Mike McCarthy had the look of a man on his way to the gallows as he conducted his press conference Tuesday night in Green Bay.
The Packers' head coach had to tell the assembled media, frothing at the mouth in search of fresh news on the Brett Favre soap opera, that No. 4 was on his way out of town for good. So started the end of The Favre Era in Green Bay, and the beginning of the end of The McCarthy Era as well.
No head coach in the National Football League escapes without being fired. Even the greatest men to ever roam the sidelines, men who will be enshrined in the league's Hall of Fame, have been handed a pink slip in the past. Bill Belichick, the current resident genius in New England? Fired by the Cleveland Browns after the 1995 season. Mike Shanahan, Denver's offensive mastermind? Fired by the Los Angeles (now Oakland) Raiders in 1989 after just 20 games and an 8-12 record. Jon Gruden, the fiery boss of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and former Super Bowl champion? He left the Raiders to coach in Tampa and was under pressure late last season before being granted a contract extension until 2011. Another 4-12 season like the Bucs endured in 2006 would give Gruden a hard shove toward the door, if not straight out onto the street. Bill Parcells wasn't fired, but he had nasty divorces with New England and Dallas before moving into the front office. Joe Gibbs wasn't canned during his second tour in Washington only because of his prior good deeds -- three Super Bowl wins and a bust in Canton build up plenty of good will. Mike Holmgren's eight-year contract that he signed when he moved from Green Bay to Seattle in 1998 might have been the only thing that saved him after mediocre seasons from 1999-2002, a four-year stretch in which he went 31-33 and made the playoffs just once. The prospect of the Seahawks eating the final four years of Holmgren's deal likely saved his bacon.
McCarthy is caught in a tug-of-war between the man that hired him, Packers general manager Ted Thompson, and the players in his own locker room. Green Bay decided to hand the starting quarterback job to Aaron Rodgers when Favre retired in March, a move that never would have been made if Favre didn't walk away from a team came within a couple plays of a Super Bowl appearance last season. Rodgers, a first-round pick by Thompson in 2005, has never taken a meaningful snap in a regular season or postseason game in Green Bay, but the Packers kept Rodgers in charge despite Favre's announced intention to return to the franchise. Favre will be traded in the coming days and Rodgers will deal with the chants of "We want Favre" and "Bring back Brett" throughout the season, not exactly the best way to settle into a job.
Green Bay's veterans will say all the right things before the season starts, talking about how Rodgers is their quarterback now and they're going to move forward. It's rubbish, and McCarthy will be left to pick up the pieces of a divided locker room if Rodgers struggles. Proven Packers like starting corners Al Harris and Charles Woodson, starting offensive tackles Chad Clifton and Mark Tauscher, wide receiver Donald Driver and defensive end Kabeer Gbaja-Biamila have all been in the NFL to know one of the league's hard truths -- young quarterbacks rarely win games. Tom Brady is the lone exception, helping to drive New England to a Super Bowl title in 2001 after Drew Bledsoe was injured in Week 2.
Peyton Manning? No. The Indianapolis Colts were horrible during his first few years in the league and Manning threw as many interceptions as he did touchdowns his first full season. Carson Palmer? Cincinnati is still waiting for the playoff success that was robbed from the club when Palmer injured his left knee against Pittsburgh. Ben Roethlisberger? The image of him chasing Rodney Harrison after a crushing interception while the Steelers choked away another home AFC Championship Game still brings a smile to my face. Tony Romo? Still waiting on his first playoff victory.
McCarthy must hope that Rodgers does his best Brady impression, or they'll both be on their way out of Green Bay. Thompson handed McCarthy a contract extension through 2012 after his 13-3 season in 2007, a strong show of faith, but McCarthy has to know that his club is likely to take a step back in 2008 and can't say so publicly -- it would be career suicide to second-guess a boss with an ax to grind against Favre. McCarthy had to endorse Rodgers and started the clock on his own tenure with the Packers in the process. Thompson can't look like the fool here and won't tolerate anything but more playoff appearances with Rodgers under center. Green Bay's veterans know this and it's McCarthy who'll be left with the locker room mutiny on his hands when his experienced players realize that their last best chance to win a title might have left town with Favre.

The time has finally come to accept the fact that the United States doesn't play the world's best basketball anymore.
The Americans struggled in the final two games of their pre-Olympic tour, breaking away late to beat Russia and holding off Australia, but the damage has been done to their collective psyche and invincible reputation. Predictions that the U.S. will win the gold medal, long considered a definite as long as basketball's birthplace fielded a team, are laughable. The Americans will be lucky to even win a medal the way that they currently play the game.
Tuesday's game against Australia, an 87-76 U.S. win, was particularly troubling. The Aussies rested their best player, Milwaukee Bucks' center Andrew Bogut, and still gave the U.S. all it could handle. The Americans launched brick after brick from the outside over Australia's tightly-packed zone defense, played selfish basketball for most of the game and couldn't get their transition game going thanks to continued poor play by starting point guard Jason Kidd. It was, in short, a perfect example of everything that has plagued the U.S. during its recent international failures.
The people who are surprised by this turn of events simply haven't been paying attention. They're too caught up in the big names and star power on the American roster, much in the same way that just about every expert picked the Los Angeles Lakers to beat the Boston Celtics in the NBA Finals. One quick glance at the Los Angeles roster, star-studded from top to bottom with big names like Kobe Bryant, Pau Gasol and Lamar Odom, was all that analysts needed to take to dismiss Boston. The Celtics didn't care and won the series by playing defense and team basketball, something that Bryant, hailed as the missing piece that will push this version of The Dream Team over the top, and the rest of the U.S. roster know nothing about.
The sad thing about this is that the powers that be in American basketball made a sincere effort this time. They didn't throw together a team at the last minute and expect to win like they've done in the past (the sixth-place finish at the 2002 FIBA World Championships spring to mind). Still stinging from a disappointing bronze medal in the 2004 Olympics in Athens, Jerry Colangelo, the president of USA Basketball, demanded a three-year commitment from every potential player on this version of his showcase team and tried to mix in some role players (standout defender Tayshaun Prince, sweet-shooting guard Michael Redd) to make the U.S. perform as a more cohesive unit.
It still hasn't worked because the NBA is so irreparably broken at this point and two weeks at a national team training camp isn't enough to erase all the bad habits that have been ingrained in the games of Bryant, LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony and Dwyane Wade. They know no other way than 1-on-1 basketball, a style that doesn't work against international opponents and their zone defenses. They don't know how to share the ball, make the extra pass and hit the open man for an easy shot. They can't shoot from the outside because they are so used to taking their man off the dribble and getting to the basket. They can't get their transition game going because none of these players will make the sacrifice of doing the dirty work in the paint and cleaning the glass at both ends -- they simply want to get out on the wings and get off to the races to add another dunk to the highlight reel. They're all style and very little substance, much like the NBA has become since the real Dream Team took Barcelona by storm in 1992 and rolled to Olympic gold. Don't be surprised when Beijing ends up another international embarrassment for a team and a group of supporters that are still blind to their own faults. 

Goodbye and good riddance to Manny Ramirez on his way out to Los Angeles. He's Joe Torre's problem now after the Boston Red Sox cut a three-team deal to send the team-killing douche bag left fielder to the Dodgers just before Thursday's trade deadline, a desperate move designed to purge Boston's decaying collective soul of a man who simply wanted no part of Red Sox Nation anymore.
Ramirez is off to the Dodgers in a trade that involved Pittsburgh sending outfielder Jason Bay to Boston and the Pirates receiving a group of young players that included Los Angeles third baseman Andy LaRoche, Red Sox outfielder Brandon Moss and reliever Craig Hansen. Boston finally granted Manny his wish to move on after weeks of systematic attacks on the Red Sox organization which couldn't continue to be ignored, and it took three players and all $7 million left on Manny's salary this season to get him to go away.
Manny got what he really wanted out of this deal. He left Boston, a place where he was never comfortable, and will be a free agent at the end of the year. One of the terms of the deal was that his two club options for 2009 and 2010, both worth $20 million, were voided. Ramirez and his agent, scumbag Scott Boras, insist that Manny can get more than that on the open market. Based on some of the contracts that Boras clients have signed recently, they might be right -- that 2-year, $36.2 million stinker that went to Andruw Jones springs to mind. Yes, the same Andruw Jones who is hitting .167 and both striking out and changing pant sizes at a record rate. Boras' negotiating platform will focus on the same things that most Boston fans can't erase from their memories -- how great a player Ramirez WAS, how great a hitter Manny USED TO BE. They'll lean heavily on his career numbers and average seasons in an attempt to secure even more money, and some general manager will fall for it. Let the buyer beware in this case, because Manny's list of misdeeds was growing by the day during his last month in Boston.
Manny's final two weeks with the Red Sox were a series of public disgraces, starting on July 15 when he blasted ownership (namely principal owner John Henry) over the status of his club options. Ramirez contended that he was being jerked around by the club and being left in limbo because Boston would not pick up at least one of his $20 million bargaining chips. Henry and the rest of the front office had said all along that they would address the situation after the season, but that wasn't good enough for Ramirez. He proceeded to embark on a very public campaign against the team, insisting that "enough is enough" during one rant and claiming that the Red Sox "don't deserve a player like me" in another. Add in his usual on-field issues, like his floundering on Maicer Izturis' cue shot to left field in a July 18 loss against the Angels or the constant dogging it down the first base line on ground balls, and Boston was officially pissed off. The fact that the Red Sox had to seriously worry about Ramirez tanking if he didn't get his way is a horribly unprofessional way to conduct business, but Manny's decision to skip games against Seattle (and Felix Hernandez) and New York (and Joba Chamberlain) with a sore knee (later proven to be healthy through a pair of MRIs) was the final straw. Manny Being Manny had suddenly turned into Manny Not Playing, which assured Manny Was Not Producing. That being the lone reason he was still in Boston, Ramirez had nothing left to cling to.
This pattern of behavior has been allowed to fester since Manny's first year of this 8-year, $160-million albatross of a contract. He's asked to be traded every single year. He's never played as hard as someone like Dustin Pedroia or Kevin Youkilis, and his petulance had been tolerated to the point where he couldn't be controlled. Manny's decision to quit on his teammates at the end of the 2006 season was the end of Ramirez being treated like the cuddly puppy that pees on the clubhouse carpet, someone so harmless and cute that he could be forgiven over and over. Men like Jason Varitek, Mike Lowell and Curt Schilling couldn't have been happy that Manny was sitting with a sore knee during the heat of a pennant race, and they must have been enraged when medical tests showed no serious injury. The organization, and mostly This Manager, continued to insist that Manny was working hard and that there were no day-to-day problems. We'll find out over the next year or so how much covering up was done, and Pink Hat Nation will get a real taste of what it was like dealing with Manny's frustrating inconsistencies.
Hansen's inclusion in this deal is the most disappointing thing to come out of all of this controversy. He's the latest reminder that prospects sometimes remain exactly that, never realizing their potential and losing their value over time. Hansen was a throw-in in this trade, a small return for Boston's top pick in the 2005 draft. He'd been mentioned in previous trade talks that would have included Colorado's Todd Helton (with Manny Delcarmen), Anaheim's Mark Teixeira (with Youkilis), two packages for New York's Johan Santana (with combinations of Jacoby Ellsbury, Michael Bowden, Jed Lowrie, Jon Lester, Coco Crisp and Justin Masterson) and Houston's Roy Oswalt (a three-way trade with Atlanta that would have included Crisp and another prospect). Friends of mine in the media compare Hansen to Nuke LaLoosh from Bull Durham, a guy with a million-dollar arm and a five-cent head. Maybe a change of scenery is just what he needs, because it didn't look like it was ever going to work for him with the Red Sox.
For those of you who weep today at the thought of Manny leaving, I counter with this -- he doesn't give a damn about you. He's spent just about all of the last two weeks, and parts of the last eight seasons, dropping his pants and urinating on the team that you claim to love. Allow yourselves to consider the future without Manny just for one second without crying and screaming that David Ortiz is going to forget how to hit and the Red Sox offense will go permanently cold. The same foolishness came out of the same mouths when Nomar Garciaparra was traded and Pedro Martinez was allowed to sign with the New York Mets. Take a quick look at the disabled list and you're likely to find both of those names somewhere in the immediate vicinity. Glance out to left field tonight at Fenway and you'll see a player who actually wants to be here, a righthanded power hitter who will run out ground balls and who won't fake injuries to duck power righthanded pitchers. Manny wasn't that guy anymore. Believe it and move on like the Red Sox have.

Mark Teixeira is on the move again, but this time he's doing much more than changing uniforms -- he's changing the perceptions of two franchises.
Teixeira's move from Atlanta to Anaheim (okay, the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim) signals the boldest decision that the Angels have made in their pursuit of an American League pennant and the end of the Braves' era as buyers at the trade deadline. Anaheim instantly upgrades its lineup with the switch-hitting first baseman, providing some added pop behind Vladimir Guerrero, and now has very few weaknesses at the plate to battle playoff-tested pitching.
Teixeira's greatest value to Anaheim will be his ability to pick up the slack when the free-swinging Guerrero inevitably struggles in the postseason. Opposing teams know that Guerrero will get himself out by swinging at sliders in the dirt and high fastballs, and that's why he's a career .183 hitter (11-for-60) in postseason play. Erase the grand slam that Guerrero hit against Mike Timlin in Game 3 of the 2004 ALDS and Guerrero has just three RBIs in 15 postseason games. He doesn't see meatballs and missed locations from the likes of Josh Beckett and Curt Schilling. Guerrero's missing thunder in the middle of the order made the Angels very ordinary, with an aging Garrett Anderson and a bunch of slap hitters (Chone Figgins, Howie Kendrick, Maicer Izturis, Kendry Morales) left to fend for themselves. Going first to third on a base hit can only do so much, and pitchers of that caliber will not beat themselves or allow three or four consecutive hits very often. Scoring runs became impossible for Anaheim. Teixeira goes a long way to changing all of that.
Atlanta traded a package of prospects to acquire Teixeira last season, but now the Braves have settled for Casey Kotchman and minor league pitcher Stephen Marek as consolation prizes in the Teixeira sweepstakes. With John Smoltz hurt (again), Chipper Jones on the DL (again) and Tim Hudson's elbow being mentioned in the same sentence as Tommy John surgery, Atlanta is done for this season and, maybe, for the foreseeable future.
Not that the Braves wanted the Teixeira situation to end this way. The Rangers offered him an eight-year extension believed to be worth $140 million just before the trade last season, a deal that Teixeira turned down, and Atlanta signed him to a one-year contract worth $12.5 million to avoid salary arbitration. The decision was a risky one (think Juan Gonzalez and the eight-year, $138-million deal he turned down from Detroit a few years ago or Latrell Sprewell's decent into bankruptcy) but it looks like it's going to pay off for Teixeira, who has overcome a slow start to get his power numbers headed back to where they usually are. He'll finish with well over 30 home runs and 100 RBIs, numbers that he has posted in each of the last four seasons. Throw in the fact that he plays Gold Glove defense and is only 28, and Teixeira will be one of the top three free agents in this year's class. He's sure to fetch something like a seven or eight year deal worth over $20 million annually, a contract that the Angels and billionaire owner Arte Moreno might be able to provide. The Braves were simply priced out of the equation despite the fact that Teixeira played college baseball at Georgia Tech and chose to go there instead of signing with the Boston Red Sox after being selected in the ninth round of the 1998 draft.
This officially ends Atlanta's inclusion with the rest of the elite in the National League. The Braves have been bypassed by Philadelphia and New York in the NL East, both clubs able to outspend Atlanta for key free agents, and talent-rich Florida is loaded with prospects that will allow the Marlins to keep the pace. The Braves are caught somewhere in between, a team in transition whose payroll is in the middle of the pack and whose minor league system isn't quite ready to produce the type of talent that will allow Atlanta to turn things around quickly. The Braves gave away a talented young catcher (Jarrod Saltalamacchia), their No. 2 prospect (shortstop Elvis Andrus) and a pitcher who has made it to the big leagues already (Matt Harrison) along with two other minor leaguers for what essentially amounts to a first baseman who can't hit for power (Kotchman hit 11 home runs in 2007, his first full season, and 34 minor league homers in parts of six seasons) and a 24-year-old pitcher who is 11-19 in four minor league seasons. It's not exactly the type of turnaround that nets a general manager Major League Baseball's Executive of the Year honors.
Anaheim, on the other hand, finally was able to pull off a big trade by releasing one of its overrated prospects. The Angels have held on too tight to homegrown players in recent years, a list that reads like a Who's Who of minor league busts. If Brandon Wood was so special, he wouldn't be playing full seasons at Triple-A and striking out more than 125 times each year like he has in each of the last two seasons. Dallas McPherson's time came and went -- he lost the third baseman's job to Figgins in 2005 and 2006 before having back surgery and missing all of 2007. McPherson was signed to a one-year deal by the Marlins and has hit 38 home runs in Triple-A so far this year, but his asking price could have been a frontline starting pitcher way back in 2004 when he was blocked by Troy Glaus. Shortstop Erick Aybar is a career .251 hitter in parts of three seasons in the big leagues, taking the shine off a reputation that once had him included in a potential deal for Manny Ramirez. Anaheim has finally realized that having the best record in the league didn't necessarily mean it was ready to win in the playoffs, and the Angels have taken a giant step forward towards erasing their disappointing ends to the 2004, 2005 and 2007 seasons. 

David Stern is one of the most PR savvy commissioners that we have ever seen run a major sports league in this country, but his latest handling of the Tim Donaghy situation might shade his legacy in a negative light.
Stern announced Tuesday that the league would delay the release of an independent probe into NBA officials, an investigation prompted by Donaghy's guilty plea to rigging games and gambling heavily on their outcomes during his career. Lawrence Pedowitz, a former federal prosecutor, is conducting the interviews and finding the facts with all the relevant parties, attempting to determine just how deep the corruption ran while Donaghy fixed regular season and playoff games for gambles with ties to organized crime.
Stern insists that Donaghy is a "rogue official" and a "criminal" to hear him tell it, lawyer speak that's meant to destroy Donaghy's credibility before he utters a word in public. The league said Tuesday that Pedowitz needs more time to prepare his report, and multiple sources told ESPN.com's Marc Stein that Pedowitz is still hoping to speak to Donaghy now that the federal investigation into his case is over. If Stern has his way, no new information that Donaghy has will find its way into the report.
It's an open secret how poor the officiating is in the NBA, to the point where the cries of fixed games and tanked calls to extend playoff series and boost television revenues have become a sick joke. Donaghy's plea deal and jail term bring a hard edge into the discussion, an uneasiness that Stern can't dismiss with a smug comment and his forced smile. The fact that Pedowitz's report is being delayed can be taken two ways -- the league is attempting to cushion the blow by putting some time between Donaghy's disgrace and its own findings, or it's found much more than it wanted to and has to find a way to spin the results to the public.
The first scenario can be dealt with easily. NBA referees have a very difficult job, but it's not an excuse to blow calls and coddle superstars like they seem to do on a regular basis. What is and is not a foul is harder to define because of their poor interpretation of rules that have stood for almost 100 years. Traveling doesn't exist anymore, carrying the ball is common practice and contact in the paint is a coin flip on a call or non-call. Referees need to be reviewed based on their performance and the lower end of the curve has to be replaced regardless of age or experience, a decision that will give the players and fans more confidence that the game will not be decided by an errant whistle.
The second set of circumstances is much more troubling. Stern hasn't exactly been forthcoming about anything having to do with the Donaghy situation, choosing instead to blanket one man with all the blame. There's very little reason to think Stern would be honest if crooked referees were common, because the damage done to the league's credibility would be crushing. The extra time would give Stern and his cronies a chance to spin Pedowitz's findings their way, quietly dealing with other referees behind the scenes and covering up the fact that the NBA has had a serious problem on its hands that has gone unchecked for years. The scandal would be a permanent black mark on Stern's legacy, one that would erase any of the good that he's done through television deals, expanding the game into foreign markets and reigning in out of control salaries to keep more teams competitive. Donaghy would change into "truth-teller", and it's Stern who would forever be known as the rogue.