Baseball and Other Events

  The Yankees seemingly have come alive. This coincides with one big development—Aaron Judge returning from the IL after his awkward slice into third base. 

Left langusihing in the basement of the AL East, New York was considered all but dead for this season, with so many injuries to key players. Yet when the Yankees’ captain reemerged, he did it with a bang—7 home runs in the past 7 games. Anthony Rizzo, his good friend and the guy who bats right behind Judge in the order, was AL Player of The Week and has ket his batting average at or near .300 thus far along with some pop in his bat (interesting statistic given during the Yankees broadcast was that Rizzo is the active leader in home runs for a visitor at the Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati). 

With Judge, Rizzo and others like Harrison Bader and Anthony Volpe, the superstar of the future all contributing, the team battled Tampa Bay to a split of their series, then took three of four in a contentious battle with Toronto before winning the opener in Cincinnati. All this with Domingo German on a 10 game suspension for the umpires finding a foreign substance on his pitching hand, stud reliever Ian Hamilton suffering a groin injury and starting catcher Jose Trevino going on the IL with a hamstring issue. 

The bullpen is on life support and welcomes the first day off in awhile on Monday. The starting corps, depleted because of the German stupidity, gets Luis Severino back for his 2023 debut on Sunday. 

Maybe this is the surge the Yankees needed to get back in the race. Tampa Bay followed up the split with the Yankees by losing two of three at Citi Field. Baltimore has been creeping up on the Rays, sitting only three behind the early world beaters. The Yankees are just six away from the Rays, with about three-quarters of a season left. 

It’s a marathon, not a sprint. Remember that, Yankees fans. 

While it is rathe quiet overall, the Mets have been pretty ugly over the first two plus month of the season. Kudos to slugging first baseman Pete Alonso as he continues to hit homers. But the fact that future Hall of Fame pitchers Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander have ben absent on the field or injured is hurting the Mets chances. Still, on this homestead with Mama Bay and Cleveland, the Mets have clawed their way back from deficits to win games perhaps they shouldn’t have. 

Atlanta is the top dog in the NL East. Surprising Miami is in second place. The defending NL champions Phillies are struggling like the Mets. There is a lot of season left, Mets fans. Keep the faith. 

I also want to mention that the Los Angeles Dodgers have been rampaging lately—at the expense of the high payroll San Diego Padres. The NL west is largely a weak division—LAD should win easily. 

One more thing—Yankees fans  Public Enemy Number 1, Jose Altuve made his 2023 debut for the Houston Astros. Just when Houston has gone on an 8-2 tear. They will be neck and neck with Texas in the AL Central, which got back star Corey Seeger this week.  

I was chided about not discussing the NBA too much in the last blog. It wasn’t because the Golden State Warriors lost to the Los Angeles Lakers in a resounding way; Golden State reverts showed me enough all season to make me believe that they were good enough to repeat. The Sacramento series was the high point of the campaign and it drained the Warriors for the next round. 

Make no mistake—I am far from enamored with the Lakers. I feel that the Denver Nuggets are the better team and they will end up in the NBA Finals. 

The choke by the Philadelphia 76’ers in Game 7 of the series with Boston led to the firing of head coach Doc Rivers and it looks like guard James Harden, who disappeared with his horrendous shooting last Sunday, will abandon ship. Look for a rebuild next season in Philly unless, with a new coach and a free agent signing to complement M.V.P. Joe Embiid, the Sixers can continue to be competitive.

Flying under the radar, and they shouldn’t be is Miami. Led by Jimmy Freakin’ Butler, as TNT voice Kevin Harlan called him in Game 1 of the series with Boston, the depleted team has managed to keep on winning against the best in the East. Eric Spoelstra, the Heat head man, is an underrated coach, if that is possible. Of course, it does not hurt to have a player of Butler’s ability to carry the team, which is 2-0 over the Celtics as the return to South Florida for the next two contests. 

Somehow, the San Antonio Spurs defied the odds and ended up with the first pick in the upcoming NBA Draft. The prize is a can’t miss kid from France named Victor Wembanyama. The guy is huge and has a bigger upside to his game. This is akin to the Spurs getting Tim Duncan, who led the team to multiple titles.

The common denominator will be Spurs’ head coach Greg Popovich, who will be returning in his mid-70’s to get the career of this phenom off the ground. Wembanyama already is steeped in the ways of the Spurs and he was hoping he would make San Antonio his home. His French team is run by the brother of fellow Frenchman Tony Parker, himself a multiple champion with the Spurs, and much of the San Antonio philosophy is used by that team. It seems like a great fit for a fan base which has suffered a bit since Duncan and Manu Ginobli retired. 

A legend has passed away. Perhaps the best football player ever and maybe the best lacrosse player ever, too. That would be Jim Brown, the Long Island native who ran over everyone in the NFL before abruptly retiring at the age of 30. 

While the Cleveland Browns did not win NFL titles, Jim Brown was the shining star of those teams. In the days of the NFL blackout, we could only see Brown when the Giants went to cavernous Municipal Stadium along the shores of Lake Erie, many times with the ground already frozen in November. I can still hear Marty Glickman, the legendary radio voice of the Giants with his definitely New York twang, describing how fellow Syracuse alum Brown would run over Giants linebacker Sam Huff on the Yankee Stadium turf, then slowly get up after the punishing hit to return to the huddle to await the next play, when he would repeat the same rough run. 

When he left the Browns in a dispute with then-owner Art Modell over pay, Brown made more money in the movies. Who of my age doesn’t remember him in The Dirty Dozen or Ice Station Zebra? He could act. 

More importantly, he joined legendary black athletes like Muhammad Ali, Bill Russell and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar in their fight against racial injustice. He was articulate, well-spoken and highly respected. 

I know he had his scrapes with the law. Jim Brown wan’t perfect and came from a rough sport. What we can mourn about him is that he was one of a kind. 

Finally, it is 65 years ago this May that a young, undersized boy in Highland Park who could play baseball, somehow was able to join the Police Department Midge League team even if he was below the age of 8. He did all right that season, including recording a double play on the first ground ball hit to him at second base when, under the lights of the old high school field, he scooped up the ball, tagged the runner flashing by, then tossed the ball to first to complete the play. I think the boy went on to play some college baseball and write a blog.

I won’t even discuss The Preakness because, frankly, I don’t care. For now, baseball and other events will suffice.