Took my boys on a family trip to Charlotte for the NASCAR All-Star race.

What a great time, go-kart tracks, good time with family and 180,000 gear heads.

The race was outstanding with the no-holds barred format. Kevin Harvick was victorious but Jimmie Johnson, Matt Kenseth and Jeff Gordon showed that they can dominate at Lowe's Motor Speedway. And that should make the Coca-Cola 600 this weekend worth the price of admission and your time on TV this Sunday.

Don't forget about the Indy 500, which will also be raced Sunday. Three women in the race for the first time.

Folks can talk about the NBA and NHL and Major League Baseball, but the attendance marks and TV ratings show that NASCAR is second only to the NFL in the U.S.

The U.S. National Soccer Team opted to remove the interim tag from coach Bob Bradley.

And it was the correct call, George Vecsey of the New York Times agrees.

The winningest coach in Major League Soccer history demonstrated a solid resolve in his first four games as interim coach.

This will give him the opportunity to grow with the team as its prepares for World Cup 2010 in South Africa … or the United States.

Some of the folks commenting want to know why I discuss ESPN as much as I do on this blog.

One reason, they provide the most content on sports on the Internet that they have produced. You can argue that Google News and Yahoo! Sports provide content but much of that is available anywhere and is produced by the Associated Press.

Same goes with TV: I will discuss the broadcasts of TNT and Speed and Fox Sports and Golf Channel and NFL Network, but at the end of the day, ESPN is the top provider of content.

As for news: the New York Times and Washington Post are the present kings online.

So plan on seeing more discussions of shows on ESPN.

And some more …

SportsTime Ohio is barely relevant beside its Tribe broadcasts and FSN is in the same boat beside Cavs games. I would love to see some network take a swing at ESPN on the national level. Comcast and its Versus channel gave it a shot, but the network couldn't secure NFL or MLB rights. It only got the NHL and is doing a great job, but few are watching. FSN has its Best Damn Sports Show and its half hour highlights show but nothing really relevant.

Speed Channel is a godsend for auto racing fans. I would go as far to say that Speed and Fox Sports have made NASCAR a mainstream sport with its excellent coverage and reports. ESPN will have it tough in the second half of this season to measure up to Fox Sports' coverage of NASCAR.

Also with some of this, I defer to George Thomas who provides media coverage for the local radio and TV on Ohio.com and the Beacon Journal.

Le Anne Schreiber is the new public editor for ESPN and her columns appear on ESPN.com. Her first real behind the scenes look at the network is very interesting and sheds some light on the thinking that goes on between SportsCenter and the actual sports that ESPN holds the rights to. Take a look.

NASCAR plays no favorites when it hands down penalties.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. was docked 100 points in the standings and his crew chief, Tony Eury Jr., was fined $100,000 and suspended for six races for an illegal wing part in the race last weekend at Darlington.

The other sports could learn a thing or two about sticking to the rule book.

Here are links to other views of the Cavs and Nets series:

New York Times

ESPN

Newark Star Ledger with 1 and 2 and 3.

Game 4 will not be sent around the world as an example of beautiful basketball, but a win is a win is a … well, you get it.

This Cavs team better figure out how to score more or the Pistons are going to dispatch it fast. They also can't shoot just 75 percent from the line, particularly when they are shooting just 41 percent from the floor.

They never tested Jason Kidd on the defensive end after the Nets guard picked up his fifth foul.

I could list five more things bad about the Cavs' play.

But as we know, they figured out how to win, and really, that is all that matters right now.

The Indy 500 has lost a lot of its luster the past 10 years. And NASCAR has left it so far in the dust, I don't think it will ever catch up.

But the new qualifying procedures were fun to watch Saturday and the drama of Helio Castroneves winning the pole for the May 27 race was exciting and made for great TV.

Kudos to the IRL and its IndyCar Series for experimenting with ways to get fans interested again.

It looks like in the near future the NFL will add a 17th game to each team's schedule.

Sounds good, right? There is never enough football.

Here is the caveat, though: The game must be played outside of the United States.

The Browns and Steelers could play in Berlin or Tokyo.

I really don't have a problem with games being moved around as long as it is not divisional games and as long as it doesn't take place at 3 a.m.

Golf fans the powers of SI.com, CNN and others have formed a great Web site at Golf.com.

It has a lot of different features that give the player and the watcher a lot of tools to enjoy the game more.

It is really well done. It will be interesting to see how the site covers Firestone C.C. in a couple of months.