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The earliest hope to avoid a lockout next fall was dashed when the NHL filed a notice of termination of its collective bargaining agreement with the NHL Players’ Association on Wednesday morning, THN.com has learned.

Article III of the agreement provided a slim hope a lockout could be avoided, as it was when the NHLPA elected to extend the agreement by one year. The article states that the CBA, “shall remain in effect from year to year (after it expires) unless and until either party shall deliver to the other a written notice of termination of the agreement at least 120 days prior to Sept. 15, 2011 or not less than a like period in any year thereafter.”

Which means that if neither side had filed a termination notice before Friday, the agreement automatically would have rolled over for another year. But that will not be the case since the league has already notified the players it intends to terminate the agreement. The players had the same option, but there was little chance the NHLPA would have filed to terminate an agreement that has been largely favorable to them.

It was not a surprise that the league filed the notice of termination, since the NHLPA had been expecting it for months. But there was some speculation that with the possibility of a New York Rangers-Los Angeles Kings Stanley Cup final, the league might want to capitalize on the upswing in interest in the NHL in the United States and avoid a lockout at least in the short term. Fuelled by the participation of large-market teams, viewership is reaching record numbers for NBC and the NBC Sports Network.

Through the first two rounds of the playoffs, the NBC Sports Network averaged 1.29 million viewers per game, which is up 43 percent from last season. Across NBC, NBC Sports Network and CNBC, average viewership was 1.32 million per game through Rounds 1 and 2, which is the best on record and up 28 percent from last spring.

As far as CBA talks are concerned, the sides have not held any formal negotiations and are unlikely to do so until after the NHL draft. The NHLPA has received the financial information it has requested from the league and is currently reviewing it to prepare for bargaining.

That would leave both sides less than three months to hammer out an agreement in which the owners will be looking to likely reduce the players’ share of hockey related revenues and place limits on long-term contracts. The one thing that has been absent from the dynamic compared to 2004 is rhetoric from either side. (Although Chicago Blackhawks chairman Rocky Wirtz recently reiterated that the Blackhawks continue to lose money despite close to 200 straight sellouts and alluded to, “a challenging business model.”)

No grand or cryptic statements from either NHL commissioner Gary Bettman or NHLPA executive director Donald Fehr to this point could be seen as a positive sign. But it will likely be impossible to gauge the temperature of the situation until both sides actually sit down and start negotiating.

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In retrospect, the answer is obvious.

Considering Rich Rodriguez lasted just three seasons as head coach of the Michigan football team, it's easy to say he was the wrong man to replace Lloyd Carr in December 2007.

For the first time, University of Michigan president Mary Sue Coleman said exactly that Friday in Flint.

According to MLive.com, Coleman told members of the Rotary Club of Flint that hiring Rodriguez was the wrong call.

While answering a question from the crowd, Coleman indicated that she and then-athletic director Bill Martin were intrigued by Rodriguez's expertise in the spread offense at a time when Carr was criticized for a conservative style of play.

From the MLive.com story:

"He was a hot, young coach with a different approach," Coleman said of the decision to hire Rodriguez.

Rodriguez's was fired last year after a three-year tenure that included NCAA violations, embarrassing losses and a 15-22 record.

Coleman said she is "very happy" Rodriguez has a new job as head coach at the University of Arizona and she wishes him luck.

She also said she is very pleased with new coach Brady Hoke and that he is a better fit for the school.

"(Hoke) has more of the kind of Midwestern ethos," Coleman said.

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Michael Phelps says he will retire after London Olympics


U.S. swimmer Michael Phelps says he'll make one more push in the pool at the Olympics in London this summer, but after that he's hanging up his Speedo.

Phelps told Anderson Cooper in an interview on "60 Minutes" on Sunday that while it took him quite some time to get back into training for London, he's ready to go for the gold again. If he can get three medals during the Summer Olympics he will be able to retire as the athlete with the most Olympic career medals.

Debbie Phelps, Michael's mother, still likes the idea of him going to Rio de Janeiro for the 2016 Olympics, in part because she wants to travel there. His consolation for her: "We'll go watch."

"Once I retire, I'm retiring," he said on "60 Minutes." "I'm done."

His coach, Bob Bowman, said he wasn't sure Phelps would even get to the Olympics. After a series of paparazzi photos showed the Olympic golden boy partying and Phelps slacked on practicing, everything was up in the air.

"I thought it was a 50-50," Bowman said. "I really didn't have a feel for whether he would come back or not come back."

In the fall of 2009, Bowman said, Phelps probably missed six weeks of practice. Phelps said he took a trip to Vegas, lounged around the house, played video games and did anything to distract himself from the pool.

"It was hard, because I didn't know if the passion or the fire was still inside of me," Phelps told Cooper. "And it took awhile for me to actually realize it myself. Bob couldn't tell me, my mom couldn't tell me. They couldn't help me find it."



But he's found it, he says, and is training harder than ever. Phelps talked about one of the interesting ways he's preparing for the Olympics to step up his endurance: sleeping in a chamber that simulates altitudes of 8,000 or 9,000 feet.

"It's just like a giant box," Phelps said. "So, it's like the boy in the bubble."

Bowman said despite Phelps' slow start to getting back into full training mode, he believes the icon of U.S. swimming can still nab several medals.

The question is, how many?

"I don't know," Bowman said. "That's up to him."

Phelps has no doubt he will contend and put on the best show he can during the Olympics across the pond.

"I kind of feel like my old self again," he said. "I'm swimming times like I used to. I'm swimming races how I used to."

But he may be even more excited about his life after the Olympics.

"I've been able to go to all these amazing cities in my travels and I haven't been able to see them at all," he said. "I see the hotel and I see the pool. That's it. And (after the Olympics) I'm just going to go and do whatever I want to do."

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Yankees reliever Rafael Soriano stepped toward third base and bluffed a pickoff throw, then twirled and made a soft toss to first. No dice, the Tampa Bay runners didn't fall for that ol' trick — they'd seen it too often.

Starting next year, no one might ever see that exact play again.

Major League Baseball is poised to pick off the much-maligned move, the fake-to-third, throw-to-first ploy that often succeeds only in getting the whole ballpark to shout "Balk!"

"I think they should get rid of it," Yankees reliever Boone Logan said. "Us lefties can't do that. If we do, they call a balk."

"Besides, how often does it work? Maybe once in never," he said.

The Playing Rules Committee has approved a proposal to make it a balk, too, with MLB executives and umpires in agreement. The players' union vetoed the plan for this season to discuss it further. MLB is allowed to implement the change after a one-year wait — no telling whether that would happen if players strongly object.

Under the new wording, a pitcher could not fake to third unless he first stepped off the rubber. If he stayed on the rubber, as Soriano did Wednesday night, it would be a balk.

Most every pitcher now makes the move the same way Soriano did.

"Some people think you're just trying to deceive the runner at first, that you have no real intention of getting the guy at third," Los Angeles Angels manager Mike Scioscia said.

"You're not trying so much to get a guy off third. You're not going to do that very often," he said. "But it can be a huge deterrent for the runner at first."

Scioscia is a member of Commissioner Bud Selig's panel for on-field issues. Would Scioscia be sorry to see the play tossed?

"I don't know if 'sorry' is the right word. It means you'll just have to find another way to control the running game," he said.

Scioscia's team has had great success using what some clubs call the "horn" play — the name comes from managers extending their index and pinky fingers in a "Hook 'em Horns" gesture, indicating opposing runners at first and third.

Last August, with Los Angeles leading 6-4 at Yankee Stadium, New York put men at the corners with two outs in the ninth inning. Rookie Jordan Walden bluffed toward third a couple of times, then did it again and trapped Curtis Granderson off first for the final out.

This year, the Angels struck again in the Bronx when starter Ervin Santana faked to third and nailed Brett Gardner at first.

The play is specifically addressed in the Official Baseball Rules under Rule 8.05 (c), which states: "It is possible, with runners on first and third, for the pitcher to step toward third and not throw, merely to bluff the runner back to third; then seeing the runner on first start for second, turn and step toward and throw to first base. This is legal."

Hence, no balk. Not yet, anyway.

"Major League Baseball and the players decide what the rules of baseball are. We just enforce them," longtime umpire Jim Joyce said.

New York Mets general manager Sandy Alderson, chairman of the Playing Rules Committee, points out "it's evolved over time what's acceptable on what you can do at different bases." A bluff to third is legal, for example, but the same fake to first is not.

Fleet San Francisco leadoff man Angel Pagan isn't too worried about whether the move is made illegal.

"I've been dealing with it my whole career," he said. "They're always trying to do something to trick you."

Same first-and-third trap they pulled in Reggie Jackson's day. The Hall of Famer is known for his slugging, yet he also stole 228 bases.

"I wish they wouldn't get rid of it. That play's been part of the game forever," he said. "But I guess that's part of change."

A pickoff move that's been part of baseball strategy for years might get picked off next season

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Only 15 players in Major League Baseball history have ever turned an unassisted triple play (with one coming in the World Series, in 1920 by Cleveland Indians second baseman Bill Wambsganss), where they have unilaterally been responsible for recording all three outs of a half inning by themselves on a single play.

Now those 15 baseball statistical icons have been joined by a 6-year-old. Really.


The video you see above -- which was brought to Prep Rally's attention by Deadspin and originally circulated on Reddit -- comes from a youth baseball game in Georgia, where the league's Dodgers and Braves teams in the first grade division were facing off. With a Dodgers player at-bat, a pop up floated directly to shortstop Ross Bernath, who nabbed it cleanly, raced back to touch third base and then chased down the advancing runner from second, all without enlisting the help of a single teammate.
And just think: He had to pull off those feats even quicker than they do in the bigs since he was playing on a diamond with base paths significantly closer to each other.
Of course, those teammates hardly seemed to register what was going on. In fact, Bernath himself seemed to be confused about everything that was going on. For a guy who had just achieved a feat which is practically the unicorn or blue bear of baseball statistics, he had an awfully puzzled look on his face.
Then again, it's not every day that anyone, at any level, pulls off an unassisted triple play. Maybe Bernath just forgot there were only three outs in a half inning, or he lost track of how many outs he earned on the play.

No matter what the reason, thanks to YouTube, this youngster will never get to forget the day that he turned a triple play by himself. Bernath may never land another one-man triple play again, but that only makes his achievement -- and the adorable puzzlement it left the entire field of players in -- even more special.

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"The travel costs far exceeded what Ohio’s two governors during that time spent, and was about three times the amount spent by University of Michigan President Mary Sue Coleman, who holds a comparable position to Gee."

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"He's just a gamer," said shortstop Cliff Pennington, who hit a game-tying single in the ninth. "He's a guy it doesn't matter what he's done all game long. In that situation, that's who you want up. What he brings to the table defensively is something else."

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As a retired NFL star, Cris Carter is out of reach of the commissioner's office. So he can admit to some Saint-ly behavior.

The ESPN analyst said on the "Hill and Schlereth" radio show last night that he had his own bounty system.

"I'm guilty of (bounties) -- I mean, first time I've ever admitted it -- but I put a bounty on guys before," Carter said. "I put bounties on guys. If a guy tries to take me out, a guy takes a cheap shot on me? I put a bounty on him right now!"

Carter talked about being threatened by a former linebacker during pre-game.

"Bill Romanowski -- he told me he was going to take me out before the game, warm-ups. No problem. (He said,) 'I'm gonna end your career, Carter.' No problem. I put a little change on his head before the game. Protect myself. Protect my family. That's the league that I grew up in," Carter said.

This morning on Mike & Mike, Carter said he didn't "want a guy hurt" but wanted to "protect myself." He said the offensive lineman were his go-to guys to "legally" hit "cheap shot artists" as plays continued. Because the "game is not going to protect you" Carter said he was looking for some "insurance to get me some protection."

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