In the somebody didn’t do their research department, ABC Family has greenlit a pilot entitled “Perfect 10″ that takes place in the world of competitive gymnastics, according to Variety.

The big problem is that in the new scoring system now used in gymnastics, there no longer is such a thing as a perfect ten, as we were reminded ad infinitum during the recent Beijing Olympics.  Considering that a majority of the probable intended audience for the show will either be involved with gymnastics or fans of the sport, and assuming ABS Family keeps the name if and when the pilot is picked up to series, the technically invalid title threatens to ring false with viewers before they even sample the show, regardless of the veracity of the drama’s actual content.  Even with all the drivel currently being broadcast, television audiences are often more astute than the networks give them credit for when it comes to a concept’s plausibility.  That doesn’t portend well for the show’s future.

And network executives wonder why shows fail.

So another college football season has completed, and once again the Bowl Championship Series has failed fans with a dud of a championship game that protects the power conferences’ big money interests. LSU (the first ever BCS Championship Game team coming in with two losses, thus belying the argument that the regular season is a week-by-week playoff) completely dominated Ohio-verrated State in a match-up that most likely would not have occurred in a playoff system. What a joke.But perhaps there is a ray of hope. I read on Yahoo! Sports an AP story stating that the BCS is going to seriously evaluate a “plus-one” system which would effectively create a four-team playoff using bowl games for the semi-finals in time for the 2010 season. Now serious discussions of a playoff system and the BCS may sound like an oxymoron and should definitely be taken with a grain of salt, but even the mere mention of such consideration is a huge step forward. Apparently a sizable percentage of the major conferences are in support of such a system, with the Big Ten and Pac-10 notable exceptions. Those two conferences have a contractual relationship with the Rose Bowl and claim that such a playoff system would devalue that game. But even in the current system that contract doesn’t always play out, so by agreeing to the BCS in the first place they’ve already weakened their own argument.I suppose you can’t blame the Big Ten. Considering the current mediocrity of the conference (once again exhibited today), instituting a playoff system would effectively end its chances of bringing home a national title. At least the Pac-10 has USC. All joking aside, it’s very interesting to note that neither of these conferences have conference championship games, either.So let’s all hope that this slim glimmer of a hope is realized and that college football fans will finally be treated to a playoff that will determine a real champion.

I haven’t been a fan of Barry Bonds since he broke Pittsburgh Pirates fans hearts after the 1992 season and signed with the Giants for a lot more money than the small-market Bucs were able to offer him.

I had the good fortune to attend the 1993 home opener for the Pirates, where the Giants happened to be the visiting team. As soon as Bonds took his position, a shower of dollar bills, coins and flags given away that night littered down upon the field. It took seven minutes to clear the field before play could resume.

Surliness with the press and allegations of steroid use hasn’t helped Bonds’s image in my mind.

That having been said, I thought asking Bonds’s in the post-game press conference after he broke Hank Aaron’s record last night whether the record was tainted was completely out of line.

I didn’t catch who asked the question, but for this one night, I felt that the media should ignore the scandal. Steroid use or not, 756 home runs is an amazing feat. If it turns out, surprise of surprises, that he is clean after all, he should have been able to enjoy this moment unspoiled.

The questions and arguments can begin again today, and an asterisk can be added at some point in the future if he is found guilty. But the reporters last night should have just let it be.

So as the NFL continues to stall on taking any actions to suspend and/or otherwise punish Michael Vick for illegal dogfighting, the question that remains to be answered is why?

Waiting for the legal proceedings to play out, as the NFL “claims” it is doing, has never stopped the league from suspending players before. Regardless of trial outcomes, suspensions are the NFL norm in substance abuse cases. Even more precedent under which the league should punish Michael Vick immediately lies in the recent suspension of Pacman Jones — without a criminal conviction — for his off-the-field behavior.

So why does the league fail to act? One possible answer is that new commissioner Roger Goodell, facing his first major controversy as the NFL chief executive, simply doesn’t have the mettle of his predecessor, the great Paul Tagliabue.

A second, more insidious, answer is that the NFL is already well-aware how deep dogfighting runs inside the league and its players. Punishing Vick would mean publicly acknowledging the issue, an issue which the league would rather see simply disappear. Having set a dogfighting precedent, the league’s hands would be tied in any further cases–whether they came to light on their own accord or by Vick naming names to lessen his own legal woes.

And there is definite reason to believe that dogfighting is extremely prevalent inside the NFL. Take for example, Clinton Portis’s despicable defense of Vick in an interview on WAVY-TV, “I know a lot of back roads that got a dog fight if you want to go see it. But they’re not bothering those people because those people are not big names. I’m sure there’s some police got some dogs that are fighting them, some judges got dogs and everything else.” Portis went on to say he saw nothing criminal about dog fighting. Portis’s fellow interviewee laughed at his statements.

And in ESPN’s recent “Outside the Lines”, the net’s informant inside the dogfighting world “says Vick is not the only professional athlete deeply involved in the blood sport, estimating that at least 20 to 30 others, mostly football players, are in the dogfight game.”

If this were an isolated incident, would the NFL be afraid to act? Probably not. Why risk tarnishing the league’s image over one player? But if the NFL is already aware of wide-spread dogfighting amongst its players, it is very easy to see why league might be unwilling to act. In ignoring the issue, the NFL itself may very well be complicit in Vick’s and other players’ guilt.

Now that the case is out in the open, there will assuredly be leaks about who else has been involved in dogfighting… and who else knew about it and looked the other way. I, for one, hope the NFL does come to the conclusion that the Vick charges are severe enough to warrant immediate suspension. Otherwise, I will only be watching college football this fall.

So it’s come and gone. One of the most highly anticipated rookie debuts in ages. And Daisuke Matsuzaka, “Dice-K”, lived up to the hype.

What makes Matsuzaka so fascinating is that he was a legend before he ever threw his first major league pitch. He has been a legend in Japan since an unbelievable run in the high-school Koshien Tournament in 1998, capped with a no-hitter in the finale. His legacy grew even greater with his MVP performance in the World Baseball Classic, which also served as his introduction to American audiences. That was followed by an epic bidding war between several Major League Baseball franchises just to have the opportunity to negotiate with Matsuzaka, with the subsequent contract negotiations with the Boston Red Sox being no less manic. The clincher? Dice-K may or may not throw a pitch which may or may not exist–and if he does, he may be the only person in the world who can throw that pitch.

That’s the stuff of which legends are made. And what does that make Matsuzaka? Quintessantially baseball.

In a review of the new director’s cut DVD of The Natural that I recently wrote for Collider.com, I discussed how that film “perfectly captures the time-transcendent mythology of baseball” and how “legendary names like Babe Ruth, Ted Williams and Joe DiMaggio still tower over the game years after they all stopped playing”. Baseball is all about history, mythology and legends, and Dice-K’s career to date perfectly falls into that structure.

The only real question that remains is, can he acutally throw the gyroball?