Lou Pinella in the right kind of pinstripes

Well, it appears as though the Chicago Cubs have finally made a smart move in the front office by hiring Lou Piniella to manage the team for the next three years. As a long-time Cubs supporter I am thrilled to see someone with Piniella's track record and vigor coming to the Cubbies. This team needs a little fire, okay, a LOT of fire, in order to break a long-standing tradition of disappointment after disappointment. Of course, a manager can only do so much but, as Jim Leyland this year and Ozzie Guillen last year proved, a good Manager can go a long, long ways.

Speaking of Jim Leyland, the Detroit Tigers are poised to be one of the feel-good sporting stories of the modern sports era. This is a fun group of ball players to watch. They play the game the way it is supposed to be played.

I would hope that after they win the World Series in another week or so that people will start to talk about Ivan "Pudge" Rodriguez as one of the games truly great clutch performers. Let's not forget that Pudge was the little engine that could behind the improbable World Series run of the Florida Marlins a couple years back and now he's doing the same thing with the Detroit Tigers.

If I'm a GM with a young, could-be contending team, and I'm looking for that one missing piece to put my team over the hump, I'm looking into Pudge's availability this winter (do you hear me Blue Jays and Indians?). The guy bleeds winning.

Anyways, here's to hoping that the Mets send the Cards packing and then we can sit back and enjoy what I think will be a phenomenal WS matchup between the Tigers and Mets. With the way the Tigers are pitching though I don't think there's any way they don't win the World Series this year.
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The NHL is back in full swing. It's been a pretty uneventful first two weeks I think which is probably good. Of the games I've watched it's been pretty disappointing because the brand of hockey that is being played right now is pretty boring. If every team in the NHL played like the Buffalo Sabres than the NHL would be the most popular major sporting event in North America.

Unfortunately though too many teams continue to play like the painfully boring Calgary Flames and, let's face it, there's nothing fun about 1-0 or 2-1 hockey games with no offensive flow.
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It's now been one full week of "farmer vision" in the Benallick house. It's been so long since we've been without cable I forgot what it's like to not have 50 or 60 channels to cycle through. I don't even have a remote to use right now:). It actually hasn't been as bad as we anticipated. I think you realize better how much you have and how much you're blessed with when you go without for a little while. The only thing I'm really missing is my TSN and Sportsnet channels. This is the first time in a long time that I won't be able to watch the World Series and that's not really sitting too well with me:). Oh well, I'll survive.
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Watched two good movies this weekend- Adam Sandler's new one, Click, and X3. ___________________________________________________________________
Last night's episode of "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip" was another great one for the young show. I love the writing and the dialogue in this show. It is quick, it is witty, and it is smart. I would love to write for a show like this. It's obviously not anywhere near as intense as a show like 24 or CSI but, for me, the hour of watching goes by just as quick. Anyways, this uneducated critic thinks that NBC has a homerun with this show and I hope to see many years of this. Again, outstanding performances in this show by Matthew Perry and Bradley Whitford.
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