Wednesday, January 16, 2008

Hang 'Em High

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22689778/


Now this is just plain stupid.

As Charlie Pierce pointed out on this week's "Only A Game", it is monumentally, epochally stupid for any professional media person to use the word "lynch" in connection with any other human being, never mind the most famous athlete, arguably, on planet Earth.

"Lynch" has a very specific meaning. It was a deeply insensitive choice of words.

Sure, there's freedom of speech. But you also have to own the words you use-and you have to own the consequences of that speech. That's life in the big city.

A Rolling Moss Gathers No Allegations

The Patriots' Randy Moss has been hit with allegations that he battered a woman in Florida January 6, during the Patriots' bye week.

According to the Boston Herald,

http://www.bostonherald.com/sports/football/patriots/view.bg?articleid=1066961

Moss knew the woman, but claims he did not hit her. She also claims that he has guns and a drug and alcohol problem.

As with the Duke rape case, it is hard to know what to think, and we should reserve judgement until the truth comes out.

Yet somehow, this does not shock anyone who has followed Moss' career. Is it possible for this to be true? Sure. Is it possible that an occasional girlfriend realized that she could shake an innocent man down? Sure.

It's hard to know what to think.

Vytorin Panic

Once again, the popular press goes bananas over a result that doesn't really mean anything.

ENHANCE, a study measuring the effectiveness of simvastatin against ezetimibe/simvastatin found that the older, cheaper drug, simvastatin, did just as well at shrinking plaques on artery walls as the newer, more expensive one.

Of course, the popular press turns this into "VYTORIN DOESNT WORK!" screaming headlines. Which is not what it means.

First of all, all it means is that the plaques aren't getting smaller. That's all. No proof of death by any cause. It is news that Vytorin isn't doing it any BETTER, I guess, because it's expensive, and in principle, it SHOULD. But it isn't.

But the only results that really mean anything are patient centered, death or cardiac event trials. Period.

Sigh.

Monday, January 14, 2008

Roger Dodger

Finally heard the audio from Clemens' 60 Minutes appearance. Both he and McNamee have compelling points to make-Clemens, that he can't prove his own innocence, and McNamee, that he has no reason at all to lie.

I am starting to think that, like so many questions in baseball history, the steroid era is going to become a series of what if questions. What if Clemens was clean? What if Josh Gibson could have played in the majors? What if Ruth came around 12 years earlier?

What if?

Sunday, January 13, 2008

All Upset Over Nothin'

Two stunning upsets in professional football today.

First of all, the San Diego Chargers beat defending champion Indianapolis, and then the New York Giants beat the NFC #1 team, Dallas. Both home teams were heavily favored, more talented, and picked by nearly every rational analyst. And they both lost, in narrow fashion, with 4th quarter drives that could have put them back in front falling short.

Goes to show you why they play the games, I suppose.

The Patriots and Packers should beat the Chargers and Giants pretty readily, thus allowing the Patriots to avenge one of their two Super Bowl losses. Exciting wins by deeply undermanned squads, though.

Funny how Dallas has now lost in the playoffs two years in a row, at least partially because they can't manage the most basic act in the sport, the snap from center? Last year, it was the fumbled field goal snap, and this year, it was late snaps from center Andre Gurode that caused penalties and blocking breakdowns.

Now watching Terminator-the new retelling of the movie as a TV series on Fox. It's pretty good. I like the Terminatorverse, so I may end up watching it. Imagine that, me watching a TV show like a normal American.

It seems to take place after the events of Terminator 2, as a sort of interstitial story. The Bad Terminator is pretty unsubtle, shooting up a classroom when he finds out that John is there, and there is a second plotline of the police chasing John and Sarah, along with the good Terminator, who comes back as a teenage cutie pie.