Hey gang, if you live in the city, remember today is election day.
Combine review
We love the draft. You know this.
We are not as lovey-dovey with the Combine, but we recognize its importance even if it is not that important, if that makes sense. With the NFL's new season a few hours away, there are a lot of important trends and details to know as the combine closed its doors Monday afternoon. Let's look at some of the winners and losers from the event, shall we?
Winner - Jabril Peppers. Everyone was a gaga over Myles Garrett, and that's understandable, but Garrett was more than likely going to be the top-overall pick anyway. So his 4.64 40-time only solidified what he already had. As for Peppers, well, he checked in a little shorter than expected, but his explosiveness and a dazzling 4.46 time at 215 pounds made him a lot of money. In a league of match-ups, Peppers, who tested with the LBs as well as the DBs, can play multiple positions in multiple formations for multiple sets. It's hard to think that the Titans and Dick LeBeau would not love him at 18.
Loser - Free agent defensive backs. There were a slew of guys in the secondary who shined at the combine, meaning a lot of teams will look to spend their free-agent money elsewhere and address secondary needs in the draft.
Winner - Washington defensive back Kevin King and wide receiver John Ross. We all know Ross tossed out a modern-day record 4.22 and put himself in the discussion to be the first wide out taken in the draft. Well, King dropped a 4.44 40 time and measured in a 6-foot-3. That's an attractive - and profitable - combination in today's NFL.
Loser - Jimmy Garoppolo. The top three quarterbacks were better than expected, and with all the power players in one spot at the same time this weekend, if a deal was going to get done for the Patriots' back-up QB, you would have though it would happen last week. Alas, there are worse jobs than making seven-figures holding a clipboard for the best ever.
FILE - In this April 4, 2016, file photo, Villanova players collapse on the court after they defeated North Carolina 77 in the championship game of the NCAA Final Four college basketball tournament in Houston. The selection committee for the NCAA men’s basketball tournament is getting into the bracketology business and borrowing an idea from the College Football Playoff, hoping it will get more fans thinking about March Madness in February. The NCAA and CBS Sports announced Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2017, that for the first time the committee will give a look at its top 16 seeds one month before the 68-team field locks in on March 12. (AP Photo/Morry Gash, File) A million mile March
Man, did you know on this day 35 years ago, the NCAA tournament selection was air for the first time?
Seems crazy right?
With all the brackets and bracketologists and investments in and around the madness that is March - in fact, March Madness is part of the expansive NCAA copyrights with the Big Dance (also copyrighted, along with Final Four and many others) - it's hard to imagine a time without the breakdowns and bankroll for the brackets.
And in turn, the timing was perfect for March to truly become mad.
If the first bracket show was 1982, that was the tournament that UNC freshman Michael Jordan won with a jumper before Georgetown's Fred Brown threw the ball to James Worthy.
Building off that, the following tournaments had, in order, NC State shocking the world and Jimmy V looking for someone to hug, Georgetown finally breking through and winning it all, Villanova and its coked-up bunch of hooligans shooting better than 70 percent in the second half to beat heavily favored Georgetown, a calm, Never Nervous Pervis Ellison and Louisville beating Duke and a younger Coach K by three in 1986, Indiana's Keith Smart hitting a buzzer bearer to beat Syracuse and Danny Manning's one-man march in 1998.
That's an amazing run and certainly the perfect springboard to lift the bracket craze from. Location, location, location may be the big deal in BID-ness, but timing is everything when trying to cat the pop culture wave.
And the timing of the NCAA's madness was spot on.
FILE - In this Sunday, Sept. 18, 2016 file photo, United States' Megan Rapinoe, right, kneels next to teammates Ali Krieger (11) and Crystal Dunn (16) as the U.S. national anthem is played before an exhibition soccer match against Netherlands in Atlanta. Megan Rapinoe says she will respect a new U.S. Soccer Federation policy that says national team players "shall stand respectfully" during national anthems. The policy was approved last month but came to light Saturday, March 4, 2017 before the U.S. women's national team lost to England in a SheBelieves Cup match. (AP Photo/John Bazemore, File) More kick ball controversy
Here's TFP ace sports columnist Mark Wiedmer weighing in on something we kicked around a little bit yesterday about the U.S. soccer's requirement for all players and officials to stand for the national anthem.
We have more questions than answers about this policy to tell you the truth.
We wonder how much of this decision is in truth about the back half of the policy as it is the front half. Remember, the language is clear that players must stand and respect our anthem and that of all other countries, too.
Also know that after tonight's Women's National Team match against France in D.C. of all places, the next women's team match is against Russia in Frisco, Texas. And while there likely has not been an issue with fries or French dressing so no one is likely going to take a knee tonight - well, the French team may, but that's genetic all things considered - there certainly could be an issue next month with the growing tensions between our government and its involvement with Russia.
That also leads us to this issue, and we did a little interweb checking. According to the USSF latest 990 filings and the 2016 internal audit, the organization is a 501©3 entity in tax eyes, meaning it is anon-profit organization and does receive some federal funds through the U.S. Olympic committee. (It's less than a million in the last fiscal cycle of a company that has assets in the nine-figure range and turned a $17-plus-million profit in the 2015-16 fiscal calendar.)
But, at what point is a non-profit organization with the U.S. name and receiving federal funds allowed to tell citizens what they can and can't choose to do, as long as it is not illegal and not infringing on the rights and safety of others?
And how then, can the federal government allow flag burning - a far more offensive gesture, but still part of the freedoms our great militaries have provided for us - but not allow flag indifference?
There seems to be a broken link in the chain, and that is about appearances more than freedom. And if you think this is about sportsmanship, well, forget that and quit kidding yourself. The U.S. Soccer Federation cares as much about sportsmanship as your average NCAA football powerhouse does.
And if you doubt that as a majority of the players roll out and embrace the role of role models to millions of American kids who are embracing soccer more and more each year, just look at the blind eye the USSF turned to Hope Solo for the majority of her career.
Solo was a nightmare for the majority of her career, and what ultimately got her was an stupid insult to a competing country that ranked far down on her list of transgressions. Sure, they trotted out that it was a career achievement award, but if Solo was still 24 and the best in the net in the world, here's betting the USSF would have turned a blind ear and eye to it like they did before.
OK, rant over. Get back to your kick ball.
This and that
- Cool news from the TFP web team. Timesfreepress.com is going to send out a morning sports report around 10:15 Monday through Friday. Excellent stuff like Weeds' above column or all the college excellence from Downtown Patrick Brown and Mean Gene Henley and David Paschall, who does not have a hip-rhyming lead-in sadly. There will be the overflow of high school stuff from TFP sports editor Stephen Hargis and his band of merry prep writers. And best of all, it don't cost nothin' to get the report sent your way. Good times, right. Plus, the 5-at-10 will be part of the morning briefing, so if you are a regular around these parts, it's like we are delivering it to you. You can sign up here for all the latest sports headlines. Just click on that link and sign up and the 5-at-10 and all the TFP sports news will be sent to each morning.
- Man, talk about your bad breaks, newly acquired Cleveland center Andrew Bogut broke his left leg less than a minute into his Cavs career. Wonder if the Cavs win it all if Bogut would get a ring. Another thought: Bogut has to rank among the most underwhelming top-overall picks in NBA draft history, right?
- ETSU punched its ticket to the NCAA tournament by beating UNCG on Monday to win the Southern Conference tournament. After UTC unraveled, ETSU in our view was the best team in the league, so there's that.
- And leave it to Sir Charles Barkley to put the perfect exclamation point on the outlandish boasts and gibberish from LaVar Ball, the father of UCLA star freshman Lonzo Ball, who his proud papa said is better than Steph Curry right now and will have the marketing moo that MJ did. "Just because you say some s---, doesn't make it right," Barkley said, via Sporting News. "He's gonna be better than Steph Curry? That's what he said. Steph Curry has won a couple MVPs, he's pretty good. Man, let me tell you something. That's that AAU s---. You can't say a guy is going to be better than Steph Curry, a guy who has played 30 college games. I know you can be proud of your son, but at some point, it becomes stupidity."
Today's questions
It's a true or false Tuesday.
True or false, you are going to register for the TFP morning sports report.
Thirty years ago today, Beastie Boys' powerhouse debut "Licensed to Ill" becomes the first rap album to top a U.S. chart. True or false, you owned Licenced to Ill.
True or false, Myles Garrett should be the top overall pick.
Let's stay with a little Bogut for the Rushmore.
In the last 35 years, Rushmore of the biggest NBA draft busts.
Go, and remember to sign up for the TFP sports update.