Tuesday Tidbits (Wed.Edition)

Welcome to the belated edition of Tuesday Tidbits. I'm moving slowly this week for a variety of reasons so I didn't get around to this yesterday. Nevertheless, here are a few items of interest from the sporting world and otherwise:

In the aftermath of the Breeders Cup, several stars have been retired and their stud fees have been announced, including Kentucky Derby winner Street Sense, $75,000; his father Street Cry, $100,000; Derby and Breeders Cup Classic runner-up Hard Spun, $50,000; and Breeders Cup Dirt Mile winner Corinthian, $40,000.

Reggie Bush sued in San Diego by co-founder of failed sports and entertainment agency for recovery of wide array of benefits paid to him while he was at USC, probably the worst thing that could have happened to USC in this whole mess. Now, the NCAA has something on the record to pursue in its investigation.

Heidi Klum married Seal for his, um, physical gifts, she explained to Oprah.

Yankees new manager, Joe Girardi, a Northwestern engineering graduate, may need every bit of that education to handle the zoo he will now run for an estimated $2.6 million per year for 3 years.

It looks like his predecessor will wind up in Dodger blue.

Billionaire sporting goods retailer Mike Ashley is building on his stake in Umbro, which is the subject of a takeover by Nike; is he angling for a better price or negotiating position for his stores?

Get Ready to Samba

FIFA confirmed the obvious yesterday and awarded the 2014 World Cup to Brazil, the lone bidder from South America. In the rotation order in effect, 2014 was South America's turn, and the South American confederation had determined that only one bidder was going to be allowed to bid. It had decided on Brazil and yesterday FIFA made it official, returning to Brazil for the first time since 1950.

In addition, FIFA awarded the 2011 Women World Cup to Germany in a narrow decision over Canada. Germany, the WWC holder, hosted the men's Cup in 2006, while Canada hosted the Under 20 World Cup this past summer.

Finally, in an apparent polictical payback for his reelection, FIFA President Sepp Blatter engineered the end of the rotation system for the men's World Cup with the award to Brazil in 2014. The 2018 World Cup will be open to any confederation and not just to CONCACAF, the confederation to which the US belongs, which would have been the next host under the rotation policy. As a result, England, Russia, China, Australia, Mexico, the Benelux countries in a joint bid and the US are all expected to bid for the 2018 Cup. England may have a decided edge though due in part to a political debt from Blatter, in part to an emotional debt to the birthplace of soccer which hasn't hosted the World Cup since 1966 and due to the facilities in place from the building boom accompanying the growth of the Premier League, the 2012 Olympics and the 2015 Rugby World Cup.

Curlin Settles Horse of the Year

In a dramatic finishing kick to the Race of the Year, Curlin ended any debate over who should be the Horse of the Year. Expertly ridden as usual by Robby Albarado, Curlin used a blazing drive down the stretch at Monmouth yesterday to win the Breeder's Cup Classic by a definitive 41/2 lengths over Hard Spun, with Awesome Gem overtaking a fading Street Sense for third. Hard Spun had led going into the stretch run with both Curling and Street Sense on his heels, as the three rivals meeting for the last time, made a memorable turn for home, but Curlin left no doubt as to who was the class of this class and of this year's thoroughbreds as he ignored the track's slop, and the mud in his face and Albarado's goggles to pull well clear of the field and take home the $2,700,00 winner's share of the richest purse in North America.

Of course, that means that Curlin's owners, who include not only the crusading Jess Jackson, about whom I wrote a couple of weeks ago, but the jailed trial lawyers Bill Gallion and Shirley Cunningham. Let's hope that their share of the the purse can be used to help fund the repayment of some the fess they diverted from the fen-phen victims they represented. So, congrats to Jess Jackson and his partners, Robby Albarado and trainer Steve Asmussen.

NCAA Settles with North Dakota Over Fighting Sioux NIckname

The NCAA has settled the lawsuit filed by the University of North Dakota over the use of the Fighting Sioux, allowing UND the right to use the nickname and imagery for three years while it tried to obtain tribal approval to use it longer. If UND does not obtain approval from the tribal councils at both the Spirit Lake and Standing Rock Sioux Reservations to retain its nickname within three years, then it must give it up. A copy of the settlement agreement can be read here.

The NCAA's willingness to settle can only be interpreted as a recognition of the weakness of its case. As we discussed previously here and here, UND maintained that the NCAA failed to follow its own internal procedures in adopting the rules in the first place and it's likely that the NCAA finally realized the strength of the university's case, because the NCAA is not exactly known for settling.

Shareholders Bitch Slap Dolans

It's just not the Dolans year. First, their boy, Isiah Thomas and Madison Square Garden lose a big sexual harassment suit, then MSG goes and sues its own league in the NHL and now the shareholders of Cablevision have rejected the Family's plan to take the company private. You wonder what Jimmy Dolan says to himself when he looks in the mirror in the morning. More importantly, you have to wonder what the old man, Charles Dolan, the family godfather, says to Jimmy when he gets to work every morning. It's certainly not going his way so those conversations can't be pleasant.

The Dolans now say that Cablevision will remain an independent company and that they have no plans to sell out. If that is true, then you could very well argue that the shareholders have shot themselves in the foot in an effort to get back at the Dolans. At the time of this post, Cablevision is selling at $29.51, down 4.25% on the day and well below the $36.26 price of the Dolan's offer. It's unlikely to get back to that price anytime soon, although there are some analysts who think who may get to $40 in a year. Cable stocks have been retreating in recent weeks, with Comcast down 10% today on lowered quarterly earnings which failed to meet expectations. If a sale to Time Warner or someone else does not materialize soon, spite may come at a high cost.

Ranger v. NHL - the NYT speaks

I previously discussed the Rangers suit against the NHL in which the team's rhetoric features phrases like “unrestricted power,” “illegal cartel,” “seizure,” “crackdown” and “blatant expropriation of team assets,” in discussing the league. Not exactly the type of language you would expect to see when discussing your partner. The Times media beat writer, Richard Sandomir, weighs in today with an article assessing the case which is worth your read and thanks to The Sports Economist for pointing it out. This is a case that will be well worth following and should be entertaining to boot.

Tuesday's Tidbits

There may be no bigger Red Sox fans than executives at Fox. Game 7 of the ALCS drew 9 million viewers and an 11.7/18 household rating and share, the largest League Championship TV audience and rating since 2004, when it featured none other than the Red Sox and the Yankees. The ALCS as a whole drew an average of 11.6 million viewers per game and an average 7.4/13 household rating/share. That is up 49 percent over last year’s ALCS series in viewers and 37 percent in household ratings. Now Fox is just praying for similar magic in college football.

Nike agreed to buy Umbro Plc or a total of 285 million pounds, or $580 million. I discussed this offer in more detail the other day here. The bid is friendly and supported by Umbro management, although two of Umbro's largest shareholder's, retailers and rivals Sports Direct and JJB Sports Plc, which own about 25% of Umbro between them, have not been heard from.

The Carnival of Sports Business, third edition is now up (well, actually, it's been up a couple of days, I'm just late) and you should get over there if you haven't already. It's worth checking out.

Congratulations to Kimi Raikkonen on his win in the Grand Prix of Brazil which gave him the F-1 Championship. Raikkonen took advantage of a mistake by Lewis Hamilton on the first lap and beat Hamilton's teammate Fernando Alonso, who placed third. The win, coupled with Hamilton's seventh place finish, was just enough to earn Raikkonen the championship by one point. However, Team McLaren has filed an appeal of a decision by race official not to penalize drivers for fuel irregularities. The drivers who finished fourth, fifth and sixth all had fuel which registered at a too low temperature. Should they be disqualified, Hamilton would be moved up to fourth giving him enough points to win the championship.

NFL to Toronto, Eh - Part II

The NFL move to Toronto took on the look of inevitability this week as the Buffalo Bills asked the city and county and the NFL for permission to play an exhibition game in Toronto in 2008, followed by an annual home game each season starting in 2009. The games would be played in the Rogers Centre, formerly the SkyDome. I think it is likely the NFL will approve, while the city and county approval may be more problematic. The Bills are justifying the move as a way to expand their marketing to Toronto, which is only 80 miles away, however it could just as easily be interpreted as paving the way for the move of the Bills to the city when Bills owner Ralph Wilson leaves the scene. It's going to get very interesting in the Empire City.

College Arms Race: Exhibit A - Ohio State

Friday, the Wall Street Journal devoted a feature story to an examination of the enormity that is the athletic budget of Ohio State. It's an interesting look at the state of college athletics. The sorry state of college athletics I should say. One line from the article about OSU speaks volumes, not just about the Buckeyes either, as the multiplier might be different on other campuses but the principle isn't. In attempting to put the OSU athletic budget of $109, 382,222 in perspective, Jon Weinbach points out that Ohio State spends "about $110,000 on each of its 980 athletes, which is triple the amount the university spends per undergraduate on education.

While there are a couple of minor mistakes, such as that the NCAA paid Ohio State for its BCS Championship Game appearance, when in fact, the NCAA has nothing to do with bowls other than certifying them. All BCS bowl revenue is paid by the BCS itself. Those minor mistakes do not detract from the overall impact of the piece. I commend it to your attention - he has do an excellent job in portraying the sheer extravagance of the money being spent by the top tier programs and what can only be described as wasteful. Does a college hockey team really need a treadmill that the Stanley Cup champions haven't been able to accommodate? Are 6 flat screen TVs in a locker room really necessary? Where did it all go so wrong?

Is Nike After Umbro?

It was a gloomy week for English soccer fans after the national team faced a Russian storm and saw its hopes for European qualifications meet the same fate as Napoleon's Russian campaign. Surprisingly, shares of Umbro, whose major asset is the contract to make replica jerseys of the English national team until 2014 rose handsomely after the English defeat when one would have expected a rather sharp decline. What was behind the rise? None other than a possible bid for the company by the avaricious soles from Beaverton.

Nike has stated its goal of the domination of world soccer by the 2010 World Cup in South Africa and since it did so poorly in Germany the campaign has not been going too swimmingly. A purchase of Umbro, and with it the most popular jersey in the world (surprisingly not Brazil, but England, I guess you just can't escape Beckhamania) would certainly be a major step in that direction and would add another significant asset to the soccer portfolio. It would give Adidas something else to be worried about as they try to maintain their place in soccer at the same time as they are fighting it out with Nike in basketball in China.

Sao Paulo Residents Profit on F-1 Championship

For strategically located Sao Paulo residents, this weekend's Formula One race will be a gold mine. The Grand Prix of Brazil will decide the season long championship in a three way battle among rookie Lewis Hamilton, his teammate Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen. The race is sold out with all 120,000 sold at prices topping $1,000.

These well located Sao Paulo residents are holding parties in their apartments and charging admission to view the race and making good money doing so. Many residents are selling space on their terraces or in their apartments for up to about $85 per person. This is to cram about 70 people into the terrace of a three bedroom apartment, which although the dimensions aren't given, I don't imagine is very large. I'm sure this will be a welcome income supplement.

A Becks Sighting

So, I'm watching the Galaxy take on the Red Bulls and at the 68 minute mark, David Beckham enters the game. it looks like MLS and the Galaxy are actually going to get a couple of extra games out of the $5+ million that they are going to pay Becks this season, money that is well worth every penny if you ask any AEG official or Don Garber. With the Galaxy late push to the playoffs, Becks may become an important piece of the Galaxy playoff puzzle, which is something no one would have ever dreamed of just weeks ago. Of course, LA still needs two wins in its final three games (tonight included - its 1-1 as I type) to secure that playoff berth.

BlogPoll Ballot

Here's is this week's BlogPoll ballot. I didn't get one in last week so ignore the delta.

Rank	Team	Delta
1	South Florida	25
2	LSU	24
3	Ohio State	23
4	Boston College	22
5	Oklahoma	21
6	Oregon	20
7	Kentucky	19
8	South Carolina	18
9	California	17
10	West Virginia	16
11	Arizona State	15
12	Missouri	14
13	Kansas	13
14	Auburn	12
15	Florida	11
16	Southern Cal	10
17	Hawaii	9
18	Texas Tech	8
19	Tennessee	7
20	Georgia	6
21	Cincinnati	5
22	Boise State	4
23	Virginia	3
24	Michigan	2
25	Texas	1

Dropped Out:

Baseball Loses Fantasy Sports Appeal

In a case widely followed by the fantasy sports industry, Major League Baseball suffered a major setback today as the Eight Circuit Court of Appeals ruled today that companies that operate fantasy sports leagues have a First Amendment right to use players' names and statistics for free. the Court upheld a District Court decision in a case brought by CBC Company, a fantasy sports operator in St. Louis against Major League Baseball in 2005, arguing that the First Amendment right to free speech supersedes any right to publicity that the players' and MLB may be able to assert under state law. Both the District Court and the Appeals Court agreed. See the discussion of the District Court ruling here.

Call for Help

For those of you reading this in IE, you know that I still haven't been able to fix the technical glitch that developed some time ago and has forced the right hand column to the bottom of the page. I assume it is something to do with a margin problem in the center column somewhere but I haven't been able to find it and I have limited CSS skills. So, I'm requesting help from anyone out there who might be able to suggest what to do or who would be willing to take a look at the template and see what he or she might be able to do. Any help or ideas or suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks

The Fight Over Intergrity of Thoroughbred Sales Rages On

For several years now, there has been an ongoing battle between several major buyers of thoroughbreds and the central Kentucky horse farms which are the prime sellers of horses at each year. In 2004, the Kentucky legislature almost got into the act as it considered legislation to regulate sales. However, it put the legislation on hold to give the industry a chance to come together and develop recommendations to the General Assembly to address the perceived problems. Thus, was born the Sales Integrity Task Force, which unveiled its recommendations yesterday.

Not surprisingly, the Task Force recommended self-policing and not legislation. The recommendations are woefully inadequate to truly make any real difference in the way sales are conducted or to bring about real change and real integrity to the marketplace. To think that a code of conduct, enforced by the conditions of sale of the auction houses, will actually effect change is to be living in Wonderland. That is exactly where we are today.

The recommendations suggest that the auction houses establish an ownership repository which sounds like a positive step but what is the incentive to use it. Without legislation mandating its use, there is no incentive on the part of owners to use it and the same practices that now exist will continue. Similarly, the code of conduct for sellers and bloodstock agents needs the force of legislation behind it to be effective. Otherwise it is little more than what the auction houses can do, and should do, today but do not have the manpower nor the willpower to do.

Jess Jackson, owner of the Kendall-Jackson winery and a leading thoroughbred owner, as well as a major critic of the current sales practices in the industry and the man behind the push for legislation has issued an open letter response to the task force recommendations. He was a member of the task force who was not present when the vote was taken and would have voted against the recommendations. His absence is the reason the recommendations are unanimous. I urge you to read his letter if you have any interest in this topic, and you must if you have read this far. He makes a great case for the need for legislation and for what is wrong with the Task Force recommendations.

NFL to Toronto, Eh?

The owners of the Toronto Argonauts have decided that the future of their franchise is best served by combining with a NFL franchise and to that end have decided to aggressively go after any franchise that becomes available. The Argos owners, David Cynamon and Howard Sokolowski, will have competition for any possible Toronto franchise, as Larry Tanenbaum, the owner of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment which owns the Maple Leafs, Raptors and Toronto FC and Ted Rogers of Rogers Communications, which is a partner with MLSE and the owner of the Blue Jays, have previously announced that they will seek a NFL team for Toronto.

Why would CFL owners want the NFL to come to town? There is a belief that the arrival of the NFL in Canada is inevitable and I think that the owners believe that it is far better to join up with the monster and try to reap what benefits that may bring than compete with it and be crushed by the tidal wave. The CFL has benefited from its working agreement with the NFL and while not all the owners agree that cooperation with a Toronto based NFL team is a good thing, most of them appear to be now on board with the Argos. What benefits would the Argos get? Well, it's likely that the NFL would need political cover to operate in Toronto and perhaps to get approval for funding for a new stadium. That political cover comes in the form of protection for the CFL and when I say protection I mean that in both its classic Webster's and its Sopranos definitions.

So, what teams do these Canucks have in their sights? I should first point out that Commissioner Goodell has mentioned on several occasions in the context of Los Angeles that expansion is not going to happen, so any team for Toronto is one that will be relocated from an existing city. Since LA may still at least nominally get first call, there are certain teams that fit logically in Toronto. The most likely candidate is Buffalo. The Bills are almost certainly going to be sold when original owner Ralph Wilson, who is 89, dies if not before. Buffalo is only 90 miles from Toronto so the Bills could move and make the case that they are still in the same market.
The other oft-mentioned relocation candidates are Jacksonville, New Orleans and Minnesota.

Any relocation of a team to Toronto is not likely to happen in the next couple of years. It is however, in my opinion, likely to happen in the near future, assuming that the powers that be in Toronto can put forward a substantial case, with funding in place, for a stadium that will meet NFL standards. The team can play in the Rogers Centre (the old SkyDome) for the short-term while a new stadium is being built but it is not a viable long-term solution, as it is too small and doesn't have the right or sufficient amenities. Nevertheless, Toronto is too attractive a market for the NFL to ignore for long.

Light Posting

Sorry for the light posting this week but I've been off dealing with a family medical emergency. Fortunately, it's nothing serious but it's taking up most of my time and I don't expect to get back to posting until this weekend at the earliest. In the meantime, enjoy the League Championship Series and tonight's college football game, which escapes at the moment.

New Blog Carnival

There is a new blog carnival I recommend that you check out. It's the Carnival of Sports Business, now in its second edition, being hosted by Take a Peck. You can find it here. Get over there and check it out.

Hamilton Stands to Make History, $60 Mil Tomorrow

Lewis Hamilton is on the brink of history. He stands to become the youngest and the first rookie champion in Formula One history tomorrow in the Grand Prix of China, in the event he finishes in front of teammate Fernando Alonso and also in front of Kimi Raikkonen. Hamilton is currently leading the driver standings with Alonso second and Raikkonen third. In addition to being the first rookie, Hamilton would become the first black driver to ever win the F-1 title.

It's the combination of those factors, together with his life story and personality, that stand to earn up to $60 million in endorsement contracts if he is successful in winning that championship in the world's' most watched motor sport (sorry Nascar fans, but only Americans watch your stock cars). Unlike the athlete to whom he is most often, and unfairly compared, golf's Tiger Woods, Hamilton is an employee of the McLaren Racing Team and his earnings will be to some degree limted by McLaren existing sponsorship contracts. He will not be able to endorse products that compete with McLaren sponsors and any deals with McLaren's existing sponsors will require negotiations with McLaren to determine how to share the sponsorship compensation. That's a problem Tiger simply doesn't face.

Nevertheless, the sky's the limit for Hamilton as any glance at the list of Forbes top earners among athletes will confirm. The only athlete who routinely came close to Tiger Woods over the last few years was Michael Schumacher, the seven time F-1 champion who made about $36 million last year in his retirement year. Perhaps a better example is Kimi Raikkonen whose spot on the McLaren team Hamilton took. Raikkonen left McLaren for a lucrative contract at Ferrari which made him the highest paid driver on the Formula One circuit, earning him an estimated $40 million a year, according to Forbes.

UPDATE: That championship is going to have to wait one more race. Hamilton failed to finish in China, pulling out after completing 31 of 56 laps in Shanghai, as Kimi Raikkonen won the race with Fernando Alonso coming in second. Hamilton still leads the overall points standing and is favored to win the Formula One championship at the season concluding race in Sao Paulo, Brazil on October 21.

Synthetic Life

Every once in a while I depart from the subject matter of this blog because I come across something that I just want to share. This is one of those times. I was reading an article in the Guardian Online, a truly great newspaper, about a battle brewing between FIFA and the European Union over regulation of soccer, specifically the number of foreign nationals permitted to play on club teams in Europe, when I happened across this article, with the headline"I am creating artificial life"...

Reading the article gave me chills. It's like something out of science fiction only it's really here. Craig Venter is the man who decoded the human genome so he clearly knows his way around a test tube. While he is a bit of a character and a showman, he is also probably serious this time, given the tone and nature of the article, although the fact that it was the Guardian and not some American publication gave me some pause. Nevertheless, the implications of this step are truly staggering and the ethical considerations are as well. Here's the scary money quote from the article: " Mr Venter was creating a "chassis on which you could build almost anything. It could be a contribution to humanity such as new drugs or a huge threat to humanity such as bio-weapons". Right, that's the rub. It's great in the right hands but in the wrong hands, well, it's too scary to contemplate because there would be no antidote, no cure, no defense to something that had never been seen or created before.

Do we have the right to play God? What controls can be placed on scientists to ensure that this is done, if it is permitted at all, for only benign purposes? Can this be the answer to global warming or cancer? Should it be? Once the genie is out of the bottle, can it ever be put back - should it ever be allowed to escape in the first place? I don't pretend to have any of the answers nor do I believe that any of one of us have the right to provide the answers for all of us. This is one of hose problems for which each person will have to struggle with God to come to grips with and then society will have to struggle with to collectively answer. Fortunately, there is a democratic process in place in the western world to deal with these questions, but it is a difficult process where law, morality and religious values intersect.

Nets Naming Rights to Izod

Jay-Z will not be the naming rights holder for the Nets playground in New Jersey after all. The New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority awarded the naming rights for the Meadowlands arena to the Izod clothing maker. The arena will be called Izod Center. Doesn't have quite the same ring as Rocarena but I guess it will have to do. I also don't if this means that the arena will now be decorated with giant crocodiles and all of the Nets cheerleaders will be outfitted in crocodile wear. We'll have to wait for the season opener to find that out. No word yet on the price tag.

NASCAR Gets New Sponsor and Eye Candy

It was a big news day for Nascar - you know it has to be if I'm writing about it. Despite growing up in the South, I have never understood the fascination with watching a bunch of cars or trucks going round and round in a circle, excuse me, oval, endlessly making left hand turns for several hours at a time. But I digress.

After 10 long months of searching, Nascar has finally found a new title sponsor for its number two circuit, the former Busch Series. A-B is pulling out at the end of this season and the new sponsor is Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company. While the value of the deal was not announced, it is said to be worth between $10-$12 million a year, about what Nascar was getting from Anheuser Busch. Nationwide agreed to give competitor Geico a two year sunset provision to handle Geico's sponsorship of the number 7 Mike Wallace car. It can migrate up to the Sprint Cup or to the Truck Series but in two years it will be out of the Nationwide Series. The express agreement avoids the AT&T situation Nascar is litigating in the Sprint Cup.

More importantly for race fans, Nascar gained some serious eye candy for the Sprint Cup series yesterday as Indy 500 and IRL Series champion Dario Franchitti confirmed his move to Nascar. He will join Chip Ganassi Racing to drive the number 40 Dodge, becoming the first European to drive in Nascar full-time. He joins teammate Juan Pablo Montoya in the most international and formerly open wheel driving team in Nascar. Franchitti is, of course, married to the luminous Ashley Judd who will soon be appearing at a Nascar track near you.

Pro Leagues Play with Vegas After All

If you believe Oscar Goodman, the former mob lawyer turned Mayor of Las Vegas, there is no better city on the planet to serve as the next expansion location or relocation site for a wayward franchise of the NBA or the NHL. However, every time he makes that argument to the league brass, he runs into David Stern telling him that no team will come to Vegas as long as the sportsbooks take bets on NBA games.

Now, a front-page story in the Wall Street Journal, confirms for all of us just how hypocritical Stern and Bud Selig, who has said much the same thing, have been about this. The open secret that the leagues (and the NFL and NHL) have long been cooperating with the sportsbooks to keep track of discrepancies in the lines that might signal that games have been tampered with has been confirmed by the Journal. In fact, the leagues all have contracts with Las Vegas Sports Consultants the firm which claims to set the line for 90% of the books in Vegas and who knows how many of the books in the Caribbean.

The biggest hypocrite of all, however, is Myles Brand and the NCAA. For decades the NCAA has lobbied intensely against sports gambling in every form and fashion, and has done more to prevent the proliferation of legalized sports gambling in this country than any single other entity. Yet, there they are feeding at the trough of LVSC, looking for the same edge on their games as every other gambler. Of course, they want to ensure the integrity of the game while the gamblers all just want to lay a little action but the NCAA won't even admit to a relationship for fear it might sully their image. Please.

BlogPoll

Here's this week's ballot. I should note that I do each week's ballot without looking at the previous week's ballot to prevent polluting the ballot by the previous week's results. That also can result in some strange doings at the bottom of the poll as teams move in and out for no good reason ( or because I forget them or because, in the case of Louisville, there are many good teams out there and I just decided to bring them back). The deltas should be wild this week.

Rank	Team	Delta
1	LSU	1
2	California	4
3	Ohio State	5
4	Southern Cal	3
5	South Florida	10
6	Wisconsin	6
7	Boston College	3
8	Kentucky	5
9	Oregon	2
10	West Virginia	6
11	Florida	8
12	Georgia	14
13	Oklahoma	8
14	Missouri	2
15	South Carolina	1
16	Nebraska	10
17	Cincinnati	--
18	Hawaii	6
19	Arizona State	1
20	Texas	9
21	Purdue	--
22	Rutgers	13
23	Clemson	5
24	Kansas State	2
25	Louisville	1

Dropped Out: Penn State (#19), Alabama (#22), Virginia Tech (#23), Miami (Florida) (#25).

Thomas, MSG, Dolan All Found Liable for Harassment

Isiah Thomas liked to project a squeaky clean image to the public. To New York, he liked to project the image of the savior of the Knicks. The reality is now apparent - he is little more than a common, chauvinistic thug who took the opportunity to harass a woman employee when it presented itself. He sure hasn't been able to salvage the Knicks. Today, in a Manhattan courtroom, a jury returned a verdict for Anucha Brown Sanders, finding that Thomas sexually harassed her, and that MSG improperly fired her for complaining about it.

The jury awarded her $11.6 million in punitive damages from MSG and James Dolan, the chairman of both Cablevision , the parent company of MSG, and MSG. Of that amount, $6 million was awarded because of the hostile work environment Mr. Thomas was found to have created, and $5.6 million because Ms. Browne Sanders was fired for complaining about it. Mr. Dolan’s share is $3 million; the Garden is liable for the rest. The jury will decide on compensatory damages at a later date. The jury was hung on awarding punitive damages against Thomas.

So how will this affect the Knicks? My friend Darren Rovell believes that all that matters is the performance on the court, and to the extent he is talking about the fans he is probably right. Fans don't care about right and wrong; they only care about wins. Sponsors however are a different story. They care about what their brand, product and reputation is associated with and they care about with whom they are partnered. Sponsors don't want to be subjected to boycotts or protests as a result of an association with an organization known to harbor a sexual harasser. If the Knicks choose to keep Thomas around, make no mistake, there will be a price to be paid.

The early readings from Commissioner Stern's office are not encouraging either. So far at least, he is indicating that he plans no action pending an appeal. I doubt seriously that would be his reaction if Thomas was still a player. When the NBA sponsors start chiming in, however, his tune may change. Don't expect much out of Jimmy Dolan either though; money has never been a spur to get him to do something he really didn't feel much like doing.

Baseball Playoffs

I've been switching back and forth tonight between the Rockies - Padres play-in game and the Monday night game, mostly because I am long suffering Bengals fan. That didn't get any better tonight of course. Playing Tom Brady is not a quick way to get healthy. Anyway, that's not the point of this post.

It struck me while I was watching baseball on TBS that MLB really blew it during negotiation of the last TV contract is failing to insist on TBS broadcasting in HD and getting carriage on major cable systems as a condition of it getting to carry the Division Series. It's really a poor reflection on baseball that the major post-season is not available to most of the country in high definition when the alternative of TNT HD was available to Turner.

Now, I know that Turner was insistent on TBS being the network for baseball and there were certain programming considerations at play here for both baseball and Turner, but it's really not too much to ask that provisions be made that HD be made available. I know that Cablevision began HD service for TBS just in time for the playoffs, which, as New York City's main cable service is no coincidence. Got to keep the MLB staff and execs happy, even if the rest of the country has to suffer. It's just one more example of baseball ignoring the fans.

UPDATE: TBS did get lucky in broadcasting a great game with a truly wonderful, if totally erroneous finish. The Padres and Rockies played a game worthy of a championship game and it had all the drama of a winner take all battle. The only problem is the ending was false and the Pads basically got screwed. Now, I'm not really a Padres fan and I didn't have a dog in that fight, but there is no way that Holliday ever touched the plate. Replay after replay showed that he was effectively blocked from the plate by Padres catcher Michael Barrett. In the words of Denver Post writer Mark Kiszla: "And Matt Holliday has still not touched home plate." He goes on to add:

"When folks retell this story 100 years from now, he still will not have touched home plate.

'I don't care,' said Rockies general manager Dan O'Dowd, speaking on behalf of everybody who loves this baseball team.

And that is the proper response from Rockies fans, players and staff. They shouldn't care because the ump made the call and the game is over. The Rockies have a gift that will keep on giving as long as they can make the magic last against the Phillies.

The Top 100 Sports Blogs

Everybody loves lists. You love them even more when you appear on them. As I mentioned last week, it seems to be the season for the lists, the Forbes 400, the ESPN/Business Week Power 100 and more. Now, Juiced Sports has come up with a list of the 100 most influential sports bloggers and I'm proud to be a member of the list. I'm even humbled to be somewhere above number 100, actually number 68. The list is headed by none other than Deadspin, followed by Jamie Mottram at Yahoo and then my friends at The Big Lead. You can see the whole list here.

Duke Finally Says Sorry

Proof that the old maxim better late than never may not always be true, Duke President Richard Brodhead formally apologized to the lacrosse players and their families that he wilfully and shamefully deserted in the heat of the lacrosse case controversy. In a speech before the Duke Law School, Brodhead apologized for the school's lack of full support and said his biggest regret was: "our failure to reach out to the lacrosse players and their families in this time of extraordinary peril. Given the complexities of this case, getting the communication right would never have been easy. But the fact is that we did not get it right, causing the families to feel abandoned when they were most in need of support. This was a mistake. I take responsibility for it, and I apologize."

With respect to the actions of certain faculty members, he said that statements were "ill-judged and divisive" and Duke should have done more to underscore that those were the beliefs of individuals and not the university as a whole.

To his credit, he accurately assessed, in hindsight, the impact of his actions as he described that by deferring to the justice system and "not repeating the need for the presumption of innocence equally vigorously at all key moments, we may have helped create the impression that the university did not care about its students. This was not the case, and I regret it as well."

Brodhead's apology hit most of the right notes, however, it came far too late to be of any use to anyone but perhaps his own conscience. It certainly wasn't going to do anything for the three lacrosse players or their families who have endured so much, nor frankly will it do much to resuscitate the image of the university or the hit to its reputation. He is no longer fit to lead an institution with the international reputation of Duke and he has forfeited any right to continue to occupy his office. The sooner he goes, the sooner Duke can get about the business of restoring its good name and cleaning up the damage done by him and by the faculty that ran wild under his watch.