The men on the other side of the radio.

It's something all sports fans will deal with in their lives. Their favorite sportscaster will retire, or worse, pass on. Often times a radio or TV announcer can become more to a fan than the actual team. The reasons for this are simple: players change, coaches change, management changes, stadiums and even team colors and logos will change, but often times the voice telling the stories of a favorite team will remain the same.

For Cubs fans nation wide, Harry Caray was the most integral part of the hard-luck team.

It is like a continuous book-on-tape with the same narrator. Football fans will spend every fall weekend afternoon tuned in to hear the tales of battle of their favorite team. Baseball fans, probably the passionate about their announcers, will have every day of summer and more narrated by a familiar voice (162 days is nearly a half a year). Even basketball and hockey fans will invite their long time friends on the TV or radio to their home over 80 times a year.

For a life long Atlanta sports fan, the intimacy of the fan/sportscaster relationship is at the forefront of my mind this week. It was one week ago last year that long time Braves announcer Skip Caray died before he could join the team for a West coast road trip. For the first 23+ years of my life, my family had invited a man into our home, car and living room 162 times a year. Next to my immediate family or close friends, I knew no voice better.

Later that year Skip's long time partner Pete Van Wieren announced his retirement. Shortly thereafter, voice of the Dogs Larry Munson decided to call it quits as well. It was as if the door to the past, my childhood even, wasn't being closed...it was slammed. I still recall falling asleep to Steve Holman calling the Hawks as Mookie Blalock would dump it into Mutombo down low, and now have to wonder how much longer he can go?

Munson decided to light a cigar on his stellar career last fall.

Phillies fans mourned the passing of Harry Kalas nationally and I could understand what they were going through. Every team in every market will have to go through it eventually, it is just something the sports fan cannot avoid.

It is a Catch-22, really. We loathe new voices and amatuers who don't know how to tell us the story of the game how we know it is supposed to be told. But we also dread the day that the voice we have become so accustomed to must move on, whether it be by choice or act of God.

Who are some of your favorite/memorable sportscaster and their stories?

Steroids.... the NONE issue.

I've been wanting to write this article for some time now, as it is quite controversial. Members of The Warehouse even got into a passionate argument over the weekend about this issue. I believe one member of The Warehouse called another member by the name "dumb f***." Now I don't condone that kind of language (even though I might have been the one who said it) but what I do condone is....... STEROIDS.

Ok, I don't really condone the use of steroids, but I don't care that professional athletes are using 'roids. Just think about it, nearly every single one of you sports fans out there has been 'crushed' by the fact that your favorite athlete has at some point in his career tested positive for a "performance enhanced drug." Wake up! Now what I'm about to tell you might bring back bad memories of when you found out that Santa Clause wasn't real (sorry kids)... but get your head out of your ass, YOUR FAVORITE ATHLETE HAS PROBABLY DONE STEROIDS. Obviously, I don't have bloody gauze from all of these athletes as proof, but common sense should be proof enough.

We live in a society where anyone and everyone does whatever it takes to get ahead. I.e; Enron, Martha Stewart, Bernie Madoff. Moving forward, common sense tells us that 99% of the athletes who have the chance to use the rage drug, will. If I could get my hands on some PED's, there's no doubt I would take them. Who wouldn't want to be bigger, stronger, faster, quicker, sexier?! In a profession like sports, you HAVE to try to get ahead of the game, by any means possible right? If not, you'll get cut. Period.

As for the state of sports today, the main reason why I don't care that people are using is the fact that EVERYONE is using, and it is in all sports. The fact that today we learned that Rashard Lewis, a basketball player, was suspended for 10 games for 'elevated testosterone' only furthers my point. Professional athletes have tested positive for PEDs in sports such as; football, baseball, basketball, track, swimming, rugby and heck even cycling. You'll probably sit there and argue that using steroids is cheating and that it is a competitive advantage.... blah blah blah.

Is it really a competitive advantage though? Look at it from this perspective; If Roger Clemens faced Barry Bonds, who has the advantage? They are both "cheaters," right?! Neither has an advantage, it is actually as level of a playing field as their can be. That is the reality of the last two/three decades of sports. Everyone is doing it, so are they really cheating? Instead of being bitter about it, appreciate what you are seeing. Regardless of how they are doing it, appreciate the fact that they ARE doing it. You may never see anything like it ever again. At the same time, you can still look back in history and appreciate all the things those guys did.

The game will get clean. Right now, the game ISN'T clean. Get over it. Enjoy sports for the beauty of them and the fun of them. Forget about steroids, it should be a none issue because it is a nonadvantage, at least for now. That's just the reality, sorry to shatter your world.

Steroids. Out.

Word.

P.S. I miss you Barry.

For those of you who appreciate soccer... Christiano Ronaldo... WOW.

How can you not appreciate this?

Word.

The Most Popular Sport In The United States is........... Soccer?!

Ok, so we all know this is obviously not the truth. But hear me out for a second.

Now, I do have to admit, this article might be a little biased as I played soccer nearly my entire youth. BUT I have this innate feeling that soccer is on the verge of blowing up in America. And no, that's not a joke.

Soccer will never compete with the NFL, at least here in the United States. But I think it seriously has the potential to compete with the NHL, NBA and maybe even MLB. For all of you soccer haters out there, I think you are hiding something. Come out of the figurative soccer closet and admit that it's really not all that bad. A great example of this is the recent success of the USA National team in the FIFA Confederations Cup. The US men's national team secured an outstanding upset of the #1 ranked team in the world, defeating Spain 2-0 in the semifinals. They moved on to face annual powerhouse Brazil as heavy underdogs in their first EVER finals appearance in a FIFA sanctioned tournament. They got off to a hot start and even took a 2-0 at halftime only to fall 3-2 at the end of the game.

With all of this being said, there was a sense of buzz throughout the sports world about, believe it or not, SOCCER BEING RELEVANT! As a lifetime soccer player, I enjoyed playing the game but I never really cared to watch it on TV. But now I have a larger sense of excitement for the game when it comes on TV than I ever have before, as do many fellow americans. What will it take for soccer to take off here? I'm not sure that can be answered with just one simple solution. I believe the biggest fuel to the fire will depend heavily on the performance of the US National team in the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. Just think about this, the entire nation got behind Michael Phelps in the Olympics last year as he went on to do something we have never seen before. If the men's soccer team goes on to exceed expectations and take the world by storm, will you really not watch? I'm willing to bet money you will, and you'll be cheering.

If this were to happen, it'll have a waterfall effect on the entire country. People will CARE. They won't care as much as they will about the NFL but that's not my point. My point is that it's not too crazy to think that more people will WANT to watch soccer. They will go by a jersey, go play FIFA (which is one of the greatest games of all time by the way) and they will talk about it at work. We've already seen more coverage than ever before, i.e. David Beckham in the MLS. Soccer will become relevant and that will boost our leverage to get premier players over to the states to play for the MLS clubs. It's a domino effect. Get some to come over, many will follow.

You just wait. Soccer IS on the verge. And when it does, you 'macho men' won't have to hide the fact that you've conformed to society and bashed soccer for years. You'll be able to live free and cheer hard for soccer here in America. It IS the most popular sport in the world.....

Only time will tell.

Word.