Who Ya Got?

Sid or Alex?



Or maybe Geno?



After reading Empty Netters, we at Second Hand Sports have decided to keep the debate going just a little further.

Sure, the Pittsburgh Penguins are struggling right now, but having Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin has to be a huge advantage. They just need to tweak the system to adapt to some new players. Remember Pens fans, they have also started slow the last two years. Either way, no one that actually watches the NHL can keep these two out of the 'best of' conversation.

Okay, so Alex Ovechkin is in Russia tending to his ill Grandfather. Good move. Maybe he isn't always the bad guy. We already know that he is the most dynamic player in the league. Now if he would only quit worrying about rivalries for a while, he could own the hearts of everyone.

The Verdict: All of that said, we're sticking with Sid. He's just too valuable with the puck and along the boards. He's a playmaker with the peripheral skill set of a grinder. There aren't too many of those around. It was a fairly easy choice because of the fatal flaws of the other two (Malkin and his unique ability to disappear on the ice and Ovechkin not being able to focus on the game when another Russian is around).

Janurary 6, 1991

Do you remember this team helmet?



Do you remember this President?



You may be wondering where I'm going with this. Well, sad as it may be, the historic Houston Oilers were the last team the Cincinnati Bengals beat in a playoff game. At that time the President was George Herbert Walker Bush.

As an Ohio sports fan, I ask Bengals season ticket holders: Why do you continue to support the blind ownership of the Cincinnati Bengals? I would ask why they support bad Bengal management, but uh......they don't have a General Manager. And Mike Brown, the owner of this horrible franchise, thinks for some reason that his system is efficient.

I could go on and on about how to manage a football team like having legitimate scouts, a general manager, and better community relations. But I won't. This is where I pipe off about Mike Brown robbing the citizens of Cincinnati and the NFL all together.

Mr. Brown convinced the citizens of Hamilton County to build him a stadium on the Ohio River, when it was opened it had the worst playing surface in football. The grass on the field was so bad that Mr. Brown refused to let Cincinnati area High Schools from using the field. The same field that the taxpayers of Hamilton County, not Mike Brown, paid for!

Bermuda Grass in Cincinnati? Are you kidding me? Bermuda grass is for Bermuda and Kentucky Blue grass, or field turf, is for Cincinnati.

And as for robbing the NFL... The quality of football is so consistently bad in Bengal land that whenever a team in the NFL sees them on their schedule at the beginning of the year, they think 'Yup, that's a win.' This is not good for the league of parity. The NFL is designed in theory for each team to be as equal as possible, and the Bengals have not won a playoff game since the fashionable mullet haircut was in style.

I guess in a nutshell what I am trying to get across is that the Cincinnati Bengals are the mullet of the NFL.

Back From Pittsburgh:

Pens-'Canes

Thursday, October 23, 2008.

Andy's first Penguins game. (Thanks Pensblog!)

Good times.

Jeff, outside the Igloo:



Andy on the inside:



From the seats:



What a game. The Pens didn't let us down, scoring 4 times in the third period to beat Carolina 4-1. For most of the game, it looked like it would be one to forget. Thanks to Sid, Geno, and the rest of the boys for making it a memorable trip.

The #1 star:



This is a great shot Mav, I should be a photographer.

Get it.

Kellen's Nuts

Rumor has it that Kellen Winslow has been absent from the Browns lineup due to swollen testicles.



Obviously this is no laughing matter.

The Browns and Winslow made the right move to have this diagnosed before he hit the field again. With scare of cancer and just having this happen, I'm sure Winslow was frightened for his future.

I would like to welcome Kellen to the Ohio Valley, or what my General Practitioner calls "The Allergy Valley". I have lived in Ohio my entire life and have gotten used to the mystery swells that I have encountered. So far I have not experienced one yet this fall but I am prepared for my fall swell up. Last year it was my lip that swelled up, this has also happened to my hands, feet, and yes other areas on my body where there is an increased blood flow.

Kellen was in good spirits on the practice field Friday and seems to not have lost a step from the reports I have read. I would be in good spirits too if I went to the Hospital with swollen testicles and left with a bottle of Benadryl. This is all speculation on my part, but it seems clear to me that whatever happened last week is not going to affect his life on, or off, the field.

Comeback City

Let it be known that I am not a Red Sox fan by any stretch of the imagination.

In fact, my dad is from New York.

Kind of a Yankees fan.

Not die-hard or anything, but he roots for them.

That said, I usually pull for the pinstripes and root against 'Red Sox Nation'.

(By the way, I feel bad for real fans of teams that are as popular as the Red Sox. It sucks to be a true fan of a team that is so good that they become the 'it' team of a sport. Everyone questions your true fanhood, day in and day out. Your loyalty and its longevity are constantly questioned. It kind of sucks.)

But last night's ALCS game 5 was something special.

Very rarely in sports does one find him/herself rooting for the comeback despite a particular allegiance. I must admit that late in the game I found myself rooting for the Sox.

Down 7-0, it seemed impossible.

Just like the past, they rallied.

For the first time, I actually enjoyed it.

Part of the excitement was that the favorite Sox had actually become the underdog during the first four games.

The Rays were beating the living bejesus out of them.

Then, for one more game, the series lived on.

See you at game 6.

NFL's New Trend?

The NFL trade deadline came and went, and for the first time in recent memory a decent player was moved.

The Detroit Lions traded wide receiver Roy Williams to the Dallas Cowboys for three draft picks (including a first round pick in 2009).

Is this a sign of things to come?

Those of us here at Second Hand Sports like the idea of the NFL's trade deadline becoming more like that in MLB, the NBA, and the NHL.

We want to see more lagging teams dump their high priced crybabies, er, players for draft picks. It would symbolize organizational change to the players and fans of those teams that, well, just plain need it.



It would have been nice to see teams like the Bengals and Chiefs dump some guys for picks. Tony Gonzalez, Chad Johnson, and TJ Houshmanzadeh come to mind.

After firing Matt Millen, the Lions now appear to be the most brilliant floundering team in the league (although we all know they will blow those draft picks).

The Crying Fan

I'm not going to act like I have never cried watching my favorite team lose a big game. When the Cincinnati Bengals lost to the SF 49ers in Super Bowl XXIII in January of 1989, I cried like a baby.
I was heartbroken.
I was 11 years old.
That was the last time it happened.
I had pretty much forgot about it until last year's Michigan loss to Appalachian State:



I laughed.
I thought, do people, as full-grown adults, really take sports this seriously? I understand getting caught up in the moment, but to start crying because you're upset at a sporting event with hundreds of cameras everywhere? What the hell, people?



Did this Cubs fan really think they had a chance? Come on.



OK, so this screenshot wasn't from today's game (Texas 45 - Oklahoma 35) and the kid is young, but it is still funny.

Sidney Crosby's interview on SportsCenter...




One of these days an athlete is going to get so frustrated at answering the same questions over and over that one of these 'journalists' is going to get hurt. Really bad. The good news for SportsCenter host Brian Kenney is that it was not Sidney Crosby...this time.

Happy Birthday to Two Legends

Today marks the 43rd birthday of Mario Lemieux, the best hockey player ever. (Wayne Gretzky is the greatest. There is a difference.)



Unknown to most, October 5, 1965 is also the day one of the greatest goaltenders in NHL history was hatched. Patrick Roy and Lemieux were born on the same day in Montreal. I don't know if they played on the same squirt team, but they would have dominated. The photo shows Lemieux being stopped by Roy back in their QMJHL days.

Big Mailday

I hope this is a good sign of things to come. On the day the NHL season opened, I received my greatest eBay triumph to date via the USPS:

I wanted an autographed Sid card for a while, and I snagged this one at a reasonable price (considering the set and print run). Once my Signature Patches Mario comes in from eBay and Upper Deck ships my SP Malkin, I'll post my Pens cup auto set. BTW, right now it is Pens-Sens tied at 3 in the 3rd. Come on Sid!

Hockey Season Is Upon Us

Being that I am a huge hockey fan, I felt like that kid on Animal House after the woman flies through his window and onto his bed when I realized hockey season was on the horizon - 'Thank You God!'

Today the NHL regular season kicks off with a pair of games in Europe. First, the New York Rangers take on the Tampa Bay Lightning (aka Penguins South) and later the Pittsburgh Penguins face off against the Ottawa Senators. Personally, I could do without the whole regular-season-games-in-other-countries-to-attract-a-worldwide-audience gimmick, but I guess the NHL has its reasons.



I'm going to admit that I am a huge Penguins fan. I can enjoy fantasy hockey again this season because I drafted Crosby, Gonchar, and Fleury and traded for Malkin. I know Sarge is out for most of the regular season, but I just can't bring myself to drop him and pick up some crap defenseman from the Sabres. Hopefully it works out and he comes back closer to 4 months than 6.



Anyway, it seems a lot of people are underestimating the Pens this year. Before the trade deadline last season, regulars in their lineup were: Crosby (Injured), Malkin, Staal, Talbot, Kennedy, Malone, Christensen, Ruutu, Armstrong, Sykora, Laraque, Taffe, Hall, Scuderi, Sydor, Gonchar, Whitney, Orpik, Letang, Fleury (I), Conklin, and Sabourin. That team was in first place. This years lineup regulars look to be Crosby, Malkin, Staal, Talbot, Kennedy, Sykora, Fedotenko, Satan, Cooke, Godard, Dupuis, Taffe, Gill, Gonchar (I), Whitney (I), Eaton, Sydor, Scuderi, Letang, Goligoski, Fleury, and Sabourin. So a first place team essentially got back its best player (Crosby) and #1 goalie (Fleury), lost its top two defensemen to injury, swapped Malone, Ruutu, Laraque, Armstrong, and Hall for Fedotenko, Satan, Cooke, Godard, and Dupuis. I guess I forgot to add Gary Roberts in there somewhere. Whatever. And don't forget that Crosby, Malkin, Fleury, and Staal are still getting better every single day. So....how is this team supposed to be worse than last year? Go Pens.

Sweeeeet!

Uhhh, I thought the Cubs were supposed to be good, really good. I have to admit, I do enjoy watching them struggle. Since my MLB team is the small-market joke Reds, I find myself rooting against all those teams ESPN loves. Cubs, Red Sox, Yankees. Get it. And how did Eric Young get a job on ESPN? The poor guy can't even get through a sentence without stuttering and flubbing all over his words. We really need to get Bill Walton to take E for a speech lesson.

Moving on, is anyone else really starting to believe in the Rays? These guys are on fire like Lou Brown's Indians in Major League.

It would be awesome to see those kids go all the way. Hopefully they can keep it up and give all the other small-market teams a template to try to emulate. Of course, it won't work. Those pesky templates never do work for anyone but their creator.

One final note: Hockey season starts this weekend.

Welcome!

Hello everyone and welcome to the Second Hand Sports blog! Be sure to check in regularly to catch a glimpse of my second-hand sports commentary. Thank you and goodnight!