Brad Cesmat
Sunday Morning Three Dots…
The Diamondbacks have put over 100-million bucks on the table for Japanese pitcher Masahiro Tanaka. It’s a HUGE risk for this franchise, the biggest contract they’ve ever extended. Are we sure that Tanaka is the second coming of Yu Darvish, or is he Daisuke Matzusaka or Hiroki Kuroda? It’s one thing for the Dodgers or
Yankees to swing and miss on 100-million clams, they just swallow up the contract and move on. If Tanaka does come to Arizona and doesn’t get the job done or is injured, this franchise could be set back for years.
On the business side of bringing Tanaka to the Diamondbacks, it’s a no-brainer. The luxury-tax threshold in Major League baseball will increase to $189-million in 2014. Arizona won’t approach that number in salary(they will never be the Dodgers or Yankees in terms of payroll). Tanaka would open revenue streams and opportunities on a world wide market for this franchise. More on that later this week…
Hamilton Huskie head football coach Steve Belles tells me that he is working on playing a team from Alaska on the 2014 schedule.
Hamilton players would host the team at their homes to keep the travel costs down…
Arizona State hoops is ranked 60th in the NCAA College Basketball RPI rankings. This week they host Colorado(20th) and Utah(122). To say that a sweep is critical would be an understatement. The seat is warm under head coach Herb Sendek. He’s lost 6 of his last 7 to Arizona(3rd in RPI). While most Sun Devil fans care more about when spring football practice begins, there is a faction that is becoming more and more vocal about wanting to see better results out of the basketball team. Those that say it’s too early to see what the power rankings show, don’t seem to have a sense of urgency about the state of the program…
Kendall Marshall is looking every bit the part of a lottery pick for the Lakers. Problem is the Suns were the team that spent the 13th overall pick in 2012 on the player that was hailed as the best passer in the past decade of college basketball while at North Carolina. Marshall has played in 12 games since being called up from the NBA Development League and as a starter is averaging 13.4 points and 12.4 assists for the purple and gold…