Quick thoughts

* The Indians had a bit of a rough stretch there, but they've won two in a row to regain the best record in the majors. A certain Of Fair Hooker reader who has been constantly beating the drum of negativity about the Indians (who goes by the name of Jeff Brown) emailed me the other day to opine that the Tribe will soon go the way of the Royals, who are now 5-13 since starting the season 20-17. First of all, the Indians' record is a lot better than 20-17, and second of all, they're pretty obviously better than the Royals. The Indians are now on pace to win 101 games. I don't think they'll actually win that many, but it probably won't take 90 to win the Central. I will be surprised if Detroit overtakes us, and shocked if Chicago does. Kansas City and Minnesota are all but eliminated right now.

* Jim Tressel has left the Ohio State football program in disgrace after committing the unpardonable sin of allowing his players to participate in capitalism. ... Don't get me wrong, Tressel should have known better, and signs are starting to point to the fact that this has been going on for years right under his nose, and he has been running a pretty corrupt program (at least in terms of the NCAA rules). But at least he won a national title. That's better than cheating and NOT winning a national title.

* Shaquille O'Neal, who spent the 2009-10 season in Cleveland, has announced his retirement. Shaq was at one time the NBA's most dominant player, and has to go down in history as one of the five best centers ever. And he's one heck of a character. Here's what he said about coming to Cleveland: "I came here with the perfect chemist's perception. The formula they had was perfect and any added ingredient could make it go bad or worse." ... Well, obviously the added ingredient that made it go bad wasn't Shaq, it was LeBron James losing his desire to win in Cleveland. Odd that he seems to have found it again in Miami. But that's a separate issue.

* I really don't want the Heat to win the championship. That's a given. If you're reading this, you probably don't either. But you know what? If Miami sweeps the Mavericks and hoists the trophy the evening of June 7, the sun will still rise on June 8. Not only that, the Cavaliers will still exist, and will still have the first and fourth picks in the upcoming NBA draft. They'll be one of 29 teams trying to knock off the champion. Whether that's the Mavericks or the Heat is not especially material.

A few random thoughts

* Sure, it was a little disappointing that the Indians lost the series at home against the Rays, after taking the first game. But the Rays are the hottest team in baseball right now, and the Tribe still has the best record in the American League. And Justin Masterson wasn't going to go undefeated all year.

* The Tribesmen were 20-8 after winning in Oakland on May 3. Since then, they're 3-5. Is this a temporary cold stretch, or what we can expect from this team the rest of the way? Only time will tell, but I'm optimistic they can turn it around.

* The just-as-surprising-as-the-Indians Kansas City Royals are in second place, at 20-17, after having just taken two of three from the Yankees in the Bronx. Partially fueling that series win was brand-new uber-prospect call-up Eric Hosmer, who homered in each of the two games the Royals won. By calling up Hosmer when they did, the Royals were signalling that they think they can contend this year, because they started the clock on his free agency. The Tigers are only half a game behind the Royals, and if the White Sox and Twins ever right themselves, this could be a very interesting race.

* In less interesting news, either Carlos Boozer or LeBron James will be playing in the NBA Finals this year. Had they both so chosen, they could have been leading the Cavaliers to a title right now. Instead, Boozer's Bulls and James' Heat will play for the Eastern Conference championship. Sigh.

* Jim Tressel just hired a lawyer to represent him before the NCAA Infractions Committee, and it's one heck of a lawyer for this situation: Gene Marsh is the former chairman of that very same committee. Before Tressel had hired him, Marsh said Tressel had a chance to get off relatively lightly because of his positive track record and the fact that the infraction wasn't as serious as some. I hope he's right, because that Tressel is one heck of a coach, and I'd hate to lose him.

Mixed day in Buckeye-land

As the Ohio State hoopsters prepare to start their expected deep NCAA Tournament run this afternoon, the football team suffers another setback as the five-game suspensions of the five players involved in Tattoogate are upheld by the NCAA, and Jim Tressel volunteers to sit out the same five games as punishment for knowing about their transgressions and not reporting them.

I've already expressed in this space what I think about the rule that ensnared the players, which is basically that they didn't hurt anybody, so what's the big deal. But the rules are in place, and Jim Tressel, who is supposed to be this great integrity guy, knows what they are, or at the very least SHOULD know what they are. On the one hand, I find it hard to fault him for not wanting his players to be punished for not hurting anyone; on the other hand, he knows darn well he and they are all subject to NCAA rules.

Of course, his volunteering to sit out five games doesn't mean he'll serve a five-game suspension and then show up for the Nebraska game in week six. The NCAA is still investigating, and could make his punishment more severe. All this over a few tattoos and trinkets. Crazy.

In other doings:

* The basketball Buckeyes haven't broken any NCAA rules lately, so long as anyone's aware, and are about three hours from starting play as the top overall seed in the Big Dance, against 16-seed Texas-San Antonio. They will of course cruise through this first-round matchup; the next 16 seed that beats a 1 will be the first ever, and these Buckeyes aren't going to lose to some pipsqueak upstart in their home state. That said, there are some potholes waiting for them in the later rounds. Likely opponents within the East Regional include Kentucky, Syracuse and North Carolina, all of which have won national titles in the last 15 years (albeit with different players than they currently have).

* Akron, the college I'm currently attending, is almost certainly about to be eliminated by Notre Dame, but it's nice to see a Northeast Ohio school in the tourney. It looked earlier in the season like Cleveland State might be the real deal, but they foundered right around the time I transferred from Cleveland State to Akron. Hmmm ... (By the way, don't ask me to name any players on either team. I don't want to embarrass you.)

* The Cavaliers won Wednesday night in Sacramento. That's the good news. Hey, there's been precious little of that for this team this year, so we might as well savor it. ... But the bad news is, they followed that up with a never-competitive, absolutely shameful 41-point loss in Portland. They were losing at various points by scores of 24-2, 35-6, 56-18, 74-33 ... you get the idea. It was only because the last three-eighths of the game were considered garbage time that the Blazers didn't double our score for the game. Had they kept their proverbial foot on our throat, it would have been even uglier. This is one of the worst teams in Cavaliers history, and that's not a small feat.

* The Indians' regular season starts in exactly two weeks, and while there's little reason to think they will contend this season, there are reasons to watch. I'm particularly excited about young catcher Carlos Santana, who was just mentioned on ESPN's SweetSpot blog as a potential breakout player for 2011. Some things I didn't know before I read that: Santana walked more than he struck out last year, between Columbus and Cleveland; and his combined AAA-MLB on-base percentage was .529. That's right, .529! Do you have any idea how good that is? Well, I'll tell you. The only players ever to post better OBPs over a full major-league season are named Babe Ruth, Ted Williams and Barry Bonds. Obviously Santana's feat is not in the same league as theirs (both literally and figuratively), but still, this is a special player. And he's not a corner outfielder, as all three of those men were. He's a catcher! A catcher who can get on base with great regularity is a rare find indeed. Joe Mauer's about the only one I can think of, among current major leaguers, and even Mauer doesn't walk that much.

We're number five! We're number five!

After last night's wildly entertaining national championship (I was rooting for Oregon, but not as much as I was rooting for a good game, so I went to bed happy), the pollsters rated the Ohio State Buckeyes No. 5 in the country, which is exactly where the Fighting Tressels finished last year. Obviously, a national championship is the ultimate goal every year, but finishing fifth out of the 140 FBS teams (73 in the so-called AQ conferences) is nothing to sneeze at.

With 10 seasons under his belt in Columbus, Tressel is now 106-22 at the FBS level, after going 135-57-2 in 15 seasons at Youngstown State. Under his leadership, the Buckeyes have won a national title and reached two other title games, gone 9-1 against Michigan, and gone 6-4 in bowl games -- 5-3 in BCS bowls, in which they've played more times than any other school. After ending the 2001 season 7-5 and unranked with John Cooper's players, Tressel's Buckeyes have ranked the following in the year-end AP poll: First, fourth, 20th, fourth, second, fifth, ninth, fifth, and fifth.

Tressel's OSU program has had its problems. We all remember Maurice Clarett's fall from grace after he led the Buckeyes to the national championship over Miami as a freshman, and of course five of our best players are suspended for the first five games of the 2011 season. But those could only be blamed on Tressel to the extent that he bears ultimate responsibility as head coach. His program has been cleaner than many, if not most.

Judging him purely on his on-field results, a case could be made that Tressel is the most successful head coach in Ohio State history. Woody Hayes was there for 28 years and won more national titles (one outright, two shared), but at 205-61-10, he had a lower career winning percentage at Ohio State (.764, to the sweater vest's .828). If you put a gun to my head and made me pick, I'd still give that honor to Hayes, but Tressel is off to a much better start than Woody was at this point in his Buckeye career. And I frankly wouldn't trade him for any coach in the country.