Baseball: A New Age is Beginning

I have to give props to this months espn the magazine. if you haven't picked up a copy you really should, especially if you are a stats geek like me. The magazine has several impressive stats in it including a number of new stats they are using to analyze fantasy statistics in football for the year. very interesting stuff.







Through all the stats that I have seen so far I find the one most impressive is the MLB players over 30 stat output for the past twenty years. It is some interesting stuff and may show a correlation between how steroids has helped older players the most. extending their careers well into their 30s. As the ESPN the Magazine says.....30 just may be the new 40 in baseball.

Now let's talk about steroid use in baseball. No one outside of the game will ever know the true extent of how deep into the fabric of the game steroids had become. If I had to throw out a number I would say more than 70 percent of pro baseball players were juicing. once again this is just a random number I'm throwing out. I think about it like this, if you were a baseball player and you were told you could take something to make you better and keep you in the game longer would you take it? Yeah you may start with products sold down at your local GNC but even stuff sold there is now illegal and not allowed. Where would you cut it off at? Would you stop with creatine? Why not go a little further, especially when the pay-off is so great...

For people not into sports the biggest myth about steroids is the drugs make you stronger. Yes they allow you to have more lean muscle mass but overall steroids work by allowing your muscle to repair and heal faster. They also give you that umph to get going on the rough days. Steroids was custom made for the over 30 baseball player, and now at the end of the steroids era we are also looking at the end of the 30s player being relevant when it comes to playing at your highest level for the longest amount of time possible.

To check my theory I just checked the yahoo fantasy baseball season rankings. Not one of the top 10 guys statistically this year in a standard five by five league are 30 years old yet. If this holds up for any amount of time this is going to completely change the game of baseball. We've already seen a fundamental change in how teams are handling their prospects. I personally think this is great for the game of baseball. Players reaching their peak at 26 and then slowly seeing their stats diminish will take the punch out of teams overpaying free agents. It is also going to make teams think twice before giving up several prospects for a solid 28 year old player. We could be entering into a new age of baseball...

To wrap things up I just want to add while steroids allowed players to keep up their high level of play, the athletes still had to work harder than 99 percent of the people out there. I don't know if taking steroids by itself should keep players out of the Hall of Fame, especially when looking at the fact some of their stats came off of opposing pitchers and hitters who very well were juicing themselves.

UFC is in trouble.

Let me start off my saying I have not drank the hater aid that many sportscasters have been spewing over the past couple of days. This past weekend the UFC held their 100th event and I am not naive, it was huge. It was so huge that many are now predicting ultimate fighting is now bigger than boxing. I will admit the momentum is on the side of ultimate fighting, but let's not kid ourselves this is as good as it is going to get for the caged sport.

So why do I feel mixed martial arts has reached its peak when it comes to popularity. First off it is the cool new kid that is just now showing up to school. Intriguing? yes, but what happens once the intrigue wears thin? What happens when those who are jumping on the sport now because it is something they have never seen before tire? What happens when well reality hits? I will tell you what happens. This niche sport goes back to being what it is. That isn't all bad though. Dana White can still fund his hell of a life as the commissioner of a niche sport. The problem as I see it though, is that what I just pointed out to me is a best case scenario, and if White and others aren't careful they could be looking at a sport that can become much less than my previous predictions.

The problem is that the big guy has now won. Brock Lesner winning did way more damage to me than his post Mir fight mouth ever could have done. Yes the mouth made him and the sport look like something straight out of Vince McMahon's playbook. Lesner winning though made me wonder if the rules of the sport are so open and inclusive that the larger you are, the more of an advantage you're going to have. No one wants to see the biggest guy on the court always win.

Let's compare brawlers and wrestlers in UFC to pure boxers. In boxing weight is maybe the third or fourth most important thing for a fighter to possess. Just at the top of my head I can think about speed, reach, and strength. That isn't even getting into the defense one gains when holding and grabbing are not allowed. That is why boxing is known as the sweet science. It's the thinking man's fight with a paper rock scissors guess of what is being thrown and what to throw often occurring 12 rounds in a row. The UFC? Fights are often times much shorter with the longest fights just lasting 3 rounds. Those shorter matches means larger guys don't have to endure for the long haul, but can make sure to come right after the other fighter pushing the action. Entertaining? Yes, but in the long run I just don't see how it keeps its current popularity.

Historic Week...

It may seem small but just remember this week as the first time Wimbledon's Centre Court roof was used during the tennis major. The historic event occured during the match involving Dinara Safina and Amelie Mauresmo on June 29th.

I don't think the match itself is significant, but if you want to make some cheap money the official first Wimbledon use is to me interesting. You see while the roof was fully closed on June 29th, the first real usage was on June 24th where court officials were asked to move the roof in some 5ft or so to cool the royal VIP section.

To tide you over here are some interesting facts about the roof....

- The roof takes 10 minutes to close. - It is 16 metres above the court surface. - The maximum time before play can start or continue after the roof is closed and the internal environment stabilised is 30 minutes. - 43 miles per hour - the wind speed up to which the roof can be deployed/retracted. - The span of the moving roof trusses is 77 metres. - The weight of each of the 10 trusses is 100 tonnes. - 1,200 extra seats have been installed. - The combined weight of the roof is 3,000 tonnes. - It would take 7,500 Wimbledon umbrellas to cover the same area as the roof. - 290 million tennis balls could fit in Centre Court with the roof closed.

thanks to the UK mirror for that. If you want to know more about the roof you can also check out this article.

US News article on how roof works.

Finally here are my predictions. Venus takes the all time series lead by one over sister Serena. 6-3 6-4. Federer also sets the record for singles major victories with another win over Rodick. 6-4 6-3 6-4