Month: August 2025

If you peek at the MLB standings this morning, you will probably notice that five of the six divisions have a close race going on at the top; only the Tigers with a 6-game lead in the AL Central should feel slightly comfortable in their leadership.  In the AL West, the top of the division involves three teams – – Astros, Mariners and Rangers – – within 4.5 games of one another.  But here in Curmudgeon Central we don’t stop there; we like to look at the bottom rungs of divisions where we focus first on the Colorado Rockies who could still set a futility record in the 2025 MLB season.  As of this morning, the Rockies project to a final record of 43-119 which is only 2 games better than last year’s woeful White Sox performance.

Earlier this week, the Rockies lost their 83^rd game of the season meaning that in the first week of August with about 2 months left to go in the season, the Rockies had guaranteed a losing season for the franchise.  They celebrated that “accomplishment” by losing a game by the score of 15-1.

Baseball is a funny game; even outstanding teams have off days and wind up getting clobbered.  Many people consider the 1927 Yankees to be the greatest team of all time; that was the year that Babe Ruth hit  60 home runs and Lou Gehrig drove in 173 runs.  In the 1927 season, the Yankees record was 110-44 with a run differential of +376; the Yankees outscored opponents by an average of 2.44 runs per game in that season.  And yet …

• One day, the Washington Senators shut out the Yankees and won that game by a score of 13-0.
• Lopsided losses happen to all teams.

But back to the 2025 Rockies …  They have had more than a couple of lopsided losses in addition to that 14-run deficit earlier this week:  The Rockies have lost games by scores of 21-0 and 18-0 and 17-2 in addition to this week’s shellacking.  The Rockies run differential – – with two months left to play – – stands at minus-316.  In the modern era for MLB since 1900, the record for the worst run differential in a season stands at minus-349 (Boston Red Sox in 1932).

• Even if the Rockies fail to eclipse the White Sox performance from last year for the worst record ever, the Rockies are poised to take the 1932 Red Sox out of the MLB regular season record listings.

One might look at this wretched season for the Rockies and expect that their attendance has cratered like the team record – – but not so.  So far in 2025, the Rockies rank 15^th in home attendance; they draw 29,646 fans per game.  How amazing is that?

• Ignore the attendance figures for the A’s and the Rays; they are playing in minor league parks where the Fire Marshall would not allow 15,000 fans to cram into the facilities.
• The Marlins average 13,039 fans per game – – and Miami’s metro area is a bigger market than Denver’s.
• The White Sox average 17,755 fans per game – – and Chicago is a bigger market than Denver.
• The Pirates average 19,065 fans per game – – but Denver is a bigger market than Pittsburgh.
• The Twins average 22,101 fans per game – – and Minneapolis/St. Paul is about 3 times the size of Denver.
• The Tigers – – division leaders no less – – average 28,864 fans per game – – and the two market cities are approximately the same size.

I don’t know what sort of marketing magic the Rockies have conjured up, but despite the despicable record by the Rockies, they draw more than the average attendance for all of MLB which is 29,200 fans per game.  I doubt that it is because the Rockies are better at home than they are on the road this year; that is technically true – – and meaningless:

• Rockies at home are 16-42
• Rockies on the road are 14-42

As I continued to peruse the bottom rungs of MLB divisions, I noticed that the 2025 White Sox are a significant improvement over the 2024 squad.  Here we are with two months left to play in the 2025 regular season and the White Sox have already won more games (42 of them to be exact) in 2025 than they did in all of 2024.  No other team can make that statement.

Finally, today’s search for anything positive to say about teams that are stinking it up in MLB for 2025 reminds me of an old joke that distinguishes an optimist and a pessimist:

• Put an optimist boy and a pessimist boy in a closed room full of horse sh*t.
• The pessimist boy will just sit there and bemoan his fate.
• The optimist boy will dig furiously in the manure figuring that there must be a pony somewhere in there.

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

 

 

Many times, I employ the disclaimer that I am not an attorney when I discuss legal matters.  Today, I want to be clear that I am also not a physician.  The topic is the shooting last week at NFL HQs in NYC; the working hypothesis for investigators here is that the perpetrator wanted to get into NFL HQs to do some shooting there but instead got on the wrong elevator to the upper floors.  According to police, the shooter – – now dead himself – – had a “history of mental illness” and that he had a note on his person indicating he had a beef with the NFL because he suffered from CTE.

In that simple paragraph above, there are triggers for several vocal segments of society spring-loaded to push their narratives:

• We have to do more to treat people with mental health issues,
• We need to have stricter gun laws
• CTE is caused by football and CTE is awful, ergo, football is awful.

Yes, we do need to do more in terms of therapy for folks who are mentally ill.  There were fewer of those sorts of folks out and about in society when it was legal to commit adults to “mental institutions” prior to their being convicted of crimes; if I recall correctly, that practice was ruled out by the courts in the 1960s or 1970s.  Mental health issues are much more difficult to diagnose without the cooperation of the “patient”; it is not like chicken pox where the “patient” presents with red spots all over his/her body.  And, sadly, lots of mentally ill people do not present themselves to competent medical professionals.

I am ambivalent about the idea of “stricter gun laws”.  The ineffectiveness of the current gun laws in terms of keeping the weapons out of the hands of mentally ill people makes me wonder if such a goal is achievable.  At the same time, anything that might separate guns and people who are mentally ill would be a good thing for society.  Frankly, I think the main issue here is that the two sides of the “gun ownership issue” are so dug into their positions that meaningful compromise has become extinct.

It is the third narrative above that really bothers me, however.  CTE – Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy – is a brain condition where there are “abnormal protein deposits” found in the brains of dead people who suffered “repeated brain trauma” while alive.  CTE is even more difficult to diagnose than “run of the mill mental illness” because as of today, the only way to know if a person had CTE is to wait for him/her to be dead and the brain of the corpse to be analyzed.  My amateur reading about CTE says that there is debate within the medical community of experts about the causal relationship between “repeated trauma” and a diagnosis of CTE.

Please do not take my uncertainty about CTE and causality as a way to accuse me of fostering some sort of conspiracy theory wherein the NFL – – in conjunction with the Trilateral Commission and the Illuminati of course – – are keeping a lid on understanding here because CTE serves a nefarious purpose on their parts.  However, CTE is a convenient excuse for erratic behavior since the only way to deny its existence would be for the shooter in this case to be rendered “unalive” so that his brain can be excised and examined.  I certainly do not know if the shooter had CTE – – and I suspect that he did not know that he had CTE but in whatever erratic construct of the universe existed in his mind, CTE was his preferred excuse.

Now let me go waaay out on a limb and talk about CTE and four other “neurodegenerative conditions” that are more well understood:

1. ALS:  It presents with pronounced motor symptoms and few psychiatric symptoms.  It can be detected by brain imaging but can only be confirmed post mortem.
2. Alzheimer’s:  It presents with mild motor impairments and few psychiatric symptoms.  It too can be detected with brain imaging in living patients.
3. Huntington’s:  It presents with definite motor symptoms and usually depression.  Importantly, this is a genetic condition that can makes the condition diagnostic in living beings.
4. Parkinson’s:  It presents with definite motor symptoms, but psychiatric involvement is rare.  It can be conclusively diagnosed in living beings.

            We are not in medical school here; so, what’s the point of all this?  These “other” neurodegenerative conditions” can be diagnosed in living persons; CTE cannot as of now.  So, I think it is important not to get out ahead of science-based understanding of what CTE is; what it is not; and what causes it to happen.

CTE is a medical term for a condition that had a street definition long before anyone thought of describing something as “neurodegenerative”.  When I was a kid, people referred to some retired boxers as being “punch drunk”.  Their words were slurred; they moved less fluidly than other people their age; they might have memory issues or flights of fancy.  Common folks who had never studied medicine chalked that  up to “too many blows to the head”.  Lyndon Johnson once said he thought Gerald Ford had played too much football without a helmet; LBJ did not mean that as a diagnosis or as a compliment.

CTE is a real condition – – but it may not be nearly as widespread as one might think because there may be sample bias in the brains donated for pathological analysis.  That is why I am not one to jump on the bandwagon of CTE, being endemic to the population of anyone who ever played football – – or soccer for that matter.  Let science march on …

I do wish, however, that there was a magic wand somewhere that someone would wave about and magically keep guns out of the hands of mentally ill people.  So, let it be written and so, let it be done…

Finally, let me close with this adage:

“Don’t let your mind make your body believe that it must bear the burden of your mind’s worries.”

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

 

 

It was about 60 years ago when Bob Dylan sang:

“The times, they are a-changin’ …”

That is clearly the case here in Curmudgeon Central.  For the first two decades of these rants, comments on any aspect of the WNBA were few and far between and usually dealt with the lack of live audiences or TV audiences for the league’s contests.  Just two weeks ago, the WNBA was the topic of an entire rant and today it will be the lead topic.  The times are indeed “a-changin’ ”.

Twice in recent days, WNBA games have been interrupted by someone in the crowd throwing a lime-green dildo onto the court as the ball was in play.  In at least one of the instances, the perpetrator was arrested.  I did not see a report of the charges against that individual but I can only hope that it was some sort of littering ordinance that he/she had violated because it would be frightening to learn that lawmakers there had gotten to the level of specificity in the law that dildo throwing was specifically banned.

This situation leads to several speculations if you have a slightly twisted view of “what might come next” …

• Imagine if a couple of fans had thrown sesame bagels on the court in the midst of WNBA games.  The teams would institute screening procedures to make sure than fans are not “smuggling in” sesame bagels.  Thwarting dildo smugglers with a search procedure might be a bit more difficult.
• Dildo manufacturers might seek to flood the market with lime-green items.  Obviously, the WNBA is not going to grant them licensing rights naming one of the manufacturers as the “Official Dildo of the WNBA”, but the marketing thrust could be:
  • • “We can’t say we are the Official Dildo of the WNBA, but our green monsters have been in play at WNBA games more than any other dildo.”

I have now proven conclusively that I never passed Marketing 101 in school …

Both incidents have involved road games for the Golden State Valkyries – – one in Chicago and the other in Atlanta.  I am not trying to justify the incidents; throwing stuff on the court of an ongoing basketball game is dangerous and might cause a serious injury to players or officials; the WNBA has a “Fan Code of Conduct” in place that specifically forbids throwing anything onto the court and says that “guests who throw objects will be immediately ejected from the arena.”  In another part of the Code of Conduct it says that guests who violate the Code of Conduct:

“… “will be subject to penalty including but not limited to, ejection, without refund, revocation of their season tickets, and/or prevention from attending future games.”

Believe it or not, these two incidents are not ground-breaking.  Buffalo Bills’ fans have thrown dildos onto the field on several occasions when the Bills have been hosting the New England Patriots.  In 2018, after the Pats had scored a TD during a Monday Night Game, Bills fans threw “at least three” dildos into the end zone.  What the Golden State Valkyries and the Buffalo Bills have in common remains a mystery to me.

Switching gears …  MLB Commissioner, Rob Manfred, said recently that he was confident that a sale of the Minnesota Twins was imminent.  Perhaps that explains why the Twins traded away 10 players from their 40-man roster at the Trade Deadline last week?  The Twins acquired “prospects” galore meaning their minor league system is full to the brim with hope for the future.  Meanwhile the beneficiaries of the Twins largesse were:

• Blue Jays – – two players
• Phillies – – two players
• Astros, Cubs, Dodgers, Rangers, Rays and Tigers – – one player each

The Twins tossed in the towel on the 2025 season; the team was below .500 at the Trade Deadline despite having a higher than usual payroll for 2025 (Opening Day payroll was $144M).  Perhaps the housecleaning was done to clear the books for whoever the new owner might be.

And before I leave baseball today, the Boston Red Sox are on a tear, they have won 6 in a row and are 8-2 in their last 10 games.  The Sox have moved into second place in the AL East and are within 3 games of the Blue Jays.  Meanwhile, the Yankees are in a funk having lost 4 in a row and going 4-6 in their last 10 games.  The AL East race might be interesting after all.

Finally, here is an observation by George Carlin:

“A crazy person will beat nine people to death with a steel dildo, but he’ll be wearing a Bugs Bunny suit at the time.”

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

 

 

About 10 days ago, I got an email from a reader and frequent commenter here; he uses the screen ID, TenaciousP.  He asked if was going to write about Christian Wilkins and I responded that I did not think so because I did not see much to comment on at the time.  Well, that was then and this is now.  So let me do a reset for folks who may not be nearly the Oakland/Los Angeles/Las Vegas Raider fan as TenaciousP most definitely is:

• In 2024, the Raiders signed Wilkins as a free agent offering a contract reported to be 4 years with a total value of $110M with $57.5M fully guaranteed and another $27.25M conditionally guaranteed.  That is a big deal for a DT and Wilkins is a top shelf DT when healthy.
• Last season, Wilkins played in 5 games and suffered a “Jones fracture” in his foot that had him miss the rest of the season.  The injury needed surgery which was done, and Wilkins was involved in rehab.
• The injury had not healed as anticipated and the Raiders’ doctors said that a second surgery was needed; Wilkins demurred and chose to continue rehab.  Training camp was about to open, and he was still unable to practice.  The Raiders put him on the “PUP List” – – the “Physically Unable to Perform List.”
• The Raiders then released Wilkins and have deemed that those “conditional guarantees” worth $27.25M are null and void.  Obviously, the NFLPA chose to fight for Wilkins’ voided guarantees on his behalf; that is what unions are supposed to do.

Here is where I get into deep yogurt.  When a team seeks to nullify “guarantees” in a contract, the team has to specify why they seek to do so.  There are some obvious reasons:

• The player cannot fulfill his obligations under the contract – – say if the player is in jail or is dead.  Pretty obvious situation there …
• The player does not fulfill his obligations under the contract – – say if he does not report to Training Camp or refuses to dress on game day.  Pretty obvious situation there too …
• The player cannot fulfill his obligations under the contract – – say if he is suspended by the league for violating the Substance Abuse Policy.  Less obvious that the items above but not too difficult to deal with …
• The player engages in “conduct detrimental” to the team and its unity.  Now we are in the highly debatable area of contract interpretation where I am indeed over my head.

Did Wilkins’ refusal of that follow-up surgery lead to his inability to play for the Raiders and therefore is his lack of ability to play due to some sort of breach of the terms?   I suspect that the Raiders can find a half-dozen doctors that would support their assertion that was the case AND I think that the NFLPA can find a half-dozen doctors that would support the assertion that continued rehab was a prudent course of treatment.  The NFLPA has a nice sound-bite on its side here because back in the Spring, Raiders’ head coach, Pete Carroll, said that Wilkins was working hard to recover.  Here is some of Carroll’s comment:

“This has been a difficult recovery and he’s done everything he needs to do.  He’s been here every day. He’s here early, working hard, but we’re still working it, and he’s not ready to get back out. We’re in the midst of a long, challenging process here. So, fortunately there’s a lot of time, and we’re going to take every bit of it. We’ve really tried to be really diligent about the way we’ve worked it and the way we’ve monitored it and all of that, and he’s really been on board the whole time. But it has been challenging.”

Granted, Pete Carroll is not a doctor, and his comments have nothing to do with the medical issues in the matter.  Nonetheless, it would seem difficult for the Raiders now to claim that Wilkins is a slacker who refused to do what was necessary to heal his foot.

And if that were not enough controversy/oppositional behavior, Adam Schefter reported last week that there was an incident in the Raiders’ facility recently where Wilkins “playfully” kissed a teammate on the forehead and the teammate took offense.  So …

• Does that constitute “conduct detrimental”?
• Was the “playful kiss on the forehead” a “one-off” incident or is there a pattern of “other stuff” at work there?

I have not read a report that says what the Raiders claim as the basis for voiding those conditional guarantees so I have no idea what the arbitrator in the case will have to deal with.  I am confident, however, that it will not be an open-and-shut case on either side.  I am confident that the arbitrator will earn his/her fee on this one.

So, a shoutout to TenaciousP here.  All I can say is, better late than never.

Finally, the mention of the “playful kiss” here reminds me of a great observation by H. L. Mencken:

“When women kiss it always reminds one of prize fighters shaking hands.”

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

 

 

Earlier this week, I mentioned Ichiro’s inclusion in the Hall of Fame.  He was joined in that ceremony by four other players:

1. Dick Allen
2. Dave Parker
3. CC Sabathia
4. Billy Wagner.

None of those four had a better career than Ichiro but all four are worthy inductees to the Baseball Hall of Fame.  I need to make that clear because I am now going to pick on one of those “new guys”.  Here is my question:

• If CC Sabathia can be elected to the Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility, why is Curt Schilling not in the Hall of Fame at all?

Here are some of the stats that got Sabathia more than 85% of the votes in his first year on the ballot.

• Career:  19 years
• Record:  251-161  win percentage = .609
• Career ERA:  3.74
• Strikeouts:  3,093
• All-Star selection:  6 times
• Cy Young Awards:  1

Now let me give you the same stats for Curt Schilling:

• Career:  20 years
• Record:  216-146  win percentage = .597
• Career ERA:  3.46
• Strikeouts:  3,116
• All-Star selection:  6 times
• Cy Young Awards:  0

Those numbers look awfully similar to me, but if you dig deep into the stats at Baseball-Reference.com and compare Sabathia and Schilling in playoff games, Schilling is the dominant pitcher there.

• Playoff Starts:  Sabathia 23  Schilling 19
• Playoff Record:  Sabathia 10-7  Schilling 11-2
• Playoff ERA:  Sabathia  4.28  Schilling  2.23
• World Series Record:  Sabathia 0-1  Schilling 3-1

Oh, by the way, Curt Schilling was also voted as the World Series MVP in 2001 with the D-Backs.  Remember, nothing here is intended to suggest that CC Sabathia should not be in the Hall of Fame or that he somehow sneaked in through a side exit.  But Curt Schilling has been eligible for the Hall of Fame since 2012.  In 2021, Schilling received 71% of the vote and was only 16 votes shy of the necessary 75% to be elected to the Hall of Fame.

I think it is clear that Schilling never made it to the Hall of Fame – – he is off the ballot after 10 consecutive years of failure to be elected – – for off-field reasons.  The numbers above say that on-field events would have both pitchers enshrined in Cooperstown.  But Curt Schilling was very vocal and very provocative with his social media postings and with his embracement of far out conspiracy theories to the point that many thought of him as an extremist.

I have often argued that unless the off field ”stuff” falls into two categories, it should be ignored; it is the performance on the field that should be determinant unless:

1. The off-field behavior is felonious and there is police/prosecutor involvement.
2. The off-field behavior involves performance enhancing substances that contributed improperly to the on-field stats.

I am not a conspiracy theorist; I bear no animus toward anyone based on their religion or skin color.  On those dimensions, Curt Schilling and I are far apart in the way we appear to view the world.  And yet, if I had had a vote for induction into the Hall of Fame, I would have voted in favor of Curt Schilling simply because as a baseball pitcher, he belongs there.

Moving on …  Yesterday when commenting on Gilbert Arenas’ arrest involving “illegal poker games”, I said that there would be more to the story.  Well yesterday afternoon, it was revealed that another person charged in this illegal poker venue is Giora Gershman who is identified in various reports as “part of an Israeli organized crime group”.  And less than ten minutes after I read that tidbit, I got a phone call from a friend reminding me of another incident involving card games and Gilbert Arenas.

• In 2009, Arenas and Javaris Crittendon were teammates on the Washington Wizards.  A dispute over debts incurred in card games among the team’s players arose and things escalated from trash-talking to direct threats.
• Arenas brought two unleaded guns into the Wizards’ locker room and left them proximally to Crittendon’s locker.
• Then, Crittendon raised the bet and brought a loaded gun into the locker room creating a “tense situation”.
• NBA Commissioner at the time, David Stern, suspended both players for the rest of that regular season.  Crittendon never really came back from the suspension; the Wizards traded Arenas to the Magic.

That incident had faded into the recesses of my memory until that phone call yesterday.

I continue to believe that this story has legs and will be back in the headlines before it is resolved.

Finally, this observation by Leo Rosten:

“Extremists think ‘communication’ means agreeing with them.”

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