The Loss of a Mariners Outfielder

Seattle Mariners outfielder Greg Halman found bleeding from a stab wound early Monday, November 21st in the Netherlands. By the time the ambulance came to the site, it had been too late. Halman's brother is now under arrest and will be questioned. The 24 year old had a successful career while playing in Seattle and with their minor league teams. Halman has been with the organization since he was 16 years old. Last month, he was on the Netherlands Baseball World Cup Team and they ended up winning the whole competition. The organization is sad to lose such a well rounded player from their team. Not much other information is known yet about the stabbing and reports say it will take some time to figure out what exactly happened.

Forced into Retirement

The former New York Knicks Guard, Cuttino Mobley filed a lawsuit against the Knicks, accusing the organization of forcing him to retire as a way to save millions of dollars. In 2008, Mobley was acquired from the Los Angeles Clippers and shortly after coming to the knicks they supposively forced him to retire. The reason Mobley is said to retire because of a heart disease. Mobley has grown up with this disease and was aware of his condition, but he was never advised to stop playing the game. The lawsuit states, knicks were aware of his condition before signing him to the team and after him coming to the team, he was sent to doctors whom they knew would tell him to stop playing basketball. The total earnings the team saved for his retirement is around $19 million dollars. The outcome of this lawsuit will be interesting to see, as well as how the team and Mobley handle this situation.

College Basketball Increase

As we all know the NBA season is does not look to be alive anytime in the near future; because of this league not being available to watch and enjoy, the increase of collegiate athletics has become much popular. The excitement of Men's college basketball is usually very energizing around the March Madness Tournament, but now the excitement is being seen even after the first games of the season. In my opinion, college basketball is much more entertaining and exciting than the NBA, since the players are playing the game since they love it. It will be interesting to see if all this attention on collegiate basketball will stay as popular as it is now or it will die down as the season continues.

Many teams are said to be even better this year, than they were last year. This will make the competition level even higher and bring out all the excitement. Will the exciement and attention stay on these basketball teams because of no NBA season right now, or will it diminish until the March Madness Tournament?

The Fate of Sizemore

As the World Series recently came to an end, many teams are now looking to rebuild or find new players and coaches for their team for the 2012 Season. The Cleveland Indians just yesterday declined the $9 million dollar option for centerfielder, Grady Sizemore. Sizemore was a player that hurt for a large part of the past season. With his contract being up, it was questioned what the Indians were going to decide what to do with the three time American League All Star. When Sizemore is healthy he is a huge asset to the team, but with him being hurt and having a few surgeries over the past year makes him more vulnerable to injury. All of the injuries and his body not being as healthy as the past was one of the big factors when deciding whether or not to accept his option for the next season. Sizemore has been with the team since 2005, when he got his start in the major league. He has made an impact on the Indians organization.

 As a free agent, there will be many offers to Sizemore and the Indians may end up getting him back onto the team. The fate of many players is up in the air for the upcoming seasons and it will be interesting to see where all of the players fall.

The Ohio State Comeback

After all the controversy of the Ohio State Football program, the new coach Luke Fickell, and the team had a lot of pressure on their shoulders to perform well this season. As the season progressed, many fans noticed this would be a rebuilding year as they lost three games early in the season. The current record for the Buckeyes is 5-3. This past weekend the team had a big game as they were facing #15 Wisconsin. Last year Wisconsin upset the undefeated buckeyes and going into the game it would be huge for the buckeyes to upset the badgers. The Buckeyes did end up winning this game in the last few minutes of the game 33 to 29. This was a big win for the Buckeyes within the Big Ten. Now the question is, will the Buckeyes continue to be in the race for the Big Ten? The season is not over yet and the Buckeyes still have games and opportunities to gain respect from those who lost it after the controversy. Hopefully the Buckeyes can finish the season strong and learn from these experiences for next year.

The Madden Curse

This past year the Cleveland Browns running back, Peyton Hillis won the competition and is featured on the cover of the new Madden NFL 2012 video game. This is a huge honor for him as he proved himself to be one the best last season in the NFL and even beat out players such as Aaron Rodgers in the run for the cover. With being featured on the Madden cover, there is said to be a curse that comes with this accomplishment. In the past, it has been proven that after appearing on the cover, may come injuries or not a successful season. In 2009, when Brett Farve appeared on the cover, later that season he led the league in most interceptions thrown. Another athlete, Vince Young, appeared on the cover in 2008, and ended up later that season injuring his knee and sitting out for several weeks. Will this happen to the Browns top running back?

This past weekend the Browns won against the Indianapolis Colts, and were led by two touchdowns scored by Hillis. He has been off to a great start leading his team. Let's just hope that he does have a great rest of the season and breaks this Madden curse.

Ohio State's loss to Miami

This past weekend the Ohio State Buckeyes traveled down to Miami, Florida to take on the Hurricanes. This was a huge game for the Buckeyes, as most games are going to be huge this year for the Buckeyes because of what has happened over the past year to their program. Ohio State has pulled off two wins for their first two games of the season against Toledo and Akron. This game was going to be the biggest one of the season so far. Unfortunately, Ohio State did not perform like they did in the 2002 National Championship against Miami and lost the game this weekend. The only points that the Buckeyes scored were two field goals. The final score was 24-6. Everyone is now wondering how they will perform for the rest of the season with still having some of their best players suspended for a few more games. Are the buckeyes going to come back and continue with a winning season? Or will this be the season for them to regroup and come back even stronger next year?

Serena's Outburst

During the women's US Open championship match, Serena Williams had a tough match and ended up losing to Samantha Stosur. This match was very intense and at times Serena got very into it and started yelling and verbally abusing the official. This action resulted in a $2,000 fine from the US Open. There are no other major consequences with her action besides this fine. Williams, the runner up, still walked away with $1.4 million from this tournament.  I think to people who make that much money, $2,000 is nothing to them and for them to realize what they actually did was wrong, the price should be higher than that. This could lead to other outbursts of her doing the same exact thing. Should the fine be higher than $2,000? Or is that amount equal to her actions?

Playoffs way off in the distance

The Cleveland Indians are a team that surprised many people this season by starting off with one of the best records in the league. They have been on and off the rest of the season, and lost the lead of the best record. The most recent series for the Indians was against the Detroit Tigers in Cleveland. This was a must win series for the Tribe. With many of the starters out because of injury, everyone knew this was going to be a tough series and they needed to win at least two out of the three games to stay in the run for playoffs. Well, Detroit ended up winning all three games and sweeping Cleveland. Seeing this is not something that Cleveland fans wanted to see as their hopes for a the team making it to the playoffs are quickly getting farther and farther away. The number of games that the Tigers are leading by continues to grow. With the end of the season being less than a month away, will the playoff dreams for the Indians continue to diminish away or will this team step up and try to make a comeback?

I personally believe that all of these players have the hope and determination to continue playing strong for the rest of the season. There are many huge assets that will be coming back to the team from injury, but is that going to be enough? The last series of the season for Cleveland is in Detroit.This could be one of the most important series for the Tribe in a long time. Will the Tigers keep their lead and win the AL Central or will there be a miracle and a team will comeback from behind and prove they deserve to be in the playoff run?

Introduction

Hi Everyone,
My name is Shannon Yaugher and I am currently a sophomore at Slippery Rock University. I am majoring in Sport Management. My hometown is Cleveland, Ohio and I graduated from Holy Name High School. I am a huge Cleveland Sports fan and I support all teams, even if they aren't the greatest. My career interest area is marketing, community relations, and sales. I hope to work within a minor league organization, preferably arena football or minor league baseball.