NFLPA Blows Chance to Teach College Players, Agents Life Lesson

by David Whitley

Filed under: Saints, Sports Business and Media

That didn't take long. One day after the Powers That Be seemed intent on staring down sleazy agents in college football, one of the powers blinked.

It was the players' union. Try to act shocked.

The NFL Players Association came out against penalizing its members for any misdeeds in college. That after Monday's announcement that the union, NCAA, NFL and American Football Coaches Association had finally gotten together to address the issue.

There is no silver bullet that will solve this problem. But fining and/or suspending players would be far more effective than the pop-gun approach currently in use. And in a marvelously fair twist, it would actually punish the guilty instead of the innocents they leave behind.

So you knew it was just a matter of nanoseconds until somebody would protest.

As always, look for the union label.

"The NFLPA is opposed to any penalty being imposed on a player in the NFL for conduct relating to the receipt of benefits in violation of NCAA rules," a union statement said.

That has sent everybody backtracking, with the NCAA now saying it won't push for NFL rookie suspensions. Consider this a classic example of unions at work.

Before the SEIU sends its thugs over to my house, let me make it clear that I am not against unions. They did a heroic job of protecting workers in the garment industry after the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire.

It's just that in the ensuing 99 years, unions have been far more concerned about helping themselves than the public. It's one thing for the UAW to destroy America's auto industry and the SEIU to turn California into Bolivia. That's just the real world.

 

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Steve Nash Responds to 'Hoax' Published by Phoenix New Times

Filed under: Suns, NBA Media Watch, NBA Rumors

PHOENIX -- The Suns suffered a tough 112-110 loss at the hands of the Spurs on Tuesday, and while the reality is that Phoenix is now 1-3 on the season, at least Steve Nash's sense of humor remained in tact afterward.

An odd story popped up on the website of the Phoenix New Times late Tuesday, with a headline that reads, "Setting Sun: Steve Nash's Quitting the Phoenix Suns to Enter Canadian Politics." The story is insanely long by internet standards, requiring the reader to click through five separate (and did I mention lengthy?) pages to reach its wholly unfulfilling conclusion.

It's played completely straight, with quotes in the story supposedly from people like Jerry Colangelo, Shaquille O'Neal, and even Nash himself. The only problem: the story is 100 percent false.

Call it fiction, satire, or -- my personal choice -- stupidity. But whatever it is, there's no clear indication anywhere within that the write-up is meant to be some kind of joke. It apparently was taken seriously by enough people that the Suns' PR team felt the need to issue a press release before halftime on Tuesday.

 

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TUF's Michael Johnson Explains Why He Wanted to Fight Bruce Leroy

by Michael David SmithOn this week's episode of The Ultimate Fighter, the four quarterfinal fights were matched up, and rivals Michael Johnson and Alex "Bruce Leroy" Caceres got their wish of being able to fight each other.

In his weekly interview with MMAFighting.com, Johnson touched on why he wanted to fight Bruce Leroy and what kind of fight he expected. He also discussed the wild card fight on this week's episode between Aaron Wilkinson and Marc Stevens, and on the fight that nearly took place outside the cage when Josh Koscheck started jawing with members of Georges St. Pierre's team.

The full interview is below.

 

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Shane Carwin out of UFC 125 bout with injury

UFC heavyweight Shane Carwin announced via his own website today that he has pulled out of his UFC 125 bout with Roy Nelson.

I am going to pull out of the fight with Roy Nelson. As many of you know I have been having some back pain. I had an MRI yesterday and I have some damage that may really require surgery. If the doctors do not have to perform surgery then I will be out 8-12 weeks. If they do have to perform surgery I do not know how long I will be out of action.

Carwin said that he will be able continue training cardio while healing from surgery, which was clearly his Achilles heel in his UFC 116 loss to Brock Lesnar. If Cain Velasquez's win over Lesnar this past weekend said anything about the UFC's heavyweight division, it was that all fighters need a more complete game to be the champ, and that includes cardio. If Carwin wants to return to the title fight, it's smart for him to both get healthy and not ignore his endurance.

Losing this fight is a blow to UFC 125, a New Year's Day card in Las Vegas. The event is headlined by the lightweight championship bout between Frankie Edgar and Gray Maynard. Carwin is disappointed about having to pull off the card, tweeting, "Roy and my boss are the only ones happy about this."

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T-Mobile Rips-Off An Apple Ad To Rip The iPhone? For Being On AT&T?s Network

Well this is interesting. And smart. Obviously, commercials that call-out rivals are nothing new. But a new commercial from T-Mobile that the company�put on YouTube yesterday does it in an unconventional way. Specifically, the commercial is for T-Mobile's new myTouch 4G device. It's an Android device that is an iPhone competitor. But rather than rip the iPhone directly, they instead rip the fact that the iPhone 4 is only available on AT&T's sub-par network. And they do so by making a parody of Apple's famous "I'm A Mac" commercials.

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Lil Wayne's Daughter Wants Homecoming Party With Siblings

Weezy's ex-wife, Antonia 'Toya' Carter, says Reginae wants to welcome her dad home with a big family bash.
By Mawuse Ziegbe

Lil Wayne
Photo: Louis Lanzano/ AP Images

Lil Wayne is slated to be released from prison Thursday, and among the superstar MC's millions of fans, few are anticipating Weezy's return more than his family. Weezy's music family, the formidable Young Money/ Cash Money crew, is planning a major homecoming party for the hip-hop hitmaker; however, another, more low-key bash, helmed by the rapper's daughter, might be in the works.

When MTV News caught up with Wayne's ex-wife Antonia "Toya" Carter, she said their daughter Reginae wanted a party attended by all of her new half-siblings.

"She said that she wanted to celebrate her birthday when her dad comes home," Toya explained. Reginae, whose birthday is November 29, apparently wants to turn the entire month into a big family celebration that includes the mothers of all of Wayne's children. "She just wanted to get all her siblings together along with me, Lauren [London], Nivea, Sarah, everybody with her dad and just celebrate her birthday. We were all just gonna go to Miami or whatever and just spend some time with him, 'cause he's been gone for a while and she misses him like crazy. I will feel complete again when he comes home, 'cause it's like a lot of weight was shifted on me. She took it so hard, because her and her father have this great relationship and she's not able to talk to him when she wants to all the time. It kinda bothered her for a while, so it's gonna be a big relief. We all gonna be so happy when he comes home."

WEEZY WATCH Bookmark weezywatch.mtv.com for MTV News' complete, round-the-clock coverage of Lil Wayne's prison release and the ensuing homecoming celebrations.

Weezy's family has expanded pretty rapidly within the past few years, with the addition of children the rapper has had with actress London, singer Nivea and another unidentified woman. While the baby boom may seem like a situation rife with drama among the mothers, Toya insists there's no bad blood between the ladies.

"It's about the kids. We all have a great relationship. I've known Lauren for a long time; I've known Nivea for a long time. We always been cool in passing, like, 'Hey, how you doing?' It's never been any problem. Our kids are brother and sister, [so] we gotta put all that craziness, what people want us to do, to the side and come together," she said. "We can't be catty and act immature. We have kids that are involved in this. We all feel the same way. We want our kids to be close, and throughout this whole time Wayne did [in prison], we kept our kids together, and that's what it's all about."

As far as how Wayne will be after prison, Toya, who has known the MC since she was 11, maintained fans will see a "more positive" Weezy.

"I think he's gonna learn a lot from this whole situation, and he's gonna be a better person. He's gonna be more careful [about] different decisions," she said. "He's gonna make better decisions, because he knows how this affected his kids and his fans, and he cares about his fans and his kids and his family a whole lot."

Toya said that upbeat energy will likely shake up Weezy's new music.

"Wayne's music is mostly his life and the things he's going through, so it may be more positive. We never know how he's feeling inside. Whatever it is, he's always been the type to let that out through his music," she said. "We'll find out, but I know it's still gonna be hot, and he's gonna still bring the heat, 'cause he always do."

While Toya maintains that she and Wayne have a great relationship, she's moved on from just being Weezy's lady. She recently opened Garb, a clothing store in New Orleans, and she is following up her hit BET reality show "Tiny & Toya," which co-starred T.I.'s wife Tameka "Tiny" Cottle, with "Toya's Family Affair" next year. She's also releasing a book, "Priceless Inspiration," and launching a nonprofit called Visual Beauty.

She's moved on romantically as well and is in a committed relationship with Jive Records A&R executive Memphitz, who has discovered artists like T-Pain and now works with songstress K. Michelle. Toya coyly refused to confirm or deny whether the duo are engaged, but she does admit that he's "The One." While her new man is in the music industry, she said she's done dating hip-hop artists.

"I don't even look twice at rappers. I'm over that," she said. "You can't help who you fall for, but I try to stay away from rappers, 'cause me and Wayne have a good relationship and that's like a no-no."

Stick with MTV News throughout the weekend for up-to-the-minute reports on Lil Wayne's prison release as we follow him from Rikers Island to his celebrations at home and beyond. Follow us on Twitter @MTVNews for instant updates and bookmark weezywatch.mtv.com for complete, round-the-clock coverage.

Related Videos

• Welcome Home Weezy!

Related Photos

• The Evolution Of Weezy

Related Artists

• Lil Wayne

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Survivor: Nicaragua?s Jill: ?I am a tough chick, and Survivor brought me to my knees?

After winning individual immunity in a challenge last week, 43-year-old ER doctor Jill Behm, from Erie, Pa., survived tribal council at last week?s double- elimination on Survivor: Nicaragua. But with individual immunity gone, and the tribes competing for tribal immunity at a cannon ski-ball challenge, it was a loss by Jill?s La Flor tribe that saw her return to tribal ? this time unprotected. And after the votes were cast, Jill was informed she?d be the eighth contestant voted off the show.

Despite playing a good game, Jill tells In Touch she did make some mistakes and by no means played a perfect game. ?I did so much wrong,? she says. ?To win Survivor you need an incredible amount of luck, or play a perfect game. I had neither.? And while Jill was not rewarded with the million dollar prize, she does feel rewarded by the game in other ways. ?I do have some dear friendships that I hope will last the rest of my life,? she reveals. ?No one understands what you went through on Survivor besides those that were there.? In addition to meeting new friends, Jill tells In Touch Survivor made her more appreciative of life?s little luxuries. ?I never want to take anything for granted when it comes to the smallest luxury that we have in America,? she admits.

Unfortunately for Jill, she didn?t make it to become a member of the jury who will vote for this season?s winner. But if she had, and her original Espada tribe mates Marty and Holly were in the running, it?d be a tough choice. ?I?d like to see Marty go to the end, as he was my team,? she says. ?But if I were on the jury I?d vote for who was playing a good game. I think Holly has come around. She made friends with the kids, she?s not seen as a threat and she?s put herself in a good position.?

For more with Jill, click here.

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Uber, Not UberCab, Launches Android App

From the company formerly known as UberCab, comes the Uber Android app. On Wedesnday, the on-demand car service unveiled the Android version of its increasingly popular (and controversial) iPhone app. The Android app features the same basic functionality: you can request service, set your pick-up location, track the driver, pay for your ride, and rate and share your experience. However, the startup did take advantage of the Android environment by tweaking some UI elements, according to Uber's CEO Ryan Graves.

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What you need to know from this week on 'The Ultimate Fighter'

We're down to the final first-round bout on "The Ultimate Fighter." Team Koscheck still looks shell-shocked from losing both bouts in last week's episode, but they have to get right back at it with the final first-round bout, Team Koscheck's Sako Chivitchian vs. Dane Sayers of Team GSP. Who will win? And who will win the Coaches Challenge? Read on for a recap and spoilers.

-- Water cooler talk of the week: Spencer Paige has returned to the house after he had surgery on his hand, so he won't be able to earn the wild card spot. The only thing these fighters are talking about is the wild card. Who deserves it, who doesn't, who fought well in their bout, and who has been drinking and partying too much to show they really "want it." Aaron Wilkinson claimed that Jeff Lentz has been hitting the bottle too much to deserve the shot, calling Lentz a "professional waster." Be sure to use that term at the bar this weekend, folks.

-- Drunk of the week: Speaking of drunks, Skarbowsky is back! He dispenses pearls of wisdom, like pointing out that Sayers, a Native American, is the only one really from "the States." And that being good is not OK. If someone asks you how you are, answer perfect. Then you'll make Parisian drunks happy.

-- Cool nickname of the week: Sayers' nickname is Red Horse, which is also his Indian name.

-- Misogynistic, unfunny humor of the week: Clearly bothered by GSP's aloofness to his prank attempts, Josh Koscheck goes off on a Team GSP medic, Brad Tate, calling him a male nurse. That's a joke that would have been funny at a time when both men and women weren't nurses and doctors, but pointing out someone's profession + gender? Sorry, Josh. Not funny. You're going to have to keep working to get under GSP's sin.   

-- Inspiring story of the week: Sako was shot in the leg when he was 19 by gangfire. He said that experience taught him to stop drinking, partying and running the streets. Now, just three years later, he's used the judo he learned earlier in life and is now on "The Ultimate Fighter."

-- Coaches Challenge! My favorite thing of the week: If you can't get behind the UFC forcing their fighters to play unfamiliar sports for large amounts of cash, check your pulse. It's usually hilarious, and this season, Kos and GSP are facing off in a home run derby for a prize of $10,000 to the coach, and $1,500 for each his fighters.

Needless to say, GSP is not pleased. He's Canadian. Do they play baseball in Canada? (Oh.) It shows, as GSP has no idea how to swing a bat, much less hold one. Kos is slightly more experienced, having played ball as a child, and won the prize for his team. 

-- Trash talk guessing game of the week: Who said?

1. The other team is underestimating me.

2. There's no reason why I shouldn't beat him.

3. I plan to win. I plan to win this damn fight.

4. I don't know what he thinks about me, but if he thinks he's going to walk in and take me out, he's mistaken.

Sako Chivitchian (Team Koscheck) vs. Dane Sayers (Team GSP)

Round 1: Sako survived a guillotine attempt at the beginning of the round, just to get in a clinch-filled brawl. Both fighters were in defensive mode, avoiding takedowns and strikes instead of scoring their own. Even GSP was saying how close the round was.

Round 2: Sako started with the takedown. Though Sayers got back to his feet, Sako controlled him the whole time, landing knees often as they were clinched. Referee Josh Rosenthal had to warn the fighters Sako more than once not to hold onto the fence, and quite frankly, he was lucky that he didn't lose a point.  

Surprisingly, the fight did not go to the third round. Sako won the unanimous decision, 20-18, but Dana White and the coaches were impressed with Sayers.

Wildcard winners of the week: Koscheck lobbied White for Aaron Wilkinson and Marc Stevens, while GSP mentioned both Wilkinson and Sayers. White made the final decision for Aaron Wilkinson vs. Stevens, both Team Koscheck fighters. This is the fight for next week.

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ICO In The UK: Google Street View?s Personal Data Represents ?Significant Breach?

Man, another day, another ?Google in privacy uproar? story. I guess my name is Phil Connors. The UK Information Commissioner has said that yes, in fact, Google did commit a ?significant breach? of the Data Privacy Act when it collected people's private information with its Street View vehicles. Great, so what happens now?

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Big East Football Approves Expansion

Filed under: Big East

Big East football has announced that its presidents have approved plans to expand from its current eight school membership to possibly 10 schools, continuing a trend that began less than a year ago.

First, the Pac-10 came calling for Texas and Oklahoma, and instead landed Colorado and Utah. Then, the Big Ten came calling for Notre Dame and landed Nebraska. Then, the SEC courted Texas A&M and instead stayed put. And so it goes in the aim-high, settle-low game of college football expansion. The latest conference joining the adventure appears to be the Big East.

The league won't officially comment about anything specific, but speculation has focused on six schools: Villanova, TCU, Central Florida, Houston, Temple and Memphis.

A Big East athletic director told FanHouse the league is "considering numerous schools. All the usual suspects."

The Big East's official statement read as follows: "The Big East Conference submitted the results of its extensive self-analysis and evaluation of the college athletics environment today at its annual Conference Board of Directors meeting. Based on those results, the Big East presidents agreed that the interests of each of the conference's 16 member institutions would be served by increasing the number of Bowl Subdivision football-playing members to 10. They unanimously approved the process to evaluate the terms and conditions for potential expansion candidates."

 

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Guess Who Wrote This Headline?

We've heard rumors that some of you play an informal "Guess what TechCrunch writer wrote the post based the headline?" game�with Twitter and your RSS readers. Now former TechCrunch developer Andy Brett (with some help from in-house rabble rouser Paul Carr) has done everyone a solid and built an entire site devoted to trying to figure who writes what. While you might think beating CrunchHunch is as easy as guessing MG for all the Apple stuff and me for all the misspelled stuff, you'd be surprised.

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Mustafa Shakur Traded for Robert Vaden

Filed under: Rockets, Thunder, NBA D-League, Rio Grande Valley Vipers, Tulsa 66ers

Last year, Mustafa Shakur was one of the top point guards in the NBA Development League as he averaged 19.2 points, 6.9 assists and 4.5 rebounds per game for the Tulsa 66ers before being called up by the Oklahoma City Thunder to end the season. Shakur was then signed by the New Orleans Hornets to a partially-guaranteed contract, but ended up as a training camp casualty and decided to re-join the D-League.

Despite being the 66ers' on-court leader last season, however, Tulsa has decided to trade Shakur to the Rio Grande Valley Vipers for the seventh overall pick in Monday night's D-League Draft -- a pick that became sweet-shooting Robert Vaden -- according to a source with knowledge of the trade.

Both the 66ers, owned by the Oklahoma City Thunder, and the Vipers, whose basketball operations are headed by the Houston Rockets, had ulterior motives to make the deal which pertain more to their NBA affiliates than the actual D-League squads put on the court.

 

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Randy Moss Officially Waived by Vikings

Filed under: Vikings

Randy Moss has officially been waived by the Vikings, according to reports. The deadline for waiving the player was 4 p.m. ET Tuesday.

If true, it puts a period on Moss' bizarre second stint with the Vikings. After telling Viking fans his return would be a fun ride, Moss disappointed on the field and allegedly offended off of it. Despite Brad Childress telling his team in a meeting that Moss would be waived, he remained on the roster at the end of Monday. Childress confirmed that while Moss had not officially been waived, the move would come.

That came a day after a bizarre press conference following the Vikings' loss to Moss' last team, the Patriots. Moss took thinly-veiled shots at the Vikings and Childress while praising the Patriots and his former coach Bill Belichick. He stayed behind in Boston after the game while the Vikings traveled back to Minnesota.

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More: Where Will Randy Moss End Up?

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Online hack puts UFC 121 free-stream link in top-stories list on newspaper site

Most of us know, if you search hard enough on the Internet, you can view just about anything you want in the world of sports. That includes fighting pay-per-views. But it does take some work and patience. Unless you just go to your local paper and its website provides an easy path. That's what happened this weekend at the San Francisco Chronicle's website. A link to a free stream of UFC 121 was featured in on top-10 most-read list.

UPDATE: There was a good explanation behind the link appearing on major websites across the country and the Chronicle. PRWeb was hacked. As we thought, there was no agenda on the part of the paper.

According to FightOpinion.com, the link pointed to this release from something called PRWeb:

New York, NY (PRWEB) October 23, 2010

Watch UFC 121 live Stream including Brock Lesnar vs Cain Velasquez, Kampmann vs Shields, Hamill vs Ortiz, Sanchez vs Thiago, Gonzaga vs Schaub.

Are you a huge fan of UFC 121? Want to know how to watch UFC 121 live online free? Simply download the new award-winning TV software, Satellite Direct, and watch UFC 121 on your PC. UFC 121 will take place at 10:00 PM EDT at the Honda Center in Anaheim, CA. Over 660,000 fans have been using the software to watch UFC 121 online. So get connected and watch the entire UFC 121 MMA event, including the pre and post show, and all UFC 121 fight cards!

Click here to watch UFC 121 live stream online now.

The conspiracy theorists were howling that this may have had something to do with  the little tiff between the newspaper and UFC president Dana White before UFC 117. Via Twitter, White shredded the bosses at the paper for allegedly telling the UFC PR department that it wasn't covering the event and doing so in rude fashion.

The philosophical battle between the newspaper and the fight promotion became good message-board fodder over at sportsjournalists.com. Most of the commenters supported the Chronicle's stance on MMA. And after Cain Velasquez downed Brock Lesnar, you even had a few commenters suggest that the fight was fixed.

The story now is this link that spent a good time on the Chronicle's website. I'm 99 percent certain that it was simply an error. That said, the UFC, which is very bullish on making sure its product is paid for, has to look into how this happened.  

Tip via FightOpinion.com

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Ellenberger uses the power of Twitter to call out 'hated' Shields

UFC welterweight Jake Ellenberger wants a piece of Jake Shields, and he's using his mouth to try to make it happen. Never mind that Shields has already cemented his title shot with a win over Martin Kampmann, and that Ellenberger is in line behind Jon Fitch and Carlos Condit, a fighter who has beaten Ellenberger. He wants Shields, and he is using the power of Twitter to try to sway the powers-that-be in the UFC.

Ellenberger -- who has recent TKO wins over John Howard and Mike Pyle -- has called out Shields several times on Twitter in the last few days, questioning Shields' title shot immediately after the fight, then going on to say:

Ellenberger isn't the first fighter to use a strategy of asking for fights to move up for a bout. Dan Hardy, "King Mo" Lawal and Ben Saunders have all gotten a shot at top fights by simply asking for them. Ellenberger would have to clear a lot of hurdles to get a shot at Shields before Shields fights either Georges St. Pierre or Josh Koscheck for the UFC welterweight title, but stranger things have happened in MMA.

UPDATE: Cagewriter spoke with Ellenberger via text, and he said that both Jake Shields and the UFC have not responded to his tweets. "But it's only a matter of time. Fake Shields is a fraud. Excuse me, Miss Piggy is a fraud," Ellenberger said. Why Miss Piggy?

"When he fights, he reminds me of Miss Piggy, with hs softness and feminine charm."

Ellenberger's beef with Shields comes from before both fighters were with the UFC. He says that he had a signed contract to fight Shields, but Shields' father (and manager) pulled him out of the bout because it was a bad match-up. Ellenberger admits that Condit and Fitch also have a claim on a bout with Shields, but, "I hate him more."

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Yahoo! Sports UFC 121 live preview show

Join Yahoo! Sports columnists and MMA luminaries for the UFC 121 live preview show, kicking off at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT.

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SCVNGR Launches Internationally, With Help From Google?s Places API

Location-based game SCVNGR is going global, and it's getting a little help from its friends down in Mountain View. Today, the company is switching to a new, improved database of venues ?�the businesses, restaurants, bars, and other locations that its users 'check into' ? and it's also adding international support. The source of the data? Google, which has given SCVNGR access to the developer preview of its Places API both in the US and abroad. Now, SCVNGR has technically been available internationally before now because you could download its mobile apps for Android and iPhone. But CEO Seth Priebatsch says that the experience left a lot to be desired, because SCVNGR didn't have a robust 'Places' database (you'd open up the app and usually would have to manually enter the venue yourself, which is a big hurdle). Today's update fixes that.

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World Series No Classic, but There Were Still Plenty of Positives for Baseball

by Ed Price

Filed under: Giants, Rangers, MLB Biz, MLB Playoffs, World Series, Sports Business and Media

ARLINGTON, Texas -- Well before Pat Burrell brilliantly lured Cliff Lee into a false sense of security by striking out, setting up Edgar Renteria's World Series-winning homer, the cries had already begun:

Terrible World Series. Baseball is in trouble.

Well, yes and no.

Indeed, on Sunday the World Series lost out in the Nielsen ratings to an NFL game for the first time ever. And years from now, fans outside of San Francisco and Dallas-Fort Worth will be hard-pressed to conjure up a spine-tingling memory of this Fall "Classic."

But it isn't the end of the world for Major League Baseball.

 

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Versus gives to MMA one day, then takes the next by cancelling 'The Daily Line'

From the world of the bizarre, comes the news that Versus has cancelled "The Daily Line."  

Why bizarre?

It was just a day ago that Versus upped the ante with mixed martial arts by agreeing to be a significant part of televising the new UFC.

Zuffa announced it was merging the WEC and UFC and debuting four new UFC cards on Versus in 2011, but today we got bad news that "The Daily Line" is done. Via Twitter, Sports Business Daily's John Ourand said the show was axed because of anemic ratings.

That's a lousy break for MMA and its fans. ESPN is getting more consistent with its MMA coverage on the television side but its not all the way there yet. The Worldwide Leader still doesn't send the "MMA Live" crew to every big U.S. event. That has to happen eventually.

Using "The Daily Line" for postfight coverage, Versus was doing a terrific job of covering the sport on fight nights. MMA deserves to be covered just like the other major sports with immediate reaction from experts. Live postfight interviews with the fighters are also a must.

So whether or not you liked everything about 'The Daily Line' is irrelevant. For MMA fans, less legitimate media coverage is a bad thing.

It's also a lousy break for aspiring MMA media folks. Ariel Helwani was developing into the first mainstream media voice on television. Hopefully people continue to see what he's doing as a writer/podcast host at Fanhouse and can add more television action to his plate. 

I'm not a hockey fan, but this must be disappointing to the NHL. The show did a nice job of covering hockey as the sport tries to recover from a bevy of disastrous television moves the last few years. 

Tip via Sports by Brooks

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