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      NASCAR meets MMA? Harvick, Edwards throw down.

      October 10, 2008 /

      Carl Edwards & Kevin HarvickRule No. 1 among NASCAR racers: You don’t call another driver a pansy. Apparently Kevin Harvick forgot that rule when he called Carl Edwards said pansy, and the two tussled following a “heated verbal and physical altercation” at a recent NASCAR practice session.

      Witnesses said the incident started in the garage stall where Harvick’s No. 33 Chevrolet was parked. Edwards had walked over from his area, two stalls down.

      The conversation appeared to start amicably, but soon heated words were exchanged, the witnesses said. At one point, Harvick appeared to turn away from Edwards, who then reached for Harvick’s shoulder, as if to turn him back around. Harvick responded by shoving Edwards, who landed on the No. 33 Chevrolet, denting the right-front section of the hood.

      People who saw the altercation, including the driver of Harvick’s motorcoach, Jeff Smith, jumped in to separate Edwards and Harvick, the witnesses said. At one point, Smith had Edwards in a headlock, they said, but the drivers apparently exchanged no punches.

      Photos were taken of the incident, but were not made available.

      Both drivers declined to comment on the incident and NASCAR officials said they considered it a “non-issue.”

      In the interview following wreck at Talladega, Harvick called Edwards a “pansy” for riding around in the back of the pack before eventually moving to the front and running with the leaders. Soon after joining the lead pack, Edwards’ car hit teammate Greg Biffle’s car, touching off the 12-car wreck that collected another teammate, Matt Kenseth, and Harvick, among others.

      I don’t know what I’d rather watch less – a NASCAR race on TV or two NASCAR drivers fight in a garage but throw no punches.

      General Sports

      The pitch that turned around the Rays’ season

      October 10, 2008 /

      When people look back at the June brawl between the Red Sox and Rays, they’ll remember the James Shield’s punch that Coco Crisp so eloquently dodged out of the way of. But as John Romano of the St. Petersburg Times writes, it wasn’t Shield’s punch that affected the Rays’ season – it was his message pitch.

      Red Sox-Rays brawlIn case you have forgotten, the underlying cause of Tampa Bay’s brawl with the Red Sox in early June was Crisp’s cheap shot on Aki Iwamura at second base the night before. Crisp was annoyed that Rays shortstop Jason Bartlett had blocked the base earlier in the game, and he took his frustrations out on Iwamura.

      Obviously, there is no manual on how to deal with such a transgression. And there is no one in charge of dispensing justice. It is simply expected that someone hold Crisp accountable.
      And, at times, that had been a problem in the Rays clubhouse.

      Over the years, Rays hitters have not always felt protected by Tampa Bay pitchers. The point was driven home most publicly in the spring of 2007 when Ty Wigginton yelled at his own dugout after being hit by a pitch.

      And so it was that Shields, 26, took the mound on June 5. The Rays had lost two in a row, had fallen out of first place the night before, and Shields had not won a game in nearly a month. And, at that moment, none of it mattered.

      On his second pitch to Crisp in the second inning, Shields drilled him in the hip.

      In a lot of ways, this fight was costly to Tampa Bay. Shields was suspended for six games, Gomes for five, Edwin Jackson for five, Carl Crawford for four and Iwamura for three.
      But for all the Rays lost, they say they gained far more.

      Much like the brawl with the Yanks in spring training, the Rays believe the fight with the Red Sox was a statement, both in their dugout and the opposite dugout.

      You could argue whether Shields chose the right moment. Yes, maybe he could have waited until later in the game, so he wouldn’t have put such a burden on the bullpen. But loyalty doesn’t work on such strict timetables.

      The brotherhood in baseball is part of what makes the game so great. Players in other sports obviously come to their teammates’ defense, but in baseball it’s different – it’s an unwritten rule. When 25 guys are together virtually every day from March until late fall, there’s going to be a bond that’s forced. And it’s kind of cool to see that bond unfold like it did in the Rays-Sox brawl, although obviously I don’t advocate teams fight nightly to show their unity.

      MLB

      Think you’re accident-prone? You have nothing on this guy.

      October 10, 2008 /

      Clint MalarchukFormer NHL goalie Clint Malarchuk is recovering after accidentally shooting himself in the chin with a rifle.

      Malarchuck, by the way, was the player who once had his jugular vein slashed by a skate in a 1989 game with the Buffalo Sabres.

      Malarchuk’s wife Christy told sheriff’s deputies that the .22-calibre rifle discharged after her husband placed the butt on the ground between his legs. He had been shooting rabbits.

      The 47-year-old former player, now a goalie coach with the Columbus Blue Jackets, was flown by helicopter to a Reno hospital for treatment Tuesday.

      “Our concern is with Clint and his well-being,” the Blue Jackets said in a statement Thursday. “We are optimistic that he will have a full recovery very soon.”

      Getting your damn throat slashed once in a lifetime is bad enough. But shooting yourself in the chin with a rifle, too? I think it’s well past the time that Clint picks up safer hobbies.

      NHL

      Curran: Cowboys are exploiting Pacman Jones

      October 10, 2008 /

      Tom Curran of NBC Sports makes an excellent point about the relationship between the Dallas Cowboys and Adam Jones, and how the team is essentially just using “Pacman” as their circus “freak show.”

      Pacman JonesGiven the pain Jones has caused himself and others and the limb the Cowboys made the rest of the league climb out on for a guy who’s a lock to offend again, the honorable thing would have been for the Cowboys to somehow shield Jones’ re-entry into the NFL from the cameras.
      Would HBO have like it? No. Did it make for great TV to see Jones dumping trash cans filled with water from his balcony on unsuspecting teammates, catching six footballs at once, saying about T.O., “That boy crazy!” and sending correspondence to the league to ask for reinstatement? Yeah.

      But the whole operation served to give Jones — someone not mentally equipped to deal with the severity of his situation and the reality of the expectations set upon him — the perception that he wasn’t a person or an employee of an NFL franchise but a reality TV star.

      And what do reality TV stars inevitably do? They melt down. And then they land on the scrap heap with the rest of pop culture’s discards to go and do whatever it is they do until they make their next and final headline (before their obit) with an arrest in a Target parking lot.

      But that’s OK with Jerry Jones, the NFL’s P.T. Barnum. Think P.T. cared if The Bearded Lady had esteem issues and a drinking problem that raged? Not if she showed up lookin’ freaky.

      So today, now that Pac is back in the news for public stupidity, we’re supposed to cluck-cluck at how stupid he is. Sorry, I’m not with that program. To me, that fact was already clear. Instead, I shake my head at the team that’s exploited him.

      Outstanding points. I’m guilty of using Pacman in my, “He’s just an idiot posts,” but Curran makes the first spot-on assessment of this whole situation. When the Cowboys first signed Pacman everyone said, “Now see – they want to help him. They’re keeping tabs on him and trying to clean up his image.” But as Curran points out, Jerry Jones and the team has just been exploiting him for exactly who he is – a guy who, in Curran’s own words is, “intellectually overmatched by the simple workings and expectations of society.”

      NFL

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