(Get) A Sporting Life

It goes without saying that every team wants to win. It also goes without saying that every team has fans that are crushed when their hero's fall short time and time again. So, as far as it goes and all things being equal, every team needs to win championships. However, all things are not equal. There are some franchises whose dry streaks just scream out a little bit more insistently because of their history or their place in their respective sports hierarchy. So, I'll be giving you my perspective and ranking these extra needy franchises starting at the 10th most needy and ending with the most terribly needy franchise. Oh, the places we will go! #10) Seattle Sounders - MLS "Wait. What?" many of you are saying. It seems incongruous that a team that has only been in the top flight of American soccer since 2007 should be on this list. However, the Sounders are in many ways the model MLS franchise and a poster child for what the league always hoped the sport could ...

...just took the worst penalty kick in the history of bad penalty kicks. I'm pretty sure a dead goalie propped up into a standing position also would have made the save, as would a box of newly born kittens. No more Espindola penalties please.

One thing I am enjoying about the baseball landscape these day is the ability to get to know something about the prospects going into the draft. Ten years ago the draft just happened and you got a blurb or two in the paper the following days. Now it is possible to get some feel for the players likely to go in the first couple of rounds. Granted, that "feel" is a little cursory, but at least it gives baseball fans more of a rooting interest. That being said, here are a few players I'm rooting for the Cardinals to select with one of their four selections in the first 72 picks. (The Cards select 27, 34, 69 and 72.) Note this is not an attempt at a "mock draft" ordering. Trying to do that past the Top 10 selections seems a bit of a fool's errand. There is just too much volatility for mock drafts to be all that worthwhile (though they are fun.) The only thing I am doing is removing some of the big names from consideration as it seems unlikely, for example, that...

I have nothing to really add here except to note how easy-goingly mediocre the Cardinals have decided to be this year. To say the Cards lack a sense of urgency would be putting it mildly. I do realize its still early but it is a fine line between calm, cool and collected and downright apathetic. I'm just not certain this team is on the correct side of that line.

It looked dicey for about 15 minutes, but Notts County was able to secure a 1-1 draw against Oldham.  It turned out Tranmere wound up losing 2-1, so it didn't matter too much. Though there was a moment in the second half when Tranmere was up, Crewe was up, and Notts was down. At that point I needed a sedative. All's well that end's well. So they say.

So, it has all come down to this in League One. Notts County need one point, one measly little point, to assure survival. (OK, OK, technically  they could be caught. But Tranmere would have to win thier game by 14 goals. I'll take my chances.) The games that matter: Oldham v. Notts County Crewe v. Preston Tranmere v. Bradford Crewe and Tranmere are both at home, and Notts is one the road. That's bad. Notts has the far superior goal differential. That's good. In the early minutes Crewe and Tranmere have gotten early leads. That's bad. In the early minutes Notts and Oldham are still tied. That's good. It's gonna be a long 90 minutes or so.