If I were in charge of sports

I have finally decided to do it -- to list the things I would do if I became Supreme Ruler of the Sports World, capable of making decisions by fiat. I am willing to be a benevolent dictator, in that if the people remember the "dictator" part, I'll try to remember the "benevolent" part.

And we'll start with the development in sports that has been making me pull my hair out all week ...

All NFL contracts would be fully guaranteed --  I've always considered the concept of the "non-guaranteed contract" to be someone oxymoronic. Isn't a contract by its very nature a guarantee that a player will play for a certain amount of time, and in exchange, the club will pay a certain amount of money?

Instead, what we have now in the NFL is a situation where if a team doesn't want to pay a player any more, it demands he rework his contract or cuts him outright. Strangely enough, it doesn't work the other way, that a player can demand more money, and if the club doesn't comply, he becomes a free agent.

Sure, it'll mean lots of bad contracts for aging players whose pay doesn't match their performance. Oh well, too bad ... players are expected to live up to contracts, and so should teams.

Of course, none of this could matter if ...

No salary caps --  Players are the game. Sports is the business it is because of them. No one buys tickets or turns on the TV to watch owners own. They deserve all the money they can get.

"But the rich teams will buy all the best players and win everything!!!" you cry. I know I certainly enjoyed that Dodgers-Yankees World Series last year, but I am willing to consider revenue plans that make sure everyone has a chance, although I don't think it's as big a problem as some claim.

Speaking of deserving money ...

All college athletes would be allowed to be paid -- Maybe the university would pay. Maybe boosters would pay. Maybe endorsers would pay. However, it's done, if someone wanted to pay college athletes, it would be legal.

If Kentucky wants to buy a team of great basketball players ... oh wait, bad example.

If every SEC football team wants to pay all its players ... oh wait, another bad example.

You get my drift.

Staying in college ...

The NCAA basketball tournaments would be run by a straight S-curve -- The top team would play No. 68 and have the No. 8 team as the second seed in its region. The second team would play No. 67 and have the No. 7 team as its second seed.

There wouldn't be any of this crap where Wisconsin might be the second seed in Kentucky's region, even thought the Badgers are definitely not the No. 8 team, because Cleveland is the closest site to both schools. (And is Wisconsin wins the Big 10 title game, it should be a No. 1, rendering the whole discussion moot.)

And while we're at it ...

So long, pods -- If the committee wants to give the top seeds early round games close to home (and congratulations, NCAA, for having yet another subregional in North Carolina; God forbid Duke or North Carolina actually have to travel), that's fine, but otherwise, teams go to the sites the S-curve tells them to.

If a team from the eastern half of the country is in the West regional, it'll have the change to see the country from 33,000 feet.

Generic floors go, too -- I have written about this before, and have not changed my mind.

Regarding who plays in the tourney...

New format for play-in games -- First of all, they would be called just that, "play-in" games. Also, they would all be the lowest-seeded at-large teams, not the split of at-large teams and 16 seeds. Teams that actually won something to get into the tournament should not have to win something else just to make the main bracket. Let the lower-ranked teams from power conferences, who otherwise have just about every advantage when it comes to being chosen, play for bids.

As for college football ...

Four teams are good, but more are better -- The college football playoff would be a minimum of 16 teams, and perhaps 20 or 24 with byes. Every conference champion would get in, plus the best of the rest.

And yes, it would run on an S-curve.

As for the sport that's about to start, even though you wouldn't know it with all the talk of NFL free agents ...

Day games are a wonderful thing -- This is why, with the exception of the ESPN Sunday night game and playoff weekends where there are three or more games in a day, all weekend games would be day games, starting at 1 p.m. locally.

Being able to see the end of a game ... what a concept!

Let's make Ernie Banks smile in Heaven -- Every team would play one single-admission Sunday doubleheader a month. They'd play the first game at 1, retreat to the clubhouse for a half-hour to get ready for the second game, and then play that one. One ticket price would cover both games.

It's a little bit of a break for the fans, and it would also shave about a week from the schedule, lessening the chance of November baseball.

Bring Pete Rose back -- I've always been torn on this one. He bet on his own team's games, so I can understand a lifetime ban, but he never bet on them to lose (and yes, I understand the argument that he may have indirectly by managing the Reds differently on days he did bet), and by this point, letting him back in probably just means he can go in the Hall of Fame and perhaps get work as an ambassador of some type. I highly doubt he'll be managing again.

So I'll let him back in the game so he can go in the Hall of Fame.

Be consistent on cheaters -- Until someone tells me why it's OK for guys who doctored baseballs to be in the Hall of Fame but not guys who doctored their bodies, I expect the writers to either vote for guys involved with PEDs or move to throw guys like Gaylord Perry out. And, by the way, they have to go tell Perry personally.

Shift away -- If a team knows where someone is going to hit the ball, why not let them arrange their defense accordingly? If hitters don't like it, they can actually learn how to hit differently. Yes, it might change their precious routines, but the best baseball players in the world (even Brendan Ryan) should be able to figure it out.

Changing gears (see what I did there?) ...

You're paid to race the whole race, so do it and don't whine -- I'm not tuning in to the Insert Sponsor Name Here 50; I'm watching the Insert Sponsor Name Here 300/400/500/600, so I expect drivers to try the whole time. If they don't, and they complain about guys who do, they can give back their prize money.

Let's go old-school -- NASCAR needs to find a way for its top divisions to race at North Wilkesboro, Rockingham, South Boston, the Milwaukee Mile and other tracks that may not be as lucrative or architecturally majestic, but are still fun.

A bit of a business lesson ...

If you don't take yourself seriously, no one else will, either -- If one of your best and most-recognizable players isn't playing this year because another team is paying her more not to play, that's a bad thing, and it makes you look like a joke. You really should do something about that.

Also, if there's an announcement about a famous player coming to play in your league, you should make sure he comes when you say he's going to. Otherwise, you also look like a joke.

And finally, even though I'm not sure what I would do to enforce it (although I have a few ideas, being Supreme Ruler of the Sports World and all), some words of advice for fans ...

Don't be f---ing idiots -- While the players are the game, it's your willingness to pay that makes people rich. I get that, but that doesn't mean you get to do whatever you want, in spite of what you may have been taught.

You don't get to throw things. You don't get to run onto the field/court/pitch (unless it's a court-storming after a big college basketball win, which I will allow as long as it's safe). You get to boo, but you don't get to make racist, sexist or homophobic remarks.

And while we're on the topic of sexism, any woman athlete is a better athlete than you or I will ever be, and if you actually challenged her at her sport, she would embarrass you.

Think a female sports announcer should just "stay in the kitchen"? Give it a try yourself, and you'll be begging to make her sandwiches. Also, for every woman announcer who you think is terrible, there are 20 men who are as bad or worse. Trust me on this one. Actually, you have to; I'm the Supreme Ruler of the Sports World.

So those are the first-day items. More could be coming as I see fit.

When your ballpark is no more

Few things beat a fine summer night at the ballpark.

At first, I treated the news that the Pawtucket Red Sox would likely be moving to Providence with a sort of benign dislike.

I don't like the Red Sox, but Pawtucket is only about an hour away, so I've gone to several games there. The ballpark isn't the greatest, certainly not Hadlock Field in Portland, the absolute gem where the Red Sox AA affiliate plays, but it's a nice place to watch a game. The first time I went, I was actually pleasantly surprised, as I had only seen the park on TV, and the high backstop behind home plate makes the place look completely soulless when shot by the center field camera.

The neighborhood the park is in isn't the nicest you'll ever see, but the parking is right across the street, and the walk gave my wife and I the priceless moment of seeing Carl Pavano's picture adorning a lamppost as a famous former PawSox player ... above a handicapped parking space. Someone had to have planned that, we thought.

But I also know how these things go. Providence is probably going to build them a beautiful little stadium in a prime location, and although it'll be a little bit longer of a drive, especially when you consider Providence traffic, it's not like the team is moving all that far away.

And I must confess, I'm looking forward to games in Hartford while visiting my in-laws once the New Britain Rock Cats move there.

Then I read this today from Dan Barry, the author of “Bottom of the 33rd: Hope, Redemption, and Baseball’s Longest Game," which, of course, took place in Pawtucket.

"As the years passed, the city’s infrastructure declined, its once-ubiquitous newspaper lost most of its circulation, and even its tired zoo — featuring a beleaguered local celebrity, Fanny the elephant — mercifully closed. The children and grandchildren of millworkers moved up and out, to Cumberland, to Lincoln, and across the Massachusetts line, to Attleboro. Other immigrants settled into the triple-deckers looming over narrow streets, seeking elusive stability during fits of protracted recession, while entrepreneurs imagined other uses for old mills.

But Pawtucket always had McCoy, where future Red Sox stars made their names, and often returned when on rehab assignment. In these ways, Boston royalty was granted to a city nicknamed the Bucket."

And I started thinking about the ballpark of my childhood ... Heritage Park in Colonie, NY.

There was nothing special about the park. Across the street from the former Albany County Airport (more on that later), it was a utilitarian, symmetrical ballpark with mostly metal bleachers unless you ponied up a few more bucks to sit behind home plate.

But it was ours. 

I was a kid when the park opened as the home of the Eastern League Albany-Colonie A's, and it was amazing to me that professional baseball was within an hour of my parents' house, close enough that I was actually able to drive to games when I got older.

One night, my family and my friend Kenny went to a game, but it was rained out, and as we were driving home, there was some noise that cause Kenny to shout, "Listen! You can smell it!" We still sometimes pull that line out today.

I got my first autographs there -- future journeyman backup catcher Charlie O'Brien is one in particular that I remember -- and I was so excited to turn on a game one Saturday to see Mickey Tettleton playing for the A's, since I had seen him in Colonie not that long before.

One night, I bought a plastic replica A's helmet that I wore everywhere, until I cracked it so badly one night during an argument with my brother that my father threw it away. I was so mad.

Then the A's moved out ... and the Yankees moved in.

The Yankees, my Yankees, had a minor league team ... in Colonie! What could possibly be better?

Strangely enough, I don't have any memories of future Yankee stars playing at Heritage Park, and the team eventually moved, first to Norwich, CT (a Norwich Navigators hat is buried in my hat collection somewhere), and then Trenton, NJ.

Its replacement was an independent team, the Albany-Colonie Diamond Dogs. The games were still fun -- instead of the traditional activities, my bachelor party was my boys and me going to a Diamond Dogs game -- but it's clear in retrospect that the Yankees leaving and independent team coming in was the beginning of the end for baseball in Colonie.

The Tri-City ValleyCats were the end of the end. They got a nice ballpark in Troy, named for then-state Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno, who got the money for the field, and Heritage Park faded away, first as a relic with some depressing pictures before being torn down. I haven't been by the site in years, so I couldn't tell you what's there now.

(A side note, and back to the airport. After an expansion project, it is now Albany International Airport, and I once had the occasion to be there for a milestone in the project, the opening of the new parking garage. I was standing on the fringe of a conversation Bruno was having, when out of nowhere, his assistant came and yanked the juice box he was holding out of his hand. He snapped his head around and looked at her funny, and she just pointed to the site of the ceremony, which was about to start. I said to myself, "Someday, I want to be so big that I have someone to take my juice box.")

I haven't been to "The Joe" since it opened, and I once vowed to never go to the ballpark, angry that (in my mind) Heritage Park had to be sacrificed to Joe Bruno could have another plaything. My stance has softened somewhat, ever since the ValleyCats helped rebuild the field where I played Little League after it was damaged (along with most of my hometown, and my parents' house, although in my parents' case they were able to repair it) by floods from Tropical Storm Irene.

So maybe I'll go to a ValleyCats game someday. I'm sure I'll enjoy it if I do. But it'll never match my youth and young-adulthood at Heritage Park, the same way I'm sure a night at whatever beautiful stadium is built in Providence won't be the same as days and nights gone by in Pawtucket for people who have fond memories there.

Alex Rodriguez "meets the press"

The scene -- New York Yankees spring training in Tampa, Florida.

The event -- Alex Rodriguez, back from a 162-game suspension, addresses the media.

"Thank you all for coming today.

I would like to start by saying that it's great to be back. I have always loved baseball, but a year away from the game has caused me to realized I love it even more than I thought, and I hope to earn my spot in the Yankees' lineup and help the team win another World Series.

That being said, I understand that I've made a lot of mistakes, the biggest being using performance-enhancing drugs. All I can say about that is that I'm sorry, and my time away from the game caused me to realize how selfish and foolish I was.

Looking forward, all I can do is try to be a better man.

I know one issue that has come up is the bonuses I am set to receive for reaching certain home run milestones. Because I realize it would be wrong for me to accept them, I have asked the Yankees, and they have agreed, to use the money toward funding scholarship for underprivileged children in New York and Miami. Those kids deserve the money more than I do.

I also realize that as I say this, none of this matters to any of you, as you probably have your stories about me making another phony statement already written, and are just looking for quotes from me to fill it in.

I am well aware that my original sin was not using PEDs, but having the unmitigated gall to sign the contract the Texas Rangers put in front of me. I have been able to do no right in your eyes since then.

Therefore, I can admit to using PEDs twice when David Ortiz -- who was a nobody before he took them -- has never admitted them, and you fall all over yourselves about how wonderful he is while I'm scum. I also know that I've just helped you write your stories, as now I've 'ripped' my 'friend David Ortiz to take heat off' myself.

Therefore, it was OK in your eyes for my own general manager to curse me out for daring to say that I'm ready to start playing again without wondering what his motivation might be.

Therefore, it was OK in your eyes for Major League Baseball to have had such a desire to come after me for Biogenesis that it would purchase stolen documents and for former Commissioner Bud Selig to never answer for how his office handled the investigation.

Therefore, it was OK in your eyes to not point out that I got a longer suspension because of everything I had done, while apparently everyone else involved in Biogenesis except for Ryan Braun must have been caught having done only one thing and for the first time in their lives.

So you know what else is OK? For you to write and say whatever you want. Because you know what else I've realized in the last year? There's nothing I can do to make you happy except retire immediately and never be seen again.

I'm sure you guys have a lot of questions, but too bad. I'm out of here. Go talk to Ortiz instead."




    

The Olympics Boston may not want may be the Olympics Boston needs

In case you weren't aware, there has been just a little bit of snow in and around Boston in the last two weeks, and more could be on the way.

Along with the snow came failures in the region's rail and subway system, the MBTA, or "the T" for short.

"The primary problem that plagued the MBTA’s subway cars this week — and caused thousands of commuters to be stranded on Monday and Tuesday — is a familiar challenge to transit specialists that other cities solved years ago using modern technology.

Many of the stalled trains failed because their motors run on direct current, or DC, power, which malfunctions easily in light, fluffy snow like the more than 40 inches that has blanketed Boston in the past two weeks, MBTA officials say. Transit systems around the country have upgraded to newer alternating current motors, which withstand moisture far better."

The storms have been a tremendous headache, but for some, they have been an opportunity to point out what they see as the preposterous nature of Boston bidding for the 2024 Summer Olympics.

Snow stops our public transportation when it's not snowing. They think they can support the Olympics? #NoBoston2024 http://t.co/c9LOE9wI32
— Nick Pizzolato (@nickpizz) February 3, 2015

The IOC might be interested to know that the #MBTA also doesn't work when it's hot outside. #Boston2024
— Dan Kennedy (@dankennedy_nu) February 6, 2015

The first tweet is from my buddy Pizz (who is a good follow for a lot of reasons, but particularly if you're in the #NoBoston2024 crowd), and the second is from Dan Kennedy, a local journalism professor, author and media critic.

I'm fans of both of them, and they're both right about the T. It basically only runs well if the weather is like San Diego (although, from having been there, I can tell you that its rail system is far more modern than Boston's), and adding the Olympics to the current system would be an epic disaster.

However, I'd say those are less arguments against having the Olympics in Boston and better arguments for actually having them here.

Everyone knows the T is a disgrace, but no one will fix it. Why? Guess.

"You can cast a lot of blame in a lot of directions for the sad state of affairs, but the big culprit is pretty clear: state legislators, particularly those from outside Boston, who have spent the past 20 years whistling past the disaster.

They have known, for many, many years, that the state needs to spend a bunch of money on maintenance and upgrading of the MBTA. They don't care."

Also, this.

So if no one actually wants to fix the MBTA, or doesn't think they should have to be the ones to pay for it, what is it going to take for something to actually be done? It might take a large event that puts Boston on the world stage where failure would subject the city to endless ridicule and cripple its belief in being a world class city.

You know, something like ... the Olympics.

Such a thing would not be unprecedented even in recent history. The London Underground was upgraded for the 2012 Olympics, as was the Sea-to-Sky Highway from Vancouver to Whistler. I can only speak as a tourist, but having been to both in the last few years, I would say it was money well-spent.

There are less-scenic rides.

Are there issues with Boston's Olympic bid? Yeah. (Again, Pizz can tell you all about it.) Is it too bad that it would take something like an Olympics to actually make our state leaders do something about the awful rail system? For sure.

But is there any other way of getting it done. Barring a change of heart, I don't see any.

It won't be the same without Jeff Gordon

I used to hate Jeff Gordon. I admit it. 

It wasn't just that he won all the time, although it was. I know there's a belief that dominant champions are good for a sport because everyone wants to see if they'll get knocked off, but I've never bought it. Unless it's who you're rooting for, why watch when you know who's going to win?

But not only did he win all the time, he was just so ... perfect about it. He had the good looks (after he got a decent haircut and shaved his cheesy mustache), the beauty queen wife, the crew chief who seemingly always made the right call (and with just a whiff of wondering if chicanery was involved, for instance the red car in the top picture), the owner who had all the money and always spoke like he was reading from a PR handbook.

It's like someone he was pressed in a factory somewhere and programmed.

And God, was it annoying.

Yet reading the news today that Gordon won't be racing full-time after this season didn't leave me with the sense of glee that it once would have.

Because you see, somewhere along the line, I stopped hating Jeff Gordon. Yes, part of it was because he stopped winning all the time, but he also stopped being so perfect. He had ups and downs in his personal life (a divorce, remarriage and children), grew a beard once in a while, laughed at himself and even got into a couple fights.

He was, dare I say, human.

And when he became human, he became a lot harder to hate.

So while I don't exactly root for Jeff Gordon, I don't spit and sputter at the thought of him winning (that would be the younger Busch brother), and I can say with respect that if he's not in the lineup of the 2016 Daytona 500, it won't be the same.

Me and my cars

Honest, they were in a display case.

My wife and I are going to be moving, which means we're working on boxing stuff up. Today, that included my collection of die-cast cars. 

With the exception of a couple Randy LaJoie cars and a Robby Gordon, all my cars of Dale Earnhardt, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Kevin Harvick. I mostly get them as Christmas and birthday gifts, unless I see a good deal somewhere, like when I was able to grab a couple Harvick cars (including an autographed one) on clearance at the Childress museum last year. I actually have a couple that aren't shown here, but since I just got them for Christmas and knew I would be packing them up, anyway, I didn't bother taking them out.

Fortunately for both my parents' and my bank accounts, I'm not a completist; I basically get the stuff I like. I still don't have any Harvick No. 4 cars, something I obviously have to rectify, and in addition to whatever current cars I add to the collection, I'd like to grab the Earnhardt Wheaties car, the Earnhardt Jr. and Harvick ACDelco cars and maybe a Ron Hornaday NAPA truck if I can find them somewhere.

As I looked over the collection spread out on our TV room floor, for all the color (and yes, I have four cars with Wrangler-themed paint schemes), the one that jumped out at me was mostly white.

Mine

The original

This may sound crazy, but I don't think Kevin Harvick has ever gotten enough credit for what he did.

The most-popular driver in the sport had just died during the Daytona 500, the entire sport and its fans were in mourning and Richard Childress, instead of finding a veteran to finish out the season and buy time until he could decide on a permanent driver, turned to Harvick, his 25-year-old, second-year Busch Series driver.

Not only did he have to start racing a white No. 29 car that just the last week had been the iconic black No. 3, he was keeping his full-time Busch Series ride.

So all he did was win his third Cup start in a you-remember-where-you-were-when-it-happened moment, finish in the top 10 in Cup points and take the Busch Series title ... with reminders of what was lost and whose car he was driving present every week. (How Dale Jr., who, after all, lost his father, managed is beyond my feeble comprehension.)

Harvick couldn't replace Dale Earnhardt -- an impossibility if there ever was one -- but he and Dale Jr. (remember the trip back to Daytona that season?) at least gave his fans something to celebrate.

John Oliver and I ... (not really) best buds

Mrs. Last Honest and I went to see John Oliver tonight in Boston. It was a brilliant show, and he told a joke that just laid waste to Patriots fans, which I'm cool with. As a sign of how good he was, it was far from the only joke that mocked Bostonians, and instead of cringing in horror or getting angry, because they were that kind of jokes, people laughed.

I had known either from a story or an interview that Oliver was a Liverpool fan, so it wasn't a surprise when he talked about going to his first game when he was a child, and then he moved on to visiting the Liverpool locker room at Yankee Stadium this summer, in a story that also involved fellow Liverpool fan Daniel Craig. (I won't spoil the story here, plus I could never be nearly that funny, but John Oliver, Yankee Stadium, James Bond and Liverpool is a whole lot of awesome in one place.)

My wife and I were sitting in the balcony, and as he was telling this ultimately fairly harrowing Liverpool story, I wasn't just laughing, but wishing I had a chance to talk to him not as successful comedian and riotous TV show host (him, obviously) and complete nobody (me, obviously) but as Liverpool fan to Liverpool fan.

Because as different as our lives are, we have that in common.