John’s Blog - Coast To Coast

The first game of the 2008 Major League Baseball season to be played on U.S. soil took place last night at the brand new Nationals Park in our nation’s capital as the Nats hosted the Atlanta Braves. President Bush threw out the ceremonial first pitch, and even spent some time in the announcer’s booth with ESPN’s Jon Miller and Joe Morgan. Our President spent just enough time in the broadcast booth to call the stadium’s first home run - a solo shot by the Braves’ Chipper Jones. Also in attendance was my friend, 2006 Miss D.C., Kate Michael, who gives a very nice account of the game on her K Street Kate blog.

The Nats went into the bottom of the 9th nursing a 2-1 lead. Closer Chad Cordero had some shoulder tightness and could not come in to do his usual duties, so set-up man Jon Rauch was brought in to close things out. Rauch gave up a one-out double to Mark Teixiera. Matt Prado ran for “Big Teix” and would score on of all things a passed ball with two outs! Rauch retired Brian McCann to end the inning. The sell-out crowd of Nats fans would go home happy though. The familiar chant of “ZIM MER MAN” rang through the air after Ryan Zimmerman hit a dramatic two out walk-off home run in the bottom of the frame to give the Nationals a 3-2 win. With the win, the Nationals now have the best record in baseball at 1-0.

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Are you excited yet? I know I am… just hearing the electicity in the air flowing from the L.A. Memorial Coliseum into my radio on the way from my home from my brother’s place last night got me into it for sure. 115,300 people!!! Is that crazy or what??? That’s how many were there to witness the Boston Red Sox defeat the Los Angeles Dodgers 7-4 last night in an exhibition game. It’s the most people to EVER attend a baseball game of any sort.

Tonight, the first REAL game is played on U.S. soil as a couple of my favorite teams do battle. Mark Teixiera, Jeff Francoeur, John Smoltz, Chipper Jones and the rest of the Atlanta Braves are in the brand new stadium in Washington D.C. to take on the Nationals. The game will be televised live on ESPN beginning at 8pm ET/5pm PT. If you haven’t set your lineups in your fantasy leagues yet, you better do so!!!

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After a close first half battle in tonight’s NCAA Tournament game in Pheonix, the UCLA Bruins held a 33-24 halftime lead over Xavier. The Musketeers closed the gap to 34-28 early in the second half, but then Kevin Love and the rest of his Bruin teammates took command as the Bruins then went on 14-0 run to extend the lead to 20 points! Xavier never got any closer than 12 points after that, as the Bruins cruised to their third straight Final Four appearance with a 76-57 win. Love led the way again for UCLA, scoring 19 points and grabbing 10 boards.

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Leona Lewis’ “Bleeding Love” rose from #7 to #1 this week on VH1’s Top 20 Video Countdown! Yet another #1 on another chart for this fabulous singer. Congrats to Leona!!!

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This perhaps must be the most ridiculous thing I’ve EVER heard in the history of sports. Danica Patrick (who has yet to win a race in 47 IRL events) is being penalized by the IRL because she weighs too little! Yes, it’s true! The preposterous notion that Robby Gordon off-handedly mentioned (and deservedly got lots of flak for) last year has been adopted by the IRL! Is it her fault that she stays in shape and has a small frame? Should a driver that weighs 250 pounds be allowed to take weight out of their car because they weigh too much? I guess so, if we follow this logic. Sheesh!!!

Needless to say, this is sure to stir up a hornet’s nest. For more on this story, please read Roy S. Johnson’s Blog “Baller’s, Gamers & Scoundrels”… The entry on Danica and the IRL’s crazy decision is entitled “To The IRL, Size Matters (Too Much)”.

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The UCLA Bruins jumped quickly to a 41-20 halftime lead against Western Kentucky in the NCAA’s “March Madness” regional in Pheonix yesterday. They then had to hang on as a furious rally by the Hilltoppers, some poor play and a few questionable officiating calls helped whittle the lead down to a four point margin (61-57) with just under seven minutes to play. The Bruins though regrouped, and thanks mostly to some good defense and timely shooting from Kevin Love (29 points, 14 points, 4 blocks) won going away 88-78. Next up for the Bruins in the round of 8 is Xavier, which romped to a relatively easy 79-60 win over Tennessee.

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What a week it’s been for U.K. singing sensation Leona Lewis here in America. She makes her first late night T.V. appearance on Jay Leno on Monday, and now three days later, her single, “Bleeding Love” has found it’s way to #1 on no less than three of Billboard’s charts! With nearly 220,000 digital sales last week, “Bleeding Love” outpaced the #2 song by more than 76,000 downloads to capture the #1 position on this week’s Hot Digital Songs Chart. Her 82% increase in sales over the previous week along with her continued HUGE airplay gains also fueled jumps from #8 to #1 on both the Pop 100 and Hot 100 charts!

Speaking of the radio story for “Bleeding Love,” there’s even MORE good news to report!!! The first call-out scores (where radio station listeners are polled) for the song are now in from RateTheMusic.com and “Bleeding Love” debuted at NUMBER 1 on the chart!!! For a brand new song by a brand new artist to debut at #1 on this chart is a pretty rare accomplishment, and it truly speaks volumes for just how well-liked “Bleeding Love” is here in the U.S.

Here’s the complete top 10 list this week:

ratethemusic.com by Mediabase
W/E March 20, 2008
12+ Rank By Sorted Column
Title, Artist, Pop (Fam), Fam%, Burn% (Fam)

1 Bleeding Love Leona Lewis 3.97 78 12
2 No Air Jordin Sparks w/ Chris Brown 3.96 92 20
3 Apologize Timbaland f/ OneRepublic 3.89 98 50
4 See You Again Miley Cyrus 3.86 93 26
5 Don’t Stop The Music Rihanna 3.83 98 36
6 Love Song Sara Bareilles 3.83 97 34
7 Stop & Stare OneRepublic 3.82 90 25
8 With You Chris Brown 3.80 95 33
9 Feels Like Tonight Daughtry 3.73 89 23
10 Never Too Late Three Days Grace 3.72 85 24

So, what’s next on the table for Leona Lewis and “Bleeding Love” here in America??? Well, one goal is probably to get to #1 on the pop airplay charts at some point. “Bleeding Love” has ascended all the way up to #12 on the Mediabase Pop chart. When you sort the chart by estimated audience instead of spins, she ranks #10! Look for “Bleeding Love” to reach #10 on the official chart (ranked by spins) over the weekend. The ascent up the pop airplay charts for new artists is usually long and hard, though a couple of other new and notable female artists (Colbie Caillat and Sara Bareilles) have had #2 hits on the chart over the past several months with their debut releases. Perhaps Leona will be able to break through and get to #1 there in another month or two.

On April 8th, Leona’s album Spirit will be released. With the astounding success of “Bleeding Love” here in the U.S., and with no real competition that week, there’s little doubt that Spirit will debut at #1 on the Billboard 200 Album chart. The only question is how many copies will it sell in it’s first week and beyond? Don’t be surprised if the album sells out very quickly at many retailers! As Oprah Winfrey said so eloquently after Leona’s appearance last week there “A Star Is Born!” Indeed!

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Two longtime pop “divas” also made their latest singles available for download yesterday. Madonna did things close to the normal way, releasing her new song, “4 Minutes” to pop radio last week (where it’s already risen to #22 on the Mediabase airplay chart). In the old days, before the era of payola and sales chart manipulation by the record labels, songs were always released to the radio stations and the public for purchase at the same time.

Which leads me to that other diva, the one who’s record label has bought several “#1 hits” on Billboard Hot 100 chart via sales chart manipulation over the past several years. That of course would be Mariah Carey. Do any of you remember the songs “Thank God I Found You,” or “Heartbreaker” by her? I didn’t think so - I’d be shocked if you did actually. What do these songs have in common? Well, neither of them was a hit here in the U.S., the songs reaching #28 and #21 on the U.S. pop airplay charts respectively. What they also have in common is that Mariah’s record label bought #1 positions for both on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart by suppressing downloads for a very long period after the songs were released to radio. I don’t have the exact sales figures, but long story short is that both songs received so many downloads in their first week of availability, that they reached #1 on both the aforementioned chart and on the sales chart. The same thing was also done with her semi-hit singles “My All” (#12) and “Honey” (#10). So, the Billboard Hot 100 record book may say that Mariah has 17 #1 hits. The reality is that only 13 of them can truly be considered #1’s.

Fast forward to today. Mariah released her latest single, “Touch My Body” to radio on February 12th. It was not well received by most listeners, consistently finishing amongst the bottom quarter of the songs rated by pop music listeners at www.ratethemusic.com as published by Mediabase. After a quick ascent into the top 20 of the airplay charts, the song started losing steam quickly, looking like it would peak in the mid teen’s on the pop chart. Songs with the sub 3.40 call-out scores that Mariah’s new song have been garnering typically fall quickly on the chart… for some odd reason though, the song though managed to push it’s way to it’s current position of #8 on the pop airplay chart. There is widespread speculation within both the industry and on various music boards that something funny is happening with this song. Is it a case of payola? It may very well be.

To further matters, Mariah’s label delayed the release of the single for download a full SIX weeks after it went to radio!!! In other words, the sales of the song which would have taken place over a seven week period, are now going to be compressed into ONE week! It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out what that means. Yes, Mariah’s label by next week at this time will have purchased her 5th “#1 hit” on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. In two days, it’s already dethroned Leona Lewis’ “Bleeding Love” (which sold almost 220,000 downloads last week - it was released back in December ‘07) from the #1 spot on the iTunes sales chart. A pretty meaningless accomplishment when you consider that you effectively have had 44 days worth of sales crammed into just TWO! It’s high time that Billboard reviewed their chart methodology so that this kind of manipulation will be ended once and for all. The industry will be better for it.

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It wasn’t at a major this time as it was in the 2006 U.S. Open, when Geoff Oglivy came from one stroke behind while sitting in the clubhouse to defeat both Colin Montgomery and Phil Mickelson on the 72nd hole as the two Goliath’s both managed to double-bogey it, to go from one up to one down.

Still his accomplishment this weekend at the famed “Blue Monster” course in a rain-delayed event which ended on Monday afternoon was against just as stellar a field as that major win, and also included a player who hadn’t lost in over six months! Yes, Tiger Woods’ quest for a perfect season ended as he could only close with a four under par 68 to get to 15-under par - two strokes behind the winner and alone in 5th place. By the way, that top 5 finish was his 9th consecutive one, the most top 5’s in a row he’s had in his illustrious career.

Woods wasn’t the only Goliath, Oglivy slayed this weekend. Vijay Singh, Retief Goosen and Jim Furyk (all of whom have been in the top 5 of the World Golf Rankings at some point in the past two years) finished a stroke back at 16 under to tie for second.

A little more than two weeks from now, the Masters begins… with Woods in top form, and Oglivy and many others looking to challenge it should be an interesing week.

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Yes, I just got back from the NBC Studios in Burbank, where the Tonight Show starring Jay Leno is taped. Leona Lewis performed an incredible rendition of “Bleeding Love” just before the taping ended at 5 pm PT. I got incredibly lucky with my seating location as I was randomly seated to left of the stage in the 4th row, about as close to Leona as I could have ever have wished to be - only about 12 feet away!!!

My day started very early today as I got out of bed around 5:20 am… left home at 6:20 am to beat the horrible traffic, and managed to be there by 7 am! 40 minutes! I even quickly found a parking spot… I then got in line while sipping on my morning coffee. At 8am sharp, the doors to the ticket office opened. I was 8th in line. I then decided to go on the NBC Studios Tour and that was pretty cool as we got to see several sets including the set which Johnny Carson used when he did the show, along with getting a pre-view from inside the studio where Jay’s show is filmed. We were in there from around 9:40-9:50 this morning, and I listened intently as they keeping playing Leona’s “Bleeding Love” so that the band would be totally familiar with the song when it came time for taping… I was hoping that Leona herself would come out and do some warm-ups, but I think it was too early for that. For you soap opera fans, we also got to see one of the “Days Of Our Lives” sets. The tour lasted about an hour and 15 minutes.

After grabbing some lunch, I got in the actual line for the show and found out that I was the 10th person. While in line, I quickly acquainted myself with one of Jay’s biggest fans, Glozell Green. GloZell is a blogger who has a site completely devoted to Jay called GloZell Loves Jay Leno, where you can find several pictures that she took… that’s her with me (below), and I’m also in two pictures on her site. GloZell knows all of the in’s and out’s of going to the Tonight Show. For instance, did you know that if you’re amongst the first 30 people in line, you’re guaranteed a seat for that day’s taping? If you’re any later than that, there is the possibility you won’t get in. It was a lot of fun getting to know GloZell and all of the other great people who came to see the show! For the record, GloZell’s been to 336 tapings of Jay’s show since 2006! You go girl!

As for the show itself, I of course came to see Leona perform… Since it was a Monday, Jay of course did his usual “Headlines” skit… which was very good as always. The funniest part though may have been a parody that was done of Tiger Woods’ latest Nike commercial where John Melendez loses a few teeth… If you’ve seen the commerical, you’ll soon understand. Actor Peter O’Toole and Comedian Katt Williams provided some comic relief. Peter was his usual funny self, and Katt (outside of one unnecessary comment) was also very funny. Overall, they were both pretty enjoyable.

Leona then took the stage a little before 5pm in a stunning black and white dress. I had no idea when they opened the stage door that she would be right at the edge of it, only 12 or so feet away from where I was perched… Those four minutes of her performing “Bleeding Love” were simply AMAZING! She hit so many high notes, and people in the audience gave her a rousing ovation afterwards!!! I’m pretty sure she saw me as I was the closest one to her to stand first… Even Jay was VERY impressed, talking to Leona for several minutes after the taping was done. Leona then went off to the backstage area… and with that I hit the road about 5:15, being very thankful that things went so perfectly well!

Note: pics are screencaps from Tonight Show airing on NBC.

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