Thursday Randomness

The NFL Draft starts tonight. Like the NCAA Basketball Tournament, it strikes me as ridiculous that the NFL draft continues to be elongated. Because the draft is not one day of excitement anymore, I probably won’t watch any of it. Yes, I still do watch the NCAA Tournament, but not necessarily the so-called play-in games. For me, the first round is still on Thursday, when there are 64 teams remaining.

That being said, I found a few non-sports-related items I thought were interesting early this morning.

One is that a Dutch soccer team signed a toddler to a 10-year deal. I love soccer. Lane Kiffin, where you at?

The other fun thing to read this morning (and hopefully for a while) is the public battle over the Dodgers. While the franchise shouldn’t be fought for like this, in public, what we’re getting now is more transparency than ever before. Us Dodgers fans just want to know what’s going on, even if it’s really bad. Here’s to a fresh start sometime between now and what could be 5 years from now.

I wonder what the Vegas over/under is on the timing of this whole mess being over with. If McCourt wanted to win the hearts of Dodgers fans, he’d take the $30 Million and bet it on the Dodgers winning the World Series. With the 35/1 odds, he could really get the team out of the financial hole they’re in and prove his metal…

NOTE – I know that scenario is impossible, but it would make for a sweet storyline for a movie…

And, finally, an excerpt from Bill Simmons’ article on ESPN.com today. This is why he’s the Sports Guy:

In baseball, Dodgers owner Frank McCourt ran out of money to pay for stuff. There were two big reasons for this: He was going through a nasty divorce, and he never had any money in the first place. How can you buy one of the most famous baseball franchises without any money? It’s a great question. But when McCourt went behind Bud Selig’s back and tried to secure a $30 million personal loan from Fox (his television partner), an enraged Selig seized the team from him last week under the rarely seen edict, “You Can’t Pay For Stuff Anymore.”

Only Southern Californians fully understand what happened to the Dodgers during the McCourt Error. Six decades, Dodger Stadium, Vin Scully, Koufax and Drysdale, Garvey-Cey-Lopes-Russell, Fernandomania, Orel’s streak, Gibson’s homer, Gagne coming out of the bullpen breathing fire, Dodger Blue … the McCourts were crapping on all of it. Desecrating the brand. Maybe it took a sneaky loan and a poor Giants fan getting senselessly beaten into a coma for Selig to finally intervene, but he did. To his credit. When a commissioner keeps siding with owners over fans, he becomes nothing but a puppet with strings trickling out of his back. Selig stuck up for Dodgers fans. He did the right thing.