Sports are Fixed? Really?

Tony Stewart said recently that he thinks NASCAR is controlling the races by deciding when to issue the caution flags, thus somehow letting the more popular drivers win or finish higher. Not exactly sure how this would work as wouldn't everyone stay in the same position if a caution flag is out. I also want to mention that i am in no way a NASCAR expert, i am in my second year of a fantasy racing league and so far have been a bottom feeder (maybe i can get my buddy who runs the league to make a post to explain this).

Anyways, it has come to this in sports, and it is disgusting, that television ratings and advertisers have now taken over OUR sports. I will attempt to show this, and try to be humorous at the same time.

NBA:

It started with the infamous Patrick Ewing lottery that netted the Knicks the first pick. But it has extended to last night where the referees are deciding the games. Last night the Warriors were T'd from any chance of going up 2-0 on the Mavs by ejecting the Warriors two best players. The league realizes that the Warriors winning would be a ratings killer among NBA fans who want to see their media driven "stars". To me, someone who doesn't watch NBA basketball, i would probably start watching and have someone to root for if the Warriors won. They don't understand. Also, in the Spurs-Nuggets tilt, they gave a huge advantage in FT's to the Spurs. Wouldn't it be more fun to watch the Nuggets/Warriors-Raptors in the final, pure basketball, but they will be stuck with Spurs-Pistons if they keep this up. Good luck drawing new fans with that? I think their dream match up would be Lakers vs Cavs where we could show our youth that shooting the ball with 4 defenders on you and not going back on defense is the way to play the game.

MLB:

Not much of a conspiracy here as its hard to control someone hitting a 95mph fastball on the outside corner. But they do force us to watch either the Red Sox or Yankees on every national broadcast. This one i blame on the fans as buying into all the hype. Seems like everyone wants to read about Bonds, A-Rod, Clemens, Schilling's bloody sock outside of baseball stories than actually watching and enjoying the actual games. There are 28 other fun baseball teams to watch out there instead of having a 5 minute report on Bonds taking a walk, A-Rod doing it in April again (that is actually a pretty funny line), Clemens throwing a rock into a lake while vacationing in Arizona (is he thinking of signing with the Diamondbacks?) or anything Red Sox. Arrrggghhh. As a baseball fan i am frustrated.

NFL:

No conspiracy here. This is the league that could play a Texans-Lions tilt on a Monday Night game and people would watch cause they have Jon Kitna playing in their fantasy league. I do find this interesting though. As a commissioner of a league, how many teams will start a player over a better player just cause they are on national TV so they can watch them. Good Times....means a win for me....

NHL:

Nothing here to report as i think the games have all been moved to Siberia, so no need for network influence here.

PGA:

No way you can influence that unless they institute mulligans based on world rankings, which wouldn't surprise me. I can see in a few years, Jim Nantz saying at the Masters, "There is Tiger on 18, after using his 35th mulligan putting for an eagle and a new record 48.

OK, be back tomorrow, might do a fantasy post, a headlines or one of the two topics that i have wanted to tackle that have been sitting on my floor...