Incredibly Novel Concepts, Vol. IV

by user J Cunningham

In light of a comment left on my last installment of Incredibly Novel Concepts, allow me to explain the purpose behind these little blurbs. It is not to write about something no one else has written about or commented on; rather, it's where I look at a handful of sports topics and try to find the most common sense approach possible to the situation.

Often, this involves pointing out a glaring example of stupidity, but not always. Some of my topics will be well-covered, some will be buried under the swamp of the mainstream sports media, but I will always try to look through everything and find the thing that makes the most sense.

Hence, the incredibly novel concept.

Anyway, enough with the explanation, on to the latest round of...

Incredibly Novel Concepts!!!

INC #1: Boston Red Sox outfielder Manny Ramirez is on the open market...again. Zzzzzzzzzz...will someone please wake me when Man-Ram actually goes somewhere?

I realize he's a big-name player on a big-name Major League franchise, but come on! Do we have to dance this pointless tango every single offseason? How many times has Manny asked for a trade or insinuated he wanted out of Beantown, only to stick around and launch baseballs over the Green Monster and prattle on about how much he loves Red Sox fans?

I've seen this act before, and it's getting tiresome. So tiresome, in fact, I have a novel idea for ESPN: leave Man-Ram and the Red Sox alone until the player is actually traded. Until then, this is a non-story that deserves no space on your already-crowded airwaves.

INC #2: While we're discussing the Red Sox...if you're going to cough up $51.1 million just to talk to someone who is widely considered the best pitcher in Japan, why are you gonna go all cheap in negotiating and only offer him $8 million per season?

Granted, I think Datsuke Matsuzaka's agent, Scott Boras, is being a bit overzealous when he tells Boston honchos he wants $15 million a year for his client--a client who's never thrown a Major League pitch, mind you--but why have the gap between what the Red Sox want to pay and what Boras wants his client to be paid so high?

With a gap that big--$7 million--I'm inclined to believe Matsuzaka won't be pitching for the BoSox next season, which means he'll be going back to Japan. And if that happens, Boston gets its $51.1 million back, but still...don't throw buckets of cash at a guy for the right to talk to him, only to go all Ebeneezer Scrouge once you reach the negotiating table.

That'd be like throwing down a couple hundred thousand dollars on a Porsche and going for some cheap, run-of-the-mill local insurance company.

Or any company endorsed by Kenny Mayne.

INC #3: Question for the NFL: Can we please figure out once and for all what roughing the passer really is? Too many times this season have I seen defenders get penalized 15 yards for what the referee considered unnecessary contact with the signal-caller, even when our naked eye tells us no roughing existed.

To a certain degree, I agree quarterbacks need some protection--no helmet-to-helmet hits, no driving a quarterback head-first into the turf, no hits after the ball's been released, no hitting out-of-bounds. But merely tackling the quarterback is a 15-yard personal foul?

Don't laugh; I've seen it a few times this season. I even saw a New York Giants defender let Titans quarterback Vince Young go this past weekend out of fear of picking up a flag.

Last I checked, quarterbacks were still football players. They wore helmets, pads and armor, just like every other football player. We know QBs are tough--anyone see the hit Chad Pennington took Sunday, only to get back up several moments later waving his arms in the air? So why insist on pampering them when they have the same protection as the other players?

Find a way to streamline the rule. There's too much protection for quarterbacks anymore, and the rule itself is too gray-area for my tastes.

INC #4: I feel the need to call out Hofstra and George Mason, who a lot of experts expected to be the class of the Colonial Athletic Association this college basketball season. The two squads are a combined 5-5, and neither team has come up with a marquee win so far this year.

After the banner season the conference had last year--with four teams reaching postseason play, Hofstra and Old Dominion running deep into the NIT and George Mason making the Final Four--the pressure was on for the top dogs of the league to serve notice.

But they've yet to do that, while the Missouri Valley is pretty much picking up where it left off last year. And the one CAA team to get a big-time win so far this season? ODU, who was an afterthought coming into the year.

But after upending then-No. 8 Georgetown on the road and throttling a young Richmond team, the Monarchs are 5-1, their only loss coming to a talented (and undefeated) Clemson team. If the CAA is going to validate its success of a year ago, more of its programs (namely, the programs expected to contend for the title) are going to have to start holding up their end of the bargain.

The respect isn't going to increase once conference play starts and these teams start beating up on each other. The out-of-conference games matter more than anything right now, and I don't see many in the CAA holding up their end.

INC #5: Let me get this straight...relations between Chicago Bulls coach Scott Skiles and free agent singing Ben Wallace are souring over a...headband?

Has the NBA completely lost its mind?!?!

Skiles has a rule on his team about wearing headbands (Rule: don't wear them), and apparently Wallace knew of this and chose to ignore it.

Pardon me while I call out both parties for their inexplicable stupidity.

Coach Skiles...what in the sam hell is your reasoning for outlawing headbands on your team? Do you want your players to wipe hot, stinging sweat out of their eyes? Are you afraid of a headband sliding over a player's face at a crucial point in a game, causing him to miss and shot or commit a crippling foul? I can appareciate rules like curfews or attire when addressing the media, but...no headbands?

And to Mr. Wallace...you just got to the Windy City and many consider you the final piece in a team that could make a title run. You've been there 12 games, the team's struggling, and you're going to willingly go against your coach? Already?! I don't know what Larry Brown and Flip Saunders let you get away with in Detroit, but something tells me this won't fly in Chi-town.

Asanine as the rule is, you have to respect it and the coach who enforces it. Get your head out of your headband, into the game and help that team win.

But seriously...a headband?!