Sports Time Radio

After this past weekend there’s one thing that you can ask most sports fans and that’s how’s your bracket? After four days of NCAA tournament action, I’m sure there are a lot of people with ruined brackets.

As for my bracket, well I had Xavier winning the whole thing and they’re still alive, but I had them beating Marquette who’s out. I still have my other two Final Four teams alive as I have Tennessee and UCLA getting there. I guess will see how that works out for me, but to be fair I never do well with my bracket.

The landscape in college basketball has changed and while there are still big-time major teams the gap between those teams and the other teams has closed. You have to think that the addition of NIL’s is the major reason that this has happened. I do enjoy an anybody can win type of scenario, but if things even out too much will there be any major college basketball teams left to root against?

Let me know how your bracket is holding up and if you see the playing field leveling out in college basketball or if you think that this is just one of those types of years.

Well, we are now just a little over a week away from the start of the Major League Baseball season. I’ll be working on my predictions, and I’ll have them here and ready to go for you next week. Feel free to play along with me and make some predictions for the upcoming baseball season with me.

Humorously when it comes to fantasy baseball the draft, I talked about in last weekend’s blog is still going on. We’re actually very close to being done as we have just two picks left to make, so hopefully things will wrap up some time today. Of course, I’m not counting on that, and it might extend into tomorrow, but at least it’s almost done.

I got vetoed on multiple picks this year by my partner and then I really got into the doghouse when we selected Vaughan Grissom and he got sent to the minors.

Now I still stand by the Grissom pick as I believe that the Atlanta Braves just sent him down to push back his arbitration clock a year. From just about everything I read the plan for Grissom was for him to take over as Atlanta’s everyday shortstop after Dansby Swanson left through free agency.

With Grissom going to the minor leagues, it looks like Orlando Arcia will be the Braves opening day shortstop. I don’t know about you, but I find it hard to believe that the Braves are planning to use Arcia as their everyday shortstop.

I guess will have to wait until Grissom goes past that date were his arbitration date moves back a year and then will see what the Braves actually plans are, but I’d expect Grissom to be called up as soon as that date passes.

Basically, with our last two picks we’re looking for starting pitching and it’s going to be thin as this point in the draft. What I’d like to do is find a couple of young pitchers to sit on and see if they develop. The problem with that is my partner likes to jump on whoever is available that comes out of the gate hot and to pick a guy up you have to drop a guy, so those pitchers would be replaced very quickly on our roster.

After the blog goes up I’m going to start looking for some young pitchers and see what I can find. If you happen to have any suggestions, I’d be very interested in seeing them. Just remember that this is an 18-team league, and we select 22 players, so there are quite a few players gone.

Now this is a fantasy league that we’ve never won, so it would be nice to change that this season. I’m not sure why, but for some reason we just can’t get over the hump in this fantasy league, but maybe this season will be different.

Alright if you’re in a fantasy league let me know how your draft went or is going if it’s still in progress like mine is. Hopefully if you drafted you built a strong team and didn’t pick up any injuries while your draft was going on.

Don’t forget to look for me on Twitter, I’m @Burketime.

For me the jury is still out on the World Baseball Classic. I haven’t sat down and watched an entire game just a few innings here and there. I guess maybe I’m too used to this being spring training time and top players not being on the field for the whole game. Plus, I wonder after an off season how many players are actually ready to go out and perform at a top level?

I’m also not all that thrilled with the timing of these games. There has to be a better time to schedule a tournament like this and right before the regular season starts isn’t one of them.

I haven’t really looked into how Major League Baseball, or the teams feel about this tournament and the time it takes place, but you’d have to think that teams aren’t happy about having their top players away from spring training just weeks before the regular season starts. We’re actually just 11 days away from the start of the 2023 regular season.

Of course, the other issue that the World Baseball Classic could cause on Major League Baseball teams is injuries. Now we’ve already had one very significant injury. The New York Mets lost their closer Edwin Diaz for the entire 2023 season when he torn the patella tendon in his right knee celebrating a win in the World Baseball Classic. Then last night Houston Astros 2nd baseman Jose Altuve was hit in the right wrist by a pitch while playing for Venezuela.

Altuve was facing Daniel Bard of Team USA. Bard’s fastball ran in on Altuve and hit him on the wrist. Altuve was knocked off his feet, and started shaking his hand as soon as he hit the dirt. He stayed lying down in the batter’s box for a moment and was eventually helped off the field. Altuve could be seen grimacing and holding his wrist as medical staff walked him back to the clubhouse.

There has been no update on Altuve’s condition, but with the regular season starting in just 11 days you’d have to think it’s doubtful that he’ll be ready to go when the Astros open up their season on March 30th at home against the Chicago White Sox.

Not surprisingly there has been a lot of criticism of the World Baseball Classic because of these injuries, but the players are the ones who make the decision to play or not and they have largely defended the tournament and have mentioned how excited they are to play for their home countries.

With the regular season just 11 days away like I mentioned earlier one of the fantasy baseball leagues I’m in ha started their draft. They call it a slow draft and trust me there’s a good reason for that. We started this draft on Friday and I think we’ve made seven picks.

I understand the reasons for doing a draft this way, but this is easily for me the worst way to do a draft and it’s no wonder that my team has never done well in this league. I like to sit down and do the draft all in one shot. When we do the draft this “slow” way I have a tendency to sit around and over think every pick that I want to make and in the end I always seem to make the wrong one.

I share this team with a friend of mine, so we co-manage it. I was all set on taking Shohei Ohtani with the 9th pick overall, but he more or less overruled me and we went with Julio Rodriguez. Being that I like the Seattle Mariners I have no issue with taking Rodriguez, but I really thought that Ohtani would’ve been the better pick. I guess will see how that plays out.

I’m guessing every fantasy baseball league does this, but in case yours doesn’t they actually split Ohtani into two players. there’s Ohtani the hitter which was the player I wanted at #9 and then Ohtani the pitcher would be another player. I’m sure if Ohtani was just considered one player, he’d be the first pick in every draft.

So, chime in here for me. Would you have taken Rodriguez or Ohtani the hitter with the 9th pick? Also feel free to let me know how your fantasy league draft is going.

Don’t forget to look me up on Twitter, I’m @Burketime.

Spring training is up and running in Major League Baseball, but some players are away from their teams competing in the World Baseball Classic. I’ve tried to watch some of the games here and there, but I’ve had a difficult time enjoying the games.

The United States team is 2-1 in Pool C of the tournament. Some people were surprised that the United States team lost a game, but they shouldn’t be. There are a lot of limitations that manager Mark DeRosa and the other managers have to deal with when it comes to their pitching staffs.

Just yesterday there was a report that Eduardo Rodriquez would no longer be allowed to pitch for team Venezuela team. The Venezuelan team is currently 3-0 and Rodriquez wasn’t scheduled to pitch until the championship game if Venezuela made it that far. It was also reported that Venezuelan team would have to limit Miguel Cabera’s at bats to just one a game.

Now I’m not sure if ever team has been given limitations on how much a pitcher can be used or how many pitches they can throw in a game, but it has to make it very difficult to handle a pitching staff if these limitations are placed on you.

Now unfortunately it’s understandable that major league teams who pays these players’ salaries want them to be healthy for the regular season when it starts. The last thing a team would want would be for one of their top starting pitchers to get inured throwing too many innings in an exhibition game that doesn’t count towards winning a World Series.

You have to wonder if there’s some type of solution to this issue of limiting pitchers and in some cases hitters. Is it possible that moving the World Baseball Classic to different dates help the cause. I heard a suggestion yesterday that the take a two week break during the regular season and play the World Baseball Classic. I’m not sure how that would work, but maybe it’s possible to move the World Baseball Classic until after the World Series has been played.

I guess the biggest issue for the World Baseball Classic if it was moved until after the World Series would be how many major league players would want to participate. Those players would be coming off of a 162-game season plus playoffs if their team made it. They could be a little burned out and end up skipping the World Baseball Classic.

Of course, it might not be a bad thing if the major league players decided to skip it. I doubt that the television networks would be too happy, but if the major league players skipped the World Baseball Classic it could give some of the top minor league players and even college and high school players to show their skills on an international level.

I guess the difficult part if the major league players don’t participate would be television. The Fox network is carrying the games and they paid for those rights. How much would a network pay if the major league players weren’t involved?

If you’re interested in checking out a few innings of the World Baseball Classic there are four games on today. The first game starts in just under an hour on Fox Sports 2 as Venezuela takes on Israel. The second game is scheduled to start at 2:00 p.m. and it’s also on Fox Sports 2 as Mexico takes on Canada. The final two games are on Fox Sports 1. At 6:00 p.m. Puerta Rico faces the Dominican Republic. The fourth and final game of the day has Team USA taking on Colombia and that game is scheduled to start at 9:00 p.m.

Out of the 20 teams in the World Baseball Classic only two are undefeated at this point. Team Japan is 4-0 while Team Venezuela is 3-0. There are also two teams that haven’t won a game yet. Team China and Team Nicaragua are both 0-4.

Ha-Seong Kim who’s playing for Team Korea has the most home runs in the World Baseball Classic right now with 3. Out of all the players who have more than 15 at bats Nicky Lopez of Team Italy has the best batting average as he’s 8 for 16 so far.

As for pitching Miguel Romero of Team Cuba has logged the most inning with 8 1/3 and has the most strikeouts with 12. Romero is tied with Jose Ruiz of Team Venezuela for the most wins with 2. There are 15 pitchers who haven’t given up a run yet and one of them is Shohei Otani who pitched 4 innings in his start for Team Japan.

So, I’m curious what your interest is in the World Baseball Classic. Have you been following it? Have you been watching full games? Or are you like me and you’re just watching a little bit of it here and there?

We went over the Trevor Bauer legal issues when he was going through them the past couple of seasons. While he was going through the legal process Bauer didn’t pitch last season and ended up being released by the Los Angeles Dodgers making him a free agent.

Bauer is a former Cy Young award winner and had been one of the better starting pitchers in Major League Baseball until he ran into his legal issues. Now to be fair Bauer was never actually arrested and no charges were ever filed against him for what that’s worth.

As a free agent the question became would a major league team take a chance on Bauer with the baggage, he might be bringing with him. Well, the answer turned out to be no, but Bauer has found somewhere to pitch this coming season as he looks to get back into Major League Baseball. Bauer signed a one-year $4 million dollar contract to pitch for the Yokohama DeNA BayStars of Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball.

Now you might look at that $4 million dollar salary and think that’s a little low for a pitcher with Bauer’s resume, but don’t forget that he’s still owed a little over $23 million dollars by the Dodgers for the 2023 season.

It will be interesting to see how Bauer pitches in Japan and if this is a path to getting him back on a major league roster.

Don’t forget to look me up on Twitter, I’m @Burketime.

After weeks of speculation the Chicago Bears ended up trading the #1 overall pick in the draft. Now there were multiple teams that were mentioned in possibly being interested in acquiring that pick, but in the end, it was the Carolina Panthers that gave the Bears the package they accepted.

For the #1 overall pick in the upcoming draft the Bears will receive Carolina’s #1 pick which is 9th overall, A 2nd round pick which is 61st overall, a 2024 1st round pick, a 2025 2nd round pick and wide receiver D.J. Moore.

It appears as though the Bears got good value for that #1 overall pick, but we’ll never actually know until we see how those draft picks turn out. What we do know immediately from the trade is that Chicago filled one of their biggest off season’s needs, to get a #1 wide receiver.

Last season Moore started al 17 games for the Panthers. He caught 63 passes for 888 yards and scored 7 touchdowns. Moore spent five seasons with the Panthers and had a career high 93 receptions in 2021. He’ll immediately step in as the Bears #1 wide receiver.

Now the question becomes, which quarterback will the Panthers take with the #1 overall draft pick they now own. There have been reports that the owner and the new head coach like two different quarterbacks. Apparently, owner Dave Tepper likes Alabama quarterback Bryce Young while head coach Frank Reich favors Ohio State quarterback C.J. Stroud.

Carolina is now on the clock, and they’ll have until April 27th to figure out which quarterback they’ll be taking with that #1 overall pick.

The other thing that this trade signifies is that the Bears have decided that Justin Fields will be their quarterback going forward. At one point there were some rumors that the Bears would trade Fields and use that #1 overall pick to select their new franchise quarterback. This trade should put all of that talk to rest.

It still appears as though there will be three quarterbacks taken with the top four picks in the April 27th draft. With Carolina picking 1st then the Houston Texans taking a quarterback with the 2nd pick and then the Indianapolis Colts selecting a quarterback with the 4th pick.

As of right now the Arizona Cardinals seem to be holding onto an interesting pick at #3. Is it possible that a team that couldn’t come to an agreement with the Bears to move up to the #1 slot in the draft still be interested in moving up to get a quarterback? If they are they’d have to deal with the Cardinals as it’s very doubtful that either Houston or Indianapolis would deal their 1st round picks since it appears as though they’re both interested in selecting a quarterback.

Of course, there still are and there always are quarterback questions that still have to be answered. Aaron Rodgers met with the New York Jets this week, so it’s possible that he’ll be their quarterback next season. Lamar Jackson and the Baltimore Ravens haven’t seen any movement on his contract situation, so it’s unclear where he’s at right now. Jimmy Garoppolo is also out there as a free agent and I’m sure he’ll be someone’s starting quarterback next season.

So, what do you think of the Bears/ Panthers trade? Do you think that the Bears go enough for the #1 overall pick? And which quarterback do you think Carolina moved up to get?

I haven’t seen too many predictions on the upcoming Major League Baseball season just yet, but I’m sure they’ll be popping up soon. When those predictions come out, I’m sure there will be a lot of people picking the New York Yankees to be a contender to win the World Series. The Yankees are always a trendy pick, but if they’re going to contend, they’re going to have to get off to a solid start and it looks as though they’re running into some rotation troubles.

The Yankees announced almost right as spring training started that right-handed starting pitcher Frankie Montas probably wouldn’t pitch at all in the 2023 season as he shoulder surgery. Well, the Yankees suffered another blow to that starting rotation when Carlos Rodon went do with a mild forearm strain. Rodon is being shut down for 7 to 10 days but is going to start the season on the Injury List.

Rodon was expected to hold down the #2 spot in the Yankees starting rotation behind Gerrit Cole. He was also the only left-handed starter that the Yankees have. If he’s healthy Luis Severino might be able to step into the spot behind Cole in the starting rotation until Rodon returns but will have to see how the Yankees end up setting up their rotation.

Rodon started his career with the Chicago White Sox, so I’m used to hearing that he’s injured. He’s managed to stay relatively healthy the last two seasons and actually made 31 starts for the San Francisco Giants last season. That led to the Yankees giving him a 6-year $162 million dollar contract as a free agent this off season.

Now it was also reported that Rodon underwent an MRI and there was no damage to his UCL. That means it’s possible that Rodon may only miss a start or two when the season gets underway but will have to wait and see how his recover goes.

Don’t forget to look for me on Twitter, I’m @Burketime.

Yesterday was the deadline for National Football League teams to use the franchise tag on players. There were already four players that had been tagged by their teams and yesterday two more players joined that list.

Coming into yesterday Tony Pollard of the Dallas Cowboys, Josh Jacobs of the Las Vegas Raiders, Evan Engram of the Jacksonville Jaquars and Daron Payne of the Washington Commanders had already had the franchise tag placed on them by their respective teams.

Yesterday just before the deadline for teams to use their franchise tags the New York Giants agreed to 4-year $160 million dollar deal with quarterback Daniel Jones. That allowed the Giants to use their franchise tag on running back Saquon Barkley.

The other player who had the franchise tag place on him yesterday was no surprise at all as the Baltimore Ravens used a franchise tag on quarterback Lamar Jackson.

The most interesting thing was the fact that the Ravens used the non-exclusive franchise tag on Jackson. That means that he’s free to negotiate with other teams. If Jackson does come to an agreement with another team the Ravens have the right to match that offer. If Baltimore decides not to match the offer Jackson would receive from another team the Ravens would get two 1st round draft picks in return for him.

More or less what Baltimore did was they’re allowing the other teams in the NFL to set Jackson’s market. As you know the biggest sticking point between the ravens and Jackson during their negotiations was the guaranteed money that the quarterback wanted. By applying the non-exclusive franchise tag to Jackson Baltimore will be able to see if there’s another team in the league that will be willing to guarantee all the money in a contract offer to Jackson.

If Jackson doesn’t find an offer from another team and he is unable to come to an agreement with the Ravens on a long term deal he’ll play the 2023 season for a salary of $32.416 million dollars.

The three running backs that were tagged Pollard, Jacobs and Barkley would play for a salary of $10.091 million dollars next season if they can’t agree to a deal with their respective teams. Engram would play for the tight end salary of $11.345 million dollars and Payne a defensive tackle would receive $18.937 million dollars next season.

Not just Jackson, but all of the players that received the franchise tag from their teams got the non-exclusive tag, so they’re all eligible to talk to and sign an offer from another team. It seems doubtful that any of the franchise tagged players besides Jackson would receive offers from other teams as it would be tough to give up two 1st round draft picks for anything other than a franchise type of quarterback.

It will be interesting to see if any of the teams that appear to be in the market for a starting quarterback will step up and offer Jackson a contract.

There has already been some talk the Atlanta Falcons might be a team that makes Jackson an offer, but you also have to wonder if the New York Jets or the Carolina Panthers could also make an offer. The New Orleans Saints signed Derek Carr earlier this week, so they’re out of the quarterback market, but Carr’s old team the Las Vegas raiders have an opening at quarterback.

Let me know what you think. Did the Ravens make a good gamble on using the non-exclusive franchise tag on Jackson and allowing him to get offers from other teams? Or do you think that they might be taking too big of a risk and could lose Jackson to a team that makes a big offer that they can’t or won’t match?

Don’t forget that with Jackson as their quarterback Baltimore had the 2nd highest scoring offense in the NFL behind only the Super Bowl winning Kansas City Chiefs. After Jackson went out injured the Ravens went from one of the top offenses to one of the bottom scoring offenses.

The only other quarterback on the Baltimore roster right now besides Jackson is Anthony Brown who made one start last season. Tyler Huntley who started for Games for the Ravens last season and played in six games is a free agent.

It will be interesting to see if or how many of these franchise tagged players get new contracts or if any of them decide to hold out if they can’t come to a new deal with their respective teams. I guess will have to follow along as we get closer to the start of what the NFL calls their “new year”.

Don’t forget to look me up on Twitter, I’m @Burketimie.

In general, it can be difficult for a team to maintain winning year after year. To do that they have to be a team that is either willing to spend money and they spend that money on the right players or there a team that knows how to draft and develop players phenomenally. Now there are a few teams in professional sports that do both of these things, and they stay in playoff contention from year to year.

Now you’d think that since I live close to a major metropolitan city Chicago that I would have at least one team that would be able to compete year after year, but sadly we don’t, and I’m not sure why that is.

Since football is considered the top sport in America, I guess will start looking at the Chicago Bears. The Bears are coming off of a season where they went 3-14 which was the worst record in the National Football League. Now that record does get the Bears the #1 overall pick in the upcoming draft, but now most teams use them to select a franchise quarterback and it appears as though the Bears have their quarterback of the future in Justin Fields, so the Bears won’t be taking a quarterback with that pick. Of course, the Bears could trade that #1 pick and it seems that they’ll do that, but you have to wonder what type of return they’ll get for it since teams know that they wouldn’t use that pick on a quarterback. This will be an ongoing story until the Bears make some kind of move with that pick.

The Bears haven’t had a winning record since 2018 and they haven’t won a playoff game since 2010. Of course, Bears fans will quickly remind you of the 1985 team that went 15-1 and is considered one of the best teams in the NFL all-time. The Bears have made 12 playoff appearances since that 1985 season and did get back to the Super Bowl in 2006 losing to the Indianapolis Colts.

These last few seasons the Bears don’t seem to be anywhere near a team that could win the Super Bowl. They did make the playoffs in 2020, but they were an 8-8 team and probably had no business in the playoffs.

The Bears have admitted that they are in a rebuild and they have brought in a new front office to do that rebuild. The question is how long will that rebuild take? and will it lead to another championship?

Now, we do have two teams in Chicago that are in the process of wrapping up their regular seasons. Unfortunately for those two teams it doesn’t look like either will find their way into the playoffs.

The Chicago Bulls are currently 29-35 and in 11th place in the Eastern conference. Even with the National Basketball Association’s new play-in format the Bulls wouldn’t make the playoffs with where they are in the standings right now. The Bulls are only a 1 1/2 out of the 10th and final Eastern conference playoff spot, but really what good would it do them to even get into the playoffs.

If you go back to just last season the Bulls were actually in 1st place in the Eastern conference for a period of time and there were some people in the media who thought that they might be able to compete for the NBA title. Well last season the Bulls tumbled to 6th place and were easily knocked out of the 1st round of the playoffs by the Milwaukee Bucks.

There was some hope for this Bulls team coming into this season, but they’ve easily been one of the most disappointing team in the NBA this season. In a league where the majority of the teams make the playoffs there’s a very good chance that the Bulls won’t end up in that majority, how sad is that for a major market team.

The other Chicago sports team currently wrapping up their regular season is the Chicago Blackhawks and let’s face it their season can’t end soon enough.

The Blackhawks are another Chicago sports team that is going through a rebuild and that reflects in their record. The Blackhawks are 21-36-5 and have accumulated just 47 points this season which is the worst in the Western conference and currently the second worst point total in all of the National Hockey League.

It appears as though the Blackhawks have capped off the tearing down part of their rebuild this week when they traded their last remaining superstar Patrick Kane to the New York Rangers. It’s quite possible that we would’ve also seen the Blackhawks trade their last remaining link to their Stanley Cup winning teams if Jonathan Toews hadn’t had to go on the Injured Reserve with an illness.

I guess you could question how long this Blackhawks rebuild has been going on? Or if they’re doing it the right way? The Blackhawks have made the playoffs just once in the past five seasons and the NHL is another one of those leagues were the majority of the teams make the playoffs. The Blackhawks made the playoffs during the NHL’s Covid-19 season, so that’s a difficult season to judge. The Blackhawks did win there qualifying round match up that season, but they haven’t won an actual playoff series since the 2014-15 season when they went on to win their third Stanley Cup in six seasons.

With the team appearing to be completely stripped down you have to wonder if and or when the Blackhawks will be able to build the team back up to the point where they’ll just make the playoffs. Who knows if the team will ever return to the point where they’re looked at as a Stanley Cup contender.

Well, now we’ve gotten to the two teams that people will be optimistic about because they’re currently in spring training and everyone will get excited for the start of baseball season, but what are we really going to get from the Chicago Cubs and the Chicago White Sox.

The Cubs are one of the odder teams in all of Major League Baseball. The Cubs are one of the better drawing teams in all of MLB attendance wise, even when they lose, so you’d think that they’d be in the market to sign the big-time free agents when they hit the market, but they never seem to be. It’s almost as if the Cubs are a team that plays in the big market of Chicago, but they’re run like a small market team. You can add the Cubs to the list of Chicago sports teams that are currently going through a rebuild.

Cubs’ fans will immediately tell you that they just won a World Series, but that was now seven seasons agio and they’ve been nowhere near competing for another one since. The Cubs have made three playoff appearances since that World Series win, but they’ve only won one playoff series.

While there were some big names on the free agent market the Cubs some of the Cubs free agent signings were Trey Mancini, Eric Hosmer and Jameson Taillon. The Cubs did go out and make one big signing in shortstop Dansby Swanson, but he was at the bottom of the free agent shortstop market, so the Cubs basically settled for the leftover big name free agent.

What Cubs fans should find very frustrating is that they play in a very weak National League Central and could or should compete every year, but for some reason choose not to.

I guess the only team in Chicago that has any chance of being competitive are the Chicago White Sox, but after coming off of a disappointing 2022 season, will they?

The White Sox made the playoffs in 2020 and 2021 which led to a lot of people thinking that they could possibly win the American League pennant and go to the World Series. Sadly, the White Sox finished with a record of 81-81 and while they did somehow end up in 2nd place in the American League Central, they were never a serious playoff or World Series contender.

The White Sox didn’t make any major free agent signings. They did allow veteran and team leader Jose Abreu to leave as a free agent while adding outfielder Andrew Benintendi.

The White Sox bullpen also took a big hit when closer Liam Hendricks was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma and is currently undergoing treatment. It’s unclear if Hendricks will pitch for the White Sox this season. The one thing that the White Sox have is they acquired Kendall Graveman before the trade deadline last season, and he has closing experience.

It appears as though the White Sox are hoping that their young players continue to mature and improve, but those young players have had issues staying healthy.

The White Sox have an advantage of playing in a weak division and might be the one Chicago team that has a winning season, but that’s what everyone thought last season and it didn’t turn out that way.

Well, that’s what the sports teams look like in my area. What do they look like where you live? Do they spend money? Or are they good at developing players? I’ll be interested to know what you think about the teams in your city.

Don’t forget to look me up on Twitter, I’m @Burketime.

At one point in time Anthony Davis was looked at as a Top 10 or in some people’s eyes a Top 5 player in the National Basketball Association. Unfortunately, injuries have been a huge part of Davis’s career as he’s never played more than 75 games in a season. After this past weekend he’s going to have to make sure he’s healthy because if the Los Angeles Lakers are going to get into the playoffs this season it looks like he’ll have to carry the team on his back.

The Lakers are currently 29-33 after last night’s 121-109 loss to the Memphis Grizzlies. After the loss the Lakers find themselves just one game out of the 10th and final playoff spot in the Western conference. The Lakers have 20 games left in the regular season to make up that game and get into the playoffs, but it’s possible that they may have to do it without Lebron James.

On Saturday the Lakers wiped out a 27-point deficit and beat the Dallas Mavericks 111-108. The win was important to the Lakers, but it may have come at a high price.

During the game James injured his foot. There really hasn’t been a lot of clarifications on James’s injury. The only thing that the Lakers have said is that he’ll be reevaluated in two weeks. With that type of a timetable James will miss at least nine games and possibly more if he’s not ready to return after that two-week time period.

Now a lot of people have written off the Lakers now that James is out injured, but don’t be too certain of that. In those final 20 games the Lakers statistically have the easiest schedule out of any team in the NBA. That means that if Davis steps up and plays like the player that used to be considered one of the best in the NBA the Lakers could find their way into the Play-in part of the playoffs.

Davis has actually had a good season so far, but that was as the Lakers second option behind James. Davis is averaging 25.8 points per game while averaging 12.6 rebounds per game and 2.1 blocks per game. Those are good numbers, but he did that as the Lakers #2 option behind James. Will Davis be able to continue to put up numbers as the Lakers main scoring option?

Of course, the big issue with Davis is will he be able to stay healthy through these last games. This season Davis has appeared in just games 38 of the Lakers 62 games this season. He’ll need to find a way to be ready to go for these final 20 games if the lakers have any chance of finding their way into that play-in portion of the playoffs.

The Lakers are on the road tonight against the Oklahoma City Thunder. This is a big game for Oklahoma City as they are 28-33 heading into tonight’s game and a win would draw them even in the standings with the Lakers. After the game in Oklahoma City the Lakers return to Los Angeles for a five game homestand.

The gap from 4th place to 13th place isn’t that big of a difference in the Western conference. The Phoenix Suns currently sit in 4th place with a record of 33-29 while Oklahoma City is the team in 13th right now, but they’re just 4 1/2 games behind Phoenix. With the standings the way they are in the Western conference right now every game is important for not only the Lakers, but for every team from 4th place down.

Chime in here. Do you see the Lakers getting into the playoffs? If you do think they get into the playoffs, do you think they could actually win a playoff series?

The Suns also play tonight. It’s the second of s four game road trip for them as they’ll face the Charlotte Hornets. What everybody will be looking at in this game is that Kevin Durant is scheduled to make his debut for the Suns tonight.

On February 9th Durant was traded to the Suns with T.J. Warren in exchange for Mikal Bridges, Cam Johnson and Jae Crowder as well as four unprotected 1st round draft picks and a 2028 1st round pick swap.

Durant has yet to play for Phoenix as he’s been listed as out with a right knee injury. Durant’s last game was on January 8th when he was still a member of the Brooklyn Nets.

It’s your turn to let me know what you think again. Does Durant make the Suns a title contender?

As always don’t forget to look me up on Twitter, I’m @Burketime.

With Eric Bieniemy moving on to be the Washinton Commanders offensive coordinator the Super Bowl winning Kansas City Chiefs had to find someone to replace him. I’m sure that no one was surprised at all when the Chiefs stayed in house and promoted Matt Nagy to the open offensive coordinator position.

This will actually be the second time that Nagy has been the Chiefs offensive coordinator. He left the position the first time to take the Chicago Bears head coaching job in 2018. Nagy spent four years as the Bears head coach and while he did have a winning record at 34-31, he produced only one winning season with the Bears.

After being fired by the Bears ion January of 2022 the Chiefs quickly rehired Nagy in February of 2022 and named him senior assistant and quarterbacks’ coach. Nagy has held that position until being promoted to offensive coordinator.

As for Bieniemy, he had been with the Chiefs since 2013 when he was hired the teams running backs coach. Bieniemy was promoted to offensive coordinator when Nagy left for the job with the Bears, and he held that position until he left for the same job with Washington this week.

Bieniemy’s name had been mentioned and he interviewed for several head coaching positions over the years, but for one reason or another was never hired. It appears as though with Andy Reid calling the offensive plays for Kansas City it hurt Bieniemy’s value as a possible head coach.

With Bieniemy’s move to the Commanders he will be in charge of the offense and will also be calling plays. If he has even moderate success with the Washington offense, you’d think that it would improve his standing as a possible head coach.

Bieniemy signed a two-year contract with the Commanders, so will see if he can build an offense and prove himself now that he’s no longer working with Andy Reid.

It’s that time of year in the National Football League were teams have to find ways to get themselves under the salary cap. In a lot of cases that means that they have to make some difficult cuts and some of them happened just last week.

After just one-year with the Los Angeles Rams linebacker Bobby Wagner and the team have parted ways. The 32-year-old Wagner had a good season for a disappointing Rams team. Wagner posted a career high 6 sacks and made tackles while playing in all 17 games last season.

The Tennessee Titans where another team that had to make some moves to help out their salary cap situation. Tennessee ended up releasing three veteran players last week.

Linebacker Zach Cunningham, wide receiver Robert Woods and offensive tackle Taylor Lewan were the three veterans that Tennessee is going to part ways with.

Cunningham was in his first full season with Tennessee but was limited to playing in just 6 games due to injury. Cunningham posted 24 tackles in the 6 games that he played in.

Woods was brought in to help the receiving corps after A.J. Brown was traded, but he didn’t really produce. Woods played in all 17 games for the Titans. He caught 53 passes, but only had 2 touchdowns and averaged just 9.9 yards per reception.

Lewan was Tennessee’s 1st round draft pick 11th overall in the 2014 draft. Injuries limited Lewan to just 20 games over the last three seasons and you have to think that had something to do with him getting released. Lewan appeared in just 2 games for the Titans last season.

I actually forgot that Tennessee made a fourth cut this week as well. Kicker Randy Bullock was also released by Tennessee this week.

Last season was Bullock’s 10th in the NFL and his second with Tennessee. Bullock had played for 5 other teams before joining the Titans. Bullock appeared in 15 games for Tennessee last season and made 17 of his 20 field goal attempts with a long of 51 yards. Bullock was also a perfect 28 for 28 on extra points.

So now I want to know what you think. Did Bieniemy make the right move by leaving Kansas City for Washington? Will this move help him get an NFL head coaching job?

Also do you see the four players that Tennessee released find jobs with other teams.

As always don’t forget to look me up on Twitter, I’m @Burketime.

Yesterday was the first day that a National Football League team could designate a player with the franchise tag. No team made that move so far, but there should be some coming very soon.

There are two kinds of franchise tags that teams can apply to a player.

There is the “exclusive” franchise player must be offered a one-year contract for an amount no less than the average of the top five salaries at the player’s position as of a date in April of the current year in which the tag will apply, or 120 percent of the player’s previous year’s salary, whichever is greater. Exclusive franchise players cannot negotiate with other teams. The player’s team has all the negotiating rights to the exclusive player.

Then there is the “non-exclusive” franchise player must be offered a one-year contract for an amount no less than the average of the top five cap hits at the player’s position for the previous five years applied to the current salary cap, or 120 percent of the player’s previous year’s salary, whichever is greater. A non-exclusive franchise player may negotiate with other NFL teams, but if the player signs an offer from another team, the original team has a right to match the terms of that offer, or if it does not match the offer and thus loses the player, is entitled to receive two first-round draft picks as compensation.

Now the first player that comes to mind that might get the franchise tag is Lamar Jackson the Baltimore Ravens quarterback. Jackson acts as his own agent and there’s been no real news on if Jackson and the Ravens have had any contract talks. Baltimore has made offers in the past, but the holdup has always been how much guaranteed money there is in the contract.

If you remember when the Cleveland Browns traded for Deshaun Watson, they signed him to a 5-year $230 million dollar contract and all of the money was guaranteed. Watson has shown that he’s a quality NFL starting quarterback, but if given the choice almost everybody would take Jackson over him, so that leads to the contract issue.

There has been some talk that Baltimore might do something like an NBA sign and trade with Jackson and if they did what could they expect in return. Using Watson as the baseline again when the Browns traded for Watson they sent the Houston Texans three 1st round picks, a 3rd round pick and two 4th round picks. When the Denver Broncos acquired Russell Wilson from the Seattle Seahawks they sent the Seahawks two 1st round picks, two 2nd round picks, a 4th round pick, a 5th round pick and three players. Jackson would be ahead of both Watson and Wilson on any quarterback list, so what would he bring back in return? and is there a team willing to pay that type of price for him?

Jackson started 12 games for the Ravens last season, but he missed the final four regular season games and the Ravens playoff game due to a knee injury. There were multiple people that came out and said that Jackson should’ve played in the playoff game and that he skipped it to punish the Ravens for not giving him a new contract. Knee injuries are tricky, but all of the reports had Jackson returning before the regular season ended and when he didn’t everyone expected him to play in the playoff game.

Now matter what Jackson’s reasoning was for sitting out be it injury or like was speculated to punish the Ravens it’s not going to hurt his trade value or contract negotiations.

I would be shocked to see Jackson in another teams uniform next season, but there are times when both sides are at an impasse that they can’t resolve, so will have to see how this plays out. Do you see Jackson and the Ravens working this out? Or do you think there’s a chance that he’s playing for a new team next season?

The other team that has some work to do when it comes to deciding what to do with their franchise tag is the New York Giants.

The Giants actually have two players that they’ll have to decide between as their starting quarterback Daniel Jones and running back Saquan Barkley are both free agents.

It’s expected that the Giants will use both of their franchise tags, but which player gets the exclusive franchise tag, and which one gets the non-exclusive franchise tag.

It would be better for the Giants salary cap to give Barkley the exclusive franchise tag, but by giving Jones a non-exclusive franchise tag it would give another team that’s looking for a quarterback the opportunity to possibly sign him.

Barkley player in 16 of 17 games for New York last season and rushed for 1312 yards while Jones had his best season at quarterback under new head coach Brian Daboll.

The Giants were a surprise last season going 9-7-1 and getting into the playoffs as a wild card team. New York won their first playoff game against the Minnesota Vikings before being eliminated by the Philadelphia Eagles in the second round.

What do you see the Giants doing with their franchise tags? Who gets the exclusive franchise tag and who gets the non-exclusive franchise tag?

Don’t forget to look me up on Twitter, I’m @Burketime.

With pitchers and catchers reporting it’s time to look forward to the start of the Major League Baseball season. Since there’s labor peace we shouldn’t have to deal with any delays to the start of this season. Of course, you never know, but let’s hope.

So, what are you looking forward to this baseball season? Obviously, you want your favorite team to do well, but is there a certain player that you might have your eye on be it on that favorite team of yours or maybe someone from another team has drawn your interest.

Just yesterday Manny Machado of the San Diego Padres announced that he will opt out of his contract at the end of the 2023 season. Machado signed a 10-year $300 million dollar deal with the Padres back in 2019, so there are still five years left on his contract after the 2023 season. Machado will make $32 million dollars this season and would make that ever year for the remainder of the contract, but that won’t be the case.

You have to think that with players contracts getting bigger and bigger Machado must think that he’ll do better than that $32 million dollar a season rate on the free agent market. I’m not sure how much better Machado can do, but he’ll need either repeat or improve on the performance he had last season.

Machado hit .298 last season with 32 home runs and 102 RBI’s. he also finished 2nd in the voting for National League Most Valuable Player. Machado is also still a plus defender at 3rd base. Last season he ended up with w fielding percentage of .966.

Machado set a February 16th deadline to work out an extension with the Padres, but the two sides couldn’t come to an agreement. San Diego did make one offer to Machado. The Padres offered to add 5 years and $105 million dollars to his deal. Will have to see how this situation plays out, but it appears as of right now that Machado will be one of the top available free agents next off season.

Of course, the biggest name on the free agent market next off season if he makes it there will be Shohei Ohtani. He’s in the final year of his contract with the Los Angeles Angels and will make $30 million dollars this season, but you have to wonder what a two-way player would get on the open market.

Ohtani hit 34 home runs and had 95 RBI’s last season while hitting .273. Now he does strikeout a lot he had 161 last season, but that no longer matters in today’s game. On the mound Ohtani made 28 starts and pitched 166 innings, both career highs. He had an ERA of 2.33 and struck out 219 batters.

Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander are the two highest paid players for the 2023 season. Both of those pitchers will make just over $43 million dollars. The highest paid position player for next season is Aaron Judge at $40 million dollars.

How do you access Ohtani’s value? He doesn’t play defense, but with the DH now being universal it doesn’t affect his value as he can fill that DH role on any National League team now.

Ohtani turns 29 years old in July, so it won’t be surprised when teams start offering him 10-to-12-year deals, but for how much money? There has been a lot of talk that Ohtani will get over $50 million dollars a season. How many teams can actually offer him a contract in the neiborhood of $500 million dollars?

It will be interesting to see if the Angels can keep Ohtani in the fold or if he’ll sign somewhere else next off season. Of course, there will be a lot of talk about him going to play for either the New York Mets or the New York Yankees and I’m sure will hear the Los Angeles Dodgers mentioned as well. You’d have to think that if his contract reaches the numbers that are being projected it will be a big market team that signs him, but which one.

When I saw this signing, I got a chuckle out of it, and I had to make sure that Schaumburg Stu knew that his favorite former ex-Cubs player had signed with a team.

Left-handed reliever Justin Wilson signed a one-year deal with an option for 2024 with the Milwaukee Brewers. Wilson spent the 2022 season as a member of the Cincinnati Reds, but only appeared in 5 games and pitched just 3 2/3rd innings due to injury.

Wilson underwent Tommy John surgery last June and it’s still unclear if he’ll be able to pitch this season. The recovery time cis generally a little over a year, so he might be able to return late in the 2023 season. Of course, with the option on his contract Milwaukee will be able to hold onto if they choose to.

I’m sure that Schaumburg Stu will follow Wilson’s recovery closely and he’ll be able to update us on a possible return date for him.

Don’t forget to look for me on Twitter, I’m @Burketime.