Recent sports happenings.

It’s not every day that the state of Wisconsin is driving the sports world, but with the Green Bay Packers fretting over Brett Favre’s return to football and the Milwaukee Brewers obtaining pitcher C.C. Sabathia from the Cleveland Indians for the pennant race, our sports stories are centered on Interstate-43.

As for the Sabathia trade, we won’t have to wait long to see how the hefty lefty looks in a Brewers uniform. He’ll take the mound for the Brew-crew tomorrow night. Likely one of the selling points for completing trade when it happened is that Milwaukee will now get two starts from Sabathia before the All-Star break. I’m estimating that he’ll have four starts under his belt by the trade deadline at the end of this month, when most blockbuster trades usually go down. By not pushing the issue with Cleveland to get a better price for the 2007 Cy Young winner, Milwaukee extended the duration of their rental (Sabathia is a free-agent at the end of the season). 

What exactly was the asking price for Sabathia? Milwaukee’s top farm product, left fielder Matt LaPorta (who also plays right field and first base) was at the center of this trade from the Tribe’s standpoint. With LaPorta comes pitchers Rob Bryson and Zach Jackson, as well as a player to be named.

From what I’ve gathered, the player to be named is not a scrub – the Indians are choosing between a couple of Milwaukee’s blue-chip prospects. If this is true, then I believe the winner in this deal is Cleveland, who seems wiped off the map in the AL Central and had little chance of resigning Sabathia (who is requesting Johann Santana-type money) this offseason. The Indians will eventually put money in Fransisco Carmona and Cliff Lee. Neither of them can match Sabathia’s stuff over the long-haul, but they kept for astronomically less than what Sabathia will make this December.

As for Favre, my favorite sports writer in the world, Peter King, reports that the Packers quarterback is considering a comeback to the NFL. Other sports journalists had been going back and forth on the veracity of this rumor, but to hear it from a top-notch guy like King convinces me that No. 4 is serious about being under shotgun – even if it’s not with the green and gold. 

The Packers are in a horrible spot. What had been a smooth offseason transition to incumbent Aaron Rodgers has crumbled, and now Green Bay is left to choose between a few undesirable options. If Favre fills out his paperwork to exit the reserved retirement list, his cap figure (of more than $12 million, I believe) is back on the Packers’ books. Coach Mike McCarthy and GM Ted Thompson are then left to determine if they want to pay their sure-thing first-ballot Hall of Famer $12 million to keep Rodgers’ spot warm yet another year.

Retaining Favre is certainly a viable option, if the motivation behind that direction revolves around public relations more than success in 2008. At the same time, Packer Nation contains some football-savvy cheeseheads who understand that another year of Favre is simply a calendar-length set-back in terms of developing a good young football team that contains not only Rodgers, but running back Ryan Grant, wide receivers Greg Jennings and James Jones, and a defensive side that includes young starters AJ Hawk and Aaron Kampman.

The Pack could also release Favre, but the fear is that Favre lands in the NFC – even the NFC North, King explains, with the Minnesota Vikings, Chicago Bears, or Detroit Lions. I think it’s implausible that Favre stay in the division. Favre isn’t one of these guys who plays for the money; he’s a football junkie, a lifer. Some players don’t buy into rivalries these days, especially with the ways that free agency dilutes the system. But I believe that Favre actually holds distain for the Vikings, and, like cheeseheads everywhere, his stomach turns at the notion of donning a purple jersey and marching into Lambeau Field as the enemy. Things would have to get really ugly between he and Thompson for Favre to stoop to that – especially given the way it would entirely unravel the legacy Favre has built on the frozen tundra. John Clayton from ESPN is reporting that Favre would be interested in going to the Carolina Panthers, which I believe is far more plausible than the Vikings or a team with no shot at winning (such as Chicago and Detroit).

There’s also the possibility of convincing Favre to remain in retirement, which is the direction they’ve taken the matter to this point. But King, Clayton, and everyone else in the business are saying that Favre is not being persuaded.

If I’m Ted Thompson, I’m taking a real long look at Brian Brohm right now. The quarterback drafted out of Louisville was meant to serve as a backup to Rodgers (and an insurance policy of Rodgers bombed in his first extended playing time, though no one in Green Bay would admit that). Here’s the thing: if Favre comes back – if the Packers ultimately concede to bringing him on for another season – I think we’ll see Rodgers demand a trade instantaneously. He’s had enough of this – it’s obvious from the way he talks about being in No. 4’s shadow. There is no chance that he holds the clipboard for another season, left to wonder what saga he’ll be put through in the following offseason.

Green Bay is not big enough for Favre and Rodgers this year. That much is clear. So Green Bay needs to take Brohm into consideration, because if Favre plays another year or two, that’s an appropriate timetable for keeping Brohm on the bench without there being trouble in the locker room.

Is there a team right now that would be willing to part with a second-round draft pick for Rodgers? I think he generates some interest. Given the potentially tragic situation for him in Green Bay, I think Rodgers would even welcome yet another year on the bench, so long as it’s not behind Favre. A team with two mediocre or unproven commodities (such as the Dolphins, Jets, Cardinals, Ravens, and Bears) might be willing to take on Rodgers, hoping that with three quarterbacks the potential for one success story is increased. Because this is the Jon Gruden theory of collecting quarterbacks, count the Buccaneers in as a possible destination for the former first-rounder from Cal.

Losing Rodgers and trusting Brohm is a risky place to be. But it’s a whole lot better than facing Adrian Peterson and Brett Favre in the season opener.

California is keeping score in ‘09

This is good news for the green-minded: California will require 2009 vehicles to possess a label containing the vehicle’s global warming score. The rating system is 1 through 10, with the average car scoring a 5.

What I like most in this article is the idea the European Union is tossing around – taxing on the basis of fuel efficiency and carbon emissions. Maybe that idea will catch on in the US. For all the complaining about fuel prices in this country, you would think that the consumer would ditch their feeling of self-importance and make concessions for the good of the economy and environment alike. But no, there are still some people who remain convinced that what needs adjustment is the supply and not the demand.

When President Bush bailed on the Kyoto Protocol earlier this decade, one of the motivations for the decision that he shared was that the American people were not ready to change their way of life to reduce carbon emissions. In 2008 I believe there’s been a degree of change on this front – more and more Americans willing to adjust their lifestyle and purchasing habits (a change driven more by economic incentive than environmental stewardship). At the same time (as I mentioned in the above paragraph), many Americans are devoted to the ideology of this liberal democracy – that nothing in existence is more valuable than the sovereignty of the individual – and still insist that supply will simply need to increase to accommodate more demand. 

In revisiting the President’s mindset about Kyoto, I hope that both presidential candidates will admit that energy-related progress needs to be made. Those changes may not reflect the values of the majority of Americans at the time, but let’s call them “decisions of anticipation,” as more and more Americans are beginning to see the need for better environmental stewardship and economic sustainability.

In anticipating that such a demographic of Americans will only rise, making changes today gives recognition to this gradual transition. Waiting for a majority (to reflect “popular opinion” of the constituents) allows the stubborn to rule the nation. When I see a CNN poll describing the high percentage of Americans willing to drill in ANWR, I translate that to a lot of uneducated people not understanding the long-term ramifications of their actions, leaving the rest of us to pay (literally, with cash) for their slow learning-curve. Are we really waiting for those people to come around? 

Some of us are very ready to pump something other than fossil fuel into our livelihood. Meanwhile we do what we can – drive fuel-efficient vehicles, carpool, and drive and little as possible. Yet we suffer economically because our fellow Americans are hellbent on adjusting supply over demand, and those in power on both sides of Washington let these issues hang in relative limbo for the sake of generating political interest and support.

My hope is that the next president of this nation will do what he can for the group of Americans who have been doing what they can. I’m convinced that allowing tax breaks and penalties to Americans based on their transportation habits is one element to building a better country, an America with a not-so-American mindset.