Author Archives: Bobby Roberts

Can Detroit Win AL Central With Verlander Struggling?

Justin Verlander has been in the running for the Cy Young award in nearly every season for the better part of a decade. In the span of his career, the Detroit Tigers have went from worst to first in the AL Central. They couldn’t have done it without his dominant pitching.

Things aren’t going so well for Verlander this season. He currently has a record of 6-7 with a 4.98 ERA. Detroit is only leading Kansas City by a half game in the AL Central. While the official MLB Futures betting lines have the Detroit Tigers in contention to take the AL Central Division, I am no longer comfortable with their position in the top spot as the Royals look to make their move on them.

Matthew Leach of MLB.com wrote an in-depth article breaking down Verlander’s problems this season. Leach opines that he shouldn’t be breaking down at 31 years old. As a power pitcher, he should actually be firmly in his prime. His velocity has taken a hit and he’s even having issues against players the second and third time through the order. This is new territory for Verlander.

What’s going on with Detroit? What should we expect from them going down the stretch?

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2014 NBA Mock Draft: Who Will be #1?

Now that the NBA season is over, let’s focus on the NBA Draft. I personally think the NBA Draft is the best draft in any major sport. There’s usually more trades, the impact of these rookies is usually felt immediately and it doesn’t go on and on like the NFL Draft.

You will begin to hear a lot of rumors about what’s wrong with these prospects. You rarely hear anything positive until a day or two before the draft. Teams know how to leak information to attempt to hurt a player’s draft stock. It’s all smoke and mirrors at this point.

I try to forge through the piles of trash out there and give you where I think the player will be drafted. I personally wouldn’t draft a few of these players in the lottery, but it’s the NBA and there are a lot of bad General Managers in the league.

Here is my 2014 NBA Mock Draft for the first round.

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Clayton Kershaw Pitches First Career No-Hitter

Clayton Kershaw, who signed a $215 million contract this offseason, was worth every penny against Colorado. He earned his first career no-hitter and was only a throwing error away from a perfect game. I’m sure Hanley Ramirez would like to have that throw back.

This is the Dodgers second no-hitter this season. Josh Beckett unexpectedly earned one less than a month ago. I wouldn’t be surprised if Kershaw, or another member of their rotation, would notch another one this season.

The Dodgers are currently four games back in the NL West behind the San Francisco Giants.

Kershaw’s next start will be in Kansas City to face the AL Central-leading Royals.

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Sweetbob’s Hipster Music Playlist: June 2014

I decided to super-size this month’s playlist with 15 songs (again). June is a great month for new music. Bands tour a lot in the Summer, so a lot of great music is released.

I always keep an ear out for new music. I love discovering new bands/songs, it’s a habit from my days as a music journalist. Even though this is mostly a sports blog, I still add quite a bit of music and pop culture content.

I have been called a hipster on more than one occasion. I like indie music more than any other genre of music. Don’t get me wrong, I can rock out to Richard Marx or Ace of Base (depending on the amount of alcohol in my system).

Here are 15 new indie songs I’m currently listening to. All of the songs are fresh and most have only been released within the last two months.

Your ears will thank you for listening!

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2014 Maxim Hot 100 List

Maxim recently released its annual “Hot 100” list for 2014. It’s filled with the usual suspects (Scarlett Johansson, Jessica Alba, etc), but they have been known to add in a few up & coming starlets.

The most shocking omissions are from the television show Mad Men. I don’t know how Maxim failed to add Alison Brie, Christina Hendricks, Jessica Paré or January Jones to the 2014 Maxim Hot 100. Also, I was surprised Modern Family‘s Sarah Hyland didn’t make the cut.

I did feel a tad old looking at this year’s list. There are many newcomers and one of the younger Kardashian girls appears on the list for the first time.

See who made Maxim’s Hot 100 list and let us know if you agree with them.

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Chicago Cubs: Trade Candidates

We are a quarter into the 2014 MLB season and the Chicago Cubs are already playing for the 2016 season (yes, not even 2015).

Their farm system is deep, but lacks pitching. They have bats for days (Kris Bryant, Javier Baez, Jorge Soler) and have used their high draft picks on position players. I assume they will draft a starting pitcher with the #4 overall pick in the 2014 MLB Amateur Draft, since they desperately need a future ace.

The Cubs currently have a handful of players that contenders would love to have down the stretch.

There is one player specifically that has been the focus of nearly ever Cubs trade rumor, Jeff Samardzija.

Which Cubs players are currently on the trading block? We will list the most likely trade candidates and any players the Cubs have their eye on in return.

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Sports Crush: Sydney Leroux

We’ve written a handful of ‘Sports Crush’ posts since we launched Americas White Boy a few years ago. We’ve spotlighted sportscasters, female MMA fighters, WWE Divas, and my favorite U.S. Women’s soccer player, Alex Morgan. We decided to profile another player on the team, the lovely Sydney Leroux.

Leroux currently plays for the Seattle Reign in the National Women’s Soccer League and is a member of the U.S. Women’s National Team. She will be playing in the 2015 World Cup in Canada.

Hope Solo and Alex Morgan gets most of the love, but that will change during the World Cup. Leroux is a stunner who, in the past, was romantically-linked to San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick (I hope that rumor isn’t true).

We are crushing on Sydney Leroux and once you look at our photo gallery, you will understand why.

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The 50 Best Sports Movies of All-Time

I’m a sucker for a great sports movie. I watch every one that comes out and have been disappointed by so many. It’s because I hold such movies as ‘Hoosiers’ and ‘Field of Dreams’ in such high regard. The bar is set really high.

I brainstormed some blog ideas and realized I’ve never written about the best sports movies of all-time. I spent most of this morning making the list of the top 50 sports movies of all-time.

I didn’t include any documentaries or this list would be loaded (I’ll save them for a future post). So if you’re asking yourself why ‘Hoop Dreams’ didn’t make the cut, now you know. Also, I only listed movie franchises once and only ranked the first movie in the series…’Rocky IV’ and ‘Might Ducks 2’ would have definitely made the list.

Here is our list of the 50 best sports movies of all-time.

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Los Angeles, A Tale of Two Owners

Most of you are already aware of the professional basketball’s recent fiasco, so we won’t exhaust that topic any more than we have to in this space. In a nutshell, NBA commissioner Adam Silver banned 80-year-old L.A. Clippers owner Donald Sterling from all team and NBA-related events for life. This happened after celebrity news site TMZ released a private phone conversation between Sterling and his ex-mistress. In the convo, Sterling can be heard making insensitive remarks about African-Americans. Now, the question is not whether or not, but when Sterling is going to relinquish his ownership of the team.

At the center of this scandal was a picture of Sterling’s ex-mistress standing next to legendary L.A. Laker point guard Magic Johnson. “Don’t put him [Johnson] on an Instagram for the world to have to see so they have to call me. And don’t bring him to my games,” Sterling told his ex-mistress. When Magic found out about Sterling’s racist remarks, the 5-time NBA Champion called for Sterling’s removal and vowed to never attend a Clippers game again as long as Sterling was still the owner. When Sterling was banned, Magic sent out a celebratory tweet.

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The 10 Best Summer Beers

There’s nothing better than drinking a cold beer in the sun on a hot Summer day.

It’s getting warmer and breweries are releasing their Summer seasonal beers. I’m a connoisseur of Summer beers, since I tend to ramp up my drinking this time of year. Don’t get me wrong, I love an IPAs, but I have a special place in my heart for Summer wheats.

Since the craft beer industry exploded a few years ago, nearly every brewery releases some sort of Summer seasonal (even Coors, Budweiser and Miller followed suit…but they didn’t make the list).

I compiled a list of the ten best Summer beers for the Summer of 2014.

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Sweetbob’s Hipster Music Playlist: May 2014

I decided to super-size this month’s playlist with 15 songs (again). May is a great month for new music. Artists begin releasing new music for the Summer.

Here are 15 new indie songs I’m currently listening to. All of the songs are fresh and most have only been released within the last two months.

Your ears will thank you for listening!

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Could NFL Now Force Daniel Snyder to Change Redskins Name?

Now that the NBA has set an example on how to handle owner racism, will the other major sports follow suit?

The NBA banned Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling for life for recorded remarks he made in private. They are pushing for the owners to vote to force Sterling to sell the team. They need 3/4ths of the owners to vote ‘yes’ in order for that to happen.

Now that the NBA has opened the ‘let’s vote an owner out of the league’ Pandora’s box, this seems like the perfect opportunity for the NFL to this as leverage to force Washington Redskins owner Daniel Snyder to change his team’s name.

Does the NFL have similar language in their bylaws to force Snyder out as owner?

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