The Cubs have signed their 1st round draft pick, Albert Almora, along with almost all of their draft picks, at least through the 1st 20 rounds or so.  I think it is safe to say that the arrow is finally pointing up for the Cubs after a few down years lately.  Anthony Rizzo, Starlin Castro, Jorge Soler, Albert Almora, Brett Jackson along with Darwin Barney, Valbuena, LaHair and Clevenger give hopes for a very good offense in the next few years.  Lets see how some of these pitchers look that the Cubs stockpiled in this last draft.  That is going to be the key moving forward.   The pitching MUST improve.  The team is already playing a lot better of late especially since Rizzo’s callup.  It’s not going to happen overnight but I look forward to seeing what the Superfriends can put together in the next couple of seasons to turn the Cubs into perennial contenders.  It is going to be interesting to see.

Keeping on a baseball tangent, it is time for the All Star Game.  I HATE what they have done to the All-Star Game in baseball.  Years of interleague play has crushed the novelty of the game.  You get to see AL vs. NL quite a bit these days.  Hell, starting next year, you will be able to see it every single day!  Imagine what that is going to do to the popularity of the ASG.  Not only has the novelty worn off, but now MLB panders to the executives at Fox and “now the game counts” to determine home field advantage for the World Series.  What the hell is that?  An exhibition game ends in a tie and everyone flips out and panics?  It was an exhibition game!  Who cares if it ends in a tie?  Now you have players from every team (whether that team deserves an all-star selection or not) deciding who has home field advantage for the CHAMPIONSHIP!  Players voted on by “fans” that might see 2 games and place their votes according to what their IQ of 50 tells them?  How is that fair?  The Yankees can have home field advantage over a Giants team with a better record because a Blue Jay hit a home run off of a Brewer? That is ridiculous.  I refuse to even watch the All Star Game anymore because they put that little caveat on the game.  Don’t even get me started on how GD awful Joe Buck and Tim McCarver are on commentary.  It’s going to be a 3 hour rim job on Tony LaRussa this year and I will not want to hear one second of that.  All of the festivities surrounding the ASG are a sham anymore.  The home run derby is a joke.  A guy can hit 25 homers in the first round and lose to a guy that doesn’t hit 25 all night because he wears himself out in the early rounds.  Add in hours of listening to that worthless piece of garbage Chris Berman scream “back back back back back back back” as many times as he can and I would rather stab my eardrums with an icepick.  I don’t know who Berman has naked pictures of or who he had to perform sexual favors on to keep his job and I don’t want to know.  Just know that he isn’t on television making you want to commit suicide instead of listening to him based on talent.  The best part of the festivities is the futures game and that is stuck on ESPN14.

In better news, it is almost football season.  College football.  NFL.  I can’t get enough of either.  It is the time of the year where my wife wishes that the television breaks or that we at least had a bigger apartment so she doesn’t have to see it all the time.  I have made a decision that I want to go to a game with a friend of mine this season for college football.  He is a huge Notre Dame fan.  I HATE Notre Dame football.  When it comes to college sports, the teams I despise more than life itself are Notre Dame football, Duke basketball and North Carolina basketball.  However, I will be the first to admit that one of the most historic and famous football stadiums in college football is in South Bend.  On my sports bucket list for college football is seeing games at Notre Dame, the big house in Michigan, the horseshoe in Columbus and at Bryant Denny stadium in Tuscaloosa.  However, I can’t decide where the 5th stadium should be.  Lots of good choices out there.  The Swamp.  Death Valley.  Tiger Stadium for LSU.  I think I’m leaning towards wanting to catch Texas vs. Oklahoma at the Texas State Fair but that has more to do with the Texas State Fair haha.  I want to do a survey among my readers.  Where does everything think the 5th place should be on a must visit college football stadium?

Also, it is time for NBA free agency.  The Bulls have resigned Kirk Hinrich.  He’ll be a good backup that can teach Marquis Teague a thing or two while DRose is hurt.  He can bounce around at both guard spots and play some defense.  I don’t think it is going to be enough to counter everyone and their brother wanting to go to Miami though.  Ray Allen will join Lebron, Wade and Bosh next season in Miami as the Heat try to defend their title.  Allen is old and might be injured a lot but he had a lot of teams interested and he took much less to go play in Miami.  It is going to be tough to compete with a team that has a state that doesn’t charge income tax and has the collection of talent that the Heat has.  Every player nearing the end of his career is going to want to go there to try to win a title.  It sickens me to see it happen because Lebron is a punk ass prima donna. But, they just might end up with all those title they bragged about because they are going to have a surplus of talented players for years.

Lastly, Sara Del Rey has been signed to a WWE developmental deal.  I couldn’t be happier for her.  She is such a talented wrestler and a super nice person to boot.  It is about damn time that Vince McMahon rewarded a woman that actually put in the time and effort to earn the right to make it in the business.  She’ll be kicking ass on television in no time because she doesn’t have much to develop.

Click here to watch:  Sara Del Rey – Highlight Video