How 'Bout Them Vikings! - Offense

A look at how the Minnesota Vikings have done so far on offense and how far they could go entering the second half of the season.

Going into week 10 of the 2009 NFL season, the Minnesota Vikings have a 7-1 record and a comfortable three-game advantage over the Green Bay Packers as they lead the NFC North Division. Adrian Peterson is having another phenomenal season, the defense is dominant and some guy by the name of Brett Favre is having a pretty good season. Friday, I will give a grade for how the Vikings' offense was for the first half of the season. Sunday, I will give a grade for how the Vikings' defense was for the first half of the season. Next Sunday, I will view how the second half of the season will go for Minnesota, predict how far they could go and what could prevent the Vikings from winning Super Bowl XLIV.

Vikings 1st half of the season:

Offense: A-

Before the 2009 NFL season began, I knew two things about the Vikings' offense:

• Adrian Peterson was not only going to have another Pro Bowl season, but maybe even a MVP season.
• With arguably the best left side in the NFL in tackle Bryant McKinnie and guard Steve Hutchinson and 6'8", 345 lbs. rookie tackle, Phil Loadholt to compliment the right side, Minnesota's offensive line was going to be one of the best in the NFL.

Unfortunately, if Minnesota was going to be a more balanced offense and go farther in the playoffs this season, they needed a better passing game and a better right side of the offensive line. The position the Vikings' needed an improvement the most from was a quarterback that could lead the team and take pressure off of Peterson. After eight games into the season, I believe the Vikings are now a scary offense for defenses to defend and I'll tell why:

QB - Brett Favre: Did anybody really believe Favre was going to be this good? Who really thought Favre was going to be a mid-season MVP candidate this season? I sure didn't think so. He is 40 years old, had a terrible second half of last season with the New York Jets where he started to show his age and after having just three weeks of training camp to gel with the team, I thought Vikings' coach Brad Childress was taking a huge risk bringing Favre to Minnesota. Childress has had a past for not taking risks, but getting Favre was exactly what the Vikings offense needed. Just look at Favre's stats so far this season:

• Favre has thrown for 1925 yards, completing 174 out of 256 passes with a 68% completion average.
• Favre has the second most passing touchdowns (Schaub & Brees, 17) in the NFL with 16 TDs and out of all the quarterbacks that have started every game this season for their teams, he has the least amount of interceptions in the NFL with 3 INTs.
• Favre has the second highest quarterback rating (Brees, 106.1) in the NFL with a 106.0 rating.

Minnesota's wide-receiver targets are playing better than ever now as players are emerging as weapons for Favre to throw to. Minnesota's passing game has not been this explosive since 2004 when Randy Moss was still a Viking, and has been productive with young receivers like:

WR - Sidney Rice: There may have been some players on the Vikings offense that were going to do well this year with Favre added to the team, but Rice's emergence has been the biggest surprise for Minnesota's offense this year. He has gone from a fourth-option wide-receiver in 2008 to arguably Favre's favorite target the first half of this season in 2009. Here are his stats:

• In Rice's first two seasons of his career (26 games), he had a total of 537 yards, 46 receptions and eight TDs. In his first 8 games this year, he already has 585 yards, 37 receptions and two TDs.
• Going into the 2009 season, Rice never had a 100-yards plus game. He has had two of them this year.
• In 2009, Rice leads the Vikings in receptions (37), yards (537) and yards per catch average(15.8).

WR - Percy Harvin: Rice may be the biggest surprise this season, but Harvin has been the biggest addition (besides Favre of course) to Minnesota's offense this year. People knew Harvin could do it all coming out of college whether it was catching the ball, running the ball or being a kick-off returner, but how good he has been at the NFL level this season has left him as the clear favorite for the 2009 Offensive Rookie of the Year award. Just look at his impressive stats:

• Harvin leads all NFL rookies in 2009 with 369 receiving yards, 28 receptions and three TDs.
• As a kick-off returner, Harvin leads the NFC with an average of 30.7 yards per return and two kick-off TDs, leaving him a great chance to go to the Pro Bowl as a rookie at the end of this season.

TE - Visanthe Shiancoe: After having his best season in 2008, some people thought Shiancoe's stats were a fluke and would have a disappointing season in 2009. Boy were they wrong. Shiancoe reminds me of what Bubba Franks was for Favre in his days at Green Bay, because he may not get many receptions per game, but is very productive with scoring touchdowns in the red-zone. He is one of the best tight ends in the NFC this year, and this is why:

• Shiancoe has just 22 receptions and 209 yards so far this season, but he is a touchdown machine as he leads the Vikings with six TDs.
• Shiancoe not only leads the Vikings, but when it comes to tight-ends in the NFL, he is tied for second in TDs (Davis, 7).

Then it comes to Minnesota's running game, still one of the most dangerous in the NFL. Statistically, the running game has been down a little compared to last season, but it is because of how balanced the Vikings's offense has been in 2009. Here is a look at one of the NFL's best running back combos:

RB - Adrian Peterson: I do not care if Peterson is third in the NFL in rushing yards right now in the season, he is hands down the best running back in the NFL. I believe I can say this because if you asked any defender in the NFL to pick which RB they would least like to play against in a game, it would not be this years rushing leaders Chris Johnson or Cedric Benson, it would be Peterson. His stats still are one of the best when it comes to RBs this year, just in different ways:

• Peterson respectively is third in NFL with 784 rushing yards, setting him on pace to run for over 1,500 rushing yards by the end of the season.
• Although he doesn't have as many yards by this time last season, Peterson's yardage per carry in 2009 is 4.8, the exact same as it was in 2008.
• Last year Peterson only had ten rushing TDs, but just 8 games into the 2009 season he already has ran for nine TDs, third-highest in the NFL.
• Peterson's biggest improvement this season has been his passing game. After just 21 receptions for 125 yards and no TDs in 2008, he has already caught 19 passes and 189 yards in 2009. Peterson still hasn't scored a passing TD this year, but expect that to change as the year goes on with how well Favre is playing.
• Even though this should never be a problem with how much of a beast he is, Peterson this year only has 2 fumbles, a major improvement to the 9 fumbles he had last year.

RB - Chester Taylor: Probably the best back-up running back in the NFL that has been lost under Peterson's shadow, Taylor has made the most of what he can this year for the Vikings as a third-down running back. Look at his stats for the first half of the season:

• Taylor has 209 receiving yards in 2009, the fourth-highest for the Vikings this season.
• Taylor has 22 receptions in 2009, also the fourth-most for the Vikings this season.

#1 Stat: Vikings average 30.5 points per game

In 2008, the Vikings scored an average of 23.7 points per game. In the first 8 games of the 2009 season, the Vikings have scored an average of 30.5 points per game. That is an improvement of 6.8 points a game, almost a full touchdown more than last seasons average. That is huge. The scary thing for Vikings' opponents is that Minnesota's best wide receiver last year, Bernard Berrian, has not really had a great game so far this season. That is why I gave an A-, instead of an A to grade the Vikings offense so far this season. If the Vikings can find a way to use Favre's strong arm and Berrian's speed to score more long touchdowns, the Vikings could average even more than 30.5 points by the end of the season.

Also, I believe that Peterson will have a better second half of the season running the ball because their opponents so far have focused on stopping Peterson, and making Favre win the game which hasn't worked with the Vikings' 7-1 record. Now, I think some defenses will respect Favre's arm and not focus on Peterson so much. If teams try to stop Peterson from running the ball, Favre with his young weapons will pick apart any defense which they showed against a good Baltimore Ravens team. If teams try to stop Favre's passing game, Peterson, the best running back in the NFL will destroy any defense that tries to match him up one-on-one, just ask the Pittsburgh Steelers cornerback William Gay. Either way, the Vikings offense will cause problems for any defense as Minnesota goes on to win their first Super Bowl in franchise history.

So What Do You Think Of A-Rod Now?

Alex Rodriguez's breakthrough postseason performance was the difference this year for the Yankees



Used steroids. Madonna rumors. Got divorced. Underperformed in the playoffs. Hip injury in spring training. Media saying he will never go to the hall of fame.

How the New York Yankees third-baseman, Alex Rodriguez or "A-Rod" overcame all these distractions before the 2009 season and play as well as he did in the playoffs, is truly amazing. What he did this postseason, in my mind, was the missing piece the Yankees had needed this year to win their 27th World Series Championship in franchise history.

What about their dominant ace pitcher, C.C. Sabathia? What about their captain shortstop and "Mr. November", Derek Jeter? What about the actual World Series MVP, Hideki Matsui? What about the best pitching-closer in MLB history, Mariano Rivera?

While all those players had their part in the Yankees winning the World Series, A-Rod was the missing piece this year for the Yankees because they finally got the performance they had been waiting for, and out of their most talented player.

It's like how the Boston Celtics did without Kevin Garnett in the 2008-2009 playoffs; they got to the second-round with everyone besides Garnett, but couldn't defend their championship without their best player. It's like how the New England Patriots did without Tom Brady in the 2008 season; they had a solid 11-5 record with everyone besides Brady, but didn't make it to the playoffs after making it to the Super Bowl the previous year without their best player.

Even with an organization that has had as much talent as the Yankees have had on their teams with A-Rod, it comes down to this: when a team doesn't get the most out of their best player, it is very difficult for them to be champions that season.

Ever since he was traded to the New York Yankees in 2004, A-Rod has been a great regular season player but a huge disappointment in the playoffs. Playing in a total of 13 playoffs games from the 2005, 2006 and 2007 seasons, A-Rod in 44 at-bats had just seven hits, one home-run, 15 strikeouts and a terrible .157 batting average. In all three of those playoffs series, the Yankees lost in the first round.

This postseason in 2009, A-Rod was much better. In 15 games and 52 at-bats, A-Rod had 19 hits, six home-runs, 13 strikeouts and a much improved .365 batting average. Even though those stats are impressive, he played better then what the stats show for the entire playoffs because after the first two rounds he already had five home-runs, just five strikeouts and an unheard of .438 batting average.

Those are the stats the Yankees organization, fans and even the media had been waiting for from A-Rod in the playoffs, and this year he finally delivered. He overcame all the distractions from the New York media and finally got his life together off the field, and showed in the postseason why he is so good on the field.

Which leads to the media and A-Rod's critics: What do you think of A-Rod now? At the beginning of the 2009 season he had many critics that were very tough about the steroids issue, his playoffs struggle and that he will never win a championship as a Yankee.

In its own way, the steroids issue was kind of a blessing in disguise for A-Rod. Yes, he lost a lot of respect from his fans, the media and baseball in general. He lost a majority of endorsements and had many people believe that no matter what his starts are at the end of career, he tainted baseball and should never be accepted to the baseball hall of fame.

It may sound weird, but admitting that he used steroids may have been the best thing that happened to A-Rod this year. He had this huge secret that must have built loads of guilt and shame to his conscience and to finally admit his use of steroids, was a huge monkey off his back. A-Rod could now do one thing that he hasn't done in a while as a professional baseball player: simply be a kid again and have fun.

As for A-Rod's playoff struggle, he really changed his critics' minds after this postseason. No matter how much the New York media may have not liked him, I hope they will realize that without A-Rod's performance in the playoffs this year, the Yankees would not have gotten to the World Series and win a championship.

I mean he almost scored as many runs as the Minnesota Twins did all by himself in the first-round. In the second-round against the Los Angeles Angles, he delivered clutch hits when the Yankees needed him the most, something A-Rod had never done beore. Although he didn't do as well in the World Series, remember that his opponent, the Philadelphia Phillies were the defending champs, the best team from the National League two years in a row and the best pitching staff he faced all throughout the playoffs. Lets just say he showed he was human by coming back to earth for the World Series after putting up out of this world stats in the first two rounds of the playoffs.

As for championships, he now has a ring and being just 34 years old with a very good New York Yankees team, expect him to have a few more by the end of his career. Its remarkable that in just one season, A-Rod's image has changed from a steroid using, overpaid, playoff disappointment, to not only to one of the best players in baseball again, but now a champion and a leader to his team. Congratulations A-Rod to your first World Series championship, after what you went through this season, you deserve it.

Senior Paper: How Technology Communications Have Changed and Afftected Sports Journalism

“When you did journalism before the Internet, you controlled the time. Nobody could read what you wrote till the paper came out the next day. Now, you could put something on the Internet, Twitter or Facebook, and you’ll get an immediate reaction…like someone is reading it almost instantly.” – Jeff Legwold

Being born in 1985, I grew up knowing how to use the new media of the past fifteen years. It came natural to me because the technology was part of my generation’s everyday lives. The transition from old media to the new media began in the late 1980s, when compact discs (CD’s) and computers came out. Then in the early ‘90s came the Internet and cellular phones, but the real transformation in technology communications has definitely been in the past fifteen years.

Since it is so simple in the world today for people to communicate and that I plan to be a sports journalist someday, I decided my senior paper would be about how technology communications have affected and changed sports journalism in the past fifteen years and what the future is for journalism. Before naming the communications used today that author Dan Gillmor discussed in his book, We The Media, I must talk about his book and how to tie it in with sports journalism.

In the second chapter of We The Media, Gillmor informs the public, especially journalists, about the new technologies of today so they won’t be left behind with the communication of tomorrow. Before the emergence of the Internet in the 1990s, Gillmor explained,

"We’ve essentially had two distinct means of communication: one-to-many (books, newspapers, radio, and TV) and one-to-one (letters, telegraph, and telephone). The Internet, for the first time, gives us many-to-many and few-to-few communications."

What Gillmor is trying to say is the Internet has expanded the way for people, and in this case sports journalists, to communicate in so many ways that communication has gone to another level. We now have technologies like e-mails, blogs, mobile phones, text-messaging, Facebook and now Twitter for journalists to communicate with athletes and coaches anywhere in the world and at any time.

Senior Paper: The Internet

In December, 2007, there was a talk at an EG (Electronic Gathering) conference where executive editor of WIRED, Kevin Kelly discussed about what has happened to the media in the past 5,000 days. The Internet has gotten so popular in the past 5,000 days, it has become part of people’s everyday lives. Kelly believes there are so many uses for people to use the Internet that whether it’s finding out what the weather forecast is for tomorrow, buying tickets so see a sports game, finding if a book is available at a library, paying your monthly phone bill or applying for a job, people forget how amazing the Internet is and how far it has come.

"It’s amazing that all this stuff (on the Internet) is here. It’s in 5,000 days that this stuff has come, and I know that ten years ago if I told you that all this stuff was coming, you would have said that’s just impossible….and if I told you it all would be coming for free, you’d say simply, you’re dreaming."

Before the Internet, the basic technology for people to communicate with was the telephone, radio and television. Nowadays, people expect the Internet to do so many things that it helps their businesses, their social lives, their personal lives and in some cases, their entire lives.

So how does the past of sports journalism have to do with what Kelly said at the conference? Well before the Internet, when sports journalists wanted to interview an athlete, they did it face to face or over the telephone. Also prior to the Internet, after journalists talked to the athletes and wrote an article, readers had to wait for the following mornings’ newspaper to read it.

Now, after the past 5,000 days, the Internet has changed sports journalism because all of the new technologies used to communicate with athletes, coaches, owners, agents, etc. are now at their grasp. ESPN The Magazine columnist and former Sports Illustrated magazine sportswriter, Dave Fleming feels because of the Internet, in some respect, it has changed everything in sports journalism today.

"When I was at Sports Illustrated in 1999, I was still covering NFL games on a Sunday, where the stories about the games would come out in that week’s magazine on the following Friday. But because of the Internet and its speed which can allow people to consume and gather their information within 24 hours, a story that comes out five days later is irrelevant these days."

So let’s say a sports fan saw a NBA playoff game and it’s now two days later. That person has already seen the game on television, they probably watched the highlights after the game on television a few times, have already read about it in the newspaper at least once and even may have seen it in some blogs on the Internet. That’s why when Kelly says the Internet is amazing, that’s just one more example why. Which leads me to one of Dan Gillmor’s new technologies used on the Internet, weblogs, or as most people call it now, blogs.

Senior Paper: Blogs

Blogging off the Internet is probably the biggest reason why journalism has changed so much in the last fifteen years. Gillmor believes blogs are tools to make it easier to publish on the Internet and is like an online journal with links and postings keeping the newest blogs at the top of the page. They are also linked to other websites and blog postings to give readers an opportunity to comment on their post, sometimes resulting into audience discussions.

With sports journalism, blogging has become a huge phenomenon. It gives fans the freedom to put their opinions about whatever they want in sports on the internet for everyone to see. In a way, it slightly evens the field between sports fans and journalists, which can be good and bad. Blogging can be good for journalism because it’s not just professional journalists posting articles in newspapers and magazines anymore, everyone has the chance to do that now in their blogs. It takes just a few minutes to start your own blog, you can write whatever you want on it, anyone can read it and last but not least, it’s free.

Star Tribune assistant sports editor, Michael Rand covers high school sports in the Twin Cities and has a blog of his own at the StarTribune.com called “RandBall” that he started in 2006. Rand was the youngest journalist I interviewed whom had his own blog and decided to start one because he noticed how sports journalism was changing,

"I did it in response to what the newspaper needed to be doing, kind of a more constant source of sports news. Also with the emergence of what other newspapers were doing with blogging, it seemed like a smart thing to do to stay ahead of the game."

Blogging has become something common for upcoming journalists to do to get their name out there and Rand gets at around a dozen posts a day on his blog. Since Rand mainly covers high school sports, blogging has been another way for him to communicate with readers that normally wouldn’t read his material.

As for Jim Trotter, sportswriter for Sports Illustrated (SI.com) who follows teams all across the NFL, believes there are some good parts with blogging, but definitely has some concerns too. He believes the immediacy of information getting out to the public for readers to blog is great for journalism, but sometimes citizen journalists who sometimes put out false information in their blogs is hurting journalism even more.

"Let’s say for example, I am at a Vikings practice and Adrian Peterson sprained his ankle that day, as a professional journalist, I can blog Peterson’s injury on the Internet and people will hear about it instantly within minutes if not seconds. But you do have some people who blog, who aren’t real journalists, and people mix them in with professional journalists, where the standards aren’t the same. Therefore, you have some information put on the Internet that is inaccurate, not complete or just false."

What Trotter was saying about blogging is similar to what’s going on in Minnesota right now with NFL legend quarterback, Brett Favre, considering coming out of retirement to play for the Vikings this season. On May 8th, 2009, a source from Yahoo!Sports.com reported that they got information from Favre himself that he is not coming out of retirement. That reported information spread across the world so quickly with the Internet and blogging, it was the topic of the day when I watched SportsCenter on ESPN that day. Yet the next day, Minnesota received x-rays from Favre of his right arm because of a biceps injury he had last season when playing for the New York Jets.

The rumors about Favre were great for sports and bloggers because people could express their opinions online for everyone to see whether they would like it or not if he played for the Vikings. The bad part of Favre’s rumors is that they are rumors, and nobody’s blogs are accurate until Favre is recorded visually or verbally by professional journalists what he is going to do. So why is incomplete information about Favre all over the Internet? Who really is telling the truth about coming to the Vikings; Yahoo!Sports.com or Brett Favre? Why would Favre send x-rays to the Vikings if he wasn’t interested in playing for them?

If people can tell the difference between rumors put on the Internet and accurate information from real journalists, then I believe blogging is great for journalism. Unfortunately, people do forget the difference sometimes because they get hooked up in the media wanting to know the most recent news and forget what they really want to know: accurate news.

Senior Paper: Mobile Phones - Text-Messaging

It started out in the late ‘90s with e-mail, where you can type a message on a computer and send it to other people’s computers. People can respond back to your message, add additional information back and forth with each other and do it with very minimal effort. Nowadays, people use text-messaging on their mobile phones like Blackberry’s and iPhones. Gillmor described text-messages as short message services (SMS), where if blogs are becoming the opinion newspapers of the Internet, SMS are the headlines. Text-messaging is like e-mail, but can send a message to whomever you want instantly with use of mobile phones instead of computers.

With the use of text-messaging, or as most people call it, “texting”, it is has changed sports journalism in many ways. Just from personal experiences with interviewing athletes in the NFL, SI.com’s Trotter has noticed over the last few years texting has become a very popular communication for journalists to use.

"It has become a pattern, that when I call (NFL) players to interview them, not all, but a good amount of them won’t answer their cell phone. But if I text them, they will respond to me immediately. It’s kind of their way of screening people, and not be bothered with people they don’t want to be bothered with."

When talking to Boston Herald sportswriter, Ron Borges, with the use of text-messaging he has received information instantly from athletes or their agents to put in his articles without having to interview with them face to face. For example, New England Patriot quarterback, Tom Brady injured his left knee in the first game of the season on September 7th, 2008. The next day he had an MRI to see how bad his knee was and it came out on Monday that Brady tore his ACL and MCL on his left knee. With Borges text-messaging back and forth with Brady’s teammates, that day after practice when the players knew about his condition, Borges was the first person to know about Brady’s knee and was the first to put it on the Internet.

It just goes to show that the way athletes are adapting to the new technology communications of today, it’s a must for journalists to adapt likewise. Good journalism is based on interviewing and getting accurate information written out to the public, but within the last fifteen years, part of good journalism has now been getting the accurate information out to the public within hours or minutes. If journalists don’t use text-messaging and other technologies like Twitter to communicate, they will be stuck in the past and most likely without a job.

Senior Paper: Mobile Phones - Twitter

Within the 2000s, it seems like every few years there has been a similar yet new, more creative way for people to communicate online by using their identity. In the early 2000s, MySpace became the first, really popular website on the Internet with its users keeping in touch with old friends, putting up pictures of them and their friends, and was a new way for businesses to network themselves. Then Facebook became popular in the mid-2000s with it being more organized and mainly set up for college students. Facebook was similar yet more advanced than MySpace because its users’ pictures had their names added to them and were labeled when a computer mouse is pointed at a specific person. Now Twitter has become a new way to communicate with the world using identity, and even though it is not the most popular way to use technology communication today, Twitter has taken Facebook’s “walls” to another level.

Seeing how popular Twitter was becoming after coming out in 2006, Facebook tried to do the same thing by making micro-blogging “walls” in 2007, but Facebook has not come close in that department with Twitter’s dramatic growth in 2009. Twitter is basically a micro-blogging service that allows its users to send and read other users' updates known as “tweets.” Tweets are text-messaged posts of up to 140 characters (spots to type) that are located on the user's profile page and sent to other users who have subscribed to them, called “followers.”

Users can send and receive tweets to people in their group of friends or anybody else they allow. Facebook and Twitter users’ both can via their websites and text-message using advanced mobile phones, but who the users actually are has been the difference between the two. Facebook was made for college students, so it’s identity communication is between college students and their friends. Twitter is different because it was made for people of all ages to communicate with people of all ages. Twitter has brought people like Oprah Winfrey and President Barack Obama from older generations to do what college students do on their walls in Facebook, and now Twitter has become the thing to do when it comes to text-messaging.

With the rise of Twitter, it has also made it easier for sports journalists to communicate with athletes and other followers because they can send or receive a post within a matter of seconds. FOXSports.com sportswriter, Jeff Legwold, has his own Twitter account and believes it has helped sports journalism.

"It is much faster (with Twitter) to do research and those types of things with new technology at our fingertips. I can twitter or should I say, tweet, something right now that I knew about the (Denver) Broncos, the NFL or whatever, and it will reach to the reader instantly."

Twitter is a fairly new technology to sports athletes, so not too many athletes have their own account but has gradually become popular with them. Helen Ross, golf reporter for PGATOUR.com, follows the PGA Tour all season long, and has noticed golfers like Stewart Cink and Adam Scott are using Twitter more and more these days.

"We have one player, Stewart Cink, that is really into twittering. He started twittering in February of this year. He told me he was going to provide updates for his followers during The Masters and by the time The Masters came in April, Stewart had over 46,000 followers. Then I talked to him yesterday (May 2nd) and he told me he has over 128,000 followers. He now sometimes tweets how his practice round went the day before a tournament, and I can put that online for golf fans to see how he might do that weekend."

From the work end of the job though, with the addition of Twitter and text-messaging, the demand for quality journalism has increased making it more difficult for journalists because there isn’t as much off-time. Since they are on the job all the time, it’s like there are no deadlines anymore because journalists constantly have to update and add information to their articles or stories. Personally though, I believe the emergence of new technology communications just mean journalists have to work harder to do their jobs and still post accurate information for their audience to read.

Senior Paper: The Future of Sports Journalism

So what is the future of sports journalism? What will happen in the next 5,000 days with the new communication technologies I grew up with? Kelly from the EG conference thinks all these technologies like computers, cell phones, laptops along with other servers are all going to become one machine. Our highly advanced mobile phones are just windows into this one machine that will go through the Internet. Any journalist that is updated with the new communication technologies of today can tell mobile phones are very close to going through the Internet.

So when asking what they thought about the future of sports journalism, the journalists felt it will be stronger than ever, but also had many concerns what journalism will be like in ten years. One common concern that was brought up was where quality journalism will go with people watching television or going online to blogs to find information related to sports. According to Gary Andrew Poole from the Columbia Journalism Review, in the mid 1990s,

"ESPN became a cultural and media juggernaut, sending fans to SportsCenter for highlights and scores, rendering game recaps and box scores in the next’s day newspapers obsolete."

In other words, ESPN has changed sports journalism because its primary television show, SportsCenter, is like a televised newspaper without much journalism. Let’s say someone missed a Minnesota Twins game one night, since SportsCenter is a 60-minute sports show that is shown at least ten times a day during the morning and again at night with the most updated news, it can provide who won the Twins game that night, see how their high-profile players did in the game, maybe get a brief interview from a manager or baseball player if something outstanding happened in the game, and all within 90 seconds.

It’s understandable if someone is in a rush and doesn’t want to read a newspaper to find out about their teams and players, but to just have facts and highlights on television or mobile phones without the journalism part is a scary thought. Buster Onley, a senior writer for ESPN The Magazine, talked about the decreasing amount of quality journalism these days when saying,

"Today, in four-hundred words you can get the basic details of the game story, but you miss the details and the anecdotes. It’s interesting, and important, to know how the players and managers think why they made certain decisions. That’s the cool stuff, and it’s getting lost."

Maybe because it’s a goal for me to be a journalist that I am a little biased when I say this, but I agree 100% with what Onley said. I know from personal internships that it’s tough to write a quality paper or article in just four-hundred words because there is not enough space, but with the newspapers and magazines reducing pages to keep their companies in business, quality journalism is starting to be forgotten.

Legwold from FOXSports.com wasn’t as concerned as the others when it came to quality writing in journalism because he believes readers in the future will soon be fed up with sloppy writing in blogs and choose to read only what professional sports journalists write.

"I think in the future, things will work themselves out between journalism and its audience. It hasn’t happened yet, but readers that like to read accurate, quality journalism from professional journalists will eventually notice the difference from false or incomplete information that certain bloggers give out just to be noticed."

As of right now people are so amazed with what new technology can do these days with mobile phones and text-messaging, that people are overlooking how the quality of journalism is dropping. Once readers get used to advanced mobile phones like they did when they got used to the Internet, a transition to getting quality journalism back to what it used to be will eventually occur. When it happens is unclear, but it should happen within ten years.

Another concern for the future of sports journalism was how newspapers and magazines will stay in business and since journalism is a business, how journalists can still make a living doing their job. The majority of the journalists said newspapers and magazines will go online. Moving to the Internet helps the environment and it gets the information from journalists to their readers faster online than information to a newspaper ever will since it will arrive the next day.

Now that newspapers and magazines will all go online someday, there still brings up the problem of how journalists are going to make a living when they are giving out their information to the Internet for free. Right now journalists’ incomes are only from subscribers that read newspapers and magazines in print, but with more and more subscribers jumping the “online” bandwagon, journalists’ incomes are coming to such a low point that they move to doing radio and television, leaving great journalism behind.

Fleming from ESPN The Magazine, believes these next few years will be a transition for sports journalism where like Legwold said, things will just work themselves out. When that transition is over and newspapers and magazines go online, Fleming believes,

"The industry in journalism will sort of contract and it’s going to reinvent itself. When it does, I think it (journalism) is going to be electronically-based because when everything moves online, where there is unlimited space and unlimited resources and the money can be spent on hiring professional reporters, writers and bloggers instead of paper, distribution and advertisements, it will be exciting."

I think his solution is a great one because most readers will want great journalism back after this transition it’s going through with new technology. When that does happen, readers will subscribe to newspapers and magazines online that have professional journalists reporting, and that could be a way for journalists to make a living doing what they do. How much money they will ask for per day for people to subscribe is unclear right now, but since there are monthly bills for mobile phones and cable television these days, maybe newspapers and magazines could do something monthly or weekly.

Another solution that was starting out in San Francisco was an idea they are calling “community-funded journalism.” There are a bunch of journalists in the bay area using a non-profit website called spotus.com, that are saying they will personally investigate and write about whatever they are assigned to. The idea is that anyone can propose a story, but only the one’s that contribute enough money from the public so they can make a living will be investigated. That way, if there is a story that the community wants to be investigated on and won’t be done by a newspaper, the community can do something called “crowd-funding,” where the people in the community must chip in some money to get the story investigated and reported. When newspapers and magazines go online in the near future, these are some good plans to keep professional journalists from going to other jobs and continue writing quality articles with accurate information that are sent to their readers faster than ever.

The last concern for sports journalism was how popular blogging will be in ten years. Blogging has been such a powerful tool for sports journalism and has gotten fans closer to sports than ever before. Right now anyone can become a reporter in their own way with blogging, by setting up their own office space and they don’t have to work for a traditional newspaper or magazine. What is becoming more common for bloggers is that they put down information or their opinions about something and think that it is journalism. Citizen bloggers usually don’t investigate, they sometimes don’t get their facts straight, they don’t text-message or tweet because they don’t have that access to athletes, and in the end they don’t always have accurate information. It seems like there are more people out there that call themselves journalists because they have their own blog and write about sports, than professional journalists that do have blogs but use it as another way for fans to get closer to them and sports, which in my mind, makes blogging the biggest concern for sports journalism in the future.

Boston Herald’s sportswriter Borges thinks that blogging is going to make journalism more superficial, especially for magazines.

"No offense to ESPN The Magazine, but it has now become the magazine for people that can’t read. Yes, there are two or three well written documents per magazine, but it’s usually one or two pages long and with pictures. Besides that, it’s a bunch of boxes with information from quotes and blogs from athletes and fans themselves."

Although his statement was bold, Borges made a great point when talking about blogs on the Internet and in magazines. It has caused their audience to have shorter attention spans because with the Internet they can read from blog to blog within seconds and forget a big reason most people read newspapers and magazines, quality journalism. I believe there will always be sports journalism and there will always be facts and stats, but if blogging doesn’t change in the near future, there won’t always be quality journalism.

So what are some solutions to keep blogging along and the importance of good journalism? I think the best solution came from ESPN The Magazine, Fleming that he just doesn’t read most blogs or other types of technology that aren’t from professional journalists anymore.

"Even going back to when Brett Favre was in Green Bay last year before being traded to the (New York) Jets, everybody held onto every word of every report whether it was true or not. So along with some journalists giving out information to their newspapers that was false or incomplete, bloggers wrote that stuff down too so by the end of the day a rumor about Favre seemed like it was the truth in people’s minds. Now with Favre thinking about coming back this year, I just don’t listen to what citizen journalists say to me or put on their blogs anymore."

It doesn’t matter if Favre signed with the Minnesota Viking next week or even if he makes it through a few NFL exhibition games. Until I see him wear a purple jersey on September 13th, 2009 on the first game of the NFL season, I don’t care what bloggers say because rumors are usually incomplete or inaccurate written information and it takes the integrity away from quality journalism. If blogging is going to be a productive tool that will help sports journalism in the future, I believe it has to be written or posted by professional bloggers that are professional journalists, because that way readers will know they are getting good journalism with accurate and updated information.

Senior Paper: Conclusion

Now it’s my turn, where will I be in ten years with all the technology that I have at my fingertips? Whether I become a sportswriter for Sports Illustrated that follows NFL teams or a golf reporter that follows the players on the PGA Tour, there are two things that I can do to help control my future as a journalist: report good, accurate journalism and be as versatile as possible with the new communication technology of today.

I really enjoy reading articles from professional sportswriters and columnists that have the knowledge, creativity, humor and ambition to go along with the passion in their writing that keeps me coming back to read their material because it’s journalism at its best. Since I don’t write for any newspaper or magazine at the moment, I do what I can and write on my own blog. When I do have time to write, I discipline myself by not writing random opinions or false information just to put my name out there. Instead, when I write articles I put my best effort forward to write well and with accurate information so I can make progress to be the best journalist I can be and to be proud of what I’m doing. That way when I put my articles out there for the world to see with the new technology I have today, people will hopefully enjoy reading my material so much that it may launch my career and help me get a job as a journalist someday.

“Don’t forget the journalism part. Just because someone carries a laptop, a Blackberry, or whatever else that is technologically advanced, doesn’t make them a journalist. You make yourself a journalist. Do you report, are you responsible, do you have integrity, are you fair, do you give people the opportunity to defend themselves…that’s the journalism part. The readers are savvy, they most of the time understand what is real and what isn’t when it comes to journalism, at least sports readers do. It truly is a mistake to not do the journalism part.” - Jeff Legwold

The Minnesota Vikings will win the 2010 Super Bowl

(Vikings first-round pick, WR - Percy Harvin; second-round pick, RT - Phil Loadholt)

The Minnesota Vikings did well last year as they won the NFC North Division for the first time since 2004 with a 10-6 record, but they lost in the first-round of the playoffs to the Philadelphia Eagles. NFL scouts suggested that if the Vikings were to improve over the 2009 off-season, Minnesota needed to be better in three positions: wide receiver, offensive right tackle and quarterback.

After a very productive off-season, expect to hear “V-I-K-I-N-G-S, Skol Vikings, Let’s Go!” a lot next year as the Vikings make it further in the playoffs. The thought of what the Vikings could do this year should make their fans excited, show their “Purple Pride” and maybe want to start tailgating today for fun even though the NFL season doesn’t start till September.

Minnesota made it to the playoffs last year with a strong defense and arguably the best running back in the NFL, but after the addition of a new quarterback and the players the Vikings selected in the NFL draft to make their offense dangerous again, the Minnesota Vikings will take it to the next level this year and win the Super Bowl for the first time in franchise history.

When the NFL Commissioner, Roger Goddell, went up to the podium at the 2009 NFL draft to announce the 22nd pick, I was surprised the Minnesota Vikings selected the wide receiver from Florida, Percy Harvin. I was surprised with the pick not only because Harvin’s past has more baggage than Paris Hilton does at an airport, but that the Vikings head coach, Brad Childress, has been known for playing it safe and not taking risks during his years at Minnesota. Most NFL experts believed Harvin was by far the biggest “high risk, high reward” player coming into the 2009 NFL draft, so I thought for sure Childress was going to play it safe and pick the best available offensive right tackle at the moment, Michael Oher from Mississippi.

Harvin was going to be a “high risk” for any team that drafted him because of his past on and off the football field. Harvin has had durability problems on the field with his right ankle ever since his freshmen year at Florida in 2006. Even after having surgery on April 7th, 2008 to relieve the pain in his ankle he had been playing on for years, Harvin re-injured his ankle on Nov. 29th, 2008. He now has a “hole” in his ankle leaving NFL scouts questionable about his injury coming into the 2009 NFL draft. His game is based on making big plays with his athleticism and breakaway speed, but with a nagging ankle injury that will probably have to go under surgery later in his career, it would be a questionable move for any team to pick him.

Harvin also had problems off the field when he tested positive for marijuana back in February, 2009 at the NFL combine. Testing positive really hurt Harvin from being a top-10 pick because the NFL combine is where teams and scouts not only test each player’s athletic ability, but to also get to know them in person before the NFL draft. Although Harvin impressed the scouts at the combine, teams ahead of the Vikings in the draft still weren’t willing to gamble on a player that had a past with drug usage and a nagging ankle injury.

So when asked by Star Tribune columnist, Sid Hartman, why Childress picked Harvin and not right tackle, Michael Oher, Childress simply responded, “Offensive linemen can't make plays." In the end, it was Harvin’s “high reward” that overcame his baggage with his explosive speed and incredible playmaking ability that was just too good for the Vikings’ to pass up.

Hartman feels the Vikings first-round pick was a good pick because he sees a resemblance between Harvin and another guy that slipped far into the draft because of his baggage as he was selected as the 21st pick in the 1998 NFL draft, Randy Moss.

"Like Moss, Harvin was recognized as one of the best and most versatile players available in the (2009) draft… If this decision works out as well as a similar decision (that) worked regarding Moss, and if the Vikings find more offensive line help later in the draft, maybe the Harvin move will put the Vikings in the 2010 Super Bowl."

Now Harvin and Moss have more in common than most people would think, good and bad. Both were the top recruited wide receivers in the country coming out of high school, yet both of them also tested positive for marijuana at their NFL combines. Both were Associated Press All-Americans the final years at their colleges (Moss, senior at Marshall; Harvin, junior at Florida), yet both of them slipped deep into the first round at their NFL drafts because of their baggage (Moss – 21st pick; Harvin – 22nd pick). Now if history repeats itself, Harvin may have one more thing in common with Moss someday: to be one of the best wide receivers in Vikings franchise history and NFL history.

Another person that liked the Vikings pick was NFL Network’s college football expert, Mike Mayock. He highly praised Minnesota’s new wide receiver saying,

"Percy Harvin is explosive. I went down and watched him at his pro day, and I’ll tell you what, he’s a better route runner than I expected. He ran crisp routes, a ball didn’t hit the ground and he didn’t double catch one pass…it’s clear to see how talented this kid is and just how explosive he is with the ball in his hands. He is a human highlight reel. I think the addition of Harvin to the Vikings offense can help take some pressure off the quarterback and off of number 28 (Adrian Peterson)."

With picking up Harvin, Mayock added that the Vikings now have two explosive players on their roster that will scare defense coordinators across the NFL with Harvin and Peterson. At least 10 plays a game with these two players on the field will run the Wildcat formation where Harvin will snap the ball as the quarterback and Peterson will be next to him as the running back. This situation will cause many problems to opposing defenses because if they try to tackle Harvin, he will give the ball to arguably the best running back in the NFL, Peterson. The thing is if defenses pay too much attention to stopping Peterson, Harvin could keep the ball and with his playmaking ability in the open field, he could score many touchdowns next year for the Vikings.

To fill the need at right tackle, with the 54th overall pick in the second round of the draft the Vikings selected the 6’8”, 343 lbs. right tackle from Oklahoma, Phil Loadholt. How a man this huge got overlooked all the way to the 54th pick is unbelievable and shocking, but this pick leads me to the second reason the Minnesota Vikings will win the Super Bowl in 2010: it made Peterson very happy and when your franchise player is happy, watch out.

"He's a big guy and he's only going to get better and continue improving," said Peterson. "You think about him and Big Mac [Bryant McKinnie], with their size, and it's a dream for a running back."

Last year Peterson was the best running back in the NFL as he rushed for a season-high 1,760 yards with a very predictable offense, but with the addition of Loadholt at the right tackle to compliment the 6’8”, 335lbs. left tackle, Bryant McKinnie and Pro-Bowl left guard, Steve Hutchinson on the left side of the offensive line, just imagine how many yards Peterson will carry in 2009.

This season will be Peterson’s third in the NFL and in most NFL players’ and football experts’ minds, he is already the best running back in the NFL. To be as big and strong as he is at running back position at 6’1”, 217 lbs. and have the moves and speed compared to hall-of-fame running backs like Barry Sanders and Eric Dickerson, Peterson is like no other running back that the NFL has ever seen.

In his first two seasons for the Vikings, he has rushed for more yards than any other running back playing in the NFL right now with 3,101 yards. With Harvin’s playmaking ability to take some pressure off of Peterson and Loadholt’s size to complete one of the best offensive lines in the NFL, Peterson could run for over 2,000 yards and be the NFL’s Most Valuable Player next season as the Vikings go on the Super Bowl. Emmitt Smith is the NFL’s all-time leader in rushing yards with 18,355 yards, but if Peterson continues to put up amazing numbers with good players around him and can stay healthy for another 10 years or so, he may own that rushing record by the end of his career.

Now over the Vikings off-season, they got the wide receiver they wanted with Percy Harvin and they got the right tackle they wanted with Phil Loadholt, but did the Vikings really get the quarterback they wanted when they got Sage Rosenfels in a trade for a fourth-round draft pick in the 2009 NFL draft? To win a NFL championship, you must have a quarterback that can lead a team because the quarterback is not only the most difficult position on a football team, but it may be one of the most difficult positions in all of sports.

In 2008, Rosenfels started six games for the Houston Texans and threw six touchdowns, ten interceptions and had a 79.5 quarterback rating. What Childress and the Vikings saw in Rosenfels must have been good enough to trade for him, but those aren’t the kind of stats that most fans would look for in a quarterback to lead the Vikings to the Super Bowl next season. Now Childress did say that going into Vikings training camp there will be no official starting quarterback, and that Rosenfels, fourth-year quarterback Tarvaris Jackson and second-year John David Booty are going to have to compete for the job. Once again, most Vikings fans wouldn’t expect any of those quarterbacks to lead the Vikings to the Super Bowl this year, but if I had to pick one of them, my best choice would be Rosenfels and for two reasons.

One reason is Rosenfels is the most experienced quarterback in the group being in the NFL for 8 years and has played more games (32) than Jackson (25) and Booty (0) combined. Rosenfels is 31 years old, and even though he has never played in the playoffs and Jackson did once (2008) for Minnesota, he played for two teams that were building up to consistantly playing in the playoffs with the Texans and the Miami Dolphins.

The other reason is Jackson has had his chance so many times with the Vikings to take over the starting quarterback position in the last 3 years, but hasn’t come through like Childress hoped he would. The Vikings just need a quarterback that will manage and lead Minnesota’s offense, not lose games because of costly mistakes like Jackson has done throughout his career. With Harvin, Peterson and the Vikings’ best wide receiver in 2008, Bernard Berrian to go along with a strong offensive line to protect him, I believe Rosenfels knows he has enough talent around him that he doesn’t need to make big plays to win games. Instead, he just needs to manage the offense and get the ball to his playmakers’ hands and let them win the game.

This is a similar situation to what the Chicago Bears had in 2006 when they made it to the Super Bowl. Chicago’s quarterback for that season was Rex Grossman, someone the Bears fans never imagined would lead their team to the Super Bowl in 2006, but Grossman did because of his leadership and the talent he had around him. With a solid running back with Thomas Jones, a great kickoff returner with Devin Hester and the best defense in the NFL that year lead by the 2006 defensive player of the year, Brian Urlacher, it made Grossman’s job much easier because the Bears didn’t need him to win games, just manage them. Now Grossman couldn’t lead the Bears to a championship that year because he didn’t have any outstanding playmakers to give the ball to, but Rosenfels does with Harvin, Berrian and Peterson. With a Vikings offense that has so many weapons and an experienced quarterback that can make the throws to manage and not lose games, it should be fun to watch the Vikings play this year.

The final reason I believe the Vikings will win the Super Bowl this year is because Minnesota does not have a good defense, they have one of the best defenses in the NFL. For the third year in a row in 2008, the Vikings defensive line was first in the NFL stopping the run allowing 76.9 yards per game. With the Vikings’ Pro-Bowl defensive tackles, Pat Williams and Kevin Williams shutting down their opponents rushing game and Pro-Bowl defensive end, Jared Allen causing chaos for opposing quarterbacks getting 14.5 sacks last year, it is safe to say the Vikings have the best defensive line in the NFL. The Vikings defensive secondary wasn’t as great in 2008 as they were 18th in the NFL allowing 215.6 yards per game, but it wasn’t because the secondary wasn’t good. It was more because most of the offenses in the NFL respected the Vikings run defense so much, teams just didn’t run the ball and put a lot more pressure on the secondary to make plays.

The Vikings have one of the most underrated cornerbacks in the NFL with Antoine Winfield, who finally made it to the 2008 Pro-Bowl for the first time in his 11-year career. Winfield is not only a player than can shut down an opponent’s best wide receiver but he is an excellent tackler who was second in tackles for the Vikings in 2008 with 95 tackles, something that is unheard of in the NFL these days. With the improvement of the Vikings’ other cornerback, Cedric Griffin who was third in tackles for the Vikings last year with 91 tackles and an upcoming talent in safety, Tyrell Johnson that will replace Darren Sharper, Minnesota’s secondary will have a much better secondary in 2009.

The Vikings leading tackler in 2008 was linebacker Chad Greenway, who had his breakthrough season last year with 115 tackles and six sacks. As the other starting linebacker, Ben Leber and reserve Napoleon Harris played with Greenway for most of last season, they did well but should be even better next year with the return of their starting middle linebacker, E.J. Henderson. Henderson had a season ending injury in 2008 when he dislocated his toes in his fourth game of the year, but when he was healthy in 2007, he was the leading tackler for the Vikings with 118 tackles. With their experienced veteran, Leber and upcoming star, Greenway alongside a healthy leader, Henderson, the Vikings’ linebacker crew could be one of the best in 2009 and for many years to come in the NFL.

As a result from getting the players they needed in the off-season, the Minnesota Vikings will win the Super Bowl in 2010 with a very talented, balanced team that has arguably the best running back in the NFL and one of the best defenses in the NFL. The Vikings accomplished what they wanted at the wide receiver position with taking a risk and drafting Percy Harvin. Childress usually doesn’t go after players with the baggage that Harvin has with injuries and marijuana problems, but the Vikings’ owner, Zygi Wilf, knew that Peterson needed help on offense and picking Harvin with his explosiveness was a move that had to be made.

"We have to strike when the iron is hot, and feel right now is the time to do it. We're very happy to get a game of his caliber and his ability."

The Vikings accomplished what they wanted at the right tackle position when they drafted 6’8”, 343 lbs. Phil Loadholt. Not only is he a massive man, but with Loadholt, left tackle, Bryant McKinnie and left guard, Steve Hutchinson on the Vikings offensive line, Minnesota now has one of the best offensive lines in the NFL.

The Vikings had chances in the off-season to trade for franchise quarterbacks like Philadelphia’s Donovan McNabb or Denver’s Jay Cutler (who actually got traded to the Chicago Bears), but to get those players the Vikings would have had to give up their first and second round draft picks in the 2009 NFL draft. If they gave up those picks, Minnesota would not have been able to draft Harvin or Loadholt. So if you think about it, the Vikings also accomplished what they wanted at the quarterback position for right now with Sage Rosenfels because the Vikings got him for a fourth-round draft pick and still got to draft Harvin and Loadholt to make their offense better. The Vikings don’t need a superstar quarterback like Tom Brady to win games for Minnesota, they just need a quarterback that can manage the offense and get the ball to his playmakers; Peterson, Berrian and now Harvin to win games for the team.

Those moves to make the Vikings’ offense more explosive will really benefit Peterson. He hasn’t had much help on offense in his first two years in the NFL, yet he still has run for 3,101 yards. With the addition of Harvin, who can run the Wildcat formation and has the ability to score a touchdown every time he touches the ball like Peterson, there is a good chance Peterson will have his best season of his career in 2009 and maybe the NFL’s Most Valuable Player. With the return of linebacker Henderson and the best run-stopping defensive line in the NFL of Allen, P. Williams and K. Williams, the Vikings defense will be even better than last year which is pretty scary for other NFL teams. The Vikings are not just an average team anymore that will make it to the playoffs every five years, they are now a great team what will consistently make it far in the playoffs for many years to come and this year in particular Minnesota will win the Super Bowl for the first time in franchise history.

Alex Rodriguez still should make it to the Baseball Hall of Fame someday

(New York Yankee 3rd-Baseman - Alex Rodriguez)

When you hear, “Take me out to the ballgame, take me out to the crowd,” does that ring a bell? Does it sound familiar? To a baseball fan, when they hear that song this time of the year in the spring, they know it means baseball season is finally here. People are talking about their favorite players, their favorite teams, the new free agents, upcoming rookies and anything else they can talk about with their friends and family because they love the game of baseball. One thing that people usually debate about is who is going to be the Most Valuable Player (MVP) for that season, and one name that has pops up as a candidate every year is Alex Rodriguez, or most commonly known as, “A-Rod”. Well in this 2009 pre-season A-Rod’s name was quite popular again, but this time it was about him taking steroids.

Although A-Rod cheated on baseball when he illegally took drugs from 2001-2003 to improve his game, lied on TV denying he ever took steroids and probably has tainted his career forever, Alex Rodriguez still should go to the Baseball Hall of Fame after his career is over.

Now A-Rod is no saint but there are three reasons that people should consider before they judge whether or not he should go to the Baseball Hall of Fame. First reason is even though A-Rod took steroids, the Commissioner of Baseball, Bud Selig has a huge part in why steroids got to be such a big deal in the first place. On Feb. 7th, 2009, A-Rod’s name appeared on a list of 104 players who tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs in Major League Baseball's 2003 survey testing. Two days later on Feb. 9th, A-Rod admitted that he took Primobolan and testosterone each season from 2001 - 2003 while playing for the Texas Rangers.

Although A-Rod did cheat, there was no testing for steroids that every single player had to take until 2004 and they didn’t come to a conclusion how long the players would be punished if caught until 2005. Selig said it best when he stated,

"Under our current drug program, if you are caught using steroids and/or amphetamines, you will be punished. Since 2005, every player who has tested positive for steroids has been suspended for as much as 50 games."

So technically, A-Rod never failed a drug test under Selig’s testing program because he quit in 2003. My question is, why did it take Selig so long to set up a drug testing program? How could Selig not have considered that steroids might be part of why Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire were smashing single season home-run records like 66 (Sosa) and 70 (McGwire) in 1998 when the record had been 61 (Roger Maris) for decades? How can Barry Bonds hit 73 home runs in 2001, when he hadn’t hit over 49 home runs in a single season in the first 15 years of his career without Selig thinking for once that Bonds might be on steroids?

When players could improve their game illegally, make millions of dollars and get away with it till 2004, it’s no shock over 104 players were tested positive for taking steroids in 2003. The past 15 years in baseball is now known as “The Steroid Era” partially due to Selig because if he had come to his senses and suspected that the Sosa and McGwire’s home-run chase might have been illegal and would have had a drug test program put together before 1998, A-Rod, home-run records and steroids would not be in the situation they are in today.

The second reason is that steroids may have saved baseball after the baseball terrible strike of 1995. Ever heard of the phrase, “Girls dig the long ball?” It means girls (and guys too) love to see the home run, and the home-run brought fans back to baseball after the strike of 1995. The strike lost a lot of fans and baseball wasn’t sure how long it would take until baseball would be back to the way it was before the strike. Then came 1998 when Sosa and McGwire both made history as they broke Maris’ single season home-run record of 61, as Sosa hit 66 and McGwire hit 70. Just the competition, the rivalry and the home-run chase between these two guys drew fans back to baseball because they were experiencing history right before their eyes.

Then three years later in 2001, Barry Bonds made history by breaking McGwire’s single season record with 73 home-runs. Fans were so amazed by the home-run, it was like the fans and even Commissioner Selig set aside that these guys were probably on steroids because it was so exciting to watch how far these guys could hit the ball. These guys were playing the best of their careers, but interestingly late in their careers when their bodies should be showing signs of age, not hitting 500 foot home-run bombs literally out of ballparks. So when The Mitchell Report came out in 2007 that Sosa, McGwire, Bonds, Roger Clemens and other players were accused of using steroids, baseball players and fans had faith in A-Rod that he would be the one breaking numerous records because he was not on the list. Now after finding out A-Rod used steroids too, baseball fans have mixed emotions about baseball and he himself.

People may think that baseball has been tainted with all these players taking drugs illegally and some people think that A-Rod individually may have tainted baseball forever, but I think people need to understand that if all these players that broke records illegally hadn’t taken steroids, where would Major League Baseball be today? Without steroids there would be no 500-plus foot home-runs or 73 home-run seasons, and without the home-run what was going to draw fans back to baseball after the strike in 1995? Fans need to realize that “The Steroid Era” may taint baseball for a long time, but that era is what saved baseball and players like A-Rod shouldn’t be the victims and kept from the hall of fame.

Now don’t get me wrong, A-Rod made a decision on his own to take steroids, knew that he was cheating when he took them and I do not approve of cheating on the game of baseball or cheating in general. I think what made baseball fans dislike A-Rod even more than his steroid issue is that he also lied on national television denying he ever took steroids when interviewed by the anchor of the CBS Evening News, Katie Couric.

Dec. 16, 2007
Katie Couric: "For the record, have you ever used steroids, human growth hormone or any other performance-enhancing substance?:
Rodriguez: "No."
Couric: "Have you ever been tempted to use any of those things?"
Rodriguez: "No."

Then just 15 months later A-Rod changed his story when interviewed by ESPN Baseball Analyst, Peter Gammons,

Feb. 9, 2009
Peter Gammons: "What's the truth?"
Rodriguez: "I did take a banned substance. And for that I'm very sorry and deeply regretful."
Gammons: "So you're saying the time period was 2001, '2 and '3?"
Rodriguez: "That's pretty accurate, yes."

Now I can understand why people could have a grudge on A-Rod because I believe they felt cheated on when Sosa and McGwire tainted the single season home-run records in 1998 and then felt cheated on again when Bonds tainted the all-time career home-run record a few years ago in 2007. So, I believe that when A-Rod came clean from The Mitchell Report in 2007, they had hope in A-Rod to be the all-time career home-run king because he would do it legally and do it the right way. Then Feb. 7th, 2009 comes along and now baseball fans feel cheated on once again and they just can’t take it anymore. Baseball fans feel that A-Rod let them down and unlike Bonds, he was also a role model for young baseball fans and for those kids to accept that their favorite baseball player took steroids has got to be hard for them.

I still believe that A-Rod should make it to the baseball hall of fame someday though, even with everything I have just said about A-Rod’s cheating. He is asking his fans to give himself a second chance to redeem himself just like Kobe Bryant did six years ago after cheating on his wife and accused of committing rape. Bryant just continued playing basketball and eventually his fans did give him a second chance as he was the NBA's Most Valuable Player last year in 2008. So try to be open minded with A-Rod right now because in 9 years when A-Rod will probably retire, if he just plays baseball, time can make things go away because America is the land of second chances, and that’s all A-Rod wants from his fans right now.

The third reason is A-Rod’s career is not coming to an end and has a chance to prove he does deserve to be in the baseball hall of fame. When A-Rod said he took steroids from 2001 – 2003, he had the best three seasons of his 15-year career as he averaged 52 home-runs per season and a .305 batting average. When athletes, and in this case baseball players, stop using steroids after using them for quite a while, their body gets out of wack and their game falls apart. So if you look at A-Rod’s last five seasons from 2004-2008, the seasons after taking steroids, his stats should be terrible, right? In A-Rod’s last five seasons he has averaged over 41 home-runs per season and a .303 batting average, showing that even though A-Rod’s home-runs have dropped, he is still producing a lot of home-runs and his batting average is almost the same without the use of steroids.

So, how does A-Rod continue to put up similar numbers after stopping using steroids? Well when Sosa, McGwire and Bonds cheated and took steroids, it was at the end of their careers where they needed and depended on steroids to stay in the pros and took the steroids for many years. When A-Rod cheated and took steroids, he was young, in his prime, took them for three years and were used more as a confidence booster to live up to his new $250 million contract even though he was already one of the best players in baseball.

A-Rod is 33 years old now and has a new 10-year, $270 million contract that starts this season, so if he stays healthy for the next decade, he will most likely break a lot of records. The record that people are focusing on is the all-time career home-run record that is held by one of the most tainted players in baseball history, Barry Bonds. Many fans agree with sports analyst from ESPN.com, Gene Wojciechowski that he believes Hank Aaron should be the home-run king with 755 home-runs, not Bonds, because he did it the right way, without cheating.

"As far as I'm concerned, (Hank) Aaron is still the all-time home-run leader, followed by Babe Ruth and Bonds' godfather, Willie Mays. Ken Griffey Jr. is fourth -- that is, if you're willing to take the leap of faith that Junior's 20-year career is clean. I am, but with fingers crossed."

As of this 2009 baseball season A-Rod has recorded 553 career home-runs, and since many fans don’t believe Bonds is the true home-run king with 762, we will use Aaron’s number as A-Rod’s goal to break with 755 home-runs. With his new contract, A-Rod is expected to play till he’s 43, indicating he has to average just over 20 home-runs a season to break the record, which he should easily do if he remains healthy.

The thing is if A-Rod wants to be the home-run king in most people’s minds, I believe he is going to have to hit an extra 156 home-runs to make up for the amount that A-Rod hit from 2001-2003 when he was taking steroids. That means if A-Rod plays for another decade like planned, he has to average just about 36 home-runs per year to be the career home-run king at 912 home-runs. It will be difficult as A-Rod does get older because he won’t make be hitting as much home runs in a season because of aging, but if he can put up a good amount of home-runs in these next 5 years while he is still in his prime, there is a chance A-Rod might break Aaron’s record someday. There is no way of knowing what will happen to A-Rod, but to be the first and maybe the last person in baseball history to have the opportunity to not only hit over 800 home runs, maybe even 900 is something that is special and can’t be overlooked no matter how much people may not like him.

A-Rod made a mistake taking steroids from 2001 – 2003, and then lieing on national television denying he ever took steroids when he really did, he not only tainted his image, A-Rod lost a lot of respect from his fans and professional baseball players themselves. The news about A-Rod over the last few months has convinced most people, even the Commissioner Bud Selig, that he should never go to the baseball hall of fame no matter what he does in his career. The reality is, there is nothing that A-Rod can do about his past but there are a few things he can do about his future.

He made a huge step that Sosa, McGwire and Bonds never did, which was actually admit he used steroids. Now he needs to do what he does best, which is play baseball and let time heal things on its own. It doesn’t help that he plays for the New York Yankees because the media doesn’t look too highly of him right now, but him playing for the Yankees could be a blessing in disguise. If A-Rod plays well in the playoffs, wins at least one World Championship (which he has done neither yet) and hit over 800, maybe 900 home-runs to become the all-time home-run king by the end of his career, the New York media could change their minds about A-Rod and eventually help him in the long run by voting him into the baseball hall of fame.