Monday Miscellany: 6-02-08

Pretty exciting sports weekend. We've lots to cover this fine rainy Monday, so we'll get into it, ASAP, after the jump. There's news a-plenty from all four of our major sports (Editor's Note: Yes. Four.), and what better a way to organize them than the oft-handy means of alphabetization. Sure. Numbers help us with stats, and pictures help those of us not all that interested in letters, but those that concoct miscellaneous sports posts, do appreciate the clever lettering system put together by, uh, the Greeks, or something smart-sounding like that. But to ease the pain of the pictures-oriented, we'll have some symbols, whatnot to spruce up the House a bit. Let's have a look.

In the American League East, the Tampa Bay Rays, despite a special long ball from the nappy-dreaded Red Sox leftfielder, cling to their one-game first-place lead. In the West, the Halos continue to roll with a three and-a-half game edge over Oakland, and in the Central, the Twinkies took advantage of a three game White-Stockings skid to pull within a game of first. Over in the National League, the Baby Bears have won seven straight, cushioning their lead over the Redbirds, while in the East, the Phils have a half-game edge over the Marlins, and the West shows that the D'bags are still the team to beat.

Given my massive homerism, I'll offer a teense more on the AL Central, where, perhaps inspired by this post, the Royals got off the awful shniede, and put together consecutive wins. They're once again in the basement, but begin a three-game series against the Stockings tomorrow before traveling to the Bronx for four contests with the right-at-.500 Yankees.

Speaking of the Stockings, though, loon bin resident Ozzie Guillen took a new approach to rallying the troops. Can't wait to see that "lineup" tomorrow.

Hoopswise, the NBA Finals start Thursday, which will be the 11th time that Boston and L.A. have met for the championship, tying the Yankees/Dodgers for most championship series in the four majors. Eight of those wins have gone to the guys in green, a lowly two for the turd-burglars that cut Kobe and company their paychecks. The last six meetings have gone at least six games, so fans should be in for a good stretch. My 100% biased/totally uninformed prediction for the "championship the league wanted" is -- check out this limb I'm about to go out on -- Lakers in six. Why? Simple. Every time I find something to like about the NBA, it pisses me right the hell back off, which it can do by having Kobe win another title. Oh. And there's something about one of these teams sucking on the road or something. Dunno.

With regards to pigskin updates, T-Hen has been cut by the Denver Broncos. I'll be up front here: I'm crushed by this news. Travis Henry was pretty much my favorite Denver signing since Clarett was drafted in recent years. Though at times during his illustrious one season with the Broncos, I did think he could pose a significant threat to a Denver division title. Never once, however, did I worry that our boy HercRockfromtheSun would come close to backing his (see comments) infamous prediction with non-imaginary hard evidence in the form of stats. It was a close one, though. I mean, 691 rushing yards is do damn close to 1500, that we should've just given him the bragging rights outright. That is, it's not like he was 800+ yards off or anything.

Hey, look: hockey comes last alphabetically, which mean it must be less important than the other three sports. Agreed? Great. Couple bits in the sticks-and-pucks department. First, as The Lone Reader already -- anybody else find it grotesquely obnoxious that this guy comments on things we haven't yet posted about in the comments of unrelated stories? anyone? -- mentioned (Editor's Note: Just join the damn staff, already.), the Wings will likely hoist the Stanley Cup tonight. Here's my favorite bit about this series thus far. For those of you too lazy to click, this 19-year-old Wings fan (from Cleveland) got booted from the Igloo on Saturday for smuggling in an octopus and chucking it onto the ice just after the national anthem. Once outside, he dropped $300 on a scalper ticket, threw on a jersey, and came back in for the game. For his first entrance into Mellon Arena, he had the 'pus taped to his stomach. Mmm. Now that's dedication. But wait -- the hockey news gets better.

ESPN, and all six minutes per week it devotes to hockey coverage, may have a job opening. I imagine the ad to look a little like this: Hockey analyst needed; previous coaching experience at the professional level and Canadian accent preferred; greasy salt-and-pepper mullet with an affinity for pinstriped suits a must. That's right. Though he's denying everything, the mulleted one may (very soon) be a bench boss again. We promise to be our laziest in keeping our hockey readership abreast of this development, and in the event we don't actually break the story first, we'll be no later than a week behind.