May 6 - Gregg gets Suckered on Survivor

It has been a rather dull season on Survivor, but things heated up in a big way last night as we had a huge game changing moment that ended up costing Gregg a shot at a million bucks. And as I expected, the wildcard was Katie who ended up reneging on a promise to Gregg and delivering the final vote that sent him packing. You have to hand it to Tom and Ian who played like grizzled vets last night. This was the scenario – Both Tom and Ian saw the tide turning against them as Greg, Jen and Katie had apparently established a strong three person alliance that was resigned to take out Karyn. Once she was gone, the men feared that the alliance would have numbers and be able to pick tem off one by one. So what do the men do? They recruited Karyn and convinced her she should join them and hit Gregg. And once Karyn was signed on, they secretly strong-armed Katie into flipping sides and the end result was a beautiful 4-2 victory over Gregg at tribal council. This was classic Survivor subterfuge and Greg never saw it coming. And once he was notified of his own funeral, all he could say was “you guys got me.” That is a huge understatement. They didn’t get him – they NAILED him. So now we are left with just five – Tom, Ian, Jen, Katie, Karyn – and anything could happen at this point. If the woman were smart, they would launch a gender war which would probably be the right thing to do since it is in their interest to get rid of the men while they still can. Jen and Karyn would certainly go for this and that is why I think one of the men will never see the Final Four. The pick here is Tom will go home next week if he fails to win immunity and if he does win immunity, Ian is French toast.

Is it more surprising that Paul Pierce inexplicably lost his head with twelve seconds to go last night or the referees lost their collective heads and actually ejected him for a fairly minor offense? This was the setting – the Celts lead by one with twelve seconds to go when Jamal Tinsley mugs Pierce to stop the clock. Pierce obviously didn’t appreciate the hard foul and responded with a flying elbow that didn’t draw iron. There is no doubt that Pierce should have kept his wing in check, but did he really deserve to be hit with a technical, especially with the game still in doubt. And the funny thing about the incident was the referees didn’t get suckered into a spontaneous call. This was not Don Denkinger in the 1985 World Series. In fact, these officials actually huddled for a minute before deciding to flag Pierce and toss him from the game. After a brief discussion, shouldn’t cooler heads have prevailed? After all, Pierce didn’t exactly clock Tinsley. It was a borderline call to begin with and don’t officials bear some responsibility to look the other way with so much on the line? What ever happened to the idea of letting players settle things on the court? Clearly that policy was on vacation last night as the officials interjected themselves right into the middle of the game. So what happened? After Pierce left the game, Kendrick Perkins missed a couple of free throws and Indiana was able to force an overtime which they eventually lost. As such, the ejection didn’t end up costing Boston anything other then five minutes of anxiety. The series now moves back to Boston where the Celtics are something like 143-2 in elimination games. Given how this series has been played, I am not so sure they will push their record to 143-2.

Notes from the National: The Brewers are officially on fire after winning their seventh straight – the last six of which have come at Miller. They should run that to eight tonight against Victor Zambrano although Pedro should end things on Saturday. Brady Clark did more damage yesterday, getting four hits and scoring two runs. The odds are against him, but he could be an all-star this summer. Does this make any sense – Corey Patterson has five home runs but only one double. Talk about feast of famine for a guy who can actually run. Kris Benson returned to the Mets yesterday and gave Willie Randolph a decent outing. He was relieved by Aaron Heilman who gave Randolph a great outing. Mike Cameron also returned and chipped in two doubles. The Phillies Vincente Padilla is now 0-4 with an ERA over ten. Those are Kevin Brown numbers. The Assholes are fading fast although Lance Berkman is supposed to be back this weekend. Berkman wouldn’t have helped yesterday as the Holes got pounded by the Bravos. The two teams go at it again tonight with Smoltz facing Oswalt. San Diego is officially warm after beating Mark Morris at Busch last night. Brian Giles, who has been asleep all year, had four hits and five RBIs. The Pirates kept it going last night as Jose Castillo came off the DL and immediately went 3-4. I can’t honestly say I have ever heard of Castillo but that was about the only thing worth mentioning about Pittsburgh’s 6-2 win over Arizona.

Airmail from the AL: Bronson Arroyo pitched his ass off yesterday and he is quickly becoming the Sox most reliable starter. The Sox have some questions at the top of their staff with Schilling and Wells out, but the back end of the staff is rock solid. I’ll take Clement, Arroyo and Wakefield over any other 3-4-5 combo in the AL. Although Arroyo was terrific, he still needed a two-out ninth inning double from Big Papi to get the win. How much longer is Tito Francona going to stick with Kevin Millar? His power drought is now being investigated by FERC. While FERC is at it, they should take a look at Cleveland who got three hit by Brad Radke last night. The Mendoza line separates people who are hitting above and below .200. Are we in need of a Boone line to separate those hitting above and below .100. You know things are going well when the opposing team walks in both the tying and winning runs. That is what happened yesterday in Chicago where the White Sox got only two hits but were still able to win. The Rays won their third straight over the Yanks last night, but the schedule now toughens as the Twins come in for three. Since April 5, Hideki Matsui is hitting .198 with one home run and 15 RBI. In other words, since game two of the season, Mr. Matsui has hit about as well as Mr. Miyagi. How long will it be before Gary Sheffield breaks his hand against a wall? The Yanks now come home for their 53rd game at the stadium this season. You think they will be well received?

The new story on Barry Bonds is his surgeon is a bit of a wildcard. It is now being reported by the Arizona Republic that Barry's doctor - Dr. Arthur Ting - has been reprimanded twice by the California Medical Board for some unscrupulous activity, the second of which involved accusations that he prescribed dangerous drugs to friends and family. Is it any surprise that Bonds chose this guy to look after his damaged knee? There are a million high end doctors in the Bay area and Bonds has to go out and find a fringe witch doctor. At this point, Bonds is only a couple steps behind Michael Jackson in the race to become the world’s biggest celebrity freak. If he starts inviting twelve year olds over to take batting practice, we will have ourselves a race. The other question I have on the Bonds front is how ESPN’s Pedro Gomez got scooped on the story that Bonds had additional surgery on his ailing knee. Pedro is a Bonds beat writer, meaning his only responsibility is to follow Bonds around and detail his activity. With that said, how can he get scooped on this story by the San Francisco Chronicle? PG should really think about a new profession.