It’s My (Other) “Birthday” so time for some Birthday wishes!

 

By…Erik Schuman

A look at my Driver’s License shows I was born on April 20 (None of your bleeping business how many years ago) when my parents messed up their life forever and brought me into the world. They somewhat atoned for their mistake just over three years later when my brother and sister were born.

But I consider May 20, 2019 to be the day of my “Second Birthday.” On this Monday, two years ago today, I walked into the Keck USC Medicine offices of Dr. Minh Nguyen, along with my: Mother, brother, and sister. A few days earlier I had a PT Scan of my right hip area after my third Chemotherapy visit/stay at Hoag Hospital. I was going to find out how much of the Stage 4 Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma I was diagnosed with in mid-February, was remaining. I recall Dr. Nguyen saying he hoped it was 100% gone. I was not as optimistic. I still felt pain in the back of my leg. I was hoping for any number above 50% since that would mean what was left over could be eradicated in the last 3 Chemo visits I had (I found out the pain I felt was “scar tissue”).

 

I sat in the chair in the room, surrounded by my family. When he said it was ALL GONE I remember the joy and jubilation of the 3 family members but I also being too stunned to react. I didn’t know whether to laugh. Or cry. Or…………..anything. I sat in the chair as if I were playing poker and was dealt the Ace-King of Hearts and the flop came: Queen-Jack-10 of Hearts. As expressionless as could be but deep down inside as giddy as if I just won the lottery! Which I did. To me at least.

 

So, because it is my “birthday,” I am going to spend today being “King for a Day” and be like Mel Brooks from the 1981 movie “History of the World, Part 1” and spend the day being a King because “It’s Good to be the King” (There is a 0% chance this could be done today and if the argument is it shouldn’t have been done in 1981 I have but 3 words for you: Springtime for Hitler):

With the powers I granted myself I am going to make many changes in the world – mostly sports related – and ones I have wanted to make for some time. The changes will be put in place until I die. Or 50 years. Whichever is longest (This way if/when people are upset by them and want to do to me what is about to happen to Brooks in that clip, but doesn’t, things can’t change once I pass).

 

Non-sports changes:

 

In December 2016, my mother did something no one thought she would do and rescued a dog. The dog’s name was “Cutie” but it was changed to “Velvet” because that is what her ears feel like. She wanted nothing to do with us for about a month because of her history of being abused and abandoned. Eventually she warmed up to us and she can’t live without us and Vice Versa. She and my father get along so well because both have a fear of abandonment and both need a lot of love. She gets that. But what she can’t get is a ride in the car because she throws up. If we want to take her anywhere, we have to give her motion sickness pills two hours before we go. My first change is to eradicate that and make her able to ride in the car without getting sick, like most dogs.

One of my biggest strengths is also one of my biggest weaknesses: I have a fabulous memory and don’t forget many things. Sadly, this includes a grade I was GIVEN in my 8^th Grade math class taught by Mr. Dube. I remember everything that took place even though it happened “a few” years ago. He handed out our final report card for the year. He said if anyone had an issue with their grade to come up and talk to him. I was the only one who did. What grade was I GIVEN? A-! I went up there and spoke to him about it. Mr. Dube was incredulous about it. Here was someone complaining about an “A-“ and I recall him telling me it came down to an “A” and “A-“ and he gave me the lower grade. I told him the same thing I have told him countless times on Facebook ever since. The debate should have been between an “A” and “A+” not “A” and “A-“. I told him he GAVE me an “A-“ but I EARNED an “A” or “A+” and felt that is the grade I should be given. It did not happen, and he stuck with the grade he GAVE me. I got up to walk back to my seat. As I did a few students asked me what I got. I remember thinking how this was not gonna go well. I muttered “An A-“ to the class. I will never forget the class’ reaction. I had several say if they got an “A-“ their parents would be ecstatic and some also couldn’t believe I was complaining about an “A.” Maybe so but that’s because you are a dumb shit and I am not. The fact I am still steamed about it all these years later is not shocking to those who know me. As King I am changing that grade to the A/A+ I EARNED and NOT the “A-“ Mr. Byron Dube GAVE me!

 

Now – let’s get to sports!!

 

BY FAR the #1 thing that upsets me in sports is the topic of: Suspensions. Player X does something to warrant a (say) 3-game suspension. If this happens in the NFL, NBA, or NHL the player misses games ASAP. In Baseball the player appeals 100% of the time and the suspension is tables until a hearing is held at which point in time the suspension is reduced. This is why baseball suspensions are like selling something on Craigslist. If you want to sell something on Craigslist for $50, you can’t list it for $50 because 100% of the time the person interested in buying it asks if you can go lower and sell for less. That’s why when you list something on Craigslist and you want you want to sell it for $50 you list it for $60 and then when the buyer askes if you can sell it for less, you sell it for “less” being $50 – the price you wanted – and the buyer is happy. The other thing that upsets me about Suspensions is: The timing of the games missed. They are always the next set of games coming up.

As “King for a Day” this all changes. Let’s say a player from the Padres gets suspended for doing something in a game against the Dodgers. Whenever the final verdict is reached on the suspension the Padres player misses whatever games are upcoming. For argument’s sake we will say that is against the Marlins. WHY! If 2 kids get in a fight they are kept from playing with each other – not all of the other kids. Yet this is exactly what happens in sports. If the teams meet up again that season the suspension should be against the same team. Make the Padres player sit out his games against the Dodgers – the team he has issues with. Suspending him for games against a team he has no issues with but letting him play against the Dodgers doesn’t reward the Dodgers at all. If the teams don’t meet up again that season, THEN start the suspension ASAP. In the NBA if someone gets a 3-game suspension and the teams meet 3 more times suspend the player for those 3 games not any 3 games. And in baseball I am going to right another wrong” when it comes to pitchers. When a starting pitcher gets suspended for, say, 10 games, they file an appeal. They make their next start and the next day they drop the appeal and only miss 1 start. A position player gets suspended 10 games he misses 10 actual games. If a pitcher gets suspended and then drops his appeal the day after he makes his start that is not allowed with me as King. The suspension would not start until the day he is scheduled to make his next start. NOW the 10 games start so he misses 10 games and 2 starts. Not 1.

Not far behind this is my gripe about Officials. I started officiating games my Sophomore year in high school. A man named John Halston came to one of my classes. He represented Fountain Valley Youth Baseball. He said the league needed umpires. I was around 16 at the time so my prospects for employment almost certainly revolved around a fast-food job. John told us how much we would get paid per game. Slightly more than minimum wage. And we would be working outside and not under a fryer flipping burgers. That resonated with me, so I started umpiring games. Decades later I still am. I couldn’t even begin to count how many games I have officiated. I have done baseball, slow pitch softball, some volleyball and for the last 20+ years, basketball. A rough estimate of how many games I have done is about 7,500 but it might be closer to 10,000. Or more. I take my role seriously as a sports official. As I said in my last entry, I am back officiating HS hoops after a 2-year absence. I am taking it slow because I know my limitations. Maybe I will go back to doing a multiple 100 number of games but who knows.

As “King for a Day” I am going to target something that really pisses me off: INCOMPETENT OFFICIALS! I work hard to stay in shape and stay competent in what I do. Sadly, that is not the case where you would most expect it: Professional sports.

#1 on that list is: Baseball. If I were to ask people to name me some MLB umpires I am sure the 2 names that would come up the most are: Angel Hernandez and Joe West. Why? BECAUSE THEY SUCK! Supreme Court judges are the only ones who should have a job for life. NOT MLB UMPS! It is embarrassing to see West “waddle” all over the place. He is fat and out of shape. MLB needs to have a fitness test for all officials. I am OK with West officiating until he is 80 as long as he passes a fitness test. Dick Bavetta officiated NBA games into his 70s but to do so he had to pass the same fitness test all NBA Refs had to pass. Here is what Joe West looks like now – NOT GOOD!

#2 on the list is: It is easier to play in MLB than it is to officiate in it. The roster of players turns over on a constant basis. MLB maybe has a few openings ever year. Put me in charge and I bring European Soccer rules into play: Every 3- years the 3 lowest rated umpires get demoted to the minor league and the top 3 umpires get promoted to MLB. Harsh? Yes! But here are some “highlights” of Angel Hernandez at work. You cannot tell me he belongs in MLB after seeing this. Hernandez is playing the “race card” game with MLB saying he is not getting high quality playoff games because MLB is discriminating against him because he is Hispanic. Thankfully that suit got tossed out. Angel – you SUCK as an umpire. You should be thankful you have a job. Period! If anyone else was this bad they would be living under a freeway overpass – not calling professional sports for as long as you have (In all fairness to Hernandez in the 2nd clip the last call was equally as pathetic Phil Cuzzi and not Hernandez):

Right now, the NBA has 2 sets of rules: One for the first 46 minutes of the game and one for the last 2.
As “King for a Day” games will now be played by ONE set of rules. Not 2. Or more.

The one thing that drives me – and everyone else - crazy, is the incessant fouling at the end of games. A team trails by 6 with a minute left they start fouling in hopes the team misses some free throws and then the losing team can come back and win because of it. What also happens if the last 60-ish seconds of a close game takes 8 hours to play.

What I am going to implement is: All NON-shooting fouls that send someone to the line – the team that gets fouled gets to pick the person they want shooting the free throws. This means when teams employ a “Hack-A-Shaq” philosophy by fouling a big guy who can’t shoot FTs, this comes to an end. Say someone fouls a player on the Warriors who is a bad free throw shooter just to send them to the line in hopes they miss. My rule allows the Warriors to send anyone to the line and now Stephen Curry goes to a place where he shoots over 90%. That will put an end to “Hack-A-Shaq” ASAP making the game better. I know this is how NC State won the NCAAs in 1983 but there is no place in the game for it now. Or ever!

 

Another basketball gripe I have is with NBA Refs WHO REFUSE TO CALL TRAVELING! A guy can walk a half-marathon and not get called for too many steps. If I let as many OBVIOUS travel calls go uncalled as NBA Refs do, I’d be working Girls Freshman games and not the Boys Varsity games I work.

Here is a disgraceful call by NBA EOE hire Lauren Holtkamp from a game on January 3, 2018. Paul George was playing for OKC. He is a few feet in front of Holtkamp and she has a clear view of things. Count how many steps George takes before he puts the ball down and then drives to the lane and get fouled and Holtkamp sends him to the line for 2 shots. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! This is a TRAVEL VIOLATION NOT A FOUL! For Ms. Magoo to call it a foul is disgraceful. Yet she is far from alone in her incompetence in being able to count to a number higher than 2 for steps taken by a player!

I am not a fan of MLB Interleague play. But I know with 15 teams in each league it has to happen. But MLB is doing the Interleague thing 100% wrong. The original concept happened when there was an even amount of teams in each league. It was done to expose fans to a different brand of baseball. For people in the following areas, they can see both NL and AL baseball teams play: Los Angeles, New Your City, Oakland/San Francisco area and Chicago. There are some where the distance is tolerable (Washington DC/Baltimore), but these are the easy 4 that come to mind.

As “King for a Day” I am going to reverse things. I am going to make games played by the VISITING TEAM rules. Now fans are exposed to a new brand of baseball. So, when the Dodgers and Angels match up, games played at Dodgers Stadium are played by AL rules – meaning a DH. Games in Anaheim are played with NO DH. Now fans get to see a different way of the game played – the true reason for interleague.

 

Right now, the NHL determines Special Teams success by percentage. That is wrong and not the right way to do it. If a team scores 1 power play goal in 5 attempts their percentage is 20%. The top teams in the NHL are scoring at just over 27%. When it comes to penalty killing the top teams are doing so at about an 85% rate. How many people out there are smart enough to know 27% is roughly 3 out of 11 while 85% is roughly 6 out of 7? Honestly. NOT MANY!

As “King for a Day” I am going to change this. For the better because percentage is very misleading. Let’s say a team’s PP percentage was 20%. It is not likely – but possible – a team could get called for a penalty of their own 10 seconds into their PP. That makes it 0-for-1. Do it 3 more times and you have been on the PP for a total of 40 seconds instead of 8 minutes which is what would happen if all PP played out to the end. Then take 1:59 on the next PP to score and that makes 20%.

I would change special teams’ success to one based on: TIME!

It is very simple to do. Add up the total amount of time a team was on the power play OR penalty kill, divide by the number of goals they have scored or given up – THERE! YOU! GO! Now instead of a percentage that few are smart enough to understand, we go by time. If we know the Kings (my team) score a PPG every 8:25 fans can do the math and know when a goal is likely as opposed to a percentage, they don’t know how to calculate. Many years ago, Nashville Predators GM David Poile put out a public request for fans to suggest ways to improve the game. I took him up on his offer. Never thought he’d call. But he did. This is one of the few things I suggested to him. He wanted to talk to me about as much as we wanted our teeth pulled without Novocaine. I stand by this but knowing how incompetent the NHL is – this will never happen.

NFL: Kudos to the NFL for finally doing something about its pathetic Overtime rules. Instead of pure sudden death where the first score won a game, even if a field goal, the league made it where an FG doesn’t end the game. A TD does but not an FG. Now there is talk of changing things again.

As “King for a Day” I am implementing the Arena Football League rule: “Each team is guaranteed a possession – and if tied after that – SUDDEN DEATH!” In the AFL no OT lasted more than one full possession for each team. If Team A scored a TD and the PAT to go up 7, if Team B scored a TD to pull within 1, they went for the 2-pointer and the (potential) win. 100% of the time. Team B would rather have their offense determine the outcome of the game rather than their defense. Same thing will happen here. We will get an ending that will have everyone in the place standing in anticipation of the one-play end to the game. It is so simple. And since many NFL owners also owned an AFL team (before it went bankrupt) they are familiar with this rule. This also helps TV because they want games to fit within a time span of 3 hours – no more than 3:15. This will do that.

 

Soccer: I enjoy watching the Premier League. I love seeing the ambiance and atmosphere at the games. What I hate is the incredible number of crying players do. And worse. Every time there is a play the other team thinks should be punished, they all “bum rush the ref to try and influence their call. And if the call is not one they like they have no trouble getting in his face and giving him an earful (I know women can officiate games, but you will have a tough time finding a female Referee for a men’s game).

As “King for a Day” I am changing all this. From now on when a Ref makes a call one team does not like ONLY the Captain can come speak to the Ref about it. NO ONE ELSE! Anyone else comes over to argue a call and/or get in the face of the official gets a Red Card for that game and suspended for 3 games with the suspension doubling for each further offense.

In ANY other sport (NFL, NBA. MLB, NHL and many more) if you don’t like the call an official made and you and 4 of your teammates all swarm the ref and touch him – YOU’RE GONE!

Yet in soccer it is OK for players to treat the official like a rag doll.

Look at how disgraceful the Orlando players treat this official after he made a call. They didn’t like it, but this is one of the all-time easiest red cards ever handed out in the sport. A lunging tackle attempt that sees the defender’s spikes clearly contact the opposing player’s quads, yet the Orlando players didn’t like the call. Players: Nani and Jr. Orso should have been immediately ejected and suspended for what they did here to the official.

Put me in charge of the sport and there are a lot of players who will be missing many games after I suspend them.

I know Women’s College Basketball has made some strides in the popularity of the game. But it will never surpass the Men’s game. Or even come close. Especially come time for the NCAA Tournament. I will give those in charge a “tip of the cap” in one aspect. The Men’s Final Four takes place on a Saturday and Monday. At one point in time the NCAA came up with the “brilliant” idea of having the Women play Sunday and Tuesday meaning their title game took place 24 hours AFTER the Men. This is the equivalent of going to Ruth’s Chris for dinner, having a small appetizer for dinner so you can save your appetite for the McDonald’s you saw on the way to Ruth’s so you can go there instead for your meal. Sounds ludicrous, right? Thankfully, the Women now play on Friday and Sunday, so their event finishes first.

As “King for a Day” the Men and Women’s Tourney never comes close to conflicting. I start the Women’s season a month before the Men. The day AFTER the Super Bowl we hold the Selection show where the 64-team field is announced. We start that next weekend. We FINISH the Women’s NCAA Tourney BEFORE the Men’s begins. Now this tourney takes place when the NFL is over, MLB Spring Training is just beginning, and the NBA/NHL have about 2 months left. This no longer competes with the Men’s Tourney. Or Spring Training. Or the very end of the NBA/NHL season. Meaning more people will care. Once again – makes too much sense. Once again – it never happens. But it should and would if it were up to me.

 

Not now – but during “normal” times the line at the concession stand at a sporting event can be rather long. You know you are going to miss part of the game. You just accept it.  A 10-minute wait is considered FAST! But in every line, there is always a dumb shit who has spent an eternity in line, gets to the front of it – then has NO CLUE WHAT TO GET!

As “King for a Day” this problem is solved. When you get to the front of the line if you don’t know what you want – you go back to the end of the line so you can have more time to decide. YOU HAD 10 BLEEPING MINUTES IN LINE! If you don’t know what you want – YOU ARE A DUMB ASS! The menu didn’t change from the time you got in line until the time you got to the counter. What the “heck” were you doing the entire time in line! Never mind. I don’t wanna know. If you have a ton of free time to not know what to get even though 90% of the game has taken place since you got in line – go back to the end so you can take all the time you want AND NOT IMPACT ANYONE ELSE’S!

 

I don’t what it is about cars getting in an accident or pulled over to the side of the road but for some reason people are more concerned about the cars on the side of the road than what is in front of them. The car slows down, we see the brake lights go on and the neck of the driver turns to the right to see what happened or they even turn their entire body that way to see. In the process traffic slows down because of people who have never seen an accident in their life so they have to look at these.
As “King for a Day” ANYONE who drives by an accident and slows down to rubberneck so they can look at it has one of 2 things happen to them:

They either get their head permanently twisted to the right so now they can focus on what is more important to them than something as “insignificant” as……..THE ROAD IN FRONT OF YOU!

The other option is: Get your head cut off. Now we can place it on the side of the road so you can get a close-up view of what is taking place there!

 

If you like what you see, please let me know so I can start making plans to run for POTUS in 2024. Don’t laugh. Seeing who we have had to choose from the last handful of elections, would I be any worse than what we did end of electing? I agree – NO!