This was a slow week for sports. That is if you aren’t into the NBA & NHL holding their annual drafts and the finishing of group play in the World Cup. Which leaves the WNBA, some golf, baseball and odds and ends to talk about. Even my editor took off a couple of weeks to luxuriate in her South Carolina home because nothing interested her sports-wise.
Yet I start with the NBA. Since I last wrote, the NBA trade wars have opened. Milwaukee finally capitulated and moved Giannis Antetokounmpo, the starting-to-age superstar who is now becoming injury-prone. He went to Pat Riley and Head Coach Eric Spoelstra for what seemed to be a large random of players and draft choices, which included the #13 pick in this year’s draft, Nate Ament, who played one season at the University of Tennessee; Miami selected him and then he was traded to the Bucks.
I don’t know if either team really made out well here. While Giannis has a M.V.P. and a NBA championship on his resume, I don’t look at his arrival to rescue Miami and Ben Adebayo from championship purgatory being a success story. This isn’t like LeBron James and the circus leading up to his teaming with Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh. There was more talent there in 2013 than exists in South Florida right now.
Which left many pundits wondering if there are more moves for Miami to make the team more competitive and to navigate the now-rigorous Eastern Conference, let alone the San Antonio Spurs, Oklahoma City Thunder and Denver Nuggets to name a few worthy teams out West.
One of those moves suddenly involves James. There is now speculation that he could go to Miami rather than opt to return to the Lakers. Then there is the belief that he would fit in nicely alongside Steph Curry at Golden State. Provided he doesn’t choose to retire. Stay tuned. The guessing will be almost as great as to when and where Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift will get married and who is really invited. (MSG July 2-3 and I can’t comment on the guest list lest a NDA will be violated)
How about the curious moves that the Minnesota Timberwolves have been making. First, star forward Julius Randle was shipped to Brooklyn in a three team trade involving Chicago. This was a salary dump, taking $30 million off the books. (I don’t pretend to understand the NBA salary cap structure as I am not a CPA; when they talk about a second apron, I think that somebody must have really soiled the first one, not about how this impacts the salary/player structure of a team)
After that, Minnesota obtained Charlotte star guard Lamelo Ball in exchange for Naz Reid and a bevy of future draft choices. This was a curious move in how it could either work out well for Minnesota, and Charlotte obviously does not see itself contending quite yet, even after making the playoffs this past season.
Perhaps Minnesota has become more savvy in putting complimentary pieces alongside its star, Anthony Edwards. Josh Green, who came from Charlotte, will play some good defense. Reupping free agent Ayo Dosunmu and his offensive prowess for five years was critical. Returning Mike Conley to the fold will also help in many ways offensively.
The jury is out for both teams. Just like it is in Los Angeles where the Lakers ponied up big bucks to keep Austin Reeves as a Laker. They selected guard Cameron Carr out of Baylor in the draft; added some bench players; and made some front office hires. Which still begs the question—does LeBron fit in with a younger squad and at what price is he willing to come back (if at all)?
Players aren’t the only ones moving. There were two head coaching spots filled this week. In different ways for vastly different reasons.
Micah Nori, the top assistant to Chris Finch in Minnesota, finally receive his chance to catch his own team (Nori filled in admirably when Finch suffered a torn patellar tendon during the 2024 playoffs when Conley collided with him on the sidelines). It only took 8 interviews within the NBA before somebody recognized the man’s talents—besides Finch, of course.
That isn’t the story here. Nori agreed to a three year incentive-laden contract with Portland, with only the first year guaranteed and the other years the Trail Blazers hold team options. His salary is also at the bottom of the NBA coaching pay scale. Tiago Splitter, the successful interim coach in Portland last season, received a three year deal with a fourth year team option for nearly $7 million a year from Chicago. Nori is getting $2 million a year as a base salary.
Experts and other coaches are up in arms over this ridiculously team-friendly deal engineered by the notorious cheapskate owner in Portland, Thomas Dundon. Dundon is seemingly on a roll, as his Carolina Hurricanes just won the Stanley Cup.
Thus, he is liked in North Carolina but despised in Oregon. Dundon axed staff and pulled other cost-cutting measures. He also wants others to fund needed renovations to the publicly-owned Moda Center, which Dundon refuses to ante up any of his money for the necessary 280-plus changes identified in a study. This promises to get as ugly and mystifying as the Chicago Bears stadium hunt in Chicago, Illinois or Indiana.
Nori is humble and deflected all comments about his contract as a non-issue. Finch supports him, identifying his former assistant as perfect for the job.
Even if you are an ardent fan for another team, you have to feel for Nori and root for his success—which may not be enough no matter how well he does. I certainly will.
What makes this even more ludicrous is the sudden departure from the University of Michigan by NCAA Champion Head Coach Dusty May to take over the reigns at Dallas. May reportedly is receiving a 5 year, $19 million deal to coach NBA Rookie of the Year Cooper Flagg and one of his former Michigan players, Morez Johnson, Jr.
Even more stunning is that Dallas will pay a hefty buyout of May’s recently extended contract (but unsigned ) at Michigan, which was going to pay upwards of $5 million a year. Incredible.
This another step in the metric rise of May as a genuine coaching talent. He burst upon the scene with an upset-minded Florida Gulf Coast team, and in two years assembled a national championship squad in Ann Arbor.
Interim University of Michigan President Dominico Grasso blasted the landscape of college sports. He said that the …”current system is in dire need of clarity and reform.” Grasso cited the monetary aspects of the transfer portal and that dreaded three letter acronym: NIL, which pushed May to the pros.
It is questionable that the bill before Congress entitled “The Protect College Sports Act” ever gets passed and if it has enough in it to bring an end to the craziness which has enveloped big-time college sports. When schools have to create a job called a General Manager and hire recognizable names to lure high schoolers and dissatisfied transfers, there is something wrong with the entire picture.
The greedy schools have only themselves to blame. TV contracts and conference realignment are symptomatic of the ills befallen major college sports. So too, is gambling a plague in sports—whether it is Brendan Sorsby, the Texas Tech quarterback who bet on his teams and finds himself in limbo after he renounced his eligibility and the NFL refused to conduct a supplemental draft for him—or what happened at the US Open when wire-to-wire leader Wyndham Clark conquered Shinnecock Golf Course on Long Island but was soundly booed throughout the tournament because the fans bet on other, higher profile players who weren’t able to catch Clark.
The NBA needs stories like Nori and May. Both are situated in a very tough conference. Both took their jobs for reasons that they decided were in their best interests. Even if the contract terms were markedly different.
I want to mention the Oklahoma Sooners baseball team. The newly-minted NCAA Division I Baseball Champions.
This is a team which stumbled greatly at the end of the season (OU finished 11th in the SEC) and in the conference playoffs. Given a new life in the NCAA Tournament, the team jelled. During the course of the event, the Sooners twice defeated #2 Georgia Tech, #3 Georgia and #5 North Carolina en route to the title. A fantastic performance indeed.
This marks the seventh different champion from the SEC in Division I baseball in the last seven years the tournament was played—COVID wiped out the Omaha jubilee in 2019. Vanderbilt, Mississippi State, Mississippi, LSU (twice), Tennessee and Oklahoma have won it all and in 2017, Florida was the winner. The conference may want to crow about its superiority in football and basketball—which Indiana and Michigan, both Big Ten schools—won in 2025-26. It is unmistakable that the SEC is the best in college baseball.
My family went to Yankee Stadium on Sunday in time to see the Yankees in the midst of a three game losing streak. The team chose to rest former Cy Young Award winner Gerrit Cole as he returns from Tommy John Surgery to let him pitch the next night in Detroit where he was not very good. I was not happy that prospect Elmer Rodriguez was on the mound in his place.
Rodriguez could not stop the Cincinnati bats, albeit without star shortstop Elly De La Cruz in the lineup. He departed on the losing side of a 3-1 score. New York would ultimately lose 4-1, on the heels of a 10-2 shellacking the day before which prompted the use of position player Max Schuemann as the ninth inning pitcher; he came out unscathed and now has a 0.00 E.R.A. for his career.
What bothered me about the game is that for the cost, I felt like I was watching an exhibition game in a MLB park. The Bombers already are without reigning American League M.V.P. Aaron Judge, whose cracked rib has him out indefinitely; slugger Giancarlo Stanton’s bat is absent due to a lingering calf issue; center fielder Trent Grisham has a bad hamstring; and starting pitcher Max Fried is rehabbing his balky elbow. That leaves a number of non-starters in starting roles.
Sure, All Star candidate Ben Rice played first base and hit a home run to account for the sole NYY run, one of his two hits on the day. Cody Bellinger looked ill-fitted to be the DH. The team had the one Rice home run as its only extra base hit of seven they accumulated.
Reds pitchers struck out 10 Yankees. New York committed two errors and had some bad base running blunders. Manager Aaron Boone once more over-managed in the seventh inning by inserting his bench players in key at bats. They failed to produce.
Luckily for the Yankees, Tampa Bay, their closest AL East rival, hadn’t been playing well of late. With this error-prone, poor hitting lineup, NYY has needed to play almost flawless baseball to win.
That ineptitude has carried over to the series in Detroit where the Tigers pitching was just poor enough to succumb to the timely hits from the Yankees. In Boston for a four game set, phenom Cam Schlittler couldn’t overcome flawed play from the subs and made one bad pitch in an inning which should have been over. Instead that resulted in a Red Sox home run which evaporated a tie game and led to an unfortunate loss.
This season is going to be a roller coaster-like ride. Rice and 38 year old former NL M.V.P. Paul GoIdschmidt have been providing the offense; the three catchers hit anemically. Not good. I don’t know if I am up for the ebbs and flows of this kind of injury-ridden, subpar team.
Sunday was like watching the Lakers when they sat Luka Doncic, LeBron and Reaves was injured. A NBA game without the stars. Yes, Sunday’s affair was technically a MLB game. Just without who you paid the big bucks to watch.
With all that is happening so negatively, (I am not getting into the mugging that Caitlin Clark took in her most recent WNBA game—bad officiating is an illness there as well as in the NBA Finals) I can report that dinner was excellent at Katz’s Delicatessen.
Corned beef always trumps the vicissitudes of sports.
