EAST LANSING -- The screamers can take the year off. Save your voices. Save the gas. The Michigan-Michigan State basketball rivalry, which, when it's good, is really good, is no better than lopsided this winter, one of those years when the light shines in only one direction. Green light. Spartans go. The Wolverines will spend most of their season just trying to get across the street.
* Lions 19, Phoenix 17: All is going well until William Clay Ford calls down a passing play for Andre Ware. Unfortunately, he is connected to Jim Arnold, who goes out and throws an interception.* Cleveland 28, Indianapolis 14: Rumor has it the Lions are interested in Jeff George. Rumor has it William Clay Ford called Jeff Daniels by mistake.
* Lions 17, Green Bay 16: Edgar Bennett is their running back? Edgar? That's a butler, not a football player.* Chicago 27, Tampa Bay 14: Erik Kramer resumes the familiar position: seated.
NEW YORK -- That does it. I am drafting a petition to the Womens Tennis Association: No more press conferences for girls under 18. Let them play. Let them shower. Let them go home to their Sting records.But keep them away from the microphone. Really. It's for the best. And I have been thinking about this for a while, ever since Steffi Graf mumbled through her first few years, and then Gabriela Sabatini mumbled through her first few years, and then Jennifer Capriati laid about 400,000 "you knows" in a single sentence.
Personally, I don't want to know whether Nancy Reagan slept with Frank Sinatra in the White House. For one thing, I have a lot of good Sinatra records that I would have to throw out. Also, I might have children one day, and maybe I'll want to take them to Washington, D.C., and then what do I say? "Look, kids, there's where Abraham Lincoln sat. And there's where Franklin Roosevelt discussed the war. And there's where Frank and Nancy did it."
So that was the first game of the season, right? We won't count those other three, right? How can you count baseball games when you can't even put your shampoo and after-shave in their regular spots, or stack your shoes in a messy pile and hang a picture of your kids near the pants hook?
HOUSTON -- They came out like a famous rock group on opening night of the tour. Chris Webber was first man called, and to a roar of applause sauntered to mid-court, looking mean, ready to roll. Next was Ray Jackson, who slapped his arms around Webber as if they hadn't seen each other in years.
I am about to say something that has needed to be said, and I hope you forgive me if it sounds a little blunt:We stink.I am talking about fans at the Palace. I am talking about their attitude and their volume. I am saying it now, because if this city really wants the Pistons to get serious tonight against the Bulls, well, we ought to heed our own advice.
Mitch Albom writes about running an orphanage in impoverished Port-au-Prince, Haiti, his kids, their hardships, laughs and challenges, and the life lessons he’s learned there every day.
