Weekly Sporties

-Well, our national nightmare is finally over. After three weeks of inconsistent calls and missed penalties with replacement refs, the NFL and the referee union agreed to a new deal late Wednesday night which will have the regular refs returned to the sidelines this weekend. The particulars of the deal were not revealed, most likely because no one cares what they are, they just wanted the refs back. Now, what I find most amusing about this agreement is that it came about 48 hours after what might be the worst call in NFL history, yet the NFL is insisting that had nothing to do with their increased negotiations to get a deal done. Right. If that were the case there wouldn't be the rush to get the regular guys back on the field so quickly. Previous reports were that even when a deal got done it would take a week for the refs to get back because they had to pass conditioning tests, get measured for new uniforms and be brought up to speed on rule changes which happened during the offseason. Suddenly all that could be done in less than 24 hours so a normal crew could work the Thursday night game and we're not supposed to think the NFL was just as desperate to have the refs back as the fans? Whatever the reason, I'm glad it got done. I know these refs won't get all the calls right, but at least we can be assured they will control the game better than the fill-ins, who were clearly too starstruck by the players to take control of the situation. I just hope this was fixed early enough that no team's postseason chances were affected.

-One league which really would be crippled by a referee strike is the NBA, because the professionals give the stars way too many calls as it is. I actually shudder to think what star-struck replacement refs would do. One of the most annoying calls the NBA refs routinely fall for is flopping, in which a player essentially falls down and pretends to have been fouled. It's annoying, it slows down the game, it makes defending players really hard and, in the most annoying aspect of all, it usually works. Well, this week the NBA announced they plan to do something about it. Commissioner David Stern said he wants to form a committee, a lot like the current one which reviews flagrant fouls to see if they should be upgraded or downgraded, to review flopping. While he doesn't think the NBA will adopt a rule like the NHL's 'diving' penalty, what they will do is look at the tape and fine players who act like they have been fouled when they haven't. This obviously isn't a perfect solution because the players who flop would still get foul shots in a game, but at least this way it would hit the worst offenders in the wallet, which may be the only way to get through to some of these guys. I don't think a fine will change the way the high-priced superstars fall to the court like they have been shot, at least we can be sure the rookie free agents won't be hitting the ground unnecessarily. Still, I will be interested to see if these rules get implemented and if fines get announced, because I feel like public shaming may be the only way to get players to man up and play hard defense.

-I'm glad to see the NBA is planning to get flopping under control because increasingly it looks like basketball will be our only professional winter sport for a while. Late this week the NHL cancelled the remainder of the preseason games, which means the regular season games can't be far behind. What makes this so frustrating is that there doesn't even appear to be much urgency to negotiate, as the two sides didn't meet for over two weeks before finally sitting down on Friday. But at least those meetings reportedly went well as they managed to hammer out several of the smaller issues. However, I don't think that should count as actual progress because I remember when similar reports were coming out of the NBA and NFL lockout negotiations and I had the same reaction then as I do now - there is no point working on the small stuff until you deal with the big sticking points. Deciding what color you want your new car to be doesn't do you any good until you figure out how the hell you are going to pay for it. And, since this lockout is happening over the issue of splitting revenue (like all lockouts are), until the two sides can agree to sit down and figure out how to split the profits having a plan for increased drug testing is a moot point. All each side is doing right now is meeting for the sake of meeting and attempting to make fans think they are not the side which keeps this lockout dragging along. It's nothing more than posturing. Unless they want to get together and start exchanging legitimate offers to one another I would almost rather they don't meet, because at least that doesn't give the hockey fanatics false hope.

-In one of the crazier scenes (and given the way this Red Sox season played out that is saying something), following the Red Sox final game at Fenway this year, manager Bobby Valentine held his normal press conference in which expressed his belief that he will return to manage the team next season. Now, given the fact that he also thanked the assembled media for their professionalism you have to wonder how much of that was lip service. Perhaps Valentine knows he is gone and is simply trying to butter them up so he isn't totally killed as leaves. (Sort of confirming that, General Manager Ben Cherington also gave an interview a day later in which he said the team spent too much time looking for a manager last offseason and wanted to spend less time doing that this year. If they were keeping Valentine they wouldn't have to anticipate spending any time doing it.) I know that Valentine never really got a fair shake because he never came close to managing the line-up he expected to have, but even if you excuse the injuries it was pretty clear this was a partnership that just wasn't going to work. I thought there may have been a chance Valentine would get a second season when the team traded Kevin Youkilis, because that appeared to be the team picking the manager over the player, but Bobby V simply didn't do enough the second half of the season to warrant another chance. You just worry if the game has passed him by. He need to go back to the booth where he belongs and the Sox simply need to chalk this season up as a failure, then go into 2013 vowing it will never happen again.

-Maybe Bobby V can go back to managing in Japan, where he is seen a baseball God, because the history of players brought over from the Japanese Leagues have been just as up and down as he has this season. Signing Japanese players has gotten very risky for major league teams as of late, because the results are too inconsistent. For every Ichiro Suzuki there are several Daisuke Matzusaka - players who have one or two solid seasons but never quite manage to have long careers. I wonder if that is because these organizations put too much pressure on them too quickly, thinking since they come from a well-run professional league they are more ready to handle the majors than they actually are. The leagues may be close, but it is still a new level of baseball in an entirely new country. Anyway, add another failed experiment to the results as the Minnesota Twins released infielder Tsuyoshi Nishioka. Nishioka was expected to be an everyday play for the Twins, but three years into a five-year, $9.5 million contract (that's on top of the $5 million the Twins paid his old Japanese club - not a small amount for a small-market team like Minnesota) Nichioka was still in the minors. So, he and the team agreed it wasn't working and released him from his contract. Normally that would be the end of it, but Nishioka went one step further by relinquishing the $3 million remaining on his contract and issuing a statement apologizing to the team and its fans for his level of play. Hearing about this, I can't help but wonder how many other baseball players would have done something like this or how many are sitting on bad teams wishing they could take a do-over on their contracts right now. (Hello, Carl Crawford). Sometimes it isn't about money, it's about personal happiness.

-When Notre Dame announced they were joining the ACC in all sports except football, but playing 5 teams from the conference every season, I was concerned about how their traditional rivalries would survive. I wasn't sure schools I like seeing the Irish play, such as Michigan State and Purdue, would stay in the rotation. However, I was extremely confident that at least their on-going series with Michigan would continue. Turns out I was wrong. Early in the week Notre Dame announced that the annual game against the Wolverines was going to be put on an undetermined hiatus following the 2014 season. I have to say I never say this coming and in my defense you could see why I came to that conclusion - a few years ago the Irish and Wolverines signed a contract to extend their match-up to last through 2031. But, like all sports contracts it wasn't really worth the paper it was printed on, because that contract featured opt-outs every three years and it appears the Irish are opting. They want to focus on California (better recruiting grounds) and will be making more of an effort to keep playing Stanford and USC every year. I understand the logic, but that doesn't mean I have to like it. While this year's game did not live up to last year's 'Instant Classic' status, it was still a very good contest. The two schools had already planned to take a couple seasons away from each other in 2018-19, but hopefully following that season they will get back together and find some way to play each other again, even if it is only every other year. College football is good when Michigan and Notre Dame are good and it is even better when they are not only playing well but playing each other.

-This one happened last week, but I didn't have time to get to it: Fred Couples was elected to the Golf Hall of Fame. His election raised a few eyebrows because while Couples is universally loved on Tour, he doesn't exactly have a Hall of Fame resume. He only has 15 wins and 1 Major Championship, which barely qualified him to be on the ballot. He has Captained a couple of President's Cup Teams, but those don't quite hold the same weight as being a Ryder Cup Captain, so I didn't think they would be enough to fill in some pretty obvious holes in his career. Turns out that the majority of golf voters agreed with me. Couples only got 51% of the vote. Normally induction takes 65% of the vote, but this was apparently a shaky year for nominees, because no one got to that magic number. In fact, Couples was the only one to get close and in a year in which no one gets the required 65% the Hall lets in the highest vote-getter, provided they have over 50% of the votes. Even by that lower standard, Freddie is barely a Hall of Famer. Now, obviously, barely is better than not at all and let's not pretend the Golf Hall of Fame is akin to Cooperstown. Still, I think this just goes to show you that demanding one person be elected every year doesn't necessarily work. Hey, everyone has down years and sports are not immune to that. I think it would be preferable to just not have a Hall of Fame class than dilute the waters with people who don't really belong. Either that or stop telling people how many votes a player got and we'll just assume they cruised over the necessary number.