• Allison at BCS Frenzy offers four reasons USC thumped Ohio State.
• Tony at Dejuiced talks about the Cubs’ almost pulling off back-to-back no hitters.
• Tony also discusses the Brewers firing Ned Yost at Inside the Ballpark.
• Jodie at Gossip on Sports talks about No Jet-ribution and tells a funny story about what happened to Tom Brady.
• Jeanne at Hockey Beat discusses NHL 09 on XBOX 360 and their unreadable discs.
• Jyle at Footie thinks that some fans of the UEFA Euro 2008 have gone bat crazy.
• Over at Sneaks ‘N Gear Jyle shows us a metallic version of the Converse Chuck Taylor All-Star Hi Top.
• David at Every Morning Quarterback features his interview with N.Y. Jets defensive back Darrelle Revis.
• Sandy at Light the Torch shows the Paralympics have their share of star athletes, such as Sweden’s Jonas Jacobsson, who picked up his 14th Paralympic Gold Medal this week.
• At Green Posse, Sandy gives us a look at Louisville’s Valhalla Golf Club, wthe site of this week’s Ryder Cup duel between Team USA and Team Europe.
• Stephen at Hoops Fantasy talks about the 2009 NBA MVP Award Favorites.
• At Knuckle Curve, Stephen takes a look at the American League MVP Candidates.
• Jarrod is back blogging with us at Thoroughbred Fever. Stop by to check out the latest horse racing news.
• Kori at The Fantasy Kickoff talks about the top fantasy football players from Week 2.

Last but not least, we want to welcome Scott Wharton to the channel. Scott is blogging at Jab and Grapple, where he writes about MMA and wrestling. Bookmark the site and visit often!

Thanks for reading!

Photo credit: istockphoto

Post from: Knuckle Curve

Some newspaper writers use a blog as a launching point for their opinions on a wide variety of topics, including the team they cover. We’ll mostly stick to the Padres and baseball, and keep most of the commentary as fact-driven as possible. The other thing we’re figuring out is, how often should we blog? Blogging takes away from our reporting. It’s possible to serve both masters, but that’s an evolving process for us.

From where I sit (not my mother’s basement in Albuquerque, for those who might be wondering), the marriage of traditional reporting and blogging is a win-win proposition. Once you get past the labels, we’re all trying to achieve the same goals, right?

Post from: Knuckle Curve

• Arrived in Vegas Wednesday evening. Nice, easy 5-hour drive.
• Dinner and drinks with fellow b5ers. I’ll name drop when I get home. For now, I’ll just say it was cool to meet in person folks I’ve been working with for more than a year. Also, I’m a sucker for sushi and beer.
• Three sports track sessions on Thursday. Good discussion on the differences between sports blogging and sports journalism, how to build an audience; good networking. Again, namedropping can wait, but you’ve heard of them.
• Morning session on Friday talked about whether bloggers need access to players, teams, etc., and if so, how to go about getting said access.

This afternoon, we’ll look at where sports blogging is headed. The speakers have been outstanding thus far, and I’m looking forward to hearing their thoughts on our future.

Oh yeah, and then Mark Cuban will deliver the closing keynote. Cool, huh?

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Post from: Knuckle Curve

I started writing about baseball on the Web in ‘97. We didn’t call it blogging back then, but eventually that’s what it became. Originally, 99% of my readers were folks I knew personally; they knew my biases and weren’t afraid to call BS if I said something that didn’t ring true.

Accountability in blogging is a funny thing — the only regulatory body I know of is the readers. With that in mind, I try to let you know when I have a particular bias about something so that you can then judge whether or not I’m full of it. I’m a fan who loves the game of baseball. I have opinions about the game and those who play it — sometimes strong opinions.

You can get your news anywhere. I try to provide a little something extra that maybe gets you thinking or talking about things. If you agree with something I say, great. If you disagree, great. It would be real boring if we all agreed all the time.

My style isn’t to seek out controversy, but at the same time, I won’t shy away from it. Mainly I’ll just try to give you an honest take on the sport based on what I know and what I perceive.

I’ve been following baseball for 30 or so years, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that you can’t learn it all. What you’ll find here are one man’s opinions. Like the man behind those opinions, they aren’t perfect. But they’re all I’ve got.

Thank you for joining me on the great ride that will be the 2007 season. Play ball!

Post from: Knuckle Curve

Schilling talks about interacting with baseball fans:

Fans in Boston want to know why I threw a slider 2-0, or they want to know the difference between my fastball and my change-up. They are smart as hell, and for me that’s fun.

Schilling also points out what I think is going to be huge down the line — the way his blogging allows him to remove any filters between himself and the public:

I did a blog a couple of days ago and basically explained my contract situation. Yesterday, there was an article written by John Tomase in The Boston Herald. The article is, John introduces my blog, quotes my blog and then finishes the article. I just did an interview without having to deal with the media. I wasn’t edited, I wasn’t clipped. It was what I said, how I said it.

In other words, we’re now getting Schilling’s words as opposed to some individual’s interpretation of his words. That is both very exciting and a little scary. Mostly exciting, though.

Kudos again to Schilling for doing the blog thing and to Belth (a very respected blogger in his own right) for talking to him about it.

Post from: Knuckle Curve