1. Los Angeles Angels
I’ll be shocked if the Angels don’t win the division, and they won’t even need Bartolo Colon to do it.
2. Oakland A’s
The A’s always find ways to stay in the thick of it.
3. Texas Rangers
They need Eric Gagne to stay healthy.
4. Seattle Mariners
Enjoy last place, Jeff Weaver.
Previously:
NL East
NL Central
NL West
AL East
AL Central
Good article by Carrie Lucas about the fallout from Title IX.
Evidence of men’s greater interest in watching and playing sports abounds. Recreational sports leagues open to all comers remain overwhelmingly male. Studies repeatedly have found that men watch, read, and talk more about sports than do women — five minutes in any sports bar would have yielded the same conclusion for the price of a beer.
Such common sense will be heresy, however, at the Cleveland conference. Many members of the organizations sponsoring the conference recoil from any suggestion that innate differences between the sexes contribute to disparate outcomes, whether on a basketball court or in the workplace. “Discrimination” is the only acceptable explanation when men out-participate or out-perform women, while women’s triumphs ironically are ignored.
Two days until the baseball season starts, my friends. Two days.
One of my favorite pastimes.
A new Creation Museum being built by Answers in Genesis outside Cincinnati is almost complete.
Tyrannosaurus rex was a strict vegetarian, and lived with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.
There were dinosaurs of every kind aboard Noah’s ark. Some dinosaurs managed to hang around until just a few hundred years ago. The legend of St. George slaying the dragon? That probably was a dinosaur.
Exhibits showing all this and more will be at the Creation Museum, a $27 million religious showcase nearing completion in Northern Kentucky.
Of course, evolutionists are all flustered by it.
But Eugenie Scott, a former University of Kentucky anthropologist who is director of the California-based National Center for Science Education, said the information provided in the museum “is not even close to standard science.”
Scott visited the museum recently as part of a British Broadcasting Corp. radio program. Although she didn’t get a tour, she saw enough to know that the museum will be professionally done. And, she says, that’s worrisome.
“There are going to be students coming into the classroom and saying, ‘I just went to this fancy museum and everything you’re telling me is rubbish,’ ” Scott said.
Focus on the Family founder James Dobson appeared to throw cold water on a possible presidential bid by former Sen. Fred Thompson while praising former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who is also weighing a presidential run, in a phone interview Tuesday.
“Everyone knows he’s conservative and has come out strongly for the things that the pro-family movement stands for,” Dobson said of Thompson. “[But] I don’t think he’s a Christian; at least that’s my impression,” Dobson added, saying that such an impression would make it difficult for Thompson to connect with the Republican Party’s conservative Christian base and win the GOP nomination.
I linked to this yesterday in my “In the News” box, but thought it was worth highlighting.
Hell is a place where sinners really do burn in an everlasting fire, and not just a religious symbol designed to galvanise the faithful, the Pope has said.
Addressing a parish gathering in a northern suburb of Rome, Benedict XVI said that in the modern world many people, including some believers, had forgotten that if they failed to “admit blame and promise to sin no more,” they risked “eternal damnation — the Inferno.”
Hell “really exists and is eternal, even if nobody talks about it much any more,” he said.
The injustice continues, as Chris Sligh got the boot tonight from American Idol while Sanjaya miraculously sticks around. It aggravates me that we’re seeing so many superior talents leaving the show, while a kid who is by far the most inferior talent of the group — and who has been for several weeks — isn’t even close to going home.
Today’s story from my spring training trip is about Florida Marlins pitcher Taylor Tankersley.
Previously:
Jake Westbrook
Luke Scott
1. Detroit Tigers
With the acquisition of Gary Sheffield, the Tigers may actually be better this year than they were last year. Scary thought.
2. Cleveland Indians
I expected more from the Indians last year, but it didn’t work out. It wouldn’t surprise me to see Cleveland win the division.
3. Minnesota Twins
I only put them this low because I’m not convinced Boof Bonser and Matt Garza are ready to contribute in a meaningful way. If they prove to be more mature than what I’m expecting, then the Twins could also challenge for the division title.
4. Chicago White Sox
Losing Freddy Garcia is going to hurt the Sox. The team could still be good, but it’s a tough division.
5. Kansas City Royals
‘Nuff said.
Previously:
NL East
NL Central
NL West
AL East
Great article by Keith Law about the way Major League Baseball winks at the alcohol problem in the game.
Baseball has a drinking problem, but it’d prefer that you not know about it. Dontrelle Willis was also nailed for DUI this offseason, but it barely made a ripple. Gustavo Chacin was charged with DUI earlier this month, received no sanction or suspension, and hasn’t even taken La Russa’s step of issuing an apology. Last year, Esteban Loaiza was caught driving 120 mph, drunk, and if anything, he punished Oakland by continuing to pitch like Esteban Loaiza. Alcohol is an accepted part of the fabric of the game; there is free beer in almost every clubhouse, and there are beer billboards on every stadium wall and beer ads on TV during nearly every commercial break.
Law nailed it with this one.
David and Karen Price are the proud parents of Andrew David Price.
My second story from my spring training trip is about Houston Astros outfielder Luke Scott.
Also, for those of you who are gun fanatics (I’m looking at you, Newman and misawa), you might be interested in this story about athletes and guns, in which Scott is featured prominently.
“An athlete gets paid a lot of money,” he said. “And someone who is after that, a thief, a mugger or someone who steals from people, they are taking a chance with the law that if they get caught, they are going to jail or face some other problem.”
With a broad smile, he added, “In my case, you are going to get shot.”
Previously:
We now have a Christian version of YouTube. It’s called ChristianUTube.com. Here’s a news release about the venture.
The first story from my spring training trip early this month is about Jake Westbrook of the Cleveland Indians.
