March 09 Notes

Back again. I'm working on a pretty major project right now that's keeping me away from the blogs but I'm close to the point where I might start becoming a more regular poster again. We'll see.
---
Good for the Chargers, LaDainian Tomlinson and his agent to come together on a deal to stay in San Diego for three more seasons. Cooler heads prevailed. It was clear to team officials that the fans wanted LT to remain, and the player and his handlers understood his age and injury history.

It's likely that LT's best years are behind him but he could be productive for several more years yet. Now I'd like to see GM AJ Smith grab a blocker or two for him. Once again, I'm afraid a below-average offensive line is going to keep the Chargers from mounting a serious Super Bowl drive this fall.
---
In the late-1950s, fans of the then-Milwaukee Braves had a saying: "Spahn and Sain and pray for rain," in reference to high-quality starting pitchers Warren Spahn and Johnny Sain and the lack of anything behind them.

The Padres apparently go into the 2009 season with something like: "Peavy and Young and a bunch of dung." I am relatively okay -- not thrilled by any stretch -- with the lineup on the field, especially if Kevin Kouzmanoff or Chase Headley come into their own. The starting pitching depth, however, is a joke. Cha Seung Baek as a third starter is a reach, followed by whom? Wade LeBlanc? Josh Geer?

The Friars are headed for a 100-loss season.
---
Make up for it by going to San Diego State to see Stephen Strasburg. He is as dominant as a pitcher for the Aztecs as Marshall Faulk was as a football running back.
---
Concerning San Diego State, is there any remaining question that Beth Burns is the best coach on campus? She turned a women's basketball team winless in conference play to a co-champion in three seasons. What's more, the nucleus of the team is in sophomores and juniors and with more talent slated to come in, what's happening this year is merely an appetizer.

The women's season has been quite a bit more satisfying than that of the men, who at times appear to be the most talented team in a conference where the top four teams were separated by a game in the standings and the fifth, UNLV, swept tournament top-seeded BYU and hosts this week's tourney.

It's a shame how the community has failed to embrace coach Steve Fisher's Aztecs, who have won 20-games four years in a row and will go into the NCAA Tournament or NIT for the fourth straight season. However, a lot of it is their own doing, from Lorrenzo Wade's brush with the law to getting out-hustled on television in the last couple weeks of the year. The one thing this team can't do is shoot, and poor-shooting teams always look ugly no matter all the other things it does well.

The fans' reception to the Aztecs -- and I toss out last week's UNLV game because that's the one all the diehards bought tickets for months ago -- confirms my suspicion of the San Diegans will support a winner theory. No, they want a quality product that will leave them satisfied at the end that they didn't waste their hard-earned money.

I suspect the Aztecs will handle UNLV surprisingly easily in their first-round MWC contest Thursday. I think their defense has the cold Rebels so flummoxed that SDSU might run them out of their own house. But then all bets are off. The Aztecs are good enough to win the whole thing and inconsistant enough to go home early. I think they have to make the MWC final and hope small conference upsets are few -- Cleveland State's Horizon final defeat of Butler has already removed an available at-large slot -- for the Aztecs to be chosen for the NCAA field.

The women made their first splash in the MWC Tournament last year. I'd like to say the right now, on paper, they're hotter than anyone and should be favored to win it. But there's teams that owe them some payback this time around, and there's some good women's teams in the league capable of knocking them off. We'll have to hold our breath and hope for the best.
---
Love the Brady Hoke football hire. I wish I'd been available to comment on it at the time. The respect shown him by his peers is all you need to know, and the recruiting class appears phenomenal for the short time the new staff had available.