May Is Ladies Month

     By Scott Morganroth

     This year's Preakness Stakes on May 16 showed me how little I know about Horse Racing. 

     I've always assumed that the winning  jockey of the Kentucky Derby would automatically race in the Preakness Stakes and go after the Triple Crown at the Belmont Stakes.

     Boy, was I wrong!

     Instead of riding Kentucky Derby Winner Mine That Bird, Jockey Calvin Borel chose to saddle up 1,095 pound filly Rachel Alexandra in the 134th Preakness Stakes, and for the 11th time in Horse Racing History, a filly won a Triple Crown race.

     Rachel Alexandra became the first filly to win the Preakness Stakes since 1924 and the first to win from the 13th position. For a days work, she earned a first prize payday of $660,000 from a gross purse of $1.1 Million.

     But for Horse Racing fans, the Triple Crown drought continues at 31 years. Affirmed was the last horse to win the Triple Crown in 1978. The only Triple Crown left is for Borel, who has not decided what horse he'll ride, on June 6 at the 1.5 mile Belmont Stakes.

     Mine That Bird is still an option for Borel but the Owners remain non committal about Rachel Alexandra's participation.

     On May 2, in the Kentucky Derby at Churchill Downs, and Preakness, Mine That Bird started back in the pack and finished strong. Had the Preakness Stakes been a little longer, we could be looking at a Triple Crown accomplishment since Mine That Bird was a close second losing by a length in Baltimore.

     I believe that if Borel rides Mine That Bird at the Belmont Stakes, in Elmont, NY, then a genius cap would be the next attire for him to wear if he pulls off this unique Triple Crown.

     On Sunday May 24th, another female named Danica Patrick, who weighs 1/10 of Rachel Alexandra, was my sentimental favorite to win the 93rd Indianapolis 500.

     Patrick put on an outstanding performance by finishing third which was the best finish ever for a female driver at the Indy 500, in front of 250,000 fans in Indiana. As a rookie in 2005, Patrick finished the Indy 500 in fourth place.

     Even though Patrick didn't get to drink the milk in the winners circle, this young lady, who has led laps at the Indy 500 in the past, has turned out to be a great inspiration for her gender competing at the highest level in one of the most dangerous sports. 

     Last season, Patrick did win a race in Japan topping the guys but her performances at the historic Brickyard are something she can feel proud of and a building block for her career.

     So May Is Ladies Month and the theme is speed with gallant finishes along with dramatic & historical story lines.

     Scott Morganroth can be reached at Scottsports33@aol.com 

     

Memorial Days Sports TV Viewer's Dream

     BY SCOTT MORGANROTH
     There are certain times of the year that are more exciting in sports than others.
During the holidays, there is the bowl season, NFL playoff races along with college basketball, the NHL and NBA.
     Who can forget the September pennant races leading to the World Series in October? I enjoy this time of the year because Major League Baseball jams its post-season into 30 days, therefore it gets everybody fired up about the World Series.
     March Madness drives this country into hysteria because a lot of people participate in office pools and have a favorite university to follow as we anticipate upsets from the underdogs defeating the bigger schools in the 65-team NCAA Tournament.
     But the time of the year which is the most exciting is Memorial Day Weekend. I have been fortunate enough to have attended two Indianapolis 500s back in 1994 and 1995.
     My Detroit Monitor colleague George Eichorn and I went to our first in 1994. We went to the parade downtown and it just so happened that the Indiana Pacers were in the Eastern Conference Finals facing the NY Knicks. We walked over to Market Square Arena and we managed to get into the game by purchasing two stadium passes from an outside worker enabling us to watch the second half of an 88-68 Pacers victory.
     Indy 500 Day was a long one. We drove to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway from our hotel at 5:00 a.m. It took 50 minutes to arrive. Watching Jim Nabors sing “Back Home in Indiana” and Florence Henderson (Carol, the mother on the Brady Bunch) be part of the weekend festivities, waving to the crowd at the parade was a sight worth watching. But until you've watched and listened to the late Mary Holman say “Gentleman Start Your Engines” you know that you're at one of the biggest spectacles in sports.
     When we departed back to Detroit on Memorial Day, we knew that the basketball/racing weekend was a blast and Indianapolis, Indiana., was the sports capital of the world.
     The Indy 500 experience was so fun that, I met my college buddy Stuart Bloom the following year in 1995. Bloom drove down from Minnesota and we did have a hotel 10 minutes from the track. We just went to nightclubs and interacted with die hard racing fans.
     This turned out to be a good move because in 1996, the open-wheel series split as CART and the Indy Racing League went their own ways. Eichorn and I covered the Inaugural US 500 at the Michigan International Speedway in the beautiful Irish Hills of Brooklyn, MI.
     Last year, the open-wheel series did merge and the top competitors are back in the same 33-car field. It would be monumental if Danica Patrick, who has led the Indy 500 in past races, does win the biggest race on the planet. It would be a marketing bonanza for the Indy Racing League.
     In the late 1980s, the Detroit Pistons played on Memorial Day Weekends. In 1989-90, I bought a ticket outside Chicago Stadium and watched Detroit lose 99-97 to Michael Jordan's Bulls. The energy and electricity at the cozy Chicago Stadium brought chills down my spine.
The following day I covered a Chicago Cubs game at Wrigley Field where I wrote a story on the late Harry Carey.
     The Detroit Red Wings lead the Chicago Blackhawks 2-1 in the Western Conference Finals. If NBC gets it's wish, this years finals could be a dandy because it will have an "Original Six" team in Detroit that has won 11 Stanley Cups, facing Pittsburgh Penguins superstar Sidney Crosby in a rematch of last years finals. This would be the first time since the early 1970's that the NHL Finals had a rematch dating back to when the Boston Bruins faced the Montreal Canadiens.
     The Red Wings Penguins rematch could be an entertaining series to watch over Memorial Day Weekend because current Red Wings Marian Hossa and back-up goalie Ty Conklin played with Pittsburgh last year and left for Detroit because they felt they had a better chance to win a championship in Motown.
     Finally, who could forget the Coca Cola 600 from Charlotte, NC? The longest race of the schedule starts late afternoon and ends under the lights.
     I've enjoyed watching on TV Tony Stewart, John Andretti and Robby Gordon drive in this race and the Indy 500. It would be unbelievable to see one of these guys or anyone else wins both races.
     What makes Memorial Day weekend fun is even if you watch a lot of sports on Saturday and Sunday, there is still Monday to spend time with family, friends and to barbecue plus watch an NBA game. Nowadays, with Tivos and DVR's, no sports fan will miss anything including the MLB Game of the Week's on FOX and ESPN.
     I challenge any fan out here to tell me there is a more action packed Weekend in Sports than this one. The only one that comes close to matching it is Thanksgiving with the three NFL games featuring the Detroit Lions, Dallas Cowboys and the late contest, plus major college football match-ups, in addition to NBA and NHL action. But none of these games have championship implications.
     Scott Morganroth can be reached at Scottsports33@aol.com

Hockey's Spring Madness

     By Scott Morganroth

     While other sports post-season's are fun to watch, it's still hard to match the excitement of the NHL Playoffs.

     This is a tournament where at crunch time the officials call fewer penalties and swallow the whistle. If there is a penalty, it's going to have to be an obvious one because that one power play could be the decisive blow to a team's quest to put their name on the famed Stanley Cup Trophy.

     How about those marathon contests when the goaltenders show how valuable they are and make the Boston & New York City Marathons look like the 40-yard dash. We've seen premature whistles that can cost a team a goal when the official didn't see the puck with players scrambling in front of the net to jam the biscuit and put it in the basket. Those tired legs for the rest of the players remind me of jello in the grocery store. 

     How many other sports have each team shaking the other's ones hands when their series are complete? Sportsmanship is a great message to send to the youngsters watching.

     The NHL was fortunate to have three Game 7's for the first time since 2001, as the three conference semifinals went the distance. That's the good news. The bad news is, how many people actually saw these games on Versus? Not as many as there would be if any of the ESPN Networks or the Turner Stations had the television rights, or perhaps NBC would have added a game or two.

     So while NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman can be proud that he had outstanding match-ups and competition, the exposure could have been much better!

     But now the Frozen Four does consist of four USA based teams.

      Two of them are original six teams that are meeting for the first time since the 1995 Western Conference Finals. The Chicago Blackhawks against the Detroit Red Wings series figures to do be a dandy with cities which have storied traditions. While there will be no Gordie Howe against Bobby Hull on the frozen pond, the goaltending match up features Detroit's Chris Osgood, who has won three Stanley Cups against Nikolai Khabibulin, the net minder who led the Tampa Bay Lightning to the promised land.

     Khabibulin posted his 41st career shutout on April 12 blanking the defending champs 3-0 in Chicago. The Blackhawks also defeated Detroit on April 11, 4-2 however the Red Wings were without Marian Hossa and Kris Draper for both games and Nicklas Lidstrom for the finale.

     The upstart Blackhawks did an outstanding job winning two hard fought series in Western Canada against the Calgary Flames and Vancouver Canucks. There is no doubt that Coach Joel Quenneville is telling his team to not become too over confident because his team swept the Red Wings during the final weekend of the season.

     What few people realize is the one thing these two cities have in common is Chicago is the home of the original comedy club called "The Second City" while Detroit added a "Second City" downtown.

     The Red Wings Game 7 heroics came with three minutes left as Daniel Cleary scored the game winning goal battling for the puck in front of the net for a 4-3 triumph.

     The NHL got a break when the Boston Bruins versus Carolina Hurricanes series went into overtime. These games started 30 minutes apart so the country didn't see all of both games. Bettman should have moved one of these games to Friday May 15 because as it turned out, there were no NHL or NBA Playoff Games on any network and hockey would have had the big stage all to itself.

     However, it didn't but as I just mentioned, overtime saved the NHL as Scott Walker scored the game winning goal 18:46 into the extra period to lift Carolina to the next round. It turned out to be Walker's first goal in is 25th playoff appearance.

     Boston was trying to accomplish what no other Bruins team has ever done and that's win a series when it trailed 3-1 but that was not meant to be as they dropped to 0-21 with two of those series reaching seven games.

     NBC had it's dream match-up a year ago when the Red Wings faced the Pittsburgh Penguins.      Can you imagine what the ratings would be if the Blackhawks or Red Wings faced the Bruins in the Stanley Cup Finals with these original six teams in large media markets?

     It's still hard to believe that the Bruins haven't won a championship since the early 1970's when Phil Esposito, Johnny Bucyk, Bobby Orr, Gerry Cheevers, Wayne Cashman to name a handful were fun to watch. 

     With the recent championship runs of the Red Sox, Celtics and New England Patriots, it's hard to believe that the Bruins have the longest drought in one of the best sports towns in the country. But the Bruins will once again have to wait until next year.

      Maybe by the time we see an original six finals, the national television contract will be greatly improved.

     While the final Game 7 didn't match the other's, the series between the Penguins and Washington Capitals was a classic. Washington's Alex Ovechkin outscored Sidney Crosby 14-13 in points but it didn't matter in the clinching game as the Capitals dropped a 6-2 decision.

     Crosby's first Game 7 of his career showed poise and no nervousness as he scored a pair of goals to raise his NHL leading playoff goal total to 12. In the Capitals series, Crosby has eight goals and five assists for 13 points while Ovechkin had 14 points. But Ovechkin will be trading his hockey stick for a golf club this summer.

     As we move forward, NBC still has a rematch of Detroit against Pittsburgh to look forward to and ironically, on February 1st, the Peacock Network watched the Steelers defeat the Arizona Cardinals in Super Bowl 43 in Tampa. The only thing we won't see with this possible match up is Al Michaels and John Madden calling the action. 

     Yet how many Americans would be disappointed if Al Michaels and Ken Dryden called this series as they did the Miracle on Ice in 1980. But there is no doubt that Mike "Doc" Emerick and Ed Olczyk will do a fine job. The only thing they'll do differently in the Red Wings and Penguins sequel is that Hossa and Red Wings backup Ty Conklin have switched from the Gold and Black to the Red and White uniforms.

      But I'm looking forward to more intense hockey, officials swallowing their whistles letting the stars play, overtimes, etc. as all four teams have eight wins but there are eight more to go to reach 16 in their quest to raise the most prestigious trophy in all of sports.

     Scott Morganroth can be reached at Scottsports33@aol.com 

     

Lions Running Back Charles Pierre

     By Scott Morganroth

     FAU running back Charles Pierre is a member of the Lions, but not the ones in Detroit. He'll be playing for the British Columbia Lions in the CFL.

     On Dec 26, 2008, Detroit fans had a chance to see a No. 20 at Ford Field in FAU's 24-21 win over Central Michigan in the Motor City Bowl. 

     No. 20 in Detroit has been out of circulation with the Lions but has been proudly worn by Billy Sims and Hall of Famer Barry Sanders.

     I am surprised that the 0-16 Lions didn't give Pierre a tryout with the worst case scenerio being that the 5-9, 210 pound native of Orlando, could play on special teams. This is always a great way to make it in the NFL.

     I'll never forget when the Miami Dolphins selected quarterback Jim "Crash" Jensen as a second day draft choice out of Boston University. All Jensen did was play 12 seasons with the Dolphins as a quarterback, running back, fullback, wide receiver, tight end, holder, and punt snapper.

     From 1984-1991, Jensen turned 229 receptions into 132 first downs. From 1984-1988, he recorded a reception in 55 of 63 games.

     I thought for sure when Jensen was drafted, he'd never make it through the summer since he played behind the late David Woodley and Don Strock. But Coach Don Shula liked Jensen's hands and versatility that he became a good blocker on special teams. Jensen would later become a weapon for Hall of Famer Dan Marino as well as an emergency signal caller.

     But Pierre could prosper in the CFL. Warren Moon led the Edmonton Eskimos to five consecutive Grey Cup Championships from 1978-82. Moon is ranked fifth on a list of the CFL's 50 greatest players.

     Doug Flutie was regarded as too small by scouts to play in the NFL because his 5-10, 180 pound frame would be a liability for him to see over defenders. However, after three Grey Cup Championships in an eight-year CFL career that enabled him to become the first non-Canadian inductee into the Canada Sports Hall of Fame on May 8, 2007, Flutie proved his doubters wrong and eventually worked his way to the NFL.

     Both Moon and Flutie took advantage of the wider and longer field and Pierre figures to benefit as well since there is no 55-yard line in the NFL with his breakaway style. Pierre will likely be the recipient of passes and could become a productive receiver out of the backfield. 

     In 1990, Flutie began his career with the British Columbia Lions. The only things that haven't changed from 1990-2009 is the fact that Pierre will need some heavier clothes, the passion that the city of Vancouver has for NHL's Canucks and Stanley Park reminds me a lot of Sea World in his hometown of Orlando.

     Vancouver is one of the prettiest cities I've ever visited. If  Charles performs well, and he is allowed to wear the BC Lions No. 20, these people would even wear it at Canucks games. But like Sims and Sanders, Pierre will still have the benefit of climate controlled dome conditions at BC Place which holds 59, 841 for football, slightly smaller than Ford Field's 65,000.

     But this will be a good stepping stone for Pierre to begin his mission to prove all NFL teams wrong by not giving him a shot to show his skills in the NFL. Now at least he can realize that Moon and Flutie did fine North of the Border.

     Scott Morganroth can be reached at Scottsports33@aol.com

FAU Football's Business Plan

     By Scott Morganroth

     We all know how much college football is big business because the NCAA doesn't have a playoff system due to the revenues of the bowl season.

     In my two year association with FAU, I've spoken to Owls President Frank T. Brogan and Athletic Director Craig Angelos about the need to schedule guarantee revenue games to build the athletic department.

     Over the past few years, FAU has endured lopsided losses to Texas, Oklahoma State, Florida, South Carolina, Clemson, Kentucky, Louisville, Minnesota and the University of South Florida to gain the extra revenue. This season, Nebraska and South Carolina will be on the schedule.

     Coach Howard Schnellenbger has watched his hair and mustache turn white and silver with these routs but has felt that these "Advance Training" contests have built character in his players to perform against the best competition in order to become better football players.

     That philosophy has worked because now FAU is sending players to NFL and CFL teams.

     Despite being the whipping boys to these national powers, FAU was won back-to-back bowl games.

     The Owls defeated Memphis in the 2007 Now Orleans Bowl 44-27 on Dec 21 and nipped Central Michigan 24-21 on Dec 26 in the 2008 Motor City Bowl. The carry over effect as to what transpired in Detroit occurred on Saturday April 18, as a record crowd of 2,011 fans watched a Spring Practice Game at the Oxley Center to get a glimpse of the 2009 squad.

     Because of FAU's success of building a program, former University of Miami Hurricanes Coach Larry Coker, 60, has contacted Schnellenberger to gain advice for his latest challenge at the University of Texas-San Antonio Roadrunners, who begin play at the Alamo Dome in 2011.

     There is one avenue Schnellenberger didn't use to build a program and that's the one which the Delaware State University Hornets are utilizing. The Hornets, a Football Championship Series (formerly Division I-AA) team out of the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference, has forfeited its Oct 17 contest against North Carolina A & T, to accept a $500,000 payout to face the University of Michigan (U-M) Wolverines at the "Big House" for the opportunity to play in front of 100,000 plus.

     Whether Delaware State can duplicate the success of what transpired on Sept 1, 2007 when Appalachian State University (ASU) pulled off the biggest upset in college football 34-32, remains to be seen. But the Hornets don't mind going into the season 0-1 facing a U-M program coming off it's worst season in it's 100 years plus history with a 3-9 record.

     But if the Hornets do pull off the win, one thing is guaranteed and that Coach Rich Rodriguez job status would place him on the hot seat. You can rest assure that the Wolverines and their fans will not take Delaware State lightly. There will be plenty of cardiologists at Michigan Stadium if the Hornets sting the Maize & Blue due to the rash amount of heart attacks that another monumental upset could create.

     As the NCAA has added that 12th game which leads to another non-conference game, it will be interesting to see if FAU and Michigan do meet. The Wolverines do know about the Owls since FAU lost a 17-0 decision to rival Michigan State in East Lansing on Sept 13, 2008.

     The Owls can thank Michigan's poor season which prevented the Wolverines from reaching their 34th straight bowl game. FAU's spot in the Motor City Bowl would have been taken by Michigan and there is no doubt that 65,000 would have packed Ford Field.

     I do know that the payouts for a guarantee game start at $500,000 and go even higher depending on the opponent. But the price of exposure especially if a team faces let alone wins against the all-time winningest program on college football history is priceless.

     Just ask ASU.

     Nevertheless, FAU's business plan with an old school architect coach is still sound even if some teams still take somewhat different paths where a loss before the season is a financial win at the end of the fiscal year.

     Scott Morganroth can be reached at Scottsports33@aol.com

Chuck Daly & I in Richfield, Ohio

By Scott Morganroth
When I was covering the Detroit Pistons on a regular basis, I'd occasionally take a nearby road trip.
There is one road trip I'll never forget in the early 1990's and that's when I saw the Pistons face the Cleveland Cavaliers in a nationally televised contest on a Sunday afternoon at the old Richfield Coliseum.
The Richfield Coliseum was located at 2923 Streetsboro Road, Richfield, OH 44286. The Coliseum was located between Cleveland and Akron.
The arena was torn down by a wrecking ball from 3/99 to 5/99. It was transferred to the National Park Service which runs the Cuyahoga Valley National Recreation Area. Now instead of basketball players roaming the court, the land is home to the deer and rabbits who run and roam the wild.
What made this trip so special were a couple things.
The Saturday night before the game, I stayed at the Pistons team hotel and went to dinner with Detroit's Assistant Coaches Brenden Malone & Brenden Suhr at Whitey's Restaurant.
We were watching a couple of NBA games on separate televisions. They were scouting other opponents while I was subdued and asked them basketball questions during commercials. It was a great time! These guys were class acts.
Twelve hours later, I had lunch with another Pistons Coach. His name was Chuck Daly. We sat in the Media Cafeteria and just talked. I asked Daly lots of questions off the record about his team but more importantly slipped a few in about life. He was nice enough to answer them, pat me on the back and shook my hand when the meal was over.
Daly told me the key to his squad's success is that he got his players to buy into the team first approach and not worry about individual statistics. He said this approach works well in life as well and thanks to his wisdom I've learned 18 years later, he is truly correct. He said he'd use his distribution of minutes to get his point across and the players knew he was in charge and respected what he was doing.
One of the things we joked about was the fact that in the Richfield Coliseum, he was 9-32 as coach of the Cavaliers in his first coaching job. He admitted that this was a learning experience but when Cleveland fired him, he always enjoyed coming back with a division rival and letting his former employer know they made a mistake by not giving him enough time to incorporate his system. But he told me that when he was dismissed, he was determined to turn a negative into a positive.
Did he ever.
It's hard to believe that Daly's first Pistons contract was a three-year deal for about $125,000 per season. He had a three-year contract at Cleveland in 1981-82 worth $500,000. But he took lesser money to come to Detroit and erase that blemish for another shot to become a successful NBA head coach which he undoubtedly did building a dynasty with the Bad Boys that led to a pair of championships.
Dealing with personalities like Dennis Rodman, John Salley, Rick Mahorn, role players such as James Edwards, Vinnie Johnson along with his stars Isiah Thomas, Bill Laimbeer, Joe Dumars and juggling their minutes made Daly look like Albert Einstein with his success.
He worked the same magic with the 1992 Olympic Dream Team which won the Gold Medal by dealing with more superstars. Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Charles Barkley, Michael Jordan, etc... turned out to be the icing on the cake for his Hall of Fame Career.
But when you think of all the success he had, it's still hard to believe that once upon a time, Daly like all of us had some tough challenges in the pros to overcome dating back to his days at the Richfield Coliseum.
It's also very ironic that by the end of June, the Cavaliers are considered the odds on favorites, led by LeBron James to win their first NBA title and Daly will not be alive to see it. Perhaps, deep down inside, he doesn't care, but we'll never know.
To date, he's still the all-time winningest coach in Pistons history. Detroit retired the No. 2 to honor his pair of titles. There is no doubt that late Pistons Owner Bill Davidson made sure his future contracts were much, much higher as his stature with organization and his influences are alive and well with the people he touched the most.
When I saw Pistons Vice President, Public Relations Matt Dobek and Dumars in town to see Detroit face the Miami Heat on April 15, there is no doubt that they went to Jupiter, Fla., on this trip to visit with Daly.
On the day that Daly died, Detroit News Columnist Terry Foster was correct when he said that it's been a tough period for the Pistons by mentioning that longtime scout and Hall of Fame Coach Will Robinson died last year and Davidson died earlier this year.
As much as I think of the great times I've spent with Daly especially in Richfield, Ohio., it's ironic that I was in Jupiter, where he lived and died on May 9, at the age of 78 of Pancreatic Cancer. I was in Jupiter picking up my friend Melissa. When I first heard of Daly's death, Melissa, who isn't knowledgeable about sports, was fantastic and listened to my great memories of Daly.
Scott Morganroth can be reached at Scottsports33@aol.com

Detroit Lions, Oklahoma State Irony

BY SCOTT MORGANROTH

When Detroit Lions Coach Jim Schwartz accepted the challenge of taking on the first NFL team to ever go 0-16, the major thing he knew about the job was the team needed a quarterback.

Schwartz is confident he addressed that need when the Lions snapped up Georgia Bulldogs signal caller Matt Stafford with the first selection in the 2009 NFL Draft on April 25.

It's well documented that Stafford attended the same high school as Lions legend Bobby Layne, who was the last quarterback to lead Detroit to an NFL Championship long before many of us were born in 1957. Stafford has also been getting mentored by Dallas Cowboys Hall of Fame Quarterback Troy Aikman.

With Detroit's second first round selection, Schwartz got another Lions history lesson whether he realizes it or not.

During the 1989 NFL Draft, Detroit selected Oklahoma State Cowboys Running Back Barry Sanders in the first round, third overall. Sanders, 5-8 frame wouldn't hinder him in the pros as he was a 10-time Pro Bowl selection, gained 15,269 rushing and 2,921 receiving yards for a total of 18, 190 from scrimmage. Sanders rushed for 99 touchdowns and added 10 more receiving for 109. These numbers don't reflect how many knee injuries and careers he ended with his dynamic breakaway ability.

Sanders holds 10 Lions team records and was a two time NFL offensive player of the year.

The former Heisman Trophy winner was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame on August 8, 2004 in the same class as Denver Broncos legend John Elway.

On draft day 2009, the Lions went back to Oklahoma State for help thanks to a trade made last season with the Dallas Cowboys which sent Wide Receiver Roy Williams home to Texas.

With the 20th selection overall in the first round, Detroit selected Tight End Brandon Pettigrew to give Stafford a blocker and another target.

Now we have the ultimate irony.

The 20th selection, 20 years later playing for a team where the last player to wear the No. 20 was a fellow alumnus, in Barry Sanders.

Stafford has his long threat in Wide Receiver Calvin Johnson formerly of Georgia Tech.

It's highly unlikely that Pettigrew will ever post numbers even close to Barry Sanders especially at his position. But with the help of another Lions Hall of Fame Tight End Charlie Sanders, if Pettigrew can be a major factor in Stafford's ability to lead Detroit back to a contender, regular playoff participant, finally reaching a Super Bowl and championship status, Detroiters would be thrilled if all of the above occurred.

The 6-6, 263 pound native from Tyler, Texas., receiving numbers will mean much less as long as the Lions sack totals decrease.

Pettigrew doesn't have to be a Hall of Fame performer as Barry Sanders turned out to be. Lions fans would be happy if he isn't in the Hall of Shame and that he doesn't become another draft mistake which places the bust label on him.

Scott Morganroth can be reached at Scottsports33@aol.com