• The Packers-Bucs game was the main early game here. Cadillac Williams is pretty good. The Bucs got the steal of the draft with him. Favre has lost it...he has the capability to play well for about a quarter a game (he made a sweet 37 yard touchdown pass on a 4th and 4 in the first quarter). Granted, his last interception wasn't entirely his fault, but that wasn't a good pass anyways.
• The Bengals-Bears game was on at the same time, but it was over pretty early, so I didn't really watch it. The Bengals seem like the Chargers of last year, whupping on weaker teams early in the season to build confidence. They could end up being the best second tier team in the AFC.
• I was able to watch the end of the Jags-Jets game. I was able to see Chad Pennington completely stink up the field (wasn't he good a couple of years ago?) and the Jags get the ball with good field position. Leftwich ended the game with a 36 yard TD pass to Jimmy Smith (who did a fantastic job keeping himself in bounds long enough to reach the ball into the end zone). They are the team I would always fear in a close game late.
• Immediately after that game ended, it switched to the Raiders-Eagles game, where the had just tied the game with about 2 minutes left. I then got to watch the classic Raiders defensive breakdown at the end of the game, twice failing to stop the Eagles on 3rd downs when they could not kick a FG (their kicker was hurt) to let the Eagles drive down to the 5 where Akers made the FG through immense pain. There were still 9 whole seconds left in the game, meaning a decent run back plus one or two deep pass attempts could give the Raiders a chance. And then their kick returner made a horrible mistake and decided he wanted to score on a squib kick (basically impossible because of the quick convergence on you of the other team) rather than go for field position. At one point, he even ran back 15 yards, while the clock ran down to 0. It never ceases to amaze how badly prepared the Raiders are, no matter the team and coach, for moments like those.
• Then there was the Patriots-Steelers game, which I watched along with the Angels-Devil Rays game (which was not enjoyable to watch). The Patriots really seemed to dominate this game, but kept turning the ball over. Roethlisberger was terrible, but he is young and should recover. Eventually, the Patriots were able to put a few drives together and take the lead, which lead Roethlisberger to play well, and then the Patriots to win on another Vinatieri FG.
• The final game of the evening, I flipped on during the third quarter (I really flipped the Rangers-A's game on to watch the 9th and switched between the two) and more or less watched the rest of the crew. With the score 35-20 Chargers, the announcing crew apparently thought that Eli Manning was God's gift to QB (but what about Favre, Vick, and Peyton Manning?). I mean, come on...the guy could only even lead his team to a FG with it down by more than two touchdowns and one quarter remaining. Save some of your praise for the guys that actually deserve it. From what I saw of Manning he looked like an average quaterback (he missed a lot of guys). Maybe, they got so excited because he was actually completing some passes. Eli Manning is and always be a punk to me, no matter what ESPN's announcers think he has the ability to do.

White Sox first baseman/DH Paul Konerko, who likely will command a four-year, $50 million contract, has emerged as the No. 1 free agent target of the Angels.

Dean Chance, 1964       20-9
Clyde Wright, 1970      22-12
Andy Messersmith, 1971  20-13
Bill Singer, 1973       20-14
Nolan Ryan, 1973        21-16
Nolan Ryan, 1974        22-16
Bartolo Colon, 2005     20-7

Dean Chance, 1964
Bartolo Colon, 2005

• New season, same Raiders. Far too many penalties, both real and imagined. That pass interference call on Moss was one of the worst calls I've ever seen, but them's the breaks you get when you wear the Silver and Black.
  
  
• So, what happened to throwing down the field, guys? Nothing against LaMont Jordon, but he should never lead this team in receptions.
  
  
• The defense is markedly improved this season (how could it not be?), but that didn't stop it from folding at the most inopportune times. Down the stretch, they couldn't have stopped the Chiefs on third down if they were in KC's huddle.
  
  
• Charles Woodson is the most overrated (and overpaid) player in football... maybe all of sports.
  
  
• The ESPN crew is going to have to be sanitized after crawling out of Tony Gonzalez's ass.
  
  
• Fourth down, throwing to the corner of the endzone for the win, and you go to... Jerry Porter? Hey Norv: I like Jerry Porter as much as anybody, but what the fuck were you thinking?

Guerrero day-to-day

They're calling it a "jammed shoulder" - the same shoulder he dislocated earlier this season. Though Mike Scioscia drops hints that he may play tonight:

"He's day-to-day; we're not going to play him if there's a risk of injury and [missing] substantial time," Scioscia told the newspaper. "If the lead shoulder is not impacting his swing and he's not at a risk of injury, he'll play."

It goes without saying that any game Vlad doesn't start is an expected Angels loss.

Washburn likely to miss another start

The Angels are still calling it tendinitis. Washburn hasn't ruled himself out, but Scioscia appears to have done that for him.

According to the Times, Mike is considering using the Angels' Friday off day to realign the rotation, skipping Washburn's rookie replacement Joe Saunders. Sounds good to me; we can't afford to start an untested rookie in a pennant chase - especially after he got run off the mound in his last start.

Simers: Angels Won't Admit It, but Collar's Getting Tight

Anyone give a shit what TJ Simers thinks? No? Ok, moving on...

The end of Percy Time?

In the same Register article as above, we learn that Troy Percival will meet with Angels team physician Lew Yocum to get a definitive prognosis on the muscle tear in his right forearm that has caused him to miss the majority of the season. It's likely to be a long road to recovery, which would all but end Percival's career.

Finley "clicking"

Probably just those old bones creaking:

About an hour after Angels manager Mike Scioscia told Steve Finley he would be benched for the immediate future, Finley found something in his swing.

"It just clicked," he said.

If Finley found something, he immediately lost it. Perhaps the memory is the next thing to go...

Saunders gets the call

As Chronicles can tell you, it was a no-brainer that the Angels would take at least two of three from the lowly Mariners (this debacle not withstanding). Now we're in the less than enviable position of throwing a rookie - with all of one game's experience - out there to try and salvage something from a lost series.

Blind loyalty

Mike Scioscia attempts to explain why he refused to lift Darin Erstad for a pinch hitter with the game on the line:

All year long, Manager Mike Scioscia has preached the need for offensive continuity, for some kind of attack consistent enough to support the team's superb starting pitching, but it's mid-September, the Angels are still searching, and there are few signs they're even getting warm.

...

"Guys aren't going to do it all the time," Scioscia said, "but I'll take my chances with Ersty any day."

You want continuity Mike? Well, you got it: over the past month the Angels have only scored over five runs six times, three of those coming in this past series against the White Sox. We've scored one run or less eight times. Consistently awful.

We quickly had it down to Wood and Young. I don't want to speak for anyone, but at least one staffer was strongly for Brandon Wood and presented his case, and presented it well. There was no formal vote, just a sense during the meeting that more people believed Delmon was the choice for BA, being that we're a magazine about player development and prospects, and the best prospect had essentially the second-best year in the minors.

As I said earlier, the Baseball America Player of the Year award attempts to combine 2005 performance with perceived future value. Because of this, Delmon Young was able to steal the 2005 award away from Brandon Wood. In actuality, it was Wood's 100+ extra-base hit season that was worthy of award, not Young, whose chances were hurt by a midseason promotion.

In 2003, I feverishly disagreed with Baseball America when they gave Joe Mauer the Player of the Year award. Jeremy Reed had flirted with .400 for much of the season, and Reed had clearly been the minors' best player that year. To me, he was worthy of the award in 2003. Last year, both my system and BA's system agreed upon Jeff Francis. This season we will again end in disagreement, as I believe Brandon Wood was the minor league baseball player of the year.

Criticizing oil industry profits, a California lawmaker has introduced legislation to give a state agency broad authority to regulate the cost of fuel.

California and Hawaii, which was the first state to introduce price caps for gasoline, have the highest per-gallon costs for gas in the nation.

Sen. Joe Dunn, D-Santa Ana, introduced a constitutional amendment this week that would allow the state Public Utilities Commission to require mandatory fuel reserves, set profit margins for oil and gas companies and order the construction of pipelines. His measure also would forbid agreements between companies that reduce competition. The PUC also could cap prices but only as a last resort, Dunn said.

"Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty."

-Wendell Phillips

"The liberties of our country, the freedom of our civil Constitution, are worth defending at all hazards; and it is our duty to defend them against all attacks. We have received them as a fair inheritance from our worthy ancestors: they purchased them for us with toil and danger and expense of treasure and blood, and transmitted them to us with care and diligence. It will bring an everlasting mark of infamy on the present generation, enlightened as it is, if we should suffer them to be wrested from us by violence without a struggle, or to be cheated out of them by the artifices of false and designing men."

-Samuel Adams

"If there must be trouble let it be in my day, that my child may have peace."

-Thomas Paine

Day of Week:

Day          Record   R/G    RA/G   Pythag. Record
Monday       11-3     5.50   2.57   11-3
Tuesday      10-12    4.36   4.50   11-11            
Wednesday    11-11    3.86   3.55   12-10
Thursday      9-6     4.00   4.40    7-8
Friday       15-7     5.45   3.91   15-7  
Saturday     13-11    5.17   3.71   15-8
Sunday       11-11    4.14   4.55   10-12

Game of Individual Series:

Game   Record   R/G    RA/G   Pythag. Record
One    32-13    5.49   3.60   31-14
Two    23-23    4.59   3.87   26-19            
Three  22-21    4.16   4.12   22-21
Four    2-4     2.67   6.17    1-5

Game of Season Series:

Game        Record   R/G    RA/G   Pythag. Record
One         13-5     5.17   3.28   13-5
Two          7-11    3.78   3.39   10-8            
Three        7-11    3.50   4.28    7-11
Four        11-3     6.21   4.71    9-5
Five         8-6     5.21   3.79    9-5
Six          8-6     4.07   4.07    7-7
Seven        5-4     4.33   4.89    4-5
Eight        6-3     3.78   3.33    5-4
Nine         3-5     4.88   4.25    5-3
Ten          5-1     7.17   3.00    5-1
Eleven       2-1     5.67   2.00    3-0
Twelve       1-2     5.67   6.00    1-2
Thirteen     1-2     3.33   7.00    1-2
Fourteen     1-1     2.50   3.50    1-1
Fifteen      2-0     4.00   1.50    2-0

B.Colon     169.41
M.Rivera    150.29
J.Nathan    144.30
J.Garland   144.27
M.Buehrle   143.79

"I called it from my heart."

"I know it was unpopular with Mike's team..."

"...but I felt it was the right call."

"the ump's wife wakes up with a horse's head in the bed."

"If she's married to Larry Young, she usually wakes up with a horse's ass in the bed, so I'm not sure she'd get the significance."

• From all accounts, it sounds like the people of New Orleans, at least analytically, knew of the potential for the city's destruction to a big enough hurricane, but they probably never believed it would occur.  This is much like the people LA expecting the "The Big One" of an earthquake.  Logically, they know it could happen, but most people think of it as an impossibility.

• The federal government had a responsibility to let Louisiana know about what kind of risks are associated with a city being below sea level and to tell them what portions were and how much they were.  The federal government also studied the pumps and pipes and declared them inadequate against a major hurricane.  Later, a computer simulation was run showing that New Orleans would fill with water when hit by a Category 4 hurricane.

• The New Orleans Emergency Preparedness Plan mentions about hurricanes that the Governor has the authority to "compel" an evacuation of any areas potentially affected and the Mayor of New Orleans has the authority to order the evacuation of the New Orleans parishes specifically.  The Mayor of New Orleans is chiefly responsible for the evacuation.  Also, the plan mentions specifically that buses can be used to aid in the evacuation.

• The President urged the Governor to call for the evacuation ahead of time.  He also declared several states disaster areas before they hit in order to aid the flow of money when it would be needed.  

• The weather reports stated that people should basically be evacuated by Sunday night.  The Mayor orders an evacuation that night, but does not "compel" it, meaning that he is not making sure everyone gets out of town.  Meanwhile, National Guardsmen are waiting to be called upon so that they might help with the evacuation and several hundred school buses sit in parking lots.

• When the hurricane hit, pumps failed and levees broke.  This washed out some evacuation routes and began the flooding of the city.  At this point there was no real ability to conduct law enforcement or evacuate people in a timely fashion.  Not to mention, those buses were suddenly flooded, meaning they could not be used for evacuation at all...they sat simply as a wasted resource.  New Orleans, as we know it, was totally destroyed.  The Mayor declared martial law, for whatever good that could do at that point.

• Lt. Gen. Honore lead the post-storm evacuation and re-supply effort, which the media (and Mayor Nagin) seems to claim was much later than it should have been, whereas many people familiar with disaster response say that this was a surprisingly quick response...especially for the size and scope.

• Meanwhile, many people began looting: some did it for food and water, while others did it for more stuff (TVs, drugs, etc.).  Also, there were reports of rapes and shootings, among many other things.  Dead bodies were seen floating in water.  People are stuck in attics.  The people who thought the Superdome would be a good place to evacuate to were wrong.  It would be a good place for any small hurricane, but because of the potential for flooding, loss of power, and loss of ability to pump water, the Superdome became a horrendous place to be.

• Of course, there are also many stories of people helping other people out: many let strangers stay in their homes or gave them money.  Not to mention, the amount of charity being given to help out in disaster relief.  Several sports stars are offering money and asking others to do the same.  Kuwait has pledged $500 million to our efforts, while Qatar has pledged $100 million.  Germany has offered their assistance if it is required.  And this is just the tip of the iceberg.

• And then the media has (and the Mayor of NO) have been quick to blame Bush for the emergency response, which, by all accounts by people who have done this before, was phenomenal.  Others have blamed global warming for more and stronger hurricanes (despite no evidence to support that).  

• As far as the future is concerned, it seems like rebuilding the city is a necessity.  Is it economically worth it?  Could we just build a big city that is a New New Orleans behind the filled in bowl?  I can't answer these questions, but I haven't even seen anyone ask them.  As it is, you have to wonder if any buildings that were flooded are ever going to be safe again.  And after the liquid is drained, there will still likely be sewage and oil that ends up sitting on the ground, in houses, everywhere.  This won't be something where people can just move back in when the water is gone...almost the entire city will have to be rebuilt.  By the time everything is rebuilt, much of the oil importation and refining will have moved to other locales purely by necessity.  

• Landon Donovan on the US/Mexico rivalry:

  "It's not just another game for me," said Donovan. "I clearly, absolutely, desperately want to beat them.
  
  "I just don't like the talking, I don't like the mannerisms, I don't like the way they treat us and the way they don't respect us," said Donovan. "I want that to change and I'm going to try and be a big part of that on Saturday."

• Donovan stirs the pot even more in this Register piece. Watch your knees tonight, Landon.
  
  
• The San Diego Union-Tribune on what passes for a home-field advantage.
  
  
• AP on the Mexican perspective. Apparently the Tricolores are "unusually confident" heading in:

  MEXICO CITY (AP) - With a World Cup berth virtually assured, Mexico seems almost relaxed heading into Saturday's qualifier in the United States.
  
  Forward Jorge Borgetti told local reporters he not only wanted to win, but to do it with the flair.

  But you can say much the same for the Americans, can you not?
  
  
• Finally, a look at what's at stake from the AP.

"I'm just a tinkerer, always have been," Erstad said before Thursday's 3-0 handcuffing of Oakland, which brought the Angels back into a first-place tie with 29 games left.

"I'm tinkering now. But in 2000 I was tinkering, too. I just found something that year, and it clicked. It all comes down to whether I feel comfortable in the box. Whether my hands are in a good position, whether I'm feeling good, whether I'm seeing everything at good angles. I can't explain it what happens to make me feel comfortable or not."

"Holy Crap" is right

Stephen Green links to some horrific satellite images of New Orleans.

Entitled among stranded

A Spanish MP is among the stranded at the New Orleans Convention Center:

Lourdes Munoz Santamaria, her husband and his 10-year-old son were on vacation in New Orleans and were unable to get a flight out of the city before Hurricane Katrina struck.

They ended up at the New Orleans Convention Center, where Munoz has used a pay phone to make several calls to a journalist friend in Madrid to describe the conditions.

The journalist, Montserrat Boix of Spain's state television TVE, said Munoz told her the situation at the center was steadily deteriorating and that authorities were unaware of the magnitude of the problem.

The authorities are unaware of the magnitude of the problem? Lady, you aren't aware of the magnitude of the problem. This is a city that was once home to 1.5 million people. There's 100,000 or so still stranded, spread to the far corners of this sprawling metropolis. And, believe it or not Princess, many are in far worse sorts than you are. Some are still stuck in attics and on roofs, wandering the streets aimlessly, or trapped in high-rises with no food, water, or means of communication. Drop to your knees and thank your lucky stars you managed to not only survive uninjured, but also found dry land and decent shelter.

Where do you expect the authorities to start such a massive relief effort? Mrs. Munoz's answer would be "with me, of course."

Personally, I've been rather impressed with the reaction thus far - there's only so much food, water, manpower, and transportation you can get to such a devastated area in the first few days. All evidence suggests that the authorities are doing all they can.

The Finest

I saw this too, and had the same thought. Leave the guy alone. He's not being withholding out of spite, he just doesn't have anything to help. In case you don't realize, Shep, it's his city too. He's in the same sad boat as everyone on that bridge. And yet, he still pulls-on that uniform to try to help in any way he can, even as the police are becoming targets all over the city. He deserves your adulation, not spite.

How to Help

Instapundit has a huge list of places to help. I've already given more to the American Red Cross than I could really afford to - please do the same.