Knock em Out Miami

             HBO has made “Game of Thrones” must see television on Sundays in the absence of football. Now, the network will take on the daunting task of making people outside of south beach watch the Miami Dolphins.

            The Dolphins are the seventh team to have participated in “Hard Knocks” since the show’s inception in 2001. The show’s sell is a struggling franchise attempting to overcome three bad seasons in a row. Another selling point is how a rookie head coach in Joe Philbin can lead his team back to the glory days of 1972.

            Forty years later, football in south beach is not great. The Dolphins have been upstaged by a basketball franchise with one title. In March, Dolphins fans held up posters calling for the job of Jim Ireland. Every draft analyst with a microphone and a computer called Ryan Tannehill a reach pick. Plus, the Dolphins have not played playoff football in 11 years.

            On the 40^th anniversary of the NFL’s only undefeated season, the Dolphins need all the good press they can get.

           

Statistically speaking, the extra cameras in training camp have not hurt anybody. The six teams that have participated in “Hard Knocks” have a combined record of 49-47. Three of those teams, the 2001 Ravens, the 2009 Bengals, and the 2010 Jets all made the playoffs while being television stars.

            “Hard Knocks” could help the Dolphins gain a national audience. When the Jets were on in 2010, the show had an average of 663,000 viewers per episode. National exposure on HBO could help the Dolphins improve on their abysmal attendance numbers; which ranked 28^th in the league a year ago.

Also, the NFL needs “Hard Knocks” like an offensive lineman need six square meals per day.

This offseason so far has featured Tory Aikman doing his best Nostradamus impersonation. Also, Greg Williams orchestrating a scandal that could ruin the New Orleans Saints. To make matters worse, Kurt Warner told Dan Patrick he does not want his kids to play football.

With football having a public relations nightmare, light practices and training camp shenanigans should provide relief the league is looking for.

The National Federation of State High School Associations has sighted a decrease of 837 high school kids playing football since Seau’s death. However, general audiences seeing the drills, competition, and team comrade could curb the hostility towards football.

There is no guarantee that “Hard Knocks” will quell the concerns that parents have regarding the safety of a collision sport. Instead, it will show a lighter side of the game that is slowly becoming demonized by its own hands.

HBO has given audiences “Entourage,” and Miami has given sports fans “Not five, not six, not seven.” Between the two influences of south beach and cable, the Dolphins training camp should be fun to watch.

Diamond in the Rough

          Yoshihrio Uchida has won more titles that Bill Russell, Michael Jordan, Yogi Berra, and John Wooden combined; and this is most likely the first time you heard his name.

           Uchida has coached judo at San Jose State University for 66 years. During his tenure Uchida birthed the judo program, raised it from its infancy, and watched it grow into a power house that won 45 national championships in 51 years.

            At the beginning of his career, Uchida had his own Lombardi-esque coaching anecdote.

            When he started coaching judo in 1946, one member of Uchida’s inaugural class picked up and shook his coach in mid-air. Uchida responded by throwing the San Jose State football player in front of his classmates.

            Uchida getting the respect of his students was easy; pioneering the sport of judo in the United States was a bit more difficult.

            In 1953 Uchida and California University coach Henry Stone fought to make judo a sanctioned sport. The two coaches submitted the Amateur Athletic Union, and San Jose State sponsored the first nationwide A.A.U. championships that year.

           Nine years later, Uchida organized the first national collegiate judo championships, which San Jose State won.

            Uchida’s fight to get judo into respectability did not stop there. Stone and Uchida advocated for, and made judo an Olympic event in 1964.

            That year, Uchida went on to coach the United States’ first Olympic judo team. Uchida’s fighters won a bronze medal in the Tokyo Games.

As much as Uchida helped put judo on the sporting map, his life before coaching was filled with racism.

Uchida was drafted into the U.S. Army while his family was ripped apart by Executive Order 9066; that not so little decree that led to the removal of 110,000 Japanese-Americans from the west coast during World War II.

While Uchida was a lab technician for the medical corps, his parents were incarcerated at a camp in Arizona; his sister and her husband were sent to an internment camp in Idaho; and his brothers were relocated to the Tule Lake Relocation Center in northern California.

            Even after Uchida served his country for four years and graduated from San Jose State in 1947, he struggled to find work before finding his niche in coaching judo part time.

            Uchida got his opportunity to coach a sport he loved and returned the favor by carving his face into judo’s Mount Rushmore in the United States.

             San Jose State renamed the building where the school’s dojo is located Yoshihiro Uchida Hall in honor of the man who brought competitive judo to this country.   

            The 92 year old Uchida may not be around much longer for the world to appreciate, yet his legacy can be seen in action this July. Marti Malloy, a senior at San Jose State, will be in London representing the United States at the Olympics this summer.

           

            

Overheated

            Never has a nickname fit the career of a star athlete so perfectly. Dwyane Wade has been the flash for the Miami Heat, there one moment and gone the next.

            Wade and his team took a beating at the hands of the Indiana Pacers in Indianapolis. Still, the story from the Heat’s beating was not that Wade went 2-13, or even that the frustrated star got into it with his coach on the sidelines. Wade’s emotions told the tale that nobody in Miami wanted to read.

            Wade acted like he didn’t want to be a part of the Heat’s Grand Experiment anymore.

            The spark that drives Wade’s game appears to have burned out. The quickness that was synonymous with Wade’s cuts to the basket has slowed to the pace of a slug shooting jumpers. Wade has gone from a fiery competitor to a sour shooter looking for a foul call after every shot he takes.

            Now before everyone starts using the ‘q’ word to describe Wade, there are a few factors that the general public should consider.

            Maybe Wade misses the good old days of being able to win without getting viciously scrutinized for every misstep his team takes. 

Back in 2005-2006 Wade was the king of Miami. He brought the first Larry O’Brien trophy to South Beach in just his third season. Wade was regarded as one of the five best players in the NBA, partly because of his numbers (27.2 points 5.7 rebounds 6.7 assists per game) and partly because of the speed and fearlessness he played the game with.

            Then after a few years without rings, Heat management made Wade share his city with a star from Canada and Ohio’s hated icon. 

The signings of Chris Bosh and LeBron James appeared to make perfect sense. Wade was going to be the scorer, James the facilitator, and Bosh the rebounder whose star would diminish a bit for the sake of team chemistry.

But the addition of LeBron has created a power struggle that subtracted from the Heat’s team chemistry.

When the big three first came together, it was Wade’s team because he the jewelry James and Bosh wanted. In the playoffs last season, James and Wade took turns being the go to guy. The struggles to find the team’s leader ultimately lead to the Heat’s demise in the Finals.

No team who wants to win it all can have their best player and their leader as two different people. Wade acknowledged James as a better player in an interview with the Palm Beach Post. Wade extinguished his killer instinct to make LeBron feel better, and that move is bound to fail.

A team of Bosh, James, and Wade can’t do it alone, or at the least they need help beyond their bench warmers disguised as role players. Mario Chalmers can be effective, but is maddeningly inconsistent. Shane Battier looks older with every three he misses. And the Heat have nobody who can play in the post besides Bosh.

Due to the massive contracts of every member of the big three, blowing the team up is not an option. Nobody in the NBA with the new salary cap rules will want to make a move and take that kind of cap hit unless Miami picks up part of the tab on Wade’s contract.

Sadly for Wade, he is stuck in Miami with an MVP with no killer instinct, a hurt star, and not much else. And the current batch of ingredients does not make a recipe for title success. Especially when a key ingredient in Wade, has gone sour.

No Excuses.

In instances of competition, it is better to play hard and get blown out Baltimore Orioles style than to emerge from the battlegrounds waving a white flag.

Unfortunately for sports and the people who watch them, cowards do not agree with that ideology.

Instead of having the common decency to play for the Arizona Charter Athletic Association State Championship, Our Lady of Sorrows Academy’s baseball team opted to forfeit because one opposing athlete played ball like a girl.

Well, her name is Paige Shultzbach and she is a girl. She and her teammates at Mesa Prep are also the recipients of a gift they wanted to earn rather than receive.   

Shultzbach’s team was handed a title by Our Lady of Sorrows because they refused to play an opponent with a girl on the team. When representatives from the school of cowards were asked why they quit, they hid behind the outdated belief that boys and girls should be taught separately.

It would have been one thing if Shultzbach was a pitcher who constantly threw at the heads of opposing ball players. Then Our Lady of Sorrows could have clamored for the safety of their players and Shultzbach would have been the villain.

Instead, the two times that Mesa Prep played Our Lady of Sorrows in the regular season, Shultzbach sat out both games out of respect to her opponent’s views and Mesa Prep won both meetings.

All Shultzbach wanted was to be a part of a game when her team beat Our Lady of Sorrows a third time. At the very least, a girl at the age of 15 wanted to play with her teammates for a title fairly.

            Sadly this is not the case and the actions of Our Lady of Sorrows have soiled the name of competition.

            The power of sports is supposed to be stronger than this. If Nelson Mandela and his South African Rugby team united an entire country, then a girl playing with boys in a high school game in the US should have not even have been news.

            Yet for Shultzbach, her name and her school are in the news for all the wrong reasons.

            Rather than a girl and her team going 9-0 and winning the Eastern Division, Mesa Prep has been given a championship trophy that was mistaken as Charmin Ultra by Our Lady Sorrows.

            Even though Our Lady of Sorrows asked if anyone had any girls on their teams at the beginning of the year (which Mesa Prep did not at the time), Shultzbach playing in the championship game is hardly Bill Belichick listing half his roster as doubtful and having them all play that Sunday.

            There is no good message being sent from Our Lady of Sorrows Academy. The withdrawal from the title is blatantly disrespecting Mesa Prep’s team as well as the hard work their students invested into the long months of their baseball season.

            As far as we have come as a society and as fans alike, Our Lady of Sorrows narrow mindedness proves we have a long way to go.

LA not so Confidential

            When one thinks of playoff hockey, the historic first images that pop up range from Bobby Orr’s diving goal in Boston to Steve Yzerman’s double overtime goal to move Detroit to the Conference Finals.

            Though all of a sudden, a select group of Kings from a warm state are making very loud decrees in their run to be crowned hockey's best team.

One of the last places where dominant hockey is thought of is out in the Golden State, but here are your Los Angeles Kings, the NHL's hottest team.

            Many in the NHL circles are doubting this team. They find that if the Triple Crown line couldn't win it all, there is no way that this team can give LA sport’s heaviest trophy.

            Still, these Kings seem capable of winning the NHL’s game of thrones.

            Just ask the Vancouver Canucks. A team that finished with the best record in the league and won the Western Conference a year ago looked like mere peasants to hockey's hopeful rulers.

            Daniel Sedin and Ryan Kesler could not do much of anything against his majesty Jonathan Quick. In contrast, the hand of the Kings Dustin Brown carved up Roberto Luongo like a Thanksgiving Turkey.

            Five short games later, the Kings had become just the fourth team in NHL history to dethrone a number one seeded team.

            Some see that stat as a fluke. There is no way that the same “noble” franchise that could not win a cup with Wayne Gretzky on their side could claim hockey’s coveted crown.

Tell that to the most recent team that the Kings made look like commoners, the Saint Louis Blues.

Between Brian Elliot and Jaroslav Halak, the Blues had hockey’s great wall of goaltending. With left wing Andy McDonald’s 10 playoff points and the Kings’ 29^th ranked offense in the regular season, the series was the Blues to loose.

And loose they did.

The so called inept offense of the Kings rampaged for 15 goals in a sweep and tore down the goalie wall that served as the Blues foundation.

The man who ranked 399^th in the NHL in goals scored this year was the general of the Kings army in this series. Matt Greene put up four of his 62 career points in four games against Saint Louis.

These Kings can feast for a short while, as they wait for the winner of the series between the Nashville Predators and the Coyotes of Phoenix.

Out of nowhere, the west coach has hockey’s both hockeys’ hottest goalie and the third highest goal scorer in the playoffs. Suddenly it is the Kings, not the Lakers with the best chance to bring a championship to Los Angles in 2012.

For the Stanley Cup to reach the walk of fame the Kings need to do the improbable: continue to play at arguably the highest level the franchise has ever played at.

Quick needs to be faster, more alert, and flat out better than either Mike Smith or Pekka Rinne in the West. Brown, the all important Kings hand, needs to continue to put up offensive numbers against everyone: whether it is the Predators, Coyotes, New York Rangers, or whoever gets in their way in the quest for the cup. And coach Darryl Sutter has to continue to be the master strategist.

History does not favor these nobles. The Kings have just now reached the furthest point in the quest they have ever gone, the Western Conference finals.

Yet this LA team seems hungry, focused, and determined to win the whole thing. And if LA keeps playing like they have in the playoffs, there will be championship crowns for these Kings.

Junior Seau 1969-2012

          The numbers that the late Junior Seau accumulated over his career are quantifiable; his overall impact on San Diego can not be measured so easily.

            Both the football world and the rest of the world lost Seau at the age of 43. Police are investigating his death and the details are still not certain.

            Luisa and Tiaina Seau Sr. lost a son, and the city of San Diego lost an icon.

In his time as a San Diego Charger, Junior Seau played the game at the pace of the lightning that streaked across his helmet for 12 years. As soon as Seau set foot on Jack Murphy Stadium, he became the identity of a defense, and the face of football in southern California.

            Seau was a laid back star off the field that played like his hair was on fire during games. He brought back star power to a franchise that existed in a black hole since the departure of Kellen Winslow in the late 80s.

            There was something different about Seau’s game. Not just the fact that after every tackle there was an electric celebration, but the technique in his takedowns was an art form in its own right.

            His tackles consisted of more than just lowering a shoulder towards the ball carrier and hoping the hit would be enough to make the play. All 1,849 tackles featured Seau’s arms ensnaring his prey before pulling them towards the turf.

            If the battle for football supremacy in California was won by Young and Rice, Seau played the role of Oedipus. Seau’s Chargers were on the losing end of a 49-26 score against the man who finally got the monkey off his back.

            Sure Seau eventually left the Chargers in 2003 for the Miami Dolphins. And yes he “graduated” in 2006 only to go back for his doctorate in Super Bowl rings at the Belichickian School of wins in New England. Still, Seau remained on of San Diego's favorite sons.

Seau never got that Super Bowl ring that separates the great from the extraordinary. Even after attending grad school in New England, Seau was on that Patriots team that had their dreams of perfection dashed by the New York Giants in 2007. Even without a ring, Seau’s name will join the 125 Hall of Famers in 2015.

Despite all of that, Seau’s heart and legacy remains in San Diego. Not only for his production as a Charger, but also for his dominance in the community.     

In 1992, number 55 started up the Junior Seau Foundation to empower the youth of California faced with adversity. Seau’s foundation has been around by more than 20 years and has rewarded individuals like Bill Walton who have impacted San Diego for the better.

Sadly, Seau will not be remembered for his volunteer efforts or his play on the field. His death, for now will be synonymous with the downfall of the NFL.

Concussions and bounty gate have combined to put the future of the NFL in question and effectively overshadowed Seau’s death. The game that Seau loved has abandoned the technique he applied to every tackle and has turned into arm tackles and images of players being carted off the field.

The legacy of Junior Seau should not be synonymous with the potential downfall of the NFL. Unfortunately, Seau has gone from a person to a talking point in less than 24 hours. Before Luisa has even buried her son, the talking heads are addressing the repercussions of their favorite collision sport.

What happens to the NFL after Seau is still up in the air, yet Seau’s impact on and off the field will forever leave flashes of lightning in the skyline of San Diego.