King Kaufman's Sports Daily

My daughter, Daisy, the coin-flippinest 2-year-old west of Gillette Stadium, went 162-94 in her debut, good for a 14th-place tie with former two-time champ Salisbury. Salisbury travels around the country and breaks down film and watches practices and talks to coaches and players and uses the expertise gleaned from his college and pro playing careers, and he's right as often as a 2-year-old with a quarter.

My 4-year-old son, Buster, who actually picked games rather than flipping a coin for the first time, finished 18th at 153-103, one place and five games behind his dad. My What the Heck™ Picks went 3-13.

Overall, the panel had a .642 winning percentage, way up from last year's worst-ever .593, and second only to the .656 winning percentage we put up in '05.

I've discontinued the Preseason Panel o' Experts, in which experts' preseason picks of division winners and wild-card teams are compared. I decided it was way too much work for how interesting it is, which is not very. It's mostly guessing anyway. At least the week-to-week picks of games are educated guessing.

And coin flipping.

Here are the final standings.

It's not possible to write a year-in-sports piece without leaving something out, assuming the piece is shorter than book length.

Readers pointed out a lot of things I missed in my annual year-ender in the story's letters thread. With some of these sports -- bird-watching, netball -- I just have to thank you for writing and invite you to read someone else's column.

But there are a few things I left out that, if I had it to do again, I'd include. I don't have to do it again for another year, but in the meantime I think I should have mentioned Marion Jones. She finally went down as part of the litany of drug abuse of 2007. Her tearful press conference and Olympic-medal surrender were such a long time coming I think I kind of dismissed them, but they were a big part of the year.

I also should have mentioned all the drunken driving, particularly the twin incidents involving the St. Louis Cardinals. Manager Tony La Russa was arrested for a DUI during spring training in Florida, and then pitcher Josh Hancock died in a drunken-driving accident in June. Toxicology reports showed his blood-alcohol level was nearly twice the legal limit.

Late in the year, former New York Yankees World Series hero Jim Leyritz was charged with DUI manslaughter following an accident in Florida that killed the driver of another car.

I also should have mentioned that tennis was rocked by a series of match-fixing incidents in 2007.

Pretty depressing, no? The Year in Sports piece was all about what a horrible year it was, nothing but death and tragedy and scandal. And I left a bunch of stuff out. The headline on my 2003 Year in Sports piece was "The Year of Behaving Badly."

It's already starting to seem like kind of an innocent time.