Sports Crumbs - 11/16/06

-- So there's a pretty big foosball game this weekend. North Carolina vs. North Carolina State? No, it's not basketball season yet. Florida vs. Florida State? No, that's next weekend and it's not 1995. Central Michigan vs. Northern Illinois? That is this weekend, and although battles between directional schools always prove interesting, there is another Michigan school with a much bigger challenge on their hands. Ohio State vs. Michigan at 2:30 PM CT this weekend is the match up of the season. Or at least that's what ESPN would have you believe. They've had a countdown clock running on this match up for at least 3 weeks now, so I'm happy the game is almost here because unless you live in Ohio or Michigan (which means by the way that you only have one full set of teeth combined in your family) you don't really care about all of this hoopla leading up to the game. We get it, #1 vs. #2 in one of the biggest rivalries in college football. I'm a huge college football fan, so I'd watch this game regardless of their rankings. I just don't need it shoved down my throat for the entire month leading up to this game because I don't even think this one will live up to the Rutgers v. Louisville game from last week. If Ohio State plays half as well as they played against Texas earlier this year, I don't see Michigan staying within ten points of the Buckeyes. With Troy Smith getting ready to have his name engraved on the Heisman, Ted Ginn Jr. still running rampant through secondaries and Jim Tressel simply owning Lloyd Carr since he arrived in Columbus (4-1 record), I just don't see the Buckeyes being stopped in their march to Glendale, AZ and the Fiesta Bowl.

-- In baseball news, the Manager's of the Year were announced and Joe Girardi - formerly of the Florida Marlins - and Jim Leyland of the World Series-choking Detroit Tigers were the winners. Kind of interesting how Girardi has already been fired and the #3 vote getter in the AL (Ken Macha from Oakland) has also been fired. Maybe if the Marlins payroll wasn't the lowest in the league by a full $20 mil, they could be more competitive but I don't see how firing the coach here helps at all. And people wonder why no one goes to Marlins games and they are talking about moving them to Vegas. The guy in the giant Marlin costume could do a better job with this team, and he probably doesn't know a thing about baseball unless it relates to riding a scooter around the stadium and shooting a T-shirt cannon.

-- And lastly, I'm sure you've probably heard about this, but I just wanted to weigh in on it too. O.J. Simpson will be doing a TV interview on FOX titled "O.J. Simpson: If I did it, Here's how it happened" that will air on November 27th & 29th. This is simply unreal to me. This guy gets away with murdering 2 people 12 years ago and just won't go away. He got his "get out of jail" free card but just keeps coming back. And why would FOX agree to actually paying him for this? Well, that's an easy one, FOX will show anything - I seem to recall a Man vs. Animal show and watching Screech box on Celebrity Boxing deserves it's own column. Anyway, the Juice just needs to take this act and get the hell out of here. He should go to some Caribbean island where they show re-runs of Naked Gun and Dragnet and film new Hertz commercials. Or maybe Isotoner is looking for a new spokesperson.