These are the sports related items that are annoying me on this cold winter Monday night.

1) Tony Dungy- His team is on the verge of making history and he stands there in press conferences like his just saw his dog get hit by a car. And what about this nonsense that he may sit his starters while his team is undefeated. Is he nuts?? This team has a chance to be a team for the ages that runs the table in the era of parity and he's coaching them scared. There's no doubt in my mind that this team has what it takes to go undefeated. My question is whether their coach has the intestinal fortitude to get them there. If I was a player on that team and heard his pensive noncommital drone, I'd wonder a little bit about my leader. The Colts have proved they can kick everyone's butt and their most improtant butt kicking time is coming up soon. Coach Dungy, you've got a special team here. Its not enough to allow them to pursue greatness, you must implore them to.

2) Major League Baseball Owners- The next time there is a serious labor negotiation, no one in that sport should have the nerve to cry poor. The absurdity of major league contracts has never been worse. The owners would tell you that it isn't and point to things like we haven't seen contracts anywhere close to Manny Ramirez' or Alex Rodriguez', but the prices being paid for average major league baseball players are downright obscene. In the last two weeks, we've seen the Dodgers give 13 million dollars a year for 3 years to a leadoff hitting shortstop with a .284 career batting average(Rafael Furcal). The Bluejays gave 9 million dollars a year for 5 years to a 30 year old relief pitcher who has closed for exactly one season in the majors(B.J. Ryan). The Mets gave a 34 year old closer with a violent pitching motion 4 years at 11 million. Now, I like Billy Wagner, but they're paying him more per year than the Yankees pay Mariano Rivera and they're going to be paying him 11 million a year when he's 38. And the worst one I've seen was today. The San Francisco Giants decided that they were short on overpaid players in their thirties. You see, Moises Alou, Edgardo Alfonzo, Omar Vizquel, Ray Durham, and Jason Schmidt aren't enough. They had to have Matt Morris at 3 years and 27 million dollars. This is the 31 year old Matt Morris who has had serious shoulder surgery twice in his career and has not completed a season with an ERA under 4.00 since his last operation.
I hope the owners are proud of themselves. I'm sure MLB commissioner Bud Selig will tell us its progress because the Yankees and the Red Sox weren't buyers of any of these players. My answer will be, thats why the Yankees and the Red Sox are good every year.

3) Stan Van Gundy's resignation- Those who regularly read this space know that I am quite fond of Stan's coaching prowess. And I certainly got my panties in a bunch this summer when Riley casually mentioned to a reporter that he "wanted more control of the day to day operation." All this makes it that much tougher to swallow that Stan left this job on his own. I have a purely speculative theory. Shaq wanted him gone. To me thats the only explanantion. I don't think Stan would have left because coaching Shaq and Dwayne Wade together is a once in a lifetime coaching opportunity that a lifer like Stan most likely would not readily walk away from. If Riley pushed him out because he wanted the job himself, there would be no need for a cover story. Anyone who faxes in his resignation like Riley did in New York is totally comfortable being prtrayed as a classless backstabber. But Shaq is a different story. He's wildly popular nationally. He's a marketing machine and he's now positioned himself as a pillar in the community with his law enforcement work. But most importantly, he prides himself as the anti-Kobe. If he was on record as having run a respected coach off a great job because he didn't like the way he was being coached, his untarnished image could take a hit. And what may be more important to him than that, might be the lost ability to play the moral superiority card over Kobe to the media. Shaq is a master at managing the media and if he had a role in Stan's firing, and the media catches wind, he will lose that upper hand. For Riley, like it would be for anyone else, a happy Shaq makes a productive Shaq. That, and maybe Riles wanted to get back to the sidelines just a little bit..........