New look (if you don’t check MetsBlog or TheJetsBlog or SNYRangersBlog or GiantsFootballBlog)

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If you haven’t noticed, this site looks a little different this afternoon thanks to the work of Adam Rotter and Matt Cerrone. We’re still working out a couple of the kinks that are particular to a non-team specific blog like this one — for one, removing the byline from every post. But for now the change should fix some of the problems several of you have reported loading the site in Internet Explorer.

Tilting at windmills

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The question then becomes how long a wild-card series should be. Costas predicted the adoption of a one-and-done playoff over a three-game series because that would be television’s preference — ensuring two games every season modeled on the storied playoff game of 1978 (Yankees-Red Sox) as opposed to the three-game version of 1951 (Giants-Dodgers).

“Here’s the difference,” Costas said. “Those games came after 162 games and were the result of a dead heat. They were not contrived like these would be.”

A best-of-three series would also require the survivor to extend its pitching staff by having to play at least twice, thereby making it that much more challenging for a wild-card team to win the World Series. Under those terms, this weekend’s series in Boston would be well worth the hype.

– Harvey Araton, N.Y. Times.

It sure sounds like Major League Baseball’s going to add a second Wild Card, so this feels a bit like tilting at windmills now. Plus I should add that even as a teenager I disliked the idea of a grand change to baseball’s playoff system in 1994. For all my pretense toward open-mindedness, I’m pretty stodgy at heart.

But indulge me. Say for the sake of argument that there were a second Wild Card and a one-game playoff in 2011, and season ended with the teams in the exact positions they are right now.

In the American League, the Yankees would be rewarded for being eight games better than the Angels over a 162-game season by having to beat the Angels in a one- or three-game series. Nevermind that the Yankees play in the toughest division in baseball and are seven games better than the AL West-leading Rangers and 9.5 up on the AL Central-leading Tigers, it doesn’t seem at all fair to force them to assert their dominance over the Angels in a short series (or single game!) that could easily be decided by randomness when they’ve already shown it over the much larger sample.

Granted, since the start of divisional play there are tons of examples where teams with better records have been excluded from the playoffs in favor of those that managed only to be better than the dreck in their division, plus it’s not like a full seven-game series is enough to show for sure that one team is superior to another.

And I guess the most important thing to keep in mind is that it’s not really about fairness. Not to sound cynical, but presumably Bud Selig has at his disposal an army of accountants showing the ways in which adding a Wild Card would be financially best for the teams and the game.

This is happening whether I like it or not, so I suppose it’s time I get used to the idea. I imagine in time there’ll be seasons made more exciting by the change and seasons made less exciting, it’ll all balance out and eventually I’ll just accept it as the way it is instead of focusing so much on the way it once was.

Your thoughts?

[poll id=”32″]

Judge not the ketchup eaters

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Yesterday’s hot-dog condiment poll is getting bumped off the front page by this post about yesterday’s hot-dog condiment poll. Here’s what the results look like as of right now:

As you can see from the bold, italicized choices there, I put mustard, ketchup and relish on my hot dogs.

That’s right, ketchup. Come at me. 50% of readers surveyed will back me up.

You know what’s funny? I never even knew people judged others for eating ketchup on hot dogs until Gary Cohen said something about it to Keith Hernandez during the SNY broadcast from the right-field deck a couple weeks ago. I knew it happened in Chicago, but I figured that for an isolated regional peculiarity.

For all I know, all these years my friends and family have been silently looking down upon me as I spread ketchup on my hot dogs.

And you know what? If that’s the case, f@#$ ’em.

It’s mustard, ketchup and relish. The Lithuanian flag, right there atop my hot dog. Like I said in the post that inspired the post that inspired this post, the hot dog is a condiment conduit. Load that bastard up with what you like and don’t take any guff from anyone for it. Yeah, I might think gooping a hot dog with mayo seems pretty gross, but when you get right down to it so are hot dogs, and if you like your hot dog in the Chilean Completo style, it’s a free country, brother.

Also, while we’re on the topic of things people eat on hot dogs that they might be judged for: Doritos. It sounds crazy but it’s delicious. Next time you’re at a barbecue and there’s a bowl of Doritos out, grab a couple, crunch them up and spread ’em out over your hot dog. Trust me on this one. Cool Ranch if possible.

 

 

Why it kind of matters

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Maybe Alex Rodriguez played in a card game where poker pros and Hollywood big shots had fist fights over $500,000 debts while snorting cocaine off of their chip stacks.

Maybe he didn’t.

Either way, who cares?

– Jim Rich, N.Y. Daily News.

I get what Rich is saying here, and I understand all the bluster over Major League Baseball investigating this after not reacting particularly strongly to the rash of drunk-driving arrests that plagued the sport in the Spring. Drunk driving puts innocent lives at risk, and playing poker risks only money.

But keep in mind that all A-Rod has endured so far for his poker playing is a bit of media sanctimony (plus whatever losses he took at the hands of shrewd cardsharks like Tobey Maguire). The league absolutely should investigate its players’ participation in high-stakes gambling, because it’s the league’s job to maintain the integrity of the sport.

Poker is a fun hobby for many of us, and apparently for A-Rod too. And lord knows he has the type of resources to cover pretty substantial losses without resorting to anything nefarious. But if he’s really involved with the type of people who send “thugs” to games to shake down players, MLB needs to at least look into it — if not for fear that A-Rod would end up intentionally altering on-field outcomes, then to put out the ol’ Marlo Stanfield my-name-is-my-name message to players around the league.

And I know it sounds almost ridiculous to think that players could throw games in this day and age, but gambling is a massive and still-shady industry and it allegedly impacted the NBA as recently as four years ago.