By Thomas Chambers

Do we love our four seasons in Chicago?
When you can’t live in Palm Springs, that’s what you say.
We’re in the middle of the baseball season, which will soon turn into a race. What am I here? George Carlin? The football season is right around the corner. And our Blackhawks are already preparing for their season.
Tangent: Not to step on the Beachwood baseball turf of Marty or Roger, but why do the MLB morons not have the Cubs and Sox play an odd number of games so as to allow bragger’s rights? Screw Padres at Red Sox. But when it come to Cubs-Sox or Yankees-Mets, have they no meaning? And don’t get me started on the umpiring.
Simply put, it’s always Thoroughbred horse racing season, 364 every year, with cleansing on Christmas Day.
But you’d miss out if you didn’t know or feel the rhythms, nuances, sine and cosign of the waves of racing. And right now, we are on the very top of a supremely tasty one, a Banzai pipe, East and West. Hang on. It’s Duke Kahanamoku time.

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Posted on July 30, 2016

By Jim Coffman and Steve Rhodes

Epic PR fail reminiscent of bad old days. Plus: Tommy Boy LaStella To Sell His Brake Pads In Des Moines; The Adam Warren Commission; Chris The Tank Engine; The Bears Are Already Grinding Coach Coffman’s Gears; and Olympic Gamesmanship.

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Posted on July 29, 2016

By Brooke Macnamara/The Conversation

We’ve all heard that “practice makes perfect.” Is this true?
Some would unequivocally say “yes.” In 1993, psychologist K. Anders Ericsson and colleagues proposed the deliberate practice view, which suggests that high-quality practice – deliberate practice – largely explains performance differences across people.
In other words, the theory holds that if “Person A” is an expert and “Person B” is mediocre, then the large difference in their performance levels is attributed to a similarly large difference in how much each has practiced. The primary evidence provided for this claim was that the “best” student violinists in the 1993 Ericsson et al. study had, on average, accumulated 10,000 hours of deliberate practice, which was more than the averages of the lower-skilled groups.

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Posted on July 29, 2016

It may be Chicago baseball rivalry week, but I think all Chicago baseball fans could use a distraction right about now. So let’s start talking about fantasy football.
Fantasy football analysts have been predicting the devaluation of the top-tier fantasy RB for many years. Yet, year after year, many of us have ended up stacking our top 10 and top 20 rankings with RBs, so it sure seemed like RBs were more prized than ever. Perhaps we realized that rarity is a big part of what creates value.
But those days are over for many reasons, among them the rise of point-per-reception leagues, the evolution of the NFL into a passing league, and the fact that most NFL rosters now feature a much more evenly-talented 1-2 punch (or sometimes even a 1-2-3 punch) at RB.
Still for WRs to take over more of the top rankings from RBs, we need to see huge and highly consistent talent at the WR position.
We finally have it. With no further delay, my overall preseason top 20 fantasy football rankings:

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Posted on July 28, 2016

By Douglas Busvine/Reuters

LONDON – British enthusiasts have launched a bid for the ancient sport of jousting, in which riders in steel armor charge and try to knock each other off their horses with a 12-foot pole, to be made an Olympic sport.
Long a feature of themed medieval fairs, jousting deserves to be recognized as a “Western martial art” and added to the roster of Olympic events, said professional jouster Dominic Sewell.
“You can see jousts from Russia to Australia to Western California,” Sewell, suited up in chain mail, told Sky TV on Thursday.
“It’s becoming a truly international sport and that’s why we are calling for it to be recognized on an Olympic level.”

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Posted on July 27, 2016

By Eric Emery

Last Wednesday, I fulfilled a 10-month/lifelong dream and attended the AFC Bournemouth-Minnesota United friendly in Blaine, Minnesota. Here is my trip report.
Rough Itinerary: Metra/Blue Line to O’Hare, Spirit Airlines to Minneapolis, Blue Line light rail to hotel, Blue Line/bus to bar, fan bus at bar to game.
5:44 a.m.: I wake up one minute before the alarm. Everything is going to go so smoothly today. For turning off the alarm before it wakes up a spouse, don’t you get marital karma points or something?

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Posted on July 25, 2016

By Marty Gangler

As the Cubs inch closer to September, the biggest “deal” there is out there is what they are going to do at the trade deadline. Or, what more they are going to do at the deadline as they made a deal for some bullpen help already with Mike Montgomery. The move that seems like it’s a done deal involves the Cubs picking up Aroldis Chapman, he of the 30-game suspension for violation of the league’s domestic violence policy (he wasn’t criminally charged due to “conflicting stories and a lack of cooperation from all parties involved.”
To some Cub fans, acquiring Chapman goes against the “good time” vibe of the present-day Cubs, a bunch of mostly young kids holding dance parties after wins and wearing pajamas on road trips at the behest of their favorite uncle, who happens to manage the team.
Chapman and the Cubs sure don’t seem like a good fit, do they?

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Posted on July 25, 2016

By Jim Coffman

Does anyone have an encouraging word about the Bears?
Heading into the start of training camp this week in Bourbonnais you won’t hear it from me, at least not until I unload all sorts of discouraging ones.

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Posted on July 25, 2016

By Roger Wallenstein

According to general manager Rick Hahn, the White Sox are “mired in mediocrity,” but when it comes to crazy off-the-field, clubhouse shenanigans, they’re leading everyone. And Chris Sale is the ringmaster under the Big Top.
After Sale’s spring training tirade aimed at vice president Kenny Williams following Adam LaRoche’s bizarre walkout – as opposed to a walk-off which LaRoche failed to register in his one season on the South Side – the ace left-hander again went ballistic Saturday evening after being instructed to wear the uniform made famous by the South Side Hit Men 40 years ago.
Before examining exactly what is happening with this team and its best pitcher, let’s review the attire in question.

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Posted on July 25, 2016

By Jim Coffman and Steve Rhodes

Grinding Coach Coffman’s Gears! Plus: The Harry Caray Death Cult; Asset Sale; The Sad Sack Sox!; Derrick Rose Still Dim; In The Olympic Swim; and Dennis Green Crowned Their Ass.

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Posted on July 22, 2016