Lebron Admits he has racist tendencies.

“When I first went to the 9th grade in high school, I was on some ‘I’m not f***ing with white people,’” James says. “I was so institutionalized growing up in the hood it was like, ‘They don’t fuck with us, they don’t want us to succeed,'" James said.

Yes, he is blessed with athletic DNA, but he is likely a short bus candidate on the mental evaluation.

j

Rory Part 28

To summarize my view of Rory is rather simple.

He has the most mesmerizing swing I have ever seen. His hip turn was like nothing we had ever seen. At around 5'9" 170lbs he is just different. 

If he could have ever learned how to putt like Jordan or Woods, we may have seen something close to Woods.  This never happened and he decided to tinker with the swing.  Now he is fighting to get it back.

He just spent 10 days with his coach and they watched a ton of video, including his swing at age 16.

Rory Quote.
“When I was that age the move that I'm trying to get back to was more exaggerated at that point, steepened the shaft very much on the way back, shallowed it coming down,” said McIlroy, who has eight top 10s this year but just one victory. “Now it's shallow coming back, and steepened coming down, that's why I get two-way misses left and right.”

Only the player himself could have missed that the changes were not working..

J

Jason Witten

We first were introduced to Witten when he ran away for the Michigan Defenders in a bowl game.

I know how happy we were when Dallas drafted the 6'6" 264lb tight end.  Most people didn't realize he ran a 4.65 40 at the combine.

Never did I expect these numbers from a Tight end that actually spent time blocking.

•  4th most receptions in NFL History
• 2nd in yard for Tight End
• 2nd in receptions for Tight End.
• Most games played by a Tight End.

 It is funny that people called him slow.  Specifically Shannon Sharpe. 

Sharpe ran a 4.61 vs Witten 4.65. (Witten is 40lbs heavier and nearly 4 inches taller than Sharpe. )

Sharpe is closer to the size of Dez Bryant and obviously had friends with a chemistry set. 

J 

Adrian Peterson

A career with 12226 yards and an amazing 4.8 yds per carry.

That 4.8 is trailing only the legendary Brown and Sanders in the 10000 yard club.

I admit that even though I have followed his career since he was at Palestine High School, I never give him his due historically.

Can it be possible that because he was hidden in Minnesota with nothing close to a balanced offense?

Highlights and Issues.

• 11.7 per carry at Palestine as a Sr. 
• 1925 yards as a freshman at Oklahoma. Heisman given to Leinart and the over hyped USC crew because his teammate QB White took votes from him.  He played with an Injured Shoulder and that required surgery after the season. 
• Soph Season broken foot restricted him to 8 games.
• Jr Year- Broken Collar Bone.
• 296 yards in a game as a Rookie.
• Passed 1000yds in 8 games before knee injury.
• 2097 yards in Season
• Most 60yd plus TD runs in NFL History.
• Tied with OJ for most 200yd rushing games. 
• 3 time NFL rushing champ
• League MVP
• 2 knee surgeries and some other injuries to tissue that are considered severe.
• He only started more than 10 games 7 times !!!!  
• Only had more than 300 carries 3 times.  Payton had 10. Sanders even had 7. 
• I am ignoring the season missed of non-football issues. 

If he would have stayed healthy and not missed 2014, I honestly think his numbers would be approaching the Sanders, Payton numbers overall.

J.

Aaron Rodgers

Sometimes, a quarterback has the privilege of playing for an all time great offense mind as the head coach. Then sometimes you have a player that can do everything.
Rating importance of the talents is hard, but we all know it starts with the accuracy.

How would you rank it.

1. Accuracy
2. Mental decisions
3. Elusive Movement
4. Durability
5. Arm Strength

I cannot think of another player that would surpass Rodgers.  He may not be the greatest guy in the world, as his locker room and family issues suggest, but he maybe in a class of his own as a talent.

Unlike some of the QB's that people rated ahead of him historically, none check all the boxes.  Rodgers can do everything.

J

TV Ratings by Sport. Ignore the NBA Hyperbole. It's football all the way.

The world of TV is ruled by Football.  The two most popular events are the Superbowl and the NCAA championship in football. 

NFL Superbowl 103 Million last year 111 previous 3 seasons.

NCAA Football 30 Million last year,  28.3 Million previous 3 seasons.

NCAA Basketball 21 Million on CBS (Turner 2 times last years of last 3 17 M and 13, drops avg   

NBA 19 M   Only 10 Million Last year - 20 Million avg the 3 previous.

MLB 18.8 Last year 17.4 Million previous 3. 

Golf (Masters) 13 Million  12.4 Previous 3 Other Majors around 5M.

Hockey 3 Million

The NFL is watched by over 100 Million.

The NBA championship hovers around 20 Million, down from the Jordan, Bird, Magic era.  Last year was only 10 Million.

World Series - As the chart shows the sport has been on downward spiral since 2004. But in 2016 with Cubs surpassed the NBA.  I should spend time and find out what TV changes occurred to cause the waning interest.  Someone made a big mistake.

Golf-  The Masters has is steady around 13 Million viewers since 1995.  As matter of fact.  1995 was 13 Million and 2018 was 13 Million. (Tiger Rookie year is 1996) During the Tiger peak it did reach 20 Million in 97 and 19 in 2002.  Phil win from the Trees garnered 16.7 Million.  But overall, there has been no change in viewers, just an increase in the value of the commercials and purses.

Sidebar, Football.
Dallas Cowboys average over 23 Million on Fox games!!!!! They are bigger than everything except NCAA Championship game.  NFL regular season dropped to 13 million per week, down from the 19 million average in 2015. The last Cowboys playoff game was a 44 Million.

SEC championship game with the small southern population averages almost 14 million.

The highest rated TV shows -- Big Bang 18.5 Million behind only Sunday Night Football.

J

Football vs others in regard to major injuries.

I don't know why I was surprised that the major injury numbers were so close. 

Did I let the media brainwash me?  Maybe it was the Russians.

Percent by State of Football Recruits 2017 Class

A simple glance tells me that Mississippi is still the open battlefield for the state with a 8 to 9% rating. 

j

The Sports We Play

How about the official numbers from High School participation as reported by the NCAA. (5 year differences)

I realize that the specialization and overly competitive training is killing multiple sports, but some of the numbers are interesting.  Football is far and away the big boy even with a 4.7% drop. I do like the increase in Baseball.

As a base line the percentage of population under 18 years old.
(2010 was 24%,7.4 Million )( 2016 22% 7.3 Million.)

j