The Roan Zone

the great state of Illinois....

Fri, 12 Mar 2010 16:04:32 -0600

without even ONE entry in the men's NCAA Division One basketball tournament? Would the Land of Lincoln go 0-for-13 with its D-1 programs??? Apparently NOT-- the fighting Illini appear to have made it, their win against Wisconsin in the Big Ten Tournament should put them over the top, somehow. They're gonna finish 19-14 unless they beat Ohio State in the semis Saturday, ordinarily that wouldn't be good enough. But five wins over top 25 teams is a pretty strong line-item on your NCAA resume. If Bruce Weber had one more guy besides Demetri McCamey either willing or able to get and take a shot when the game's on the line, Illinois might actually win an NCAA game. But there hasn't been a bona fide scorer in Champaign since the national runner-up team in '05. Jereme Richmond, we're all waiting for you.

An interview with Ozzie...in his Papa Smurf Pants

Tue, 02 Mar 2010 12:11:53 -0600

An interview with Ozzie...in his Papa Smurf Pants

Tue, 02 Mar 2010 12:11:53 -0600

White Sox Training Camp

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 12:18:07 -0600

The White Sox have their full squad together today for the first time this spring, although everybody had been here except for the captain, Paul Konerko. He came in this morning, veteran's privilege I guess. Paulie talked a lot about the upcoming season but also about his future beyond that. We'll have it tonight on WGN News at Nine...

Candid Ozzie

Who knew the White Sox were such good speed walkers?

First Full Squad Workout

Tue, 23 Feb 2010 15:00:10 -0600

It's the first full squad workout for the Cubs, everybody was on the field on a perfect Arizona day... Lee, Soriano, Ramirez all smoking the ball in the cage...Tonight at 5, we'll hear from the Ricketts family -- they stopped by this morning. And a full report, Cubs and Sox, tonight on the news at 9...

Cubs Training Gets Rained on

Mon, 22 Feb 2010 14:34:37 -0600

The Cubs didn't get much done on yet another rainy day in Mesa.... some light throwing and some hitting in the two available cages at Fitch Park and that's about it... hoping for better weather tomorrow and the rest of the week....

Moving West....

Sun, 21 Feb 2010 18:52:14 -0600

away from the Cubs and over to Glendale for the White Sox opening workout... unfortunately for them, it wasn't much of a workout-- big rains Saturday night swamped the fields, so the pitchers got to throw 25 apiece, and that was about that... Not that it wasn't great last year, but there's a really positive vibe in the Sox clubhouse-- they SHOULD be excited, with the pitching staff they have, but it seems to exgtend far beyond that. Even the newcomers like Andruw Jones are happy to be in the room and to have a chance to show they can stillmake a contribution... Ozzie designated Mark Buehrle the opening-day starter, partly because he didn't want to face the question every day... but nobody would argue with that anyway. More tonight on Instant Replay-- and for you Cub fans, we're live with the skipper tonight from Lou's palatial spring training residence....

Ted Lilly Knee Update

Fri, 19 Feb 2010 12:14:01 -0600

MRI on Cubs pitcher Ted Lilly shows only normal wear and tear on right knee, nothing serious...

as we debate the Bears' unsettled future... a note on another

Sun, 03 Jan 2010 22:59:09 -0600

topic, the passing of Bill Gleason... for a lot of people, Bill was one of those wrinkled old characters on the "Sports Writers on TV" show that ran on a few outlets in town through the late '90s.... but Bill, who died Sunday at the age of 87, was for more than six decades one of Chicago's most decorated sports writers-- in a class with guys like Bob Verdi and the late Jerome Holtzman, owning a depth of knowledge and context that comes only from hard-earned experience.... on top of it, and despite his crusty demeanor, Bill was a good guy-- certainly not above pointing me in the right direction a time or two when I had just arrived in town from downstate... In his retirement, I still bumped into him around town, infrequently, sometimes at church on Sunday and it was always nice to catch up a bit. I'll miss him.

just watched Illinois State...

Sat, 19 Dec 2009 19:22:57 -0600

win its game in the MVC-Mountain West Challenge at Utah... I know the Redbirds are a decent team, but it all made me wonder how in the world Utah beat Illinois earlier this season, on a neutral floor, no less... Then I watched the Illini play Georgia, again on a neutral floor in Duluth, and my question was answered. Illinois has a world of potential but it is still a very young team looking for leadership. Demetri McCamey is way too inconsistent, made some nice plays in Georgia but also some horrendous decisions that really cost the Illini at times. Weber's team is projected in the top three or four in the Big Ten and a lock for an NCAA bid... The Illini have some growing up to do before they live up to those expectations...

Did any of us have any business thinking...

Sun, 29 Nov 2009 22:05:30 -0600

that the Bears actually had a chance in the Dome? For the record, they were officially eliminated from the division race and the series of events it would take to get 'em into the playoffs would take the world's largest blog to figure out. Since we don't have that much time, I would simply say this-- I agree with what Troy Aikman said on the broadcast, that Cutler deserves credit for hanging in there and getting his brains beat out on almost every pass play. He's made more than his share of mistakes, but he's out there plugging away, even at the very end, which was ridiculous to me. Why would you have the franchise QB out there in mop-up time when Jared Allen and those guys are trying to remove his head from his shoulders? You have to shake your OWN head at a lot of what happens on the sidelines.

NFL week 5

Sun, 11 Oct 2009 16:06:46 -0600

anybody watching the KC-Dallas game notice who got smoked for the tying and winning touchdowns??? Former Bear Mike Brown, one guy you hate to see it happen to... missed the tackle twice and the receiver left the Chiefs in the dust both times....

Twins-Tigers

Tue, 06 Oct 2009 20:45:33 -0600

...now, THAT'S BASEBALL!!!

...and so it ends...

Sun, 04 Oct 2009 17:00:46 -0600

...with neither of our baseball teams in the post-season-- maybe since they BOTH made it last year, we should have expected this??? The Cubs laid down in the last week, lost five out of seven when it looked like they might win 'em all and at least end on a good note... Geo Soto struck out to end the season, could there have been a more fitting finish? I was in Detroit this morning for a huge dose of managerial hilarity in Ozzie's office at Comerica Park-- not that I can repeat most of it in a family blog, but he was killing us with stories about the Mets and Javier Vasquez and a bunch of other topics... As always, he was brutally honest, said he was glad to see the season end after his team had struggled through the second half of it. But Ozzie's already looking forward to 2010, if only because of his pitching staff, which could be sensational... and really, the CUBS' staff should be awfully good, too.... all depending on injuries, of course but maybe there is a decent reason why we should keep the faith for another year, on BOTH sides of town.....

Blackhawks Predictions

Thu, 01 Oct 2009 16:30:38 -0600

as we do in our office prior to the start of ALL the major sports seasons, the WGN Sports crew is offering the following predictions for the Blackhawks season and beyond...

Dan Roan: 100 points and Western Conference Finals

Rich King: 101 points and Western Conference Finals

Joel Liberatore, Producer: 98 points and Western Conference champions

Steve Lippo, Producer: 99 points and Western Conference Finals

Steve Scheuer, Camera: 108 and Western Conference Finals

with the exception of Mr. Scheuer, there seems to be some question about the ability ofour new full-time goaltender... but we'll see, beginning tomorrow morning... it's great to have 'em back, and you can see the Hawks most Saturdays and Sundays right here on WGN!!