The Coin Toss

This was the most ho-hum draft I have ever watched. Here are a few points I would like to make.

Stattford went number one. Did anyone think that the Lions even had a choice? When you go 0-16 you have to go with qb, that is where all things start. I just would have liked them have a better selection to choose from. Stattford being the most guaranteed paid player ever is such a travesty. There are veterans who are proven great players who aren’t making as much. If Stattford ends up anything less than a probowl qb then it was wasted money.

I was greatly disappointed in the Oakland Raiders going with a fast receiver over a super-star like Crabtree. It would be the same as picking a quarterback based on who can throw it the furthest, forgetting about accuracy.

The Denver Broncos (my favorite team) also surprised me when they chose to go with Moreno at running back. The Broncos have proven year after year that you can put anyone behind the line and they can run for a thousand yards. I don’t know if the new coach wants to just bring in a big name to replace the other runner-Jay Cutler (who ran like a crying baby) to the Chicago Bears. I would rather have seen Denver go with a defensive lineman. They are definitely rebuilding and hopefully they either have a great year and prove me wrong or they do terrible so they can be in the running for a high draft pick.

Why did Dallas settle for nothing more than special teams players in its draft strategy? I would love to have some more emphasis on the defensive line and linebackers. They definitely went quantity over quality. Lets see how it pans out.

Overall the Eagles and Tampa Bay, in my opinion, had the best drafts. They actually addressed their needs well. They have the best opportunity to really impact their teams not only for now, but in the future as well.

So overall draft opinion? I am really looking forward to next year. The talent, especially in the offensive specialist positions will be something to see where they end up!

So I have been thinking long and hard about my list of the top 10 qbs that have played during Brett Favre’s career, and this is what I have come up with.

10. Warren Moon
09. Dan Marino
08. Jim Kelly
07. Peyton Manning
06. Phill Simms
05. Steve Young
04. Brett Favre
03. Troy Aikman
02. Joe Montana
01. John Elway

I will have another article soon but there is my list! Anv conversation?

No. 4  The last of the great QBs is retiring.  His era of QBs include Joe Montana, Troy Aikman, Steve Young, John Elway, Warren Moon, Phill Simms, Dan Marino and Jim Kelly.  What does all these quarterbacks have in common?  The Hall of Fame.  If I missed someone I apologize I did this off the top of my head.

So this is my question to you, my favorite sports fans.  I would like you to rate the best quarterbacks that played at some point in the last 18 years.  Lets see where Favre ranks with the best of the best.  Here are some facts to remember about Favre.

At of the end of the 2008 regular season, Favre owned or shared most of the well-known NFL career records for quarterbacks, including:

• Consecutive starts by a quarterback: 269 (291 including playoffs)^[5]
• Games started by a quarterback: 269 (291 including playoffs)^[83]
• Career regular-season victories by a starting quarterback: 169 (Regular-season record: 169-100)^[5]
• Career passing touchdowns: 464^[84][85]
• Career passing yards: 65,127^[84]
• Career pass completions: 5,720^[86][5]
• Career pass attempts: 9,280^[5][4][87]
• Career interceptions thrown: 310^[84][88]
• Career games with at least three touchdowns: 65^[49]
• AP NFL MVP awards: 3 (1995, 1996, 1997)^[89] (tied with Peyton Manning)
• Career playoff interceptions thrown: 28 (tied with Jim Kelly)^[88]
• Career playoff losses as starting QB: 10 (tied with Dan Marino)

Favre is one of four quarterbacks to lead the league in touchdown passes four times. The others are Johnny Unitas, Len Dawson and Steve Young.^[90]

Favre is one of three NFL quarterbacks to have beaten all 31 other NFL teams in his career.^[48]

In addition, Favre owns a number of team records, having printed his name into almost every passing category in the annals of Green Bay Packers history. Most recently, he set the team record for consecutive completions with 20 on November 22, 2007, against the Detroit Lions.^[91] With 39 “come-from-behind” 4th-quarter wins and three more overtime victories (Packers total of 40 makes him Green Bay record holder), Favre is second only to John Elway’s 47 4th-quarter or OT “come-back wins”, in NFL history.

I pulled these records off of wikipedia.  So get out your thinking caps and put together your lists for me.  I promise there are no wrong answers and i will have my list up on Monday.

So much going on right now that I decided to talk about drugs and sports.  Obviously the first thing that comes to most people’s mind is the whole ARod fiasco with him admitting to using performance enhancing drugs from 2001 to 2003, while playing for the Texas Rangers.  First of all, I hope that he is no longer on anything and that his admission was full disclosure.

In the era from the late ninety’s through mid 2000’s, the baseball culture was in shambles.  All baseball wanted to do was hit homeruns.  Remember the baseball changed to be tighter wrapped to bounce off the bat faster.  Remember that Stadiums being built were smaller and “hitter’s parks”.  Remember that the era of stolen bases and sacrfice hits were declining faster than ever.  Baseball lost is strategy, to its muscle.  So how could steriods not be passed out like Pez?

Is it a disgrace that the only stats that matter in sports are all tainted due to the enhancement of an entire generation of ball players?  How do we compare them to the all time greats of yesteryears when we watch those legends play? There is no doubt in my mind that we will not be able to verify those who never used versus those whose roid habits were as prevelant as those who used to do chewing tabacco.

I applaud A Rod in his decision to just admit to the reports and hopefully all of baseball can realize that there is more to this national past time, there is honor in the numbers.  And now there is an asterisk for over a decade of baseball.

To all my faithful readers, and maybe some of you that gave up on the site.  I want to apologize for the hectic schedule during the holiday season!  Personal life got in the way of truly doing something I love- writing about sports.  I will be back in the groove starting this weekend so keep an eye out for new changes.  Tell your friends to check us out, again.  We will be focusing on the college basketball season as well as NBA.  I admit I don’t know much about hockey but with some reader’s input who knows what all we can cover.  I look forward to making 2009 even better than 08.   Thank you again.

Could you ask for a better run of college football bowl games than what we have this year?

BCS National Championship - Florida vs Oklahoma is obviously going to be a great game. Superb offensive fire power going into this game and what a spectacular match up between last years Heisman and possibly this years Heisman winner. Sam Bradford has continued to write his name in just about every page in quarterback record books. Has been one of the best quarterbacks I have ever seen play football. His accuracy, patience, and field presence have been amazing the entire season. Even in the loss to Texas he has 350 yards passing and 5 TDs, what more can you ask from a player?  Tim Tebow has been equally impressive with his “on the field general” attitude. Watching that game against Alabama Saturday, seeing him charge full speed ahead into the special teams huddle and demand perfection from them, also getting up in the face of Spikes, the defensive captain, pressuring him to achieve dominance. What a leader! His off the field accomplishments deserve no less respect. He is a die hard Christian, lives, breathes, plays for God. Does missionary work in the off season. Cannot say enough about Tim Tebow. This will prove to be one of the best National Championship games in a very long time, maybe even in the history of the sport.

Fiesta Bowl -Texas vs Ohio State. Some say Texas got robbed. I personally think that the situation has played out correctly. Their loss came late in the season and honestly didnt have the time to make up for it like Oklahoma did. But thats another story. Texas still has their shot to split the National Championship by impressing the voters in the AP poll. If Texas some how dominates the Buckeyes, they could find themselves #1 in the AP and split the National Championship. I dont see that happening though. Ohio St has came on strong in the final weeks, and Terrell Pryor is playing like a “kid” possessed. I think Texas is going to have their hands full with this game. They probably better worry about getting up for this game and quit worrying about what Oklahoma is doing. If Ohio St comes into Tempe and stuns the Longhorns, the only split they will be getting will be a banana with some ice cream.

Rose Bowl - USC vs Penn St. Now everyone is expecting this to be a lop sided victory for the Trojans. I will in fact take a comment out of Lee Corso’s vocabulary and say “Not so fast my friends!” Everyone talked all year, including myself that Penn State was over rated and benefited from a weak schedule. Well, USC has pretty much done the same. USC has a very strong defense, against the Pac 10, Penn St has been dominate against the Big 10. So basically you have a match up between the champions of the two weakest conferences in the nation. Will Joe Pa trump Carroll? Or will the mighty Trojans prevail?

Orange Bowl -  Cincinnati vs  Virginia Tech. You better have Tivo for this one. Or at least a DVR. This is going to be a supremely fast game. Cincy is loaded with speed, VT is just as fast. Look for Marshawn Gilyard to have a huge game in this one.

Sugar Bowl - Alabama vs Utah. Is this Utah team another BCS cinderella story? Can that come into Sabans territory and withstand the brutal Alabama defense? I think not. What I learned last weekend was that Alabama is very aggressive and will lay the wood on you if given the chance. Utah has not seen this kind of stubborn hard nosed defense all year. Yeah they beat TCU, but lets be honest, this is David vs Goliath here. Who would you put your money on?

Here is a little contest I am going to have with all of our readers.  (Tell all your friends, the more response from this contest the better).

There are 34 bowl games coming up.  What I want you to do, and I will as well is do a confidence pick’em.  If you aren’t sure what that is, this is how it works.  You number the bowl games 1-34  and you want to pick the one you are most confident at 34 and the one you are least confident at 1.   Scoring is done for everyone you got right you get the number of points the pick was at.  It isn’t against any point spreads, just winners.   So have fun and send your picks or any questions to mg.cointoss@yahoo.com.   The winner will receive their picks displayed in a blog as well as some little dinky prize to be announced later.  Sorry, we aren’t a rich site yet

First off I would like to take this time to say, it has been a pleasure! Now down to business!

When the weekend presented us all with a shocking blow that proved to be what Oklahoma fans had been hoping for since October 12, 2008, you had to think that there is no chance. On the contrary, if you look closely, it is very possible. Alabama remains #1  in the Harris and the USA today polls. Oklahoma is ranked #1 in the computers, Alabama is ranked #3. Texas is ranked #2 in the computers, #3 in the Harris and USA today polls. Florida on the other hand is ranked #2 in the Harris, #4 in the USA today, and #6 in the computers.

So upon further review, after seeing what the computer rankings are capable of, anything is possible, anything. So if you take into consideration that its obvious that loss to Ole Miss in Gainesville, is killing Florida in the computers, then its not so out of the question. You know the voters are hurting for redemption after what has occurred this week. So if for some reason Florida squeaks by Alabama, in a ball game where neither team scores 30 points, you have got to believe that Texas has an outside shot of sneaking into the following weeks BCS at #2. So Texas fans don’t think that you are out of this just yet.

What would this mean for college football? What would it do for the Big XII conference? If somehow the nation decides after this weekend, that Oklahoma and Texas are the #1 and #2 teams in the country, which I think they are, how huge do you think that would be? I know that this would be the first time in 105 years that they play each other twice in one season, and it would be the first time that 2 teams from the same conference will play each other in the National Championship game. I think that this would turn out to be the greatest National Championship since the inception of the BCS.

You would have to think it would be a great game and you know Oklahoma would love to get another shot at Texas, as well as Texas would love prove their dominance. The opportunity is there and available, will the voters do it? Most likely not, will Florida barely beat Alabama? Probably not going to happen there either, but that’s another story, another time, possibly today.