ROOTING FOR LAUNDRY

As far as I’m concerned, baseball people are the most superstitious on Earth. Though I’ve been told hockey people are a close second.

So in the interest of full disclosure that probably borders on Too Much Information, I feel like I should let you all know that I’ve been wearing the same underwear throughout the Dodgers playoff run.

Lest you think I’m some kind of sicko, the protracted playoff period with its off days and some convenient scheduling of my own have allowed me to do laundry a couple of times. So, yes Ma, they’re clean.

But the fact remains, the Blue Crew is 3-0 when I’m sporting these old blue boxers – of course they’re blue – and until further notice, I may just have to step up the laundry cycles.

(By the way, this isn’t my only fashion related superstition. USC football tends to lose on days that I don’t wear any item of Trojan clothing. Oregon State in 2008? Stanford in 2007? My bad. Washington 2009? Not my fault.)

What other reason is there for Andre Ethier’s October-found ability to hit left-handed pitching? How else did Vicente Padilla silence a rabid sea of St. Louis red with the kind of gem that I still don’t believe even after watching every single pitch?

And Game Two? Really? Adam Wainwright had a fantastic season, but was even better than advertised for eight innings but ends up only as a footnote in the box score. Sure, Matt Holliday has never been known for his defense, but you’re going to tell me that after finding no offense all day, the Dodgers have five straight hitters reach base with two out and no one on without a little intervention from the Baseball Gods?

But Dodger Nation has been to this party before. It ended with the Phillies stealing our dates and pouring punch on our heads. So now is the time to see if the Blue Crew has learned anything. Clayton Kershaw says they have, but the proof is in the pitching.

Will Ethier continue his stroke against the Phillies’ solid left-handers? Will Matt Kemp make consistent contact? Was Game Three in St. Louis a portent of good things to come from Manny? Which Hiroki Kuroda will show up?

In the meantime, the fan base wants to ride this train as long as we can. Even if it means being a little liberal with the laundry.

Lest we forget, however. The Freeway Series is still intact. The Angels beating the Red Sox surprised few in the Southland. The Angels sweeping the Red Sox caught everyone by surprise. Their reward…The Evil Empire.

True, the Angels have had plenty of postseason success against the Yankees in recent years, but these aren’t your big brother’s Yankees.

Okay, they kind of are. They still run out an All-Star lineup by spending more than a rich island dictator’s wife left to her own devices on Rodeo Drive. But this Yankee team has a different attitude. Along with the Jeters, Pettittes and Riveras looking to grab glory once again, you have the Sabathias, Burnetts and Teixeiras all looking to taste it for the first time. The scariest part may be that Alex Rodriguez looks to be having the finest autumn of his career. The talent has always been in New York, but there’s a hunger in the Bronx that hasn’t been seen for a long time.

I’d tell you that I have some special Help the Halos ritual, but I don’t. They have their Rally Monkey – which honestly may be more annoying than anything the Yankees can do – and that seems to be enough under the shadow of Splash Mountain. The real test will be whether they can steal a win in The House Next To The House That Ruth Built.

There’s little doubt that John Lackey can go pitch for pitch with CC Sabathia, but what about Jered Weaver? How does Joe Saunders handle the bright lights of October? Can Scott Kazmir’s experience from last year’s Rays’ run to the Series be an influence? And will the bats show up? Will Vlad still be fearful? Can Kendry Morales continue what’s been an unexpectedly amazing season?

So many questions. They’ll all be answered in a few days. Now if you’ll excuse me, I think the dryer just stopped.

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MAKING THE CASE

Alrighty, we’ve all gotten a good taste of early fall sports. A little college football here, some NFL there. Everyone’s been introduced to LaGarrette Blount’s right cross. We’ve all asked what’s written into the side of Jacory Harris’s head. And we all remembered why Brett Favre decided to come back (though 49ers fans are wishing he’d stayed retired).

But now it’s October, which means we get to focus on things that really matter. L.A.’s two baseball teams are back into the postseason and hoping to bring some West Coast balance back to the Fall Classic.

As an unabashed supporter of all things Best Coast, I’d love to see this end up as a Freeway Series. Who cares if the rest of the country wouldn’t watch? My name’s not Nielsen. Plus, it would serve as nice payback for the rest of us having assorted Teams of the Eastern Seaboard foisted upon us ad nauseum.

While I’m not confident enough to fully buy into the idea, it has given me the idea to explore the Southland’s potential playoff fortunes.

DODGERS

Best Case: Joe Torre realizes he’s managing a National League team that is blessed with speed, occasional power and the ability to manufacture runs. Armed with that knowledge, he becomes more Billy Martin and less Earl Weaver. Manny Ramirez returns to being a terror at the plate while Matt Kemp and Andre Ethier announce their presence to the nation with authority. Randy Wolf asserts himself as the unlikely head of the pitching staff while Jonathan Broxton proves himself as the anchor. The team plays up to and beyond its potential and wins its first World Series since 1988.

Worst Case: The offense is buzz sawed by the Cardinals’ dynamic duo of Chris Carpenter and Adam Wainwright. The Dodger pitching staff, in their fear of Albert “El Hombre” Pujols and Matt “I Apparently Just Didn’t Want To Be In Oakland” Holliday, get beat up instead by Brendan Ryan, Skip Schumaker and Colby Rasmus. Home field advantage means nothing and they’re embarrassed in three games.

Most Likely: The Dodger offense has been light years better at home than it has on the road (minus James Loney, whose bat seems to have an aversion to sunshine and palm trees). More than likely they will find a way to pull one out at home in the late innings against an up and down Cardinals bullpen. But as the scene shifts to St. Louis, the Cards regain their season-long mastery of the Boys in Blue and quickly put them out of their misery in four games.

ANGELS

Best Case: The good John Lackey and Jered Weaver show up while Scott Kazmir shows why the Halos swung a deal to pick him up from Tampa mid-season. The world learns who Kendry Morales is. The world remembers why Vlad Guerrero was once one of the most feared hitters in the world. The world realizes that Bobby Abreu is one of the most underappreciated all-around players in The Show. The Angels shake off whatever mojo the Red Sox have over them while continuing to be a thorn in the Yankees side on their way to November baseball.

Worst Case: The Red Sox continue to be to the Angels as hammer is to nail. Jacoby Ellsbury and Dustin Pedroia give anxiety attacks at the top of the lineup. Kevin Youkilis, Jason Bay and J.D. Drew terrorize in the middle of it. Even David Ortiz comes to life. The law firm of Lester, Beckett and Buchholz put the clamps on the Angels’ offense and make quick work of the Halos on their way to another meeting with the Yankees.

Most Likely: A bit of a role reversal. In the climax of a five-game series, the Red Sox shaky pitching will finally do them in, giving the Angels a hard fought series win. Their prize? CC Sabathia, former Angel Mark Teixeira and the rest of the loaded New York Yankees. Expect the Angels to get at least one in the series, but expect to see the Pinstripers playing for their 27th title.

Should be fun. We’ll return you to your regularly scheduled sports in November.

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A LITTLE BIT OF HISTORY REPEATING

In Los Angeles, there are a few things you can always count on. Traffic on the 405, Storm Watch news graphics accompanying the first drizzle of the year and sham celebrity weddings (Thanks, Khlomar…third-best Laker marries third-best Kardashian sister!).

Add to that list, the inevitable “The NFL is coming back to L.A.!” story. Usually it turns up sometime in January as though it’s some part of the official Rose Bowl wrap-up package. This year however, the rumor mill starting grinding a few months early. L.A. Times’ NFL writer Sam Farmer did his due diligence in reporting on a proposed stadium in the City of Industry.

(By the way, there’s a City of Industry and a City of Commerce but no City of Residence…what gives?)

Feeling like I knew what the story would say even before reading it, I asked Farmer (via Twitter) if he re-wrote the story every year or just dusted off an old copy and changed all the pertinent names and locations.

His response, which confirmed many of my suspicions: “It’s ‘select all,’ control C, control V.”

There are those in Los Angeles who would really love to see the league drop itself down on our collective sports couch. They’re just vastly outnumbered by the people who hear the knocking but aren’t in any rush to answer the door.

Why would they be? In a city filled with transplants, most of the football fans in town have a team they cheer for. For proof, look no further than the Seattle Seahawks bar I stumbled upon in the heart of Culver City. Imagine my surprise when hordes of blue and green clad rowdies starting showing up and demanding that the televisions be changed to their beloved ‘Squawks.

Admittedly, I harbored some secret sadistic glee when Devin Hester broke free for a long touchdown that eventually was the game-winner (it helped slightly ease the pain from Brett Favre sinking the 49ers earlier in the day with his buzzer beater). But that’s the point…no one here wants a hand-me down team. There are plenty of football fans in this town, but not enough of one team to support it if they decided to settle down in The Basin.

Add to it that the league isn’t considering expansion – it took years to organize into eight neatly arranged divisions and they’re not going to add a 33rd wheel. That’s to say nothing of being able to get the weekly NFL doubleheader on your local network affiliate. Why mess that up for a team you may or may not care about?

Yet this story resurfaces every year like the city’s own personal game of MadLibs. For the middlemen trying to bring the NFL back: respect their persistence, but question their judgment. There’s no doubt that the biggest sporting enterprise in the country looks a little odd not having any ties to the nation’s second largest media market, but at some point continually chasing your tail over something that few really care about makes you look like an all-day sucker. And probably pretty dizzy as well…

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TROY FALLS… AGAIN

Last week, I was having a conversation about college football and talked about what it’s like to be USC fan.

“When they win most weeks, it’s more a sigh of relief than any feeling of excitement,” I said. “When they win, they were supposed to win. When they lose, it’s the end of the world.”

Armageddon came on Saturday afternoon.

In what is becoming an ugly hallmark of the Pete Carroll era in South Central, a highly ranked and heavily favored USC football team goes on the road and finds a way to lose to an inferior opponent. This time it was the Washington Huskies getting the self esteem boost, courtesy of three Trojans turnovers and an unfathomable 0-for-10 on third down conversions.

If one is an accident and two is a trend, what’s four? Well, it‘s the Trojan Horse in the room that you can‘t help but look at. And it’s become a problem that has many fans casting sideways glances at Carroll, once the Pied Piper of the Pac-10 and the greatest common denominator of the recent shockers.

There have been no calls for his job, nor should there be. The school isn’t that far removed from the mind-numbing mediocrity of the Paul Hackett Era. Plus Pete’s resume since landing in Heritage Hall is nothing to sneeze at (7 straight seasons with 11 wins, a Pac-10 title, a BCS bowl and a top-4 AP finish). But it’s becoming apparent that his personal motto of “Win Forever” isn’t necessarily sinking in twelve Saturdays a season.

After this latest stinker of a season sinker, Carroll shouldered the blame for loss. Maybe the sentiment was sincere. Maybe it was a deflection to take the pressure off sophomore quarterback Aaron Corp, who often looked lost in the pocket. Regardless, the fan base is more than willing to lay that blame at the coach’s feet.

It’s a feeling that Fresno State fans should be familiar with. The enormous highs of knocking down the Redwoods followed by the embarrassment of tripping over a rock.

I never believed that this team was headed for a national championship. Best case scenario ended with an eighth straight conference title and another win in the Rose Bowl on January 1. More realistically, even that was going to be tough sledding with a hungry sleuth of talented Bears waiting in Berkeley.

(By the way, sleuth is the proper term for a group of bears. I looked it up. Not quite as cool as a murder of crows, but pretty darn close.)

Now, the probability of a trip to San Antonio for the Alamo Bowl (the new replacement for the Holiday Bowl for the Pac-10 runner up) seems more inevitable. If it indeed is the case, they can always Remember Husky Stadium.

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JUST AN AVERAGE JOE

Before anything, I’d like to take a moment to recognize everyone lost on September 11th and those who continue to fight for our freedom and safety in the succeeding years. It was amazing how we came together as a country on that day eight years ago and sad to see how we’ve been divided in the years since. Regardless of your politics, it was a horrible, frightening day that brought out the strength of this nation. We can’t ever forget.)

Ever since the All-Star Break, I’ve sat and watched the Dodgers play Blue Diamond baseball (A win a week, that’s all we ask) and what was once threatening to be a pleasant walk through September is turning into a bona fide race for the postseason.

And I’m fed up enough to say it.

Joe Torre’s just not that good.

He arrived in Los Angeles as the conquering hero who got the fantastic, sepia-toned sendoff from his hometown of New York to try and work his magic on the West Coast.

It worked for a bit. He took young talent, molded it with a superstar or two, handled a couple of small ego issues and made an entire city believe all the way to an admittedly pretty rough landing in the NLCS.

But it was fun getting there.

This year started off that way. The quick, dazzling start. Even handling the suspension of the team’s bona fide superstar and dashing off with the best record in the majors. Watching the likes of Billingsley, Kershaw, Kemp and Ethier grow up in blue right before our eyes. Seeing Juan Pierre dash around in left field and on the base paths with visions of slap hitting Willie Davis running through our heads.

Then came the All-Star Break.

Manny not really getting on track. James Loney and his stroke flirting like teenagers who are too fickle to go steady. Russell Martin seemingly swinging a toothpick all year long. Chad Billingsley hitting his ceiling. Clayton Kershaw looking all of 21 years old.

And Joe, sitting statue-like, watching a 15 ½ game lead shrivel up like so many veteran Venice sunbathers.

Home runs and big scoring totals make for smart managers and the 2008 edition of Joe Torre was a genius. Same for the first half of 2009. High scoring lineups erase a lot of mistakes.

The real measure is how to handle the prolonged slumps. Part of it is undoubtedly playing psychologist to a group of guys lost in a fog. But just as much (if not more) has to do with making tangible change on the field.

Less than an hour to the south, Mike Scioscia has succeeded by moving runners around and bringing a “National League” style of baseball to the American League. Meanwhile his SoCal counterpart continues to preside over an offense staler than a 3-day old bagel.

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CONFESSIONS OF A WEST COAST HOMER

Let’s just get this out of the way now. I’m a West Coast homer. I was born here, raised here and if I have my druthers (by the way, what are druthers?), don’t ever plan on leaving here.

If my team can’t win a championship, then I’m putting my weight behind someone else from west of the Continental Divide. Lakers over Celtics? Check. Diamondbacks over Yankees? You know it. Boise State over Oklahoma? Roll out the blue carpet!

When it comes to college football, I’m a proud supporter of the Pac-9. As a USC alum, there’s a certain blue and gold institution across town that I just can’t cheer for under any circumstances. Don’t believe me? December 5, 1998 was one of the best days of my life. Edgerrin James was my hero for running all over the Bruins and keeping them out of the BCS championship game. I had never cheered for “The U” before and haven’t considered it since.

I bring all of this up because college football season is upon us once more and when it comes to debating the best squads and conferences in the country, it’s a coastal battle like none we’ve seen since Death Row and Bad Boy were in their primes (minus the violence and death, of course).

This brings me to my beloved Pac-10 conference. Having acquired the label of “USC and the 9 Dwarves” has somehow relegated the league to second class BCS status. All this despite a 5-0 bowl record last season and not posting a losing post-season in any of the past six seasons. Not to mention consistently playing one of the most difficult non-conference schedules of any league in the country. Yet somehow they’re fighting with the Big East to stay out of the BCS conference power rankings cellar? Go figure.

I‘m not suggesting the Pac-10 is the best conference in college football. Few will argue that the SEC in all its over-the-top, renegade, self-congratulatory glory plays the most competitive (and certainly highest profile) football. After all, they have won the past three BCS championships and boast probably the best team on paper – defending champ Florida – coming into the 2009 season.

Not far behind is the Big 12. Last season’s conference round robin between Texas, Oklahoma, Texas Tech wasn’t some of the most exciting college football played all year.

But more than any sport in America, college football is ruled by lazy thinking disguised as tradition. How else did Florida State remain in preseason Top 25 year after year despite struggling to remain a .500 team? Why else is every year the year that Notre Dame comes back to prominence? What other reason is there for the same schools always pulling four and five star recruiting classes even in their last few haven’t been up to snuff?

“The Pac-10 isn’t very good” ranks right up there with “…due to the economy“ and “…or the terrorists will win” as easy ways to dismiss things. Florida loses at home to an unranked Ole Miss team and it shows how tough it is to run the gauntlet in the SEC. USC loses on the road to an unranked Oregon State team and they apparently weren’t as good as we all thought they were.

Then again, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised when talking about a sport that would rather settle it in the polls than on the field. Somehow challenging yourself with only the teams in your conference proves how strong your conference really is. Even Homer Simpson wouldn’t abide by that logic.

In the meantime, the experts are already predicting that this season’s BCS championship game will come down to the winner of the SEC against the winner of the Big 12. That’s it. It’s all settled. Everyone else can pack it up and go home.

Just another sunset in the West.

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NO FALSE STARTS

If I were running for President, there would be two very important issues in my platform. First, I’d get rid of the BCS (but that’s another column for another time).

I’d also pass a law that all holidays must be celebrated during their appropriate season. That means Thanksgiving would be properly observed. No more Christmas decorations going up the day after Halloween. The first painted snowflake shouldn’t make an appearance until the fourth Friday in November.

You see, I’m still fully invested in baseball season while it seems the rest of the sports world has moved on to football. Everyone is doing backflips because large men in shorts and helmets are running sprints and hitting blocking sleds.

Really? I mean, with all apologies to Allen Iverson, we’re talking about practice.

Meanwhile, there are still more than two months left in what is shaping up to be a very interesting race to the finish in Major League Baseball.

Despite the Dodgers running of and hiding from the rest of the NL West, Ned Colletti and the Boys in Blue are still trying to find a way to load up the storeroom for a long stay into October.

But the more interesting story is thirty miles down the Golden State Freeway in Anaheim.

A slow start, a patchwork pitching staff and a lineup that right now wouldn’t scare Nervous Nellie after twelve cups of coffee and the Halos are on top with a bullet. Mike Scioscia has to be the frontrunner for Manager of the Year and needs to start being mentioned in the same breath with some of the all-time greats.

Call it National League style baseball. Call it aggressive baseball. Call it whatever you want, but the Angels are the most exciting team in the majors. Good team speed, smart base running, quality defense and just enough power to keep opposing pitchers honest.

Add to it that Tony Reagins is not afraid to pull the trigger on a big deal before the trading deadline (I’m looking at you, Brian Sabean). He’s the same guy who engineered the Mark Teixeira trade last season and no one would be surprised to see an equally big name taking up residence in Orange County before this year was done.

With the Red Sox playing Kryptonite to the Angels’ Superman in the AL and the Phillies standing in the way in the NL, there’s no guarantee of a Freeway Series in October. But before we toss the season aside to chase pigskin, let’s see how this works out, okay?

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LIE TO ME

Submitted for your approval, the curious cases of Manny Ramirez and David Beckham.

Mannywood had a grand re-opening last week, celebrating the return of its star after a 50-game suspension plus another 13 days away from Chavez Ravine. Even after being connected with baseball’s NASCAR set (“if you ain’t cheatin’, you ain’t tryin’”), Manny received a welcome fit for a bona fide luminary in a town that loves a showman.

Contrast that with the return of Becks to the L.A. Galaxy and the Home Depot Center. Hecklers, angry signs and general unpleasantness. Beckham faced the kind of vitriol that Angelenos usually reserve for…well, not much.

It was partially his misfortune to make his re-debut against AC Milan, the team he left Los Angeles to play for last season. Kind of like inviting your mistress to a family barbecue with the wife and kids. Very awkward – especially when you’ve said that you’d like to go back to that mistress at the first opportunity.

Beckham has been a disappointment at every turn. For the non-soccer fan, he can never live up to the hype that surrounded him when he arrived here. It would be like Jason Kidd going abroad to boost basketball’s popularity. He’s a little older and his skills have diminished. But even in his prime his strengths were as a distributor and not as a scorer.

Yet even for the soccer literate, Becks hasn’t done much to endear himself. After leaving Real Madrid and signing a five-year, $250 million contract with the Galaxy (a gargantuan deal for any sport, let alone one that has only a niche following), it took barely one season before he was looking for the first flight out of town. Add injuries that took him off the pitch and inconsistent play when he was on it and Beckham was a Tommy gun away from being John Dillinger.

It even got so bad that Galaxy teammate Landon Donovan took shots at Beckham in a new book, calling him a “bad teammate” and accusing him of not caring about the squad. Donovan later apologized for using the media to lodge his complaints, though he never recanted anything he wrote about Beckham.

Meanwhile, Manny is as happy-go-lucky as ever. In the pantheon of bad athlete behavior, his transgression was far worse than anything Beckham has been accused of. The difference is that there is a simple joy in Manny. He smiles. He plays hard (more often than not). He interacts with his teammates and contributes to the clubhouse culture.

Does that mean a Manny meltdown isn’t going to happen? Not at all. In fact, there are quite a few people (mostly outside of Los Angeles) waiting for that shoe to drop. Yet in the interim, he’s convinced everyone that he’s happy where he is.

It’s easy to feel alienated by players’ salaries. Sure, they work hard at what they do. But what they do isn’t exactly hard work. As sports fans, sometimes we just want our athletes to show a little gratitude – even if it isn’t totally genuine.

With all apologies to Fleetwood Mac, tell me lies. Tell me sweet little lies.

Maybe something is lost in translation between American and European sports fans. Maybe Beckham redeems himself in the next few months. Maybe Manny blows all of his goodwill by defaming Dodger Dogs. But for now, there’s little doubt who’s learned the game better.

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THE LAKE (SIDE) SHOW

Just back from taking a few days off only to find that The Summer of the Lakers continues. Forget the fact that the Dodgers have the best record in all of baseball. Or that the Angels have clawed their way back into the thick of the AL West race (though losing both Torii Hunter and Vlad Guerrero to the 15-day DL may put a crimp in that). Even ignore the Clippers making some interesting personnel moves that will give them a chance to be competitive in the very near future (even though we all know the CW will eventually rear its ugly head).

Forget all of that. Ron Artest is coming to town.

It’s like Santa Claus and the circus all rolled into one.

Say what you want about the Lakers – love ‘em or hate ‘em, you have to pay attention to them. Fresh off a championship run that was equal parts frustration and domination, Mitch Kupchak added maybe the most intriguing free agent available.

Obviously there’s the question of how Ron-Ron will fit in with the rest of the Kobettes on the floor. The man Artest is replacing, Trevor Ariza, seemed comfortable deferring to the team’s other stars and knew when to pick his spots.

(By the way… if you’re Trevor Ariza do you fire your agent? You leave a team with a very real shot at winning another title to sign with a team full of question marks in the beginning of a rebuilding process. And you do it for less than a million dollars more per year? Trevor…you got some ‘splaining to do.)

Pau Gasol and Andrew Bynum are already coming back and it appears that Lamar Odom will also be back in Purple & Gold (once he realizes that even at “only” $9 million a year, he can still buy a truckload of Snickers). Add Artest to the mix and suddenly there aren’t enough shots to go around. Especially considering Gasol and Bynum publicly expressed their frustration with the offense during the playoffs. So who ends up as the odd man out and how does he handle it?

But potentially the best thing about Ron Artest in Los Angeles is, well…Ron Artest in Los Angeles! Everyone wondered how a lifelong New Yorker like Joe Torre would take to L.A. but Joe and Dodger fans have been like peas and carrots. Then again, Joe never claimed to have seen someone stabbed to death with a chair leg during a pickup basketball game.

Artest has gotten off on the right foot in Los Angeles. He’s wearing number 37 in honor of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” album being on top of the charts for 37 straight weeks after its release – though I enjoyed seeing him wear 96, since he said he was four times as good as Kobe. He’s even written a rap song in tribute to the King of Pop.

Honestly, I don’t think Ron’s going to cause any problems. The hot-tempered, scorer’s table-lounging knucklehead that probably still can’t walk the streets of Detroit alone appears to have grown up. But that doesn’t mean he can’t provide off-court entertainment. Maybe the side of his head can be a billboard for Jack Nicholson’s next movie. Or maybe he and Manny Ramirez will get lost on the freeways and end up at a random house party in Pasadena. By the way, is there any doubt the two of them will end up as friends?

Maybe he and Luke Walton will spend the summer ruling the courts at Venice a la Sidney Dean and Billy Hoyle. We can even get Marques Johnson out there for a cameo.

(By the way, Part II…this has all overshadowed the fact that Kobe essentially took a pay cut this summer. After this past season his value has never been higher yet instead of opting out and taking a career heat check, he decided to stand pat on the final two years of his deal. Granted, it’s not a totally selfless act, but it does show a commitment to trying to keep a team together. Give Kobe some credit.)

So let’s get this show on the road. Ron, you’ve gotten to know Los Angeles, now’s our chance to get to know you. I, for one, am looking forward to it.

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SUMMER MADNESS

With the summer in full swing and a holiday weekend on the way, a few tasty morsels to chew on…

For the past week, L.A.’s other pro sport – call it TMZBall – has been on full display. Trying to avoid celebrity news coverage in Hollywood is like Sonny the Cuckoo Bird trying to avoid Cocoa Puffs. And on a day that saw the death of two icons, the city was even more enrapt than it was at any point during the Lakers championship run.

As an aside, I’m still trying to wrap my head around the fact that Michael Jackson’s gone. His music was such a major part of my life. I remember the first time I heard “Beat It” and “Billie Jean”. I remember watching the premiere of the “Bad” video on MTV just before Little League practice – then having it be the main topic of conversation with my teammates for the rest of the afternoon. Even when he became a sideshow attraction, I found more to pity than to mock. His truly is the first celebrity death to have a real impact on me. I miss him.

Meanwhile the Clippers once again found themselves caught up in the jetwash. Even on the franchise’s biggest day, it fails to grab the attention of the local population. Instead, the Clips earned measured applause for taking Blake Griffin with the first pick – really the only pick they could have made. But the overriding analysis is that it will somehow go wrong. It usually does.

At the other end of the spectrum (literally) sit the Angels. The Four Letter Network put out their annual team rankings based on fan happiness. No surprise that the Clippers are sitting in the cellar. But maybe it shouldn’t be much of a shock that the Fightin’ Arte Morenos are kings of the heap. Even with 2002 getting further in the rearview mirror, there’s a lot to like about what the Halos do on and off the field. Minus the Clips, Southern California didn’t fare too badly in the survey. Out of 122 teams, the market can claim #1 (Angels), #11 (Ducks), #50 (Dodgers), #51 (Lakers) and #95 (Kings).

Finally, the soccer geek in me would be remiss not to give some love to the U.S. national team for their run at the Confederations Cup. This Independence Day will mark the 15th anniversary of our 1-0 loss to Brazil at Stanford Stadium in the World Cup. A decade and a half later, the margin of difference may have been the same, but manner in which it happened showed a world of American improvement. Now that we have the world’s attention the next step is to show the consistency necessary to be among the sport’s powers.

Happy Fourth of July!

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