This is the FDH Lounge Multimedia Magazine, a partner of our FDH LOUNGE Web TV program with web clips embedded here and on our YouTube channel at www.youtube.com/thefdhlounge. As with the show, there is nothing off-topic here for The Dignitaries of The FDH Lounge (sports/politics/TV/music/movies/geopolitics/pop culture/fun web stuff/fantasy sports/sports entertainment/etc.). With text/links/audio/video/pictures, we promise always to enlighten & entertain.
The 21st Century Media Alliance will be joining to provide live, as-it-happens coverage from the pro and college gridirons this fall, with on-the-ground coverage aggregated from a variety of outside media sources all over the country via Twitter. Today's presentation marks our sixth effort on the pro side.
PLEASE NOTE: While the Cover It Live software may classify the liveblog as being in "Standby," it is continuously updating from a variety of sources, averaging several entries per minute during the height of the day's action. You need only to click the play button to view the continuous updates and follow what has already been posted at any time. We hope you enjoy.
In addition to posting my weekly picks, I will post those from The FDH New York Bureau and FDH Lounge Dignitary Sean Trench for The FDH Lounge Dignitaries' Football Challenge Contest. Each week, we will single out our three strongest plays:
ME (2-1 last week, 9-4-2 overall)
Houston -4 ½ over Kansas City
San Diego -8 over St. Louis
New York Jets -3 over Denver-- my 1,000-Star Gold-Plated Lock of the Millennium for this week (Lock was 0-1 last week, 2-1-2 overall)
BUREAU (1-2 last week, 6-9 overall)
New York Giants -10 over Detroit
San Francisco -6 ½ over Oakland
Pittsburgh -14 over Cleveland
SEAN (1-2 last week, 3-12 overall)
TampaBay +4 ½ over New Orleans
San Francisco -6 ½ over Oakland
Chicago -6 ½ over Seattle
MY OTHER PICKS (4-10 last week [!!!], including my Big Three, 36-37-3 overall)
The 21st Century Media Alliance will be joining to provide live, as-it-happens coverage from the pro and college gridirons this fall, with on-the-ground coverage aggregated from a variety of outside media sources all over the country via Twitter. Today's presentation marks our third college effort.
PLEASE NOTE: While the Cover It Live software will classify the liveblog as being in "Standby," it is continuously updating from a variety of sources, averaging several entries per minute during the height of the day's action. You need only to click the play button to view the continuous updates and follow what has already been posted at any time. We hope you enjoy.
For the most part, we keep our fantasy content on our fantasy website and fantasy blog and keep this site for content on all subjects. It allows our readers to find specific content more easily that way. However, it has come to our attention that because our new fantasy sports newsletter is published on the older Blogger platform that our readers may be limited in their ability to subscribe to it. There does not appear to be a way to have content on the FantasyDrafthelp.com blog forwarded to an aggregate news reader -- however, we know that we have that ability here. So we will link to that newsletter each week right here when it is published. Here is this week's newsletter.
ALCS
New York Yankees vs. Texas
Power: New York Yankees, edge
Speed: Texas, edge
Starting Pitching: Even
Relief Pitching: Texas, slight edge
Key Player for New York Yankees: AJ Burnett -- The one big winter-of-'08 signing who hasn't panned out -- and should have looked pretty risky at the time -- can no longer be avoided in the revised LCS format that took out the faux travel day, so he needs to keep his team in the game somehow.
Key Player for Texas: CJ Wilson -- Based on how he thrived in his first year as a full-time starter, the Rangers now have two hammer lefties and they cannot win the series without fully exploiting New York's vulnerability in that regard.
The easy hook for this series is that it matches baseball's most decorated franchise with arguably its least -- or at least, the last one to advance to an LCS. The Yankees blew through Minnesota in the LDS just as they have previously and just as they did against Texas in three LDS in the late 1990s. Oddly, the Twins were configured slightly differently this time around, with a bit more emphasis on power and less on starting pitching. Same result, though. And this Ranger team is likewise a bit different from their softball-slugging forefathers with a bit less power, a bit more speed and a whole lot more pitching. The fact that it is southpaw-oriented is the main source for hope for good Yankee-haters everywhere. A secondary source of hope lies in the return to form of two Ranger lineup linchpins. The league's most explosive hitter, Josh Hamilton, will be returning to the scene of his greatest national exposure in the 2008 Home Run Derby. Can he round back into form after missing much of September and seeing his team advance past Tampa in spite of his weak performance? And can Ian Kinsler continue his sharp October after suffering through a sub-par regular season? If so, Texas will be in business, because when he's at his best, he's worthy of being in the conversation along with the Yanks' Robinson Cano for best AL second baseman. Speaking of momentum, former Texas first baseman Mark Teixeira recovered from his trademark slow start and has been red-hot through the second half. Ultimately, he's part of a deeper attack and while history has shown that the Yanks can be vulnerable to a faster, hungry young team (i.e. Florida in 2003), postseason experience and the confidence gained from past accomplishments should carry the Yankees into yet another World Series. Yankees in 6.
NLCS
San Francisco vs. Philadelphia Power: Philadelphia, slight edge
Speed: Philadelphia, edge
Starting Pitching: Even
Relief Pitching: San Francisco, edge
Key Player for San Francisco: Jonathan Sanchez -- Lefties hit only .181 against him in his breakthrough year, potential bad news for the Howard-Utley-Ibanez part of the Philly attack.
Key Player for Philadelphia: Brad Lidge -- Just like how San Fran has "Good Aubrey" and "Bad Aubrey," Philly has one of the great arms -- and great stomach-wreckers -- of this generation and he needs to be the former in a series that should be razor-thin.
It's tough to remember the last time each team through three aces at each other like what we're going to see in this series. The Halladay/Lincecum throwdown in particular is pay-per-view worthy. It will be very interesting to see what materializes in Game Four when super-rook Madison Bumgarner faces off with the man who exemplifies the first syllable of his last name, Joe Blanton. In a close series, the bullpen edge and the Mad Man could prove decisive, but Philly's experience and proven lineup -- which contrasts sharply to the Giants' admittedly impressive job of achieving reclamation in so many spots -- are likely to trump those elements. This clash looks like a lock to go seven, but those kinds of series never do. Phillies in 6.
WORLD SERIES PREDICTION
Phillies over Yankees in 6.
^ This year, depending on the combinations in the World Series between the Rangers, Yankees, Phillies and Giants, there are many different possibilities for history to be made.Here’s the first of many odd facts, right off the bat: if the Yankees and Phillies meet in a World Series rematch, it will be the first time since 1956-58 that a team that has won three straight pennants (the Phillies now, the Yankees then) would be meeting a team that has won two straight pennants (the Yankees now, the Milwaukee Braves then).The Yankees and Phillies would also meet in the tenth rematch in World Series history, following the Yankees and Dodgers in 1977-78, Yankees and Braves in 1957-58, Yankees and Dodgers in 1955-56, Yankees and Dodgers in 1952-53, Yankees and Cardinals in 1942-43, Yankees and Giants in 1936-37, As and Cardinals in 1930-31, Yankees and Giants in 1921-23 and Tigers and Cubs in 1907-08.
^ Credit to Wikipedia: along with the Cubs, the Phillies are one of only two old-line NL teams who the Yankees haven’t lost to in a World Series.
^ If the Giants and Rangers meet in the World Series, it will stir memories of what seemed at the time an entirely random matchup: June 12, 1997 marked the first regular-season interleague game ever with San Francisco at Texas.
^ If the Yankees and Giants meet in the World Series, it will be the matchup with the most combined pennants in history (62), surpassing the 1981 World Series between the Yankees and Dodgers (54), the 1999 World Series between the Yankees and Braves (53) and the 1978 World Series between the Yankees and Dodgers (52).If the Rangers and Phillies form the championship combo, they will have nine pennants between them, good for a tie for seventh in the LCS era (post-1968), ahead of Orioles-Mets in 1969 (4), Royals-Phillies in 1980 (5), Indians-Marlins in 1997 (6), Blue Jays-Phillies in 1993 (7), White Sox-Astros in 2005 (7), Rays-Phillies in 2008 (8) and Orioles-Reds (9) in 1970.
^ In terms of potential renewals of rivalries between cities in the World Series, New York and Philadelphia top the list because of the many playoff meetings and divisional battles they have seen across all four major sports.Philly vs. Texas would be intriguing because it would match the markets engaged in one of the NFL’s great enduring rivalries.Philly and San Francisco don’t have a ton of history between them – they’ve never met in the NLCS before, having previously alternated eras when they have been strong – but they did share Wilt Chamberlain and the NBA Warriors franchise.And there hasn’t been a lot of interaction between New York and Frisco – although they did meet in the 1962 World Series, the only matchup of the historically recurring rivalry since the Giants moved west in 1958 – other than the epic Giants-49ers battles of the 1980s.
^ Some indicators look good for the Rangers’ chances.Ron Washington is the only manager in this year’s LCS without World Series experience.The last seven times this was the case, that manager moved on to the final round: 2009 (Joe Girardi), 2001 (OhioUniversity’s Bob Brenly), 2000 (Bobby Valentine), 1998 (Bruce Bochy), 1997 (Jim Leyland), 1996 (Joe Torre) and 1995 (Mike Hargrove).The last such manager to lose in the LCS? Dick Howser in 1984 – and his Royals won it all the next year.Also, the last four teams in the LCS for the first time (Tampa Bay in 2008, Colorado in 2007, Arizona in 2001 and Florida in 1997) advanced to the World Series.
^ But some indicators bode poorly for the Rangers’ chances as well.Teams from the AL West have lost in the ALCS six of the last seven times: lost in 2009 (Angels), 2006 (As), 2005 (Angels), won in 2002 (Angels), lost in 2001 (Mariners), lost in 2000 (Mariners) and lost in 1995 (Mariners).
^ The Rangers’ long-awaited ALCS debut marks the second time that an entire division has qualified for it since the start of the three-round playoffs in 1995.The NL West completed the feat with Colorado in 2007.The NL East may very well have attained this had the strike not prevented Montreal – arguably the best team in baseball in 1994 – from advancing at least that far.The Blue Jays are the only AL East team not to make it since 1995, but they were there the previous two times in 1992-93 when they won the World Series each year.
^ If the Giants make it back to the World Series, it will be exactly eight years in between appearances.When was the last time that happened?1979, when BOTH Pittsburgh and Baltimore made it back after an eight-year absence.
^ This year stands out in one regard: not since the start of the LDS in 1995 has each league featured a matchup of teams who have never faced one another for the league championship but who could have because they were in opposite divisions in the old two-division setup from 1969-93.The last time each league featured a matchup of two teams who have never faced each other for the league championship?1993, with Toronto vs. the Chicago White Sox and Atlanta vs. Philadelphia in the final LCS not to be preceded by the LDS.
^ We mentioned in our LDS notes that the World Series has never failed to feature an “old-line” franchise (those who were around prior to the post-1961 expansions in the game).But last year’s “all-old line” World Series between Philly and the Yankees is pretty rare in the recent history of the game.The last few were St. Louis vs. Detroit in 2006, St. Louis vs. Boston in 2004, the Yankees vs. Atlanta (keeping in mind that the Braves go way back, in Milwaukee and in Boston before that) in 1999 and 1996 and Cleveland vs. Atlanta in 1995.So in terms of the likelihood of seeing the Yankees vs. Philly again or the Yankees against the Giants, you have to go back to the first two years of the LDS format in 1995-96 to find a World Series comprised solely of these franchises in back-to-back years.
^ Speaking of old-line teams, this is the third consecutive NLCS featuring exclusively teams from this designation.There hasn’t been a run like that in the National League since the one from 1989-96.The AL hasn’t had one of these matchups since 2007 (Red Sox-Indians) and 2006 (Tigers-As).
^ There’s plenty of interesting Bruce Bochy notes.First and foremost, if the Giants make it to the World Series, he will be going back after a 12-year hiatus.He’d be in very good company as far as managers with a similar break between appearances: Bucky Harris (23 years), Connie Mack (15 years), Tony LaRussa (14 years), Joe Cronin (13 years), Alvin Dark (12 years, with the first one coming with the Giants in 1962), Bill McKechnie, Danny Murtaugh and Dick Williams (11 years) and Leo Durocher and Charlie Grimm (10 years).All but Cronin and Grimm have a world championship to their credit.Also, because he managed against the Yankees with the Padres in 1998, if he gets them again, he’ll duplicate the feat of Durocher (who managed the Dodgers and Giants against the Yankees) and McKechnie (who managed the Cardinals and Yankees against the Yankees) in facing the same team in the World Series at the helm of two different squads.Additionally, he would be the fifth manager to take two different teams from the same state to the World Series (Durocher: Dodgers/Giants, Dark: Giants/As, Williams: As/Padres and Yogi Berra: Yankees/Mets).
We’ve got another huge night of variety ahead for you on THE FDH LOUNGE (Wednesdays, 7-10 PM EDT on SportsTalkNetwork.com).
Once we come on the air in our new temporary perch at The Promenade at Harpo’s, we get going immediately with The Opening Statements of The FDH Lounge Dignitaries and our look at This Week in The FDH Lounge and then by turning again to a favorite web destination of ours.Unfortunately, ThisIsWhyYoureFat.com is no more, but ThisIsWhyYoureHuge.com has picked up the slack and then some.We’ll go through some meals that could kill you in a single setting and see if anything actually sounds digestible.
At the bottom of the first hour, Ken Palmer of The Giants Beat comes on to talk about the Big Apple’s “other” hugely talented and volatile squad.Additionally, he covers the New Jersey Devils for their arena program and he is also a big fan of the Phillies and PennState football and we’ll hit those as well.
At the top of Hour Two, it’s the return of THE GOON SQUAD!Our hockey “show-within-a-show” is now a recurring feature as opposed to an every-week segment, but we’ll be covering the great cold-weather sport heavily this winter and we start out with a great roundtable to preview the 2010-11 season.Jan Levine of HockeyBuzz and Keith Korneluk of KingsCast will be on with us.Also, don’t forget our fantasy – and non-fantasy – guide FANTASY HOCKEY DRAFTOLOGY 2010, the only publication you need to be up to speed this year.
From there, a big-time past guest, Episode #65 and Episode #99’s Kenny Albert will be back on to discuss his work broadcasting Rangers and Knicks games in New York, Olympic hockey for the NBC networks, college hoops for ESPN Plus and NFL and MLB for Fox Sports.He’s seen some great NFL action lately and we’ll be talking about everything he sees from his unique perch in American sports.
At the top of HOUR THREE, The FDH Lounge Pigskin Report dissects last weekend’s Alabama upset and previews the first BCS Standings of the season and a big slate of Saturday games – to say nothing of breaking down what the shocking slate of outcomes last Sunday bodes for the NFL season.
Then, THE FANTASY DRAFTHELP.COM INSIDER closes out the show with our big NFL Week 6 preview.As always, you should be using our FANTASY FOOTBALL DRAFTOLOGY 2010 as your guide through the season, along with our weekly fantasy newsletter at The FantasyDrafthelp.com Blog – which, during the football season, has your list of which players to start each week.
As always, we urge you to watch the show live (or listen if you’re on dial-up), but if you can’t catch this as it’s happening, you can always catch the FDH archives 24-7 right here or catch us on iTunes. Also, you can sample THE FDH LOUNGE VAULT, a compilation of our best interviews and roundtables, now every weeknight from 6-7 PM, also on SportsTalkNetwork.com.
Before I delve into the meat of this column, I’m going to bottom-line what that headline is about: I would put my convictions as a spending hawk up against anyone’s, but if the coming GOP resurgence means more of their cowardly borrow-and-spend policies when the country is in crisis, then yes, tax hikes are the lesser evil.
I’d like to start by mentioning a recent column by my good friend Scott Pullins, a tax and spending hawk by anyone’s measure.I was his sidekick as he rose through the ranks to become Ohio College Republican Chairman (before I moved on to my “ideologue, not a partisan” phase of life) back in the day and he’s always been pretty hard-core.As such, there might be many people shocked by his recent endorsement of Ohio Democratic Governor Ted Strickland in his reelection campaign against John Kasich.It’s worth noting that Scott, in his public policy career, has had ample opportunity to observe Kasich’s true colors up close and if he finds him lacking, that’s good enough for me.Having said that, I can’t join him in voting for Strickland; I’ll probably just cast the same protest vote as in every gubernatorial election since 1994 and write in Scott himself!Nothing exemplifies the notion that “a lesser evil is still an evil” like Ohio Republicans.
But Scott’s decision is a perfect example of why you have to scratch the surface a bit when you see something that might be a bit surprising at first glance.Given all that I have written about my opposition to tax hikes over the years, my (qualified) advocacy of one in this column may seem shocking.But with the Republicans poised to take over the House next year and make a huge dent in their Senate deficit, they will have to actually stand for something.I sounded the alarm early on about Dubya’s “compassionate conservatism” because I saw that the Karl Rove pabulum about building a durable majority meant waving the white flag on exploding government once and for all.
What Scott and I have in common above all else is intellectual honesty.Neither of us has ever knowingly defended the indefensible.That’s not to say that we haven’t changed our minds about a few things along the way – I wasn’t born a paleocon – but we don’t subscribe to the bumper-sticker mentality of today’s partisans.As such, I acknowledge, and I would guess that Scott might as well, that Republicans have been a borrow-and-spend party for a few decades now.Certainly, Ronald Reagan’s priorities at the time have been proven correct by the successful end to the Cold War that his defense buildup helped hasten, but even he would have agreed that in a perfect world that we would actually pay for the government we utilized.How do I know that?Because he (reluctantly) closed some tax loopholes and raised some taxes in his first term when the deficit first began to really explode.And as much as I loathed it when George H.W. Bush raised taxes (the move that led me to split away from him once and for all), his policies at least were coherent compared to his runaway-spending son.
This column is predicated on the notion that our nation looms on the precipice like Greece.Our short-term government debt is bad enough; with our long-term obligations set to explode as the Baby Boomers collect Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid in full force, we are absolutely flat-out doomed if we continue on the present course of talking a good game about cutting spending but never actually implementing it.
Of course, to be an elected Republican is to pretend that George W. Bush was a real skinflint who left matters behind in great shape on January 20, 2009.[This sad reality is compounded by Rove’s lingering status as a power broker and the sublimation in his mind of all other priorities to the rehabilitation of his former boss.]Granted, President Obama has taken a bad situation and made it far worse by compounding all of Bush’s spending mistakes ten-fold, but we can’t get anywhere as a country if entities aren’t owning up to their own piece of the blame.The American people are finally focused and engaged on this issue as never before and there’s finally no excuse left for the GOP to play the know-nothing game on fiscal policy.The voters finally can see through such games.
Before I address the choice that seems ahead of us, I would like to address the ideal hierarchy of answers to the debt crisis engulfing our government.I would hope that all sane people could agree that the best solution to getting the government back on its feet would be to cut unnecessary spending, live within its means and have no need of higher taxes – or at the very least, generate needed tax revenue by way of dynamic tax cuts like those on capital gains that actually lead to more tax money coming into the government.
Short of that, though, I would hope that all sane people could then agree that higher taxes – imposed in the least intrusive manner possible, whether by closing existing loopholes or, more likely, instituting a national Value Added Tax (VAT) – would be preferable to falling off the debt cliff.We cannot default on our debt or see it rise to a rate that is unsustainable for future financing.To do so is to put every existing obligation by the federal government at extreme risk.The entire system could fall apart with nothing to replace it.
So, believe me, in my heart of hearts, I want elected Republicans to have the testicular fortitude (TM Mick Foley) to take a hard stand on spending and fix the problem completely “the right way.”This column is geared towards testing whether that is possible, or whether horrible yet necessary measures will be needed to disarm this fiscal time bomb.
I have identified half a trillion dollars of spending – most of it annual spending – that I would like to see eliminated.These are all spending cuts that I personally endorse.The links that accompany each one spell out the proposals as they were created by budget experts.
While my Lounge colleague Nate Noy takes issue – perhaps rightfully so – with my description of these cuts as the “low-hanging fruit,” they do undeniably constitute a first tier of what is possible in terms of restructuring this government.In other words, while these may not be easy, they sure are compared to the heavy lifting that lies ahead with the entitlement programs and as such, they’re perfect for calling the bluff of Republicans who claim to be riding to the rescue.After all, as much as I hate to give credit to the statists, they are right that every time they ask the GOP for specifics on spending cuts, all they get is the old Jackie Gleason “Humina humina” routine.
So here’s my $500 billion that I deem expendable.If the Republican leadership can’t join me on at least half of this, they are hopeless and should wave the white flag on tax policy for the good of the republic.
And if the American people recoil?Well, then it will be time to adapt the lessons of recent foreign policy adventurism at home.The neocons taught us the hard way, at great cost in terms of blood and treasure, that we cannot force good government on others abroad.If those of us who understand that it is rational to avoid higher taxes if at all possible are proven to be in the minority, then we must accept that ours is a constitutional republic and we must deliver and fund the Big Government that our fellow citizens demand.
That doesn’t mean that wise Americans should give up the fight in the long term, and certainly, we reserve the right to point out the costs that accompany this unfortunate decision.It is entirely possible that the bitter medicine of higher taxes – which, as sane people know, even if aimed at higher-income people will have deleterious effects for many beyond that in terms of consumer spending – may be just the tonic necessary to wake the American people up once and for all about how the federal behemoth needs to be contained.
But that step is secondary.First, this nation must choose once and for all the kind of government we really want.Republicans, armed with a list of cuts like the ones listed above, should muster the courage for once in their lives to wage a fight about the scope of government.But if they lose, or more likely, cannot even bring themselves to do something they deem so poll-unfriendly in the first place, then they should at least be decent enough to admit the consequences and get on with the business of trying to settle our debt by all means necessary.
The 21st Century Media Alliance will be joining to provide live, as-it-happens coverage from the pro and college gridirons this fall, with on-the-ground coverage aggregated from a variety of outside media sources all over the country via Twitter. Today's presentation marks our fifth effort on the pro side.
PLEASE NOTE: While the Cover It Live software may classify the liveblog as being in "Standby," it is continuously updating from a variety of sources, averaging several entries per minute during the height of the day's action. You need only to click the play button to view the continuous updates and follow what has already been posted at any time. We hope you enjoy.
In addition to posting my weekly picks, I will post those from The FDH New York Bureau and FDH Lounge Dignitary Sean Trench for The FDH Lounge Dignitaries' Football Challenge Contest. Each week, we will single out our three strongest plays:
ME (3-0 last week, 7-3-2 overall) Indianapolis -7 over Kansas City Atlanta -3 over Cleveland Green Bay -2 1/2 over Washington -- my 1,000-Star Gold-Plated Lock of the Millennium for this week (Lock was 2-0 last week, 2-0-2 overall)
BUREAU (1-2 last week, 5-7 overall) New Orleans -7 over Arizona Atlanta -3 over Cleveland San Diego -6 over Oakland
SEAN (1-2 last week, 2-10 overall) Cincinnati -6 1/2 over Tampa Bay Dallas -7 over Tennessee New York Jets -4 over Minnesota
MY OTHER PICKS (8-6 last week, including my Big Three, 32-27-3 overall) Baltimore -7 over Denver Buffalo +1 over Jacksonville St. Louis +3 over Detroit Cincinnati -6 1/2 over Tampa Bay Chicago +1 over Carolina Houston -3 over New York Giants New Orleans -7 over Arizona San Diego -6 over Oakland Dallas -7 over Tennessee San Francisco -3 1/2 over Philadelphia Minnesota +4 over New York Jets
