This And That

The baseball HOF ballot has been announced and at least one, possibly two, players seem likely to be voted in immediately:  Greg Maddux and Tom Glavine.

Timing, of course, is everything, so the unluckiest names on the ballot are Mike Mussina and Frank Thomas. Mussina won 270 games and had a career ERA of 3.46, but here's betting he won't be voted in.  Not easy to be that good and fail to get in.  Indeed, a lot of pitchers with less gaudy numbers have been voted in.

Frank Thomas is my candidate for least good player to get in.  Thomas had a career batting average over .300 and smacked 521 home runs, but many fans and maybe even a writer or two will say, "Who'd he play for?"

Lastly, there is the cheaters' division led by Barry Bonds.  He ain't getting in because the baseball world is still pissed off at him.

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If football were a 45 minute game, or even a 59 minute game, Temple might be ranked number two or three in the nation.  Unfortunately, it is still a 60 minute game.  Temple has lost more big leads and late than any team I can ever remember.  Is their problem one of conditioning or is their defense easy to figure out after about 30 minutes exposure?

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The 2008 Phillies never died.  You can see most of them again this coming April at a stadium near you.

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The Flyers struggled mightily to get back to .500 after their disastrous first month and when they finally got there they went to Florida and blew it against a mediocre team.  Afterwards, one of their veteran players and their new coach said aloud the team didn't seem ready to play last night.  Seems a little late for that kind of sentiment, eh?

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The Eagles have defied a lot of pundits and sit tied atop the NFL East division.  Of course, theirs is the weakest division in football.  The next several weeks they play a number of teams who could prove the pundits really do know what they are talking about, but it has been entertaining lately to watch Nick Foles mature into a starting quarterback....at least for this season and next.  The Eagles are still going to try and draft a franchise quarterback.