sxx123: San Francisco Giants and New York Mets more than the Reds as Cinc

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TUSCALOOSA, Ala. Nomar Garciaparra Jersey . -- On the same Saturday that Ohio State and Michigan played perhaps the most heart-stopping of their 113 games, No. 1 Alabama closed out the only undefeated regular season among the Power 5 conferences with all the drama weve come to expect from the Crimson Tide this season. That is to say, none.Alabama is powerful. Alabama is dominant. Alabama is much better than its archrival, a game but beat-up No. 13 Auburn, and the 30-12 final score failed to reflect the one-sided nature of the 81st Iron Bowl.Alabama is not really big on keeping the interest of any audience not dressed in crimson or houndstooth. Anyone with any sense of this rivalry understands how much Tide fans enjoyed seeing Auburn struggle to finish with 182 total yards and seven first downs. But the rest of us are left to contemplate why we didnt cover the game in Columbus.Just kidding. But there is a point to make here. Michigan and Ohio State played a game for the ages, but one in which excitement and emotion papered over the mistakes. Alabama just keeps churning out victories. The latest winning streak is 24 and counting. If the Tide make mistakes, they are temporary, like a rub-on tattoo. A bad punt and two Jalen Hurts interceptions in the first half led to three Auburn field goals, and Alabamas lead at the half was only 13-9.While the scoreboard said the game was close, Auburn had two more field goals in the first half than it had first downs. The Tigers gained 31 yards on 20 offensive plays. Alabama didnt turn the ball over in the second half and scored two touchdowns in the third quarter, and that was that, as surely as hum follows ho.Auburn, didnt have its injured starting quarterback, Sean White. Tigers tailback Kamryn Pettway, who missed the past two games because of a hamstring injury, gained 17 yards on 12 carries. The Auburn offense couldnt keep its defense off the field. Alabama, which averages 31 minutes, 9 seconds in time of possession, held the ball for 40:29 and gained 501 yards.In the fourth quarter, the Auburn defense was so spent that it couldnt stop a simple handoff to Bo Scarbrough on third-and-9 at the Alabama 6. The Crimson Tide bled the final nine minutes off the clock on a 15-play drive to nowhere. They took a knee at the Auburn 37 to end the game.No, the definition of excitement in Tuscaloosa is watching the clock tick as it adds to the minutes since the Alabama defense last allowed a touchdown. That s 267:54, or nearly four-and-a-half full games, since early in the third quarter of the Texas A&M game on Oct. 22.In other words, the last time Alabama gave up a touchdown, the Chicago Cubs had gone 108 years without winning a World Series and Donald Trump had just lost the third presidential debate. A lot has happened since then. Just not in the Crimson Tides end zone.So how do we measure this Alabama team? We know that head coach Nick Saban has won four national championships in the past nine seasons in Tuscaloosa. But this is only his third Alabama team to finish the regular season undefeated, and the first since his 2009 team went 14-0.We know that Alabama has won only one game by fewer than 10 points, and this mismatch was the third-closest final score of the Tides 12 victories.We know that what excites Saban might not do a lot for the rest of us.The consistency in performance, Saban said. I think thats the most difficult thing for any team now, especially for college players, to be able to sustain that for the season. Im really, really pleased and proud of our players, that weve been able to do that.We are at the nexus of a problem inherent in the College Football Playoff, albeit one that didnt arise in the first two seasons. Alabama has had a good enough season that it doesnt have to win the SEC championship game against Florida to make the four-team field. When presented with this scenario after the game Saturday, Saban almost winced.I hate it when you say that, Saban said. I hate it when you put that on TV, radio, internet, any type of communication. Look, Im really proud of our team. But really, the legacy of a team still lies ahead.Saban, the master of playing the next play, doesnt venture down the legacy road very often. He noted that the next goal is the SEC championship, which we hold in very high esteem.Sophomore tailback Damien Harris was more blunt.Anyone that says we can afford to lose a game, Harris said. doesnt know what its like to play sports.Junior linebacker Shaun Dion Hamilton, perhaps cognizant of the mistakes in the first half Saturday, perhaps merely matter-of-fact as his team heads into the bonus portion of the season, uttered one truth unsealed by the 12 games to date.Alabama, Hamilton said, is our strongest competition.The rest of the season gets tougher. Alabama will play No. 15 Florida, and then, barring something cataclysmic at the Georgia Dome, will play two of the top four teams in the nation, whomever they might be. Alabama has played no one as tough as Ohio State, no one as explosive as Clemson or Washington. But they havent played anyone as tough or as explosive as Alabama, either. That team has yet to reveal itself. Cheap Red Sox Jerseys Online . Tracey comes to the Blue Bombers after spending over a decade with Queens University. Most recently he was the schools assistant football coach. Cheap Red Sox Jerseys Authentic . 1, meaning problems for the doping controls at both major international sports events next year. The World Anti-Doping Agency provisionally suspended the Moscow Antidoping Center on Sunday, saying its operations must improve or a six-month ban on the facilitys accreditation will be imposed. www.wholesaleredsoxjerseys.com/ . -- The proud fathers huddled near the Dallas Stars dressing room, smiling, laughing and telling stories while wearing replica green sweaters of their sons team. CINCINNATI -- One day after a controversial loss,?Cincinnati Reds manager Bryan Price wasnt backing down from his assertion the system cheated his team out of a victory while throwing a wrench into the wild-card race.I think Major League Baseball is going to have to take a hard look at these end-of-game situations, Price said on Friday afternoon. For it to end like that is a crime.The Reds were tied 3-3 with the St. Louis Cardinals in the bottom of the ninth inning on Thursday when Yadier Molina doubled to left field, scoring Matt Carpenter from first base with the winning run. But the ball actually bounced over the home run wall and off one behind it and then bounded back in the playing field.The correct call should have been a ground-rule double, sending Carpenter back to third base, but the umpires didnt see it and the noise in Busch Stadium prevented Price from hearing the phone ringing in the dugout -- a call from his video team. By the time they figured out what happened, the umpires had left the field. The game was declared over.We werent in the clubhouse sitting around in shorts looking whats in the kitchen to eat, Price said. We were still on the field. Were talking about 30 seconds after the play.My feeling now in retrospect is maybe he [third-base coach Chris Maloney] saw that the ball did go out of play and there was nothing to lose because if the runner was thrown out at the plate they could apppeal it and its a ground-rule double. Jim Rice Jersey. Maybe he saw something no one else did.Price has an advocate in Cubs manager Joe Maddon, who stressed its hard to see outfield plays from the sunken dugout at Busch Stadium while also agreeing it can be tough to hear the phone.The phone in Pittsburgh [for example] is kind of quiet, Maddon said. Its a buzz instead of a loud ring. We should have a blinker that comes on.Maddon often has criticized baseballs desire to speed games up, and he and Price agree that was part of the problem on Thursday. The Reds needed more than the allotted 10 seconds before the umpires left the field.The things that I read [on Friday], the manager wasnt out fast enough, Price said. He has to make an immediate call. The focus needs to be making sure the rule is adjusted to accommodate time to see the replay.Maddon simply added: I have no sympathy for the time element there at all.The outcome affected the San Francisco Giants and New York Mets more than the Reds as Cincinnati isnt in playoff contention. But the win by the Cardinals kept them closer to the two wild-card leaders.We want the game to end with a proper result, Price said. One that should be supported through replay. ... Whats the point of replay if you cant use it in every single circumstance? Cheap Authentic Jerseys Discount NFL Jerseys Stitched Jerseys Cheap Jerseys Store Wholesale Jerseys 2018 NFL Jerseys From China NFL Jerseys From China ' ' '