Questions from a Wolfman

The Wolfman, 24, once stole the t-shirt of a girl streaking the Quad at Wake Forest. When she returned, naked, drunk and confused, she inquired as to the whereabouts of her perfectly-weathered Schweppes t-shirt. The Wolfman coolly remarked he hadn’t seen such a shirt, in a Wolf-like performance that rivaled Scott Howard’s in Teen Wolf’s final basketball game.
Unfortunately, The Wolfman’s prize from that midnight rendezvous went largely unused for the next two years because he was worried the streaking victim would see him around campus wearing her shirt and demand it back. That t-shirt, lying at the bottom of his drawer, was like Darko Milicic sitting on the Pistons bench for two seasons: So much potential, so little action.
But since leaving the idyllic Winston-Salem campus, The Wolfman has gotten good use out of his Schweppes shirt and has no doubt charmed many a lady in San Diego with all its pit-stained splendor.
Today, The Wolfman asks questions about worthless sports leagues, NFL mediocrity and, for the first time, publicly professes his disdain for a certain redneck quarterback.

I’m a little worried, both the NHL and NBA have started this season yet you did not do season previews for either, why? It’s as if you don’t care about either league? We need an in depth look at the NHL and NBA this season.
After the debacle that was my combined 14-part MLS/WNBA preview this spring, my interest in doing such entries has waned. Following those magical three weeks where I discussed the virtues of Hercules Gomez, how underrated La’Keshia Frett is, my distaste for the antics of Amado Guevera and the unstoppable force that is Swin Cash, I received more e-mail and comments from readers than ever; yet all were critical.
Every day my inbox was flooded with missives from angry Colorado Rapids fans who would dutifully attach the MLS Standings to their note while making sure to point out how I picked their team to finish behind lowly Chivas USA. And then there was the ugly incident with the San Antonio Silver Stars fan who had taken umbrage at some disparaging remarks I made about Silver Star star Wendy Palmer-Daniel. Let’s just say that a 50-feet restraining order is about as effective as a screen door on a submarine.
No, Wolfman, season previews were just too much of a hassle to deal with after that. The reason I do in-depth NFL and NCAA Basketball Previews is because I really don’t care about those sports. But writing about the NHL involves me pouring a little bit of my soul into each word and, dammit, I’m just not strong enough to do that.
But, since you asked, here are quick previews of each league:
NHL - Everyone will make the playoffs, except the Washington Capitals, who will then raise ticket prices 35%.
NBA - 1) The start of 2006 training camp will be postponed so the Spurs and Heat can finish the 2006 NBA Finals.
2) The Spurs will win their fourth title in eight seasons behind Tim Duncan, the most underrated superstar in sports history. By the time Duncan retires he could have a fistful of rings and be considered the best power forward of all-time. Yet some people are still touting Ron Artest as an MVP candidate.
3) The Joe Johnson signing will go down alongside $100 million for Allen Houston and $105 million for Juwan Howard as the worst big-time contracts in recent NBA history. Johnson was the fourth option on an explosive Suns team, and now he’s expected to resurrect a moribund franchise? Besides Bullets games, I probably saw more of the Suns than any team last year because they were so fun to watch, and my impression of Joe Johnson was that he was a solid NBA player who benefited from an up-tempo offense and major minutes (he was on the floor 40 per). Put him in Atlanta and he’ll disappear.
4) Kwame Brown will be the most disappointing thing to happen in L.A. since The Magic Hour. Anyone who thinks all Kwame needed was a change of scenery clearly doesn’t know Kwame. Changes of scenery help guys that want to be good but were stuck in bad situations where they didn’t get much playing time. Jermaine O’Neal is often cited as the prime example of this, and he’s a good one. He averaged 10, 13, 8 and 12 minutes in his first four seasons in Portland, tripled that his first season with Indiana and saw his numbers go up exponentially after that. All Jermaine needed was a shot.
Well, Kwame’s had a shot. He’s had four of them. And he’s blown them each time. Kwame apologists can complain about the way Michael Jordan and Doug Collins handled him, and they probably have a point. Bill Parcells has made a career out of giving tough love to players, but he also knows which guys it will work with and which guys need to have their hands held. Kwame was clearly the latter, but MJ didn’t realize that.
But those are just excuses. The worst thing that ever happened to Kwame Brown wasn’t being drafted by Michael Jordan, it was being drafted #1. After that he seemed to think everything in his career would come easy, almost like his stardom was predestined just because he was the top pick. So Kwame didn’t work hard, did some knucklehead things in the off-season, didn’t improve and got kicked off the team during the playoffs because he “wanted to hurt Gilbert Arenas”. Then, in a self-serving interview with The Washington Post this summer, Kwame has the audacity to position himself as a martyr for all he went through in D.C..
Kwame Brown is a joke and will never be anything but.
5) Congratulations to your buddy Chris Duhon who nabbed his first career triple-double last night. Maybe he and “Jay” Williams can celebrate by taking a helmet-less motorcycle ride through the streets of Chicago.
6) Chris Paul will win the Rookie of the Year, not because he’ll necessarily be the best rookie, but because he’ll probably get the most minutes playing for the lowly Hornets. And did you see my man’s three-piece gold suit Tuesday night? Playa looked like Bishop Don Magic Juan’s illegitimate son.
7) It looks like your actual buddy, Darius Songaila, cut to chase last night and willed the Bulls to their first victory of the season with a prayer three-pointer in the waning seconds. That, along with beginning communications presentations without giving an intro, is just Darius being Darius.
8) Eastern Conference Playoff Teams (in order): Miami, Detroit, New Jersey, Indiana, Cleveland, Milwaukee, Washington, Chicago.
9) Western Conference Playoff Teams (in order): San Antonio, Denver, Phoenix, Utah, Houston, Dallas, Sacramento, LA Lakers.
10) There’s one important fact to keep in mind; I don’t know jack about the NBA.

I’m glad that the rest of the country finally learned what Chicago already knew: The White Sox are nearly impossible to watch. They hadn’t won a World Series in almost 80 years and nobody watched. I used to blame the lack of viewers on Hawk Harrelson’s brutal announcing, but that doesn’t work for the postseason. Having watched the American League all your life do you have any idea why nobody cares about the White Sox anywhere even in the AL?
I remember you often talking about how bad the White Sox announcers were, but didn’t fully realize just how awful they really are until I got the MLB In-Demand package last season. For those that haven’t had the intense pleasure of listening to Harrelson, it’s like watching a game with your friend who can’t name a single player on the team he professes to love and goes nuts on pop-outs to the pitcher because he thinks they’re going to be homeruns.
I thought long and hard about your query as to why nobody cares about the White Sox, and here’s the only reason I could think of: Over the past 90 years, the White Sox were never good enough to experience any heartbreak (which, in turn, leads to future interest – look at the Red Sox), nor were they bad enough to inspire any sympathy. Since they threw the Series in 1919, the White Sox have avoided any long stretches of lousiness; the worst being some bottom-of-the pack finishes in the early ‘30s and immediately after WWII. But it always seems the White Sox were close to a playoff berth, or hovering around third, but never were close enough to make it. Thus, they were non-factors. And nobody cares about non-factors.
Coupled with their second-team status in the Second City, and the White Sox apathy makes sense. I just hope the Sox bandwagon can hold all the new fans it has to carry.

Where do you see Manny Ramirez and Theo Epstein working next season?
I’m sick of Theo Epstein. For all the great he did (unloading Nomar, signing Papi and Schill, keeping Jason Varitek in Boston), Theo gets a pass for the A. Rod trade that would have gone through had it not been for the player’s union, desperately wanting to sign Jose Contreras, signing Edgar Renteria and Matt Clement to huge deals and being the beneficiary of Kevin Millar’s two-season deal with the devil.
I like Theo, but it’s a whole lot easier to run a team with a $120 million payroll where $32 million to Renteria doesn’t cripple the franchise for three seasons. Bill Simmons (yes, I read him the other day to get his take on this) made a good point: If Jorge Posada’s throw is a split-second earlier and Dave Roberts is called out in Game 4 of the ALCS, Theo’s legend never would have been. You can do this with a lot of things in sports (if the inane tuck-rule didn’t exist, the words “Bill Belichick” and “genius” never would have been used in the same sentence, if the Celtics got the #1 pick of the 1997 NBA Draft, Rick Pitino would be a Hall of Fame NBA coach, etc.) and it’s usually a frivolous endeavor. But it’s worth noting.
I think Theo will be working behind the scenes with some club next season biding his time until the right job opens up, unless the new owners of the Washington Nationals (if baseball ever gets off their ass and sells the team) throw him a crazy offer.
As for Manny, the Red Sox would be insane to get rid of him. $50 million for three more seasons of Manny isn’t much, especially when you figure you’re paying Edgar Renteria half of that to be 1/10th the player. The Sox won’t get value for Manny (are Sox fans supposed to be excited about the new “Manny for Glaus and Erstad” rumor?) and if he leaves, David Ortiz will experience a huge drop-off in numbers. There’s a reason guys like Mike Matheny, Joe Mauer, Mike Lieberthal and Aubrey Huff had more intentional walks than Ortiz; the protection that Manny Ramirez affords. If Manny is gone, Ortiz won’t see any pitches. And without Ortiz’s 45 homers and 145 RBI’s, the Sox won’t even have a Divisional Series to blow next season.
I have no clue what’s going to happen, but my gut says Manny won’t be taking bathroom breaks in the Green Monster next season.

I don’t know if you’ve seen this, but apparently Eli Manning had a comeback against the Broncos. Do you think he’s nearly as good as people say he is, or is this all hype. I mean a 51.1% completion percentage has always indicated a star quarterback to me, but what are your thoughts?
Wait a minute here. Hold the phone buddy. Beep-beep-beep, back up the truck. What’s all this about an Eli Manning comeback now?
My thoughts on Manning are well documented, and I can picture you sitting at your laptop writing this e-mail with a glint in your eye as you picture the tizzy I’ll get myself into ranting about how overrated Eli is. Well, it worked.
Eli has been mediocre, at best, all season. Some key stats: That 51.1% competition percentage is good for 31st in the NFL, which ranks the crybaby-daddy’s boy behind future Hall of Famers like Joey Harrington, Josh McCown, Aaron Brooks and Gus Frerotte.
His passer rating of 83.6 puts him behind Kelly Holcomb, Kerry Collins, a beat-up Steve McNair and is nearly 30 points less than a quarterback from his same draft class, Ben Roethlisberger, who has stellar numbers this year but is treated like a seasoned vet and gets none of the anticipatory hype that accompanies Manning. And that’s because Roethlisberger is already the truth, while Manning is pure fiction.
I’m not saying Eli Manning won’t be a good NFL quarterback. All I’m saying is that he’s not even close to one right now. The Broncos comeback was due, in all parts, to a shoddy Denver secondary. And Manning’s 12-31 follow-up performance against the Redskins was even worse than the numbers indicate because Tiki Barber was running all over Washington. The little girl should have been tearing up a banged-up 'Skins D that was putting eight guys in the box to stop Tiki.
At one point in the game Manning threw up a dead-duck of a ball to Amani Toomer. Had Shawn Springs not slipped, the pass would have been deflected or intercepted. Instead, Toomer nearly called for a fair-catch and the Giants got a first down. This play set Daryl Johnston and Kenny Albert off on a five-minute dissertation about how Manning was already one of the best QB’s in the league. It reminded me of watching the Falcons Monday Night football game when Michael Vick was over and underthrowing every receiver as John Madden was touting his virtues.

Speaking of quarterbacks, what’s your take on Michael Vick. I remember in college you saying he might revolutionize the quarterback position, but so far he hasn’t progressed as a passer at all. Will he ever progress, or will he always be a poor passer near the bottom of the league in passing below rookies like Kyle Orton?
It seems that we both made an effortless Manning/Vick connection. I remember saying that about Vick at some point during sophomore year, but I’m guessing I was in no state to be making rational judgments about the NFL futures of quarterbacks who were flicking their wrist and launching the ball 60 yards off their back foot on national television.
However, I did say he might revolutionize the position at the time, and I still agree with the sentiment from back in 2000. (If I recall, you agreed too, before turning back from German class because you didn’t think you “could handle it.”) At that point, Vick seemed to have it all, speed, agility, an arm, good decision making ability and precision combined into one. I believed he would turn the QB position into a passer/runner hybrid that would change NFL defensive schemes and the prototypical quarterback. Unfortunately, Vick’s good decision making and precision seemed to have gotten lost on the trip from Blacksburg to Atlanta.
He has regressed during his five-year NFL career, to the point where anytime he drops back to pass his is a detriment to his team. Yes, you can state his record as a starting QB, but that only marginalizes the contributions by Warrick Dunn and defenders like Rod Coleman.
The question now is, can Vick ever become a good passer? It took Donovan McNabb until his 6th season (which happened to coincide with the arrival of Terrell Owens) to become a great NFL quarterback. It also should come as no shock that McNabb had the fewest rushing attempts and rushing yards of his career in that season.
Vick still always is thinking about running when he drops back to pass. The first time he goes back to pass and is thinking about throwing instead of running will be the first step towards Michael Vick becoming the quarterback everybody expected him to be. If he continues with his freestyle runs two things will happen: 1) The Falcons might keep winning, but Vick will never become anything more than a below-average passer. 2) Vick will never be healthy for another game in his career.

I have not heard one person in the media say Brett Favre’s last play against the Bengals was ridiculous, all I hear is that poor Brett is trying to do too much, he doesn’t have players around him. So instead of having one last play to go to the end zone by spiking the ball, Favre fake spikes it, surprising every Packer on the field and runs 10 yards past the line of scrimmage then throwing it? What is that all about, how many free passes does this guy get for doing stupid things (6 INTs in a playoff game against Rams, being over the line of scrimmage against the Vikings in the playoffs last year, the interception against the Eagles in the playoffs). Maybe he’s like a kid out there because his brain capacity is that of an inbred hillbilly child from Mississippi instead of the alleged childish emotion he brings to the game. He was great at one time (and you have no idea how much I hate to say that) but at some point he needs to be shredded in the media for stupid stuff like that.
Be honest, that was less of a question than it was a cry for help, wasn’t it Wolfman?
You’re right about Favre and the free-passes though, and you’ve been right about it for the past five years. The media is so in love with Brett Favre that they refuse to criticize him, even in must-criticize situations like the interception against the Eagles two playoffs ago. They do it for the same reason no movie critics will rip a Clint Eastwood movie; you can't knock a legend, which is why nobody blinked when Marlon Brando would mail-in his final few movie performances just to get paycheck large enough to cover the cost of flying Big Mac's to his private island.
I watched Blood Work a few months ago on HBO and it was, seriously, one of the worst movies I had ever seen. Eastwood directed and starred, so I was wondering how the reviews were. Some excerpts:

"Although the identity of the action thriller's culprit is painfully evident early in the movie, Mr. Eastwood's direction is skillful enough to keep the suspense percolating."
Philip Wuntch, DALLAS MORNING NEWS

"You don't know whether to admire the film's stately nature and call it classicism or be exasperated by a noticeable lack of pace. Or both."
Kenneth Turan, LOS ANGELES TIMES

"It's not an important picture, and probably not even a memorable one, but I had a good time."
Charles Taylor, SALON

"For all its plot twists, and some of them verge on the bizarre as the film winds down, Blood Work is a strong, character-oriented piece."
Susan Stark, DETROIT NEWS

"What Blood Work lacks in speed and surprise it almost makes up for in doughty professionalism."
A.O. Scott, NEW YORK TIMES

"It can be argued, I suppose, that Blood Work was designed from the outset not so much as a whodunit as a why-and-how-dunit, and here the film becomes metaphysically ingenious."
Andrew Sarris, NEW YORK OBSERVER

Translation: This movie sucks, but if Clint Eastwood dies tomorrow I don’t want to be the movie reviewer who ripped his last film.
It’s the same thing with Favre. I think all these guys in the press are either blinded by their love of Favre and think he is infallible (like doting parents who refuse to acknowledge their hellion of a child), or don’t want to criticize him for fear of alienating him or their readers.
The best football writer alive, Dr. Z., did briefly mention Favre’s ridiculous play in his Power Rankings, as I’m sure you saw. (In the same rankings, the good doc also became the first online writer to mention Cornelius Griffin’s injury and how that adversely affected the Redskins defensive line during the Giants game, a key note that wasn’t mentioned once by Daryl Johnston, which I guess isn’t surprising coming from a guy nicknamed “Moose”.)
By the way, I thought the greatest part of the final Favre play was him flipping the ball when he was eight-yards past the line of scrimmage. He had that A.J. Pierzynski look on his face like, “I know this isn’t going to work, but maybe it will if I sell it hard enough.”

That guy who took the ball from Favre was hilarious. I’ve heard a lot of people calling him an idiot, though I reserve that term for Woody Paige and quarterbacks who run ten yards down field then throws the ball on the games final play. What do you think, was it funny or did it make you mad that a fan interrupted the game?
The only funnier thing I saw last week was this.

Do you think Shaun Alexander and Edge get big contracts from their respective teams, or do you see them elsewhere next year?
Everyone who has read this blog for any amount of time knows that I think Edgerrin James is the most overlooked player in football. All he does is rush for 1,300 yards and 10 TDs every season but guys like Kevan Barlow and Domanick Davis get more training camp-hype.
That being said, the Colts would be stupid to give him a huge contract as Edge is nine carries away from crossing the dreaded 2,000 carry barrier where so many great backs go to die. Somebody probably will though, so Edge could be elsewhere in 2006. (This is the main problem with the salary cap. It was never introduced to keep teams from re-signing their own players, it was adopted so teams couldn’t hoard free agents. It keeps parity in the NFL, but at what price?)
Shaun Alexander is the A. Rod of running backs. He gets so many yards in garbage time and his touchdowns come in bunches against crappy teams. So many times Alexander has a 25 carry, 90 yard day in which he got 40 yards on 22 carries and the remaining 50 on three late meaningless carries. Give me a guy like Thomas Jones who moves the chains all day instead of someone who does it when it doesn’t matter. I think the Seahawks realize this too, which is why they’ve given Shaun Alexander a series of one-year contracts.

Is Jacksonville the epitome of average? Apparently they have an easy schedule the rest of the way, but doesn’t that seem like a ticket to losing in the first round of the playoffs as a wild card? Do they just have trouble putting it all together or are they simply not as good as people say they are?
I haven’t gone out of my way to hide my man-crush on Byron Leftwich, but Sunday’s loss at St. Louis gave me serious reservations as to whether Byron has what it takes to stay in a long-term relationship. A team desperate for respect and a big road win like Jacksonville can’t go in to St. Louis and lose to a team missing three of their four biggest offensive weapons, particularly on a day where Fred Taylor runs like the Fred Taylor of old.
Jacksonville has big wins against Cincinnati and the Roeth-less-berger Steelers and their losses are at Indy, at St. Louis and home against Denver. I wouldn’t go as far as to say they’re just average, but they certainly aren’t the 3rd best team in the NFL like I had them ranked last week.
Jacksonville will make the playoffs because their remaining schedule is as follows: vs. Houston, vs. Baltimore, at Tennessee, at Arizona, at Cleveland, vs. Indianapolis, vs. San Francisco, at Houston, vs. Tennessee.
For the record, that’s eight games against teams currently with one or two wins. Figure the Jags will at least six of those, which puts them at 10-6 and in good position to get wrecked by New England in the first round of the playoffs.

I know you like to pick on the Bengals but you have to admit Carson Palmer is awesome.
Carson Palmer is awesome. He leads the league in yards, touchdowns, completion percentage (almost 70%, which is ridiculous) and trails only Big Ben in passer rating. Palmer is the real deal and once Marvin Lewis lives up to his reputation as a defensive genius, the Bengals will be too.

What do you see happening in the Colts-Patriots game? Your Colts man crush has seemed to wane this year, so who are you taking Monday night. And since I assume you’re taking the Colts, do you think the Colts are the team this year because they’re that good or the Patriots aren’t that good. And don’t say you’ll cover it tomorrow when you do your Friday picks because we all know most of the previews have nothing to do with football.
I won’t say I’ll cover it tomorrow, because I never cover Monday night games on Friday. Check back Monday afternoon for my take on the Colts/Pats game, sucka.
Oh, alright, I'll answer your question just because I know all to well what happens when you become more wolf than man. The Colts are 7-0 but their most impressive win is a 10-3 struggle over the mediocre Jaguars. They were also down 17-0 to the Rams when Marc Bulger got hurt. If he stays upright, Indy loses that game. Their other wins are against the same awful teams that Jacksonville will play over the next nine weeks, so it’s really tough to tell whether the Colts new and improved defense is simply beating up on weak competition or has actually made huge strides from last season.
I still don’t know who I’m taking on Monday night. I assume it will be the Colts, but part of me wants to take New England because they’ll have no pressure on them. Everyone expects the Colts to choke, they have to win or else the 800-pound gorilla on their backs will become an 8 billion-pound one. The Pats, on the other hand, are playing with house money. Plus, they got this guy named Tedy Bruschi back last week. Apparently he had a stroke in February but, remarkably, is back on the football field! This is the sort of story Sunday NFL Countdown should have spent 18 minutes covering at the top of the show last weekend, yet I barely heard anything about it.
I think the game boils down to this: The Colts aren’t as good as everyone thinks and the Pats aren’t as bad as everyone thinks. Indy is healthier, and therefore a little better. But with the weight on Peyton Manning’s shoulders and a raucous crowd in Foxborough, it should be a memorable night, especially if Corey Dillon steals a Schweppes shirt from some drunk chick.

Questions from a Wolfman is an occasional feature on this site.