It was almost 15 years ago today, on March 18, 1995, that Michael Jordan announced that he was returning to the NBA with a two-word statement that simply read: "I'm back." Jordan, who had been retired since the end of the 1993 season, suited up for the Bulls that Sunday in a nationally-televised contest against the Indiana Pacers on NBC's Game of the Week. That game remains the most watched regular season game in the history of the NBA.

How fitting is it then that Tiger Woods announced his return to his sport on almost the same day Jordan did? Is it a coincidence? Maybe (probably). But Woods is the only athlete in the last twenty or so years who you can even compare to Michael Jordan. Who else but Woods and Jordan have single-handedly carried their respected sports to the degree that they have? When LeBron James took his Cavaliers to the finals against the Spurs, the ratings for the games were three times lower than the ratings Jordan's Bulls got in the '98 championship. Similarly, the total purse money given out at PGA tour events is more than three times higher than it was before Tiger joined up in 1996. Without Jordan and without Woods, the NBA and PGA just haven't been the same, and no matter what you think of Woods, the game of golf is better with him on the tee range than it is with him in a sex clinic.

When Woods arrives at Augusta National on the first week of April, the atmosphere and coverage there will be something out of this world. And if you don't think that that played into Woods' decision-making, then you must not know Tiger Woods or Michael Jordan. After retiring from minor league baseball, Jordan could've picked any time to come back to the Chicago Bulls. It wasn't a coincidence that he came back on a game airing on NBC, back when NBC was the most-watched network in the country. It isn't a coincidence that Woods is coming back at the Masters, the biggest and most highly-covered golf tournament in the country, which also happens to draw the highest ratings. It certainly wasn't a coincidence that his first press conference since the car crash happened during the Accenture golf tournament, a decision everyone saw as a jab to the company that had dropped him as a sponsor that December.

Continue reading this post »

(Tulsa Shock President Steve Swetoha, new player Marion Jones, and Head Coach Nolan Richardson as the Tulsa Shock announce the signing of former Olympian Marion Jones. Photo by Rich Crimi, Getty Images)

In an unlikely side-story in the career of Marion Jones, the woman who was once the most recognized female sprinter in the nation has signed on with the Tulsa Shock of the WNBA. Jones, 34, was the starting point guard on the North Carolina basketball team that a won a national championship in 1994. Jones won five medals at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, including three gold. She was later stripped of all her medals after admitting that she had taken performance-enhancing drugs and also spent a half-year in prison for lying in a court of law.

Although Marion hasn't played basketball in about 15 years, she is easily the highest-profiled woman to join the WNBA over the last ten years.

Jones is not the first sprinter to make a crossover into other sports. Back in the day, when the NFL and NBA drafts went more than 15 rounds, it wasn't unheard of for teams to draft Olympics sprinters in the quixotic hope of them joining the team. In 1984, for instance, Carl Lewis was drafted by both the Dallas Cowboys of the NFL and the Chicago Bulls of the NBA (Lewis, of course, wasn't interested in playing with either, and signed with neither of them). Even now, people talk about what it would be like if Usain Bolt -- the world's fastest man -- were to play in the NFL.

(The Montreal Expos in 2002. The Expos were one of several MLB teams in financial trouble; rather than ceasing operations, they moved to Washington and became the Nationals. Photo by Paul Chiasson, AP)

Every once in a while, you'll hear grumblings about how sports leagues should consider contracting their number of teams. Usually these complaints come only from the fans and are rarely uttered by anyone within the sport. There are exceptions though. When Major League Baseball was on the verge of a work stoppage in 2002, the Florida Marlins and the Minnesota Twins appeared destined to get erased, and the same was true of several NHL teams after the league canceled the entire 2004-2005 season. Recently, Jerry West voiced his opinion that the NBA would be better off if several teams were to be wiped from the books.

As much as we hear about contraction -- so much so that the word is in the lexicon of any sports fan -- it's worth noting that none of the big sports leagues have ever done it. The Twins and Marlins escaped disaster, as did all of the NHL franchises. And if you've heard David Stern's plans to build an entire European division of the NBA in the future, you know that reduction is the last thing on his mind.

We're in an age of sports where more is better, and the notion of over-saturating the product is often ignored. The NFL plans to expand its regular season to 18 games while both Major League Baseball and the NCAA basketball tournament are considering adding even more opening-round playoff games. The same is true of the number of sports teams in each league. The big four see addition as their best way to globalize their sport; more teams mean more fans, and more fans mean more money.

Continue reading this post »

(photo by Randy Belice/NBAE via Getty Images)

Yesterday, it was reported that the Philadelphia 76ers are in negotiations to buy out the remainder of Allen Iverson's contract. While it was rumored that the Sixers had begun planning this as early as two months ago, the fact that it comes while Iverson is missing time due to his daughter's health issues throws into question the reason why the 76ers picked him up in the first place. On the same day, the San Diego Chargers announced that after nine years, LaDainian Tomlinson has been released. During his time with San Diego, Tomlinson amassed one of the five highest touchdown and rushing yard totals in NFL history. Yet even he was given the axe.

The fact that both players got shown the door (or in Iverson's case, is getting shown the door) speaks volumes about how difficult it now is to remain on one team for years and years and years. The age of the John Elways and Reggie Millers and Tony Gwynns -- who played their entire career with the same club -- appears to be over, or at the very least is on its last breaths. It doesn't make sense why the 76ers would cut Iverson, who was signed on mostly to attract crowds, with only two months of the season remaining and with all the opportunity in the world to give A.I. a farewell tour (which are becoming rarer and rarer in sports).

In baseball and particularly in basketball, free agency gives players all the opportunity in the world to skip town. With teams like the Yankees and Red Sox and Cubs able to give players $100-million-salaries, and with a readily increasing number of teams who are incapable of supporting such players (Tampa Bay, Florida, Oakland, Pittsburgh, Kansas City, Minnesota), the likelihood of a baseball player playing anywhere for 20 years is almost impossible. Only the highest of the highly-paid, the Ichiros and Jeters of the world, have a chance to do it, and even they could sign on with another team for the final years of their career, ala Michael Jordan or Babe Ruth. And then there's the chance they could get cut as their production wears off, ala L.T.

Of course if any league has a consistency problem it's the NBA, which is about to experience its most anticipated offseason in its 60-plus year existence. Only six players have been on their team for at least 10 years, and that number probably won't get much higher with players such as LeBron, Amar'e, Wade, Johnson, Boozer, McGrady, and Ray Allen available for free agency.

Meanwhile, once again standing above all the other leagues is the NFL, which sees a pittance of offseason activity compared to the NBA or MLB. Sure, Tomlinson got canned, but there are still a few big-name stars who have spent their entire career with one team. Barring any Favre-like activity, it's hard to imagine that Tom Brady or Peyton Manning will ever play with another team. Still, pretty much every quarterback beneath them will cut at some point in their careers, no thanks to their lack of a championship ring.

Basically it's almost impossible to last on a team for more than 15 years, and with clubs like the Chargers and 76ers eager to abandon loyalty for the sake of winning, the feat only gets tougher and tougher. In order for it to happen, a player has to be great enough to be the best player on his team and must be paid accordingly. During his time on the team, he absolutely must win at least one championship, otherwise people will shout for a rebuilding process while claiming that it'll never happen with him (ala Philly fans with Donovan McNabb). In essence, it's only available to Hall of Famers.

(Don Nelson yells in a game. Photo by Ezra Shaw, Getty Images)

It hasn't been a good year for Don Nelson and the Golden State Warriors. If the NBA season ended today, the Warriors' 27.5% winning percentage would be the lowest of Nellie's 31-year coaching career, and Nelson still faces rumors that he will be fired at the end of the season. Ironically, Nelson's least-successful season as a coach could be the one that puts him on the apex of the coaching win list; with 1,323 wins, Nelson needs only 10 more w's to pass Lenny Wilkens for the all-time record.

Golden State has 31 games left in the '09-10 season, which -- in theory -- should give Nelson a solid chance at passing the record. But the Warriors are the third-worst team in the league and 10 wins could be hard to come by. Prior to their 30-point domination of the Los Angeles Clippers, the Warriors had lost nine in a row and 13 of 15, with their only wins coming against the Bulls and Nets.

(the final shot of the series finale of M*A*S*H)

Wanna talk about coincidences? What are the odds that the all-time box office gross record and the record for the most-watched TV program ever would both fall in the span of five days? Slim, yet that's exactly what happened. On February 3, James Cameron's Avatar surpassed Titanic -- Cameron's previous film -- as the highest-grossing movie in cinematic history. And yesterday, Super Bowl XLIV between the New Orleans Saints and the Indianapolis Colts drew 106.5 million viewers, breaking a 27 year-old record previously held by the series finale of M*A*S*H.

Keep in mind that the No. 2 and No. 3 most-viewed Super Bowls were the previous two games between the Steelers and Cardinals and the Patriots and Giants. So don't get attached to the Saints-Colts record; there's a REAL good chance it'll fall next year.

The New Orleans Saints, one of the most beleaguered franchises in all of sports, are now the champions of the National Football League. Prior to their 31-17 victory over the Indianapolis Colts on Sunday, the Saints had done virtually nothing since their inaugural season in 1967. It took them a whopping 21 years to experience both a winning season and a playoff season, and it wasn't until 2000 -- with a 31-28 triumph over the Rams -- that they actually won a postseason game. Like the Arizona Cardinals, who pushed the Steelers to the limit in last year's Super Bowl, the Saints were playing in a game unprecedented in their franchise's history, but unlike the Cardinals, who lost in the final minute, the Saints closed strong and ended the contest with an interception of Peyton Manning and a game-clinching stop on fourth-and-goal.

Some other records and historical tidbits of Super Bowl XLIV:

• Sean Payton's onside kick was not only the first recovered onside kick outside of the fourth quarter, it was the first onside kick ever even attempted outside of the fourth quarter in Super Bowl history.
• By coming back from a 10-0 first quarter deficit, the Saints tied the 1987 Washington Redskins for the largest comeback in Super Bowl history.
• The NFC team has won the coin flip to begin the game a miraculous 13 times in a row. Interestingly enough, prior to the Saints, the team that had won the opening coin flip had lost 10 of the last 13 Super Bowls.
• Peyton Manning threw for 333 yards, an INT and a TD while completing 31 of 45 passes. While his an enormous fourth quarter interception may have cost his team a chance at victory, Manning did become the fourth quarterback to amount 5,000 career postseason passing yards, joining John Elway, Joe Montana and Brett Favre. Manning is now 9-9 in playoff games.
  
• Drew Brees had one of the greatest Super Bowl performances ever. By completing 32 of 39 passes while collecting two touchdowns and 288 yards, Brees tied a Super Bowl record for most completions in the big game. He tied Tom Brady, who threw for 32 catches in Super Bowl XXXVIII.

   

  (more after the jump...)

Continue reading this post »

The Associated Press reported on Sunday that during the height of the "Bay Boys" Detroit Pistons teams of the 1980's, coach Chuck Daly received numerous death threats and that the FBI had undergone an investigation to determine who sent them.

From the Washington Post:

One letter, mailed from Cleveland and postmarked April 24, 1989, arrived about two months after Cavaliers guard Mark Price suffered a concussion following a Rick Mahorn elbow and three months after Cleveland's Brad Daugherty and Detroit's Bill Laimbeer had an on-court fistfight.

"God made me realize that YOU, not Laimbeer, Mahorn or any of the others are the one possessed by (Satan)," the author wrote in the one-page handwritten letter addressed to "Mr. Chuck Daly."

While the FBI determined that none of the threats were serious, hence why Daly was never attacked, it is interesting that the Bad Boys' style of play wound up biting the team a little bit, or at least Daly. For all the emphasis we put into athletes' and coaches' bad behavior, we seldom consider what they may have to go through because of it. And really, playing a rough style of basketball isn't even that much of an offense. Who knows what sort of mail other athletes have received for more serious offenses?