the success.