Beauty and The Beads

When the San Francisco Giants started off the season with a seemingly rejuvenated offense, I couldn#39;t help but be excited for the things to come. After having struggled to put together solid offensive outings minus their star catcher Buster Posey and second baseman Freddy Sanchez in 2011, 2012 started off just the way San Francisco wanted. So far this year the Giants have scored four or more runs in 15 of their 25 games. (If you remember, in 2011 the Giants were 55-9 when they scored four or more runs in any given baseball game.)

In 2012, they are 10-5 when they score at least four runs. Which, to be fair, does not exactly stack up to what they were able to do in 2011 due in large part to a small sample size. Also, it has to be noted that in 2012, the Giants#39; starting pitching and bullpen have not been as solid as they was in 2011, but I digress.

If anything, the Giants need to step up their hitting when they have runners in scoring position (RISP). In 2012, the Giants are ranked 11th in the majors with a .260 team batting average – which, is not bad by any estimation. However, when it comes to hitting with RISP, the Giants are in the bottom five of the league, ranked 27th with a .197 team batting average.

The Giants have had troubles hitting with RISP, obviously, and it has been extremely difficult to watch the Giants lose games due to not being able to get that timely hit. San Francisco#39;s 2010 World Series title had every bit as much to do with timely hitting as it did with the team#39;s dominating pitching staff. Without clutch hits, such as Edgar Renteria#39;s three-run home run that clinched the World Series title, who knows how far the Giants would have gotten in the postseason?

Now the Giants will have to do without arguably the best hitter on their team for 4-6 weeks. It has been revealed that after experiencing some discomfort in his left wrist/hand, Pablo Sandoval has broken his left hamate bone. Oddly enough, Sandoval endured the same injury in 2011, except it was his right hamate bone that was fractured. The injury set Sandoval back a good bit and hurt the team greatly because he was one of their sole offensive weapons in 2011.

2012 may look a little differently now with Buster Posey, Melky Cabrera, and possibly Brandon Belt in the lineup to try and pick up the slack in Sandoval#39;s absence. However, Sandoval is the one of the team#39;s leading hitters, ranking top-five in several categories including home runs, RBIs, batting average, OBP, and SLG. Not to mention he leads the team with a .280 BA with RISP of all players with at least 20 ABs.

I expect the Giants to see a drop-off in their already dismal attempts to get runners in when necessary. While it is early in the season, the 4-6 week window is a significant chunk of time that could certainly put the Giants at a disadvantage in a surprisingly competitive NL West. Sandoval will undergo surgery on Friday, May 4. I imagine that the success of the surgery will help dictate which end of the 4-6 week spectrum we might see Sandoval back in action. (The fact that his injury is not of his throwing hand this time, could be in Sandoval#39;s favor in terms of a speedy recovery.) In the meantime, I#39;d get ready to hold onto your seats folks, as this ride could get a bit bumpy.

David is co-founder of wrapupp sports blog where fresh content is posted daily and present sports blogs and sports opinions – all with a West Coast bias. Growing up in the Bay Area, David is a huge supporter of all the local sports teams; the Giants, Athletics, Warriors, Sharks, 49ers, and Raiders. His one fault, admittedly, as many of his friends and family would say, is his love for the Los Angeles Lakers. Growing up, Magic Johnson was his favorite basketball player and he fell in love with the team. He chalks it up to, #34;Not knowing any better#34;. Now his love for sports has turned just as academic as it is intuitive and he follows most all sports all over the nation.

You can follow David on Twitter: @officialwrapupp

Sources:

SFGate.com. SF Giants#39; third baseman Pablo Sandoval to undergo surgery. MLB 2012.

More from David Mehrwein and the Yahoo! Contributor Network:

San Francisco 49ers#39; Jim Harbaugh #34;Coach#39;s Notebook: April 28#34; – Fan Reaction

San Francisco 49ers#39; LaMichael James Ready to Contribute: Fan Reaction

Los Angeles Lakers Looks to Redeem 2011#39;s Early Exit: Fan Preview

San Francisco 49ers Select LaMichael James in Second Round of 2012 NFL Draft: Fan Reaction

Will San Francisco 49ers#39; Wide Receiver Michael Crabtree Explode in 2012? Quote Roundup

Less than two years after US swimmer Fran Crippen died during an open-water race in Dubai, the swimming world lost another star athlete at just 26 years old when Alexander Dale Oen passed away during a training camp in Flagstaff, Ariz. on April 30. The reigning world champion in the 100-meter breaststroke suffered cardiac arrest and was found on his bathroom floor by one of his teammates. Dale Oen would have been a favorite to win the race at the London Olympics.

The Norwegian was a self-proclaimed water rat, who started out as a poor swimmer, but liked it too much to stay away for long. He liked to fish and wakeboard, and enjoyed being near the sea. He trained to keep up with his older brother, Robin, and their parents often drove the siblings 75 miles to practice at 5:30 in the morning. I truly admire their glow and work ethic, Alex said. Its easy finding the power within yourself when you have family like that.

Even though Dale Oen won a silver medal in 2003 at the European junior world championships, a new coach, Stig Leganger-Hansen, convinced him he was too light and put him on a strict regimen of dryland training and weights. At the Athens Olympics in 2004, he went out too fast in the first 50 meters and finished 21st, badly missing out on the final eight. Then and there, he said recently, I decided that I was never going to watch the 100-meter breaststroke final from the stands again. That was the beginning of what is today my career so far.

Dale Oen finished second to Japans Kosuke Kitajima at the Beijing Games four years later, but finally overcame Kitajima at the worlds in Shanghai last summer. His powerful technique was as close to flawless as many coaches have seen. He wrote words that sound as though they came from a Lou Gehrig speech, though there was no known medical issue affecting him. I am very lucky to be doing what I love the most, he said this year. I sometimes feel like time doesnt stretch out to those I want to share it with. In my world, I am one of the luckiest humans alive.

*****

Earlier this week, the Court of Arbitration for Sport overturned the British Olympic Associations decision to impose lifetime bans for serious drug offenses. In doing so, it set a precedent that other national Olympic committees will need to follow, while also polarizing the sporting landscape in the country that will host the next Olympics.

Hardliners see this is a shallow victory for the World Anti-Doping Agency that pushed hard to limit the bans. Among other things, the current ruling prevents there from being a sort of uniformity in the severity of penalties that can be administered across all sports and in all countries. Some federations maximize their penalties at two years, but the International Weightlifting Federation handed out 28 four-year bans in 2011. The decision will likely make it easier for suspended athletes to appeal future bans and may subject them to conflicting jurisdictions, irrespective of CAS.

Because of this ruling, sprinter Dwain Chambers and cyclist David Millar will be allowed to participate at the London Games. The arbitration ruling has met with approval from former world champion hurdler Colin Jackson and Jonathan Edwards, an Olympic champ in the triple jump, though others, such as Paula Radcliffe, the countrys best known distance runner and a staunch anti-drug advocate, have expressed disgust over the ruling. Britains Roger Black, an Olympic silver medalist in the 400 hurdles, said simply, Its a sad day.

*****

The US wrestling team is a step closer to fielding a full squad at the London Olympics, as Shawn Bunch qualified his spot in the 132-pound freestyle class at a qualifying tournament in Taiyuan, China last weekend. The top three wrestlers in the tournament, featuring athletes from non-qualified nations, received Olympic berths — Bunch placed third, defeating Bazar Bazarguruev of Kyrgyzstan to earn the spot. The US team has now qualified 17 of 18 possible wrestling slots, and is missing only the 211.5-pound class position in Greco-Roman competition, a place the team can still win at a final meet in Helsinki next weekend. Though Bunch secured the place for the team, he must still earn the right to wrestle in London himself, by winning a secondary Olympic trials to be held in weight classes that were not yet qualified for the Games at the time of the primary US trials in Iowa City last month.

*****

It isnt quite the group of death, but the US mens basketball team drew a tough opening bracket in the qualifying round of the Olympics. The defending champs will face African qualifier Tunisia, European silver medalist France and 2004 gold medalists Argentina; two other teams will join the group from an Olympic qualified in July. In that round, the US will likely see some familiar faces from the NBAs San Antonio Spurs: Tony Parker of France and Manu Ginobili of Argentina. The US team has an enormous pool of talent, but has already suffered injuries to Dwight Howard and Derrick Rose, two players originally expected to make the cut.

*****

It may sound like a broken record, but another IOC member has been disgraced by a plagiarism scandal. South Korean member Moon Dae-sung, an Olympic taekwondo champon in 2004, was stripped of his thesis called Proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation stretching and its effect on taekwondo athletes after sections were found to have been copied from another college student. Moon, 35, was chosen to the IOCs Athletes Commission in 2008 and been eyeing a political career in his homeland. He withdrew his membership in the influential Saenuri party after the revelations last week. Last month Pal Schmitt, a longtime IOC member from Hungary and the nations former president, was also exposed for having plagiarized sections of his doctoral thesis.

On the bright side, some of the other games might actually be close.

Oklahoma City plays at Dallas in Game 3 of their first-round series at 7:30 on TNT, with the Thunder holding a 2-0 lead on the defending champions and threatening to eliminate them after pushing them hard last season.

Game 3 is Game 7, the Mavericks’ Jason Terry said.

That game follows Game 3 between the Miami Heat and the New York Knicks at 5 on TNT, with the Heat controlling the series with a 2-0 lead heading to New York and the banged-up Knicks looking every bit like the Eastern Conference’s version of the Jazz. It might be worse for them, in fact, since second-leading scorer Amare Stoudemire is out after badly cutting his hand when he punched the glass out of a fire-extinguisher case in frustration after Game 2.

And if you want playoff hockey, there are two games on the NBC Sports Network tonight.

The Philadelphia Flyers and New Jersey Devils play Game 3 of their conference semifinal series — it’s tied 1-1 – at 5:30, followed by Game 3 between the St. Louis Blues and the Los Angeles Kings, who are heading home with a 2-0 lead.

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Product review: Morgan Stanley structured trio

New structured product releases target growth, track FTSE 100 index for six year term

By Geordie Clarke

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Published May 03, 2012
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Having domain users be the local administrators of their own computers is a bad but common practice. To make matters worse, if the Domain Users group
is a member of the local administrator group, the users also have administrative privileges on every computer in the domain. Administrators know that
this is a security risk, but on top of the daily fires that they have to extinguish, there often isnt time to remedy this situation.

If they had the time, these administrators could lock down users computers, then deploy any software that a user requests by using a Group Policy
Object (GPO) or a deployment tool. And if a user needed to run a tool or legacy software that requires Local Administrator privileges, administrators
could use a tool such as Process Monitor to relax (via a GPO) the appropriate
registry or NTFS security permissions. Deploying software and relaxing permissions when needed arent difficult tasks, but they can be time-consuming.
In the end, many administrators just give up and grant users local administrator access to their machines so that they can move on to the next fire.

Viewfinity Privilege Management takes the work out of discovering the permissions that each application needs to function correctly. It also gives you
the option of letting users install software on their own, while you still maintain control — all from an easy-to-manage console. Viewfinity isnt the
first software company to come up with this type of solution. A few years ago, I reviewed a similar product in the article Bit9 Parity. The products are similar, but Viewfinity adds a new twist.
In addition to a locally administered tool (GPO Editor) that runs on your network, Privilege Management can also be implemented using a Software as a
Service (SaaS) model. Both the GPO Editor and SaaS editions of the product have their pros and cons.

Test Network

To test Privilege Management, I used a test network consisting of a Windows Server 2008 domain, a Windows XP client, and a Windows 7 client. For
testing the GPO Editor edition, I added a Server 2008 member server to host the software.

Overview

For the most part, the GPO Editor and SaaS editions of Privilege Management function identically. They divide the applications that your users need to
run into two groups:

• Applications that are currently installed; these applications are managed with applied policies
• Applications that your users will likely want to use in the future; these applications are managed with a feature named Policy Automation

If users need to use a particular application or tool in their day-to-day activities, you can create a policy that allows its use. For example, in a
locked-down computer environment, non-administrator users cant run the Disk Defrag utility, change the power options, or change the date, time, or
time zone. You can create a policy that lets them do these things. In addition, if theres a legacy program that users need but it requires Local
Administrator privileges to run, you can configure a policy so that theyre allowed to run this program with escalated security privileges, while
keeping the users out of the Local Administrator security group.

This is a great start, for sure. But eventually youll run into the problem I mentioned previously — you simply dont have time to research and write
a policy for every single application that users might want to use. This is where Policy Automation comes in.

Policy Automation actively monitors the applications that your users attempt to use. Theyre prompted by a dialog box that asks them to write a short
justification for why they need access to a specific tool or application. This request is then logged in the Privilege Management tool, where you can
quickly write a new policy that allows them to use the software that theyve requested. The new policy can be implemented right away or at a specific
date and time. You can also set a policy to expire at a certain date and time. What makes Policy Automation extremely powerful is that the Viewfinity
client agent sends all the data needed to create a policy for the requested application back to the management console. You simply right-click the
event (eg, a user attempted to set the date and time), choose Create Policy, and follow a wizards instructions.

GPO Editor Edition

If you would like to manage the back-end server yourself, Privilege Management comes in a standard executable that you install on your own server.
Double-clicking VFGPOEditorSetup.exe takes care of the prerequisites, such as Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 and Microsoft Report Viewer 2010, during
the installation. The entire administrative console is built as an add-on to the Group Policy Management Console (GPMC), as Figure 1 shows.

Figure 1: The administrative console in the GPO Editor edition

Each computer that you want to manage needs to have a client agent installed. The agent comes in an .msi file, so installing it with a GPO, Microsoft
System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM), or your favorite third-party deployment tool is a snap.

One of the advantages of the GPO Editor edition is the close integration with Group Policy and GPMC. As a result of this integration, you can easily
target specific users and computers.

Another advantage over the SaaS product is that you and you alone control the product. You dont have to rely on an administrator in someone elses
data center (aka the cloud) to ensure that your users are able to run the software that they require.

I found the GPO Editor edition to be responsive and easy to use. I found only one disadvantage over the SaaS edition: slower policy updates. The SaaS
edition has a very tight communication window with each Windows client, whereas the GPO Editor edition updates the policies for the clients during the
standard GPO update cycle. (According to TechNet, this happens every 90 minutes,
with a random offset of 0 to 30 minutes.) I could speed this up during testing by issuing the gpupdate /force command from the client, but
its otherwise much slower than the SaaS edition.

Justin Bieber engaged? He’s ring shopping with Selena Gomez

By bill zwecker
bzwecker@suntimes.com

April 19, 2012 1:26PM

To get the latest sports news from USA TODAY, including game results, columns and features, follow us on Twitter at @USATODAYSports.

The NFL commissioner suspended the New Orleans Saints middle linebacker for the entire 2012 season and dinged three other players for as much as a half-season for their participation in a bounty system.

The severity of the suspensions surprised even players in other sports.

• STORY: NFLPA misguided in fighting for Saints
• PHOTOS: NHL Suspension Tracker in pictures
• PHOTOS: Saints Bountygate scandal in pictures

Wow, thats tough, New York Knicks forward Steve Novak said. Point made, I guess.

And making a point is the point: In an era when players make so much money that fines can seem as trivial as parking tickets, leagues are getting tough by issuing long-term suspensions, without pay.

Players can pay the fines, no problem, ESPN NFL analyst and former coach Herm Edwards said, but when you start taking them off the field … they have to answer for it in the locker room.

Suspensions have rocked other sports in recent weeks as well. The NHL suspended Phoenix Coyotes winger Raffi Torres for 25 games, one of the longest in NHL history, for a hit deemed high and late. And the NBA suspended Los Angeles Lakers forward Metta World Peace for seven games for a high elbow.

Game suspensions are far more meaningful than simple monetary fines, said Peter Finley, an assistant professor of sport and recreation management at Nova Southeastern University. The players want to be on the field. … In terms of dollars, they brush off a lot of that.

Torres and World Peace are repeat offenders whose latest suspensions came after taking shots at opponents heads. The Saints are accused of running a system where players could get paid for hits knocking opponents out of games, including blows to the head. All this comes as evidence mounts that concussions and repeated sub-concussive blows can lead to terrible health consequences later in life.

Goodells backers see Wednesdays suspensions as a bold statement that player safety is paramount in the NFL. His critics say the suspensions are an unfair reaction to the more than 60 lawsuits filed by former players alleging that the NFL didnt adequately protect its players, including a suit last month that cited the Saints bounty system.

People are going to question Roger: He was too tough. He wasnt tough enough, said agent David Falk, most famous for representing Michael Jordan. Its a very difficult posture for Roger to take, but I think its the correct one.

Goodell previously suspended Saints coach Sean Payton for a year and former Saints defensive coordinator Gregg Williams indefinitely for their part in the bounty system.

Listen, if you want to play in the NFL, you better do what a coach says, former Saints quarterback Bobby Hebert said. I take the approach that none of the players should have been suspended because of that.

The reason why Roger is so concerned with player safety is hes trying to cover the owners and the leagues behind. … If they truly cared about player safety, they would have done something about this 20 years ago.

Sports USA NFL Radio analyst Ross Tucker, a former offensive lineman, questioned the length of the player penalties: Honestly, they could cut every one of these suspensions in half and it would accomplish the same (thing). Roger always says club executives are going to be held to an even higher standard. It seems to me that the players have been held to the exact same standard.

New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning backed Goodell: I think hes doing the right thing to make sure that this doesnt happen ever again. … I think hes been harsh to try to make a statement saying there is no place for this in the game of football.

ESPNs Mike Golic, who played defensive tackle in the NFL for nine seasons, said knocking quarterbacks out of games with legal hits is just football. But he also thinks suspensions are the most effective deterrents: Everybody wants to play. Playing time is key. When you cant be there for your team, its a horrible feeling.

Increasing consequences

NHL disciplinarian Brendan Shanahan said during the all-star break that short-term suspensions can still be effective.

I still believe in one- or two-game suspensions, he said. Ive had hearings with players where theres been no suspension and well get off the phone and say, Were never going to hear from that guy again. Just with a warning. Ive also given out multi-game suspensions and we get off the phone and say, Well see him again.

Torres is the sort of recidivist Shanahan was talking about. Last season, Torres was suspended four games for elbowing. This season, he was fined the maximum $2,500 for another elbow — and the same day he was fined, he charged Minnesotas Nate Prosser, which earned him a two-game suspension.

Then, in the playoffs, came Torres devastating hit on the Blackhawks Marian Hossa, who was carried off on a stretcher.

NHL rules specify harsher penalties for repeat offenders. If a player has no suspensions in the previous 18 months, his lost pay is based on the number of days in the season. If theres a second suspension within 18 months, its based on the number of games in the season — 82.

Heres what that means in practice: When Edmonton Oilers defenseman Andy Sutton was suspended for five games in November for an illegal hit to the head, it cost him about $11,500 a game. When he got an eight-game suspension for charging in December, the cost was nearly $26,000 a game.

Paying and playing

Pittsburgh Steelers linebacker James Harrison is the poster boy for Goodells on-field safety enforcement. Harrison knocked out two Cleveland Browns with concussions in a game in 2010 and was fined $75,000 for one of the hits. Additional questionable hits, and additional fines, followed — including a helmet-to-helmet hit against Browns quarterback Colt McCoy last season that got him a 15-yard penalty and a one-game suspension.

I was suspended on a hit where there was no way I could have done anything else, Harrison said. If you slow it down to one-tenth speed, then it looks bad, like I could have avoided it. In real time, it cant be.

A guy goes out and happens to make helmet-to-helmet contact? By the letter of the rule, its wrong. But to suspend guys and fine them these crazy amounts of money, I dont know.

Harrison said the suspension made him less aggressive at first. (But) I felt like I was putting myself at risk. If you hesitate on the football field, you can get your knee blown out. You cant play the game. … When it comes down to it, I dont want to get hurt and I dont want to hurt anybody else.

Harrison did hurt Broncos receiver Eric Decker in a January playoff game when Decker sprained the medial collateral ligament in his left knee on a play over the middle.

I couldve hit him high, and I probably wouldve gotten fined or suspended, Harrison said. I hit him low, and his knee is injured. If its me coming across the middle (as a receiver), I want him to hit me high. Maybe I know with head injuries, in the long run it can be life-threatening. But a knee injury can be life-threatening, too.

And for some guys, this is all they can do. Think about a guy whos married, with kids. How is he going to support his family?

Suspensions of the sort Goodell meted out Wednesday have meaning beyond missed games and missed paychecks.

It has financial ramifications in the short run, but in the long run it also impacts marketing and branding, said David Carter, executive director of the Southern California Sports Business Institute, and whether they ever get into the Hall of Fame.

Colorado Rockies first baseman Todd Helton played quarterback at Tennessee and he doesnt understand the math of a bounty system: Say you knock somebody out and you get $5,000, but then you get fined $75,000. Ive got to talk to my accountant, but that doesnt make any sense to me. That should be a deterrent in itself.

Contributing: Jarrett Bell, Mike Brehm, Robert Klemko, Michael McCarthy, Gary Mihoces, Bob Nightengale, Tom Pedulla, Jon Saraceno, Kelly Whiteside and Jeff Zillgitt.

(CBS News) With the first Saturday in May approaching at a steady trot, its time for sports fans who only tune in to horse racing for the Triple Crown (this journalist included) to once again focus their attention toward the famous twin spires in Louisville, Ky., for the Kentucky Derby.

Before pulling your Derby hat or seersucker suit out of the closet for a viewing party Saturday, check out our handy cheat sheet to make some small talk about the 138th Run for the Roses.

Kentucky Derby: Bodemeister is early 4-1 favorite
Night racing a hit, but not yet for Kentucky Derby
Kentucky Derby a rematch for top contenders

Whos the favorite to win?: Bodemeister was the odds-on favorite (4-1) in Thursdays morning line. Many experts chose other horses as their winning pick, notably Union Rags, whose 9-2 odds were just nosed out by Bodemeister. The odds will change constantly until just before the race. Its worth noting that Animal Kingdom won last years Derby at 20-1 odds, and Super Saver crossed the finish line first in the 2010 Derby at 8-1 odds.

How many horses are in the race?: As of this writing, a field of 20 horses have been assigned post positions out of 21 entrants. Scratches arent unheard of though. Should one occur, My Adonis is waiting in the wings to fill the empty starting gate.

When does the race start?: Post time is 6:24 pm ET. The race should start soon after that.

Whats the weather forecast?: Not ideal. According to the National Weather Service, the forecast for Louisville calls for scattered showers and thunderstorms with a 40 percent chance of precipitation during the day, improving to isolated showers and thunderstorms with a 20 percent chance of rain at night. Two years ago, a bad forecast prompted Churchill Downs to consider running the Derby under then-newly installed lights for the first time in its history.

Whos singing the national anthem?: Mary J. Blige is expected to sing the anthem around 5:10 pm ET after the last race before the Derby, the Woodford Reserve Turf Classic.

Mary J. Blige to sing at the Kentucky Derby

Whats that other song played?: Stephen Fosters My Old Kentucky Home is traditionally played by the University of Louisville Cardinal Marching Band as the horses are led to the starting gate. Scroll down for lyrics.

Whats in a mint julep?: The traditional Derby drink contains bourbon, mint and simple syrup plus some other ingredients depending on the recipe. Click below for recipes from the CBSNews.com archives.

Bobby Flays mint julep
Its derby time: How to make mint juleps

Who was the last horse to win the Triple Crown?: In 1978, Affirmed was the last horse crowned with victories from the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness Stakes in Baltimore and the Belmont Stakes in New York. In 2008, Big Brown came close to winning the crown, entering the Belmont with wins from the previous two legs, but he lost to Da Tara.

My Old Kentucky Home lyrics

The sun shines bright in the old Kentucky home,
Tis summer, the people are gay;
The corn-tops ripe and the meadows in the bloom
While the birds make music all the day.

The young folks roll on the little cabin floor
All merry, all happy and bright;
Byn by hard times comes a knocking at the door
Then my old Kentucky home, Good-night!

Weep no more my lady. Oh! Weep no more today!
We will sing one song for my old Kentucky home
For the old Kentucky home, far away.

Source: Churchill Downs Inc.

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Following is a summary of current sports news briefs.

Former NFL star Junior Seau dies in apparent suicide