He is a Real Dominican...

Tonight will be my first visit to Fenway Park since 2004. It will also be Pedro Martinez's. The record press passes, astronomical scalper prices and rock concert buzz around the park will not be for me but they will be present. Today I ask myself if I have witnessed anything like this before. I am fortunate to say that indeed I have.

Boston Dirt Dogs and some personalities on WEEI have been urging fans to boo Pedro upon his return and he did take a longer more lucrative contract to leave for New York rather than stay for the loyal following of Red Sox Nation. The only difference between him and Johnny Damon is the surname after the word New York.

However among the 30,000 Red Sox fans in Fenway Park (figure approximately 5,000 Mets fans) all of them are Red Sox fans because of Pedro Martinez. For Pedro's best years were among the rest of any Red Sox teams worst. He single-handedly carried the 1999 team to the ALCS through the 23-4 regular season and in painful relief against the Indians. While the suspense has been taking out today by the Red Sox putting together a touching video to Billy Joel's "Days to Remember" prompting a standing ovation while Pedro was in the dugout. The question is only how long, how loud, and how often will the ovation be.

My friend Scott (who will be in attendance and got me the tickets to tonight's event, thank you!) and I waited in line at the gate for two hours at Toronto's Skydome to see a star-filled card for WWF's Wrestlemania X8. The main event was WWF's marquis young superhero The Rock against the returning Hulk Hogan of the villanous nWo. The WWF even had Hogan run over Rock's jeep with a Mack truck just so we knew who was supposed to be the good guy and the bad guy.

When the bell rang, the response was surreal. Easily the biggest big-time moment I have witnessed live up to this point (and I have been to a Final Four). The ovation for Hogan was insane. 60,000 fans cheering Hogan's return to Wrestlemania even booing the previously babyfaced and forever hip Rock.

The point was and will be tonight. Fans while fickle are always nostalgic. They remember. The good times the bad times and when there are no more good times or bad, they remember the good times more vividly and the bad times more forgivenly. While Pedro was a diva when he was in Boston and contracts prevent him from being a Red Sock again (like the WWF made Hogan wear red and yellow the next night) for one night (or two) we can treat him like one of our own again and prove that in Boston you can come home again.

Unless, of course, you're a Yankee.

Pageantry by the Numbers

ESPN.com’s Ivan Maisel is doing a neat project naming the best college football players to wear each jersey number 1-100. Most bloggers would lose interest when the research required is at its most and reader interest is at its least (numbers 50-79). I sure hope Jim Brown or some other Syracuse Running Back is no. 44. Donovan McNabb is given honorable mention behind Reggie Bush at No. 5. Marvin Harrison is nowhere mentioned at no. 8. and I assume Troy Nunes narrowly missed the cut in the race to be no. 11. Wuerffel is an interesting choice to be no. 7. Maisel is from Florida, not Palo Alto, California, Denver, Colorado or Londonderry, New Hampshire. I never saw Frankie Albert play but how much better was he than Dan Marino? I only assume this list is biased against players who were more successful in the NFL than college, meaning Doug Flutie will be no. 22 over Emmitt Smith. Here are the first 20:

1. Anthony Carter, WR Michigan 1979-82
2. Deion Sanders, CB Florida State 1985-88
3. Joe Montana, QB Notre Dame 1975-78
4. Brett Favre, QB Southern Miss 1987-90
5. Reggie Bush, RB USC 2003-05
6. Robbie Bosco & Marc Wilson, QB BYU 1983-85 & 1977-79
7. Danny Wuerffel, QB Florida 1993-96
8. Davey O’Brien, QB TCU 1935-38
9. Jim McMahon, QB BYU 1977-78, 1980-91
10. Vince Young, QB Texas 2003-05
11. Matt Leinart, QB USC 2002-05
12. Roger Staubach, QB Navy 1962-64
13. Frankie Albert, QB Stanford 1939-41
14. Don Hutson, TE Alabama 1932-34
15. Tommie Frazier, QB Nebraska 1992-95
16. Peyton Manning, QB Tennessee 1994-97
17. Charlie Ward, QB Florida State 1989-93
18. Archie Manning, QB Ole Miss 1968-70
19. Rashaan Salaam, RB Colorado 1993-94
20. Earl Campbell, RB Texas 1974-77

I was right about Flutie over Emmitt. The second list features numbers retired by The Ohio State University. Looking at this list may make Ricky Williams and Bo Jackson (both 34's) and Ron Dayne (33) wish they had chosen to wear No. 29.

21. Barry Sanders, RB Oklahoma State 1986-88
22. Doug Flutie, QB Boston College 1981-84
23. Jim Swink, RB TCU 1954-56
24. Nile Kinnick, RB Iowa 1937-39
25. Tommy McDonald, RB Oklahoma 1954-56
26. Riley Smith, QB/FB Alabama 1933-35
27. Eddie George, RB The Ohio State 1992-95
28. Warrick Dunn, RB Florida State 1993-96
29. No one of any Significance
30. Mike Rozier, RB Nebraska 1981-83
31. Vic Janowicz, RB The Ohio State 1949-51
32. John Lujack, QB Notre Dame 1946-47
33. Tony Dorsett, RB Pittsburgh 1973-76
34. Hershel Walker, RB Georgia 1980-82
35. Doc Blanchard, RB Army 1944-46
36. Bennie Blades, S Miami 1985-87
37. Doak Walker, RB SMU 1945, 1947-49
38. George Rogers, RB South Carolina 1977-80
39. John Kimbrough, FB Texas ATM 1938-40
40. Hopalong Cassady, RB/DB The Ohio State 1952-55

Hugging it Out: "Dominated"

(SPOILER SPACE: If you do not want any of last night's episode of 'Entourage' spoiled for you, do not scroll past the picture of 'Drama', 'Turtle', and 'Dom')


My apologies for no HIO last week. My thoughts in a nutshell. Rolling blackouts and lame high school parties aren't good television.

This week Entourage introduced a fifth friend "Dom" played by Domenick Lombardozzi. This is great news because it allows me to schill for Lombardozzi's other show on HBO "The Wire" which is the best show on HBO, that none of you watch that will start its fourth season this fall. On that show Lombardozzi plays a cop so of course on Entourage he plays a crook. Specifically, he just finished serving five years for punching a cop after being busted with Vince's weed.

You don't need great foresight to see that Dom will bring nothing but problems to the current "Entourage" and the writers went to the David Chase school of symbolic metaphors by having Vince mention he landed him a personal job as head of security just as the roller coaster ride they were on ("Aquaman" the Ride) began its descent. While I don't expect Dom to be a permanent addition, he is at least A PLOTLINE, that this show lacked up until this point.

Hopefully the child-star punk is not a permanent storyline in the show. I was disappointed with the quips the writers gave Ari during that storyline as we all know what happens to child actors when they grow up.

Next Week: Dom is accused of robbery and causes more angst amongst the crew.

NCAA considering doubling Basketball Tournament Field

In one of the worst ideas in a long time, The National Association of Basketball Coaches is recommending expanding the NCAA Tournament field from 65 to 128 teams.

It doesn't take Columbo to realize the agenda of the Coaches as making or not making the NCAA Tournament is pretty much the watermark to whether coaches contracts are renewed or if they are fired.

The consequences of expanding the field are:

-The influx of mediocrity into the NCAA Tournament. Lowering the benchmark for inclusion in the NCAA Tournament from 20 wins to around 14 or 15 wins and teams like Minnesota and Florida State who go below .500 in their conference would be allowed to play for a National Championship

-Rendering the conference tournaments to just about complete irrelevance. What is one of the more enjoyable weeks of College Basketball and a chance to see almost all the major teams and players in a short amount of time would be almost a non event and would have no incentive for highly ranked teams to play their best players.

-The postseason NIT would probably have to be cancelled or include teams with winning percentage in the .400 range. Chances are there is no value in watching these teams whatsoever. I would admit this is the least significant of the consequences.

Jim Boeheim of all people recommends a much less ambitious expansion. From three to seven teams. Three would be the ideal in my opinion as it would allow all 16 seeds to play a play-in game and would make for a full day in Dayton of four games. As opposed to the play-in game between the lowest ranked 16 seeds which seems like the Tournament's Appendix.

Jim Haney, Executive Director of the NABC doesn't foresee the NCAA adopting their recommendations. "I don't think the idea of doubling the field is going to happen right now because there are too many complications to do that," Haney said. "But I think the committee will seriously consider what the number will be. ... I think if it happens, it will have to happen soon because of the logistical issues."

That said, the idea is on the table and when it comes to the NCAA and television and tournament sites, more is more. Once the logistics are figured out I think we may see a 128 game tournament until the ratings for the first round barely get off the ground and no team seeded below 20 wins a game and no team below 25 is even competitive. Then the NCAA will come to its senses.