By Thomas Chambers

Was (or is) Floyd Mayweather good for boxing?
My buddy and I have debated Mayweather’s legacy for a long time, sometimes to the point where we’ve had to just stop talking about it.
I don’t like “Money.” Don’t like his “defensive” style – I see a runner – and he was one of the prime players in the fraud that was his fight against Manny Pacquiao, a bout that took six frickin’ years to make. Their duplicity severely damaged the boxing pay-per-view business, which hasn’t recovered since.
The same might be asked of American Pharoah and his herculean campaign in 2015, in which he won the Triple Crown and the Breeders’ Cup Classic. Unprecedented. One big difference is that ‘Pharoah and his human connections are so much more likeable than Mayweather’s.

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Posted on May 21, 2016

By Jim Coffman and Steve Rhodes

Cubs, White Sox spiraling into oblivion. Plus: Cy Sale And The Rubs; Bulls Offseason Going Great!; Bears 1st-Round Draft Pick Leonard Floyd Is Stuffing His Face Right Now; Absent Alshon; The Olympic Way; and The Nerds Who Are Ruining Horse Racing.

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Posted on May 20, 2016

By Alexander Murk and Erhan Bayraktar/The Conversation

From Wall Street to politics, quantitative analysts (or quants) are revolutionizing much of the world. Nowadays, that even includes horse racing.
By using computers to identify hidden patterns in past racing data and arcane mathematics to optimize every aspect of their betting strategies, horse racing quants can confidently wager staggering amounts. At first, that may seem good: more money in the pot means the house and the winners take more home. Still, their trades have been blamed for (among other things) driving away other bettors and shrinking prizes for everyone over time.

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Posted on May 20, 2016

By Karolos Grohmann/Reuters

BERLIN – Allegations of Russian doping at the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics would represent a shocking new dimension and an “unprecedented level of criminality” if proven to be true, International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach said on Wednesday.
Russia is at the heart of the biggest doping scandal in sport, with its track-and-field athletes suspended as a result of a probe into accusations of widespread doping and their participation at this year’s Rio Olympics in doubt.
Citing the former head of Russia’s anti-doping agency, the New York Times reported last week that Russian anti-doping experts and members of the intelligence services secretly broke into tamper-proof bottles to replace urine samples tainted by performance-enhancing drugs with clean urine collected earlier.

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Posted on May 19, 2016

By Elaine Lies and Karolos Grohmann/Reuters

TOKYO – A Japanese official who led the successful bid for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics said on Wednesday the Japanese Olympic Committee plans to investigate the bidding after questions were raised about payments by the bid committee.
Media reports say the bid team made payments totalling more than $2 million to a Singapore bank account linked to Papa Massata Diack, son of disgraced former international athletics chief Lamine Diack.
Japanese officials have said the payments were legitimate consultant’s fees.

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Posted on May 18, 2016

Whoever They Are, They Just Lost To The Wisconsin Storm

The hometown Clovers dropped a three-point decision (135-132) to the visitors from the north at Hyde Park High School on Saturday.
Wait, who?

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Posted on May 17, 2016

By Jim Coffman

First of all, let’s offer up (very) belated congratulations to the White Sox for not over-reacting a week ago after Minnesota Twins reliever Trevor May hit Jose Abreu with a fastball. I suppose by some standard it is inappropriate to just flat out say May did it on purpose, but anyone who saw that pitch knows May just flat out did it on purpose.

Then again, given the big brouhaha in baseball Sunday, we may be jumping the gun a bit in handing out kudos. The gutless Toronto Blue Jays waited until the second-to-last inning of their last game of this regular season against the Texas Rangers to intentionally hit slugger Jose Bautista. The most rational explanation for that move was that the Blue Jays were still pissed about a Bautista bat flip – from last year’s playoffs!

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Posted on May 16, 2016

By Roger Wallenstein

If winning the close ones and having a great bullpen are required for a ballclub with post-season aspirations, then should we be concerned about the White Sox’ prospects?
Four losses last week – two against the Rangers and a pair at Yankee Stadium – were decided by a total of six runs.

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Posted on May 15, 2016

By Marty Gangler

Before we get into this week let’s take a quick look back at the last week. If you are a loyal reader you know that I ripped good ol’ Dusty one more time.
As if like clockwork, as myself and others pointed out, why in the world would you not put Daniel Murphy, who is batting .407 right now, behind Bryce Harper. If you also remember, the Cubs walked Harper a billion times in that four-game series two weeks ago. So yeah, Baker finally sees what other people see. You know, like reality, and bats Murphy fourth.
But you know, he’d been thinking about it for a while . . . sure, Dusty. And it seems to have worked. Way to be on top of it, dude.

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Posted on May 15, 2016

By Jim Coffman and Steve Rhodes

Can this be real? Plus: Arrieta Already On Way Out; The Trials of George Sun; Gonzo Hawk Harrelson, Doctor of Journalism; and Biggs Time.

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Posted on May 13, 2016