Penn State

This week we learned of the Penn State sanctions, handed down by the NCAA and they were harsh.  All of the school's wins since the first known Sandusky rape in 1998 were vacated. (111 wins)  With that Joe Paterno went from the second to twelfth on the all-time winningest NCAA football coach list.  The football program was placed on probation and given a four year bowl ban, meaning none of the teams can play for a National Championship, BigTen Championship or any other bowl for the next four seasons.   Probably the most significant part of the sanctions is the loss of scholarships, the school will loose 20 scholarships a year for the next four years and ten immediately.  As a result of this their new head coach Bill O'Brien will have to step up his recruiting because he can't offer everyone a scholarship or a chance to play in a bowl or for a championship.  The Penn Stat Nittany Lions football team will most likely be composed of a large number of walk ons for the next five years.  The Team will probably not be very good during this stretch, as they play with walk ons and a less than elite roster.  (The NCAA is letting players transfer without a penalty)  All Bill O'Brien can sell to his players the next five years is an education, a chance to play in front 106,000 fans a game (Beaver Stadium is one of the biggest stadiums in college football) and to get ready for the NFL.  In my opinion these Sanctions (although harsh) were slightly better then the alternative, which may have been (maybe multiple years) the "death penalty".  With the "Death Penalty" all of the coaches and players would have left for the duration of the time the football program would be suspended so the program would have to start all over again from scratch, and it would take the better part of a century to build it back to respectably.  The program received harsh penalties but at least they can still play football, so when they get off probation they can get back to respectably faster.                      

Retaliation

The New York Yankees are a professional franchise.  They do everything by the book and follow almost every written rule.  There are some unwritten rules, like getting retaliation on other teams that they don't do.  Pitchers and teams retaliating and hitting guys on the other team after your guys get hit is an ago old unwritten rule.  This is not only an unwritten rule but its expected amongst teams.  When your pitcher hits a batter, everyone on your team starts fearing that they my be next.  You have to somewhat pick your spots when hitting the other teams batters because you don't want the hit batter to effect the outcome of the game.  The other night five Yankees either got hit (A-Rod broke his hand) or almost got hit by Seattle pitching.  After all these Yankees got hit, no Mariners got hit.  I am pretty sure the Mariners were expecting something but it never happened.  You don't want this to get things out of hand.  The veterans on the team or the coaches should take charge of this if it doesn't happen.  The Yankees and Manager Joe Giradi are not above this, it is expected around the league and has been for years.  The Yankees and Mariners play again next week, and something has to happen, if it doesn't happen one game its carries over to the next.                

MLB, half way point

Tomorrow, we start the second half of the baseball season. (it's just over the halfway make as teams have played around 85 of 162 games)  The first half has featured some great pitching, (first Met No-hitter in history (Johan Santana), 2 perfect games (Matt Cain and Philip Humber)) some good hitting, (Josh Hamilton 4 2-run home runs) and some great defense.  If the first half of the season was an indication, we are in for a treat in the second half.
In the American league Cleveland has been holding their own and now Detroit is getting healthy and Chicago is getting stronger with the acquisition of Kevin Youkilis.  In the East, arguably the best division in baseball the New York Yankees are winning the battle.  The Yankees have been able to overcome injuries to Brett Gardner, (has been out since april) Michael Pineda, (lost for the season before it began with a torn labrum) Mariano Rivera, and (the greatest closer of all-time, torn ACL) Andy Pettitte. (broken leg)   Veterans have come off the bench to fill in, the starting pitching has been good, and they didn't miss many beats in the bullpen with being able to replace the greatest closer with a guy (Rafael Soriano) who had 45 saves for Tampa Bay.  If I was to pick a surprise player for the Yankees in the first half, it would be Rafael Soriano because it's not easy to close out games, and they were able to replace the best with a guy who had done it before an embraced the challenge.  The Baltimore Orioles I knew would be better and have been surprising in being able to hang on to an over .500 record at the break.  The Boston Red Sox have had injuries all over the diamond, with notable injuries at shortstop, the outfield, the starting pitching, and the bullpen. With Boston barely hanging on to a .500 record, it looks like it may be the Yankees, Rays, and Orioles at the end.  We have a lot of division play remaining so every team in the division may beat up on one another.
In the National League we knew the Washington Nationals would be good but we didn't know the New York Mets would play over their heads for this long, although I don't see the Mets playing this much over .500 for the rest of the year.  Washington might come back to the pack and make the division interesting, if they shut Strasbourg down.  The Pittsburgh Pirates who have had 19 straight loosing seasons are in first place in the NL central.  I think Pittsburgh can hang in there with Cincinnati and St. Louis if they can add some offense at the deadline, so far in Pittsburgh it's been Andrew McCutchen and pitching.  There are some good stories to follow in the second half and we should be in for some good baseball.