A view for the chair

Are you ready for some football! It is the end of July and football season is starting with the opening of training camp. There are two major football stories in the news this week. On Monday, NFL commissioner Roger Goodell conditionally reinstates Michael Vick following the end of his prison sentence for running a dog fighting operation. Vick will be allowed to play in preseason games and practice, provided he can find a team that will sign him, and Goodell will decide on Vick's full reinstatement no later than Week 6 of the 2009 season. Vick did say this week that he is close to signing with a team. But of all the 32 teams in the NFL, only 6 teams have interest in the troubled QB. I hope he doesn’t sign with an NFL team but goes to the new UFL that starts play this fall. I think Vick needs a year or so to mature while playing in a minor league.

The other big football story this week is that Brett Favre, who was considering coming out of retirement for the second consecutive season and playing for the Minnesota Vikings, announces that he will remain retired, saying that he does not feel physically able to play for a full season. I’M glad Brett is not coming back this season because I want to remember him as a great QB and not the one that came back last year with the Jets. Unfortunately as Peter King of Sports Illustated said, “We will probably have to revist this after the season.” Please just leave the stage Brett.

The major baseball steroids story of the week is that in 2003 former Red Sox Manny Ramirez and team mate and current star, David Ortiz had tested positive for performance-enhancing drug. 2003 was the year to test to see if Major League Baseball had a steroid problem. The positive tests should have been private. There were supposedly about 100 ballplayers that tested positive that year and only about a quarter of the names have come out, so, why not publish the whole list so we can know and just end this drama. Some people think the Red Sox and any other team that won the World Series in the steroid era ( I would say 1995 to 2005) needs to give back their Championship. Let me know how you feel about it. In the record book I would just have a section called Steroid Era and have all records from that time peroid listed. As far as the Hall of Fame goes, no player from that era should be allowed in.

Media Watch

ESPN became the story last week on two occasions. Frist, Erin Andrews was the victim of a “peeping tom” who took a nude video of her in her hotel room. ESPN made the decision to ban all New York Post sportswriters from it’s shows because the paper printed photos of Erin from the video. This decision was reversed because the Editor of the Post decided not to print the photos. That was the good news for ESPN.

The bad news was the way they handled the Ben Roethlisberger civil lawsuit story. ESPN in the initial days of the story, issued a “Do not report” order to its jouranlist. Why? When a lawsuit is filed in a courtroom in the United States of America and the person being sued is the current Super Bowl winning QB it needs to be report. If it was any other football player in this situation, it would be reported and be the first thing on SportCenter. ESPN needs to look at their policies and procedures to make sure this does not happen again. Oh wait, ESPN doesn’t have any policies or procedures, only when it comes to social networking sites like twitter or myspace. Just last night (Tuesday August 4) ESPN sent a memo to all employees for using Twitter unless it was for ESPN purposes. This could be a good thing I guess. I will keep my eye on this story.

This just in to the laznet news room. Aussie Rules Football is back on ESPN. The network reached an agreement with the Australian Football League to cover up to three live games each weekend for the remainder of this season and the next two after that. Most of the games will be online at ESPN360.com but a select number of games will be televised on ESPN2. This includes this year’s championship game (the Grand Final) in September. I’M so exticed, I grew up watching Aussie Rules Football on ESPN back when we were both growing up and I have miss it since. Can’t wait for the fall!

This Weekend

Next week I will be on Cape Cod for our family vacation, Don’t worry I will have TV and will be bringing my laptop, so if there is any breaking news I will be on it.

The major sports events this weekend is another round of the Red Sox against the Yankees. After a shakey month of July for Boston, the Yankees lead in the American League East is 2 and a half games (entering Thursday). It is a 4 game series that starts Thursday at Yankee stadium. It is always fun when these two teams get together.

There are two big MMA events this weekend. UFC 101 from Philadelphia Saturday on Pay-per-view. The main event of the night is a bout for the UFC Lightweight Championship, Champion B.J Penn will take on Kenny Florian. This should be a great fight as both guys have a ton of experience and are both Jiu-Jitsu specialist. I wish I could see it or better yet I wish I could be there live.

Sunday night in Las Vegas is WEC 42 live on Versus. The main event on this card is a fight for the WEC Bantamweight Championship. The champion Miguel Torres taking on Brian Bowles. The lighter weights are always exciting and this fight should be more of the same. One of the great things that makes MMA so exciting is that it is so unpredictable and anyone can win on any given day. I hope to catch this fight.

And that is the way it is.

Jamie Lazaroff

The view from the chair

This is a South Africa themed post.
Here is my recap of the FIFA CONFEDERATIONS Cup from South Africa. The first match of day one (Sunday) was a lifeless scoreless draw between the hosts South Africa and IRAQ. Match number two was Spain versus New Zealand, score, Spain six to zero. Spain shows that they are here to win and stamped their authority on this tournament. New Zealand was just out classed.
Day two (Monday) was the greatest day of football (soccer) I have ever seen. Match one was Brazil versus Egypt. Brazil survived a tough Egypt team 4 to 3. Brazil won on a controversial handball in the Brazilian goal area from an Egyptian player. That led to a Kaka penalty kick to win the game. For the record, I did not see the handball, but every one I talk to did. The Egyptian team has filed a protest, not on the handball its self, but the fact that the third official may have seen a video replay of the handball and gave advice to referee Howard Webb to award the penalty kick. Video replays are not used in soccer; by the way, FIFA (world’s governing body) has rejected Egypt’s protest. Despite the controversial call, as my fellow soccer sportswriter, Jamie Trecker, said this match was a great advertisement for soccer. It had everything, goals, send offs, PK’s, corner kicks, free kick, and the best part for sports writers, like me, controversy.
Match number two of day two was the United States National Team taking on Italy. This match was not with out controversy either. In the 31st minute the Americans were down to 10 men when Ricardo Clark was given a straight red card. But the Americans took the lead when Jozy Altidore was taken down in the penalty box by an Italian player. Landon Donovan stepped up to convert the PK. The second half was a different story as the 11-man Italian side scored three times. The irony is that two of the Italian goals were by Giuseppe Rossi, who was born in New Jersery, but his dad was born in Italy and he decieded to play for the Italy national team. Again, as Jamie Trecker said there are no more moral victories anymore for the American team. Ricardo Clark’s red card could have gone either way. It was a reckless tackel but I think it should not have been a direct red card which meant an immediate ejection but should have been a yellow card. The U.S. should know by now that FIFA tournaments are called in a tighter fashion than MLS because the refs are under the microscope by their bosses. If anything, FIFA refs tend to overcompensate. When will they learn?
The US played Brazil and lost 3 to 0 Thursday morning; in one of the worst games I have seen the US National Team play. Their defense was just awful; they even had another player sent off for a reckless tackel. Didn’t they learn anything from the other day? I guess not. As much as the Americans played terrible, Brazil was Brazil, they put on a show and scored in every way possible, off free kicks and in the run of play, thankfully not on a PK, I would have killed someone, that would have put me over the edge. My question is, why does the US play well against their regional opponents but when it comes the worldwide tournaments, they suck? Just sayin!

There is good news about next year’s World Cup in South Africa and the way ESPN will cover the event. According to the Sports Business Journal, ESPN is sending two SportsCenter sets and three host anchors to the event. The setup will be similar in scale to how the network uses “SportsCenter” at the Super Bowl as opposed to how it uses remote sets at an event like the recent Belmont Stakes and this weekends US Open Golf Championship. ESPN is finally identifying the World Cup as one of its three corporate priorities. In years past, the only other productions to make that list were “SportsCenter” and the NBA. ESPN hasn’t made any decisions about announcers and analysts for the games, but the executives said that it planned to handle the 2010 World Cup more like its telecasts of the Euro 2008 tournament than that of the 2006 World Cup. For the Euros, it used Sky Sports commentator and Brit Andy Gray, whereas for the 2006 World Cup it used American Dave O’Brien, who is a baseball guy and did not know anything about soccer. The difference between next year and the last World Cup is that the network sublicensed the rights from Soccer United Marketing in 2006. Next year in South Africa and 2014 in Brazil, it will own the rights to the events outright and it is treating the event accordingly. I’M glad to see ESPN owns the rights and will be treating the event as the global spectacle it is.
The next news story is also about South Africa, ESPN is finally giving Nelson Mandela the Arthur Ashe Courage Award at its ESPY awards show. I can’t believe ESPN finally is recognizing the 1995 Rugby World Cup and the impact it had on South Africa. He is the first paragraph of the press release: “The 1995 Rugby World Cup was hosted in South Africa for the first time. Following the victory of the host national team, The Springboks, and in a pivotal moment for South Africa, President Nelson Mandela, wearing a Springbok rugby shirt and cap, presented the William Webb Ellis Cup to South African captain Francois Pienaar to the delight of black and white sports fans across the country. This iconic gesture helped to unite a previously divided nation through a shared passion for sport, and further cemented the transition from apartheid to democracy”. Also what made this moment so moving is that while Mandela was in prison he would listen to rugby matches and because rugby was such a white sport, he would rote for the other team. This year the Arthur Ashe Courage Award coincides with Mandela Day, which will fall on July 18th, Nelson Mandela's birthday. Mandela Day will act as a global call to action for people to recognize their individual power to make an imprint and help change the world around them for the better. The Nelson Mandela Foundation and 46664 (Mandela’s number in Prison) are calling upon people around the world to commit 67 minutes (Nelson Mandela has been making an imprint on the world for 67 years) of their time to make an imprint and help change the world around them. Talk about cross promotion, but it’s good to see him get this award. The ESPYs will be televised Sunday, July 19 at 9 p.m. ET on ESPN/ESPN HD.

This Weekend

This is a big sports weekend. It started Thursday with the first round of the US Open Golf Championship at Bethpage Black on Long Island NY. Bethpage staged the Open back in 2002 and was the first public course to host our National Championship of golf. The main storylines are; can Tiger come back after last years win and his win at the Black in 2002. The other major story is Phil Mickelson who came back to the tour after his wife Amy was diagnosed with cancer. He said he only came back because he thought he could win the Open. He was the runner-up to Tiger in 2002 by 3 shots. The course is always the story at the US Open. The United States Golf Association says that protecting par is the goal for the tournament. NBC has the weekends, Sunday 1:30 to 7:30 P.M.

For you fight fans the UFC has their Ultimate Fighter finale Saturday on Spike TV at 9 P.M. This is when the 7-figure contract will be handed out for the winner of the Ultimate Fighter realty TV show. The Main event of the night is a lightweight fight between two of the most exciting fighters in the world, Diego Sanchez and Clay Guida. This one should be good. Also on the card is Nate Diaz against Joe Stevenson, both fighters are very exciting. Should be a fun night.

Monday was starts the Wimbledon Championships from London. This is the first year that there is a roof over center court, no more rain delays at the All England Club! The main story will be; can Rafael Nadal defend his title or will Roger Federer win back his crown. Update: Rafael will not defend his title he withdrew this week, this news opens the door wide open for Federer to win the tournament. On the women side, will Venus Williams defend her title or will someone else win the crown. From the British point of view will Andy Murray be the first Brit to win the Gentleman’s Crown in a long long time. Always interesting to see Wimbledon from the British point of view, you have to love the Brits. Should be interesting. ESPN will have the coverage starting Monday through Friday 7 A.M. to 5 P.M. each day. Enjoy!

See you next week, if not before.

Jamie Lazaroff

A view for the chair

I’m really getting into the NBA finals this year. The Lakers are a great team; Kobe Bryant has taken over the game. Magic is the team of the future. In my opinion Dwight Howard of the Magic is the future of the NBA but needs some more work before I call him a superstar. A lot of the Magic success is because of coach Stan Van Gundy who, I think, is an extremely underrated coach. He made the necessary adjustments needed after game one and the blowout by the Lakers to continue in this series and to help make it competitive. Two of the games have gone into overtime, the Magic should have won these games but they blew it in OT.

I think ABC is doing a great job on the telecast of the games. Mike Breen is the best play-by-play man in the business. Jeff Van Gundy (Stan’s brother) is a great analyst. He is a former coach but talks the fans language. Mark Jackson is also very good he comes up with some funny lines but his voice is very monotone.

My question about the NBA Finals is, why do the weekday games start around 9 P.M. and weekend games start around 8 P.M.? Last Thursdays game did not end until after midnight, to late for me! Should it be revised? Just a though!

Last weekend was the finals of the French Open. Roger Federer won a career Grand Slam and is now tied with Pete Sampras for the most all-time Grand Slam singles titles with 14 championships. Roger is the greatest tennis player I have every seen. Wimbledon in two weeks will be very interesting. Can Roger regain his crown he lost last year to Rafael Nadal? Let’s talk about NBC’s telecast. I think Ted Robinson is the second best play-by-play voice in tennis behind Dick Enberg. John McEnroe is the best in the business behind no one. Mary Carillo is very good too. These three combined may be the best announcing team in all of sports.

Last Friday as Roger Federer was outlasting Juan Martin del Potro in the French Open Semifinals, we in the United States did not see it live until that afternoon on Tennis Channel. Here is an explanation from NBC Sports via Richard Deitsch from Sports Illustrated. NBC Sports’ contract with the tournament allowed it to air only one of the semifinals and they gave NBC a “blackout window” after the broadcast of the NBC taped match ended. NBC’s window was 10 A.M. to 1 P.M. because it wanted to protect the “Today Show”. By the way I thought the “Today Show” went to 11 A.M.? I would like to know why there was no live tennis on NBC the first weekend (May 30 and 31) of the French Open? As Richard says in his Monday column, the three network partners (NBC, ESPN, and the Tennis Channel) need to figure out how to air live coverage on the first weekend and last Friday in 2010.

Last Saturday, June 6th was the season opener for the WNBA Connecticut Sun. It was one of the worst games I have every witnessed. I hope this was just season opening jitters. On Sunday, June 7th they beat New York, so we will see how they do in their next game, Sunday, June 14, 2009 at home versus Atlanta. I won’t be there!

Now on to hockey for a minute, why are some of the NHL Stanley Cup Finals games on the same night as the NBA finals games? Just asking?

Last Sunday TNT took over NASCAR coverage from FOX. I think play-by-play announcer Bill Weber is good but no Mike Joy. I don’t like Wally Dallenbach, I think he is too laidback and comes off as arrogant sometimes. Kyle Petty was a good diver in his day but is no good in the booth. He speaks diver language but for the most part I can’t understand him. After just one week, I miss Darrell Waltrip. Larry McReynolds is part of TNT coverage but just trackside but he’s not on enough to be effective.

Last Sunday night Mike Brown and Urijah Faber put on a great show for the WEC on Versus. Mike Brown won the fight by unanimous decision to retain the WEC Featherweight Championship. Faber broke his hand in the frst round of the fight, but still fought all 5 rounds @ 5 minutes each. Just incredible, in fact, I missed the overtime of game 2 of the NBA Finals to watch this fight. Versus needs to find a new announcer because Todd Harris was just awful. He should not do any sports, he is bad at everything he does. Kenny Florian was great as the analyst. He has been an analyst on ESPN internet show MMA live, but I did not know how he would do on live TV. After his fight career is over Kenny has a furtue in TV.

This Weekend
The big event this weekend is UFC 99 from Cologne, Germany on pay-per-view. There are no championship fights on this card, will have some great matchups, like former UFC Middleweight Champion Rich “ACE” Franklin fighting fomer Pride Middlewight Champion Wanderlei “The Axe Murderer” Silva in a 195 lb bout. The other headliner is the return of Mirko “Cro Cop” to the Octagon. “Cro Cop” is a former Pride Openweight Grand Prix Champion. Should be fun.

The other big event is the start of the FIFA Confederations Cup from South Africa on Sunday. The good news for soccer fans in the U.S. is that all of the games will be on ESPN and ESPN2. Here is next weeks schedule:
Su 6/14 9:55 a.m. ESPN2 South Africa vs. Iraq
2:25 p.m. ESPN2 New Zealand vs. Spain
Mo 6/15 9:55 a.m. ESPN2 Brazil vs. Egypt
2:25 p.m. ESPN USA vs. Italy
We 6/17 9:55 a.m. ESPN2 Spain vs. Iraq
2:25 p.m. ESPN2 New Zealand vs. South Africa
Thur 6/189:55 a.m. ESPN2 USA vs. Brazil
2:25 p.m. ESPN2 Egypt vs. Italy

Enjoy, I know I will!

See you next week, if not before.
Jamie Lazaroff

A view from the chair

The 2009 Masters is in the books and I think it was one of the most enjoyable in some time. Sunday was like two tournaments in one, we had the pairing of Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson the number one and two players in the world trying to make a run and chasing the lead. I was at my cousin Carley home for Easter. Carley’s husband David, her father-in law Bill and I were glued to the TV watching Tiger and Phil duel to the end. We all felt the roller coaster ride with them. When Tiger and Phil ended their round and we knew that they would not win the golf tournament, my dad asked my why I was still watching (he’s not a fan of golf) I said, “ Some one will win and it will be a great story.” After the thrill ride of Tiger and Phil the tournament really took off. Kenny Perry had a two shot led heading to the 17th hole, but he ended up with bogeying the 17th and 18th to set up a sudden-victory playoff with Chad Campbell and Angel Carbera. Carbera came out the winner on the 2nd playoff hole. He is the first player from Argentina to win the Masters. One of the great stories that goes along with Angel Carbera’s win is that in 1968 Roberto De Vicenzo, also from Argentina, was disqualified for signing an incorrect scorecard only to lose the golf tournament. Roberto could not win 41 years ago but finally a fellow Argentinean did.

This Weekend

This weekend’s big event is UFC 97; live on Pay-per-view on Saturday night from Montreal, Canada.

The main event of UFC 97 is Middleweight Champion Anderson “The Spider” Silva who returns to the Octagon to defend his crown against number one contender Thales Leites. The pound for pound king Silva has already defended his title more times than anyone in UFC middleweight history and will battle Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. Black Belt Leites is a winner of five fights in a row. Silva is the best in the world and should win this fight.
Also featured is the Light Heavyweight showdown fans have waited for years to see. As UFC legend Chuck "The Iceman" Liddell squares off against Brazilian superstar Mauricio "Shogun" Rua in what promises to be one of the most explosive bouts of 2009. This is a must win fight for both men as both are coming off of big loses.

Monday is another sign of spring in the running of the Boston Marathon. This is the 113th running of one of the oldest sporting events in the country. Headlining the field is four time champion and course record holder Robert Kipkoech Cheruiyot of Kenya, defending women’s champion Dire Tune of Ethiopia, and former champions Lidiya Grigoryeva of Russia and Timothy Cherigat of Kenya. Challenging the champions are Olympians Ryan Hall, Brian Sell and Kara Goucher of America; Deriba Merga and Gashaw Asfaw of Ethiopia and Salina Kosgei of Kenya, as well as additional Olympians and winners of international marathons. The good thing about the marathon is that it is not just a one-off race; it is part of a whole series of races all over the world that will crown a champion at the end of the year.
Also running this year is Terry Moulin of Woodstock CT. Terry works for my mom at The Arc of Quinebaug Valley in Danielson. Terry is running in the marathon to raise money for Paul Newman’s Hole in the Wall Game Camp in Ashford CT. Good Luck Terry, I for one will be watching for you.

See you next week if not before.

Jamie Lazaroff

the week that was and the week to come

The big story last week was Alex Rodriguez admitted to using steroids from 2001 to 2003. This DOES not surprise me at all. Baseball and the fans are at fault for the steroid era. Baseball turned a blind eye to performing-enhancing drug users, because the Home Run became the attraction of the game. By 1998 ESPN had started live coverage of the Home Run Derby at the All-Star week. Also at this time there was a famous advertisement campaign with the slogan “Chicks Dig the Long Ball.” All this contributed to the pressure to perform. I think it’s better for A-Rod to admit to using steroids and finally come clean now than to continue denying it like others such as Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds. History will look at A-Rod more kindly for admitting and I think he might still have a chance to get into the Hall of Fame.
Tuesday February 17, 2009 A-Rod held his first Press Conference since an interview he did with ESPN last week. He said a cousin injected him with an over-the-counter drug designed to give an "energy boost." He also said that it was a mistake that his cousin obtained these banned drugs from the Dominican Republic I understand this was before testing and the culture was different back in the early 90’s but if I were a pro baseball player I would look at what I was putting in my body before I used it.

A side story to this is that Miguel Tejeda was charged with lying to Congress about performance enhancing drug useage the same week. For lying, he faces up to one year in federal prison and deportation as he was born in the Domican Republic.

The other major story last week was the second retirement of Brett Favre. I say second because he retired last year but came back to play. We wll see if this retirement holds before I talk about it.

This Weekend

This weekend’s big event is the final stop of the Winter Dew Tour from Lake Tahoe, CA. Saturday is the Freesking Slopestyle final from 2:30 to 4 P.M. on NBC. Sunday is the Snowboarding Superpipe final from 3 to 6 P.M. again on NBC Sports. Like I said this is the final stop of the Tour, so the season-long champions will be crowned. Should be fun.

The next big event is an Ultimate Fighting Championship card on free TV; UFC 95 live from London, England at 9 P.M. on Spike TV.
The main event of the card is the first winner of the Ultimate Fighter Reality TV show, Diego “Nightmare” Sanchez who will move up from welterweight to lightweight to challenge former world title contender Joe “Daddy” Stevenson. UFC is always a good time.
In other news, the UFC is about to get some competition on National TV from Showtime and CBS. I think the frist Showtime live event will be April 11, no word on the first CBS show, I think it will be in May. When I know I will let you all know.

Also this weekend is the Oscars. Usually I don’t like or have an intrest in seeing any of the movies up for the awards, but this year I wil watch because of the two movies“The Wrestler” and “Frost/Nixon”. I hope Mickey Rourke wins for best actor. Yes I’M a wresting fan. I also would like to see “Frost/Nixon” win Best Picture. Frost/Nixon is a true story about a series of interviews by Robert Frost /Richard Nixon after Watergate. I think the BBC just released the real interviews. .

Enjoy the games.

Talk to you next week if not before.

Jamie Lazaroff

The week in sports and what's to come

Hello everyone

I’M writing this with a head cold and I don’t know how I got it.

This past weekend was the end of the regular season in college football. Florida beat Alabama in the SEC title game to get in the championship game. As one sports writer said “ Tim Tebow willed Florida over Alabama”. Alabama was the better team but when Florida needs him most Tim Tebow stepped up and won the game. The defense also stepped up big. Oklahoma just beat up on Missouri 62 to 21 to set up the meeting with Florida in the national championship game, January 8th in Miami. Texas should be in the championship game because it beat Oklahoma earlier this season; I guess if you score 62 plus points in your last five games of the season, your in. It is not whom you loose to but how much you score that matters. I’M also looking forward to the Fiesta Bowl that has Ohio St. versus Texas on January 5. As I said Texas should be in the title game but I think they are in for a test in Ohio St. I think Ohio St. is underrated. Should be very interesting.

Saturday was the re-airing of the Paralympic Games Special that premiered a few weeks ago. The special sowed the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat but in the end the athlete’s spotlighted are just that athletes. I hope TV networks and cable stations get the point because athletes are athletes and should be covered just like any other sport.

What to watch this week

Saturday is a little light this weekend but I would suggest the Ironman Triathlon World Championships from Hawaii at 2:30 P.M. on NBC. It is a perennial Emmy award winner. Al Trautwig is underrated. He is another announcer who paints pictures with words. This show makes me cry each year, watch the last 15 minutes, your see what I mean!

Saturday night at 9 P.M. on Spike is the live season finale of the UFC Ultimate Fighter realty show for Las Vegas. The winner of the lightweight and light heavyweight final will get a six-figure contract to fight in the UFC. Should be fun, some of the fights in the past have been classics.

Saturday night 10 P.M. on ESPN 2 is the final round of the 2008 National Finals Rodeo from Las Vegas. This is when the World Champions for the year will be crowned.

Sunday is week 15 in the NFL. The Patriots are at the 3-10 Oakland Raiders; kickoff is 4:15 P.M. on CBS. The Pats need to win to keep their playoff hopes alive. Should be fun.

Like I said a little light, Saturday you may go Christmas shopping, but please record the Ironman and watch it Saturday night.
I’II be back next week for a full report. Look for my end of year awards in a few weeks.

Jamie Lazaroff

This week in sports

Happy belated Veterans Day everyone, hope you honored our veterans in some way.

Did you watched the Paralympics special on NBC? NBC did an awesome job of capturing the dedication and the true athletic abilities of these men and women that, in many cases, outshine the accomplishments of their able body counterparts. The film shows many winners and losers, it also addressed the 83 million disabled Chinese — which is equal to the population of Germany and shows how the country embraced and supported the Paralympics. Even the Great Wall of China has been made wheelchair accessible. If you think your life is bad a lot of these athletes not only over came their disability, but in some cases, have been abandoned as kids and adopted by other families. The special also underlined the fact that it is not about winning a medal, but it is about competing and taking part. I hope NBC will product a DVD of this special and its Paralympics event coverage, which is re-airing this week on Universal Sports.

It’s a big weekend up coming. Saturday is UFC 91 with the main event of Randy “the Natural” Couture vs. Brock Lesnar. This is the biggest fright in UFC history as Randy is one of the biggest names in the game. He is a 5-time champion (2-time light Heavyweight, and 3-time Heavyweight champion). He is also a member of the UFC Hall of Fame. Brock Lesnar is a former WWE champion and one of the toughest people in the world. I give the edge to Brock, but if he makes a mistake like he did against Frank Mir, Randy can win. Should be fun.

Also this weekend is the start of College Basketball season. I can’t wait, as both the UCONN Men and Women teams are number 1 in the preseason polls.

Enjoy the weekend and I hope to be back with a report on the UFC if I can find a friend to watch it at as its on PPV and I can’t get it at home.

Good night and good luck.

Jamie Lazaroff