I love baseball. It’s my favorite sport. Somehow I was good enough to play at the collegiate level. I talk, write or watch the sport as much as I can.
Yet I won’t watch a lick of televised Spring Training games. Even if there is a phenom raking the ball, hitting moonshots and wearing a broad smile on his face. Because those games are meaningless.
Look at Aaron Judge. He only started to play in exhibition games on March 1. And I am quite sure he won’t be getting on a bus to travel around Florida to the Spring Training sites of other teams.
However, the fans are smitten with the games. They look at them as a way to get closer to the action, even if the prices continue to rise. Great marketing, I guess.
I’d rather read the reports from Florida and Arizona to see who is hurt. Unfortunately, the Yankees always seem to have too many players with early injuries which will impact when they might play in the regular season.
Seemingly, it is always at least one or more pitchers. Louis Gil, last season’s AL Rookie of the Year, has a stiff arm. Maybe because he was overused in his first full season? Reliever Scott Effross, coming back from Tommy John surgery is on the shelf due to a hamstring issue.
I worry more about Gerrit Cole, Max Fried, Clarke Schmidt and Carlos Rodon staying healthy. Those guys comprise the formidable Yankees starting rotation, which normally would include Gil if his arm was cooperative.
Yet I am not surprised that slugger Giancarlo Stanton is hurt. Except that the injuries go back to last season and haven’t healed. His tennis elbows, unlike my Golfer’s Elbow (different location on the arm), take a long time to heal. I can directly relate to that. One has to wonder what did he do to try to get better instead of landing on the IL and facing potential surgery which could leave him out of the lineup for considerable time? Is that on him, the Yankees, or both?
I am also troubled by the balky calf that third base candidate DJ Le Mahieu suffers from. For the past three seasons, the former hitting star has been hurt and unavailable. That’s why the Yankees had to get Jazz Chisholm, a second baseman, and throw him into the fire at third base. With Le Mahieu once more hurting, now who is going to play third, with Chisholm ensconced at his natural position, poised to make a dynamic middle infield duo with shortstop Anthony Volpe?
Here it is, the beginning of March, and the Yankees’ season is already up in the air. I’ve got to find something else to distract me from major league baseball.
Except that there is a movement afoot to remove the tarnish from the late Pete Rose. Rose had a lifetime ban from baseball for betting on games. Such a shame, given that he holds the record for most hits in a career and would be enshrined in Cooperstown if he hadn’t succumbed to gambling.
President Trump is going to pardon Rose for his tax crimes. Now Commissioner Rob Manfred is willing to look into a petition to reinstate Rose. All this is happening posthumously.
But will it matter? The Baseball Writers Association of America acts as the guardian of the game. Its members are the ones who vote on who has a plaque in the building. They include morality in their judgment.
Are there some unsavory characters who weren’t voted in despite their playing abilities? Ty Cobb comes to mind.
And we know that those who chose to use banned substances aren’t getting in. Alex Rodriguez, Roger Clemens, Barry Bonds and Mark Mc Gwire immediately come to mind.
Pete Rose goes in a different category. He played the game hard. He could hit like nobody else. On merit, this would have been a no brainer for the writers.
Except that they can be a sanctimonious bunch. Even if the Commissioner reinstated Rose, will that sway their opinions? All because he bet on baseball and lied about it for a long while until he came clean?
Now that Rose and former Commissioners Bart Giamatti and Fay Vincent, who banned him from baseball for his sins, are dead, should this issue be put to bed and Rose be finally inducted into the Hall of Fame? I haven’t wavered on this subject—Rose deserves to be a Hall of Famer. What President Trump does has no relationship to what baseball will do. I hope the BBWAA and fans can accept that.
Meanwhile, I have become engrossed in basketball. College basketball at the Division I and III levels, and the NBA. As I should, with D I and the NBA in their stretch runs and DIII finishing their post-season conference tournaments.
I actually was present at Drew University on Saturday to watch the Rangers seek to win a berth in the upcoming D III NCAA Tournament by defeating the Catholic University Cardinals for a third time this season. Which they did, by a 85-70 score.
The game started out tight. Then Drew pulled away, opening leads of over 20 points while amassing 50 points in the first half.
Catholic came out firing in the second half, cutting the margin down to 11 points at one time. Drew proved to be resilient and, coupled with a lot of missed free throws by Catholic, they secured their spot in the Big Little Dance. To the great joy of a very packed Baldwin Gymnasium, full of Drew supporters waiting for the big moment.
Both teams are quite good. Catholic may make the NCAA’s as a Pool C entrant; there are 43 automatic entrants and 21 at-large slots. Having seen teams from the NESCAC, Centennial, NJAC, UAA, MIAA and Middle Atlantic Conference among others, these are worthy tournament squads. Drew might even get a home game or two, which would be a big boost.
I have been following Franklin and Marshall College, my alma mater, throughout the season. At first, things looked grim. A stunning loss at home to Virginia Wesleyan after holding a large lead and a road loss to middle-of-the-pack Landmark League foe Elizabethtown College and in-conference losses to powerhouses Gettysburg and Johns Hopkins made me think this isn’t the year for the Diplomats.
Then the team ran off victory after victory to secure home court for the entire playoffs. Which proved to be very important in a semi-final win over Ursinus College. The Diplomats nearly squandered another huge lead before scoring the victory. The reward—a date with Johns Hopkins on Sunday; Hopkins survived Gettysburg in overtime on Thursday.
In a rugged defensive battle, F&M outscored its nemesis 60-47 to win the Centennial Conference and punch their ticket to the field of 64. I enjoyed the play-by-play of F&M alum Steve Ulrich, class of ’82. Ulrich is the excellent voice of F&M streaming sports. He is a DIII guru with his DIII Playbook and having been the long-time Executive Director of the CC. Ulrich made mention of CC and F&M all-time scoring champion Brandon Federici ’18. If you want to know what epitomizes F&M sports and you have Linkedin, look up Ulrich and Federici.
Don’t look now—St. John’s is a powerhouse. Hall of Fame Coach Rick Pitino has his team primed to win the Big East Tournament and then go deep into the NCAA’s. Could they be the most interesting team in the New York Metropolitan area—more watchable than the Knicks?
I did view a bit of #18 Memphis and UAB. It reminded me why mid-majors are tall, talented and somewhat undisciplined. Also, I saw a bit of Michigan State and Wisconsin. Those are two very good teams. With even better athleticism and basketball acumen.
Then again, Duke is really good and the experts are sticking with Auburn. How good is Houston? Tennessee? The regular season ends this week and the post-season conference tournaments start soon thereafter. I am sure that I will be getting into this topic in greater depth in the next two weeks, once Selection Sunday is upon us.
By the way, the USC women destroyed UCLA for a second time this season. There is no one team which is head and shoulders apart from the other women’s teams.
Have you noticed the amount of buzzer beater baskets to win games this season? Just this past week, a heave towards the far hoop, way beyond half court, gave Michigan State a big road win over a ranked Maryland team. And Michigan came all the way back after Rutgers had scorched the Wolverines in the first half to sink a game-winning three point shot as time expired, escaping with a home court win.
As to the NBA, I saw how vulnerable Golden State is without Jimmy Butler playing. Butler suffered back spasms in the Thursday game at Orlando, where Steph Curry went off for 56 points in a win. Without Butler, the lowly Philadelphia 76’ers came alive, breaking a nine game losing streak by downing the Warriors on national TV. He has to remain healthy for GSW to have a prayer of a chance this post season.
Plus don’t piss off the Cleveland Cavaliers. Boston ran out to a 25-3 lead on the Cavs, and superstar Jayson Tatum mocked the Cavs. Bad move. Cleveland won the game handily. The Cavs are that good. Kenny Atkinson for Coach of the Year?
My daughter has me watching Friday night SEC women’s gymnastics. Big crowds and sterling performers. Fun to watch these very skilled athletes.
The outdoor hockey game between Detroit and Columbus at Ohio Stadium was a magnificent setting, drawing over 94,000 to the horseshoe. The NHL got it right—again.
On TV at the gym I caught the final hole of this week’s golf tournament. A guy named Joe Highsmith made the cut by one stroke and won the whole event by two strokes. Amazing story and good for him—he really earned his $1.7 million prize.
Two melancholy deaths this week. Oscar-winning actor Gene Hackman, who played the irascible coach in Hoosiers, died suddenly in New Mexico. Chess master Boris Spassky passed away, too. His matches versus the aloof Bobby Fischer were fraught with tension and unforgettable.
Finally, Kansas City Chiefs’ tight end Travis Kelce will return to the team for another season. Which I figured he would. The bigger question now is when will he propose to his girlfriend, pop star Taylor Swift. Will that happen before former Green Bay and New York Jets QB Aaron Rodgers finds a new team—perhaps the Giants or Raiders now that the Los Angeles Rams resigned their QB, Matthew Stafford?
Baseball. Basketball. Gymnastics. Hockey. Golf. A mention of the Oscars. Chess. Football. Taylor Swift’s engagement. Aaron Rodgers. Did I leave anything out this week?