The Latest

It's been a hectic time with a new house, bad car accident, and new puppy but things have started to settle down a little. I plan on dusting off the website over the next year and adding a couple new sections. Thanks for your patience.

Positive Affirmations:

I'm alive. You sort of take that for granted until something reminds you how fragile life truly can be. In my case, in November a semi truck couldn't stop coming down a freeway hill and slammed into the back of my stopped car. After a while I was able to eventually pull off the freeway, and as I was reaching into the passenger side to get my information out (from outside the passenger door), the truck roared down the hill and hit me again knocking me back into th car. He almost missed the car and hit me dead on. I don't know of many people who survived getting hit by a semi truck twice, and especially twice in the same day, so in that regard I feel very lucky (despite neck and back issues).

Collecting wise, I was able to get out to see some new collectors in person, and see or talk to some old friends. Picked up some beauties over the last couple of months as well (see Featured), and leapt head-first into figural trophies and football helmets (new section coming soon).

Congrats back-to-back champs, Los Angeles Lakers! And yes, it was a little more special against the hated Celtics.

It's nice to see the Padres and Rays doing well. I'm mostly intrigued that they have been as successful with such small team payrolls, but also because the two managers were bench coaches for the 2002 World Champion Angel team.

Rants:

My Angels were a mess this year, partially by their own doing. They let three of their most popular players leave in free agency and acted surprised that fan interest waned. All three of the replacements had horrible years, which isn't just bad luck. And then, one of the bright spots remaining -- in his contract year -- broke his leg at home plate celebrating a rare Angel homer. Hey, at least college football is starting up.

Oh yea, almost forgot that my favorite college football team, USC, was pummeled by the NCAA and can't participate in a bowl for the next two years, lost a bunch of scholarships the next two years, had the NCAA promoting current players and recruits to transfer, and several other crippling sanctions. Throughout the course of history there have been very few things that I have agreed with the NCAA on, but in this case they to took it to an extreme in what looks like an absolutely biased and unprecedented witch hunt. Before you pile on take a look at the facts. Reggie Bush apparently took gifts from an agent AFTER he was already on the team. The agent was not an alumni, there was no proven connection to the school or high level coaches, and the gifts were NOT an incentive for him to stay, but rather to GO pro and preferrably to go pro early (which he did). And oh by the way, the majority was given to his parents in San Diego which was hidden and outside USC's reasonable span of control. When you send me your disagreeing emails -- which I actually welcome - let me know which team you follow and I'll help remind you how several teams (probably yours) were found guilty of something more directly tied to the school, related to recruiting, and punished significantly less. We should be able to agree that the level of sanctions was unprecedented given lack of connection to the school (and counter-benefit to the school). I feel sorry for current players who had nothing to do with it, while Reggie Bush reamains unpunished and "just wants to move forward." We all do, Reggie, we all do.

Let me get this straight, Lebron James left a team that had post season success and the best record in basketball the last two years to go to a contender?!! I thought it would have been admirable to stay with Clevelend to lead his team over the top, or understandable even to go to New York or New Jersey to restart those big city organizations, but am really bothered that he took this easy way out. And yes, how he did it was brutally epic.

Really sorry to hear the news that fellow SDSU alum Steven Strasburg needs Tommy John surgury, and I certainly hope that he is able to return to his early brilliance. It just goes to show you how historically tough it has been for strikeout pitchers to maintain that consistency throughout their careers, and especially through long careers. Makes you really appreciate guys like Nolan Ryan and Bert Blyleven even more. Speaking of which, it still absolutely astounds me that the number THREE guy all-time in strikeouts when he retired (and number ONE in the modern era) still isn't in the Hall of Fame. Bert Blyleven only missed by a handful of votes last year and here's hoping that the non voters wake up out of their haze or stubborness.

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