DL516: Groundhog Day, Letters of Intent, Stephen A, NFL Labor, Groundhog Day

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It’s Groundhog Day. I refuse to recognize Staten Island Chuck as a deciding-factor of springtime. Seriously, look at this guy:

Anyway, we talk about that, plus a ton on National Signing Day, Stephen A. Smith going back to ESPN Radio (it really IS Groundhog Day) and some NFL Labor issues.

There is another show coming today. Thanks for listening.

Call of the Day: Former PA Governor Ed Rendell’s First Daily News Column(!)

Excited to read former Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell’s first official column as a member of the Philadelphia Daily News? He sure seemed excited to write it, using seven exclamation points in the story including six in the first three paragraphs(!)

Eagles touchdown in less than 35 seconds! We’re going to win the Super Bowl! I just know it, I feel it, we can’t be stopped!

You see, Rendell’s first column was just a dream, or at least he was just writing about a dream in his first column. It’s worded better that way, I suppose. And look, I like Ed Rendell. I really like the guy. I had the chance to interview him a week before the Eagles lost to the Cardinals in the NFC title game and asked him about the chances of an all Pennsylvania Super Bowl. He was excited about the idea back then, and using that concept as his first official newspaper column since leaving office, he’s still excited about the idea; even if it totally skews history, reality and common sense. Let’s review:

RendellREAD MORE

Over/Under: Reactions to the January Transfer Window

As we turn our calendar pages from January to February, an amazing sporting endeavor has just come to a close in big-time European soccer.  The so-called “January transfer window” in which clubs can buy, sell and loan players to and from other clubs has just ended.  Essentially, it’s like the baseball trading deadline except that clubs almost never exchange player-for-player, it’s more centered around flea market-type shopping.  You see someone elses wares and make an offer. It was particularly mental in England, where yesterday on the last day of the window, £200 million was spent (approximately $350 million) by clubs in the Barclay’s Premier League.

The English sporting media, predictably, went with the idea that the clubs have gone off the deep end, while the rest of the country sits in a harsh and seemingly-unending recession.

From the back page of the Daily Mirror, the headline “Football Crazy”.  From the Mail, the words “madness” and “craziest day” in transfer window history.  The Guardian calls it a “frenzy of crazy spending”.  You get the drift.  The BBC spent anREAD MORE

News@Noon: Bradley to EPL, Strasburg Quits Chew, KD/Bosh, Media, SAGs, Phil’s Layup & Pujols Math

News@Noon is a collection of links from people we know and like or stories about folks in sports we know and like. It is, and will always be, completely arbitrary. If you have something you want linked, send along.

• The transfer window deadline day has been must see reporting and tweeting and reporting about tweets and tweeting about reporting. Plus, news(!) like USMNT midfielder Michael Bradley making the move, reportedly, to Aston Villa. Many people think Bradley is a prototypical EPL midfielder, and finally he’ll get his chance.

• Last week we linked to Richard Deitsh of SI, tweeting about whether or not he’d be interested in Ombudsing for ESPN. Here’s Deitsch’s take on Don Ohlmeyer’s run with the WWL and other media thoughts — including an interview with Mike Mayock — in his Media Circus column.

• Big League Stew posted a story from the Washington Post about Stephen Strasburg trying to quit chewing tobacco because his former college coach, Tony Gwynn, was diagnosed with parotid cancer. Hopefully high school kids who think it’s cool to dip — baseballREAD MORE

NFL.com May Want To Reconsider Posting AP Content About The Pro Bowl

After catching the first few minutes of the Pro Bowl, it was on to more interesting TV viewing on Sunday night like re-runs of shows we’d missed earlier in the season, DVR’d dramas and Episodes with Matt LeBlanc, on Showtime.

The second half of a blowout Pro Bowl that eventually became a cosmetically-close game was just not in the cards on Sunday night, despite the fact that it was football and we only have one game left before, perhaps, the longest off-season in quite some time.

I wasn’t the only one who thought the game was a drag. The tweets of a blowout were quite hilarious, yes, but nothing compares to the rip job done by the writer for the Associated Press (in part):

The NFC’s 55-41 victory, a game not nearly as interesting as that score might suggest, did nothing to repair the tattered image of the NFL’s all-star contest.

Yikes! Where was this linked? ON THE NFL’S WEBSITE, that’s where. The slam piece continues:

AFC quarterbacks Philip Rivers, Peyton Manning and Matt Cassel threw first-half interceptions as the NFCREAD MORE

Call of the Day: Bubba Watson Wins, Tears Up On A Great Day For Lefties

During the off-season I joked with Shane Bacon that he was my second-favorite lefty golfer, other than Phil Mickelson, but he could drop to third if Bubba Watson ever got it going.

Boy did he, winning the Farmers Insurance Open atop of a stacked field, sinking a snaking 15-footer on 18 for birdie with Phil Mickelson a stroke back, waiting to hit his approach. This tournament serves as the de-facto start to the PGA Tour season, as well, with the likes of Tiger and Phil playing for the first time all season. With a leaderboard with names like Anthony Kim, Hunter Mahan, Mickelson, Dustin Johnson, Nick Watney and rookie sensation Jhonny Vegas, It was Watson who took home the title.

It was a great moment for Bubba, and of course, a great moment for lefties.

Seriously, how can you not like this guy? He went from a bomber who nobody looked at as a serious contender to, likely, the next great lefty on Tour and one of the top players, names and personalities in the game.

Again, what aREAD MORE

DL513: Josh Zerkle on Pro Bowl Reform, BEN, Super Bowl Plans & Is Ines Sainz Still A Story?

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Josh Zerkle of With Leather, KSK and the House of Punte Podcast joins the show to preview Super Bowl week. Not the Super Bowl, but the week leading up to the Super Bowl which can be, in a way, as entertaining as the game.

First we talk about the Pro Bowl and give a huge rundown of suggestions for how to make the game better. We cover everything from helmet cams to a skills competition to Zerkle suggesting the game be played between free agent veterans and rookie wage scalers with the winning team getting a bigger piece of the contract pie.

That, and robots. Exploding robots.

We talk a lot about Ben Roethlisberger and if fans really care that he was an accused rapist a few months ago. Is it a big storyline heading into the Super Bowl? Of course it is, because there isn’t much else to talk about this week. But will it be an awkward moment after the game between Ben and Terry Bradshaw, and does Roger Goodell really wantREAD MORE

Aussie Open Final: Djokovic, Murray, Crazy Dive-Bombing Birds

Andy Murray defeated David Ferrer in the second of two men’s tennis semifinal matches at the Aussie Open, placing Murray into the finals against Novak Djokovic for the first major title of the season.

The bigger story, however, is who else will be on the court during the final. Birds. Crazy birds.

We posted a video yesterday of the incessant bird squawking and feathers falling onto the court during the Djokovic-Federer match. In today’s semifinal, the birds began to — as Chris Fowler called it on ESPN — “dive-bomb the court.”

Yesterday, McEnroe blamed it on the darn Indian Myras, but today, it was certainly the seagulls.

Despite the birds, the tennis has been spirited. Here’s hoping the finale is a real, ahem, thriller. Which catch phrase works the best?

Call of the Day: Tracy Morgan + Sarah Palin = Hilarity, TNT Apology

Here’s the biggest issue I have with the video below, that spread like wildfire yesterday evening after Tracy Morgan popped into the TNT pre-game show and said that former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin is “serious masturbation material” on live television…

…Kenny Smith and Charles Barkley have the argument of who is more attractive — Tina Fey or Sarah Palin — ALL THE TIME????

Seriously, Kenny, you guys are rich and famous. Not even loser schlubs sitting at home with nothing else to do but watch old SNL bits on Hulu have that conversation any more. And it’s an argument between the two of you? Not a debate, but it devolves into an argument? I mean, come on, Kenny, one is smart and funny and quirky and the other has a funny accent and knows her way around a shotgun…hmm…tougher than I thought.

Anyway, Fey’s 30 Rock co-star didn’t let the question go without a quip that rendered Barkley and Smith speechless, and left Ernie Johnson with a look so uncomfortable, it was barely even funny to watch him awkwardlyREAD MORE

Over/Under: The Follett-Stafford China Doll Incident

[Ed Note: Ty writes the Lions blog The Lions in Winter, so he's pretty close to this story. He also did the creepy Photoshop, so blame him for any Stafford-is-China-Doll nightmares.]

Yesterday Detroit Lions LB Zack Follett talked to ESPN 1430 in Fresno. In the midst of talking about Matthew Stafford’s freakish ability on a Fresno radio interview, qualified it with “he’s a china doll right now.”

The Detroit-y corners of Twitter exploded over this, and within minutes WXYT’s Mike Valenti brought Follett on to clarify and/or back off of his comments. The firestorm didn’t stop there, though. A rotational outside linebacker calling out a franchise quarterback?  The national media took note, and soon stories were up at  ProFootballTalk, FanHouse, etc. Shortly after that, Follett retracted the comments on his Twitter account, and in a post on his vlog.

Today, most of the discussion is about whether Follett has the right to say what he said, whether comments were accurate—and whether this is the tip of an iceberg of Stafford-doubt, lurking underneath Allen Park, threatening to sink the Lions’READ MORE