1. The Red Sox should never get knocked out of the playoffs before the ALCS. It’s just bad for baseball.

2. Wade Phillips will not be a head coach in the NFL next season unless he can orchestrate a Tom Coughlin like turn around. Thanks to Miles Austin and Jay Ratliff, that might still be possible.

3. No team should ever win a game when their quarterback (Derek Anderson) has a 15.1 passer rating. Derek Anderson was so bad, he had nearly as many completions to the opposite team as he did his own (2 completions, 1 interception).

4. If the NHL is able to successfully thwart Jim Balsillie from buying the Minnesota Wild, the NFL should be able to stop Rush Limbaugh from buying the Rams… Right?

5. Fantasy Football stops being fun when you’re 4-0 but your team underperforms so woefully that you lose to an opposing team that didn’t start its quarterback, number one wide receiver, tight end, and opposing defense. I started Willis McGahee, Calvin Johnson, John Carlson, and Neil Rackers who combined for an incredulous 7 points between them. I also sat Roddy White against the 49ers in favor of Steve Smith with a matchup against the Raiders. Three points would have won me the week.

We all have to come to terms with the fact that:

1. Tim Tebow is the poster boy of sports in America. Move aside Lebron and Shawn Johnson, Brett Favre and yes, even you Michelle Wie, America only cares about Tim Tebow and how many chapters of a book he can read before his headaches set in. I cannot remember the last time media covered the health of a collegiate athlete as actively as they have pursued the status of Tim Tebow. And while reporters critiqued Tebow’s every breath, a much better quarterback named Sam Bradford returned to the football field as well. And I don’t buy this Florida-LSU national championship showdown either. The Tigers offense isn’t BCS bowl worthy and this definitely won’t be their last SEC loss….
Oh and this just in, Barack Obama’s main competition for the Nobel Peace Prize? Yup, you know it. Tim Tebow.

2. The Broncos are better than we thought they were. Nobody wants to jump onto the Kyle Orton bandwagon but it’s time to face the facts; they’re 5-0, allow an average of 8.3 points a game for opposing offenses this season and have wins against the Patriots and Bengals–a Cincinnati team that would be undefeated themselves if Brandon Stokely hadn’t plucked Kyle Orton’s batted ball out of the air and raced 87 yards for a game-winning touchdown.

3. The Cowboys are just really mediocre. Miles Austin bailed out Tony Romo and the rest of his teammates by almost single-handedly winning the game against the Chiefs on Sunday. Don’t be fooled by Tony Romo’s 300 yards of passing either. 250 of them were to Miles Austin and almost all of those yards came after the catch.

4. J.P. Losman will lead the Las Vegas Locomotives to the UFL championship this year. After watching a gritty come from behind win to beat his California Redwoods, coach Denny Green said of Losman and the Locomotives, “They are who we thought they were!” Just kidding. He did however say, while analyzing his ground game, “We were really chasing the rabbit into the rabit hole in the second half.”
I don’t know which is more comical, Dennis Green coaching a team called the Redwoods or JP Losman getting his first UFL win while teams in the NFL with quarterbacks named Jamarcus Russell, Marc Bulger, and Kyle Boller have one win between them.

5. It’s time to usher in the Vince Young era in Tennessee. With all due respect to Kerry Collins, there is simply no way the Titans will contend with him behind center. Jeff Fisher has to realize that he’s playing in the AFC and that, even if he won the remaining 11 games on his schedule he still might not make the playoffs (as the Patriots learned last year). If this was the NFC it would be a different story, but the Titans are now all but done. If Jeff Fisher needs more motivation, all he has to do is look into the stands where his fan base is begging the organization to make a change. And why not just run straight wild cat formation the rest of the year with Young and Lendale White in the shotgun and Chris Johnson running the motion route from the wide position? The Titans could be the first team ever to rush for 3,000 yards and it would probably sell tickets.

6. Chad Pennington is probably done in Miami. Out with the old Chad and in with the new. If you missed Monday Night’s game, Chad Henne did an excellent job managing the Dolphins offense. Henne however, displayed not only the ability to spread the ball across the field and hit open receivers for first downs, but also the strength to stretch the middle of the field, as evident on Ted Ginn Jr.’s 53 yard touchdown catch. Most impressive however, was that Henne led three come from behind drives during the fourth quarter against one of the best defenses in the NFL.
6.a. If in fact Chad Pennington’s days as a Dolphin are over, is it merely setting the two-time Comeback Player of the Year Award to win it for the third time?

Final Thoughts About the Weekend:
Football reigns supreme in America right now. For the most part each individual game in the Division Series was interesting, but the Series themselves were all short without much major drama. Alex Rodriguez has quieted his critics who have termed him “un-clutch” in the past for now, but he better realize that Yankees fans equate performance in the ALDS roughly with that of the regular season. With expectations in New York as high as they are right now, the only way A-Rod can permanently quiet his critics is by leading the Yankees to a World Series. I’m much more excited by the second round matchups in the MLB playoffs and especially a potential showdown between Joe Torre and his former team. While things in baseball have been going more or less as predicted (all four favorites winning short series’) both the NFL and College football have had their share of surprises and great matchups. The week ahead features more of the same for football fans and the start of two potentially great series in baseball. Early indications all point towards a great week of sports ahead.

Anyway, the point I’m trying to make here is that if the Cardinals and Red Sox can win their game 3 matchups, they have a better than average chance at staging a comeback; “Better than average” just seemed to long a phrase to put in a headline.

The reason for this assertion is that while both teams’ offenses have struggled, their top-two arms have been and are fantastic, and that is an incredible resource to have. Even though the No. 1 starter would be going on short rest, any team that gets to start Chris Carpenter or Jon Lester is at a distinct advantage. And once the series is evened-up, anything can happen. And anything can especially happen when Adam Wainwright or Josh Beckett is on the hill.

The Cardinals are certainly in a better spot than the Red Sox, because the Dodgers really don’t have a comparable ace to match Carpenter or Wainwright, so if they can squeeze through the Pineiro game I like their odds. The Red Sox have a tougher road. Jon Lackey will at least start one of the games, and depending on what Mike Sciosia wants to do, either Ervin Santana or Jered Weaver will be starting the other. The Red Sox also have a tougher task because Scott Kazmir, a Red Sox killer, is starting game 3 against Clay Buchholz, who has pitched very poorly his last two starts after a number of very impressive ones.

Offense is going to be the key for both teams in game 3. Their lineups are going to have to wakeup from their daze (and even though Matt Holliday has been hitting, he’s going to have to make up for his costly error with his bat) and win a ballgame for their pitchers.

If the Cards win game 3, I give them a 50/50 shot at the series. If the Red Sox win game 3, its more like a 33/67 scenario, but it’s been done before…

For the first time in my life, I got to be a part of those drunk people at a baseball game. And it was glorious.

Highlights included one friend challenging the Sea Dogs mascot to a dance-off, and with half the stadium (around 8,000 people at the game) watching, a four-round show between the two ensued, good enough to make the judges on “America’s Best Dance Crew” proud. Ultimately the giant Sea Dog won the contest, largely due to his ability to make splits look awesome in his ridiculous costume. Later on in the night, as several of us were naturally heckling the third base coach (Hey 24, why do you even need cleats?) one local Mainer grew a little tired of our endless chirping (the rest of the crowd was totally loving it) and told us, in slightly coarser language, “to please lower our voices.” Instead of hmm, obliging, one of our most pacifistic friends was not having any of it, and went toe-to-toe with the big man, to the bemusement of the rest of us.

Mostly, however, it was a good time because of the whole atmosphere of minor league baseball. For those of you who don’t know, Portland is a gorgeous, artsy, small city in southern Maine. The Sea Dogs are the Red Sox AA affiliate, a team that recently featured Clay Buchholz, Daniel Bard, Michael Bowden and Jed Lowrie. Last night we were only treated to seeing Lars Anderson, even though Daisuke Matsuzaka and Jonathan Papelbon’s younger brother were on the roster. By my count, by the way, Anderson walked at least 19 times.

Regardless of the lack of near-Major League ready talent at the game, it was quite the occasion all-around. I did have one complaint however, and a lesson learned. Some of my less than enthusiastic friends decided that after 10 innings of a 2-2 game it was time to leave. Outnumbered (and because the birthday boy wanted to go) I obliged, but I will be sure to let them each know that the Sea Dogs won with a walk-off home run in the 14th inning, you could say leaving was a bit of a mistake. Now that’s the understatement of the century.

But this season, it just hasn’t been the same. Maybe it’s the mere fact that Papelbon insists on waiting a good 45 seconds between pitches, which is particularly frustrating when batters foul off five or six fairly regularly. But even setting aside the “Papelbon Lag Time,” I never quite feel comfortable when Pap is on the mound. I mean the guy has a 1.94 ERA and is 32/35 in save opportunities so clearly he is succeding, but just when I watch him it always seems like he’s making it close by putting guys aboard or narrowly escapes homeruns that die on the warning track. And sure enough, when I looked at his peripherals, it seemed to fit. Pap has a 1.29 WHIP, which is quite a bit higher than what you might expect. He also has .41 GB/FB ratio, meaning that over twice as many balls that are hit off him end up in the air…not where you want them, especially if they’re headed for left field at Fenway.

While I lack the data to figure out where those fly balls are going I have seen quite a few travel right up against the wall. And the way I see it, I don’t really see why they wouldn’t. Papelbon doesn’t throw that hard. He tops out at 97 or 98, but sometimes is down around the 95 region, and the fact is that his fastballs are straight. And we’re talking about major league hitters. It also comes down to pitch selection. He pounds the strike-zone with fastballs (in theory) but sooner or later you have to mix it up. And the fact that I know that each and every time Papelbon has someone 0-2 he will go to the high fastball is not a good thing. He has to utilize his splitter more or at the very least throw in some more changeups. Hitters may have just missed so far this year, but major league hitters don’t miss flat fastballs for very long.

But are those suspensions equal? It’s easy to quantify the loss of Youkilis, his bat can’t be in the game, and instead the Red Sox will use just another combo of the Lowell/Varitek/V-Mart/Kotchman/Ortiz madness for those games. But nonetheless, the Red Sox lose arguably their best player for five games.

You could argue the same for Porcello. 5 games means he will miss his next start and the Tigers are going to have to find someone else to start that fifth game and then in another five days Porcello will make his next start. But is that what is going to happen? When a pitcher is suspended for five games, the idea is to miss his start given the 5-man rotation. In reality, teams often just push that player’s start back one day, and can almost always put in another starter on full rest in to replace them due to off-days. So it’s just not really fair.

In some ways the 5 and 5 suspension makes sense, because the idea is that a pitcher makes up a much higher percentage of the outcome of a game than a hitter. Maybe five hitter games equals one starting pitcher game, or thereabout. But in order to fully make this work the commissioner’s office should realize they should hand hitters five-game suspensions and pitchers a nine game suspension, to ensure the pitcher misses a full turn of the rotation. It’s only fair.

But that may change. Before we go farther, I want to point out that it has not been made clear what exactly Ortiz tested positive for. While everyone assumes that Ortiz was on steroids, it may not be the case. Regardless, Ortiz has said that he doesn’t know what he could have tested for and the idea of a false positive has been floating around. For the moment, let’s ignore the fact that so many past users have denied usage or claimed they didn’t think they could have tested positive. What is far more important here is that PED experts have said that the over-the-counter supplements that Ortiz was using during the 2003 season could have caused a false positive in the 2003 tests. Likewise, Major League Baseball has said that there were in fact false positives in the 2003 testing, meaning that some of those 104 players who tested positive may not have actually been PED users.

So does that give Ortiz, and me, a glimmer of hope? Well, yes it does. Actually I started to feel that hope when Bronson Arroyo spoke out saying that in 2003 it wasn’t like it is now. He said there wasn’t a list of what was okay and what wasn’t, everyone was just taking supplements and he wouldn’t be surprised if he was on that list. That says a lot to me about the culture of baseball at the time. And there’s a big difference between Ortiz/Arroyo and A-Rod right there too. At least in my book, pleading innocence when your cousin is injecting you is entirely different from taking oral supplements that anyone can pick up in a GNC and sparking a false positive. A huge difference.

Now I’m not saying that Ortiz definitely didn’t do anything wrong. He may well have. But when we should take away from this is that the issue isn’t settled yet. We don’t know enough to rule on whether Papi is guilty or not, or somewhere in between. But if there was ever someone insistent upon his lack of usage, and they were innocent, it would be David Ortiz.

Really, the bullpen might have been where Smoltz should have started. But the fact that there isn’t going to be an attempt with the bullpen suggests to me that Smoltz has given up, realizing that his body just wasn’t ready for another season. If he was going to come to this conclusion anyway, he saves the Red Sox a lot of money by doing it now instead of later. As far as I’m concerned, it’s still a shame, I would have loved to see his resurgence in Boston.

In other news, its been reported that Toronto outfielder Alex Rios has been claimed off waivers. At this point the Jays can pull him back and have nothing happen, let him go to the team, or try to work out a deal. As far as I’m concerned, the Jays should let him go. Obviously it would have been better if they had traded Halladay but the Jays have got to recognize that there signing of Wells and Rios were not great ideas. Rios is a good player, but he’s not a star and not someone you build a franchise around.

Rios is $9.7M in 2010, $12M for the two years after that, and $12.5M for the two years after that. That’s a lot of years of question marks, and I could easily see them trading him a few years down the road and swallowing a lot of salary. They’re not going to be able to compete next year even with him, and they should let him go.

No word yet on which team has claimed him, but I’ll keep updates coming when word comes in.

7:57 p.m. According to MLBTradeRumors, the Mets, Red Sox and Giants did not claim Rios, looks like this could be a process of elimination game.

Update: ESPN’s Buster Olney says the White Sox are most likely the team who have claimed Rios, though this is unconfirmed.

2:27 p.m. Peter Gammons has said that talks have “heated up” and that a deal is close.

2:29 p.m. MLB.com’s Jonathan Mayo says that Nick Hagadone will be a part of the Victor Martinez to Boston deal via twitter

2:31 p.m. FOX says that Clay Buchholz and Daniel Bard are not a part of this deal. Sounds good for the Red Sox if you ask me. Updates coming in very quickly.

2:37 p.m. Buster Olney has confirmed that Martinez is heading to Boston and that Buchholz and Bard are not part of the trade. Jonathan Mayo now adds Justin Masterson (as well as Hagadone) to the players Boston is sending.

2:42 p.m. Mayo now adds that the deal isn’t done yet, Red Sox may send more players

2:48 p.m. Rumors suggest that the Mets may be the third team involved, and will receive Adam LaRoche as part of the trade. Completely unconfirmed however.

2:54 p.m. NY Baseball Digest and MetsBlog are sources for LaRoche rumor. Maybe not a three-way deal, just Red Sox flipping LaRoche to Mets because he is no longer needed (after getting Martinez).

2:59 p.m. SI’s Jon Heyman says Braves are interested in LaRoche

3:02 p.m. Bob Nightengale says Victor Martinez deal is done. Hagadone and Masterson are the two pitchers sent to Cleveland.

3:15 p.m. MLB Network says pitcher Bryan Price is the third player going to Cleveland in the deal.

3:20 p.m. Yahoo’s Gordon Edes reports that Adam LaRoche has been traded to the Atlanta Braves

3:26 p.m. Looks like the Red Sox are getting Casey Kotchman in return for LaRoche, who they will immediately flip to someone else…probably.

3:35 p.m. Looks like Kotchman may not be being flipped after all.

3:41 p.m. Red Sox are going to keep Casey Kotchman because they like him as a bench player. Sort of strange, but I guess it kind of makes sense. According to Ian Brown, Ortiz just yelled in the clubhouse: “I was just falling in love with LaRoche.”

3:51 p.m. Ian Browne says LaRoche is in Francona’s office. Door is closed.

4:01 p.m. According to Ian Browne: “Some tears were shed,” –Masterson.

4:36 p.m. Red Sox made a last second attempt at Halladay, but the deal fell apart because Red Sox would not give up Buchholz and Bard.

I’m going to the start with the Red Sox because they’re involved in all of the blockbusters. At this point, it’s reasonably safe to say that if Roy Halladay is going to be traded, it will be to the Red Sox; if Victor Martinez is going to be to traded, it will be to the Red Sox; and if Adrian Gonzalez gets traded it’s going to be to the Red Sox. The Dodgers and Rangers are still players on the Halladay sweepstakes and the Mets and Rays are technically involved for V-Mart, but basically I think the Red Sox are the frontrunners for all three. But they will only get one of them. And they will get one of them. I will be shocked if the Red Sox don’t nab one of the three, it could happen, but I doubt it.

From what I gather, Adrian Gonzalez is Boston’s first choice. Gonzalez solves the problem shortage now and in the future, and plays an excellent first base. He also will be the hardest to get, but the Red Sox have spent all Wednesday negotiating with the Friars, as well as late Thursday night. But if they don’t get something done, they’ll turn their attention to Victor Martinez and the Indians. The teams are looking to include a third team in the deal, with Clay Buchholz going to the Indians in exchange for Martinez and prospects evening things out across the board with the three teams. As of yet no word on if they’ve found a third team, but things are definitely progressing, so if the Red Sox take this route I think they and the Tribe will get it done. Were the Red Sox to get V-Mart or Gonzalez, they would trade away Adam LaRoche as he would be of no value anymore.

As far as Halladay is concerned, I don’t think it’s going to happen. The Jays and every other team are at an impasse. As far as I can tell, the Red Sox made the best offer, and I’ve already explained why I think the Jays should ignore the division-rival aspect. In order to get it done, I think the Jays would have to approach the Red Sox or any other team and accept a previous offer or make a less demanding one. That all being said, the Rangers were talking to the Jays yesterday, though nothing came from it as far as we know.

Alright let’s move on to others. There is talk that if the Red Sox do get Adrian Gonzalez, they may take Heath Bell along too if they are willing to include Daniel Bard. Not sure if they’ll do that. The Angels and Marlins are the main suitors for Bell, though it’s not clear that he will necessarily be traded. The Padres made an offer to the Marlins yesterday but it was rejected.

Yesterday the Cubs traded prospects to receive Tom Gorzelanny and Tom Grabow from the Pirates. Just keeps the Bucs fire sale rollin’.

The Twins and A’s are getting closer to a deal for Orlando Cabrera it seems. No specifics have been released, but apparently progress is being made.

The Indians are looking to move Carl Pavano, and it may be to the one place he actually suceeded: Florida. If the Marlins aren’t going to get Heath Bell, they might get Pavano if they’re set on being buyers.

Update: Just now as I’m writing this, the Red Sox said they will be discussing Halladay with the Blue Jays this morning, so maybe it isn’t completely dead. Don’t know if the Sox would rather get Gonzalez or Halladay.

The lead story is that there are unconfirmed reports that Orioles reliever George Sherrill has been traded to the Dodgers. Apparently the Orioles are seeking something like Josh Bell in return. This makes sense, the Dodgers have been talking to the O’s about Sherrill for a few days, and need at least one more reliever.

In other news, the Reds have been talking about acquiring Scott Rolen from the Blue Jays for several days and things were progressing. Now it appears that the talks are dead and that we can probably rule out Rolen heading to Cincy.

The Red Sox and Padres apparently had lengthy discussions regarding Adrian Gonzalez yesterday. I’m assuming that Gonzalez is the Red Sox first choice of all of their trade targets (over Halladay and Victor Martinez) because he is young, has years left on his contract, has power, and is a good fielding first basemen. It’s a move that would be good for this season and beyond (Kevin Youkilis would likely become a more permanent third basemen).

In other Padres news, the Marlins are looking to acquire Heath Bell from the Friars. This news comes after the failure of the Marlins’ surprising attempt at trading for Roy Halladay.

The Mariners have said they will not be trading Jarrod Washburn, so the rumors linking him to the Yankees or Brewers can now be considered dead.

Things are silent with regards to Halladay, more and more expect he’ll stay in Toronto. I’ll keep updates coming.