September 8th, 2013

We’re only 2 games into the 2013 college football season, and we’re already on Kiffin Watch.  USC athletic directory Pat Haden insisted that Kiffin was not on the hot seat last month.  However, after Saturday night’s debacle at the Coliseum, he’s gotta be thinking about replacing his head coach soon.  The Trojans lost their home opener in pathetic fashion to Washington State by a score of 10-7.  Kiffin has completely micromanaged both of his quarterbacks thus far, and the Trojans scored their fewest amount of points in a game in the last 10 years.  Do you hear that sound Trojan fans?  No, it’s not the fans booing Lane Kiffin off the field on Saturday night.  It’s the sound of USC free falling out of the top 25.

If the Trojans can’t beat WSU at home, then who can they beat?  As much as UCLA and Notre Dame fans are enjoying seeing USC suffer, it’s going to hurt their strength of schedule big time.  After Notre Dame lost to Michigan in the Big House on Saturday, the Irish are going to need some quality wins to get back in the BCS race, and beating up on a crappy Trojan team won’t be one of them.  Same can be said for the Bruins, who have BCS aspirations as well.

Speaking of the Bruins, they’ll be playing with heavy hearts against Nebraska next week, after wide receiver Nick Pasquale was killed in a tragic accident on Saturday morning.  Pasquale spent the weekend back at home in San Clemente, and attended his alma matter San Clemente High’s football game on Friday night.  On Sunday morning at 1:27 am, he was struck by a car on the corner of Camino De Los Mares and Calle Nuevo, in San Clemente.  The accident is still being investigated.  Pasquale was a 20 year old, redshirt freshman, and appeared in the Bruins season opening win against Nevada.  As someone who grew up in San Clemente, it’s certainly easy for me to imagine how a pedestrian could be hit in a neighborhood that is not very well lit at night.  My thoughts and prayers go out to the Pasquale family after this tragic loss.

Here are my thoughts on the NFL season after week 1.  The Steelers are going to be terrible this year.  Colin Kaepernick singled handedly defeated my fantasy team this week, and he might make the 49ers even better this year.  The Cowboys season opening win against the Giants was very predictable, as will be their collapse come January.  Are there any good running backs left?  Shane Vereen was the only running back in the league to rush for 100 yards this week.  My fantasy football team desperately needs help at wide receiver!

On to baseball, where Don Mattingly and the Dodgers have certainly taken their foot off the gas pedal over the last 4 games.  The Boys in Blue were swept by the Reds over the weekend, and after losing 3 straight one run games, they’ve lost four in a row.  Since LA has an 11 game lead in the division, and a magic number of 10 with just 20 games left to play, this doesn’t seem like a big deal.  However, there’s some unsettling trends taking place of late.   The Dodgers are just 2 games behind the Braves for home field advantage throughout the NL playoffs.  However, Don Mattingly doesn’t seem to have any interest in home field, because he started Edison Volquez on Wednesday at Coors Field, and rested his 4 best players.  Then against the Reds, he managed without any sense of urgency, refusing to manufacture runs in tight, one-run games.  The Reds were a far more desperate team, and even though they needed the games more than the Dodgers, LA can’t just sit back and wait for the 3-run homer to bail them out.

Meanwhile, Matt Kemp hasn’t given up on a return this season.  Even after straining his hamstring during this rehab assignment, Kemp is still trying to get back into the lineup.  Don Mattingly said Kemp will need at least another 10 days to get ready, and that’s if he doesn’t suffer any more setbacks.  That would leave him just 11 games to convince the Dodgers he’s ready for the playoffs.  Knowing Kemp, he’ll probably break his wrist signing an autograph for a fan, which will effectively end his season.

We’re only a month away from the start of NBA training camp.  My friend Eugene Kim informed me that after several years on the waiting list, he has finally become a Lakers season seat holder.  Eugene told me he plans on attending only “the crappy games.”  Well Eugene, I guess you will be attending all the games this year, because when Mike D’Antoni is your coach, every game is going to be a steamy pile of crap.

What an amazing cliff hanger Breaking Bad left us with last night!   Spoiler Alert for those who have it on DVR.   Before I get to the cliff hanger, I’ve got to mention how the tables finally turned on Walt.  Hank tricks Walt by taking pictures of a barrel of money, and making him think that Jesse is going to burn all of his money that he buried out in the desert.  In the process of Walt racing out to the desert, he is on the phone with Jesse, and incriminates himself by discussing all of his previous criminal activity.    I certainly did not see this one coming.  Jesse is a rat!  He broke the code among criminals, and turned on Walt by rating him out to Hank.  Then again, I never imagined that Walt would ever hire someone to kill Jesse.

Hank slaps the handcuffs on Walt, in a moment that suddenly made the show seem like a modern western.  The good guy forces the bad guy to surrender, and come out slowly with his hands up.  For just a moment, morality and righteousness was prevailing.  Hank calls his wife Marie to celebrate his capture of Walt, and I suddenly got this uneasy feeling that this may be the last time these two may ever speak, and that something bad might happen to Hank.  Moments later, a car shows up with Todd, Uncle Jack, and his band of thugs.  Both sides opened fire, and a gun fight ensued.  Walt and Jesse are both hiding in the cars to avoid the flying bullets, while Hank and his partner Gomez are hiding behind the car during all the gun fire.  That’s when the episode ended!

In addition to the tables finally turning on Walt, it also seems like he’s becoming overly emotional.  He didn’t want to kill Jesse, and reluctantly agreed to it, then called it off at the last moment.  When Uncle Jack shows up, Walt pleads with him not to open fire and klll Hank.  Of course the irony of this is that if Hank is killed, many of his problems are probably solved, and he can be free again.  Thus, it seems like Walt is emotionally conflicted.  With just three episodes left, I get the feeling this is rapidly moving toward an explosive ending.  Walt participated in all this horrific criminal activity to secure his family’s financial future.  Now it seems possible he could lose his family and everyone he cares about before it’s over, which would leave him with a pointless pile of money for a man with only a few months left to live.  This means when it’s over, there will be no winners.  Just one loser.

September 2nd, 2013

College football season is here and both So Cal squads found the win column in week 1.  However,   the Trojans and Bruins each appear to be trending in completely opposite directions.  UCLA obliterated Nevada 58-20 at the Rose Bowl, while the 90 degree heat simultaneously obliterated the fans that were willing to show up in Pasadena.  I’m not sure what’s more amazing: Brett Hundley’s 334 all purpose yards and 4 touchdowns? Or the fact that Jim Mora Jr. was wearing pants and a long sleeve shirt under his polo for 5 hours in the heat?  In any case, UCLA looks like they have an exciting football team for the first time in many years.

Then there’s the Trojans, who had an unimpressive 30-13 win over Hawaii in Honolulu.  Although the USC defense looked strong, the quarterback situation remains an issue for this team.  In addition to the fact that Lane Kiffin foolishly won’t commit to one starting quarterback, he constantly micromanages his signal callers, which inhibits their ability to improve.  Southern Cal had more talent at every position than Hawaii.  Instead of unleashing that talent and seeing what it can do, Kiffin wouldn’t let his quarterbacks do any more than act as game managers.  Kiffin also micromanaged Matt Barkley last season, causing him to lose confidence and ultimately, sink like the Titanic in the NFL Draft.

When it comes to So Cal college football, it appears for now, up is down and down is up.  Jim Mora Jr. looks like the new Pete Caroll.  Lane Kiffin looks like the new Ric Neusheisel.  UCLA has a great quarterback, while USC has two crappy ones.  Before you know it, UCLA will suddenly start having better looking girls on campus than USC.  Ok….maybe not.

As for the rest of the college football weekend, I was pleasantly surprised to see my Fighting Irish of Notre Dame take care of Temple 28-6.  I think most of my fellow Golden Domers were so shocked by “Turnover Tommy” Rees’ two touchdown passes in the first quarter, we felt it was practically a slap in the face to Notre Dame tradition.  Oh, and how could I forget to mention Texas A&M quarterback Johnny Manziel, who couldn’t be any more of a douchebag for taunting a player and pretending to sign an autograph after scoring a touchdown on Saturday.  This guy is becoming more unlikeable by the minute. The NCAA knows damn well he accepted money for signing autographs, but they know they have a star they can make money off of, so why suspend him?

On to baseball, where the Dodgers continue to roll.  The Boys in Blue swept the Padres over the weekend, and they’ve now opened up an 11.5 game lead over Arizona in the NL West with just 26 games left to play.  LA can probably look to start getting some of their top players some rest, even though they are only two games back  of Atlanta for the best record in the NL.  It sure would be nice to have a healthy Matt Kemp back for October, but you’d have an easier time trying to find Carmen San Diego right now than finding Kemp’s swing.  He’s been dreadful in his minor league rehab assignment.  Good thing Yasiel Puig showed up….

Despite Puig’s erratic behavior, there’s no doubt he can be a star.  The Dodgers look brilliant now for locking him up to a 7 year $42 million contract last winter, which is a bargain.  Speaking of being worth every penny, Zach Greinke has been a fantastic #2 starter.  After improving to 14-3 with yesterday’s win, Greinke has won 6 straight starts and looks like he’ll make a formidable duo with Clayton Kershaw come October.  Adding veteran infielder Michael Young over the weekend was another great, low risk move for the club too.  Closer Kenley Jensen has been just filthy, as he has converted 17 straight saves, and looks like a completely different pitcher than we saw earlier in the year.

As for the Angels, they’ve won a meaningless 8 of their last 9 games after sweeping the Brewers over the weekend.  As they did last year, they start playing real baseball when their season is already over.  Speculation is already running rampant about what Arte Moreno will do with Mike Scioscia and Jerry Dipoto.  Even though Scioscia deserves to keep his job more than Dipoto, hiring a general manager who can’t hire his own skipper isn’t very ideal.  In fact, when Moreno hired Dipoto two years ago, he was very interested in Rays GM Andy Friedman, but Friedman turned him down.  Moreno needs a general manager who can rebuild his farm system, and turn his current team into a contender by adding quality pitching at an affordable price.  Sounds like he’ll have to hire a new gm with the authority to hire his own manager to make this happen.

Moving on to the Lamar Odom saga, now that he’s has been found, and isn’t actually dead, everyone can resume the jokes.  It’s obvious that LO is on crack because he hasn’t signed with the Lakers, who are the only team that was actually offering him a contract.  Well, they “were” the only team offering him a contract, but after he was arrested for suspicion of DUI last week, that opportunity is gone.   Lamar is a good dude, but he needs to get his life together.  Last week, reports were that he was missing for 3 days, but they were clearly mistaken.  He’s been missing for over 3 years.

This Time Warner Cable vs CBS cable dispute is ridiculous.  I can’t believe they haven’t come to a resolution yet.  You Time Warner Cable subscribers realize that you don’t have CBS, Showtime, and KCAL right now is because TWC doesn’t want to charge you $1 more per month right?  For a company that has been notorious for price gouging its customers, I think they can drop the “concerned for their customers” act and gladly add the $1 to everyone’s bill.  TWC escalated this dispute when they blocked Showtime from its subscribers when the dispute started, and they stand to lose a ton of customers if they don’t figure this out fast.

I realize that I’m late to the party on this whole discussion about last week’s VMA’s, but I wasn’t nearly as horrified with Miley Cyrus as others were.  Her twerking display on stage was just another example of an artist trying to create an identify and sell a brand.  We’ve seen far more offensive displays on stage than what we saw that night, so I’m surprised people are so up in arms over it.  However, with that being said, Miley is definitely trying way to hard to separate herself from her Disney Hannah Montana character, to the point where she is hurting her brand.  There’s nothing wrong with trying to re-brand yourself, but there’s probably better ways to do it.

Sadly, all the talk about Miley Cyrus probably overshadowed Justin Timberlake’s performance.  JT had arguably one of the greatest live on stage performances that I have ever seen.  I would hate to be any artist that had to follow that.  I don’t care if you are a JT fan or not, but that guy is unbelievably talented, and his performance was phenomenal.  Here it is in case you missed it:

Finally, the 4th episode of the final 8 episodes of Breaking Bad aired on AMC last night, and the show took somewhat of a breather.  Spoiler Alert for those of you who have it on DVR! Last night’s episode showed how Jesse was convinced not to burn down Walt’s house by Hank, and then Hank proceeded to try and get Jesse to provide some testimony that would incriminate Walt for all his crimes.  Jesse failed to provide this evidence, and when Hank asked Jesse to wear a wire and meet Walt in person later on, Jesse abandoned the plan at the last moment, thinking Walt has an assassin prepared to kill him.

This particular episode definitely did not provide us with the usual edge-of-your-seat tension as before.  Instead, we are given some meaningful moments to ponder.  I found the most interesting  part of the episode to be the ironic impact Walt has suddenly had on all the other characters.  In the first four episodes of this season, Walt’s biggest threats have been his own brother-in-law Hank, and his former business partner Jesse.  Despite the threats they pose, Walt has refused to kill them, because he cares deeply for both of them, as Hank is his family, and Jesse is practically like a son to him.  For all the horrible things Walt has done, he is still willing to protect the ones he cares about.  The irony of this is the very cavalier attitude Walt’s loved ones suddenly have about killing people.  Skyler urges Walt to kill Jesse in order to protect the family.  Marie suggests that she is enjoying the thought of poisoning Walt, and Hank admits he’s willing to let Jesse get killed if it means incriminating Walt.    These moments are definitely setting the stage for an incredible final four episodes, which Breaking Bad fans anxiously await!

August 26th, 2013

It was quite a run for the Dodgers.   After dropping two out of three to the Red Sox over the weekend, the Boys in Blue lost their first series since mid-June.  LA went 14-0-4 in that stretch before those clam chowder eating, terrible driving, “wicked” accent speaking Boston Red Sox beat them up at Chavez Ravine.  This could have very well been a potential World Series preview, however, fear not Dodger fans, this team is still in great shape.  The team didn’t pitch their top two starters in this series, and Hyun-Jin Ryu took the mound with the flu on Saturday night.  The Dodgers still have a 9.5 game lead over 2nd place Arizona in the NL West.  Besides, did you really expect LA to keep winning those games that Chris Capuano kept getting his ass kicked in every five days?

Meanwhile, I think it’s time for the Dodgers to at least pick up the option on the final year of manager Don Mattingly’s contract next year.  Mattingly has definitely earned his keep.  He’s taken the Dodgers from the 4th worst team in baseball, to the 2nd best record in two months.  He’s done this while dealing with a ton of injuries to the club throughout the year.  He’s also successfully managed two different teams:  A completely stripped down Dodger team at the end of the Frank McCourt era, and a team with much more star power in this years Dodger team.  The players like him, he’s managed the egos well, and he’s a huge part of LA building great clubhouse chemistry.  I’m sure the Dodgers have been keeping an eye on Mike Scioscia, but why mess with success?  You don’t need an organization made up of stars in every role.  LA should also think about that this winter before they start replacing Mark Ellis and AJ Ellis with free agents Robinson Canoe and Brian McCann.

Speaking of Mike Scioscia, he denied there is a rift between himself and general manager Jerry Dipoto.  This was a rather predictable move by the Halos skipper.  However, since these two are really “on the same page”, I’d hate to see how bad this team would be if they weren’t on the same page.  Scioscia claimed that their only real public dispute was when hitting coach Mickey Hatcher was fired last year.  “The one thing that I publicly disagreed with Jerry about, and we’ve talked about it too, is when he let Mickey go.  And that’s been it.”  Scioscia also also said “our  philosophies are right in line with anything we’ve ever done here.”

That couldn’t be further from the truth, but what can you expect him to say when he knows his job could be in jeopardy?  Scioscia and Dipoto have both said they want to focus on improving the pitching staff this off-season.  Have they talked with their boss Arte Moreno yet?  Because he’s probably going to want to waste another $200 million instead on signing Robinson Canoe.

Every baseball fan should be thrilled to know that Dodgers announcer Vin Scully is coming back to call games in 2014.  It will be Scully’s 65th season as the Dodgers announcer, which is remarkable for a man who is 85 years old.  Scully could probably read a phone book, and make it interesting for his listeners.  LA sports fans have been so fortunate over the years to have 3 legendary, hall of fame, announcers in their city:  Scully, Bob Miller of the LA Kings, and the late Chick Hearn of the Lakers.

Why can’t Lane Kiffin just pick a starting quarterback for the Trojans already?  This guy is more indecisive than a 17 year old girl right now.  Kiffin said that “ideally” they don’t want to have a two quarterback system.  Then he decides that both Max Wittek and Cody Kessler will play in the season opener at Hawaii on Thursday night.  SC hasn’t used two quarterbacks since the 1995 season, when Brad Otton and Kyle Wachholtz shared the role.  USC did win the Pac-10 title that year, but these types of systems don’t usually lend themselves to effective chemistry building.  Rumor has it that Kiffin was informed that if Wittek doesn’t win the starting job, he will end up transferring, which could ultimately force him to make a decision, rather than use two quarterbacks.  I’m sure right about now many USC fans are wishing that the Trojans would use two coaches as well.

After hearing reports that Lamar Odom has been missing for 3 days, there were many things that were going through my mind.  I know many of you are expecting me to cue up the jokes on this one, and even though there are probably a multitude of them I can throw in here, it just isn’t the time.  TMZ reported over the weekend that Odom has been battling a drug problem for two years, and that he could be addicted to crack cocaine or Oxycontin or Ambien.  His family reportedly tried to stage a drug intervention, but he refused, then took off.  Nobody has been able to contact him, and his family is speculating he could be on a huge drug binge.  I’m shocked that once the news came out that he was missing, few people reporting on it took it seriously.  Sadly, this is probably because his is married to Khloe Kardashian, who people just associate with fake drama.  On Sunday evening, a rep for Lamar confirmed he was fine, yet would not discuss his whereabouts.

The Lakers and Clippers had both reached out to Odom weeks ago to gauge his interest in playing for them.  However, now it’s clear why he hasn’t signed with either.  Both teams are concerned about his drug abuse.  According to the TMZ report, Odom went to drug rehab for three weeks last August.  He stayed clean while playing for the Clippers, but then began using hardcore recreational drugs when the Clippers season ended a few months ago.    Hopefully LO is ok, can turn his life around, and this story does not have an unfortunate ending.

And finally, Breaking Bad had another riveting episode last night.  Spoiler Alert for those of you who have it on DVR, and have yet to watch it.  In classic Breaking Bad fashion, just when Walter White gets away with something, another thing far worse happens to him.  In this episode, Walter gets the upper hand on his brother-in-law, Hank Schrader, when he makes a video tape confessing his criminal activity, but simultaneously makes Hank the patsy.  This was another brilliant move by Walter, especially considering that his confession brings up the fact he paid for Hank’s medical bills, which Hank had no idea about until seeing the video.  This ends the threat of Hank telling his friends at the DEA about Walter’s criminal activity.

However, a new threat appears to be emerging for Walt, and that is his former business partner Jesse Pinkman, who is angered by the discovery that Walt poisoned the little boy Brock.  Jesse is so angry, that he storms into Walt’s house, and starts pouring gasoline all over the place, presumably to light the house on fire.  I guess we won’t know until next week because that’s when the episode ended.

Several other key themes seemed to emerge from this episode.  Walt has become very good at manipulating people emotionally.  He has done it repeatedly to Jesse, and he even did it to his son, to prevent him from going to visit the Schraders.  The writers of the show also seem to be focused on colors and what they symbolize.  For example, during the meeting between the Whites and Schraders,  Marie wears black to symbolize her mourning for the family she thought she had, while Hank wears purple to atone for upsetting his wife.  In the previous episode, the writers tried to create symbolism by focusing on the colors of Lydia’s shoes.  Speaking of Lydia, her new business partners may be an additional new adversary for Walter.  That is not entirely clear after seeing the opening scene of last night’s episode, but it must have some significance.

The real question moving forward is whether or not Walter would kill Jesse to save himself.  For almost 5 seasons, the show has been built on the emotional relationship between these two.  Now it appears as though it’s ending will be very much revolving around this relationship.  As horrible of a person Walt has transformed into, I still can’t see him killing Jesse.  Walt came very close to getting caught by his brother in law, yet refused to kill him because he was family.  Jesse seems just as important to Walt as Hank is, so I can’t see him killing him, even if it means not saving himself.