The Master, The NHL playoffs mean Spring is Finally Here.  That is the feeling I get when those two things arrive.  We know that Spring is finally here.  Of course we know that the true start of spring in in March.  March Madness is just the end of the Winter.  The Masters and the NHL playoffs are what usher in spring.  The start to both of those events was nothing short of amazing.  What the Blue Jackets are doing and what Tiger Woods did are setting the tone for the rest of the year.  The NHL playoffs are some of the most exciting games of the year.  Tiger being back brings a new level of attention to golf.  I still don’t get why baseball insists on scheduling so many games in cold weather out door stadiums in April but is happens every year.  Then every year baseball can’t understand why they have so many games that get postponed  Guess that is just one of those things that they cannot figure out.  All that and more in The Week that Was.

The Masters Start  and End With a Bang

I look forward to The Masters every year.  We watch some golf before the Master.  But The Masters weekend is when we really start to watch and follow golf each year.  I love the build up to the tournament.  Maybe someday I will actually be able to get there.  Not going to hold my breath on that one though.  I wish that The Masters would allow the whole tournament to be broadcast.  They are better than they used to be and at least now we get coverage starting at 3PM on Thursday and Friday.  The biggest question coming in to The Masters was how would Tiger do?  Can he win a major again?  Most of the people were saying no.  He may win a few more times on the tour but his days of winning a major are over.   Tiger said you can take your opinion and cram it.  Cram it hard.

Tiger is the type of player that you either love or hate.  Two qualities that are good for business especially in Sports.  The Masters, The PGA, the USGA and golf governing bodies across the world are extatic about the events that transpired this weekend.  The attention that a Player like Tiger brings pulls up everyone else on the tour.  You can see it in the way players, fans and the media approach things when Tiger is involved. That is something that is good for all the Golf fans in the world.

Golf could not have scripted a better start and end to The Masters.  The Maters entire week went well.  Golf was in the news for all of the events that they had doing on.  The Par 3 tournament on Wednesday kept people interested and the trick shots were amazing. All of that lead to quite the start for the tournament.  Every day of the tournament was more exciting.  That does not always happen in a tournament.  The build up was fantastic and the end was like a Hollywood script.  Not only did something happen that most people though would never happen again.  Tiger won it in a way he had never won before.  He had never won when he did not have the outright lead or tied for the lead after 54 holes.

The true kick of to the season is past.  It build all kinds of momentum.  The excitement of Tiger possibly getting to Jack’s record is now real again.  Now that Tiger is only three behind Jack for the most wins in the Majors.  Catching him is a real possibility.  Could you imagine what it would be like if Tiger were to win the PGA Championship in May.  Things would get really crazy.  Golf wants that to happen more than anything.  Guess we will see where it goes.

NHL Playoffs defy the odds

The NHL playoffs are always unpredictable.  It is the one sport where one player can really decide the outcome of a game and sometimes a series.  There are some really interesting match ups.  The one that I see at the top of the list is the  Lightning vs the Blue Jackets.  This is a match up that the Odds Makers really did not want t alot to do with.  Before the series started you could not place a bet on Tampa Bay that would win you some money.  No one thought that the Lighting would have any trouble with the Blue Jackets.  As I write this now the Lightning are down 0 – 3 to the Jackets.  When the playoffs started every one thought that it would be 3 – 0 but they thought that the Lightning would have the three.

Now this series is not over.  Neither is the other 3 – 0 series.  The Islanders are up over the Penguins 3 – 0.  This is a bit of a surprise but not a huge surprise.  The Penguins did not have the greatest season this year but they are generally pretty strong in the playoffs.  Not sure how many people were picking them to win this series but I am sure that few were expecting them to get swept.  It has happened before.  The first time a team was down 0 – 3 and came back to win was the 1942 Maple Leafs.  They were down to the Detroit Red Wings 0 – 3 and came back to win the Stanley Cup 4 games to 3.  The last time it has happened was in the first round of the playoffs when the Kings came back to beat the Sharks.  It is highly unlikely that both the Penguins and the Lightning will come back to win.  It is actually pretty unlikely that either team will do it.  Five times in all the history of the NHL playoffs is hardly a trend.

The Blue Jackets are the eighth seed in the East but they were only two points away from being the 5th seed.  That lose to Edmonton in the 80 game of the season played large.  Let your guard down for one second and you go from playing a team not the team that tied the record for wins in a season to playing a team that did not.  But then who knows they might not have had the same fire and we might be talking about something else.  As much as Tampa fans do not want this to happen.  Columbus  and the NHL really do.  It will be good for hockey if the Jackets are able to pull off this upset.

NFL The Schedule and the Draft again

When you are able to get people to write stories about when you release your schedule then clearly you are doing something right.  Pro Football Talk is a never ending train of almost interesting stories.  This time my favorite sports </s> writer has said that the schedule should be moved to after th draft.  His idea being that you could then highlight games with high draft picks.  Not sure about you but why would you want to highlight games with high draft picks when you are not even sure that they will be playing at that point.  I don’t know for sure but it seems that the NFL is releasing the schedule before the draft. 1. To get it out there.  2. Fill a time that is filled with mock drafts. giving people something that is real. 3. Allowing teams to start planning for travel plans.  4.  Highlighting teams and players that are already proven in the league.  It make sense to me the way that they do it.  Hey at least it gives us all something more to talk about.

The rumblings that Kyler Murray might not be the first pick are getting louder.  Not sure that is because they really believe that the Cardinals are going to pick someone else or try to trade down.  I really think that they are going to take Murray.  While think that Haskins is a better quarterback I think that Murray fits what Kliff Kingsbury wants to do.  If he can stay healthy he has a chance to be really good in that kind of offense.  Maybe not Russell Wilson good but pretty darn close.  Close enough that it makes sense for the Cardinals to take that chance.  Of course taking Bosa would not be a bad move for them either.  But really I think they are taking Murray.

The other interesting news coming out this week is the ultimatum that Wilson gave the Sea hawks.  It is difficult to figure out if he really means it.  Is it just that he will not negotiate after the deadline or will he want s trade.  Of course the big rumor mill has him going to the Giants.  I don’t know about that.  The Giants would have to give up quite a bit to get him.  They do have picks and possible players to trade but not sure they would do that or go through the draft.  Wilson does not really fit what they do.  Saying that I think he can fit in most places.  If you are looking at the draft then Haskins fits what they do pretty well.  The Giants are already set up for a quarterback with a big arm and limited mobility.  Even though he only starte one season in College it was a really good season and his accuracy was much better than the accuracy of Eli when he was in college.  They would have to use their first round pick of course he is an unknown but he seems to be ready.  Haskins or Trade for Wilson.  To me it looks like Haskins would be the better option to take.

Did NASCAR Race this weekend

Yes there was a race in NASCAR this past weekend.  Yes I also forgot about it.   It was a night race in Richmond.  The winner was Martin Truex Jr.   Again I completely forgot about it.  The night races that are not Memorial Day or Independence day weekends really just don’t seem to fit in the schedule.  I have other things going on then.  Usually I at least keep up on them but this weekend it completely slipped my mind.

NASCAR has other issues going on as well.  The way they were pushing the 200th win in Kyle Busch’s career was a little strange to me.  They were tying to compare it to the 200 wins by Richard Petty.  Yes Petty drive in a different era.  The 200 wins by Busch are very impressive.  I am not taking anything away from what he has done.  The problem from my point of view is that 95 of those wins came in the XFinity series and 55 of those wins came in the truck series.  With 54 of the wins coming in what is known as the Monster Energy series.   If you are not familiar with the structure in racing.  Monster Energy is like the Major Leagues in Baseball.  The XFinity series in the AAA baseball and the Truck series is the A baseball.  So counting Busch’s total wins to try and say he match Richard Petty would be like baseball counting hits or pitcher wins from AAA baseball toward their major league stats.  It just does not work that way.  So again while impressive. Not the same.

I will Finally acknowledge the MLB Season is here

Baseball is just such a crazy long season it is difficult for me to stay interested in it for the entire season.  Yes I get that it is all about the strategy and the history.  I like all of that but really April is when spring training should be and the season should start in May.  i know that will never happen.  The other problem that starting in May would solve it the insistence of scheduling games in out door cold weather stadiums in April.  Yes there will be snow.  There will also be days where it is freezing. Large amounts of wind and rain. Yes games will get cancelled.  It is just going to happen.  If having to schedule games in April was taken away then they would not be able to do it.  It just does not make sense to me that you will have a warm weather team travel to an outdoor cold weather team in April.  Seriously just think about it.  I am sure there is a lot more that goes into it and making schedules is not that easy.  Especially when you are talking about 162 games for each teams. There is going to be some conflicts If the season did not start till May some of that would be eliminated.  I know not going to happen.  It is not at a point where we need to talk about the teams leading their devisions.  At this point it really just does not matter.

On the Tube Not You but TV

This week saw the premier of the final season of Game of Thrones.  I don’t have HBO so have not watched the series yet.  We are going to wait till it is done and then binge watch it.  I did see a very interesting story about one of the actors in it. Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson who plays The Mountain in Game of Thrones.  Usually in E:60 the story goes 10 to 20 minutes.  For this one the used the entire 60 minutes for it and it was worth it.  He has had a very interesting life that led to where he is now.  Like everyone he has had some struggles.   Some of them were pretty difficult to over come.  During the story you were absolutely  rooting for him to make it.  Now that he has I really hope that he can keep it all together.  If you have not seen it I highly recommend you take some time and watch it.  i was going to try and get you a link but ESPN’s site is such crap now it was difficult to find.  Either that or it is on that Stupid ESPN+ and I already pay enough for their networks I am not paying more.  So Sorry you are on your own to find it.  I am sure they will replay it in a few weeks on Sunday Morning.

The other big thing for us this week is American Idol getting down to the final 10.   I have not agreed with every move they have made on the show this year. They do have a pretty good group of performers though.

Looking for your assistance

I am trying to figure out if people like the long post like this or if they would rather have each section broken out into individual posts.  If you have any ideas on that though let me know in the comments.  On that note.  When you are posting a comment there are two check boxes under the comment section.  One of them is to notify you when a new post is made.  If you check that box a notification will be sent to the email address you put in every time a new post is made on biglakesports.

I am also looking for people that are interested in writing posts on biglakesports.net If you are interested you can send me an email at jbigalke at biglakespots.net and we can go over what I am looking for and see if you are a fit.  There would be no pay at this time but you would be able to put your writing out there and could post it on other sites if you wanted to.

The Week that was Last Week