KarateKen

Cleveland pitcher Emmanual Clase, who is being investigated for rigging bets, has made a public statement defending himself. Clase has plead not guilty and argues that the text messages the FBI we misinterpreted and are not about illegal sports betting. What were the messages about? Rooster fighting. Clase claims that the messages were about rooster fighting, something he does as a side hustle. That is not his legal defense, that is just his public statement. Glad Mr. Clase has cleared that up for everyone. Sheesh.

Another crazy story, it has been one after another. New York Jets defensive back Kris Boyd was shot on the lung on Sunday morning in Manhattan. He is currently in the hospital and in critical condition. Evidently Boyd got into an argument with another person outside a restaurant that got heated and lead to the shooting. The suspect remains at large.

It won't get any easier this week, they play the 8-2 Colts on Sunday who are coming off a bye week. Then the play the Cowboys on Thanksgiving, so that one will be easier. Also, they will get another shot at the Broncos on Christmas Day. If KC can get in, they will have a chance to get back to the Super Bowl, though they might have to win three on the road in the playoffs. A few teams have done it, and those teams also had great QBs. The Packers did it when Rodgers was there, I think in 2010, they were a wild card and won the title. Then in 2020 the Bucs did it with Tom Brady, three on the road and won a home Super Bowl. It's rare but it has happened. With the talent, experience, and coaching that KC has they might be one of the few teams in history that can pull it off.

Soon I am going to start Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom. It has been on my book self about six months, which might seem like a long time to get to a book, but for me it is not at all. I've got many books that have been on myself for well over a decade that have never been opened. There will always be more books than time to read them. Thus is life.

They beat the struggling Blues but today they lost to the struggling Wild. Minnesota has 22 points, fifth in their division, and gets the OT win against Vegas 3-2. Both teams seemed unhappy with the officiating. Hey, at least Vegas won the Cup a few years ago, this is season 25 for the Wild and they have never been to the SC Finals. Slow start for both teams to this season.

Well Live by the Sword Die by the Sword. Dan Campbell and the Lions went 0-5 on 4th down attempts Sunday night against the Eagles. The aggressive style has been his approach to coaching the team since he took over in 2021, and often times with great results. Not this game. Eagles win it 16-9 and improve to 8-2. Philly looked good on defense, pressuring Goff the whole game, deflecting several passes, forcing an INT, and getting the stops. They also looked sharp on special teams coverage. Lions drop to 6-4, putting them in third place in the division behind the Bears and Packers. We now have the Eagles, Rams, and Colts all at 8-2, and the Patriots and Broncos at 9-2. Other division leaders are the Steelers (6-4) Bucs (6-4) and Bears (7-3).

Tough loss for the Vikings today as they drop to 4-6 after a 19-17 home loss to the Bears, losing on a FG as time expired. Chicago is kind of a quiet 7-3, a big improvement over where they were a year ago. They are winning some of these close games, five of their seven wins are by less than six points. Last year they found crazy ways to lose those games. The Bills bounce back after a blowout loss to the Dolphins; they win at home against Tampa. The struggle continues for the Falcons, Giants, Cardinals, Commanders, Titans, and Bengals, all who lost again this afternoon. Jacksonville got a big blowout win against the LA Chargers and are 6-4, Chargers are 7-4. Right now, the 7-2 Seahawks and 7-2 Rams are in a tight game, Rams lead 14-12 in the 4th. The Broncos and Chiefs are in the third quarter, tied at 13. Big game tonight between the Eagles and Lions in Philly. This is the time of year the contenders start to separate from the pretenders. Let's Go! Edit: The Rams have defeated the Seahawks 21-19, Chiefs and Broncos now tied at 19-19 in the 4th. The number 19 is showing up in a lot of scores today, that is unusual. 2nd edit: Broncos have defeated the Chiefs 22-19. Another close win for Denver, moving them to 9-2, tied with the Patriots for best record in the NFL.

More sad news connected to game sport of football. Laney College coach John Beam, known for his role in the Netflix series Last Chance U, was shot on the college campus Thursday, and died the following day. The Las Vegas Raiders released a statement on their website showing support for coach Beam, who has been coaching football in Oakland for decades.

The Patriots are red hot, winners of eight in a row, longest in the NFL this year, and are a league best 9-2 after beating the Jets on Thursday. Drake Maye is the front runner for MVP right now and Mike Vrabel deserves a lot of consideration for coach of the year. They have won more games this season than the previous two years combined, and it is only mid-November. After finishing with a losing record the last three years, nine wins assures that the Patriots will have a winning record this season. The Jets fall 2-8.

Former Steelers, Patriots, Raiders, and Bucs WR Antonio Brown has plead not guilty to attempted murder and posted $25k to get out on bail. Brown will be under house arrest and is required to wear a GPS ankle monitor while awaiting trial. He was also required to give up his passport. No trial date has been set yet.

Charlie Sheen has joined the NA beer business, releasing a golden nonalcoholic beer called WildAF. Kind of a play on his Rick Vaughn character "wild thing." Not sure the exact date it will hit the market but sometime before the end of the year. I'd give it a try.

I have not had a chance to speak with Felix directly, but the word is he is very appreciative of the birthday wishes. And some people say cats don't care. Blasphemy!

Agree with this and @bushido_man96 response, it has gotten out of control. For me it is also damaging my ability to enjoy sports. It has all shifted to the gambling and corporate greed now. We are bombarded with sports betting ads, even ESPN and Fanatics have an online sports book. In the NHL the Vegas Golden Knights wear a patch on their jersey for a Las Vegas sportsbook. It is everywhere. Furthermore, now anytime someone's team loses, anything strange happens, or a call is missed, the fans of that team claim the game is rigged. I wonder if we will see some cutback on this now that we have several scandals in the news at once, but I don't expect much of that. There is too much money in it.

Two things that come to mind when something like this happens. One, could he be making more money throwing the fight and if he were to win it? And two, is there anyone else involved, such as the mob. It's possible that someone has a figurative gun to his head and it runs a lot deeper than one fighter making a bad decision.

I was watching a video about athletes and gambling, and evidently gambling is huge among pro athletes, many of them are likely somewhat addicted. Part of the conversation was that athletes see it as a competition, to try and beat the casino, beat the game. As you can guess, successful pro athletes are hyper competitive, and that extends past the competition on the field. I would also add that many top pro athletes are highly protected by the teams and the leagues they work for. The Ravens initially defended Ray Rice, as one example. A lot of these guys probably figure that they are above the rules because the leagues make so much money off of them, they want to protect that money train and keep it going, so a lot of these players might be under the impression that rules do not apply to them equally. They have agents, media coaches, ect, who are helping shape a public image of the player which might be nothing like who they are when the camera is off.

This is exactly it. If enough people decide not to buy the tickets prices will drop. Part of the problem also is the resale market. Some people are buying up lots of tickets and reselling them at a much higher price. This causes the original prices to be raised also because the entertainer looks at the ticket prices in the resale market and says, "why should a reseller make more money on my tickets than I do?" So, they raise the price to try and match it. Ticketmaster wants that ticket to keep reselling because every time it does, they get more money.

Another week and another sports gambling scandal. The NBA, the UFC, and now MLB. This is really getting out of hand. Two pitchers for the Cleveland Gradians, Emmanual Chase and Luis Ortiz, are facing criminal charges for rigging prop bets in games they pitched in. The investigation started earlier this year because of unusual betting activity. Ortiz was arrested on Sunday in is expected in court on Monday. The accusation is that the rigging of the bets helped gamblers win at least 460,000 dollars in the Dominican Republic. Ortiz's lawyer has said his client is innocent and there is no credible evidence that he knowingly did anything wrong.

It has been a busy day of sports news, including the first NFL head coach being fired this year. That is Brian Daboll of the NY Giants. The Giants were 20-40-1 during his time as head coach and the last straw was the loss to Chicago on Sunday, dropping the Giants to 2-8 on the season. Mike Kafka will take over as interim coach.

Thoughts to those who died in the recent plane crash in Kentucky. There was also a near collision of planes outside LAX the other day. Maybe not paying the ATC isn't a smart decision.

As you might know, Felix the Cat is celebrating a birthday. It was on this day (November 9, 1919) that Felix made his first appearance. We were a cat family, and I have many memories of the Felix cartoons as a child. Felix is now 126 years old, that is 882 in cat years!

I went as Dexter Morgan.

You might not have noticed but the Anaheim Ducks are in first place!! They are winners of 6 in a row and their 21 points is second best in the west behind Colorado. Are the Ducks for real? Too early to tell, as they got off to a good start in 2023 only to fall apart later in the season. It has been a lot of long years for the Ducks, who have not been to the playoffs since 2018, the second longest in the league behind Buffalo. During that stretch the Ducks have finished no higher than sixth in the division.

On a less serious note, the Bills were on the wrong side of a butt kicking against the Dolphins as the 30-13 win for Miami ended my season in survivor league, so you guys don't have to sit through my ramblings about that for the rest of the year. Another big upset was the Saints over the Panthers, and the Jets are on a rare two game win streak after beating the hapless Cleveland Browns. The Ravens seem to be back from the dead, they have won three in a row and are 4-5, with games against the Browns and Jets the next two weeks, so they could be 6-5 and back in the hunt by Thanksgiving. Colts and Patriots both win, so now three teams are 8-2, and the Seahawks win puts them at 7-2, same for the LA Rams. While the best team right now might be Indy, their run game looks unstoppable, there is no clear frontrunner thus far. The Bears and Bucs are both a quiet 6-3, while Washington continues to struggle and falls to 3-7 after getting blown out at home against the Lions. Aaron Rodgers is in LA tonight as the Steelers face the Chargers, and the 6-2 Eagles visit the 5-2-1 Packers Monday night, so two good matchups the next two nights.

Fromer NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue has died at age 84. Tagliabue was the league commissioner from 1989-2006.

Another unfortunate story connected to the NFL, this one about former WR Antonio Brown. Brown has been arrested on an attempted murder charge from back in June. He was in Dubai and is being brought back to the US to face the charge. Brown allegedly attempted to shoot and kill a man in Miami with a handgun, firing a bullet that grazed the alleged victim but did not kill him. The charge is second degree attempted murder. Brown has had several serious off the field issues over the years, none more serious than this one. Many have pointed to a hit Brown took while he was with the Steelers. It was a playoff game against the Bengals and LB Vontaze Burfict. A very nasty and illegal hit to the head. Someday I hope research is done on Brown's brain, very possible he has an extreme case of CTE.