Baseball's doubling dealing
Cheating is OK unless it's not.
That's the message and dilemma baseball faces right now. The hubbub in MLB right now is that Boston used Apple watches to steal signs form the Yankees.
Cool, right?
Stealing signs has been part of baseball since the Babe and Ty Cobb and dead ball and day games during the week. But, and there's always a but right, what is the dotted, hazy line between cool cheating and crummy cheating?
Stealing signs is campy. Stealing homers with PEDs is criminal.
Where is the divide between those levels of dishonesty in the same game in regard to the same talking points? Integrity of the game or the majesty of the numbers or what have you. Still, the question remains, what's the difference?
Gaylord Perry cheated his hat off and Barry Bonds is viewed as a pariah. The former was lovable and in the Hall of Fame because he broke the rules. The latter is the best hitter of his generation and barely got a third of the votes submitted for Cooperstown.
What's the difference, other than some grease on the cap, some horse sperm in a syringe or a fancy high-tech watch?
Former Tennessee quarterback and NFL great Peyton Manning and Tennessee head coach Butch Jones talk before kick off between Tennessee and Georgia Tech in the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game at Mercedes-Benz Stadium on Monday, Sept. 4, in Atlanta, Ga.More UT discussion
A day later, the validity of a win being a win is even more clear for Johnny Vols Fans.
Still, the questions remain. Among them are the following two key avenues:
First, are you more or less convinced that Butch Jones is the guy to take UT from good to great?
Make no mistake, Butch has accomplished a lot of things and made the Dooley days seem like a distant memory. That's a monster credit to his bricks and his banality. (That said the trash can needs to go.) But the question about Butch's ceiling is completely fair, and we'd love to hear the folks who believe Butch can win a Natty as to why they believe that.
The second question, and this one has layers, is has Tennessee lost its two most important players for the majority of the season with Darrin Kirkland and Jauan Jennings on the shelf with injuries?
We think there's a fair discussion about that, but as a tangent, the "injuries" talking point, even if valid, does not hold water for a second straight year for Butch and Co. does it? (And if it does, is there something beyond bad luck to one team having this many key injuries inside of 12 months?)
Again, a game into a 12-game march and we have more questions than before we started. Crazy, right?
United States' Christian Pulisic controls the ball past Honduras' Brayan Beckeles during a 2018 World Cup qualifying soccer match in San Pedro Sula, Honduras, Tuesday, Sept. 5, 2017. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell) Say what?
Want to know why the U.S. will never embrace soccer?
The best our country has to offer is elated to escape with a tie against Honduras after being spanked by Costa Rica.
Honduras, in 2015 had roughly the same population as New York City. Costa Rica's population was a little more than half that.
And the powers that be were happy with the tie with the Honduras Hondos.
With the assets and talent this country has, it would take about a generation or three for the U.S. to be the best in the world at just about any sport.
But the money rules the direction, right?
Be it college scholarships to professional contracts the money is not in kickball, and that's how it works that Team USA is high-fiving to tie Honduras.
This and that
- Hey the Braves got rained out on Tuesday. The make-up will be at 1:35 p.m. today, so Press Row will be a little late.
- At 37, Venus Williams getting to the semifinals of the U.S. Open deserves to be among all the names of this great run of aging athletes who defy the sands of time.
- A night after staying up too late with the Vols, we stayed up too late watching "Almost Famous" which is on the short list of most underrated movies of all time. Thoughts?
- Side question: We hit better than 70 percent of our NFL picks against the spread last year after the college season ended. That's not a question. That's a statement. Here's the question: Should we do a weekly installment of NFL picks? They would be for entertainment purposes only of course. Discuss.
Today's question
On this day in 1620, the Mayflower departs Plymouth, England with 102 Pilgrims and 30 crew members.
The first true "supermarket" - the Piggly Wiggly - was opened in Memphis on this day in 1916. Side question: How unbelievable is the suggestion that they call the store "Piggly Wiggly" even back then?
On this day, Luciano Pavarotti died 10 years ago.
In that discussion point, who makes the Rushmore of all-time male singing voices? Whatcha got?