A Mishmash Today …

I try to keep politics out of these rants, and I am completely incompetent when it cones to dishing out political advice.  Nevertheless, I feel sufficiently strongly about a minor current issue in the political realm that I will go out on a limb here.

After the LSU/Iowa game to decide the Women’s NCAA basketball championship, our First Lady suggested the possibility that both teams should be invited to the White House.  A subsequent statement from the White House said that there would be invitations for LSU as the women’s champion and for UConn as the men’s champion, but it made no mention of Iowa or San Diego State.  Here is my position:

• The practice of inviting champions in the sports world to the White House has run its course. 
• I think President Biden should set a new trend in motion and not invite any sports figures to the White House for a meaningless photo-op.
• The last thing we need is to expand this practice which approaches the level of existential nihilism to runners-up.

The plaintiff rests, Your Honor …

The MLB season is only a week old; it is far too early to do any sort of projection about the season, but a few items do stand out:

• The pitch clock is working.  So far in 2023, the average game time is 2 hours and 38 minutes.  According to CBSSports.com, that is the shortest average game time since 1984.  Last year, the average game took 3 hours and 3 minutes.
• There has already been a game played in less than two hours.  There was only one such game in all of last season’s 2430 scheduled games.
• The limitations on “The Shift” seem to be working too.  Offense is up in 2023 as compared to 2022.  Last year in the first week of the season the OBP for MLB was .312; this year it is .323.  More offense means more action on the field in shorter game times.  Hard to complain about any of that.
• The larger bases introduced this year were intended to encourage more base stealing adding to the action on the field.  So far, that seems to be the case.  Attempted steals are up slightly and the fact that a higher percentage of that increased number of attempted steals are successful portends a continuation of that early trend.

Looking at the early standings, a few things stand out:

• The Twins have given up only 11 runs in 6 games even in this environment of more offense in the games.
• The Red Sox have played 6 games and the total number of runs in those games was 73 or just over 12 runs per game.
• The Royals are 1-5 on the season but their run differential is only minus-9.
• The Phillies are 1-5 on the season and their run differential is a whopping minus-24.
• The Rays are 6-0 on the season and their run differential is +31; they are winning their games by an average of more than 5 runs.
• The Orioles are 3-3 on the season and their run differential is zero.  Talk about a team in perfect balance…

Switching gears …  Back in early February, the Dallas Mavericks acquired Kyrie Irving from the Nets.  The Mavs were in 6^th place in the NBA Wet at the time with a record of 30-26, and some folks suggested that the pairing of Irving with Luca Doncic could give the Mavs a shot at the #1 seed in the NBA Western Conference playoffs.  In terms of offensive firepower, the tandem of Irving and Doncic is formidable indeed, but the rise of the Mavs has not exactly followed.  As of this morning, the Mavs would not even be in the play-in portion of the NBA playoffs.

Since acquiring Irving, the Mavs are 8-16.  Those 24 games represent about 30% of a full NBA season; so, I think we are outside the realm of extrapolation from a small sample size as one clearly should not do with the MLB stats cited above.  But there are two disturbing trends at work here:

1. The Mavs do not defend well at all.  Neither Irving nor Doncic is even an “average defender”.
2. This is Irving’s third consecutive team that has been better without him as compared to with him.  Surely, neither the Celtics nor the Nets would want him back.  Irving is in the final year of his contract; Mavs’ owner, Mark Cuban says he wants to sign Irving for “the long term”.  Really …?

The Masters gets started today.  I will check in periodically over the weekend because it is a milestone event on the sports calendar.  There is an interesting new bet available this year.  You can wager on whether an LIV Golf pro will win the Masters or not.  Current odds are 6-1 if you bet that the person to put on a green jacket over the weekend is with LIV Golf.

Finally, I shall close today with these words from Mark Twain:

“Good breeding consists in concealing how much we think of ourselves and how little we think of the other person.”

But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………