Weekly football post #50.

Welcome to the Big 5-0! I sure hope it's fun...

Kyle Boller finally showed some studliness in a preseason game against the Bengals that got the Rams to 2-1 on the preseason table. Boller, in his second game for the injured Marc "Fantasy Man" Bulger, went 14 of 20 for 96 yards and a TD in the game. Despite leading the Boys in Horns to a 24-21 victory against Cinncy, his highlight of the night was getting his helmet ripped off by a charging defender. He scrambled for 8 measly yards, waited to long to slide, and got the crap knocked out of him. Boller got to his feet, though, picked up his helmet (which got popped off), and completely his TD pass to running back Samkon Gado. Is this the emergence of our 2009 starter? Will Bulger be replaced by this 28 year old Burbank native? I think Andrew would say no, but I'm still hopeful. Gado also added a rushing TD, the defense returned a 73 yard fumble for a TD, and Josh Brown nailed a third quarter field goal in the win. The Rams created 4 turnovers and gave up a big doughnut. Vanderbilt graduate Sean Walker led the receivers with a small 24 yards, but I may be slowly starting to get excited with this fairly decent preseason. Will '09 be our return to dominance? We'll see in 2 weeks, as the regular season starts against the Seahawks on September 13 at Qwest Field. Will Bulger be back behind center? I hope not. Really.

Notre Dame starts their season against Nevada this coming Saturday at 12:30 pm. I'm pretty sure I'll be cheering on JC, Tate, Hughes and the boys at Silky's live and in person. I'm still calling that this will be the year when we beat SC. So pumped for this!

The BC Lions got the week off, and play Montreal this Friday night. Going up against the Beast of the East isn't going to be easy for the Least of the West. But, like a true Orange & Black fan, I'm confident.

Newcastle United got in on for a Monday Night Football match tonight, and wrestled away a 1-0 victory against Leicester City to improve on their top of the table form. Big Boy Danny Guthrie fired home the golden goal, collecting the ball from super youth Nile Ranger, and unleashing a thrilling 20 yard drive into the top of the net. It was his second in the last two matches, and it sealed the deal just 52 minutes in. Of course, it is the continued keeping magic of Steve Harper, coming away with a couple of top notch saves and earning the clean sheet to power the Bar Codes. The win continues the Mags undefeated start, going 4-0-1 through the 5 opening games of the Championship League season. With 13 points (+2 on West Brom), 'Castle has the fans already thinking promotion. At least, that's what this fan is thinking. By the way, I thought demotion to the second division would make the Black & White less exciting, but in reality it is all just about winning to get you pumped up as a fan. Newcastle gets some serious time off for international play before a 9/13 game against #3 Cardiff City, and hopefully Shola can get back into the thick of things and improve upon his team leading 4 goals.

Sunday afternoon saw a nice 1-0 win for Celtic as well, beating up on the Hibs with a beautiful tally from Gorgeous Georgios Samaras. The Greasy Greek scored against Hibernian just before the half time whistle, after a perfect cross from Andy Hinkel that Samaras was ever to bang home into the net. The Hoops' 4-4-2 was too much for the Easter Road side, even with Marc-Antoine Fortune sitting out with an injury. Artur Boruc was on point with another clean sheet for the super star SPL side. Of course, the majority of the focus on the match was on Aiden McGeady getting tossed off for a second yellow card, which was highly disputed. The Republic of Ireland player was sent off after getting tossed to the ground by a Hibs defender, and was called for a dive. Celtic boss Tony Mowbray was enraged, and made it known. As the game concluded, he held a player huddle on the field to help rally the troops. The fans responded well, and it was a solid move by the new manager. Celtic and Rangers are now tied atop the SPL standings, both sitting at 3-0-0 with 9 points. The next battle will be on 9/12 against #3 Dundee, and Rangers will be dueling with #5 Motherwell, as the race for the SPL title continues.

Hey, Chivas USA lost the Super Clasico! Are you shocked? No, neither am I. For some reason, the Red & White just don't know how to do the do against the Galaxy, and that continued against this weekend. It was the second defeat in the last four days, and it comes just after it seemed as though the Goats were turning it around. Chivas now hasn't scored against LA since August 14, 2008. That's no joke. My boys lost 0-2 aggregate in the Super Clasico battles this year, and it drops them to 6th in the West. The most recent version of the battle was a fast paced and aggressive match, that ended on a David F-ing Beckham goal. It was Beck's first of the year, if you can believe it, and came in the 80th minute. All of that time pushing forward for nothing. Lance Parker was unable to do his best Zach Thorton impression. The goal for Becks was kind of lucky, with a long bomb just kind of falling to his feet near the penalty spot, and there was nothing Lance Parker could do. Where is all the love from Jesus Padilla? Now at 10-9-3, Chivas is #6 in the West, just 3 from the bottle. I guess we're tied for fourth, in reality, with 33 points, but are suffering a staggering -7 of Houston, -5 of LA, -1 of Seattle, and tied with Colorado and RSL. Remember when Chivas got off to their best start in franchise history? Next up is a 9/13 battle, as all of soccer takes next week off (to sit back and watch the ND season opener?), against New England (9-6-6, 33 points, #3 in the East). Hm. I wish we played in the East!

Elsewhere: 1) Guada drew with Pachuca 2-2 over the weekend to "improve" to 1-3-1 (-8 points of 1st place Toluca). The FMF doesn't take the week off next week, as the Goats head in to face Puebla. 2) Sligo and Bray drew 2-2 as well, with Sligo still in the probable relegation spot with 22 points. A Tuesday win against first place Bohemians, although mega unlikely, would pull Sligo to the #8 spot, and thus in a better position to remain in the Irish Premier table. Come on Bit O' Red...shock 'em! 3) Lazio opened the Serie A season with a 2-1 win against Chievo Verona. It was a Julio Cruz double that opened the season off right for my favorite football greasers.

Baseball rosters expand tomorrow, so I'm pumped about that. Get ready for next week's football post, because it'll be fairly Notre Dame heavy.

Goodnight.

Enter the Kazmanian Devil.

As I sit here and watch the Angels trail to the hated A's 2-6 in the seventh inning, on the verge of losing their second straight game to my most hated baseball franchise, I really want to ponder the move they made today on the waiver wires and see what I think. It's August 28th, and I don't think I've ever even heard of a trade happening at this point in the year, but hey, Tony Reagins is a genius. He did, after all, sign Torii Hunter at a Del Taco in Riverside. Today he pulled of a trade, that initially I felt pretty good about. The Angels sent minor league pitcher Alex Torres (who has made an appearance on this very blog), infielder Matt Sweeney, and everyone's favorite "player to be named later" to Joe Maddon and the Tampa Bay Devil Rays for left handed 25 year old hurler Scott Kazmir. Kaz's numbers haven't really been crazy awesome this season (8-7, 5.92), but he has been known as a solid southpaw, and I think I'm happy.

Bobby Abreu just got a RBI infield single to make it 3-6. Are we marching back?

Let's first take a look at what the Angels are getting in Kaz. ESPN provides some lovely "fast facts:" 1) Kazmir is amazing against the Rangers in his career (5-1, 2.28), 2) Kaz's 9.36 Ks per 9 innings trails only Jake Peavy (9.46) among pitchers with a minimum 750 innings pitched since 2005, 3) Scott is 4-0 with a 2.92 ERA against our hated playoffs foes in the Red Sox and the usually beatable Yankees. Sounds too good to be true. The Houston, TX native has seen his former team win 4 out of his last 6 starts, and one of the losses includes a 6 inning 1 run effot against the Blue Jays with 10 Ks that the Rays lost 2-3. So, his record may not look amazing here in 2009, but that may be because he hasn't gotten a ton of run support from the former AL Champs. In '08 he went 12-8, in '07 he went 13-9, and he had 10 wins in '06 and '05. He has a career ERA of 3.92. He hasn't pitched at Angel Stadium this season, but he has a 1.80 ERA in Arlington, a 0.00 ERA at McAfee, and even a 1.50 ERA at the elusive Rogers Center. I'm usually a pretty open with my dislike when the Angels pick up a douchebag, and this time around I don't feel that way. I'm happy with the Kaz. Especially once we hit the playoffs, and we're making a smaller playoff rotation, we'll have a lot of nice options between Lackey, Saunders, Ervin, Weaver, Kazmir, and even Palmer. Seriously, who in the AL is going to compete?

Kendry Morales just hit his second jack of the night against the A's, this one takes the Angels to an 8-6 lead. Haha! Yes!!!

Let's take a look at what the Angels are giving away. Alex Torres in a Venezuelan pitcher currently at AA Arkansas. He's 3-1 with a 2.77 ERA, punching out 25 batters in just 26 innings. In his last outing, AT went 6 innings of shutout ball with 8 Ks. When he pitched in Rancho (single A) earlier in the year, he went 10-3 with a 2.74 ERA. He punched out 124 batters in just 121.3 innings. Are you kidding? I know he's just a 21 year old minor leaguer, but he seems like he has tons of potential. The Rays aren't stupid, you know. Matt Sweeney is a little further out, playing for the Quakes out in Rancho. He's hitting .299/9/44, adding in 17 doubles and a triple to get you even more geeked. But, as much as I'd like to pump Sweeney up, he's way to far off to worry about him getting dealt. Who knows who the player to be named later will be. All in all, I would usually be pissed about losing a guy like Torres, but with Kazmir being major league ready and only 25, I'm still happy. Just remember, if Alex Torres becomes a big thing in 2 years, remember that I told you so.

Will we be waiting until the September 1st game against Seattle for Kaz's debut? Either way, I'm glad to have him.

Another run, knocked in by HK 47, and the Angels have made it a 7 run 7th inning. Can the 'pen close it out and help us even the series against the hated ones.

Joe Dirt off DL, saves the day.

The tried to blow it in the ninth, but in the end the Angels were able to steal win in the final game of a three game series against the Tigers with a 4-2 victory. It has been an emotional three games, after a couple of really bad losses, but the Halos got a hopeful starter back off the DL, and were a team on a mission to make the day game fans happy. 36,329 day game fans, by the way.

Big Joey went to the DL with an injury that we at the LSF like to call "15 days for sucking," and was finally ready to put his ego on the line in his return against Edwin Jackson today. I guess if he still sucked, not very many fans would notice, since the game started at 12:35. Good idea. Luckily, he shined in his first start back from the DL, despite not going too deep. Joey went 5 innings of 4 hit ball, allowing 2 runs, and punching out 6. His lone problem was a two run bomb by Adam Everett in the fifth that cut the Angels lead in half. Other than that, Joe was on like Donkey Kong (I've always wanted to say that). After 89 pitches, though, Joe headed to the bench, as the Angels try to ease him back into things as we approach the stretch run. The bullpen of combination of Bulger, 'Dondo, Jeps, and Fuentes did the Tigers in (going a combined 3 innings of 3 hit shutout ball. Despite earning his MLB leading 36th save, Fuentes made thing interesting in the ninth (and I thank my Dad for leaving a ninth inning play by play message on my cell phone). BFF hit two batters, tossed a wild pitch, and allowed Adam Everett up to the plate with a chance to give the Tigers the lead if he found a way to hit his second jack. Result? Pop out, Angels win. Fuentes, you lovely fool!

It sure was nice seeing my boys beat up on a former Dodger fan's best buddy. The Angels tagged 4 runs on 8 hits, all to Jackson, and had their main man Torii Hunter getting back into the swing of things. Hunter extended his modest hitting streak to 12 games with a 2 for 3 2 RBI day, and mashed his first home run in almost two months, thanks to his DL issues. Big Game finished, like I said, going 2 for 3 with 2 RBI and a walk, and he was joined in the Angels VIP club by the likes of Chone "Farewell" Figgins (2 for 3, 1 RBI, 1 BB). Not a bad effort for a game where only two players had a pancake, eh? Honorable mention goes to Vladdy (1 for 3 with a walk, and his 1,000th hit as an Angel). The Impaler now becomes one of just eight Angels players to get 1,000 hits in the Red Hat. I have to give a little respect to Gary Matthews Jr. too, because I have to make a reason to have his Jackie Robinson t-shirt jersey, as the Least Valuable Junior had a 1 for 3 day with a walk and a run. GMJ baby! Keep in mind that the Angels left 8 runners on base, going 3 for 13 with runners in scoring position. I'm sending dead flowers to Bobby Abreu (0 for 3), Mighty Maicer (0 for 3), and Mike "I told you he sucks" Crapoli (0 for 4 with 2 punch outs).

In case you are wondering, like I was, here is the list of the 8 Angels with 1,000 or more hits: GA (2,368), Tim Salmon (1,674), Brian Downing (1,588), Darin "One Good Year" Erstad (1,505), Jim Fergosi (1,408), Bobby Grich (1,103), Chone "Believe It Or Not" Figgins (1,011), and Vlad (1,000). Chili Davis and Rod Carew are honorable mentions at 973 and 968. Wally Joyner got himself 961 knocks.

The Halos walk away from this series, a little more battered, but with a win coming out the back side. At 75-50, the Angels have a 4.5 game lead on Texas (how are they still sticking around?), a 10.5 game lead on Seattle, and a 20 game lead on Choke-land. Speaking of the hated ones, we are about to have one of my favorite time around Angels Nation starting tomorrow. Tomorrow, my boys start a four game series against the team I hate the most, the Oakland A's. Ervin Santana (7-6, 6.13) will try and continue his amazing recent success against Oceanside native Trevor Cahill (6-12, 4.86). Cahill hasn't actually earned a win since July 22 against the Twins, despite the A's winning his last two starts. Over his last ten games on the mound, the A's are 4-6. Of course, on the other side, Cahill and the A's beat the Angels on July 17 by the score of 7-3 with a 4.67 inning/3 run effort. Meanwhile, Black Magic has been deadly lately, with the Angels going 8-2 over his last ten starts. He has earned a win in his last 4 starts, and has been pretty solid. In his last 21 innings, El Rosario has only allowed 6 runs, and that includes a complete game shutout three starts ago against Tampa Bay. The last time Erv went against the A's, he busted them in a 6-2 win with 8 solid innings of 1 run ball, that almost was a complete game shutout. Odds are on us to make it a two game winning streak, eh? I'm hopeful.

My message to the Angels after this game? Let's keep up the good work, Joe.

Weekly football post #49.

Welcome to the forty ninth weekly football post, still hating the 49'ers after all these years. This time around we're going to be keeping things simple, and focusing squarely on my big time football teams, rather than going all over the place, so I hope you'll enjoy.

The Rams dropped their preseason game to Atlanta 13-20, helping me to regain that lovely feeling of the last couple of seasons. Matt Ryan went 7 of 8 for 8 yards with a TD in a game where the Rams just had no answer for the Falcs at any point. Even Steven Jackson went 3 carries for just 10 yards in one series, and that was it. Can I blame the loss on not having Marc Bulger in the lineup? I guess not. This year's backup battle between Kyle Boller (9/16 for 91 yards) and Brock Berlin (5/8 for 71 yards and a TD) has started to heat up, with Berlin clearly still in the lead. Laurent Robinson was the leading receiver in the game, as the Rams continue to try and find out what they are going to do at the wideout spot when the season comes along. All that, and we created 3 turnovers. What a loss. The Rams are now 1-1 on the preseason, but are just a -4 in point differential. We continue the preseason on Thursday night against the Bengal Tigers, as we continue to march toward the regular season opener on September 13 against Seattle.

I'm starting to get somewhat nervous about the upcoming college football season. A while ago, actually right after we beat Hawaii in the bowl game in early '09, I called that Notre Dame would finished the '09 season with a 10-3 record. I still stand by that prediction. But, now I'm worried that the rest of the world is agreeing with me, and that makes me nervous. I prefer when the Irish are hated on going into the season, and then they blow everyone away. All of the sudden, last year's 6-6 team are coming into the '09 season ranked as the #23 team in the nation (just ahead of Nebraska and Kansas in the preseason top 25). Really? Come on AP. Come on USA Today. Why would you do this to me? Oh well. Despite the jinx, I'm still completely expecting BCS from my boys this year. We're actually getting close to the big day!

In CFL action, BC lost to Winnipeg 10-37. Jarious Jackson went 15/24 with 185 with a TD, but had 3 interceptions, which was the basis for the Lions losing the game. At 3-5, the last place Lions get ready for September 4 when they try to get make to form against Montreal.

Is Newcastle just trying to get me overly excited, or what? This weekend, the Bar Codes came away with a thrilling 2-0 shutout over former EPL buddies Crystal Palace. Kevin Nolan and Ryan Taylor did the damage from the scrambled eggs in the game to extend Newcastle's unbeaten start, and it didn't take long for my boys to get the action going. Just 99 seconds into the game, Nolan fired a long strike passed the Palace keeper to get 'Castle on the board. It was a mistake by the defense, a nifty pass by Jonas Gutierrez, and Nolan pounced to put us ahead. Ryan Taylor, who also joined the squad in January, doubled the advantage at 21 minutes into the game. Gutierrez again made a nice pass, and Taylor made good on it with a left footed strike from about 20 yards out. The visiting squad was celebrated in their questionable third jerseys, and Magpie Nation let out a collective cheer. Despite some late pressure from Palace, Steve Harper held strong for another clean sheet and another three points for the Toon Army. Newcastle are now 3-0-1 on the young Coca Cola Championship season, tied for first place with Cardiff City, Middlesbrough, and West Brom with 10 large points. We get a Carling Cup match midweek against Huddersfield Town before getting back into the league play on Monday Night Football against Leicester City (2-0-2, 8 points). Respect!

Celtic big upped Newcastle with their weekend win, stealing a 5-2 SPL win against St. Johnstone. 5 goals. The best part is that DirecTV is now hooking us up with Setanta Sports, and I have this game set to record early this week to actually watch it! Thanks DirecTV! It was newbie transfer Marc Antoine Fortune coming through with a double in the game to help endear himself to Green & White Nation around the world. How about the double from Shaun Maloney as well? And, it wouldn't be a 09/10 Celtic win without a goal from Scott "Croc Dundee" McDonald, and he put in goal number five in the gigantic victory. Tony Mowbray has to be proud with the way this squad has played thus far here in the early goings of the SPL season, and they really rebounded after a tough first leg loss to Arsenal earlier last week. St. Johnstone, the recent call up from the first division, proved that they deserve to be in the SPL with their two goals, but this match saw a real approach from Celtic that had us all sure they would get the big win. Fortune's first career Celtic goal, just 21 minutes into the match, sent us on a wild ride to a fantastic finish, and I'm pumped. My boys are an easy 2-0 on the SPL season, tied with Rangers (damn!) and the Hibs with 6 points atop the league. The win has given Celtic players even more confidence heading into their Wednesday Champions League match against Arsenal. Will we have a better effort in the second leg? I hope so!

Could Chivas earn this LSF All-Star an easy triple? They did. A nice return back to the HDC in the way of a 2-0 clean sheet win against Toronto FC this weekend did me real proud. Anaheim, CA native and US National star (and, I believe, FIFA '10 cover boy) Sacha Kljestan scored his first goal of the season just 32 minutes into the match, causing havoc in the midfield with newbie Jesus Padilla. Galindo and Maicon Santos were up front, allowing Sacha to get free. As if it wasn't enough, Kljestan added to the goal at the 51 minute mark on an assist from Santos to really seal the deal against Andrew's Toronto side. Add to this a) the fact that I got to watch most of the game on Prime Ticket and b) the fact that Lance Parker came in and earned the clean sheet in relief of Zach Thorton, and I'd say you have a pretty sweet game. For Lance, it was an impressive outing, making all of Oklahoma City proud, and helping Chivas Nation believe that we have some keeping talent beyond Thorton. The win continues to help the Goats get back on track, now at 10-7-3 (33 points). We trail #2 LA by 2 points and #1 Houston by just 5, as we continue to try and march back to the front of the Western Conference. A midweek match against RSL should help to solidify our position. Can we keep the 2 game winning streak alive and beat our rival expansion brothers.

Just quickly now: Chivas de Guadalajara lost to Atlante 3-1 (are we nearing the end for Luis Michel?), Sligo tied Bray 2-2 to keep them in the relegation zone (1 point away from safety), and Lazio started their Serie A campaign with a 1-0 win against Atalanta (Rocchi is the best Italian player in the game).

Thanks for listening.

LSF T&F World Championship review.

I don't think I've made any bones about my love of track and field. Is there any better sport than just going head to head and seeing who is the fastest? I don't think so, and that is why I'm ready to provide you with the LSF review of the 2009 World Championships in Athletics that is just wrapping up in Berlin as I type. I'll give you the reviews of the events that I love, and I hope you enjoy the journey. Please note that there is still one day of competition left, so I will be leaving out both 4X400 relays, the women's 1500 final, and the men's 800.

Men's 100 m: The good folks in Berlin decided to get the most anticipated event of the Championships out of the way on day 2 of 9, and it lived up to expectations. With the likes of Usain Bolt, Tyson Gay, Asafa Powel, and Doc "Beijing Baton Drop" Patton, the 100 finals were ready to thrill. I'm sure you've seen the actual race by now. Jamaica's golden boy ran full out for the entire distance of the race and put up a new World Record of 9.58. The media has played up the Bolt World Record like crazy, as well they should (even if he is seemingly a douche), but they missed the real story we should all be talking about. Silver medalist Tyson Gay came away with a second place finish at 9.71. 9.71! That is a National Record, the fastest time any American has ever finished 100 meters. If you consider the amazing comeback that Gay has now pulled off after going down to a severe hamstring injury in the US Olympic Trials back in '08 (limiting him to no medals in Beijing), you have to be proud. Bolt may have stolen the show with a solid record, but our boy Gay deserves some serious respect.

Women's 100 m: Slightly less anticipated was the women's 100 meter final on the third day. Carmelita Jeter and Lauryn Williams were the American hopefuls in the event. After finishing with the bronze in the 2007 World Champs in Osaka, Jeter falied to make the 2008 Olympic team after finishing two hundredths of a second behind the qualifying time. Wasn't sharing a name with Derek Jeter punishment enough? Meanwhile, Lauryn Williams came into everyone's heart at the '08 Beijing games after picking up a dropped baton in the 4X100 relays and finishing the race, despite finishing in last place. It was a big up move that made an entire country proud. In the 100 finals, however, we would have to put up with another Jamaican domination. Shelly-Ann Fraser took gold at 10.73 with Kerron Stewart earning silver at 10.75. Carmelita did us as proud as any American could do in this event with a 10.90 bronze to equal her bronze at the '07 Championships.

Women's 400 m: How long have we been waiting for Sanya Richards to win us some gold? No longer! Sanya put together a 49 flat to win the 400 m finals in Berlin, putting Jamaican Shericka Williams back 00.32 for the silver. Sanya, still engaged to NY Giants Super Bowl champ Aaron Ross, is actually a native of Jamaica but came to the US at the age of 12 with one thing in mind. Dominating her fellow Jamaicans. We're glad to have her, but a bronze finish in Beijing left all of American wanting more from Richards. She provided it this year, taking the national title with a 50.05, and followed that up with a 49 flat to win the gold in the World Championships.

Men's 400 m hurdles: We dominate! Americans Kerron Clement and Bershawn Jackson earned gold and bronze respectively to continue the American domination in this event. What redemption for Clement after finishing silver in Beijing behind fellow American Angelo Taylor. Bershawn Jackson, meanwhile, was able to earn bronze again in Berlin after getting the same result in the Olympics. Will Batman ever regain his gold glory from 2005? All of Dade County, Florida thinks he will.

Men's 1500 m: The fifth day of the games brought us the exciting 1500 finals, and it wasn't nearly as a favorable outcome as I though it would be. Bernard Lagat has one of the craziest kicks in the game, and Lopez Lomong is up and coming after qualifying for Beijing. Lagat failed to get passed the semifinals in the Olympics, and was out for revenge. Lomong was also eliminated in the semifinals, but represented the Lost Boys of Sudan with pride. He's looking to become the future of the US 1500. In the race, Lomong was trailing throughout, and never overcame that, finishing eighth. Lagat kind of hung around like he usually does before breaking out in the final 200 or so for the push to the front. This time, Lagat had the energy to get his kick on, but was boxed in by Frenchie Mehdi Baala on the rail. Lagat was finally able to get out of the box in with about 100 left and kicked like a stud. However, when you are trying to race back on the outside with just 100 left, it doesn't usually work. He worked his way up from about sixth to third, finished with the bronze, and looked pretty disappointed.

Women's 100 m hurdles: Lolo Jones failed to make the games in Berlin after disappointment in Beijing, and that left the Americans out of the whole thing pretty much, with Brigitte Foster-Hylton winning the gold. At least Priscilla Lopes-Schliep from Canada took the silver with 12.54. North American pride! Priscilla doesn't look like a runner.

Men's 200 m: I'm sure you've read about/seen the men's 200 meter finals as well. Usain Bolt came out and stunned the world for a second time with a World Record 19.19 run. He again ran through the entire race, obviously making sure he avoids the critiques of the media for not taking things seriously. He completely dominated this race, winning with 19.19, considering that Panamanian Alonso Edward finished second with 19.81. Good for us that Wallace Spearmon earned himself a bronze with a 19.85 run. Bad for us that Spearmon and Bolt joke around right before the race. The media presents them as "friends," but I'd prefer if Spearmon would take things a little more seriously next time, eh?

Men's 100 m hurdles: You may look at the results from this race and see Terrence Trammell and David Payne finishing silver/bronze and think that the Americans are finally earning some respect in this race. Not really. Dayron Robles of Cuba, who burst onto the scene in 2008 injured himself in his initial heat of the events after crashing into three hurdles. This completely opened the door for all comers. The real story of the event from Barbados stud Ryan Brathwaite finishing at 13.14 to earn the gold and the first World Championship for the nation of Barbados. All of the sudden he's a National hero, and that has to feel good.

Women's 200 m: This is probably the most intense rivalry in all of women's running. American Allyson Felix vs. Jamaican Veronica Campbell-Brown. In the Olympics, it has been all Campbell-Brown (gold in 2004 and 2008 with Felix taking silver in both). In the World Championships, it has been all Felix (gold in 2005 and 2007 with Campbell-Brown taking silver in '07). It would be no different this time around, as the most anticipated battle between women on the track came down to the two amazing rivals. The magic mark this time around was 22.02, and it was the always smiling Allyson Felix getting her third straight World Championship. Are you kidding me? I mean, Allyson has not been able to get it going in the Olympics (when everyone in the world is watching), but around the running world, getting 3 World Championships in a row is pretty amazing and unheard of. In fact, she is the only woman in history to do it. What a win.

Men's 400 m: For me, this is what running is all about. The men's 400 meter is so exciting, so amazing to watch, and features one of the most intense rivalries in all of athletics. LaShawn Merritt vs. Jeremy Wariner. Good Guy vs. Bad Guy. Solid American vs. Sunglasses Wearing/Coach Ditching Bro-type (that is actually a picture of him...I'm not joking!). I guess you know that Merrit is my boy. With Michael Johnson and his golden shoes always being the gold standard of the 400 with a 43.18, Jeremy Wariner has the 3rd fastest time in history and LaShawn Merritt has the fifth fastest time in history. Wariner, a native Texan, dominated the event for quite a while. He earned gold in '04 in Athens, gold in '05 in Helsinki, gold in '07 in Osaka. Then came Merritt. After getting silver in Osaka to Wariner's gold, LaShawn was ready to show that he was the American 400 stud. In 2008, LaShawn opened things up by beating Wariner for the gold, which shocked the world. It was a win for the non-douche everywhere! Coming out in the World Championships in 2009 on Berlin, Merritt had to prove that the Olympics weren't a fluke. He did. Wariner came out with the early lead, but Merritt over took him around the turn to the final 100. Wariner kicked to draw even temporarily, but LaShawn powered ahead over the final 100 to finish at 44.06, a beautiful 00.54 ahead of Wariner. This is quite the American dominated event, and it's fun to watch. Especially when Merritt beats Wariner!

Men's & Women's 4x100 m relay: I just wanted to quickly point out that neither the men nor the women even made it to the finals in the 4x100 relays. Remember Beijing? The men and the women both dropped the baton in the Olympics and came into the World Championships in Berlin looking to prove to the world that they can hand off a stick and run really fast. The men appeared to do just that in the semifinals, but after video review it was ruled that the American passes the baton outside of the official zone. That is a fundamental flaw. We blew it again. All of our relay hopes fell on the women. It was even worse. On a handoff, Muna Lee bumped legs with the giver of the baton, went crashing to the track, and actually was pretty darn injured. The Americans provided another "did not finish," Muna Lee was carried off on a stretcher (I'm not kidding), and the American dream of redemption in the relays came crashing down to the ground.

We still have hope to get more positive results tomorrow, as Oregon graduate Nick Symmonds goes in the men's 800 finals and the American men and women will get a second chance at relay redemption in the 4x400 relays.

All in all, I think we have to be very happy with our performance in the Berlin World Championships. As it sits right now, the Americans have won 7 golds (tied with Jamaica for #1), 5 silvers (all alone at #1), and 5 bronzes (tied with Russia for #1). That gives us a total of 17 medals in Berlin (even though the medals look like candy wrappers), which puts us +5 on #2 Jamaica.

Even Sports Pickle got involved in the track and field excitement.

I'll leave the decision on Caster Semanya up to you.

Don't call it a comeback. It wasn't.

Sean O'Sullivan seems to be looking at his pitching hand as if there is something wrong. There was something wrong. His pitched. The Angels dropped their second consecutive match, showing that Sully is clearly up here to early despite his moments of brilliance (including a no hitter at AAA) this year, falling 4-5 to the Blue Jays. The score makes the game look way closer than it actually was.

I know the Angels have gone 8-2 over SOS' last 10 starts, and if you read the blog you know that I have been supporting him the whole way. However, now that I've been checking him out a little more in depth, I'm starting to wonder if he's the pitcher I think he is, or if he still has a ways to go. His earned runs go like this over that 8-2 run: 4-6-6-4-2-4-2-3-1. That's five of the ten games with 4+ runs. His inning pitched over the 8-2 run goes like this: 1-4-4.67-5-5.3-5.67-6-5-7. That's right, in the last 10 games he's only gone 6 or more innings twice. Hm. Have I been clouded because he gets over 7 runs of support every time around? I think so. I still think he'll be a stud in the near future, he just isn't there yet. I'm saying he's no Matt Palmer (wink, wink). In tonight's edition, SOS went just 1 inning of 4 run ball. The first inning was painful to watch (and listen to, as it dragged on so long I had to get in my car and drive away). Just 23 strikes in 49 pitches, he was tagged for hit after hit. Matt Palmer, our other #5, came in to save the day with 4 innings of 1 run ball in relief (the complete opposite of SOS!), and was joined by Jose Arredondo (finally finding his way back into the thick of things) with 3 innings of 1 hit shutout ball with 5 Ks. Big ups for the 'pen, but is Angels Nations second guessing Sully starting and Palm Tree relieving at this point?

The Angels scored 4 runs on 8 hits in the game, but really three of those runs came on a meaningless Mike Napoli ninth inning jack that just made the game look close. A deep double by Kendry Morales accounted for the other run, in inning number seven. Juan Rivera, who scored on that K-Mo double, was the only multi-hit Halo in the game (2 for 4 with a run). Honorable mention goes to Torii Hunter 1 for 3 with a walk. Yeah, we only worked one walk against Rzepczynski, who almost averages one walk per inning. With six team punch outs (Hunter leading the way), we did everything we could do to make Toronto's Yorba Linda, CA native look good. We left only 5 on base in the game, but just one more of those would have changed Mike Napoli from being JD Drew to being an actual hero for one night. Oh well, he's Drew for tonight.

Back to back loses has the Angels at 73-47 on the year, maintaining a 5.5 game lead on Texas as we head down the stretch. The Mariners are 11 back, and Oakland has finally turned the corner to 20 back. Congrats! Tomorrow morning the Angels will try and get back on the win train against the Jays with a battle between Ervin "El Rosario" Santana (6-6, 6.25) and Scott "The 7th Canuck" Richmond (6-6, 4.01). This is almost too funny to type, but the Blue Jays are 2-8 in the last 10 starts by Richie Rich. Are we hitting him at the right time, or what? The funny this is that he hasn't been giving up very many runs in that span (he was under four runs allowed eight out of the ten games), but the Jays just aren't hooking the kid up. He's earning his $402,3000 for the year, but the bats sure haven't been. Meanwhile, everyone has been talking about how Ervin has finally been getting hot for the Red Hats lately. The Angels have won the last four Black Magic starts, including a complete game shutout against the Rays two starts ago. He's looking pretty damned good lately, with a .205 BAA in the month of August, and hopefully our boy can keep it up for his son and his Hooters working wife. Come on Erv baby!

This was too funny.

The Amoeba strikes again.

I was hoping I would be posting on an Angels sweep over the Indians, but since they got blasted 3-11 in the series finale against the Tribe tonight, I think I'll shift my focus to my favorite English soccer team. A midweek match against Sheffield Wednesday on Wednesday (interestingly enough) provided an attempt for the Bar Codes to continue their climb up the Coca Cola Championship table, and they sure did. A golden goal from my main man, a clean sheet from out keeping sensation, and the Magpies walked away with an all important 1-0 win.

It was 44,000 Toon Army faithful screaming for the boys in bars against Sheff, and the cheering really paid off. After earning a thrilling hat trick against Reading on Saturday, my main main Shola Ameobi earned a game winning goal on a feed from Andy Carroll just 15 minutes in. Keeper Steve Harper blasted a ball down field, which was picked up by Andy Carroll. Carroll sent the ball to the Amoeba, who chested it down, and blasted the ball into the twine from 12 yards out. It was his fourth of the year, and the second time in as many games that Shola earned himself a game winning goal. There was a couple of chances for Sheffield, but Steve Harper and the defense did what they had to do to keep the three points for our boys. All in all, it was another solid effort in the Championship race for the studs from Newcastle.

After 3 games in the lower division, 'Castle are 2-0-1 with 7 points in their first 3 games. What a different story than last season. Man, I wonder if I'm really setting myself up for disappointment by getting ready for promotion just 3 games into the new season. Hm. A weekend match against Crystal Palace looks like it is getting ready to get me even more excited. Palace is 1-1-1 this season (4 points), which isn't great, but they are coming off of a crazy 3-1 win over Ipswich Town. Of course, Ipswich sucks, so that really isn't a big deal. If my boys overcome Crystal Palace this upcoming weekend, can we just get promoted now and get it over with? I mean, Burnley just beat Manchester United. Anything can happen.

I'd just like to touch briefly on Celtic's 0-2 loss against Arsenal on Tuesday. The Hoops went into their UEFA Champions League match with high hopes despite most of the world being pretty sure that the Gunners would blow my boys out of the water. Well, most of the world was right. Gallas scored a goal at 43 for the away side, and Caldwell earned himself an own goal to seal the deal in the 71st. Caldwell deflected a cross into his own net, past Boruc, and the stylings of my boys just didn't get it done. I'm not sure how you'd get it done with a 4-4-1-1 against a 4-3-3, but that is what the Hoops tried. Our chances of making the groups stage of the Champions League is seriously in question. Of course, if you asked the players of the Sligo side, they would tell you that we are mainly focused on playing a Saturday match against St. Johnstone in a SPL league battle. Johnstone tied in their only game this season, with Celtic winning theirs, and a big win against SJ would possibly pump us up for the second leg against Arsenal next Wednesday. Hail! Hail!

Usain Bolt broke the world record in the 200 tonight in Berlin, dropping it in 19.19 seconds. You know, if he was to run his 200 in his world record 100 time it would have been 19.16. That's only a 00.03 second drop off from his world record 100 time stretched out over twice the distance. Are you kidding me? I still don't like the Jamaican wonder, but that is damned impressive. At least we know that Bolt is actually what he says he is, unlike this South African (allegedly).

Bozo gets win, leading Halos over Tribe.

The Angels got out on top early against the Indians in the series opener, and the pitching staff of Trevor Bell and the pen held on in the late innings to help power the Halos to a fourth straight victory at 5-4.

For Trevor "Bozo" Bell it must have been a thing of beauty. The Angels won in his first major league start, but this time around he was able to factor in the decision. Bell went 5.3 innings of 3 run work, despite allowing 9 hits and 2 walks. He wasn't as solid on the strikes/pitches ratio as he was in his first start, but he went long enough and good enough to make Angels Nation proud on the road against former fan heartthrob Fausto Carmona and the Tribe. After Bell's 5.3, the Angels got quality work from the bullpen of Bulger, Jepsen, and Fuentes. The trio went 3.67 innings of 1 run ball (Bulger) with Fuentes earning his 35th save in a 12 pitch effort to kind of bounce back. Of course, I say "bounced back" despite the fact that he continues to be have the most saves in the entire bigs. I sure wish fans would get off his back.

The offense was prolific, in the first three innings, and finished the game with 5 runs on 13 hits. Despite not getting any RBI in the game, Vlad Guerrero has to be considered the guy running the show with his 3 for 5 afternoon and 1 run scored. He just seems to be firing on all cylinders lately, and that has to make you wonder if they might bring him back for another ride at a DH level and a cheap price. Hm. Did I mention that everyone in the Angels starting lineup is hitting .300+? VAG was joined in the VIP club by Bobby Abreu (2 for 5, 1 RBI), Torii "Big Game Is Back" Hunter (2 for 5), Mike "Where's Mathis?" Napoli (2 for 4, 1 RBI, and 1 BB), and even EA Sports (2 for 4, 1 RBI, 1 run). Honorable mention goes to Chone Figgins for getting 2 walks and a run scored in the game to boost his OBP to a pretty .403. What if the Angels offer Chone and Vlad another year? I don't know, Figgy is going to want some big money. Let's focus on the recent resurgence of Vlad The Impaler. Our Big Boy is hitting .313/10/31 on his injury plagued season, and he has been turning up the heat lately. Would you believe that he's hitting .370/.431/1.192 here in the month of August? 10 RBI and 10 runs with 17 hits, including an amazing 6 jacks? This guy must finally be getting back on the juice. I love VAG.

The Cleaveland Rocks sized win has pushed the Angels forward to 72-45 on the year (just .007 back of the Yankees for the best record in baseball). The Halos +85 run differential is now second in the AL (just 16 back of..you guessed it...those fags). Would you believe that the Tigers are the AL Central leaders and only have a +16 run differential? Crazy. The Rangers are 5.5 back of the Angels, with Seattle trailing by 12, and the A's back by 19.5. In the middle brick of the series, the Angels will be sending Big Baby Weaver (12-4, 4.12) to the hill Jeremy Sowers Patch Kids (4-8, 4.88). The Indians have gone 4-6 in his last 10 starts, but he really hasn't pitched all that bad. His earned runs in his previous 5 are 4-2-2-0-4. Like I said, not too bad. One down side for Sowers is that he doesn't pitch deep into games. Meanwhile, JDW (Jered David Weaver) had a serious drop off in his last start after a wild run. Last week against the O's, the Caveman went 3.3 innings of 8 run ball. Bleck. Prior to that, the Angels went 8-1 in his previous 9 including 7 straight. If it wasn't for that Balty start, we'd be talking about how epic he's been lately. Time to swing things back in the right direction here against a reeling Indians team.

Who would have though a couple of years ago that our 2009 leaders would be as follows: Batting average - Erick Aybar (.313), home runs - Kendry Morales (26), and RBI - Bobby Abreu (80)? I'm loving it.

Let me just step away to focus on one of my favorite and most underrated sports on earth, track and field. The 12th IAAF World Championships in Athletics is happening in Berlin (from 8/15-8/23), and I hope you're watching because it has been fresh. The US is holding it down with 7 medals, tied with Russia for the lead, and we lead all countries with 3 golds so far. Usain Bolt obviously set the World Record for the 100 with a thrilling 9.58 times, but don't let it go unnoticed that Tyson Gay set our national record with a 9.71 time in second place. Bolt ran flat out, and I still just can't like this guy. In other coolness, Sanya Richards ran the 400 final in 49 flat. It was awesome to see her power past Shericka Williams. We also had the super stud Kerron Clement win the 400 hurdles, going at 47.91. That is a huge way to follow up on his silver medal from Beijing, eh? Coming up in Berlin, we have the men's 200 finals on Thursday (the heats are tomorrow) as well as the 110 hurdles, we have the men's 400 final on Friday (the semifinals are tomorrow with the hated Jeremy Wariner and the studly LaShawn Merritt) along with the women's 200 final, the men's and women's 4X100 relays on Saturday, and finally the men's and women's 4X400 relays on the final day.

I'm completely serious when I say that track & field is the ultimate sport. Try and challenge me the next time we meet.

Weekly football post #48.

All of Europe is ready for some football, as well as America, and that brings us to the forty eighth weekly football post.

T-minus 19 days until the Notre Dame season opener against Nevada. Come on Clausen and company!

The Rams opened preseason on a very high note, defeated the New York Jets by the score of 23-20 and I was sitting at a Mexican restaurant watching the whole things after 2 margaritas and a Bohemia. Does this mean good things for the upcoming season? Marc Bulger went a nifty 4 for 4 for 77 yards (0 TDs/0 INTs) with Brock Berlin Wall going 6 for 8 for 27 yards. Even Kyle Boller thew for 25 yards! St. Louis put up three field goals from Josh Brown in the first half before opening up a TD in the second half on a 77 run by Nigerian native Samkon Gado. Gado may be the dark horse here. After the defense relented a little bit, it was a Sean Walker 13 yard touchdown reception that season the deal and the 3 points win for my Ramies. Laurent Robinson led the receiving crew with 52 yards, and Steven Jackson chipped in 2 7.5 yard rushes on the ground in the game. Add in two forced fumbles, and you have a pretty nice well rounded win. Of course, all ESPN could talk about was the fact that Mark Sanchez went 3 for 4 for 88, but obviously it wasn't enough! The preseason stays warm against the Vick-less Falcons next Friday, and hopefully we can keep the good vibes going.

Notre Dame alumni Jarious Jackson stood very tall as the BC Lions earned a nice comeback victory against Toronto this weekend, 38-36. JJ thew for two touchdowns in the 22 point Lion fourth quarter, handing the Argos their ninth straight home loss. Ouch. Down by 11 heading into the fourth, Jackson hooked up with Paris Jackson for a 5 yard TD and then found Emmanuel Arcenaux for a 23 year score as well. However, it was the 54 yard eight play drive to the Toronto one yard line that turned a nice try into a miracle comeback. The Lions had to play all 3 QBs they dressed due to injury issues, with Buck Pierce going 2 for 3 before leaving on a concussion. Jackson entered the game and didn't play well, but shined when he was brought back in later in the game to replace third string Travis Lulay. Jackson was solid at the presser, "I don't feel like we stole one at all. I feel like we went out and played like we should've played in the second half." My boy finished with a 21 of 31 night for 254 yards and 3 TDs (and 1 INT). Everyone's favorite WR and Utah University standout Paris Jackson led the crew with 6 catches for 122 yards and 2 TDs. The win has the Lions at 3-4 on the young season, tied with Calgary, and trailing Saskatchewan (3-3) and Edmonton (4-3) in the West. It's still pretty tight. Next week is a battle against Winnipeg, who are 2-5 and bottoms in the East. Let's keep this winning streak rolling.

How about what the rest of the world calls football? Celtic opened their SPL season this weekend, in style, with a 3-1 win against hated Aberdeen. The Mighty Celts got two goals from Irish National Aiden McGeady (29 and 42) and one from Super Aussie Scott McDonald (44) before the end of the first half. Aberdeen may have solved Artur Boruc and the 4-4-2 stylings of the Hoops in the 61st minute, but I think that all of Celtic Nation has to be happy with the way this season has started. For head coach Tony Mowbray it was a sparkling win in his debut with the Celts, and the visiting side broke out in cheers of, "Bring on Arsenal," after the 90 minute whistle sounded in success. This Tuesday, the now confident Scottish side get ready to face off against Arsenal in a UEFA Champions League playoff before getting back to action next weekend against St. Johnstone in the SPL. Rangers also won, the bastards. Now, let's beat the heck out of the Gunners!

Are you kidding me? Speaking of three goals, Newcastle opened their Coca-cola Championship run with a draw against West Brom last weekend, and followed with a thrilling 3-0 win against Reading. The love is back for the barcodes! My main man Shola Ameobi netted a freaking hat trick in the game! He opened things with a header on a pass from Jose Enrique from close range at the 37th minute. He then nailed another header from Ryan Taylor's cross after just over an hour. How about getting #3 in the 75th on a penalty shot? How could they not give it to him? The Nigerian born ace was completely out of his mind, and I can't think of a better way to start this season for the Mags. It should not be lost in the shuffle of the hat trick that Steve Harper earned himself the clean sheet despite 4 Reading shots on target, with hard props to the defensers Ryan Taylor, Steven Taylor, Fabricio, and Coloccini. It was Shola and Andrew Carroll on the front end of the 4-4-2, and it sure as hell worked. After 2 games, 'Castle are a resounding 1-0-1 (3rd in the table with 4 points, -2 of Coventry), and now look to a mid weeker against Sheffield before a weekend bought against Crystal Palace. Are we ready to get called back up to the EPL?

How about Chivas USA? This was some winning kind of weekend for me. Chivas played New York on Prime Ticket, and I got to watch as the trounced the East Coast side with a decisive 2-0 victory. It was finally an end to a stretched out five game losing streak, and it included goals from Maykel Galindo (15th) and an easy netter by Eduardo Lillingston in stopage time. Galindo was streaking toward net and found a perfect pass from Chijindu that he blasted passed the keeper to open things up. By the way, his "brush off" celebration was classy. Zach "The Beast" Thorton would keep things quiet on the other end all the way until a 90+ minute goal from Lillingston shut the crowd up mightily. Gerson Mayen sent a long pass forward that Michael Lahoud caught up to (barely onside). Lahoud was played by the defender at the box, and sent an easy pass to a waiting Lillingston on the other side. Lilly stopped the ball and had an empty net while the NY keeper raced back in front of the net. He had no chance, though, as Lilly sealed the Chivas win with the easy tapper. The win pushes Chivas to 9-7-3 on the season (30 points), which is only good enough to be tied for fourth in the West (-9 on conference leading Houston). That losing streak really hurt, but now we've got a new streak going, and all of Red & White Nation hopes it continues next weekend against the hated FC Toronto (8-7-6, 30 points).

Believe it or not, Chivas de Guadalajara actually came away with a win as well. A 2-0 win against Queretaro was great news for the Mexican Red & White, as things haven't been going well south of the boarder lately either. This time, it was Javier Hernandez Balcazar going bananas with two goals (14th and 44th) to seal the deal in the win. For JHB, he doubled his goal total for the season in this one game, and did everything he could to try and equal the talents of the LSF player of the weekend, Ameobi. But, the bigger news from the Guada game was the clean sheet from Luis Michel. People have been wondering what has been Michel's problem so far this season, and he was finally able to answer with a resounding shutout this weekend. Despite facing 5 shots (3 on goal) Luis was able to keep the Goats squarely in the lead all the way through. Nice work! The first win is always the hardest to get, right boys? At 1-2-0 (3 points), Chivas will try and continue their winning ways against Atlante next weekend.

As if I can't get enough winning, the Sligo Rovers came away with an impressive 1-0 win against Derry City in League of Ireland action. It was a dramatic game winning goal with just three minutes left to dump Derry City. It was a free kick from Rafale Cretaro that was sneaky good to give the Bit O' Red a little luck. The "Tubbercurry Tornado" or "Raff" as he is known to the Sligo faithful is one of the most prolific Sligo goal scorers in recent memory, and it's not wonder why he's a fan favorite amongst Bit O' Red supporters. Don't forget that he turned down a sweet offer from St. Pat's to stay with us for at least 2 more years. Stud. Sadly, Sligo is still sitting in the relegation zone with just 21 points in 24 games, but a win could vault them into that all coveted 8 spot, leaving them to play for their lives. Next week we go up against the last place Bray Wanderers. So, what I'm saying is that it is a must win.

One week after a stunning Lazio win against Inter Milan with two goals in two minutes early in the second half, my Blues got a week off before getting ready for some UEFA Europa league action against Elfsborg on Thursday. One week from today, though, Lazio gets their Serie A season off and running against Atalanta. But, I'm still buzzing about the goals from Matuzalem and Rocchi that bested the Eto'o goal at the Bird's Nest in Beijin to win the Super Cup. Stunning.

Finally, disappointment again for the US Men's team down in Mexico as they continued a trend of losing at Estadio Azteca. After taking the 1-0 lead early on, Mexico came storming back to win the game 2-1 and send the Americans back to the brink in the World Cup Qualifier. Despite getting us all excited with a 9th minute goal, the US allowed Mexico to quickly tie things up before allowing El Tri to get the win in the 82nd minute in from of 100,000 screaming home fans. We may have pulled off a goal, but the highlight for me was the Mexican fans pelting Landon Donovan with cups filled with pukes and piss, which led to him contracting swine flu. Priceless. Still, we are now 0-23-1 in games against Mexico in their country. Hopefully we can recover against El Salvador on September 5th in Sandy, UT (the town in Big Love), followed by a road trip against Trinidad & Tobago four days later. To keep the soccer buzz flowing, we need to get a couple of wins hear. Big up yourself Charlie Davies. You're Catholic, and you nailed a sweet goal in a losing effort.

I'm tired.

Boy, that sucked.

I think I'm going to stop saying, "I don't think there is any way that the Angels can lose this one." I've said that twice this year, and both times the Angels got blown the heck out. If I would tell you that the Halos scored 6 runs on a night where Jered Weaver was hitting the hill, I think you guess that the Red Hats won. You are wrong. In a game where the O's scored 6 runs in the first and seven runs in the seventh, my boys dropped a 6-16 match against Baltimore. Rough.

Felix Pie hit for the cycle and earned 4 RBI, leading the charge for the O's against the Angels hurlers that never seemed to slow down. Jered Weaver's sorry outing went 3.3 innings of 8 runs ball, walking 4, punching out just 3, and allowing 9 hits. It certainly wasn't his best effort, as he dropped to 12-4 with a 4.12 ERA, and the bullpen wasn't the brightest spot either. Mattie Palmer went 1.67 innings of 1 run work, Shane "Loux Dawg" Loux went 1.67 innings of 7 run ball (showing that the Angels threw the towel in), and Jose Arredondo gave his best effort this season with 1.3 innings of perfect ball. It all goes back on Weaver, though, who set the tone for the losing effort. Meanwhile, youngster and Anaheim native Chris Tillman put on a good enough show with 6.67 innings of 3 earned run ball in the win. Bummer.

Of course, the offense did put up 6 runs on 12 hits, which is pretty nice. Good ol' JR went 3 for 4 with 2 RBI in the game, leading the charge for the Angels, hitting three doubles. Are you kidding me? I love this guy! He was joined in the VIP club by Bobby Abreu (2 for 4 with 1 RBI), Vladdy (2 for 4 with a run), and Mike Napoli (2 for 4 with a run). Honorable mention goes out to the 1 for 3 Chone Figgins with 1 RBI and a walk. But how about this Juan Rivera? Our sometimes injured Guarensa, Venezuela native is hitting .312/18/64 on the year with a .351 OBP and a .518 SLG. In July, JR hit .365/.412/.603 with 14 RBI. He had 24 RBI in June, and is already sitting on 7 here in August (.293/.311/.463). With runners in scoring position, Juan is hitting .350. With runners in scoring position with 2 outs, Juan is hitting .353. I love this guy. In case you're wondering, Jose Guillen is hitting .245/9/40 for the Royals, and that doesn't even take into account the sweet swing of Maicer Izturis.

The loss drops the Angels to 68-45 on the year, leading the Rangers by 4.5, leading the M's by 9.5, and leading Oakland by 18. We still hold the second best record in baseball (just .027 behind the MLB leading Yankess), and are enjoying the third best run differential in the American League (behind NYY and BOS). Can we turn things around here against the Orioles? God, I hope so. Out #2 #1 John Lackey (7-5, 3.88) is going to give it a try against Brian Matusz (1-1, 7.04). His WHIP is 2.35, and he has only gone out for two starts this year. Matusz went 5 innings of 1 run work in his MLB debut (beating the Tigers) and followed that up with 2.67 innings of 5 run stuff against the Blue Jays (losing). So, he's been either poops or daisies here in his MLB career. He was in AA earlier this season. He'll be going up against our stud horse this afternoon. Gigantic John has had tough luck outings in his last two starts (6.67 innings of 2 earned run ball in a loss and 8 innings of 3 earned run ball in another loss). Prior to those two starts, the Angels won 4 straight in Lackey's starts, putting the team at 6-4 in Lack's last 10 overall. Here in the month of August, he is holding down a venerable 3.07 ERA, and he is 3-1 on the road. Bring us a win Lack Dog!

Is it bad that I think this is funny?

Angels record quality sweep.

First off, why am I watching NFL Preseason action on TV right now? Isn't it early? Second, I'm ticked that the Eagles are getting Vick instead of the Rams.

Yesterday was fun. Since I was driving to and from a meeting at work, I got to spend some quality time listening to the Angels game on the radio. Beautiful. A three run bomb from GMJ, a three run bomb from HK 47, a good enough MLB debut from Bozo Bell, and the Angels roughed up the Rays 10-5 to earn the series sweep and improve to 24-8 in 2009 day games.

Stepping out on the mound in front of family and friends, Trevor Bell was pumped up to get his first MLB start underway. Some may saw that he's getting his shot a little early, but what the heck, this guy is solid. How can you not like a guy who just throws strikes? I think we all want our pitchers to huck strikes and just let the defense do their job, rather than walking fools. Bozo came in and threw 75 pitches, with 52 of them as strikes. He punched out 4 Rays and only walked a single enemy batter. In the end, the North Hollywood native went 5.3 innings of 4 run ball, allowing two home runs to Carlos Pena (who is a crazy HR hitter), and a lazy Longoria single. Other than that, he was throwing the ball in the zone, and keeping Tampa on lock down. All in all, it may not have been a quality start, but it definitely gets the LSF seal of approval. The bullpen sure as heck didn't let him down. Bulger (0.67 shutout innings), DO (1 shutout inning), Arredondo (he's back?- 1 inning with 1 jack allowed and 2 Ks), and Kevin Jepsen (1 shutout inning) came out of the pen to hold the Rays back enough to allow the Angels to triumph. In case you are wondering, Bell was brought up thanks to Speier getting released and 'Dondo was finally called back up with Joey Saunders going on the DL with a case of the suckies. While in AAA this season, 'Dondo went 1-1 with a 2.18 ERA and 24 Ks in 20.67 innings. He is ready to be the late season bolstering to our 8th inning that we've been waiting for. Welcome back. As far as Bell, maybe he can get one more chance to impress Angels Nation before Saunders comes back. That'd be cool. As for Speier, have a nice life pal. You won't be missed.

Los Halos scored 10 runs on 12 hits in the game, with Howie Kendrick and Gary Matthews Jr. each going yard for 3 runs, and Mike Crapoli chipping in with a towering pop up that Crawford dropped which ended up being so high it counted for a RBI triple. That was fun. HK 47 went 2 for 3 in the game with 3 RBI and a walk, leading the way, and was joined in the VIP club by Chone Figgins (finally, 3 for 5 with 1 RBI), Erick Aybar (2 for 4 with a walk), Kendry "Boom Boom" Morales (2 for 3, RBI, 3 runs, and a walk), and Bobble Head (2 for 4 with 1 RBI). Tons of hits, as this offense continues to power their way around the league, but with rumors circling about Torii Hunter getting back on this upcoming road trip, can we focus tonight's spotlight on Gary Matthews Jr.? GMJ hit a three run bomb for the Angels in the 6th inning that helped pull us ahead for good, and he hasn't really been as awful as you think in the replacement role for Hunter. With a .249 batting average, 3 jacks, and 38 RBI, the SF native (now you have to be his biggest fan, Andrew) has been super stoked to step into the starting role lately trying to earn his $10.4 million for the year. In the month of August, Junior is hitting .353/.450/.471 with 6 RBI, 6/8 BB/K, and 12 hits in just 34 AB. Overall in 2009 when there are runners in scoring position with 2 outs, Gary is crushing it. Our "Least Valuable Junior" is ripping at .432 with an .811 SLG coming up with 28 RBI on just 16 hits. Are you kidding me? Is there anyone we would actually rather have up in that situation? When the bases are juiced, Gary is hitting .571/.500/1.143. That's light Barry Bonds numbers. So, the next time you are about to jump on the GMJ suck bandwagon, remember these numbers, and give the poor guy a little love. I guess I should admit that I rock a #42 Matthews t-shirt jersey, but that has nothing to do with it. I just want to help you understand that he did just fine playing for our injured All Star.

The Angels are 68-44! With a .607 winning percentage, the Angels have the second best record in the bigs (behind only the Yanks at .623...poor Dodgers). The +78 run differential is #3 in the AL, and easily the best in the West. Texas is trailing the Angels by 4.5 games as I type, with the M's falling back 9 games and the A's still way back at 18. If it all ended right now, the Yankees would play the Red Sox and the Angels would play the Tigers in the opening round of the playoffs. Is there anyway that we can get the Red Sox out of the second season? We'll have to get the Rangers (-.004 of Boston) working on that one. Tomorrow afternoon the Angels start their massive road trip against the Baltimore Orioles. I'm not sure there is any way the Halos will drop the series opener. Jered "Cave Man" Weaver (12-3, 3.73) is going head to head with Anaheim native Chris "No Photo" Tillman (0-0, 5.19). Tillman has started just 3 games this season: 4.67 innings of 3 run ball against KC, 6 innings of 5 run ball against the Tigers, and 6.67 innings of 2 run ball against the Jays. The O's are 1-2 in his three starts this year, but you know that he'll be giving it everything he has against his boyhood favorites. However, he'll have a tough task against the Red Hats' 2009 #1. Big Baby Weaver has seen the Angels go 8-2 in his last 10 starts. He continues to rank #3 in AL wins (12), #9 in AL WHIP (1.18), #3 in AL complete games (3), #7 in AL Ks (137), and #1 in AL W% (.800). He's a winner this year, and I don't think he's going to let Baltimore stop him from getting that lucky 13th win of the year. Bring it!

Let's go around the minors, you punks. SLC beat Nashville 10-5 in their game as well, and you won't believe what Sean "HR Rod" Rodriguez went and did. HR Rod went 4 for 4 with 2 jacks and 7 RBI. 7 RBI! What a freaking stud. Why does no one around Angels Nation love this guy as much as me? He is one of our most underrated minor league guys (and he's shown it in the majors as well). Give him love! The pitching was nice as well, with our other Francisco Rodriguez going 2 perfect innings with 4 K in relief. To keep the streak alive, the Travs beat Corpus 3-1! What a night! LF Coby Smith earns player of the game nod with a 1 for 3 game with 1 RBI leading the Greatest Show on Dirt. The pitching was great as well, with Boston College graduate Marco Albano going 6 innings of 1 run ball punching out 6. He has 61 strikeouts in just 58.3 innings of work, and I'm wondering if Albano is a starting down in the minors who has been getting overlooked. Even Rancho grabbed a win, beating High Desert 11-freaking 1. Let's leave Torii alone for a second, and give player of the game honors to virtually unknown 1B Efren Navaro. The future? Navaro went 3 for 5 with 3 RBI in the game, and is hitting .300/5/55 this season for the Quakes. Torii "Big Game" Hunter made well in his rehab, going 2 for 5 with 3 RBI and a jack. I think he's ready, baby. Also, Quakes starter Jayson Miller was at it again, going 8 inning of 1 run ball with just 4 hits allowed (0 BB and 0K). He deserved the win in this one. Of course, Cedar Rapids couldn't cap things off, dropping their low-A game to Wisconsin 5-10.

Does anyone else think Arroyo is just trying to be cool?

Ervin emerges, Angels smoke Rays.

I leave the blog in the hands of the Davis brothers, Patrick Kane beats up a cab driver in Buffalo, and there isn't a single post? I'm shocked! After seeing Vlad lead the Angels to a series opening win against the Rays with his 400th career HR last night, the Angels turned to Ervin Santana to continue their winning ways, and he pitched amazingly in a 6-0 Angels victory. David Price, who?

Erv Daddy! The San Cristobal, DR native came into the game with a 4-6 record and a super inflated ERA. It had been 5 starts since his last quality outing (a July 16th masterpiece against the A's), and hopes were not ridiculously high going against the ESPN Overrated David Price of Tampa Bay. Never count our boy out, though. Young Erv was completely insane tonight, going the distance in the Halo win. El Rosario somehow found a way to go 9 innings of 3 hit ball, shutting the Rays out like what. Ervin punched out 5 and walked 2 in the game, and looked better than we have seen all year (actually, miles ahead of any outing this year). He finished the game with just 97 pitches, which should make headlines around the world, and really put an exclamation point on his fifth win of the year (5-6, 6.38).

The offense was straight solid as well, with some tasty frenzied hitting sparked by Reggie Willits. The Angels finished with 6 runs on 10 hits, getting runs on a clutch money Willits double, a Figgy single, and a deep 3 run double by the Mathis-Matician. Mathis was 2 for 3 with 3 RBI in the game (see? Better than Nap!) and was joined in the VIP club by the recently amazing Vlad Guerrero (2 for 4, hitting .303, and upping his waiver wire value), and the classic Kendry "Bombs & Bombs & Bombs & Bombs" Morales (2 for 4 with 2 runs scored, boosting his numbers to .301/25/75). An interesting thing to note is that the Angels failed to work a single walk in the game, which hasn't been like them this year, but this time around it didn't hurt. With the sixth inning bases loaded double, I think you'll agree that we have to fixate tonight's spotlight on my catching choice Jeff Mathis. My favorite catcher (and my favorite Marianna, FL native) is hitting a modest .213 with 5 jacks and 26 RBI this season. In the month of August, my boy is hitting .313/.313/.500 (and that's pre-tonight's game), and he's working it at .333 (with a .500 OBP) with the bases loaded. I know that Napoli is hitting .294/16/43. I don't care if he's hitting .350/30/80, I'd still want Mathis out there on the field.

The win has the Angels at 67-44 on the year (+73 run differential) and has increased the lead to 5 games over Texas. Seattle sits in third at 8.5 back, and Oakland continues to trail at 18 back. Can we get a sweep? This will be an interesting one to call. The Angels are going head to head with the Rays in a getaway day game at the Stadium tomorrow at 12:35, and it is going to be a special one. The Angels will be getting a Major League debut from Trevor Bell (0-0, 0.00) against the Rays Big Jeff Niemann (10-5, 3.73). The Rays have gone 7-3 in Niemann's last 10 starts, and outside of a July 26th game against Toronto, Niemann hasn't allowed more than 4 earned runs once in the last 10 games. Lucky for us, he is 0-0 with a 9.82 ERA against the Halos this year, and his ERA blows up to 4.26 on the road. Meanwhile, North Hollywood, CA native Trevor Bell is ready to take the spotlight in his MLB debut in front of a minimal day game crowd. Pressure is off, right? This season in AAA, Bell is 3-4 with a 3.15 ERA. He also spent some time in AA Arkansas, going 4-3 with a 2.23 ERA. Overall this year, he has held the bad guys to a .231 batting average. In SLC, he has been relieving and starting, so we'll have to wait and see what he can put out there. Here is a little LSF Insider Info about Bell: His father was the actual Bozo the Clown in Chicago! So, will Bozo Bell be able to thrill Angels Nation with a win in his first-ever game?

This headline proves that the Sports Pickle hasn't lost it.

This just in: The Angels have officially released reliever Justin Speier to make room for Bozo Bell! The tyrannical reign of one of our worst relievers has finally ended!

Angels finally open a can on Sox.

Take that! After losing two big ones to Chicago, the Angels opened things up in the get away game with a nifty 9-5 victory that included Ervin pitching "okay," the offense going yard, and an improvement to 22-7 in day games this season (the best in the majors). I had the day off as we were preparing for our weekend trip to Yosemite, so I got to watch the entire affair, and it was great (for in-game thoughts, check out the LSF Twitter Page). 

Whenever El Rosario takes the mound this season, most around Angels Nation hold their breath, cross their fingers, and rub their lucky rabbit's foot. After seeing how Erv started the game, they started rubbing that foot a little harder. Ervin walked the first batter in each of the first three innings, allowed a three run bomb in the second, walked a run home in the third, and eeked his way out of some really tight jams. However, in the end, the Angels powered through another Black Magic start for the win, and this time he actually factored in the decision! Ervin finished the game with 6 innings of 4 run ball, giving up 5 hits and 5 walks, and punching out 7 (including a big one with one out and the bases juiced). All in all it was a game that was good enough to earn Erv the win and bring his record to 4-6 with his 7.20 ERA. The most impressive thing about the pitching was Jason Bulger. Everyone has been on the Jepsen bandwagon lately, and most have done that at the expense of overlooking Jason Bulger. Bulge has been the real pleasant bullpen surprise, at least when you look at consistency. JB came in and went 2 innings of perfect work in the game this afternoon to help keep the Angels ahead, which was good considering Jepsen's ninth inning where he allowed a meaningless jack. Just so you know, JB has only allowed a man to cross the plate in 2 of his last 10 games, and when there are runners on in scoring position he really locks things down (.154 BAA). 

The Halo bats finally came out swinging in this one, earning 9 runs on their 11 hits. The Angels were powered by home runs from Jeff Mathis, Vladdy, Abreu, and even EA Sports as they blasted their way toward victory. Erick Aybar was back to his recent unbelievable success, earning player of the game honors with a 3 for 4 night and 2 RBI. He was joined in the VIP club by Juan "Most Underrated Player of the Game" Rivera (2 for 4 with 1 RBI and 1 BB) and Jeff "Still The Mathis-Matician" Mathis (2 for 4 with 2 RBI, and a way better day than "Nap"). Honorable mention has to go to Chone Figgins (worked a walk, stole second, stole third, and scored on a shallow sac fly in the 2nd) and El Comedulce (1 for 4 with a RBI and 1 BB). Clearly, though, EA Sports was the star of the game and deserves today's spotlight. Aybar is hitting .311/4/41 on the year with a .352 OBP and a .432 SLG. He finished the month of July with a .414 batting average and 18 RBI, and that batting average was good enough for the best BA in the entire AL in the month of July with batters having 50+ ABs. By the way, the top 3 AL batting averages in July were 1) Aybar (.414), 2) Howie Kendrick (.387), and Bobby Abreu (.380). Juan Rivera was ranked #6 with his .365 July average. Best offense ever. 

This was an important win, as the Angels are now 64-42 on the year, holding onto their 4.5 game lead over the Rangers. Seattle sits 8.5 back, and isn't it lovely that the A's are way back by 18? The Red Hats are now just -.003 on the Yankees for the best record in the American League (and only -.007 on the Dodgers for the best record in the entire MLB). Now, as I pack for Yosemite, the Angels are flying back home for one of the most important weekends in recent memory against the hated Texas Rangers. With Texas 4.5 games back, this weekend could either put the Rangers right back into the thick of things or possibly get them out of the Angels' hair for good here in '09. Big Bang Friday night will be just that as Joe "Colonel" Saunders (9-6, 5.07) will try to be the impressive Joe against Hawaii native Scott "Corey" Feldman (10-4, 3.91). This Feldman guy has been one of the best for the AL West's second best, with Texas going 6-2 over his last eight. In only two of his last 8 games has Feld given up more than 3 runs. He ranks 9th in wins in the AL and 6th in win percentage. However, Feldman hasn't exactly been pitching against the best as of late. Feldman's recent wins have come against Seattle, Kansas City, Seattle, Tampa, Us (oops!), and the D-Backs. He went 6 innings of 2 run ball against the Angels back in June, but we're a way hotter team now, so watch out. Meanwhile, the Angels are 7-3 in Saunders' last 10 starts, despite not really having a nice game since a June 24th match against Colorado (6 innings of 1 run ball). Since then, he hasn't had a game where he allowed less than 4 runs, and he has just been getting a ton of help from the offense. At least he ranks 7th in walks. Will Joe be able to put a nice outing together to allow the Angels to grab some distance between first and second place? Let's hope so. 

This one made me laugh out loud. Also, if you've never seen this website, jump on it. 

Angels flip flopped by the Black Sox.

Two game against the hated White Sox, two losses putting an end to our nice little five game winning streak. After a heartbreaking bottom of the ninth 4-5 loss in Tuesday's game, the Angels came into Wednesday with high hopes only to lose 2-6 to drop the series. With Vlad back, Sean O'Sullivan coming off of a near perfect game, and the bullpen wreaking havoc lately, most of Angels Nation thought we would have a pretty good chance. I guess we were wrong. 

When SOS takes the mound, we're all pretty excited. The Angels had never lost a Sully start ever. Of course, I said "had." Sully went 5 innings of 4 run ball with 3 Ks, which isn't horrible, but it wasn't enough against an 8 inning 2 run night from Chicago's Gavin Floyd. Darren Oliver came in to relieve Sully in the sixth, but couldn't do anything. DO gave up a run on 2 hits without getting a single player out. His awful outing was followed up by a sweet Matt Palmer effort, with the Palm Tree going a good 2 innings of shutout ball. Brian Fuentes came in to get himself a little work, but he gave up a Konerko jack in his inning, making us all still wonder if he's going to have a solid second half. Blast the infernal pitching tonight! 

The Angels offense couldn't make anything happen either, getting just 2 runs on 6 hits against the solid White Sox hurlers. Not a single Angel had a multi-hit game, and the Halos only scored thanks to an error in the first and a sac fly in the ninth. For the seven innings in between, however, there was nothing happening. Bobby Abreu earned the right to get the lone accolades, going 1 for 3 with a run and a walk. El Comedulce was the only player on the Red Hats that made it on base more than once. He, of course, continues to lead the team with a .322 batting average and a .416 on base percentage. After a game like that, I'd like to place the "loser spotlight" on our boy Chone Figgins. Our beloved third baseman, who has been pumped up by everyone from the media to the fans of Angels Nation went 0 for 4 with a K in last night's game, and his batting average has dropped to .308 with a .397 OBP. Thus far in the month of August, Figgy is hitting just .214, easily his worst start to a month this year. When you look at his switch hitting numbers, you also see that he is not a good right handed hitter. Chone if hitting .343 from the left side of the plate, and just .225 from the right. However, let me be clear that Figgins is still doing what he needs to do despite his recent well running dry. He is still #1 in the American League in OBP for leadoff hitters (+.001 on #2 Ichiro Suzuki). He's holding steady at #3 in batting average, and is also sitting at #2 in stolen bases (-2 on BJ Upton). In terms of AL leadoff men, he's doing a better job this season than ever before, but how you finish is most important, and Figgy is going to need to get back to his frenzied hitting ways. 

Despite the last couple of losses, the Angels are continuing to rock and roll in the AL West, with a 4.5 game lead on the Rangers. At 63-42, Los Halos also lead to M's by 8 and the A's by 17. Although we've dropped to the second best record in the American League, we're still bringing the confidence that we'll once again win the division. The Angels will try to finish their series with the Sox with a little respect this afternoon as Ervin "Young Gun" Santana (3-6, 7.31) will try with all his might to pitch better than John Danks (9-7, 4.00). Danks has been dank here in 2009, and his recent losses have really been due to not getting run support. The White Sox are 4-2 in Danks' last 6 starts, and in his last outing he went 6 innings of 4 run ball against the Yankees. One thing to watch is that the Austin native has been a little walk happy lately, and hopefully that will continue in four and a half hours. Meanwhile, Ervin will be going back out to the mound to try and get himself together. While the Angels are 3-1 in Black Magic's last 4 starts, he really hasn't pitched well since July 16 in Oakland. Erv Daddy has allowed 17 runs in his last 23.67 innings on the mound, but luckily he has been a road warrior kind of guy. On the road this year, Ervin is going 3-2 with a 4.28 ERA. That may not sound great, but compared to his home record (0-4, 12.38) is purely Cy Young kind of stuff. I wish I could tell you what is going to happen in this afternoon's game, but it's really a toss up. Will Ervin wear the mouth piece? 

Well, I'm off to Yosemite, Andrew is off to England, and the LSF is left squarely in the hands of the Davis brothers. What has this blog come to? 

Weekly football post #47.

So much football, so little time. Let's get it on. 

NFL training camps are under way, and the Ramies have announced that they signed their second pick Jason Smith. Smith was a Baylor stud, only allowing 4.5 sacks last year past him. Will the Rams be able to ride him to victory as he blocks for Bulger? We'll see in less than 2 weeks when the Rams and Jets get in on to start the preseason. 

Notre Dameis glad to have gotten the Hawaii coach double. After beating the Warriors in the bowl game last season, the Irish (and the NCAA) have stuck it to those losers yet again. Hawaii coach Greg McMackin was officially suspended for 30 days without pay for making homosexual slurs prior to the bowl game last season. He dropped the gay slur when describing Notre Dame fans chanting prior to the game. He will also take a 7% pay cut. You really should think before you speak, fag. Notre Dame is looking to turn the page on this homophobe, and move forward toward the season opening game against Nevada on September 5. 

Why is my favorite CFL team off to such a poor start? The BC Lions dropped another one to the Hamilton Tiger Cats this weekend, with a 18-30 loss being the latest lapse of quality play. Despite putting together 10 unanswered points marching toward halftime, the Lions had an 18-17 lead before a Jarious Jackson fumble turned the entire game around. BC never scored in the second half. Buck Pierce got the majority of the QB duties, going 23/36 for 272 and 1 TD. However, 2 INTs combined with the fumble of Jackson, and the whole thing was pretty much over. Martell Mallett was again the Lion in charge on the ground, going 12 rushes for 91 yards, and this time it was San Jose State Spartan Rufus Skillern's 67 yards through the air (with a 22 yard long play) leading the way. Utah stud Paris Jackson got the lone receiving TD. BC is just tumbling toward the bottom with their 1-4 record, holding the worst record in the entire CFL. Things are sure to turn around, though, as the Lions get ready to go head to head with Saskatchewan next weekend. Bring it Jon!

Now to what the rest of the world calls football. Celtic went into their match against Sunderland in a UEFA Champions League qualifier, and came out on the wrong end of a 1-2 tally. Scott Brown was out to make his first appearance since Tony Mowbray took over as boss a memorable one. Sunderland's Keiron Richardson and Kenwyne Jones were on target for two goals, but Celtic got a nice one from Spanish star Marc Crosas to at least get on the board. In 22 appearances last year, Crosas only tallied 1 goal for the Hoops, and he'll be looking for bigger things in the midfield this year. Keep in mind that Celtic rested such stars as Artur "The Polish Pipe Cleaner" Boruc and Landry N'Guemo ahead of a big mid week clash coming up. The Celts may have played a 4-2-3-1, but it wouldn't be enough in the end. We'll see the Hoops take on Dinamo Moskva in a midweek UEFA qualifier clash before battling Manchester City in a friendly on 8/8. Then, on 8/15 it all starts against Aberdeen. 

My Mighty Mags came out a little better this weekend. Rocking the third kits, which look way better than the scrambled egg ones they lost in last weekend, Newcastle drew 1-1 with the hated SPL side from Dundee. It was actually kind of a frustrating draw, being that Newcastle's Steven Harper kept out a Dundee penalty kick in the 65th minute to hold on to the narrow 1-0 lead at the time. A second penalty kick, with 5 minutes left, was awarded to Dundee (I wish it was a more questionable call), and that time it was a no doubter to tie the game. Ugly way to lose the win, but what was Harper supposed to do? It was Andy Carroll, returning from loan, who fired Newcastle ahead in minute 60, but sadly the mistake penalty by newbie Ryan Taylor sealed the fate of this one, and the Bar Codes were denies a preseason win against the crafty second degree rivals of Celtic. In way worse Newcastle news, we lost Obafemi Martins to Wolfsburg on a 4 year contract. Oba was intent to help 'Castle get back to the EPL, and it is sad to see him off. As long as Shola stays around, we'll have plenty of Nigerian force. 

Still nothing for Chivas USA this week, as they continue to wait for MLS redemption after this long All-Star break. This Saturday, the Goats will try to get things back on the straight and narrow against Colorado, doing anything to improve on their recent string of games which has landed them with an 8-6-3 record. Come on Galindo! 

Chivas de Guadalajara isn't providing much inspiration for their American counterparts. Guada came away with a 1-3 loss to UANL Tigres this weekend, dropping their FMF start to 0-2-0, despite being predicted by many to run away with the whole thing. It is still early! Chivas had half the shots on goal of UANL (4-8), but had 14 corner kicks to Tigers' 2, and they should have made that count for something. A red card to Sergio Amaury Ponce in the 82nd minute didn't really make much of a difference, with the team already being down two goals at that point, but the questions need to be focused on the Chivas offense (wake up Medina!), the defenders (we need better Ponce), and even Luis Michel between the pipes. The lone Red & White goal was scored by Javier Hernandez Balcazar (or Chicharito, as I know him), his second of the campaign, but it wouldn't be enough. The winless Goats take on Queretaro in two weeks, after getting some much needed rest. 

In the League of Ireland, my boys from Sligo came away with a 0-1 loss to Galway United in their weekend match. The Bit O' Red just couldn't get on the board, and were never able to recover from the 17th minute goal from John Russell on a tic-tac-toe play. Sligo came on strong in the second half, but the goal allowed by Brush was all that it would take for Galway to send by Sligo side reeling. After 22 games, the Rovers hold just 21 points (+1 on #9 Drogheda and +3 on #10 Bray Wanderers). We're still looking up 5 points at St. Patrick's! Next weekend, the boys from my family's home town take on Dundalk, who are currently the #5 team in the Premier Division. 

In Lazio news, my Italian side grabbed striker Julio Cruz to try and bolster their Serie A chances. Cruz, a former Inter Milan forward, will be going up against his former side in the Italian Super Cup match on August 8. The Argentine had just 3 goals for Inter last season overall, with two coming in Domestic play, but he is only 2 years off from a 19 goal season with Inter that we hope will be a foreshadowing for his solid play with the Blue. 

Just so you are well aware, the United States squad gets a chance to get sweet revenge for their Gold Cup embarassment on August 12 against Mexico, in Mexico, in a World Cup Qualifying match. All eyes will be on the squad Bradley puts out there, and we really need to get Mexico back!

Just when you think they can't get better...

They do. Kendry Morales was stunningly awesome, Jered Weaver worked his new haircut magic, and the Angels completed an unbelievably offensive sweep with a 13-4 win against the reeling Twins. The Twinkies are surely happy to see the Angels leave Minnesota, after my Red Hats dropped 35 runs on the home team over their three games. 35 runs. Can you believe that? What a weekend! 

The Caveman looked completely different with his new hairdo, and he pitched pretty well overall. Despite giving up a run in the first inning on a Joe Mauer single, Jered settled down to finish with 6.3 innings of 4 run ball, allowing just 6 to reach base (4 hits and 2 walks). He was stunning with the movement on his pitches, taking out 11 Twins by knockout, finishing with 72 strikes in his 114 pitches. I haven't seen a pitch count that nice in a while. J Weav pumped his record up to 11-3 with an ERA of 3.79, and his line would have looked much better if it weren't for Orlando Cabrera and Justin Morneau hitting solo jacks. Overall, though, it was a pretty nice road outing for the Angels' Big Baby. The bullpen featured Justin Speier (0.67 innings of shutout ball with 2 Ks) and Shane "Mop Up Man" Loux (2 innings of shutout ball) closing things out for the Halos, who walked off with a series that had "good enough" pitching that ended up being plenty good enough because of the immense offensive effort. 

I was watching this game thinking, "Can they get 11 runs for the third straight game?" Nope; they did better. 13 runs on 15 hits powered the Angels this afternoon, with Kendry Morales really stealing the show. Morales went 3 for 5 with 2 home runs and a career high 6 RBI. Like I have always said, "Teixeira who?" K Mo was joined in the Angels VIP club by Bobby Abreu (2 for 4 with 2 runs and a walk), Howie "Pinball Wizard" Kendrick (2 for 5 with a run), Gary "Way Over My Head Lately" Matthews (2 for 5 with 2 runs), and Jeff Mathis (2 for 5 with a run). Honorable mention has to go to my main man Sean "HR-Rod" Rodriguez, who went 1 for 3 with 3 RBI and a walk. Sean's 2 run blast with Mathis on in the second combined with his sac fly in the fourth really helped to continue to endear him to all of Angels Nation. He's been my man ever since we watched him in Rancho. However, can the focus today go on anyone other than Kendry Morales? After 96 games on the year, Morales is hitting .299/23/69. I don't think even I thought he would have the kind of season he is setting himself up to have here in 2009. Right now he is projecting out to finish the year with 35 home runs and 111 RBI. Last season, Miguel Cabrera led the American League with 37 home runs, to give you some kind of perspective on Kendry's stats. After hitting .326 in July, our beloved first baseman is off to a .500 start here in August, and is clearly looking to best his season leading 7 home runs in the month of July here over the next 28 or so days. Kendry's only knock this year is his .253 batting average with runners in scoring position. Interesting. He's actually raking at .352 when leading off an inning, which I bet you didn't know. 

All of this offense, and now we have rumors that Torii Hunter and Vlad will be headed back sooner than expected? Big Game starts a rehab on August 7, and hopefully it'll be a quick one. Meanwhile, Vlad is expected to be ready to DH by the end of this upcoming White Sox series. Farewell Sean Rodriguez. 

The sweep has the Angels at a 63-40 mark (remember when they were 29-29 and I posted about how I was the only one who thought this team was going to win the AL West at that point? How things have changed around Angels Nation!) and puts us with a +78 run differential. The best record in the American League (and now just -.003 of the best record in baseball, held across town) is good enough to give us a 4.5 game lead on Texas, a 9.5 game lead on Seattle, and a 19 game lead on Oakland. Pretty freaking awesome, eh? This five game winning streak, which is occurring just a week after an eight game winning streak, has all of Angels Nation buzzing. Remember when I brought up the interesting thing about Matt Palmer coming out of the bullpen despite being the #5 starter? Well, looks like I was right. The no-hitter in AAA from Sean O'Sullivan has gifted him another call up, and he is going to be placed into the starting rotation for game 2 of the upcoming series against the White Sox, as the Angels continue their rag tag 4 man rotation with a spot start from a #5 guy here and there. In the opening game of the series, though, we will be seeing our former #1 John Lackey (7-4, 4.00) getting out against Jose Contreras (4-10, 4.80). What happened to Contreras? He doesn't really sound like a $10 million man. He is 0-3 in his last three starts, and the Sox are 4-6 over his last 10 starts (all decisions for the hurler). Contreras has allowed 12 runs in his last 16.67 innings, and only made it 5.67 innings in his last start (against the Twins) with 3 earned runs and 5 walks. Lackey has been going in quite the opposite direction than Contreras as our $10 million man. Gigantic John is 4-0 in his last 4 starts (never going less than 7 innings and never giving up more than 2 runs), and the Angels are 7-3 over John's last 10 starts. He has only allowed 5 runs in his last 30.67 innings on the mound, and that includes a really nice complete game shutout 1-0 win against the A's back on July 19. In his last start, he allowed just 1 run in 7 innings, after only allowing 3 hits to the Indians. He's been solid boys, and hopefully he can get us going in the right direction to open this series with the White Sox. 

How about that lovely MiLB? Well, SLC got dropped in a nail bitter by former rivals from Las Vegas 7-8. The Bees offensive player of the game was LF and Loyola Marymount graduate Chris Pettit (2 for 5 with 3 RBI). Pettit is hitting .336/4/40 on the AAA season, and has to be one of our more underrated outfielding prospects. In case you are wondering, Brandon Wood (playing SS) went 2 for 5 with 2 runs. Starting pitcher Brad Salmon went 6.67 innings of 5 run ball, allowing 10 hits and only striking out 2, and it wasn't enough to keep his Mighty Bees in the ball game. When does SLC lose and Arkansas win? Today! The Travs bested the hated Drillers with a 6-1 romp, and C Hank Conger earned player of the game honors with a 2 for 4/3 RBI game. He's now hitting .301/8/51, and probably making both Mike Napoli and Jeff Mathis worried about getting dealt because of the organization's belief in him. The always notable Gaucho Nate Sutton went 2 for 3 with a walk (.311/1/24). Starter and Boston College graduate Marco Albano was awesome, going 6 innings of 3 hit/shutout ball with 6 Ks in the win. San Jose beat Rancho again! Damn. This time it was a 0-2 loss for the Q's that we're talking about. It was difficult to pick an offensive player of the game, but we'll go with ASU graduate and SS Andrew Romine. The Lettuce Head went 1 for 3 in the game to raise his numbers to .270/0/24 with 22 stolen bases on the high-A season. Starting pitcher and Lakeland, FL native Jeremy Thorne went 5.67 innings of 2 run ball, but just couldn't get any bat love from the other members of the team. Finally, Cedar Rapids dropped another game to Western Michigan 2-3 in low-A. 

Man, this steroids thing is getting out of control.