Sports Agenda For Monday (8/15/11)

Big Story:
Whew, I take a week off and all sorts of fun stuff starts happening in the sports world. Here's a taste of what's to come in today's agenda…the SEC is expanding, the Marlins are still the morons of the major leagues, the NCAA has UM in the crosshairs (again), and the Dolphins starters were beaten so bad they could have been married to Ike Turner.
Dropping this agenda like the Marlins do a home game, here we go….

Firsties/Marlins:
I was torn with what to start with, but I chose Logan Morrison.
For those of you who didn't know, LoMo was playing very well and sent down to the minor leagues.
Officially, the Marlins said LoMo was sent down because his hitting was down.
Unofficially, LoMo was demoted because he was acting like a kid and saying some things that rankled Marlins brass.
LoMo got in trouble over his twitter account and for missing a meet-and-greet with season-ticket holders.
I've had to laugh at a couple of things about this story.
First, if the Marlins were serious about sending players down who are performing poorly and becoming locker room problems, why the heck is Hanley Ramirez still on the Big League squad?
Second, Morrison's swipes were at said Hanley Ramirez.
It's once again a case of the Marlins covering for Hanley at all costs, despite his coddling being part of the Marlins' problems.
Finally, I really got a laugh out of sports writers telling him to grow up.
The fact of the matter is that if you are a franchise with a history of doing the right things you can get away with a move like this, see the New England Patriots. But when you're a team that's run poorly, like the Marlins or Cincinnati Bengals, you look like a collection of bumbling idiots. From the owner through the front office management, this is how the Marlins have come off in the past few seasons. From lying to county governments to fleece taxpayers, to coddling Hanley Ramirez, to not knowing how to put together a big league squad that can compete year-in and year-out, the Marlins have done it all.
As for the team,
Marlins @Colorado tonight looking to climb back out of the NL East cellar.
At this point, the Marlins should just give up because this season, as all of us knew, is a joke. The Marlins are 22.5 games behind the Phillies and 13.5 games behind the Braves.
The Fish dropped 9 of 10 at home, way to inspire people to go out to the games guys!
All I can say is thank God it's football season so we don't have to be subjected to more of this pathetic attempt at a season.

College Football/SEC Expansion:
Officially, the SEC is content to have 12 teams in the conference. Texas A&M said they were staying in the Big XII.
Two words….yeah, right.
The reason why the SEC isn't expanding right this second is because the league couldn't decide on who should be the 14th team or if they should expand to 16 team to become the first super conference.
Texas A&M is coming to the SEC, it's not a question of if, it's simply a matter of when.
Don't believe me, read the language of the SEC's statement yesterday evening…
"The SEC Presidents and Chancellors met today and reaffirmed our satisfaction with the present 12 institutional alignment. We recognize, however, that future conditions may make it advantageous to expand the number of institutions in the league. We discussed criteria and process associated with expansion. No action was taken with respect to any institution including Texas A&M."
It's pure legalese that simply took the speed limit of the move from 90 miles per hour down to about 25 miles per hour.
But this will happen, sooner rather than later.
The question is who will join A&M.
FSU has been the most talked about school, but you know that Florida will fight that tooth and nail, same goes for South Carolina fighting Clemson and Georgia fighting Georgia Tech. You can't take UNC because their football program is going down hard in front of the NCAA. NC State isn't an option.
It's going to come down to which school has the most power to block another school from getting in. UF would be in the catbird's seat to keeping FSU out for the simple reason that they're not sure they can compete with FSU in a conference schedule. UF is known to chicken out when it comes to scheduling, so they don't want any further tough games, and yes I know FSU is on their schedule every year.
If the SEC expands to 16 teams, they'll need two for the west and two for the east.
If that's the case, I expect them to add Missouri, Texas A&M, FSU, and Clemson.
At this point, I don't know who will come to the SEC, but expansion is coming and when it's made official, the conference realignment puzzle will have all the pieces thrown in the air again.

Dolphins:
Well, after Friday's game we know a few things about the Fins….their backups are better than Atlanta's, the Falcons starters are head and shoulders above the Fins, and Bill Parcells continues to curse the Fins franchise.
We'll start with the good….
The Dolphins backups played well and played with passion. They came into a game where the team was getting hammered and propelled the team to victory. I was intrigued by the play of Matt Moore at quarterback who seemed very calm in the pocket. I was so intrigued I'd love to see him play with the starters in Week 2, but the Fins refuse to drop their guy down the depth chart, until the season is lost that is.
Now the bad….
Bill Parcells was supposed to be a savior for the Dolphins, but instead has become an albatross around the franchise they're still trying to shake.
Parcells' first pick was Jake Long. He's a great player, but he's not at a position that deserves to go number one overall. Matt Ryan, a franchise quarterback, was sitting there waiting to get picked.
Why didn't Parcells pick Ryan? Because he was afraid he couldn't sign him, i.e. he was too dadgum cheap to take a franchise signal-caller.
So now, the Dolphins have a good left tackle and bad quarterback play. In a league dominated by quarterbacks, which one do you think is more important?
If Ryan continues to grow as a player at the current pace, Parcells' decision will go down as one of the most boneheaded draft-day decisions ever.
There was a reason why Dallas didn't want him, they realized that he was past his prime and just couldn't cut it anymore.
When the Dolphins finally realized it, it was too late.
Now the ugly…
Wow, that was absolutely pathetic. From quarterback Chad Henne's two interceptions to the Dolphins starting defense getting manhandled, the starters looked ill-prepared, inadequate, and not worthy of starting.
Henne's performance was especially dismal. Don't say, well he threw a nice touchdown pass. Yeah, he did, against a guy who was on the Falcons' practice squad last year. That's like claiming your ratings are good compared to NBCMiami.
Unless Henne shows some massive improvement before this weekend's game, he will lose his starting job for the season-opener, and rightly so. I want to give the guy a break, but he's bombing harder than JaMarcus Russell.
On the bright side for Fins fans, you'll get to see one heckuva quarterback this weekend when Cam Newton comes to town.
He's as big as an offensive lineman in height, strong as a linebacker, and can throw a frozen rope.
Should be fun to watch!