A former colleague and reader of these rants for a long time used to be a baseball umpire at the college level. College baseball in the DC area is not usually contested at an “elite level”, and he had some instances where games spiraled out of control. However, he may never have had a situation quite as out of control as the one that unfolded in a Lehigh/Coppin St. baseball game last week. The game was at Coppin St., so Lehigh led off in the first inning:
- The leadoff batter was hit by a pitch.
- In the first eight batters, three more batters were hit by pitches
- Also in the first eight batters there were two walks and two hits yielding 8 runs before the first out was recorded.
- At the end of the top of the first inning, the score was Lehigh 20 and Coppin St. 0
- In that first inning there were 11 walks, 6 batters hit by pitches, a single a double and a grand slam.
- The final score of the game was Lehigh 38 and Coppin St. 6.
I feel confident in saying that the umpires were glad to see the final out recorded in that contest and from personal experience I know that the kids broadcasting that game over the college radio station were glad to see it come to an end. Whew!
Moving on … In the recently completed WNBA Draft, the Dallas Wings selected Azzi Fudd (UConn and Geico commercial star) with the first pick. The side-story to that selection is that it reunites Fudd with Paige Bueckers (former UConn teammates) and evidently, Fudd and Bueckers are a couple. That tidbit sent a few commentators into a tizzy. The line of thinking went something like:
- Might the locker room split into factions if the “couple” chooses to “decouple” down the line?
I think this is a concocted argument; any situation has the potential to go south but most are just dealt with calmly and logically. Moreover, the Wings’ management knows about the relationship here and would calmly and logically seek to use it constructively and not destructively. For me, this “story” has little if any news value; this is “dog bites man” and not “man bites dog”.
- Lesbians on WNBA rosters are not news in 2026
- Married lesbians on the same team are not news; and in fact, one married couple had twins while on the same team.
- Two players on the WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury are currently engaged.
Move along … Nothing to see here …
I mentioned the “Bobby Layne Curse” here in the past; let me do a reset:
- After winning the NFL Championship in 1957, the Lions traded Bobby Layne to the Steelers and gave Tobin Rote the starting QB job in Detroit.
- Layne said the Lions would not win another championship for the next 50 years as a result of that decision.
In fact, the Lions have not won an NFL Championship or a Super Bowl – – or even an NFC Championship – – in the years after 1957. That streak is now entering its 68th NFL season; fifty years of futility is left in the dust of history. Just to rub some salt in the wound back in 2008 – – the year that the “Curse” would be lifted – – the Lions went 0-16 for the year. And there is yet another angle to the story here.
The “Curse” arises from a mistaken decision by the Lions as to their starting QB. Well between the time that Layne was traded in 1958 and the arrival of Matthew Stafford in Detroit in 2009 – – the year after the Lions went 0-16 – – the Lions only had one QB selected for the Pro Bowl in those 50 seasons. That happened in 1971 and the QB was Greg Landry.
The “Bobby Layne Curse” ranks right up there with the “Curse of the Bambino”, the “Billy Goat Curse” and the “Sports Illustrated Cover Jinx. Those are all examples from US sports, but here is one dealing with a foreign sport that is really eerie:
- Mayo is a Gaelic football club, and they won the Irish championship in 1951.
- As the story goes, the team mocked a funeral procession on its way back from the game to their home ground and the “curse” is that Mayo could not win another championship until all members of the 1951 championship team were dead.
- In fact, Mayo has not won the Sam Maguire Cup – – the Irish equivalent of the Lombardi Trophy – – since 1951 which was 75 years ago.
- Cue the music from The Twilight Zone…
Finally, this from Oscar Wilde:
“Work is the curse of the drinking classes.”
But don’t get me wrong, I love sports………
Having worked a couple of Coppin State games years ago, I am not shocked to see them involved in such a debacle. You are correct; that’s quite a bit worse than anything I ever worked.
If I had been there, the strike zone might have stretched a bit by the second inning.
Greg Landry. You look at his statistics for 1971 and they are slightly less pedestrian than a streetlight. Times sure have changed.