Adrian Beltre: Raise your hand if you thought Beltre would be leading the Sox in average (.349) and RBIs (52) two weeks before the all-star break. When the Sox signed him, they signed him for his reliable defense and solid bat. He has done nothing but exceed the expectations that had been set for him at the beginning of the season. The 2 time Gold Glove winner has stepped in and filled the role at third that Mike Lowell could no longer do because of his hip, and has come up huge at the plate in games when his team needed him to. He’s not going to start the all-star game, but he should.
Evan Longoria: He probably will start the all-star game, but that’s not why he’s getting mentioned here. If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s professional athletes making absurd amounts of money and not putting forth their greatest effort. Kudos to Longoria for getting in teammate B.J. Upton’s face after he dogged it chasing down a fly ball in Sunday’s game against the Diamondbacks. Upton, a talented player with excellent speed, has no excuse for jogging after a fly ball in a tie game, in which the Rays ended up losing. It’s a good sign for the Rays to see a young player stepping up and taking a leadership role.
Ozzie Guillen: If there were any coach in professional sports who would go out to dinner with a player from a rival team while they’re currently playing each other, it would no doubt be White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen. After the Cubs Carlos Zambrano erupted in the dugout the other day, he did what any irrational hot-headed nutcase would do… go out to dinner with the coach of the team he’s playing. While the meeting of the two mad men makes Big Z look even worse than he already does as of late, it doesn’t change the image of Guillen who has made it clear that he doesn’t really care what anyone thinks, and pretty much does whatever he wants. Hopefully for the owner of the restaurant they ate at, there wasn’t an argument over who was picking up the check.
FIFA: Hey, it only took 4 blown goal calls on soccer’s biggest stage, but FIFA has agreed to re-open the file on instant replay technologies. I think that soccer, more than any sport, could benefit from instant replay, and ironically, it’s the only major sport that doesn’t use it. In a sport where 1 goal is more often than not the difference, it’s so crucial to get the calls right. At the very least, they should implement instant replay to protect the lives of the refs who blow the calls.
A Slice of Steve 