The NBA Finals are over. The Stanley Cup’s been handed out. The US Open is already forgotten. So now what? Baseball? There’s still four months of that. The NBA Draft? That’s going to dominate the headlines tomorrow. A drunk guy trying to drive 40 miles home in his golf cart because his family left him behind at the course? Now we’re talkin’!

The MILWAUKEE JOURNAL-SENTINEL has the tale of a 47-year-old man (who for some reason has been unidentified) who was abandoned at the Kettle Hills Golf Course in suburban Milwaukee by a group of people he referred to as his “uncles.” And when you’re 10 beers into your day, taking the cart home seems like a great idea, even if would take you a week and a half to get there. Luckily the guy was run down by the cops in an extremely low speed chase about a mile from the course. Here’s a map of the 2009 “Tour de Beast Light”:

(In the guy’s defense, he thought he was playing “Tron”)

Originally, when the cop car blew his horn and flashed his lights at the guy, he just pulled over to the shoulder and kept right on driving, as if the only thing he was doing wrong was driving in a lane instead of the shoulder. He eventually pulled over and was charged with operating a vehicle under the influence and for blowing a stop sign on the corner of Route 167 and Route 175.

There’s no word on the whereabouts of the “uncles,” who clearly were not pleased with their nephew for some reason. It appears as if things might have gotten well out of hand before he decided to flee, as the police were called to the course before the crew even finished up their round.

Speaking of deluded men under the influence, it’s not exactly news that Sammy Sosa was juicing all those years, and still not news that Ryne Sandberg says he doesn’t belong in the Hall of Fame. Personally, I think so many guys were ‘roiding it up that the now-sullied stars of the era were still the best players of their generation even if they were artificially enhanced (and pitchers were doing it too). So I’d probably be OK with guys like McGwire, Bonds, and Sosa getting into the Hall someday. But I might be changing my mind on Sosa now that Darren Rovell has discovered that Sammy had his jersey sleeves tapered so that his arms would look bigger:

Courtesy of Rovell’s article:

CNBC confirmed through a source that Sosa did indeed ask for the elastic arm tapering for at least the 2002 season. The source said that he could not remember another player that asked for this specification.

“I don’t know why it would be tapered like that other than it being a purely cosmetic change so that people could see his muscles,” said David Hunt, president of Hunt Auctions. “There doesn’t seem to be any other reason why he’d do it.”

Oh man, that’s just kinda sad. At least Bonds and Big Mac had the courtesy to just take some drugs and mash. Who knows what all Sosa was doing. We now know that he was willing to not only shoot up, but also cork bats AND make his jersey tighter. I wouldn’t be shocked if he somehow found a way to sneak some sort of springy superball into play during his at-bats.

And now for some links for you to peruse while Ricky Rubio looks for someone in Sacramento to throw the ball to:

• Texas won Game 2 of the College World Series final to force a deciding game tonight.

•  The DELAWARE COUNTY DAILY TIMES’ Anthony Sanfilippo says that NBC has nixed the idea of putting Alex Ovechkin and the Caps in one of the Winter Classic games next year because the Caps-Rangers series drew poor ratings this year.

• The Red Sox beat the Nationals 11-3 last night in D.C. in front of the usual 5,000 or so Nats fans. And, oh yeah, about 36,000 Sox fans.

• This might be the classiest video you see all day — a Yankee fan getting in a fistfight with a Marlin fan in front of his young daughter, who is now scarred for life (thanks BBTF):

• The Bills are mired in a decade of futility, but the people of Buffalo are still snapping up season tickets in near-record numbers.

• ESPN doesn’t televise every Manny Ramirez at-bat when he’s playing for the Dodgers, so why are they doing it every time he hits for Albuquerque? Are they really going to do this every day?

• The 76ers have become the latest team to try and forget about the last few years by bringing back their old-school logo. If this is the first step toward the rebirth of the Bullets, I’m all for it.

• The Spurs’ deal for Richard Jefferson may seem like a steal, but BASKETBALL VALUE (courtesy of TRUE HOOP) notes that the Bucks were actually a better team when Jefferson wasn’t on the floor.

• Swimming’s governing body, FINA (where’s the “s”?), is alarmed that world records have been getting crushed lately by swimmers wearing polyurethane-covered suits. Their solution to the problem? Just keep allowing the suits at the world championships.

• Hey, if Tony La Russa’s “done a lot of research on it,” it’s good enough for the Royals’ Trey Hillman to try out. That would of course be batting your pitcher eighth, which Zack Greinke did last night. The problem is that #9 hitter Mitch Maier hit like a pitcher, going 0-for-3 with 3 Ks.

• YOU BEEN BLINDED has video of ESPN’s fantasy guy Matthew Berry f-bombing it up in a faux-interview with a sports comedy duo called 12 ANGRY MASCOTS. He tries waaaaay too hard, but delivers a few decent lines. Not sure how ESPN feels about Berry dropping the phrase “Kosher C***block” on YouTube.

• Did you think last August that Michael Phelps was going to be rendered mostly irrelevant already, while Shawn Johnson would be the one going to every big film premiere? Here’s Shawn at the Transformers premiere:

Eleven years ago, the world of sports was a very different place. Internet usage was in its relative infancy, ESPN cared more about televising sports news than people shouting at each other, and steroids were something that old-timey football players like Lyle Alzado used. That summer, Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa would capture the nation’s attention and “save baseball” with their epic home run battle. It was truly a simpler time.

The lone voice of cynicism that summer was AP writer Steve Wilstein, who introduced the world to the bottle of androstenedione in Mark McGwire’s locker. By doing so, he opened the floodgates to the controversy over steroids, and opened himself up to much controversy. Fast forward eleven years. That summer’s heroes - McGwire and Sosa - are disgraced shells of their former selves…and Wilstein? He might be headed to the Hall of Fame.

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The issue of Sammy Sosa’s Hall of Fame candidacy has lay near the center of a vortex of both cynicism and optimism for years now, teetering between “Hey, he never tested positive, did he?” and “Come on, everybody knows he was using something.” Both sides had merit, and how one felt about Sosa closely mirrored how one felt about the era as a whole. So goes Sosa, so goes the rest of the league from, oh, ‘96 to ‘03.

(This, in retrospect, was most unfortunate.)

Well, both sides had merit, anyway. Lawyers close to the 2003 drug tests have just revealed to the NEW YORK TIMES that Sosa did, in fact, test positive for a performance-enhancing drug in the league-wide tests that year. Neither Sosa nor the MLB is allowed to comment, since those test results are sealed (you’d think a lawyer would understand what that meant), but we don’t know what any of them would say.

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It’s been said that either Manny Ramirez is incredibly dumb, or incredibly good at playing dumb, and his response to his 50-game suspension for violating MLB’s Joint Drug Prevention and Treatment Program gives proponents of either theory plenty of fuel for the fire. On one hand, claiming that a doctor gave him medicine for a “personal problem” seems like a flimsy attempt to use ignorance to cover up cheating, especially since the drug in question (hCG) is primarily used as a fertility treatment for women.

But what the “personal problem” really was personal - like he was trying to get pregnant? Maybe he saw that Arnold Schwarzenegger movie “Junior” on a plane flight and thought that sounded like a great idea. I mean, come on: Manny’s so crazy, he doesn’t even know that men can’t conceive. That’s just Manny being Manny.

(The only thing inconceivable is Manny Ramirez’s story.)

Are you buying it? Me either. As the news spread throughout the baseball world, the most shocking aspect is just how not shocked anyone who wasn’t a Dodger fan was about it. His former teammates with the Boston Red Sox seemed to be more upset that they have to talk about Manny Ramirez again than anything else, with closer Jonathan Papelbon summing up most player’s thoughts:

“I just walked in the clubhouse today and found out about it. I haven’t really thought about it all. We’ve got more things to worry about on our club. Obviously, it’s a news story, blah, blah, blah. There’s so many more things we have to go get ready for. He’s not in our clubhouse anymore, so this is something that we’re not even worried about.”

Meanwhile, the debate seemed to come not about Manny Ramirez’s guilt or innocence, but about everything surrounding his presumed guilt. Such as Brooks’ question that if everyone is doing PEDs, then do we have to let Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire and Roger Clemens into the Hall of Fame? Or if the Dodgers are going to symbolically tear down “Mannywood,” the section devoted to the team’s Cult of Personality.

So how did the Dodgers react on the field without their leader? In a word: shaky. Oh, it started out good, jumping out a 6-0 first inning lead on the dreadful Washington Nationals. But then it all fell apart, although this had nothing to do with Ramirez’s absence.

Blame this on the Dodgers’ increasingly leaky bullpen, which allowed nine runs in the seventh and eigth innings en route to an 11-9 Dodgers loss - which stopped the team’s record home winning streak to start the season at 13. You also couldn’t blame Ramirez’s replacement in left field, Juan Pierre, who went 2-for-4 but did make the inning-ending out in the eighth with the bases loaded.

Meanwhile, back to Ramirez’s former team again … actually, let’s look at both of them, since his original team (the Cleveland Indians) just happened to be visiting his most recent team (the Red Sox) on Thursday night. And while it might be tacky after the events of yesterday to says that Boston’s offense was on steroids, it’s safe to say that they were at least jacked up on a six-pack of Jolt colas.

The Red Sox matched a major league record by scoring 12 runs in the sixth inning while drubbing the Indians 13-3. At least we can be sure that Jason Bay isn’t juicing, unless he tests positive for having too much maple syrup in his blood.

And speaking of blowouts, let’s take a moment to congratulate the Atlanta Hawks for making it to the second round of the Eastern Conference playoffs as they collect their parting gifts and head to the exits. Sure, they are only down 2-0 to the Cleveland Cavaliers, and they are returning home.

But anyone who saw just a few minutes of Cleveland’s 105-85 thrashing of the Hawks knows that this series has all the makings of a sweep. Cleveland lead by as many as 36 before calling off the dogs, and LeBron James was just toying with defenders. And oh yeah, Joe Johnson sprained his ankle and might be out for the series. Have fun at the golf course, Atlanta!

More news that you might have missed last night as you were slowly backing away from Kiefer Sutherland and avoiding eye contact as not to enrage the beast:

• The Players Championship teed off in Florida yesterday, and of course Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson share the lead. Actually, that’s a lie: the FLORIDA TIMES-UNION says that while Ben Crane leads after an opening-round 65, Woods dealt with a balky putter while shooting a 71 and Mickelson was all over the place while putting up a 73.



• But if Tiger feels like he needs any help, he can call on Lee Trevino, as the DALLAS MORNING NEWS says that “Super Mex” has offered to teach him a power fade that will make sure that “he doesn’t lose any tournament.” At the least, he would like him to try an authentic salsa from Texas versus a competitor made in … NEW YORK CITY?!?
• As usual, the Stanley Cup playoffs didn’t disappoint: the CHICAGO SUN-TIMES says that the Blackhawks relied on a late third-period goal to pull even and then scored early in OT to win 2-1 and level their series with Vancouver at 2-2.
• Meanwhile, the DETROIT NEWS says the Red Wings also tied their series with Anaheim at 2-2 but were far less dramatic about it, playing some old time hockey on the way to a 6-2 blowout.
• And as hockey attempts to shine on the ice, it continues to stumble elsewhere, as the TORONTO GLOBE AND MAIL says that a group of investors trying to buy the failing Phoenix Coyotes and move them to Hamilton, Ontario are accusing the NHL and Commissioner Gary Bettman of “operating like an illegal cartel” in blocking the sale and move. Kind of like a more stupid version of the Mafia.
• As the baseball world was reacting to Manny Ramirez’s suspension, the EAST VALLEY TRIBUNE says the Arizona Diamondbacks took the opportunity to relieve manager Bob Melvin of his duties while no one was looking. He’s being replaced by former major league catcher A.J. Hinch, because that’s apparently the only people who can manage the Diamondbacks.
• YAHOO! SPORTS claims that Louisville coach Rick Pitino has made himself a candidate for the Sacramento Kings coaching job. It probably won’t have as much impact when he tells the local media that “Vlade Divac is not walking through that door.”
• The WASHINGTON POST says there was plenty of hot disciplinary action in the NBA, as the Magic’s Rafer Alston received a one-game suspension for his head-slap on the Celtics’ Eddie House, while the Lakers’ Derek Fisher received the game punishment for his cross-check of the Rockets’ Luis Scola. There were no suspensions given to Kobe Bryant, Ron Artest or any pieces of furniture.
• It wasn’t just Didier Drogba who was upset with Norwegian referee Tom Henning Ovrebo for several calls that didn’t go Chelsea’s way in the 1-1 tie with Barcelona that knocked them out of the Champions League semifinals. EUROSPORT says the ref had to be “smuggled” out of the country under police escort.
• A football player at Chico High in Texas has been arrested for assaulting a 13-year-old girl in what WFAA-TV is referring to as a “sex game” gone horribly wrong, involving freshman girls “sexting” the popular football players to gain popularity.

Three months ago I wrote that since Alex Rodriguez was found to have used steroids, the baseball Hall of Fame was eventually going to have to let in anyone who had the numbers to warrant induction. That included guys like Mark McGwire, who if not for the pall cast over his career by steroid-use suspicion, would already be in Cooperstown. Not to mention Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds, who may soon be unequivocally found to have used PEDs throughout their careers.

(OK, a little over-the-top)

Guys like Bud Selig, Bob Costas, dozens of holier-than-thou baseball writers, and plenty of other dinosaur media members though have continued to intimate with their words and deeds that confirmed (and suspected) steroid users should not be afforded the honor of entering the Hall.

But now with the news today of Manny Ramirez using PEDs, it’s getting to the point where if we don’t let steroid/PED users into Cooperstown, there won’t be anyone left to induct.

You won’t hear any of those hypocritical media members backtracking about the Hall of Fame today. Not yet. But I can guarantee you that the Ramirez revelation, regardless of his claims of innocence, will have an impact going forward on who is seriously considered for the Hall of Fame.

It has to, ‘else you might as well furlough HOF workers for the next decade or two.

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I’ve enacted an embargo on all sports media, thanks to Alex Rodriguez’s PEDs admission today. I can’t take anymore talk of how this will affect ARod’s reception by fans and his off-field endorsement career. I could give a damn how Rodriguez is treated by fans or how much off-field money he’ll make in the future.

(Guess those Horse ‘Roids Nomah scored in TJ didn’t do the job)

How is the media missing the only thing that matters in the aftermath of ARod getting nailed to the floorboards? Or am I giving them too much credit?

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Like a lot of people, we got pretty excited when we saw quotes from former bodybuilder Jay McGwire, and heard whispers about the possibility of a tell-all book. After all, who wouldn’t be excited about a tome from a man who looks like a dead-ringer for the Gold’s Gym logo? It never hurt that there were quotes about his brother Mark’s steroid use in there, which sure seemed to make the book a ready-packaged winner at Barnes & Nobles. Well, evidently we were in the minority, because all the publishers who have seen Jay McGwire’s 58-page proposal have passed on it … rapidly.

(What we didn’t know: Big Mac was drinking the clear in this ad.)

In a story printed in today’s NEW YORK TIMES, executive editors, publishers and presidents of HarperCollins, Gotham Books and Penguin Group USA (via Gotham), all said they had serious doubts about the younger McGwire’s claims … and that even if they didn’t, they wondered if the concept would sell anyway:

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• Police have put the cuffs on the pyromaniacal perpetrators who messed up Donovan McNabb’s suburban Phoenix lawn.

(Criminal masterminds Rex Perkins [L] & Ryan Hanlon [R])

• Notre Dame denies the rumors that they want to grab Jon Gruden.

• First Sir Charles, and now the D-Backs mascot. Guys, just call a cab.

• This parrot has ceased to be … a spectator at an English soccer game, because he kept impersonating the ref’s whistle.

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Mark McGwire used a ton of performance-enhancing drugs during his baseball career. Everybody knows it without really knowing it; between the unprecedented power, the rapid muscle growth, and the fiffin in front of Congress, there was no rational explanation for his behavior other than “roid roid roid.” But at the same time, nobody except for half-man, half-cartoon Jose Canseco has ever claimed to be there when the usage went down, so there’s that shred of ambiguity. Where’s the stone-solid proof that puts McGwire in direct contact with steroids?

(Here it is!)

Unfortunately for McGwire, that aforementioned shred of ambiguity can be sold for an unholy amount of money, and that’s something that his brother Jay understands very well. According to DEADSPIN (also the source of the picture above), Jay plans to write and sell a book called The McGwire Family Secret (we’re really hoping that’s a working title) that describe’s Jay’s personal involvement with Mark’s entrance and journey into the world of PED’s. And you’re probably wondering, “but are there embarrassing anecdotes and family-rending accusations?” Boy howdy, are there ever. Excerpts are after the jump.

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The Clear. It sounds like the name of a rock band with a vaguely Christian background, but we all know what it really is: the steroid concoction that Barry Bonds and other elite athletes took as part of their training regiments through BALCO labs as a way to cheat the system and produce jaw-dropping, chemically-enhanced performances. Technically, the drug is called tetrahydrogestrinone, otherwise known as THG, but The Clear is clean name for it when used by dirty players.

But YAHOO! SPORTS did some poking around some recently unsealed grand jury testimony from expert witnesses, and found some very interesting facts. Like that THG wasn’t classified as an illegal steroid until 2005, well after the BALCO case broke and Bonds had admitted to using The Clear. Or that that lead BALCO investigator Jeff Novitzky testified in 2004 that ”there’s never been any studies to show whether or not THG does, in fact, enhance muscle growth.”

So yeah, the drug that has become a code word for a designer steroid at the heart of the government’s perjury case against Bonds? It wasn’t actually illegal when he was allegedly taking it. That’s more than a monkey wrench being thrown into the government’s case - that an entire 48 piece Craftsman tool set.

The government is expected to claim that regardless of the legality of THG, they have proof that Bonds took other banned substances. But if that’s the case, why is it that the only thing we heard about was The Clear for the past five years?

So it’s time to be honest with ourselves: Barry Bonds is not going to jail. This case is teetering close to a total meltdown, and at some point the government either has to cut its losses or risk a series of headaches in court. There will be no Schadenfreude moment of him doing a “perp walk” to a federal prison somewhere in Kansas, no teary interviews from jail with ESPN. It’s not happening.

But now what? It’s an amazing coincidence that this news comes out the same week that Hall of Fame voting results were released, which showed that voters are apparently willing to make at least Mark McGwire a scapegoat for the “Steroid Era” in baseball even if he’s been convicted (or charged) with no crimes, a fact that didn’t bode well at all for Bonds.

So do voters do with Barry Bonds? It’s easy to keep him out if he’s convicted, or has the cloud of the BALCO case hanging over his head. But if it turns out that The Clear - the drug that people thought might doom his chances - wasn’t illegal when he was taking it, and perhaps didn’t give him any edge, how do you justify keeping him out?

Meanwhile, back in the world where we actually talk about sports - as in what happened on the field - the LOS ANGELES TIMES reports that the Lakers had themselves a little bit of a Texas Train Wreck against the San Antonio Spurs on Wednesday night. First, with the Lakers clinging to a 111-109 lead with 10 seconds to go, the Spurs’ Roger Mason was fouled by Derek Fisher while scoring, setting up a three-point play to give San Antonio a one point lead.

That’s ugly, but what happened next was worse. With a chance to win the game, Kobe Bryant (who had drained a three pointer the previous possession to give the Lakers their lead) took the ball and confidently … passed off to Trevor Ariza, who got all tangled up with Manu Ginobili and was called for travelling with 0.8 seconds to go to end the game.

What? No offense to Ariza, who is a good role player. But why in the hell is Kobe Bryant passing up a game-winning shot? If you ask him, it’s because he wanted to motivate Ariza and the team:

“I could have rose up and shot it myself, but I felt like if one of my teammates, particularly Trevor, to get that opportunity just to drain a shot or something like that, he just takes his game to a whole ‘nother level,” Bryant said. “It just didn’t work out.”

Which is great if he makes it, Kobe. But since he blundered the chance, you’ve probably crushed the kid’s confidence. Way to go.

• Crime doesn’t pay, especially if you’re photographed doing it in a major national magazine. MMA fighter and avowed anarchist Jeff Monson has learned this the hard way, as THE OLYMPIAN has details of his arrest on vandalism charges after being photographed spraying anarchy signs and other graffiti on the Washington state Capitol building for an ESPN THE MAGAZINE story.



• USC Trojan fans, get ready for the Mitch Mustain era to begin. Or maybe Aaron Corp. Or possibly Matt Barkley. Somebody is likely going to need to step in and replace Mark Sanchez at QB next season, as the LOS ANGELES TIMES reports that the junior will likely enter the NFL Draft.
• Speaking of Kobe…he has a new viral video for Nike that involves him riding a horse and selling “ankle insurance.” NESW SPORTS has the video, but I can promise you this: I’ve seen fake commercials for insurance, and this is no Old Glory Robot Insurance.
• Yet another installment from The Classy World of Elijah Dukes: the TAMPA BAY TRIBUNE says that the Nationals slugger has been ordered to pay more than $40,000 in child support and alimony to his ex-wife or face 90 days in jail.This is the same ex-wife he once reportedly texted a picture of a gun to with the words “You dead, dawg.”
• Newly-elected Baseball Hall of Fame members Jim Rice and Rickey Henderson appeared on David Letterman’s show last night to deliver the “Top Ten Highlights of My Hall of Fame Baseball Career.” My personal favorite is hearing Rickey utter the line “I invented the first vibrating jockstrap.” I think he believes he actually did.
• Two Sydney FC soccer fans wanted to show longtime player Robbie Middleby just how upset they were he was leaving for a rival team. So the SYDNEY MORNING HERALD says they attacked him in the stadium parking lot. Well I guess he’ll stay now!
• MASN SPORTS catches up with Kris Benson, who is trying to make a comeback from a torn rotator cuff. Sadly, no update on his wife Anna, but we can assume that she’s still pretty hot.



• The VICTORIA TIMES COLONIST has the sad story of former major league pitcher Frank Williams, whose career was ended by a car crash in 1989 that sent him into a spiral of homelessness and alcoholism that led to his death last Friday at the age of 50.
• TV10 NEWS in Columbus reports that Matt Sylvester, a former Ohio State basketball player who hit a late three-pointer to beat then-No. 1 Illinois in 2005, was arrested on Wednesday after he almost ran over a cop while leaving a Buckeyes game last week. Maurice Clarett thinks he could have done much, much better.
• And in case you missed it…the Orlando Magic set an NBA record by hitting 23 three-pointers in their 139-107 win over the Sacramento Kings. Something tells me the zone defense wasn’t working on them.