Monday Water Cooler – March 15, 2010
Here we go with today’s sports water cooler talk. Here, you won’t just find the straight news; you’ll find the stuff everyone is talking about – the ice breakers, the Twitter Sports Picks and topics…well, basically all the stuff you discuss at the water cooler.
Enjoy!
Plenty of big stories went down over the weekend – so many that I barely know where to start. Here goes!
NFL news: Tomlinson a Jet, Quinn a Bronco
I thought the New York Jets let Thomas Jones go because they wanted to hand Shonn Greene (or Leon Washington, returning from injury) a bigger workload. Maybe I was wrong. The Jets clogged up their backfield again by signing LaDainian Tomlinson to a two-year deal. He’ll be 31 when the season starts.
Hey – if you lose Jay Cutler…there’s always…Brady Quinn? The Denver Broncos acquired him as insurance for Kyle Orton in exchange for Peyton Hillis, a 2011 sixth-rounder and a conditional pick in 2012. Quinn, a 2007 first-round pick out of Notre Dame, has scuffled to a 66.8 career passer rating over his first 14 pro games.
NHL news: Ovechkin suspension looms
Another day and another dirty hit in the NHL. These guys aren’t doing a good job retaining all the fans they won over with the Olympics, are they? League scoring leader Alexander Ovechkin drilled Chicago’s Brian Campbell with a hit from behind on Sunday. Campbell suffered a broken clavicle and broken ribs and could miss the rest of the season as a result.
No official word yet but, considering the heat the league took for mishandling the Matt Cookie ruling last week, Ovechkin could be suspended – especially since he’s a repeat offender.
Soccer news: David Beckham tears Achilles; out for World Cup
Sure, David Beckham is the envy of almost every man on the planet. But, in other ways, he can’t catch a break. He tore his Achilles tendon on Sunday while playing with AC Milan and will miss the World Cup this June in South Africa. Sure, Beckham wasn’t expected to start for England, but his leadership, experience and free-kick abilities would’ve been extremely handy. Bettors may want to nudge England’s World Cup futures odds down a hair.
MLB news: Strasburg dominates again; Blue Jays close in on “next Alfonso Soriano”
Stephen Strasburg is making it harder for Washington to keep him in the minors every time he takes the hill. In his second career spring-training start, he tossed three shutout innings, striking out two batters. The Nolan-Ryan-esque prospect also flirted with triple digits on the radar gun again
Are the Toronto Blue Jays on the verge of a major coup? They`re reportedly close to outbidding the New York Yankees and signing 21-year-old Cuban shortstop Adeinis Hechavarria to a four-year deal that includes a $10-million bonus. At a wiry 6’1” and 170 pounds, he’s being compared to Alfonso Soriano. He’s reportedly leaning toward Toronto since he’d be blocked by Derek Jeter if he entered the Yankees’ system.
NBA news: Arenas says he deserves to be punished
Is Agent Zero growing up after all? In an interview with Esquire magazine that hits newsstands next week, Arenas is reportedly candid about his gun-in-locker-room incident and quite critical of himself. He claims he messed up the legacy of late Wizards owner Abe Pollin; he called Pollin’s wife and said he “deserves to be punished” and that he’ll “do everything it takes to earn back your husband’s respect.”
He also said he once had roughly 500 firearms in his home; he bought many of them from a man’s World War I collection but put most of them in storage when he had children.
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