Vote For Curtis

The MLB All Star Game ballot is now out and available for voting on MLB.com. There is a nice article about the Tigers' nominees on their official website. It provides a link so that you can go and stuff the ballot box for all your favorite Tigers, up to 25 times per person.

Unfortunately, there was one Tiger left out. Since the game is being played in a National League park, there is no DH to vote for. Gary Sheffield was moved to the OF for voting purposes which meant that one regular Tiger OF got bumped. Curtis Granderson, perhaps the most popular player on the team, was the one left out.

Normally, I wouldn't really care about this. But Curtis Granderson is rapidly becoming one of my favorite Tigers of all time. He's a genuinely nice person, he's all over the internet with blogs and a myspace site, and he's actually a good player. How he was left off instead of Craig Monroe is mind blowing (no offense to Craig).

I believe I am going to get around to organize a write-in campaign for Granderson next week. He might not be the best outfielder in the American League, but he is one of the better centerfielders in the AL and he definitely deserves consideration for the All Star Game.

University of Kentucky hires Billy Gillispie

The last thing University of Kentucky basketball fans needed after being spurned by Billy Donovan was for their A.D. to hire a coach with a last name they would never be able to spell right on any of the message boards where they will be whining nonstop about being one of the new SEC doormats. The thankless job of head coach now belongs to Billy Gillispie who left the Texas A&M Aggies to coach the Wildcats.

Billy Gillispie was hired as Kentucky's sixth coach in the last 76 years on Friday, a person familiar with the search process told The Associated Press. He'll replace Tubby Smith, who spent a decade under the glare of college basketball's brightest spotlight before bolting to Minnesota two weeks ago.

Good luck Billy! You are going to need it in the Bluegrass state and in the SEC battling Bruce Pearl at Tennessee, Billy Donovan at Florida and John 'fat cheeks' Brady from LSU.

Florida Gators re-chomp as National Champions

The Florida Gators repeated as NCAA men’s basketball National Champions on Monday night beating the Ohio State Buckeyes 84-75. Florida led and controlled the entire game. The Gators were up eleven points at halftime and never really looked back. Joakim Noah didn’t play much of a factor and scored only 8 points with 6 of those coming from the free throw line.

Ohio State phenom giant Greg Oden was heroic in defeat scoring 25 points and grabbing 11 rebounds. It was likely the last college game for Oden as he is likely to be the #1 pick in this summer’s NBA draft.

The MVP of the game and Final Four was Florida’s Corey Brewer. Brewer is an amazing all-around player both on the offense and defensive side of the ball. Brewer had 13 points, 8 rebounds and shut down Ohio State’s perimeter game.

The game could be bittersweet as Florida coach Billy Donovan is expected to leave to take the University of Kentucky head coaching job. His name has also been rumored to take over as the coach of the NBA’s Miami Heat. Also, as many as five Gators could turn pro early and enter the NBA draft.

Box Score

Bee-line to the Tourney?

Reports are starting to bubble up on message boards from Morgantown to Ann Arbor that John Beilein has decided to coach the Wolverines.

What else can I say? Bill Martin hit a home run on this one. He is getting a phenomenal coach on the bench that can and will get players to improve over time and play smart basketball and win games. He also proved his ability/desire to get outside of hiring somebody from within or somebody with ties to Michigan, but just went out and got a great coach. We can only be so lucky if the football coaching hire in a year or two goes so well.

But anyways, visions of the NCAA tourney are once again dancing in my head!