The Sports Curmudgeon

The Supreme Court of the United States is not a normal source of material for these rants but that was not the case yesterday.  In a unanimous 8-0 decision, the court struck down the provision of the Lanham Act that allows the Patent and Trademark Office to deny trademarks in cases where the name being trademarked may be offensive.  The Court said this was a violation of the First Amendment – and indeed, it is.  The Lanham Act was passed by the Congress and signed by the President meaning that it was the force of law and the US government that was regulating such speech/expression.  As someone who places high value on the First Amendment – and who gets annoyed when people try to invoke it in situations not involving the “interference” of federal laws – I applaud this decision.

Right about now, I can imagine people wondering what the heck this has to do with sports.  Here it is:

• This decision is going to make it very difficult for the Patent and Trademark people to prevail in their action to deny the Washington Redskins a renewal of the team trademark.  [Aside:  This case did not involve the Redsiins; this case involved the “trademark folks” and a rock band with a name that the trademark folks found to be offensive.]

Given that there are a significant number of folks who find the name “redskins” offensive, my reaction – were I the owner of the team – would be to change it to something else.  However, I do not own the team and never will.  Therefore, this decision now rests in the hands of Danny Boy Snyder and the odds of him changing the team name are about the same as the odds that I will buy the team from him.  This has to remain the owner’s decision and not the US Government’s decision.

Since my preference would be to change the team name – and I acknowledge that my preference does not matter a whit as compared to the preservation of the First Amendment – I have paid attention to the protests and the actions taken by folks who seek that change.  This Supreme Court decision deals them a serious if not fatal blow.  I have said this before; let me say it again here with regard to this “protest movement”:

1. If you try to make the team name a moral issue, you can save your breath to blow your beans.
2. The only way to effect a change here is to make this an economic issue – one that turns the team from a cash cow into a cash drain.

Denying a trademark renewal would have been an economic blow to the team; now it seems as if that is not going to happen.  So, if the activists are going to do anything useful now, they have to come up with some other economic aspect to their activism.  And as I finish typing those words let me say unequivocally that organizing and maintaining a boycott against an entity as large and popular as any NFL team or the NFL itself is more than merely a daunting task.

For a far more informed analysis of this decision and its potential impact on the Redskins/Trademark Office contretemps to come, please check out this link from Forbes.

Since I began today with a sports issue that seems to ricochet off the First Amendment of the US Constitution, let me take a moment here to comment on a sports issue that has nothing to do with the First Amendment – – even though some would have you believe that it does.  Over the weekend, Colin Kaepernick made his job hunt in the NFL more difficult.  After a jury in Minnesota returned a verdict of “not guilty” in the trial of the police officer who shot and killed Philando Castile.  Kaepernick was hardly the only person who protested the verdict and every person who protested peacefully simply exerted their fundamental Consitituional right to do so.  However, what Kaepernick did as part of his protest makes his job search more difficult.

In a Tweet, Kaepernick compared police officers to the people who hunted down runaway slaves in the 1800s; he posted a picture of the badges worn by those slave hunters juxtaposed with a police badge from today.  Before going a millimeter further, let me state clearly:

1. I think it is inappropriate to equate – or even suggest – that police officers in the US in 2017 are analogous to the runaway slave hunters of the early 1800s.
2. Nonetheless, if Colin Kaepernick or any other folks think that is a valid expression of their feelings, they are free to say so and to post images like the ones Kaepernick did.
3. There must be NO legal consequences from any level of government to such expression in order to preserve the First Amendment.

At the same time, this latest expression of protest from Colin Kaepernick makes him “more controversial” for a team that might consider signing him to be part of their roster.  Now, even if some teams – or even all of the NFL teams – make a decision that his level of controversy is more than they wish to incur, that is not a legal consequence of Colin Kaepernick’s protest or his latest appropriate expression of his protest.

There are precedents in sports where individuals have made inappropriate/offensive remarks and it cost them their jobs on a permanent basis.  Consider:

1. Al Campanis:  He was the GM for the LA Dodgers for about 20 years.  In the late 80s, he said on TV that Blacks “may not have some of the necessities” to be baseball managers or general managers.  Campanis had been a teammate of Jackie Robinson and was good friends with Robinson; Campanis had been a very successful GM in his career.  Nonetheless, after his remarks, he became radioactive and never worked in MLB again.
2. Jimmy “The Greek” Snyder:  As a TV personality/commentator, Snyder was widely known for his flamboyant style and his definitive viewpoints.  Arpound the same time that Al Campanis made his career-killing remarks, Snyder said on camera that the reason Blacks were so good as athletes was that they were bred to be big and strong by the slave masters in the Old South.  CBS fired Snyder in the wake of those remarks and he never worked in network TV again.

            It is more than merely “OK” to hold controversial positions; it is absolutely one’s right to express one’s views and to advocate for those controversial position.  That does not mean that such expressions can be done without any consequences at all.  Those expressions cannot be squelched by the government but those expressions can cost one a career or at least force one into a change of career.

Finally, let me end on a lighter note here with this “sports/political analysis” from Brad Rock in the Deseret News:

“WWE legend Kane has filed to run for mayor of Knox County, Tennessee.

“In 2013 Kane was voted Most Hated Pro Wrestler of the Year.

“Which means becoming a politician should be a natural transition, right?”

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

 

 

Late last week, the Celtics and the Sixers made a draft pick trade.  In terms of this year’s draft, the Sixers move up from #3 to #1 while the Celtics get another first round pick from the Sixers in 2019.  If the common narrative is correct, the Sixers will take Markelle Fultz with the overall #1 pick; and then after the Lakers take Lonzo Ball, the Celtics will take Josh Jackson.  Here is my assessment of the situation:

• Markelle Fultz:  Because Washington was not a top-shelf team last year, I did not get to see a lot of his play back here on the East Coast.  I did make it a point to watch a Washington/UCLA game because both Fultz and Lonzo Ball would be on the court together.  That game was a blowout in favor of UCLA but it seemed to me that the basis of the blowout was the lack of real talent around Fultz.  Based on highlights I have seen and on his state, Markelle Fultz seems like a player who can make it in the NBA – – but I have no idea if he is the best player in this draft.
• Lonzo Ball:  I have said before and will say again that Lonzo Ball is gifted when it comes to passing and hitting the open man.  In that aspect of the game, he may be the best since Magic and Bird.  He is not a natural scorer although he does have great range on his jump shot.  His weakness is that he does not play any defense at all and will have to ramp up that part of his game significantly in the NBA.
• Josh Jackson:  Based on last year’s college basketball season, I think he is the best player in this draft.  He is athletic; he can shoot – albeit his range may need to be expanded a bit; he is a good defender and he will rebound once he adds some weight/muscle to his frame.

Based on that assessment – and on the assumption that the Sixers are going to take Markelle Fultz – I suspect that the Celtics got the better of this deal.  If you are a Celtics’ fan, you may want to harken back about 35 years to the last time the Celtics traded away the overall #1 pick in the draft in order to move down to #3 and pick up “other assets.  That trade wound up being a windfall for the Celtics; let me remind you of the trade:

1. Celtics gave the overall #1 pick to the Golden State Warriors – which they used to draft Joe Barry Carroll – plus the #13 pick in the draft – which they used to draft Ricky Brown.
2. Celtics got from the Warriors, the #3 pick – which they used to draft Kevin McHale – plus Robert Parrish.

Kevin McHale and Robert Parrish – plus Larry Bird of course – made the Celtics a force majeure in the NBA for more than a few years.  Rickey Brown played 6 seasons in the NBA averaging 13.2 minutes per game, 3.4 points per game and 0.4 rebounds per game.  Joe Barry Carroll was a solid NBA player averaging 20 points per game for his career.  In addition, he always led the league in first names…

I don’t know if this Celtics’ trade will bring the same windfall of talent as did the one they made with the Warriors about 35 years ago, but I do think the Celtics came out ahead on the deal.

Since I mentioned the Golden State Warriors tangentially above, let me move to the current wondering as to whether or not the team will go to visit the White House as the NBA champions.  I do not understand why this is worth the energy it takes to think about it.  In the first place, I have seen nothing that suggests that the team has been invited to the White House and – despite the seeming grandeur of winning a sports championship – teams need to be invited to go to the White House and do their silliness with the incumbent President.  They do not decide to show up one day and get to see the President because they are the reigning champs of whatever sport…

Moreover, Bob Molinaro pointed out last weekend in the Hampton Roads Virginian-Pilot that Larry Bird did not go to the White House to “visit” Ronald Reagan and that Michael Jordan did not go to the White House to see George H. W. Bush.  As Professor Molinaro properly observed, the republic survived.

I think we can dial back the energy that is going into this story and report the outcome – they will go or they won’t go – in the agate section of the newspaper after the invitation is offered…

The US Open concluded yesterday with Brooks Koepka as the champion.  If you have never heard of Brooks Koepka, that could be because he has only won one tournament in his career and that was certainly not a major championship.  Koepka finished at 16-under for the tournament winning by 4 strokes.

Dwight Perry had this comment relative to the US Open in his column, Sideline Chatter, in the Seattle Times last weekend:

“The U.S. Open gallery witnessed quite an unusual sideshow during Thursday’s opening round at Erin Hills: an advertising blimp crashing to Earth about a mile from the course.

“Evoking memories of John Daly carding an 18 on No. 6 at Bay Hill in 1998.”

Finally, with the CFL season set to start later this week, the Saskatchewan Rough Riders released QB Vince Young who was trying to make a football comeback there.  Young had suffered a hamstring injury in training camp and was expected to be out for the first several weeks of the CFL season – – but he was cut.  Greg Cote had this comment in the Miami Herald in the wake of that release:

“Want the exact definition of ‘your football career is over’?  Comeback-attempting Vince Young got cut by the Saskatchewan Roughriders.”

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

 

 

I have a bunch of little things on tap for today so I’ll just call this “hit-and-run” to get them all in.  Ricky Fowler shot a 65 yesterday in the first round of the US Open.  That is a good round on just about any day, but it put Fowler in a tie for the best performance in the opening round of the US Open at 7-under par.  Only two other golfers in history have done that; they would be Jack Nicklaus and Tom Weiskopf.

Obviously, it is more important where Ricky Fowler finishes the tournament on Sunday but I still think this is a big deal for him because any time a golfer can put his name on a short list and the other two names on that list are “Nicklaus” and “Weiskopf”, he has done something special.

Yesterday, LeBron James was spotted leaving a gym workout with his head shaved.  James’ receding hairline has been a topic of discussion for reasons that have never been clear to me.  Yesterday he had the hair on the top of his head cropped and he was rubbing the area of the shorn locks.  Naturally, this “new look” attracted attention on SportsCenter and outlets of that ilk.  People who are prone to seek “meaning” in any and all circumstances pounced on this with interpretations such as “even more commitment to regain the NBA championship next year” and “new look/new determination”.

Frankly, I think most of that is an excessive strain of logic.  But if anyone simply must have a “hidden meaning” in this change of coiffure, let me offer a really nonsensical one:

• Maybe this is a secret/subliminal message to James’ buddy, Chris Paul, to re-sign with the LA Clippers because James will join him there after next year when James is a free agent.  How is this a subliminal message?  Well, he cut his hair – – and you need “clippers” to do that.

If you want to buy that “explanation” of what happened here, perhaps I can also interest you in oceanfront property in Omaha …

Meanwhile, Kevin Durant made a pronouncement yesterday that Kyrie Irving was a better player that Allen Iverson.  Any “debate” about that quickly devolves into “oh, yeah?” versus “well how about this?”  Obviously, they are both outstanding players and one of the unattractive features of such comparisons is that it becomes necessary to assert negative things about the player one is in favor of.  As I said, they are both excellent and I will only point out one thing that Allen Iverson accomplished that Kyrie Irving has not:

• Allen Iverson plus a cast of journeymen supporters made it to the NBA Finals.  There were no other players on that Sixers’ team who will ever get a vote for the Hall of Fame; most of them never even made it to the all-Star game.  Nonetheless they got to the NBA Finals and actually won a game against the Lakers’ team led by Shaq and Kobe.
• Kyrie Irving has been to the Finals multiple times and has won a championship but the “other players” on his Cavaliers’ team were significantly better than Iverson’s teammates.

Connor McGregor and Floyd Mayweather are going to fight – with boxing rules – in August.  You can expect hype and hoopla galore for the next 10 weeks.  This is going to be a spectacle and not a fight.  Given that this is a boxing match, McGregor is at a huge disadvantage.  Max Kellerman made this point yesterday:

• Consider the best water polo player in the world.  He obviously knows how to swim and he obviously has strength, stamina and familiarity with the water.
• Now consider Michael Phelps.
• If these two men were matched in a race, Phelps would have a huge advantage; if they were matched in a water polo game, the other guy would likely dominate.
• Pairing those two athletes in one-another’s sport would prove nothing.  Neither will the McGregor/Mayweather spectacle.

This is nothing more than a “money-grab” by all the involved parties.  Good for them as they pull it off; there are plenty of folks out there who are already committed to buying the pay-per-view for this thing.  I do not begrudge anyone their take from this “fight” but you may be certain that none of that take will come from my pockets.

I happened to see the Houston Astros play several times in the past couple of weeks and that leads me to make this very simple and very straightforward statement:

• Carlos Correa and Jose Altuve are a whole lot of fun to watch both in the field and at bat.

The NCAA put Louisville on probation for 4 years and suspended Rick Pitino from 5 ACC conference games next year.  This is based on the prior allegations made by a woman that an assistant coach at Louisville paid her to provide escorts and sexual services to potential recruits in a dormitory at Louisville.  Pitino is being punished for not sufficiently supervising the activities of that assistant coach.

Here is the problem.  A prosecutor and the police have considered the allegations made here and they are far more serious than any prudish concern about plying teenagers with sexual favors or prostitution; one allegation was that a minor child was used for some of the sexual favors.  At the end of all that investigating – which took more than a year – there were no charges brought against anyone.  Not the assistant coach …  Not the woman making the allegations …  Not the person(s) who allegedly inserted the minor female into the narrative …

So, the NCAA here is punishing Rick Pitino and the assistant coach (He is under a 10-year show-cause restriction from getting another college coaching job.) and Louisville as a school for actions that did not even result in charges let alone convictions.  So, here is the essence:

• Rick Pitino did not sufficiently supervise a member of his coaching staff there by allowing him to … do something that is alleged but cannot be proven?
• If I were to allege that the assistant coach also arranged for recruits to have sex with a yeti, would that mean Pitino was guilty of an even bigger NCAA offense?

Finally, here is a comment from Brad Dickson in the Omaha World-Herald that mirrors my experience:

“Joanna Jedrzejczyk made her fifth successful UFC title defense. ‘Jedrzejczyk’ looks like something I ended up with last time I tried to work the New York Times crossword puzzle.”

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

 

 

Happy Flag Day.  On this date 240 years ago, the Second Continental Congress adopted the Stars and Stripes as the country’s flag.

Having exactly nothing to do with Flag Day, I read a “thought piece” yesterday on this question:

• Could a team of current NFL free agents beat the Browns or the Jets?

My reaction to that was simple and two-fold:

1. Who cares?
2. At least this is a different spin on the hackneyed “think pieces” trying to assert that Alabama or whatever college team is ranked #1 at the time could beat the worst team in the NFL.

What caught my attention, however, was that the author cited 2 NFL teams as sufficiently bad – on paper – to merit inclusion in the hypothetical race to the bottom.  We know the Browns stunk last year winning only one game with a roster full of question marks regarding NFL talent.  We also know that the Jets were miserable last year and that they are still in search of the “Franchise QB replacement” for Joe Namath.  [FYI, he left the Jets for the Rams after the 1976 season.]  So, I started to take a look at what the Jets had done so far in this off-season; and based on a quick glance, they may indeed be in as bad shape as the Browns or the Niners or the Bears.

The Jets will never announce that they are tanking the season but they are clearly tearing down the roster that they had and starting from a point not unlike an expansion team.  One report that I read said that the Jets got rid of $68M in salary with their veteran cuts in this off-season; I will take that as a fact and not try to verify all the cuts and all the salary numbers associated with those cuts.  Here are some of the veterans who were on the Jets’ roster in 2016 who are not on the Jets’ roster as of this morning:

1. Ryan Clady OT:  Clady is only 30 years old so you would think he has some tread left on his tires.  He did suffer a shoulder injury last year that sent him to the DL late in the season and he had a knee injury earlier in his career.  He is still a free agent so maybe that injury history is significant?
2. Eric Decker WR:  Decker is 29 years old and only played 3 games last year due to injury.  However, in his 2 previous seasons with the Jets, he averaged more than 990 yards receiving.  Decker was only released last week so his future whereabouts are not yet determined.
3. Marcus Gilchrist S:  Gilchrist is only 28 years old and seemed to play well last season.  He will find work somewhere else.
4. David Harris ILB:  Harris 33 years old and has been with the Jets since 2007 – his entire time in the NFL.  His age probably does not fit with any sort of “long-range projection” for the team and its roster but David Harris can still play somewhere.  Like Eric Decker, his separation from the Jets only happened a week ago; it remains unclear where he will surface.
5. Nick Mangold C:  Mangold is 33 years old and has been part of the Jets’ OL for his entire career.  If, in fact, the Jets’ braintrust is working on a 5-year plan to rebuild the roster, it would not make a lot of sense to work around a center who would be 38 at that time.  Like Clady, Nick Mangold remains a free agent; if my contract research is correct, he was scheduled to make $9M in 2017 with the Jets and if that is what he is seeking in a new contract as a free agent, perhaps the price tag is why he is still “unemployed”.
6. Brandon Marshall WR:  Marshall is 33 years old and has been with the Jets for 2 seasons.  In those years, he has averaged about 1150 yards receiving.  Marshall signed a new deal with the NY Giants in March 2017 soon after he became a free agent.
7. Calvin Pryor S:  Pryor is only 24 years old and has been with the Jets for 3 seasons.  Reports say that he has not lived up to his potential as a first-round pick in 2014; I would not know about that.  Pryor was traded from the Jets to the Browns for Demario Davis who used to be with the Jets but then signed on with the Browns.  Now he is back with the Jets…
8. Darrelle Revis DB:  Revis is 31 years old and it was not too long ago that he was one of the top 3 defensive backs in the NFL.  Last season, however, was not his finest hour.  The question hanging in the air is whether he has lost a step and should be willing to covert to playing safety or if the defensive scheme(s) last year did not set him up to succeed.  Rumors have Revis going to the Cowboys – but he is not signed there yet.

            This is not an exhaustive list of the players who were Jets but are no longer Jets but it demonstrates that a team that won only 4 games last year has jettisoned (sorry about that) a significant portion of its starting talent.  The Jets’ GM says that these roster moves are intended “to create opportunities for a lot of players on the roster”.  I should say so; three quarters of the Jets’ starting defensive backfield from last year are gone.  There are indeed opportunities for young players on the Jets’ roster but the key question is this:

• Is there enough talent among the young/replacement players to make up for the talent and experience that is now on the free agent market?

Sunday October 8, 2017 will be Week 5 of the NFL season.  On that day, the NY Jets will venture forth to play the Cleveland Browns in Cleveland.  That game should have exactly no bearing on playoffs or tie-breakers, but it could well have a significant impact on the draft order in the Top 3 of the 2018 NFL Draft…

Finally, here is a comment from Dwight Perry in the Seattle Times:

“Former NFL agent Terry Watson pleaded guilty to giving cash to three former North Carolina football players.

“In keeping with tradition, they had tutors take it for them.”

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

 

 

After the sudden demise of my computer over the weekend, I am back at the keyboard with a new device – – albeit without any major change of attitude.  The NBA Finals are over; the Golden State Warriors are the champions; we saw two interesting/competitive games in the Finals and that should be taken as a blessing in this year of boring/blowout NBA games.  At one point during the early stages of the playoffs, I thought about labeling the NBA as the National Blowout Association but did not because trying to define “blowout” so that I could make the case was convoluted and the amount of research necessary to go back a month or so into regular season games quickly convinced me to do other things.

The MVP of the Finals is Kevin Durant and he played last night just like an MVP shooting 14 for 20 and totaling 39 points.  Nevertheless, the biggest advantage the Warriors had last night – and for the balance of the Finals – was their bench.  Compare these aggregate numbers from last night:

1. Warriors’’ bench played 70 minutes; Cavs’ bench played 49 minutes.
2. Warriors’ bench scored 35 points; Cavs’ bench scored 7 points.
3. Warriors bench had 9 rebounds; Cavs’ bench had 4 rebounds.
4. Warriors’ bench committed 6 fouls; Cavs’ bench committed 11 fouls.

After the game, LeBron James said that he needed time to “figure things out”.  That’s fair; it should be unreasonable to expect that he already knows what needs to be done to change the outcome for him and the Cavaliers next year.  However, since I had the luxury to watch the games in the Finals without having to worry about how to do things on the court to thwart the Warriors, let me make one solid suggestion to LeBron James and anyone else in the Cavaliers’ Front Office who may be involved in off-season changes:

• The Cavaliers need significant improvement on defense.  James is a good defender and Tristan Thompson is sometimes a good defender.  Iman Shumpert is a good defender off the bench most of the time.  If the Cavs are to beat the Warriors’ offensive machine, they need a major upgrading on defense.  If I read the contracts correctly, the Cavs will have 5 veteran bench players heading into free agency this summer.  That is the window of opportunity for the Cavs to find a couple of defensive specialists as replacements.

This season’s Warriors’ team might be summarized algebraically like this:

• 2016 Warriors minus Harrison Barnes plus Kevin Durant = 2017 Warriors.
• Therefore – – –  2017 Warriors > 2016 Warriors.

Meanwhile, the Cavs made only cosmetic changes from 2016 to 2017 adding Kyle Korver – who plays zero defense – and Deron Williams who is well past his sell-by date.  The Cavs were able to come back from a 3-1 deficit in the Finals in 2016, but the simple fact is that the Warriors got significantly better and the Cavs did not.

Meanwhile, the Stanley Cup Finals also concluded with the Pittsburgh Penguins as the repeat Stanley Cup champions.  The NHL revenue for the season appears to have been flat as compared to the previous season and that would suggest a lack of growing interest in the sport.  However, according to the folks who measure TV viewership, the Finals did very well.  The games in the Finals averaged almost 4.5 million viewers and if that is accurate, that means these Finals attracted a bigger audience in the US than any previous NHL Finals that did not have one of the “Original Six” in the series.  The last game of the Finals had an audience in excess of 7 million viewers.

I find that even more impressive given that Pittsburgh and Nashville are not “major-markets”; a Stanley Cup Final series between LA and Philly would not have “Original Six” teams in it but the number of people in those cities dwarfs the numbers in Pittsburgh and Nashville.

I mentioned that the NHL revenues for the season were flat and according to this report in the NY Post, that puts the NHLPA in a delicate position.  I am not going to pretend to understand all of the ramifications here, but if there is agita on the union side as it starts to prepare its negotiating position for the next CBA in a couple of years, that is not a good sign.  Remember, the two folks sitting across the bargaining table from each other:

• Gary Bettman – the man who sacrificed an entire season of NHL hockey in order to get concessions in a previous set of CBA negotiations.
• Donald Fehr – the former leader of the MLBPA and a co-conspirator in the work stoppages that plagued MLB in the 80s and 90s.

In college basketball, Chris Holtmann is the new coach at Ohio State after 3 successful seasons at Butler where his teams made the NCAA Tournament each year.  Holtmann was originally hired at Butler on a “1-year/show us what you can do” contract at Butler; that was his first head coaching job.  Now he has gone to Ohio State with an 8-year contract that could – with incentives – approach $25M.  After Ohio State fired Thad Matta and went hunting for a replacement, I said that the school had the ability to “money-whip” a replacement.  I think these numbers indicate that I was onto something with that comment.

Finally, since I said above that I was back to ranting without a change of attitude, let me close with a definition from The Official Dictionary of Sarcasm:

“Air:  The glorious God-given substance that provides us our very breath of life while also containing the disgusting contagious pathogens that will one day kill us.”

Have a good day …

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

 

 

Tomorrow is the 149^th running of the Belmont Stakes.  In terms of “buzz” and excitement, this race had generated just about nothing.  Not only is there no possible Triple Crown winner in the field, neither the Derby winner – Always Dreaming – nor the Preakness winner – Cloud Computing – will go to the post.  Lest you think that their trainers and owners have them entered somewhere else, that is not the case; both horses are stabled at Belmont park.  For 2017, the Belmont Stakes is really not much more than your garden variety Grade 1 Stakes race run on a summer weekend – – except for the fact that the race is a mile and a half.

If you have never been to Belmont Park, it is a huge facility; in terms of size it dwarfs Pimlico and Churchill Downs; the record attendance for a Belmont Stakes was 120,000; it would surprise me if the live gate tomorrow is more than half that figure.  The Belmont has always had to be its own draw because the New York Racing Association has never been known for its promotional acumen.  Let me give you a couple of tidbits about the race so that you might be tempted to use the remote to tune in and see it tomorrow around 6:30 PM EDT.

• Hall of Fame trainer, Woody Stephens, saddled the winner of the Belmont 5 times – and all 5 of those races were in succession from 1982-1986.
• Trainer D. Wayne Lukas saddled the winner 3 years in a row from 1994-1996.
• The record time for the Belmont Stakes is 2:24 set by Secretariat in 1973.  That record is 2 full seconds – about 10 lengths in handicapping terms – better than the second fastest time in the race.

That last item leads me to share with you something #2 son pointed out to me.  Someone has taken the telecasts of the 1973 race won by Secretariat and put it side-by-side with the telecast of the 2015 race won by American Pharaoh and posted it on YouTube.  Let me be clear, Secretariat would have beaten American Pharaoh by 13 lengths based on their times but there is an interesting aspect to the race comparison.

As you watch the 1973 race, Secretariat blazes through the early fractions and then continues on a pace that leaves the second place horse 31 lengths in the dust.  If you only look at that race, it appears as if Secretariat is actually accelerating in the final portions.  However, when the two races are juxtaposed, you can see – and you can verify by looking at the split times for the ¾ of a mile and for the mile that American Pharaoh actually ran the final half mile faster than Secretariat did.

Just for fun, here is the  video comparison…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eT50hQINVrI

For what it is worth, here are my picks for the race.  Until late yesterday, I liked Epichris (#11) to be part of the superfecta but then I read he had been given a pain killer shot for an abscess on his foot.  That convinced me to look eslewhere for a runner in a mile-and-a-half race so here is my wager:

• Exacta Box: Tapwrit (#2) and Irish War Cry (#7)
• Trifecta Box: Tapwrit/ Irish War Cry/ Twisted Tom (#1)
• Superfecta Box:  Tapwrit/Irish War Cry/Twisted Tom/ J Boys Echo (#4)

I want to switch gears here and talk about a relatively new phenomenon in sports radio and sports TV commentary.  It did not start yesterday but yesterday put me over the top here.  It seems the latest fashion is to discuss how current ongoing events may or may not affect the “legacy” of some star player or some team.  Yesterday’s versions of this sort of nonesnse went along these lines:

• If the Warriors sweep the Cavaliers, will that tarnish LeBron James’ legacy to the point that any discussion of him as “The GOAT” is “off the table”.
• If the Warriors sweep the Cavaliers, does that make this team the greatest basketball team of all time?

I guess the producers of the radio shows and the TV shows have to come up with items to fill time, but these sorts of discussions have gotten tiresome very quickly.  For starters, what the Hell difference does it make if I think the 1990s Bulls teams are better than the current Warriors team and you think the obverse?  We could have that “debate” privately over some beer and chips and it would probably move on to another topic in about 3 minutes – if we got really worked up over the “debate”.  On radio and TV this goes on forever and ever and ever…

The idea of a “legacy” should not – because it cannot – be assessed in the current time.  A player’s legacy or a team’s legacy is only capable of measurement once a decent interval of time has past.  Legacies are things that are more on the “mental” or “intellectual” end of the spectrum; in the immediate moment, “mental” and “intellectual” things tend to get clouded by emotions and adrenaline and endorphins. Let me give you two examples:

1. In 1979, OJ Simpson retired from an 11-year career in the NFL.  If, during the final weeks of his career, you had discussed his “legacy”, the focus would have been on things like “first-ballot Hall of Fame RB” and “2000-yard season” and “five time first Team All-Pro” and “in the conversation with Jim Brown as the best RB ever”.  That was then.  In 2017, with the perspective of history, is that OJ Simpson’s legacy?
2. In 1986, Pete Rose retired from a 24-year career in MLB.  If during the final weeks of his career, you had discussed his “legacy” the focus would have been on things like “all-time leader in base hits with 4,256” and “sure-fire first ballot Hall of Fame” and “played the game the right way” and “Charlie Hustle”.  That was then.  In 2017, with the perspective of history, is that Pete Rose’s legacy?

Having dismissed these “legacy debates” as frivolous at best, let me try to answer briefly the two sorts of questions that dominated a lot of yesterday’s air-time:

1. Getting swept in the Finals by an opponent cannot possibly be a positive entry on any player’s résumé.  At the same time, a career is much more than a single 4-game series.
2. I doubt that the 2017 Golden State Warriors could possibly have beaten – let alone dominated – the original Dream Team.

Finally, here is an item from Norman Chad’s syndicated column, The Couch Slouch.  It is one of a list of “facts, tired and true, about the widening world of sports television”:

“Best thing about having kidney stones?  It takes your mind off Stephen A. Smith.”

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

 

 

Earlier this week, here is what I said I wanted from the NBA Finals:

“I would like a game to be tied with 2 minutes left to play.  Then I want either team to win the game – I really do not care which one – without the benefit of some outlandish call by an official.

“I am only asking for one game like that.  After enduring the tedium of this NBA regular season and its playoffs, I don’t think that is so much to ask for.”

Well, I got my wish last night; it was a 5-point game with 3 minutes to go and a 1-point game with 1 minute to go and there were no outlandish calls in the final 3 minutes of the game.  The Warriors scored the final 11 points in the game to take a 3-0 lead in the Finals. Here is some history:

• Prior to this year, 12 teams have taken a 3-0 lead in the NBA Finals.
• All 12 of them have become NBA Champions.

If you are to believe the narrative of many of the sports yikkers on TV, this series and this season represents LeBron James’ quest to be recognized as “The GOAT” in basketball.  I have no idea if that is really in James’ mind – nor do I care because those sorts of arguments get very old very quickly.  However, I would note that leading/carrying the first team ever to come back from a 3-0 deficit in the Finals would be a solid résumé entry.

I have not seen any reports on the TV ratings from last night’s game but the ratings for Games 1 and 2 were up about 8% from last year when these same two teams met in the Finals.  My interpretation of that is that plenty of basketball fans knew in their hearts that this was going to be the pairing in the Finals and had been waiting all year to see it.  Regular season ratings had been down but now the fans were going to get what they really wanted to see.  Games 1 & 2 were hardly exciting; last night’s game was as entertaining as anyone could have wanted.

Also earlier this week, I said that there was a surprise eruption of news from the college basketball world when Ohio State fired Thad Matta as its head coach.  Early June is normally a quiescent time in college basketball – just as it is in college football.  And then, yesterday, news broke in the world of college football that was even more shocking than Ohio state’s announcement.  Bob Stoops announced his retirement as the head coach of the Oklahoma Sooners football team.

At the news conference called to make this announcement, Stoops said specifically that “health” was not a factor in his decision.  He made that point emphatically more than once.  That is good to hear because I know of no reason to wish ill-health on Bob Stoops.  Moreover, here is a bit of Stoops’ family history:

• Bob Stoops’ father, Ron Stoops Sr., was a successful high school coach in Ohio.  In 1988 at the age of 54, Ron Stoops Sr. was coaching in a game against an opponent coached by his son, Ron Jr.
• In the second half of that game, Ron Stoops, Sr. collapsed on the sidelines and died of a heart attack soon after the game ended.
• Bob Stoops is now 56 years old…

I am not insinuating in any way that Bob Stoops has a health problem; that would be an outrageous assertion.  I do think, however, that his father’s sideline incident and Bob Stoops’ current age has to be something in the back of his mind.  Bob Stoops has made plenty of money in his career at Oklahoma; he is leaving on his own terms; he could – if he wanted to – slip easily into a TV commentator role.  He has earned his retirement years and has decided to start to “cash in on them” a bit earlier than most highly successful coaches do.

Here is what I mean by a “highly successful coach” as it applies to Bob Stoops’ career:

• His record at OU is 190-48; the Sooners under Stoops were 101-9 in Norman, OK.
• In 18 years, Stoops’ teams won 10 conference championships and 1 National Championship.
• In 14 of his 18 seasons at Oklahoma, the team won 10 games or more.

Oklahoma named its offensive coordinator, Lincoln Riley, as the man to take over from Stoops; Riley is all of 33 years old.  Following a legend in a job is not an easy task.  Let me use Oklahoma football to demonstrate what I mean:

1. Bud Wilkinson coached the Sooners in the 50s and early 60s; his teams dominated the 50s and won national championships.  When he retired, the next two coaches spent a total of 3 years on the sidelines and the total record over those 3 seasons was 15-15-1.
2. Barry Switzer coached the Sooners in the 70s and 80s also winning national championships and amassing a winning percentage of .844.  From the time Switzer left and Bob Stoops took over, three coaches amassed a cumulative record of 61-50-2 – – not nearly a winning percentage of .844.

Bonne chance, Lincoln Riley …

It is almost obligatory at this point to pose the rhetorical question:

• Will Bob Stoops ever return to coaching?

Here is my answer:

• He left coaching on his own terms and so he could change his mind someday – also on his own terms – and return to the sidelines somewhere.  Here is a major question he will need to resolve in his own mind.
• Absent a financial necessity to go back and earn the kind of money a highly successful college football coach can command, would he want to spend a significant portion of every year cajoling 17-year old prima donnas to come to his school to play football as opposed to going to some other school to do the same thing.  Or has he “been there … done that”?

Finally, with so much of today’s rant focused on matters in college football, this commentary from Brad Dickson seems an appropriate way to close things out:

“Next year’s College Football Playoff national championship game will have a ‘Super Bowl-style halftime show.’ Step one: Hire a musician whose last hit song was in 1968.

“ESPN and the College Football Playoff committee are going to work on the halftime show together. What could possibly go wrong here?”

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

 

 

I do not play fantasy sports but I have a hunch that, if you had Scooter Gennett in your baseball lineup yesterday, you did pretty well.  Gennett tied an MLB record with 4 home runs in a single game becoming only the 17^th player in baseball history to do that.  He also had a single to produce a stat line for the evening like this:

• 5 for 5; 4 runs scored; 10 RBIs; 17 total bases

At the start of the game, Gennett had hit a total of 38 home runs in his career which began in 2013 and consisted of 502 games and 1637 at bats.  It is fair to say that he had a “career-game” last night.

The Seattle Seahawks put an end to the speculation that they would sign Colin Kaepernick as their backup QB earlier this week by signing Austin Davis to fill that role.  I wrote previously that I thought Seattle would be a logical landing spot for Kaepernick for the simple reason that the team had no viable backup on the roster but the rest of the roster indicated that the playoffs should be within reach.  Signing Austin Davis simply adds fuel to the concocted debate that has been out there ever since the Niners released Kaepernick regarding the motive(s) for his long-standing free agency.

Austin Davis was drafted by the Rams out of Southern Mississippi in the 2012 NFL Draft.  He did not see the field in his rookie; he did not see the field in 2013 and in the previous 2 seasons, he has appeared in 13 games – starting 10 of them.  He was with the Rams in 2014 and the Browns in 2015.  When Austin Davis is the starter, his team’s record is 3-7-0.  For his career, he has thrown 13 TDs and 12 INTs and he has completed 62.4% of his passes.

Meaning absolutely no disrespect to Austin Davis, those statistical entries on his résumé do not match those of Colin Kaepernick who did take a team to the Super Bowl.  Meaning absolutely no disrespect to Colin Kaepernick, that was at the end of the 2012 NFL season and a lot of water has gone over the dam since then.

I do not know why the Seahawks made the decision that they did; they worked out and interviewed both men; the folks who run the Seahawks are not stumblebums.  Rather than add to the cacophony surrounding this “debate”, I will simply say this:

• When a player’s perceived talent level is sufficient, that perception is sufficient to override some dark stains on that player’s reputation – darker than Colin Kaepernick’s national anthem protest last year.

Let me stay with NFL news for a moment here …  If you have watched NFL games on TV for even a few moments, you realize that beer companies spend a lot of money buying advertising time on those games.  However, there have never been any ads there for hard liquor and the reason for that is that the NFL has “worked with its broadcast partners” to refrain from selling ad slots for those sorts of products.  That will change this season.

The NFL has eased up a bit here and will allow the networks to sell up to 4 ad slots (30 seconds each) to hard liquor products per game.  This is not a capitulation by the NFL to economic realities because there are still restrictions:

• None of the ads can be “football focused”.  You are not going to see folks in their backyard pounding shots and playing touch football; you are not going to see a football team in the locker room after a game drinking highballs; you are not going to see an active player endorsing “hooch”.
• Each ad must contain some sort of exhortation to use the product responsibly and not to do something dumb like drink-and-drive.  [Aside: Given the number of DUI incidents involving NFL players, any reference to the negative aspects of drinking and driving might be considered “football focused”.  Hmmm…]

Before you jump to the conclusion that the NFL is racing to get away from its stodginess, let me assure you that there are still products that will not be part of the ad mix on NFL games.  You can agree with it or not, but the NFL is not going to air commercials for condoms or sexual lubricants during its games.  Nor will you see ads for birth control drugs even though you will see plenty of ads for drugs that purport to combat erectile dysfunction.  I guess the NFL would try to argue that they would prefer to stay away from the “debates” that could arise from such advertising.  Whatever …

More interestingly, the NFL still will not allow energy drinks to be advertised nor can the makers or distributors of “supplements” purchase ad time.  I was surprised to see energy drinks on the “do not sell ad time to these guys list”; but given the problems that some players have had with drug tests that they blame on supplements, I can understand the league not wanting to muddy those waters any more than they are.

However, here is the case that I find particularly interesting.  The NFL will still prohibit any advertising by a gambling concern or for Las Vegas tourism.  The NFL is putting a team in Las Vegas; they are the beneficiaries of $750M in State of Nevada tax revenue to build a new stadium there.  The Las Vegas economy is not driven by heavy industry; Las Vegas lives and dies via tourism.  I can understand that it might take a while for the NFL to get itself to the point where it does not look upon places like The Mirage or Bellagio or The Westgate as facilities populated in the main by evil ne’er-do-wells, but I do not understand how it can simultaneously believe that it is OK to place a team in Las Vegas but not allow the city to advertise itself as a tourist destination.

Finally, consider this comment from Brad Dickson in the Omaha World-Herald.  I did not know this was part of the existing NFL/NFLPA Collective Bargaining Agreement:

“Ex-Husker Randy Gregory reportedly failed a drug test for the seventh time in the NFL. One more and he’s removed from the league permanently and becomes a member of the Grateful Dead.”

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

 

 

Let me begin with a Public Service Announcement today.  You still have time to get your tickets to Des Moines, IA and hustle on out there for the World Pork Expo.  Preliminary events began yesterday but things will be hopping all week long.  Tomorrow, you can play a round of golf in the World Pork Open; you can pick up clothing accessories at the World Pork Apparel Shop; you can attend a seminar on Social Media in Pork Production.  You can begin Thursday morning with an “Inspirational Service” and then participate in the World Pork Open Clay Target Championship.  Friday will feature the judging of the Junior National Swine Show while Saturday is the piece de resistance – the sale of the livestock from the World Pork Open Swine Show.  A good time will be had by all …

Back to sports…  Albert Pujols joined the rather exclusive club of MLB players who have hit 600 home runs in a career.  I have no interest in debating the cheapening of home run records in MLB over the past 25 years; the fact remains that very few players have ever done it and it may be a while until we see the next player join the club.  Looking at active players who might get to this level, I see only one player over 30 years old who may have a shot and that is:

• Miguel Cabrera:  He is 34 years old and has been in MLB for 15 seasons.  He has 451 home runs as of this morning; that is an average of 30 per season.  If he can play until he is 40 and can average 25 home runs per season until then, he will join the club.  Only twice in his career has he hit fewer than 25 home runs in a season.  The first time was his rookie year when he only played in 87 games; the other time was in 2015 when he played in only 119 games.  Barring injury, I think he is going to make it.

After Cabrera, I think you have to look all the way down the list of active players to the “young stars” to find someone who might get to the 600 level in home runs.

• Nolan Arenado:  He is 25 years old; he has 125 HRs in his first 5.4 seasons.
• Bryce Harper:  He is 24 years old; he has 136 HRs in his first 5.4 seasons.
• Manny Machado:  He is 24 years old; he has 117 HRs in his first 5.4 seasons.
• Mike Trout:  He is 25 years old; he has 184 HRs in his first 6.4 seasons.

June is not a month when one should expect an important news item from the world of college basketball.  Nonetheless, just such an item emerged yesterday when Ohio state fired head coach Thad Matta.  This parting of the ways was not sugar-coated; Matta is not leaving his job to spend more time with his family nor is he leaving to pursue some lifelong passion of his that had never been expressed to any human before yesterday.  Ohio State simply fired him and doing that in early June is strange because the coaching carousel for college basketball coaches had pretty much gone to mothballs about a month ago.

Ohio State has had two consecutive difficult seasons; they have not made the NCAA Tournament – or any of the post-season basketball tournaments – in both of those years.  While that may sound like a reason for a big-time athletic program to fire a coach, consider Matta’s coaching career for a moment:

• He has been a head coach for 17 seasons (13 of them at Ohio State).  He has missed post-season play only 3 times.
• Overall, he has a winning percentage of .740.
• At Ohio State in 13 seasons, he has a winning percentage of .733.
• He has taken Ohio state to the Final Four twice.

Ohio State is a sufficiently attractive job to get the coaching carousel out of mothballs and fired up once again.  It is not likely that Ohio State will hand the job to some high school coach who did a bang-up job somewhere; remember when Notre Dame tried that once in their football program and how swell that worked out.  Ohio State is going to get a good coach and if that person is already employed somewhere else, that will start the domino effect.

The Buckeyes could hire Tom Crean for the job.  He is capable and he is “unencumbered” at the moment having been let go by Indiana earlier this year.  He knows the Big 10 and can likely be successful rather quickly.  The problem with hiring Crean is that there will be no domino effect and that is not interesting.  So, let me allow my mind to wander and present some other college coaches who might “get a call” from Ohio State so that if they take the job, there will be openings elsewhere.

• Greg Marshall – Wichita State.  He has been a constant presence in the NCAA Tournament in recent years and he always brings a competent and competitive team there.
• Chris Mack – Xavier.  Like Marshall, his teams are always in the tournament plus he is already a key player in basketball recruiting in the State of Ohio.
• Shaka Smart – Texas.  Smart is an excellent coach who made a mistake going to Texas where basketball is the poor relative.  If he gets the call, he should take the job in a heartbeat.

Let me throw out one more name here that would probably not start up the college coaching carousel – but might get things moving in the NBA.  Billy Donovan was highly successful in college and has had a nice run in Oklahoma City.  Looking objectively at the Thunder, it is hard for me to see them doing much more than edging into the playoffs occasionally over the next several years in the NBA West.  So … maybe a return to the college game at one of the premier programs would be enticing?  Just saying …

Finally, here is a comment from Brad Dickson in the Omaha World-Herald:

“A Boston Marathon competitor reportedly took the train to get a better time. I’m going out on a limb and guessing that the meet director didn’t have to consult the rule book on this one.”

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