Sports Central

As everyone knows, Boston is currently the center of the sports universe. Fans of the football Patriots are talking about dynasty and Red Sox enthusiasts are still teary-eyed about their first World Series championship since 1918.

Though we moved here less than two months ago, I have personally already attended a couple of off-season SABR events in Boston (and missed one). Some years, the Louisville chapter is lucky to have a single meeting during the baseball season. At the last event I attended, I sat next to a founder of sonsofsamhorn.com, which is a fairly fanatical Red Sox fan website. The guy was very excited because this off-season he was personally contacted by Red Sox owner John Henry and is now a part-time employee of the team, crunching numbers in hopes of extended future glory.

The Boston Bruins, like the rest of the NHL, are on hiatus, but there's still plenty of hockey in the area.

In fact, today I attended my first hockey game and first Harvard sporting event. Since my family includes two young girls, we decided to go to the women's hockey game versus Vermont.

We like to take the kids to high level women's sports events to show them what is possible. A few years back, we attended a game featuring Team USA soccer, with Mia Hamm and the rest of the famed bunch, when the team played a game versus Brazil in Louisville.

Unfortunately, the hockey game was not much of a contest, as the final score was 7-1 Harvard. The first period was superficially close (the score was only 1-0), but the Crimson had 24 shots-on-goal to 4 for the Catamounts.

Nonetheless, it was entertaining and my youngest especially seemed to enjoy it. She said she'd pay next time if we came back, but this was the final home game of the year (though Harvard will be in the ECAC tournament next weekend on home ice).

Harvard entered the weekend ranked 5th in the country, but they knocked off number 3 Dartmouth Friday night and will likely move up. Go Crimson.

Other sports news: Last night, my wife and I watched "Friday Night Lights," which earns a recommendation because of its realistic intensity. At times, it seems almost like a documentary about Texas high school football. I liked it and I don't even watch football.

Finally, hours ago, I received my copy of Baseball Prospectus 2005. It arrived in perfect time, because I'm about to depart on a long trip west. More on that later.