Factoring In 08/10/2009

- Despite owning a black Michael Vick Falcons jersey, I'm not a big fan of him. In fact, I think he's an idiot. He threw away everything and for what? Dog fighting. It makes me sick to think about what he did to those dogs and if it were up to me, I would've thrown his ass in jail for life. But its not up to me and now Vick is back and looking to get back into the NFL. Despite my dislike for him as a person, he is a great football player and can single handily turn a loser into a championship caliber team. He already did it once with the Falcons. People forget that he took a 5-11 Falcons team in 2003, turned them around into a 11-5 team in 2004 and led them to the NFC championship game and pretty much did it all by himself. In order to be successful in anything you do, you need to be willing to do whatever it takes. The people that are willing to do whatever it takes, will always have an advantage over the people that are not. Nothing Vick did off the field should be considered when making football decisions. He is an exciting, 3 time Pro Bowl quarterback and if I was running an NFL franchise and my QB position was in bad shape (like a lot of teams are), I would've been trying to acquire him the second he stepped out of the jail.

- "Super Bowl Champion Peyton Manning is the highest paid player in football". That seems about right. Three time MVP, threw for over 4000 yards 9 times, threw 30+ TDs 4 times in his career. How about if I change one word in it? "Super Bowl Champion Eli Manning is the highest paid player in football". What?? So let me get this straight. A guy that has never won an MVP award or passed for more than 4000 yards in a season or thrown more than 24 TD passes is the highest paid player in football? What a complete waste of money! He's a solid quarterback, but highest paid player in football? Really Giants? Really? You know just because the Yankees spend like there's no tomorrow doesn't mean you can. There IS a salary cap. Instead of wasting that money on Eli, maybe they could have saved some of it and acquired a wide receiver to replace Plaxico Burress. This is simply wasteful and careless on the part of the Giants and it will bite them in the ass down the line.

- So "Big Papi" David Ortiz was outed for performance enhancing drugs. He appeared on the 2003 list of players that tested positive for drugs. I have been saying for 5 years now that Ortiz was on something and people looked at me like I just swore at the Pope. In 2002, good hitter, but by no means anything special. By 2004, he was giant, power hitting MVP candidate. Take a look at Ortiz prior to 2003 and take a look at him now. Huge difference in body type. Take a look at his numbers. In 2002, he had 20 homers and 75 RBI. After that year, his homerun totals increased fast (31, 41, 47, and 54). Once the league announced that they would punish PED users, his numbers suddenly began to drop, 35 HR in 2006, 23 in '08 and just 15 so far this season. Ortiz also had heart problems last year. According to BodyBuilding.com, heart problems can be a problem for steroid users. Now Ortiz is denying it. After all that's the baseball way. Deny, deny, deny and then when there's a mountain of indisputable evidence against you, you apologize, say you made a mistake and everybody's happy.

- Lots of people have been asking me "What do I think of the Red Wings off season?" expecting me to say "Ohhh we're doomed. We lost Hossa, Samuelsson and Hudler and now we have no one." The Wings won the Cup without Hossa in '08, Sammy has been replaced with Jason Williams, who already knows the Wings system and Patrick Eaves will be every bit as good as Huds, if not better. Plus, the Wings will now get full time contributions from Darren Helm, Jonathan Ericsson and Ville Leino who will be a Calder finalist this upcoming season.

- The New York Yankees own the best record in baseball. They have a $192 million payroll. The Pittsburgh Pirates have the 3rd worst record in baseball. They have a $49 million payroll. Baseball needs a salary cap. Despite there being 30 teams in MLB, in reality there's only about 6-8 teams while everyone else is simply a farm club for them.