Back From Italy

I am back from 9 days in Italy. While I did not attend a Serie A game, I did see a numbers of soccer stadiums in Venice, Padua, Florence and Rome. On our way into Rome, I passed the 1960 Olympics sight. There was football, as the rest of the world calls soccer, on TV on the weekends. My sports on TV came down to a thrashing of the New York Liberty by the Washington Mystics in English, as the NBA smartly courts European fans to their games.

I did see the Colosseum in Rome. A magnificent structure, always under repair or part of an archeological dig. The Forum and Circus Maximus too. So now I have been in the following Coliseums—Rome, Charlotte, Oakland, Los Angeles and the Nassau County Veterans Memorial Coliseum. Plus the one at Caesars’ Palace in Las Vegas. I have been in the Fabulous Forum in Inglewood, the Felt Forum attached to Madison Square Garden and of course again in Caesars’ Palace. The only other Circus Maximus that I know of is in Vegas—again at Caesars’ Palace.

While I was gone, the Yankees suffered in Oakland, seemingly hitting rock bottom there before taking 2 of 3 from the Los Angeles Dodgers at Dodger Stadium, followed by a sweep of Seattle to finish the West Coast swing with a winning record. And who was in the midst of this turn around—Aaron Judge. His bat came alive and he hit home runs—even pulling the ball. No coincidence the Yankees started hitting like crazy and once more winning games. 

Then their nemesis, Oakland, came to Yankee Stadium. The A’s routed the Bombers on Friday night and had leads on Saturday and Sunday. But the Oakland  bullpen failed twice in late game situations. First, in the eighth inning on Saturday, it was Judge who pulverized a pitch into the right field second deck, 371 feet from home plate—a prodigious shot for a right handed hitter. That tied the game at 3. In the tenth inning, Judge extended himself at the wall in right field to take away a home run. Which set the stage for A.L. batting leader D.J. LeMahieu to smash a walk off home run in the bottom of the eleventh for the first win this season against the A’s. 

Sunday J.A. Happ pitched 6 scoreless innings and the Yankees’ bullpen did not do the job. Heading into the bottom of the eighth inning, New York trailed 4-1. Gleyber Torres hit a sacrifice fly and Didi Gregorius added a two-run single to narrow the deficit to 4-3. In the bottom of the ninth, Brett Gardner and Mike Ford hit back-to-back homers to win the game. Ford’s homer was his 10th and he was pinch-hitting for the recently called up Clint Frazier, who was the Yankees DH.

Impressive wins for the Yankees. Luke Voit has come off of the IL. Luis Severino is making great progress in his rehab assignment. Dellin Betances is throwing to hitters. Giancarlo Stanton is participating in baseball activities and hitting hard drives in batting practice. Aaron Hicks is coming along, too. 

The future is looking rosier for the Yankees, who now have a record of 90-48. The two other teams who have a chance for securing the overall best record in MLB are the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Houston Astros.

Los Angeles is in the midst of a funk, dealing with injuries, bullpen issues and is 4-6 in their last 10 games. Nothing to panic about, as the lead in the NL West is very safe. Plus, on an Eastern swing later this month, they visit the woeful Orioles. 

The Astros are another story. Sunday, future Hall of Fame pitcher and probable A.L. Cy Young Award winner Justin Verlander, no hit the Blue Jays in Toronto. This was his third no hitter in his illustrious career, putting him in rarified air with the likes of Nolan Ryan, Sandy Koufax, Cy Young, 1880’s pitcher Larry Corcoran and Bob Feller, all of who had thrown three no hitters in their special careers.

Make no mistake, the Astros are not a one man team. The pitching of Verlander, Gerrit Cole, Zack Greinke and Wade Miley is a pretty formidable group to face in the playoffs. There aren’t many holes in the lineup nor in the field. Facing the the likes of Cleveland, Tampa Bay, Minnesota, Oakland and the Yankees will be tough for any pitching staff; Houston has one which can negate most lineups. 

Which is why the Yankees need to secure home field throughout the playoffs and through the World Series. Playing Houston in a Game 7 needs to be before the raucous crowd at Yankee Stadium. Otherwise it may be advantage, Houston. 

It is still a dogfight in the National League outside of the NL West. St. Louis and the Cubs are still fighting it out for the N.L. Central lead. Atlanta has a 5 game in the NL East. It is more and more looking like the Cubs (or Cardinals if they falter) and the Washington Nationals are going to be the NL Wild Card teams, barring serious collapses and miracles involving the Phillies, Mets, Brewers and Diamondbacks. Who will survive this side of the draw will be hard to predict, as the Dodgers would be the favorites, yet cases could be made for the Braves, Cardinals, Cubs and Nationals to make the World Series.

Twenty five games to go and it is Labor Day. Baseball is coming down the stretch and it is fun.

The U.S. Open is finishing its first week in Flushing Meadows. On the Men’s side, Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer are still alive. With the Women’s draw, Serena Williams has made her 11th straight quarterfinals. The story of the tournament had been Coco Gauff, the 15 year old American, who made it to the third round, before losing to #1 seed Naomi Osaka. There will be many more meetings between these two—they are part of the new face of Women’s tennis.

The U.S. has sent the C or D team to the FIBA World Championships. Coach Greg Popovich has molded a defensively-oriented squad who can also score. Hopefully American basketball can still be the tops in the world, even after our A,B and C listers declined the opportunity to represent the U.S. internationally.

I am going to ignore pro football except for one little bit. We went to Met Life Stadium on Thursday night, thoroughly jet lagged, to spend only the second quarter watching a desultory effort of rookies and others not destined to make the Jets or Eagles. The only reason we fought traffic on the Garden State Parkway and the slowness of getting into the stadium parking lots was to test the new Jets phone app, to insure that my tickets would be shown and accepted when scanned. This is the new method of entering the stadium. The test was a success. Bring on Buffalo and Fan X on September 8.

The real story of this weekend was the grand start of the college football season. It is quite distasteful to have collegians playing before Labor Day until, in some cases, into January. With training camps, the student-athletes are intensely participating 5 or more months. Add off season workouts and Spring practice and the football scholarships most players have are yearly stipends. Too much emphasis on football, not enough on academics and other amenities of a college campus?

I always like to look at the first week’s matchups to see who is playing who and what the results were. Many of the big name schools look to play lesser lights and to give the visiting team financial incentives to come get shellacked. A win is a win when you are trying to be bowl eligible. 

There were mismatches—Maryland absolutely demolished Howard 79-0. At least it was only a short bus ride back to D.C. for the Bison, whose quarterback is the brother of Carolina Panthers QB Cam Newton. This was not the Maryland record for points—they shut out Washington College 80-0 in 1927. The D III Shoremen don’t play football anymore.

Maryland was not the only school to score 79 points on Saturday. #15 Penn State invited the Idaho Vandals to Happy Valley and sent them back on the long plane ride as 79-7 losers. Maryland and Penn State used to play each other all of the time when there were no conference ties and worries about bowl games. Perhaps Howard could have stayed in their own league and the Nittany Lions and Terrapins might have met in a more meaningful contest.

Patriot League teams traveled to play FBS schools. Holy Cross lost to Navy, Bucknell was defeated by Temple and Colgate went from Hamilton, New York to Colorado Springs, Colorado to soundly lose to the Air Force Academy. I bet that the hosts made it worth the while for these 3 schools to make the trips. Besides Colgate, Bucknell and Holy Cross, each Patriot League team lost this Saturday—to FCS teams like St. Francis of Pennsylvania, Central Connecticut State, Davidson and William and Mary. Moreover, Colgate is the only 0-2 school in the nation, having lost the week before at Villanova. An auspicious start, indeed.

There were neighborhood rivalries renewed—Colorado and Colorado State brawled in Denver; East Carolina met NC State; old foes from much earlier in the ACC era, South Carolina and North Carolina, faced off in Charlotte; Indiana played Ball State in Indianapolis; #21 Iowa State outlasted Northern Iowa in 3 OT; Ole Miss traveled up the road to Memphis; Eastern Washington and Washington clashed in Seattle; UC Davis ventured up to Cal; Alcorn State and Southern Miss played in Hattiesburg; Grambling went to Louisiana Tech; UTEP survived Houston Baptist; and Fresno State giver USC a hard time in the LA Coliseum.

Some conference games were played—Georgia won at Vanderbilt; UVA defeated Pitt on the road; Virginia Tech lost to Boston College; Notre Dame journeys to Louisville to meet the Cardinals on Monday; Clemson handily defeated Georgia Tech on Thursday.

While an injury-riddled Alabama team vanquished Duke in Atlanta, arch rival Auburn overcame a strong showing by Oregon to win in the final moments in Arlington, Texas.

Of course there were the closer than expected games—FCS #2 James Madison led West Virginia for much of the way; Wake Forest outscored Utah State by 3; SMU won by 7 at Arkansas State; San Diego State defeated Weber State 6-0, among others.

Upsets were few—Georgia State took home $920,000 and stunned Tennessee in Knoxville; a bad omen for the home team was when a member of the Volunteer Navy, the private boats which populate the river by the stadium, caught fire and sank earlier in the day. Wyoming hosted a good Missouri team and held off the charge of the SEC Tigers to record the victory. Boise State defeated Florida State in Tallahassee—what has happened to FSU football? Nevada snatched sure defeat from Purdue with two late scores.

Plenty of strange matchups occurred—Florida Atlantic and Ohio State; South Alabama and Nebraska; Les Miles, the former National Champion coach at LSU, won his first game as the head man at Kansas, over Indiana State, by 7. Portland State gave Arkansas trouble in Fayetteville. Syracuse played at Liberty, where the bedridden Liberty coach was seen communicating with his team from a hospital bed set up in the press box. Wagner and UConn played. New Mexico State was soundly beaten by #23 Washington State Southern lost to UNLV in Las Vegas. Now that’s a trip!!

Last but not least, Rutgers hosted U Mass and its new coach on Friday night. First half tackling mistakes and poor defensive plays put RU in a hole. With new QB Mc Lane Carter, the Texas Tech graduate transfer and legitimate FCS player completing 21 of 31 passes despite tossing 3 INT and Isiah Pacheco forcefully scoring 4 TD’s, Rutgers stomped on the Minutemen after accruing deficits of 14-0 and 21-7. 

A win is a win, so good for the Scarlet Knights. Chris Ash and his coaching staff are not off of the hot seat. There is some talent on this squad. However, the Knights face an immediate test next week at #20 Iowa. The offense must rise up again and limit the turnovers, while the defense, stout in the second half against UMass, must play better earlier. 

All in all, a fun weekend. It is great to be back home from Italy. I am happy that we avoided the start of the Venice International Film Festival, and the Pope getting stuck in a Vatican elevator today, rescued by firefighters.

As beautiful as the Italian sights were, there is nothing sweeter than seeing Aaron Judge homer, or RU win a football game in the 150th season of college football. If I could just get rid of this damn jet lag…Besides, we will be attending the Wednesday night Yankees-Rangers game, weather permitting. There are priorities.