Author Archives: Kent Sterling

Kentucky Basketball – John Calipari to Lakers or Is He Just Negotiating for Even More Cash?

by Kent Sterling

“Gee, I hope my salary is doubled because of Rex Chapman’s tweet!” John Calipari seems to be wishing.

An $10-million per year extension to continue as coach of the Kentucky Wildcats, or roughly $10-million per year to coach the Los Angeles Lakers. Either way, John Calipari wins big.

I may not agree with John Calipari’s use of the one-and-done rule to feather his nest and create a revolving door of single-year talent at a four-year university, but anyone underestimating his intellect and street savvy makes a serious error.

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Last night, former Wildcat and brutal game analyst for Saturday’s semifinal game between UK and Wisconsin, tweeted that Calipari’s departure for Los Angeles to coach the Lakers was a “done deal”. The question of whether Cal would be leaving was asked at the post game press conference (along with the usual insipid apology for a good question by the guy who asked).

Calipari’s response was a wonderfully worded non-denial denial, “Lakers have a basketball coach, Kentucky has a basketball coach. I have best job in the country. I’m not going to dignify that.”

What I thought when I heard the answer live was, “Boy, that’s exactly what a really smart guy should say if he wants to leverage a rumor to extort an extension from his current employer.” He made four statements in the 11-seconds:

“Lakers have a basketball coach” – True, but they won’t in two weeks. Hiring Mike D’Antoni was a miserable failure from announcement through coming termination
“Kentucky has a basketball coach” – Silly and obvious addition as though the Lakers coaching situation and UK’s have any similarities.
“I have best job in the country” – If the job is the best in the country, the comp package should be the best. This wasn’t praise for UK as much as a demand that Cal’s pay be brought into line with Mike Krzyzewski at Duke – approximately an addition $2 million per year.
“I’m not going to dignify that” – Most say that prior to the self-serving answer, and stop talking. Calipari left it for the end.

Whether you love or loathe Calipari, people should listen to him and learn how to negotiate from a position of strength from him.

Am I saying that this episode was concocted from soup to nuts by agent Worldwide Wes and Calipari to use the brightest spotlight in college basketball to force an extension? That a rumor about the soon-to-be open highest profile coaching job in basketball was started by Wes or Cal through willing ambassador Chapman to force UK to counter against a mythological competitor? I would love to say that, but who knows what evil lurks in the hearts on men?

I will say that it’s what really smart people in positions of strength do all the time, and that we’ll find out one way of the other when Calipari either signs an extension at UK or bolts for the Lakers.

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Calipari’s current deal pays him an average potential $5,54 million per year (with incentives) through 2019. Krzyzewski reportedly was paid more than $9-million in 2011, the last time Duke won the national championship.

Krzyzewski has suffered a first round crap out in two of the previous three years against a 14 and 15 seed, while Calipari has gone to three final fours and an elite eight in his five years in Lexington.

If anyone doubts Calipari’s strategic acumen, they need look no further than his masterful handling of his own career.

Calipari is the master, and even if the Chapman tweet wasn’t a plotted contrivance to prompt a flurry of talk, his non-denial denial was a stroke of genius, and it will be rewarded one way or another.

NCAA Tournament – Aaron & Andrew Harrison’s Kentucky Wildcats Will Win Program’s Ninth Crown Tonight

by Kent Sterling

The only unpleasantness for Big Blue Nation tonight will be Rex Chapman’s absence on the CBS only championship game telecast.

Kentucky is just too big and athletic for UConn to beat tonight, or so I believe.

The work Kentucky does on the offensive glass makes them a very tough team to put away. In every game in this tourney, the Wildcats have outpaced opponents on the offensive glass for a total advantage of 22 boards. That translates into 22 extra possessions.

Think of offensive rebounds as anti-turnovers. Instead of forfeiting an offensive possession, you add one.

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Amazingly, Kentucky’s opponents have only 11 more defensive rebounds in the five games than offensive boards the Wildcats have controlled.

Kentucky is also tournament tough, winning games by seven, two, five, three, and one point, and have trailed in four of the games. Against Kansas State in the opener, Kentucky led after the opening minutes. Wichita State led Kentucky by five with 4:15 remaining, Louisvile led by seven with 4:10 left, Michigan was up four with 11:00 to go, and Wisconsin was up five with 5:10 left.

They know what it takes to win, and they do exactly those things when necessary, and in the last two games it took a three-pointer by Aaron Harrison as the clock wound down to give the Wildcats the lead.

For their part, UConn has won with greater ease after being taken to overtime before winning by eight against St. Joseph’s. They have rolled to wins of eight, 12, five, six, and 10 points.

The Huskies have not trailed during the last 12 minutes of any of the games following the outlier against St. Joseph’s.

What does that mean? That when Kentucky turns it on, as they have in every game since the beginning of the tournament, UConn needs to maintain its wits and continue to fight.

Defensive pressure from Shabazz Napier and Ryan Boatright will need to make running offense very uncomfortable for the Harrison twins, and do it for all 40 minutes. This morning on ESPN, analyst Dan Dakich mentioned Napier and Boatright’s defensive pressure as a huge reason for the Huskies upset over the Florida Gators, and as usual, he was right.

He also said that UConn needs to play 40 minutes, and what that means is the must avoid the surges that have propelled UK to wins in their last four games.

Causing discomfort and disrupting rhythm is what good defense is all about, and if it’s absent Kentucky will have its way with UConn. Without forcing turnovers, Kentucky gets to shoot, and given the near 50% of an offensive rebound followed by a second chance, there is just no chance for UConn to win.

Because the Harrison’s have really improved over the course of the season, they will beat the best defensive backcourt in college basketball and the best player in the tournament in Napier. That means Julius Randle, James Young, and Marcus Lee will get touches, and that means points on the first, second, or third shot at the bucket.

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It might make John Calipari detractors physically ill tonight to listen to a post game press conference featuring more of his ludicrous blathering about the “toughest” road to a championship in history, and how his team was fueled by the negative chatter about how their 10 losses painted the Wildcats as a huge disappointment.

No one celebrates victory with a chip on his shoulder like Calipari. Fortunately, the game tips at 9:10p, so the earliest Jim Nantz can hurl softballs to Calipari is roughly 11:30p as the over/under on going to the monitor in the last two minutes is three.

Kentucky wins tonight 74-68, unless UConn slows it down enough and defends well enough the keep the score down. Then I’ll take UConn 60-54.

Indiana Pacers “Putrid” in Loss; Roy Hibbert AWOL Late; But They Will Still Make Eastern Conference Finals

by Kent Sterling

Roy Hibbert’s mind snapped last night, but snapping back is likely for a man as competitive as Hibbert.

The Indiana Pacers march to the next step in their drive to win an NBA Championship appears to have hit a tall, thick, and insurmountable barricade covered with razor wire. Last night’s 23-point first half against the Atlanta Hawks at Bankers Life Fieldhouse was the most futile offensive result in franchise history.

ESPN called it “putrid”, and they were right.

Fans and media are leaping from a bandwagon upon which they were stacked tall and deep less than three months ago as though Roy Hibbert set it ablaze last night. It was a given that the Pacers would reach the NBA Finals when their record was 33-7. Now, pundits see the disintegration of the positive vibe within the Pacers locker room as evidence that they cannot succeed once the second season starts in 13 days.

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Can the Pacers fix themselves? Has Roy Hibbert lost the will to compete with teammates he recently believed to be brothers? Is Frank Vogel the right man to lead this group to the next level? Did the moves by Larry Bird that appeared to be so smart at the time erode the positive collective mindset that was a big part of last year’s run?

Lot’s of questions, and I have answers:

Yes, they can and will fix themselves.
No, Hibbert is an emotional guy, and last night’s ridiculous behavior will be the lever that brings him back to the group.
Yes, the coach is an overvalued influence on the players. Vogel does his work, and the players need to do theirs. Players like David West, Rasual Butler, George Hill, and Luis Scola need to hold the rest of the team accountable. If Vogel is needed to motivate great effort, the Pacers need to re-tool their roster.
No, the trade for Scola, signings of West and Paul George were, midseason signing of Andrew Bynum, and the Danny Granger trade were the exact right moves.

Those are my answers, and until I’m proven wrong when it matters, I’m sticking with them. Before you think I’m some pie in the sky doofus, I also predicted the Pacers would lose 10 of their last 15 regular season games. After 11 of those 15 games, the Pacers are 3-8. If they beat the Bucks and Magic, and lose to the Heat and Thunder, I hit that prediction on the number.

The problem with the Pacers isn’t chemistry, strategy, or a matter of will. It’s fatigue. Tired legs and tired minds are impossible to overcome. When the playoffs start, the brains will freshen. Without a back-to-back left on the schedule, the legs will bounce back.

Don’t sell the Pacers short in finding a way to grab that #1 seed either. The Heat game in Miami is a must Friday night, and while it seems like a longshot after scoring 23 points in one of the worst first halves ever played (only four points of the 19 scored by the Clippers during the first half vs. the Lakers in December, 1999), the light is going to flicker on and off until the regular season ends. Why can’t it flicker on against the Heat?

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Fan and media worries about the Pacers will vanish as quickly as they came once the postseason starts and the Pacers start playing with renewed focus on strong legs. That is not the majority view, but I’m very comfortable alone out here on this increasingly skinny limb.

Eighty-two games with laser focus, the stated goal of the Pacers prior to the season, is not possible. After a summer of dedicated work, an intense preseason, and a remarkable first 40 games, the Pacers buckled, but buckling is not breaking.

I’m sticking with Roy Hibbert, Frank Vogel, Paul George, and the rest of the Pacers as long as they still have bullets left, and right now they have plenty.

College Athletics – Change Will Either Occur Because of Mark Emmert and NCAA or to NCAA

by Kent Sterling

What could be more fun than watching really smart guys being held accountable for illogic, as happened yesterday at the NCAA’s annual press conference?

Bureaucrats affect change slowly, and when the window of participation in college athletics is a maximum of five years, “student-athletes” have chosen to grin and bear the inadequacies and lack of fairness they perceive.

After all a scholarship covering the costs of tuition and room and board isn’t nothing, and making waves might put those annual grants in jeopardy.

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The tide is turning with the National Labor Relations Board ruling that agrees with Northwestern football players they should be classed as employees and allowed the right to collective bargaining. Ed O’Bannon’s lawsuit over the licensing of images is scheduled to go to trial in June. Media, fans, and athletes are incessantly bleating about the tremendous wealth being generated through and how the athletes are the only pigs not allowed to reach the spoils in the trough.

The NCAA continues to form committees, add members to committees, hold meetings among members of committees, and stonewall changes that are providing enormous profit for the schools and the organization. Bureaucrats enjoy playing the long game because there is no reward for expedience.

Always remember that the pain of change must be outweighed by the pain of staying the same for change to occur. Through the courts and Congress, pain is no longer lurking on the horizon; it is hurtling toward the status quo with increasing speed and confidence.

The glacial changes for the NCAA have not pleased those who see the “neo-plantation mentality” of college football and men’s basketball as being unfair, and their bloodied foreheads are staggering away from the brick wall in Indianapolis toward more welcoming ports of redress.

The NLRB ruled in favor of Northwestern football players who claim they are employees compensated through scholarships for their athletic efforts in the weight room and on the field.

In yesterday’s state of the NCAA press conference, president Mark Emmert stated the obvious, “You’re either a student at a university playing your sport or you’re an employee of that university. If you move to a model where you have labor negotiations between management – that would be coaches and athletic directors – and student-athletes to determine everything about what that relationship should be, is a wildly different notion than saying these are students.”

In what way student-athletes are uniformly students would have been interesting to hear him explain. Many coaches consistently mandate changes in a student’s major to accommodate the athletic schedules, and just as often steer them away from a rigorous academic schedule in order to manage the program’s academic progress rate and ensure graduation. All enforce a 12-month per year schedule of athletic work.

College athletics isn’t a sham everywhere in the five power conferences in Division One, but the money coming to the schools, coaches, and administrators is completely out of whack with the educational mission of a traditional university. University presidents know the score, and while they would love to see the status quo maintained, it’s clear to them that embracing change is now a requirement rather than a choice.

The time for endless meetings has passed because the evolution will either move through or around them.

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Kansas State president Kirk Schulz said, “I think there’s a perception at times that we’re asleep at the switch. I think most of the membership recognizes we’re at a fork in the road and some of these things must change and we need to do it rapidly.”

His fork in the road analogy gives the impression that they have a choice of which direction college athletics will move, which is a fallacy. Players ARE going to be paid something. They ARE going to be able to control the licensing of their image. And they ARE going to have a voice in how money they generate will be distributed. The only if is whether university presidents will turn the wheel at the fork, or have it turned for them by the courts and/or Congress.

Indiana Basketball – Anyone Waiting for Tom Crean to Resign in Position or Attitude Will Just Keep Waiting

by Kent Sterling

You can love him or not, but Tom Crean is coming to work tomorrow morning with intent.

Tom Crean played sparingly on his high school’s team, and did not play in college. Yet, he earns $3.16 million per year in one of the plum jobs of basketball coaching in the world at Indiana University.

Assembly Hall is no longer home to the kind of elite basketball program that it was from 1973-1993 when the Hoosiers won three NCAA titles, advanced to eight Elite Eights, five Final Fours, and had 16 teams ranked among the nation’s top five at some point during their seasons, but it still pays really well. There aren’t many coaches at any level that wouldn’t be thrilled with the job to which Crean lays claim.

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The career path Crean has taken requires several traits – positive self-image driven by a defensive response to insecurity, unbridled ambition, and a work ethic that borders upon mania. Most men would wither under the pressure. Almost 18,000 pairs of eyes trained on every gesture, substitution, and strategic decision would be daunting for most who enjoy working in near anonymity.

There is a piece on IndyStar.com that describes Crean’s mood as confident less than one month after his Hoosiers crapped out on a season that held promise. Indiana’s 17-15 record was not up to the standard of fans or the committee that decides on NIT bids. Failing to please either, Crean took his team back to Bloomington to re-tool.

Of course, he is. That confidence might be misplaced. The Hoosiers might not be better next year than they were this year, but Crean will never admit to anyone – including himself – any psychological weakness or concede failure before exhausting all resources. If he did, his wife, the former Joani Harbaugh – yes, of the family of football coaches Jack, Jim, and John – would take measures to correct that behavior herself as she has seen how coaches succeed for a lifetime.

Weak men cannot win because they cannot lead. Insecure men can’t communicate vision, and whether Crean’s vision is valid or not, time will tell, but he is not going to sink his own mission by allowing a milligram of doubt to enter his mind and corrupt his attitude.

Time will tell whether Crean’s plan will work often enough to please the fans and continue to attract a reasonable level of recruits, but if it fails, it won’t be because Crean torpedoes it with a case of the attitudinal jitters.

Size will be a problem next year – as will be youth. Indiana will be without a single senior next year unless a senior transfer, like Evan Gordon last season, decides to spend a year in Bloomington, and that means that if Crean utilizes the remaining three scholarships left to his discretion, there will be no room at the inn for anyone to join the party in 2015.

According to ESPN, there are 19 players in the 2015 class mulling over offers from Indiana, including Cody Zeller-esque big man Stephen Zimmerman and former Cathedral Irish stud Jalen Coleman. Both would look great in candy-striped britches, but without a scholarship they will land elsewhere.

Fans look to Assembly Hall, and see the Hoosiers roster bereft of meaningful size. Crean sees the roster, plus incoming freshmen James Blackmon Jr., Robert Johnson, and Max Hoetzel, and sees the shooting that was missing last season, and with it the spacing on the offensive end that is required for players like Yogi Ferrell and Stanford Robinson to drive to the basket.

If Indiana Basketball is in trouble, you won’t see any sign of it in Crean’s words or demeanor. He wakes up in the morning eager to attack challenges – even those he may have created himself – and his relentless self-assurances are not only needed to succeed, they are a necessary part of the tool box required for keeping this very difficult job.

You can admire Tom Crean, find his quirks too much to bear, or believe the Indiana basketball program is heading up, down, or sideways, but Crean will be at work tomorrow with a list of challenges to overcome.

Crean has very little in common with former coach Bob Knight, but one trait they share is the ability to fascinate and compel conversation.

Chicago Cubs – Crash Course in Finance Explains Why Cubs Will Suck Until 2020; But Not Tom Ricketts Dishonesty

by Kent Sterling

Truth from Tom Ricketts would do a hell of a lot more to engage fans than the insipid creation of “Clark”.

The Cubs suck. Sad, but true. Even worse, there is a reason for it that has no cure until the 2020 season, and it has nothing to do with profiteering by the Ricketts. Whether you prefer to be pissed off by it, or tolerate it, the Cubs being noncompetitive is not going to change.

My process with understanding sports management operates in the following order – dissatisfaction, impatience, outrage, education, and finally acceptance. It might be less emotionally taxing to start with education and skip the preliminaries, but what fun would that be?

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Watching the Chicago Cubs begin the season 1-4 with an offense that has tallied 1.6 runs per game, and ranks 29th of 30 teams in runs and slugging percentage, turned me angry quickly. I used to wait until June to rev up the outrage, but the worst three-year run in the 138-year history of the franchise rubbed me raw before Jeff Samardzija threw the first pitch in Pittsburgh last Monday.

Worse was the proclamation by the occasionally untruthful owner Tom Ricketts that he believed the Cubs could be a playoff team in 2014. If he is very comfortable lying to a fan base who has earned better through years of watching terrible teams, and having their hearts broken by those who managed to play some good baseball, how can fans trust anything that comes out of his mouth?

So I was pissed, and lashed out at the Cubs with a list of team improvements I would make were I the owner. The list was supposed to be fun – a diversion from the impotent lineup Rick Renteria is forced to trot out day after day. The ridiculous ideas, like urine troughs for women, seemed bizarre enough to let readers know I wasn’t serious. Maybe fans are also a little raw, and the baseball they have been forced to endure so far has caused an erosion of any sense of humor they possessed, or maybe I’m just not funny to anyone but myself, but the response from Cubs fanswas filled with invective and unpleasantness.

A Cubs blogger named Evan Altman recommended I read an exhaustively researched piece about the financial restrictions that came as part of the terms of sale when the Cubs were spun from the Tribune Company to the Ricketts in 2009.

I read and read and read. The piece was 9,000 words, and was filled with the specifics that told the backstory of why the Cubs are terrible, and will remain so – not until 2016 as supposedly candid Cubs officials assert – but until 2020. Then I sought more information about the ownership terms, and now I can add another entry to the continuum of my understanding sports management, which now is dissatisfaction, impatience, outrage, education, acceptance, and finally despondence.

Here is what the Cubs don’t tell us very often – that the Ricketts Family does not actually own the team. In order to skirt paying the IRS taxes due for the revenue generated by the sale, the Tribune Company and Ricketts Family formed a partnership that acquired the team. That partnership will last through the 2019 season, and comes with a lot of strings attached.

The first string is that the Ricketts can’t just pay off the debt because if they do, the IRS will get the idea that the partnership was nothing more than a tax dodge, which it was. The debt service, as I understand it, kicks in some Major League Baseball mandated protections that require the Cubs to show a specific percentage of net revenue – minus some allowable single time expenses that do not include payroll.

To condense the MBA level financial details to something easily understood – until the 2020 season, the Cubs are prohibited from spending much beyond their current payroll because of the terms of sale and MLB financial protections enforced to keep prospective owners from getting in the game without enough cash to operate. The irony that those provisions are actually keeping the Cubs from spending is a new source of salt in the wounds for the most preyed upon fans in the history of sports.

Truncating 9,000 words and several other financially astute peeks behind the Cubs curtain is easy – until the partnership between the Trib and Ricketts dissolves in 2019, the Cubs are stuck in their rut of underspending and underperformance.

Several revenue sources (new TV deal, video signage, etc…) will provide enough cash to make incremental upgrades, but until the partnership driven shackles come off, the Cubs won’t be on anything resembling equal footing with the Cardinals, Pirates, or Reds.

The development of the kiddie corps will help, but Javy Baez, Jorge Soler, Kris Bryant, Albert Almora, and Arismendy Alcantara don’t pitch. Arms aren’t cheap, and neither is filling holes that are created by injury and defection.

The lingering question for me is why the Ricketts don’t just come out and tell the truth. It’s been 107 1/2 years since Frank Chance led the Cubs to a World Series title, so another six years isn’t difficult to handle. At least the honesty would make fans part of the process and relieve the deranged Cubs fans (very close to the definition of redundant terminology) of the absurd notion of hope that creeps into their psyche every spring.

A few beers at the ballpark celebrating its 100th anniversary of a baseball cathedral filled with the ghosts of players both great and terrible, along with the memories of first games with dads, moms, brothers, and sons isn’t such a bad way to spend a spring or summer day.

I just don’t want to feel like the Ricketts are stealing from us. The truth would help curb that uneasiness.

“Ahead of the Curve” at 11a on 1070 the Fan; Dakich, Venturi, Wells, & Altman Join Hagan & Sterling

The Final Four, Pacers regular season winding down, Cubs home opener yesterday, and the NFL’s offseason keeps churning stories. So much to talk about, so little time.

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And so many to talk to. 1070 the Fan and ESPN’s Dan Dakich joins Fox 59 sports director Chris Hagan and me at 11:15a to preview the Final Four and tell us whether Wisconsin can answer all reasonable people’s prayers to keep Kentucky off the offensive glass, and if Florida can stop Shabazz Napier from scoring when UConn runs a pick and roll.

Coach Rick Venturi stops by at 11:45a to talk about how Colts GM has done so far answering the Colts pressing needs. We all know they still need a safety, but do any available fit their need? Will Arthur Jones and D’Qwell Jackson be upgrades at defensive end and linebacker?

ESPN’s Mike Wells will answer questions at 12:15p about the Colts and Pacers as only he can. With five picks in the draft, can fans expect the Colts to help themselves? Is DeSean Jackson a good risk for the Redskins, and do the Pacers have things figured out?

ChicagoNow.com’s Evan Altman will try to talk me off the ledge that all Cubs fans are about ready to leap from. The 1-3 start is doubtless to portend of things to come, but the light at the end of the tunnel may be just six years away. Why six years? We’ll find out at 12:45p.

That is a full show. Really full and a lot of fun. Can’t wait to get started.

Top 12 Changes to the Chicago Cubs I Would Make Immediately If Tom Ricketts Sold Me the Team

by Kent Sterling

The Ricketts turned Wrigley into a realtor’s signage wrapped minivan for Opening Day.

Current Cubs owner Tom Ricketts has brought unprecedented and unrepentant misery to Wrigley Field is his 4 1/2 years as owner, and I have been critical of almost everything he’s done – minus the mercy killing of Jim Hendry as general manager, which the right thing done a year too late.

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Instead of calling out Ricketts for his robber-baron ownership, why not be proactive and share what should be done to make being a Cubs fan a little more joyful through my ownership – if I ever stumble into the $1.2 billion needed to buy the dumpster fire of a franchise.

12 – Mr. Ricketts, take down those garish signs Wrigley Field is beautiful just as it is, so removing the offensive festoonage on the facade of the ballpark that taints the experience of driving to east on Addison to see Wrigley emerge from the trees that line the north side of the street. This is Wrigley Field not a damn casino/whorehouse.

11 – Boom! Boom! Out go the lights Night baseball works in some places, but not at Wrigley Field. Every game being over at 4p gives kids plenty of time to get home to get a good night sleep, every drunk a chance to bounce around the 553 bars within a mile of the ballpark for additional day drinking, and Cubs employees a somewhat normal family life.

10 – Adios Crane Kenney The president of business operations who crafted the insane deal with the rooftops and has seen the wisdom in opening Wrigley Field for movie showings like some drive-in theater must go. I’m not buying the Cubs to squeeze every dollar out of Wrigley Field, and that rooftop deal alone is enough to forever cast Kenney into the Wharton School of Business fires of eternal damnation.

9 – Troughs for All Not all progress is good progress, and the aluminum troughs in favor of urinals is crowd control genius that should be expanded for women, not contracted for men. The complaint I hear most from women at Wrigley is that the lines at the bathroom are too long. We will take care of that by introducing urination-only troughs for the ladies. There are hygienic and janitorial concerns that must be addressed by the design team, but if we can put a man on the moon, we can certainly figure out a way for a woman to gain mess-and-humiliation-free used beer relief.

8 – Wrigley Field is for baseball and baseball only Ricketts and Kenney certainly didn’t invent the concept of bringing hordes of folks into a ballpark for concerts, exhibitions, circuses, and odd sporting events like ski-jumping, but if I owned Wrigley Field, I would show a little respect by bringing fans in for only the 81 Cubs home games, and annual postseason appearances (because I would not take 4 1/2 years to get this thing straight).

7 – Theo, we hardly knew ye Theo Epstein would be fired immediately in favor of John Mozeliak, who continues to restock the Cardinals farm system without purposely tanking. The June draft after the Cardinals won the World Series in 2011, Mozeliak drafted Michael Wacha 19th. He became an ace down the stretch and during the playoffs in 2013. The Cubs drafted Albert Almora #6. He’s now in high-A ball.

#6 – 22,000 seats on sale the day of every game When Phil Wrigley owned the team, scalpers were thwarted by the decision to hold 22,000 seats for sale on the day of every game. Granted, some days from 1932-1977, the Cubs drew far less than 22,000, but I like the idea of people being able to head to the ballpark without tickets in hand to enjoy a day at the ballpark. No question I would lose money on the deal – both in initial sales, and on secondary market capitalization, but if I buy the Cubs, it won’t be because I need extra scratch from scalping tickets.

#5 – Best players play NOW The arbitration clock be damned. I’m not stuffing potential all-stars who are close to ready for the majors on Iowa and West Tennessee rosters. Javier Baez and Kris Bryant would be on the Cubs roster right now, and they would play everyday. Potential excellence mixed with some growing pains beats the hell out of sustained mediocrity. Luis Valbuena and Darwin Barney can tend bar at Will’s Northwoods Inn and watch their replacements on TV.

#4 – Rooftops closed To hell with that deal signed in 2003 to compel the rooftop owners to give 17% of their gross to the team in exchange for leaving the sight lines intact. I’m putting screens up to block the view, and those product thieves can sue if they like. I would have billions, and could appeal any judgment until the grandchildren of the current owners lose interest. I’m not putting up those wretched video boards, but I’ll be damned if I would tolerate theft of my product. Once the knucklehead neighbors stopped selling tickets, the screens come down to restore the historic vista.

#3 – Au Revoir, Budweiser; Ya Hey, Krausened beer from LaCrosse, Wisconsin! Budweiser is owned by a Belgian/Brazilian company, and it’s a St. Louis beer. Everything from Missouri and has a taint to it, like Granny says in “Outlaw Josey Wales.” If we are competing against the Cardinals, we sure as hell aren’t supporting the company that used to be owned by the family that used to own the Cardinals.

#2 – Spending on talent commences! I’m not going screwy like former GM Jim Hendry, signing marginal and possibly insane players to multi-year huge dollar deals, but the days of Nate Schierholtz, Ryan Sweeney, and the aforemented Valbuena holding roster spots would be over on day one of my reign. We build with the farm system and plug holes with free agents, like teams that win championships, and the Chicago Cubs sure as hell are NEVER going to be sellers at the trade deadline. Our talent will remain our talent. Period. Champions don’t let winners walk out the door.

#1 – Lovable kid-friendly Clark the mascot undergoes change Because my Dad’s name was Clark, I would redesign the mascot to resemble him circa 1985 – receding hairline, brown polyester pants, penguin shirt with pack of Luckies in the front pocket, reading glasses on his nose, and a hair-trigger temper, this Clark would bring a very different attitude to his job as mascot. Children would be chased for spilling drinks, and ordered to “wipe the damn ketchup off your face!”. This Clark would also complain about overpaid athletes, and amuse himself by mimicking Eleanor Roosevelt.

The only thing missing from this equation is the $1.2 billion it would take to buy the team, and another few hunge to run things smoothly without worrying about a million here or there. And one more thing, we will never produce a pink anything – pink hat, pink jersey, pink coozie, pink wrist band, or pink collectable of any kind.

Paulina Gretzky Showing Skin vs. Inbee Park in a Sweater Vest; Golf Digest Made Right Choice

by Kent Sterling

Paulina Gretzky on the cover of Golf Digest is softening my disdain for women golfers.

I have to admit that when I first saw the cover of Golf Digest that has many LPGA tour pros upset, I assumed Paulina Gretzky was a hot chick pro like Anna Rawson, Belen Mozo, and Natalie Gulbis.

Turns out, her only claim to fame is as the girlfriend of PGA pro Dustin Johnson and the daughter of hockey hall of famed Wayne Gretzky and Janet Jones of “American Anthem” fame. (If you went to college in the late 1980s, you saw Jones in that movie about gymnastics on an almost constant loop on HBO.)

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Regardless of her lack of credentials in the golf world, there she is on the cover. The last LPGA member to be feted in the same way was Lorena Ochoa in 2008. Nothing against Ochoa, but my money is on this issue of Golf Digest outselling the 2008 edition with her mug on the cover.

Publishing is a business, and this decision was made the same way all others are – by what moves product. Gretzky showing skin, or Inbee Park – the best female golfer on the planet – in her traditional sweater vest. Which do you think is more likely to prompt a business traveler to pick up a copy in the airport?

The comments from LPGA members from USA Today combine resignation and angst:

World #3 ranked Stacy Lewis, “It’s frustrating for female golfers. It’s the state of where we’ve always been. We don’t get the respect for being the golfers we are. Obviously, Golf Digest is trying to sell magazines, but at the same time you like to see a little respect for the women’s game.”
World #1 Inbee Park, “That’s just been the way it is for over 20, 30 years. We are trying to get closer to the guys (in popularity), but obviously we are never going to get there. That’s for sure. The LPGA is getting better and better.”
Angela Stanford, “The question is who are they trying to sell to? If the answer is men 25 years old through 45 years old, then I guess that’s what they have to do. You know the old saying, sex sells. And nobody can argue with that.

Stanford hits the nail on the head, while Park amicably concedes.

Golf Digest is not puffery produced to promote golfers. It’s a for-profit magazine that needs to move product in order to survive, and if putting some hot chick in a bikini top on the cover moves product, that is what will be done.

Chicago Cubs Opener Today – Wrigley Field Deserves a Boycott as a 100th Birthday Gift

by Kent Sterling

Cubs owner Tom Ricketts is laughing all the way to the bank every time you buy a ticket.

Sadly, firing the owner of a sports franchise is impossible.

Cubs owner Tom Ricketts has vaulted himself into the conversation as one of the worst owners in sports, and is closing in on late Blackhawks owner Bill Wirtz as the worst in the long and strange history of Chicago professional athletics futility.

On a day that Cubs fans used to look forward to as one of the few when reasonable hope could be justified, all positive feelings have been sapped by Ricketts and his family’s unquenchable thirst for profit.

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The Cubs ended last season with the third highest average ticket price in baseball, and begin this season with the 23rd highest payroll. Fans keep pouring through the turnstiles at Wrigley Field, as the true star attraction of the team celebrates its 100th birthday, but the always silly notion of optimism is gone.

Fans should respond by taking the year off. Don’t buy a ticket. Don’t attend a game using someone else’s tickets. Tell your son that he will not be pulled out of school one day this spring to head to Wrigley for a father-son afternoon.

For just one year, penalize Ricketts and his family for their profiteering. Cubs fans have been preyed upon enough without Ricketts charging fans top tier ticket prices to watch the 23rd highest payroll toil and fail.

The late Phil Wrigley owned the Cubs from 1932 until his death in 1977, and the disappointment came year after year, but ticket prices were always reasonable ($3.50 for the most expensive box seat, and $1 for bleacher seats). Twenty-two thousand tickets went on sale the day of every game. Sure the Cubs sucked more often than not, but a trip to Wrigley didn’t break a family budget.

Ricketts is not only breaking family budgets but records for futility, and for that he must pay a tariff. The only people able to enforce that penalty are the fans.

As painful as it is, for one year stay away from Wrigley Field. Postpone for one year the pilgrimage to the place where you have so many wonderful memories with grandparents, parents, brother, sisters, children, and grandchildren. Of course, it hurts, but it’s the only tool at our disposal to motivate Ricketts to deliver a reasonable product.

When you hear Cubs president Theo Epstein tell Dave Kaplan on Comcast Sports Chicago about how the minor league system in bursting at the seams with talents, shout at the TV that you will make the drive to Iowa to watch them instead of going into debt to watch the sad collection of mopes he has gathered in Chicago for your displeasure.

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As Ricketts considers offering stock to fund the Wrigley Field renovation, laugh at his face. If he didn’t have the cash to invest in the team’s infrastructure, he never should have bought it in the first place. The value of the Cubs has jumped $350 million since he bought it. How about using some of that money to erect the precious video screens that will generate the ad revenue that he covets.

For Cubs fans who want answers as to why this sad excuse for an owner was welcomed into the brotherhood of baseball owners instead of the brilliant Mark Cuban, you need to look no further than the owner’s suite at 35th and Shields. At the time of the purchase, a former owner of a major league franchise told me their was no way Jerry Reinsdorf would allow Cuban into baseball. He’s a big enough headache as an NBA owner, so Reinsdorf and close friend Commissioner Bud Selig worked to block the Cuban bid.

Okay, Jerry, you win. Chicago is becoming a White Sox town by default.

The only recourse is to refuse to financially support a robber baron. Cubs fans deserve better, unless they continue to buy tickets and concessions. In that case, crappy baseball is exactly what they will continue to get.

Celebrate Wrigley Field’s centennial by forcing Ricketts to pay for players worth your allegiance.