United Football League

I believe that the UFL (United Football League) will be fun to watch. The AFL (Arena Football League) got the ax lately, so now there is an opening for semi-professional football players. Right now, the UFL has seven teams and should only have seven for the upcoming season. None of these teams are in my area, though. So far there will be teams in San Francisco, Hartford, Orlando, Los Angeles, New York, Las Vegas, and Sacramento. I don't know any players or coaches or any of the names of the teams for that matter. The only thing I know is that it is going to be great to watch a new kind of football.

Dan the Sportsman Says: Go to ufl-football.com and vote for the names of the new football teams.

Fourth Round of March Madness

I believe that the Elite Eight was not a big surprise. As you may recall, I said that Michigan State and Villanova were on upset alert and they both won! Now there are four teams left in the tournament. North Carolina, Connecticut, Michigan State, and Villanova. Connecticut and Michigan State will play, and North Carolina and Villanova will play. The games will be played on April 4th. Michigan State really blew out Louisville. It was a surprise to me that the game was not at all close throughout. The North Carolina game was not close either. The only close game was the Villanova game, which they won by two last-second points.

Dan the Sportsman Says: Michigan State will upset UCONN because they are more experienced and Tom Izzo is one of the best NCAA coaches no matter what anyone says. Also North Carolina will win.

Third Round of March Madness

The third round was a disaster! There were no upsets. Besides from the Villanova at Duke game. I don't like Oklahoma one bit, which is why I was hoping Johnny Flynn and Syracuse would beat them. One game that came down to the wire was the Michigan State vs. Kansas game. It was tied down to the last minute! Michigan State came out on top. Another close call for the head coach Tom Izzo. Again all of the first seeds advance to the the Elite Eight. All but one of the first seeds won by a score of more than twelve. On upset alert is Villanova over Pittsburgh, and Michigan State over Louisville. Neither of the first seeds, Pittsburgh and Louisville still have a lot to prove and Villanova has really been hot.

Dan the Sportsman Says: It looks like another Final Four of one seeds.

Draft Talk

I believe that the Lions should trade the first pick in the draft to Denver for Jay Cutler. Cutler is one of the elite quarterbacks at a very young age. He is only twenty-five years old. The Lions still don't know what they are going to do with the pick and the Broncos could use it to draft Aaron Curry. We can still get someone good with the number twenty pick such as James Laurinaitas who is a middle linebacker from Ohio State, or maybe William Moore, a safety from Missouri. Both have shown that they have talent on defense. I was also thinking that they should take a quarterback with the the 33rd pick. Preferably Pat White. He is a very fast quarterback who also has a cannon of an arm.

Dan the Sportsman Says: Nothing can hurt the Lions at this point. Whatever they do will help. Whoever they draft will help.

More Basketball Playoffs

The NBA regular season is coming to an end, yet we still don't know who the eight seed is going to be in the Eastern or Western Conferences! I love the Phoenix Suns, but if they don't go on a big winning streak soon, then they won't make the playoffs. I know Shaq is trying to have fun and all, but he needs to get his team into the playoffs before he starts messing around. In the East is where there is the most chaos. There are five, maybe six, teams fighting for the last two playoff spots. Right now it looks like the Pistons are going to be one of those teams. They have experience and young talent to make a deep run in the playoffs. I also think the other team will be the Bulls. They destroyed the Pistons yesterday and ended up with a eight-point victory. At one point they were up by 20 points! They have the best young point guard in the league in Derrick Rose.

Dan the Sportsman Says: The Bucks, Knicks, Pacers, Bobcats will not make the playoffs in the East this year.

18 games per NFL season?

I believe that 18 games is better for the NFL season. I say this because the National Football League's season is way too short -- only sixteen games. All of the owners of the teams in the league will vote in May to increase the number of games for every team starting this upcoming season. If the number of games per season were changed to eighteen, there would be no preseason games. You could ask any player in the NFL what they think about the preseason and they would all say that they hate it. They especially hate the chance of injury before the season even starts. It would also take away the chance for teams like the Lions to be preseason champions again. In the preseason they went 4-0 last year, but during the regular season their record stood at 0-16.

Dan the Sportsman Says: They should change the number of games, it will make everyone happier (except the 16-0 Patriots who could have their record broken).

Second Round of March Madness

I believe that the second round of March Madness had no upsets. There were a lot of teams that came close such as USC who only lost by five, Marquette who lost by four, Western Kentucky lost by a last second shot, Texas only lost by five, and Sienna lost by seven but it was closer down the stretch then the score showed. Louisville looked shaky in their win so they better change something because they may not make the elite eight. I am a big Southern California fan. All of the one seeds, such as UCONN, North Carolina, Louisville, and Pittsburgh are Still around. Same goes for the two and three seeds. On upset alert is Villanova over Duke and Syracuse over Oklahoma.

Dan the Sportsman Says: North Carolina is still favored to win after Ty Lawson's big return against LSU

First Round of March Madness

I believe that the first round of the NCAA Tournament went pretty much how I thought. In the first round, I only got three games wrong. The Western Kentucky-Illinois game. The Louisiana State-Butler game. And especially the big shocker, Cleveland State over Wake Forest. Which I am still recovering from. All the number one seeds made it through to the 2nd round, which is no surprise to me or anyone else for that matter. In fact, a 16th seed has never beaten a first seed. One seeds are 100-0 against sixteen seeds. In the Cleveland State on top of Wake Forest game., the thirteen seed Cleveland State beat the four seed Wake Forest. It wasn't tight either, it was a fifteen point game! It was, in my opinion, the best upset game so far. I knew that most of the other upset games were going to happen. The Dayton-West Virginia game and the Arizona-Utah game were just a couple.
Dan the Sportsman Says: I'm not budging, North Carolina is still going to win the Championship.

Baseball Predictions

I believe that the upcoming baseball season will hold many surprises. One thing I think will happen for sure is that Ryan Howard will hit 60 home runs. He is the best home run hitter (which is why he is on all my fantasy baseball team). The Tigers should do better than last year, well, it would be hard not to. You should not expect the Yankees to be that good, but you never know, they could win 100 games for all I know. The Phillies, last years champions, should be good but not as good as last year. The Cubs have a lot of good young players and a lot of good experience. I see them doing well in the playoffs.
Dan the Sportsman says: The 09 year should be hectic but I see the Mets coming out on top.

Hockey

I believe that hockey is a fun sport to watch. Right now my favorite team, the Detroit Red Wings, have the best record in the NHL. They have great players on every line. Such as Henrik Zetterberg, Pavel Datsyuk, Nicklas Lidstrom, and Johan Franzen. The San Jose Sharks have already clinched their division with a record of 45-14-10. The leader in the East is the Boston Bruins with a record of 45-17-9. On the outside of the playoffs right now are the Dallas Stars who should make the playoffs by the end of the season. Alexander Ovechkin is leading the league in goals with 49. Evgeni Malkin is leading the league in points with 102. Martin Broduer just broke the record with most wins in his career with 552!
Dan the Sportsman says: The Red Wings will repeat as Stanley Cup Champions because no team has more experience than they do.

World Baseball Classic

I believe that the world baseball classic is tearing the countries who participate apart. It gets too competitive for some exhibition games. Tonight, Puerto Rico is facing the United States in an elimination game at 7:00 eastern time. Ironically they are both part of the United States. The winner will take on Venezuela in the Pool 2 championship. The winner of this game will go on to play the winner of the Pool 1 championship game. Japan and Korea will play tonight at 11:00 pm. The winner of that game will take on Cuba in the Pool 1 championship game. My prediction is that Puerto Rico will play Japan in the championship game because they are flat out the best teams out there.
Dan the Sportsman Says: I don't think America will win because they just don't have the heart of the smaller countries and/or territories.

NFL Free Agency

I believe that NFL free agency is more fun than the draft. You get to see your favorite players re-signed, signed or even traded. I am always keeping an eye on the Lions, partly because I live in Michigan, but also because they went 0-16 last year. Therefore they can't get any worse. There have been a lot of big names signed, such as T.J Houshmandzadeh who went to Seattle. Julian Peterson recently was traded to Detroit. The Bills signed Terrell Owens. Derrick Ward got nabbed by Tampa Bay. Early on, Albert Haynesworth was signed by Washington. Ray Lewis eventually stayed in Baltimore. And Ladainian Tomlinson also stayed in San Diego. Still left to be signed is Terrell Suggs, Chris McAlister, Julius Peppers, Mark Tauscher, and many more.

NBA playoff picture

I believe that an Eastern Conference team has the best shot at winning the title. I say this because there are three, maybe four good teams in the East and they are really good. So it won't take much for them to beat the other playoff teams in the first and second rounds. Therefore, they will have a lot of energy left for the finals. The Western Conference is always hectic. It usually takes the last five or so games to determine who the final 7th and 8th seeds are going to be. Right now if the Phoenix Suns don't make a few changes, they may not even make the playoffs. I think they have lost seven games in a row! There are a lot of teams with winning records in the west who usually don't make the playoffs and a lot of losing-record teams in the East who make the playoffs. My predictions are that the Boston Celtics will play the San Antonio Spurs. I also predict that the Celtics come up on top once again.

Lions' First Pick

I believe that with the first pick in the 2009 draft, the Lions should draft Jason Smith. Smith is an offensive tackle from Baylor. They should draft him because the Lions have a horrible offense and the key to a good offense is the offensive line. I know what people are thinking, why don't you think they're going to take Matthew Stafford? I agree that they do need help at the quarterback position, but they have other priorities. Plus there is going to be a better class of quarterbacks next year. There is also another good OT out there, his name is Andre Smith. I have also heard people say they should take the outside linebacker Aaron Curry.

March Madness

I believe that it sucks that March Madness is at the end of March. Because I just can't wait. There are so many good teams out there such as Pittsburgh, North Carolina, Memphis, UConn, and Oklahoma. North Carolina is stacked but when I watch them play it just doesn't seem like they are trying. But if they buckle down I just don't see if anyone can stop them. Watch out because Michigan is coming out of nowhere. They're surprising to me because their team is all freshmen. Also watch Kansas because they just might make the Final Four. Also on upset alert is Gonzaga. Also I can see Clemson in the Final Four.

NBA MVP

I believe that Dwayne Wade should be crowned the MVP this year. Think about it, no one does more for their team. Even the Cavaliers would be around .500. He is the league's leading scorer at 29.7 points per game with 7.7 assists per game to boot. I just don't understand who he's passing to. Possibly Jermaine O'Neal? Anyway, right now your other candidates are Lebron James and Chris Paul. I leave Kobe out of this because he has done solid, but not anything over the top or crazy. Chris Paul has still done a lot with his league leading 11.1 assists per game. He has 21.4 ppg as well. But as we all know, Lebron will win. I don't like it, I don't agree with it, but it's gonna happen. His presence is really what will win it for him.

Who should the Chargers draft?

I believe that the Chargers should take a safety because they desperately need one. But there aren't any good safetys at the sixteenth pick, so Rey Maualuga seems like the best choice. But I wouldn't be surprised if they went with the RB from Georgia Knowshon Moreno as a back who they know they can rely on. Recently I haven't seen anyone's need to take BJ Raji in an early pick so maybe he'll fall to the Chargers. Because Jamal Williams is 32 and he's not getting any younger. If the Chargers were to take a safety it would be William Moore, although he is not a reliable player. So if the Chargers stay healthy this year, and they pick well in the draft then I predict a deep playoff run for the Bolts