A Harbinger Of The Fall

  There really isn’t much going on these days to write about. We are in between the pre-season and regular season in the NFL. College football gets going in earnest this weekend. 

Baseball is in its last 30 games to determine which teams make the playoffs and in what place. And the WNBA continues its season.

I can start with Rutgers for a moment. There seems to be some chaos on the Banks of the Raritan. 

First, Athletic Director Pat Hobbs, the longest tenured AD in the Big Ten, suddenly resigns, citing health issues. Then the renowned women’s soccer program ends up in an ugly brawl while losing to the University of Massachusetts. Plus The Star-Ledger publishes a scathing report on the woeful women’s gymnastics program, noting a pattern of abuse which Hobbs did nothing to curtail while keeping a coach who has won only TWO Big Ten meets in the program’s history. 

All this with football and men’s basketball on the rise. Coach Greg Schiano’s team has been projected as a possible sleeper for the National Championship playoffs which expand to twelve teams in 2024. 

The schedule is not a killer involving all of the tormenting Big Ten powers which fed on the Rutgers carcass in past years. Still, with a transfer quarterback from Minnesota at the helm, and an injury or two involving key starters before the opener against Howard, one must remember that this is Rutgers and a .500 or above record remains a vast improvement. Schiano may produce plenty of NFL caliber players, but they are not on a par with Michigan, Ohio State or Penn State, let alone be able to produce a squad capable of reliably beating Indiana, Northwestern, Maryland or newcomers to this season’s slate, USC, UCLA, Washington and Oregon.

Plus the hopes for the men’s hoopsters, largely on the shoulders of two highly-regarded recruits may be overblown. I have seen projections that the team would make the NCAA Tournament as one of ten Big Ten schools—possibly the last one to make the post-season. Not exactly a ringing endorsement, and the team plays a gauntlet of good teams in an event in Las Vegas in November in addition to the daunting Big Ten schedule. 

So Rutgers goes about this new academic year leaderless at the top of its athletics totem pole. Hobbs didn’t do a good job with NIL, leaving a new person a deficit to make up in terms of competitiveness. 

It just never seems that the Scarlet Knights are catching up with its established brethren in the conference. That largely has to do with money—the powers have it in train loads while Rutgers is comparatively cash poor. That is something which will take more years to overcome in this era of the transfer portal and NIL endorsements. Good luck to the next person to inherit the hot seat.

Which is why the news about Hobbs, women’s gymnastics and the UMass fiasco come at a bad time in RU athletic history. Making national news for these reasons is the kind of black eye Rutgers and its infinitely loyal and somewhat patient alumni and fans don’t deserve.  

While I am singling out Rutgers right now, many of the top programs have been subject to scrutiny for behavior and unnecessary transgressions. Head Coach Jim Harbaugh timely fled Michigan after winning a title last year with the football team embroiled in scandalous activity which has gotten the attention of the NCAA. Ohio State has had its shortfalls. Penn State had the notorious Sandusky affair which led to the downfall of legendary coach Joe Paterno. 

With all that happens in college sports and the immense pressure to win and justify the enormous budgets for athletics, one wonders how clean a successful program can be—in any sport at the Division I level. You just hate it a little bit more when its the school you root for.

As I mentioned at the beginning, baseball is in its final month. There are some stirring pennant races in each league. All three divisions in the American League are up for grabs. 

Only the Milwaukee Brewers seem to have a lock on the NL Central Division. The Dodgers are being pursued by the Diamondbacks in the West. And while the Phillies have maintained a lead over Atlanta, the Braves have suddenly gotten hot while the Phils are playing .500 or less baseball. 

New York and Baltimore have been going neck and neck for the bulk of the season. There is no reason not to believe that the AL East won’t be decided in the last week of the season, when the Yankees host the Birds before ending the schedule with Pittsburgh at home while the O’s travel to Minnesota, a team almost certain to be a Wild Card entry and which currently sits 3.5 games behind AL Central leader Cleveland. 

Plus Cleveland is looking over its shoulder at Kansas City. The Royals briefly held first place this week with a couple of wins over the Guardians. KC is looking to win the division outright, totally reversing its fortune from a 106 loss campaign in 2023. 

Out West, Houston is in the driver’s seat. Seattle, with its managerial change, has a little life left. If the Mariners can stay close, the three games in Houston in the last week of September could be pivotal. 

Boston, Detroit and Seattle maintain faint hopes in the AL Wild Card chase. Only the floundering Mets have a puncher’s chance of making the playoffs if any of the five teams ahead of them falter. Which seems unlikely. 

The US Open is in its first week of play at Flushing Meadows. Novak Djokovic looks nonetheless the top player even after his grueling Olympics triumph in Paris. My kids are going on Labor Day. I hope the weather holds up. I haven’t been there in nearly 20 years—it’s too hot for me during the day and too tough to travel at night.

From the fun and games department. Lebron James stated that his son Bronny has been instructed no to call him “Dad” on the court this season. That’s not going to stop opponents and fans from taunting him as to “Who’s Your Daddy?”

Caitlin Clark set the rookie record for three point baskets when the Indiana Fever defeated the Connecticut Sun. Clark has led the team to almost a .500 record and the cusp of a playoff spot with the seventh best record. 

Angel Reese has Chicago in the last playoff position right now; despite her record for double doubles, Clark has shined that much brighter. Which is why Clark will be the Rookie of the Year while Las Vegas Aces’ A’ja Wilson will walk away with the M.V.P. trophy. 

The Kelce brothers scored a big financial windfall, as their podcast was sold for nine figures. Taylor Swift should get a percentage of that money—the duo are funny guys by themselves but her popularity coupled with dating Travis Kelce might just have influenced the buyers price a slight bit.

For now, the heat has broken once more in the East. I didn’t get to experience it the first time while in Spain. This time the temperate temperatures will feel nice.

I am sure I will be ranting about the NFL and college football next week. (Georgia Tech already moved the landscape a little with a win over a ranked Florida State team and thee are a plethora of games this week). Add that to my sports plate and  what I have discussed—all of this is a harbinger of the Fall. 

Sports Wherever I Go

  The Olympics is over. Not without controversy afterwards. A protest by Romania led to the stripping of Jordan Chiles’ bronze medal in gymnastics. This was the result of an inquiry by the USA over the incorrect valuation of Chiles’ floor exercise score, which raised her total by a tenth of a point. 

That ever-lasting loving body, the International Olympic Committee, sided with Romania to strip Chiles of her medal. There was plenty of evidence to overrule the decision. However, another earnest body, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) sided with the IOC, then further ruled that their ruling was final despite the significant information which USA Gymnastics brought forth. 

If truly ruling fairly, there was more video proof that the fifth place finisher had been incorrectly penalized for stepping out of bounds. Had that penalty not been imposed, Chiles and the Romanian would have not finished in third and fourth place. 

Moreover, this tarnished the end to a pretty good Olympics. The magic moment of Simone Biles, Chiles and gold medalist Ramona Andrade on the podium which went viral for the sportsmanship it showed was all but forgotten in the hubris of gymnastics and Olympic politics. 

So where have I been these past two weeks? In Spain. It doesn’t mean that I haven’t been following American sports—thankfully I had the Verizon Travel Pass, hotel internet and What’s App to keep me apprised of the goings on of the Yankees, Jets and a plethora of happenings in the sports world. 

I am not a good international flier. My ability to sleep on planes isn’t very good. Even when the flight wasn’t very bumpy as with our initial leg to Barcelona. 

My intrepid tour guide, who happens to be my son, had a simple remedy for our lack of sleep—forge on. Thus my wife, son, daughter and son-in-law roamed the streets of Barcelona after arriving around 9:00 in the morning local time. 

Make no mistake—the locals were right in protesting how many foreign tourists were there. Unlike the earlier unhappiness, no one was doused with water guns—even if the temperatures and sun were soaring.

We visited many of the top sites in Barcelona, with a sojourn to the beach. Spain is a very athletic country—we know of top tennis players like Rafael Nadal and Carlos Alcaraz currently holding court, and great basketball stars Pao and Marc Gasol. 

What struck me there and in our journeys through the country, beginning in the home city for the 1992 Olympics, was the fervor to work out—run, walk, play beach volleyball or, most of all, kick a soccer ball. So many children and adults were doing such and many wore the jerseys of their favorite teams. Billboards promoting FC Barcelona, one of the top soccer clubs in the world, were all over the Metro. 

Needless to say, a pilgrimage to the Olympic Stadium in Barcelona was a must. While FC Barcelona renovates its nearly 100,000 seat stadium, we saw the exterior of the venue  which temporarily houses the team and which hosted the opening and closing ceremonies along with track and field. Plus other adjacent stadiums and arenas which were part of a beautiful park. 

While my daughter thought gymnastics, I thought of the Dream Team in 1992. Coming off the heels of the dramatic run to the gold medal by the 2024 team, in my mind I compared the two teams. And while the 1992 team was special, the current squad was also gifted, traversing a minefield much more arduous than its predecessors. 

There was not doubt in my mind that, even with the plethora of greats populating the 1992 roster, there would have been room for Lebron James, Kevin Durant and Stephen Curry on that team. With apologies to Curry, who I thought was on the downside of his incredible career (which he is) but was a non-factor in early round games. When the game is on the line, you want him to have the ball. Or James. Or Durant. 

We left Barcelona via Renfre train which clocked in at 180 m.p.h. That got the juices flowing in this train-lover going back to my childhood with trips to New York Penn Station on the Pennsylvania Railroad whose tracks were not too far from my Highland Park home, where I collected volumes of materials on all the train lines of the 1950’s and 60’s. It reminded me of the luxurious train lines of the past, complete with five-star dining, pictures of which were seemingly always on the pages of the National Geographic Magazine.

Our next stop was the capital city of Madrid. Where we did plenty of walking—to the tune of one day accumulating over 24,000 steps. The crowds were everywhere—at the museums, around the royal palace.

But the place where I was most amazed about crowds was at the stadium where Real Madrid CF plays its La Liga contests. Like its counterpart in Barcelona, Santiago Bernabeu Stadium was undergoing significant renovating. 

What the stadium reminded me of was the Dallas Cowboys and New York Yankees. Teams that play in cathedrals of their particular sport. This edifice was a modernistic metallic outside housing a playing field where the greats of the sport have played. Champions galore. 

My son and I decided to walk the stadium’s perimeter once we alighted from the Metro. Located in a residential area in Madrid, we were surprised that the area included such American eateries as Subway, Pizza Hut, and even more stunning, a Carl’s Jr and a Tony Romo’s. Not that we hadn’t seen KFC and Popeye’s or eaten at Mc Donald’s and Burger King; I guess that the American culinary influence, albeit mostly fast food, was alive and well in Spain. 

Ups entering the building at the team store, we were met with hundreds of people, young and old, families, and couples buying over-priced merchandise besides jerseys. It was a magnificent monument to the success of the team—one which became the first soccer club to surpass 1 billion Euros in value.

A day trip to Toledo offered a vista not unlike what the famed artist El Greco had painted in 1600. Haunting reminders of how Jews were persecuted in Spain were everywhere, most prominently in Toledo’s Jewish Quarter. 

Nonetheless, in the main plaza of the fabled city stood three pictures of Spanish athletes who went to Paris just weeks before. Even among the ancient architecture, the Spaniards love their sports heroes. 

I saw plenty of stadiums, schools etc. with basketball courts or soccer pitches. A beautiful stadium in Grenada was very visible from the rises of La Alhambra, However, I learned that the La Liga club finished 20th of 20 and had been relegated to lower league.

Our final stop was the beautiful Costa del Sol and the city of Malaga. We did a side trip to Gibraltar, where I was stalked by a monkey at the top of the Rock (and yes, I thought of the New Jersey Devils, whose Newark area is called the Prudential Center, with the insurance company’s logo of that magnificent mountain). I swam in the pool, dunked in the Mediterranean Sea.

I marveled at how many in shape individuals were on the beach or in the resort. I went to the gym, which was always busy with serious individuals running, using the machines or pumping iron. This emphasis on healthy bodies was not limited to Spain based on the languages I heard and the license plates I noticed. 

It was a great trip. I may have lost some inches in how I fit into my clothes from all the exercise I did. I am certain that I will eat enough to reverse that trend. 

Now I can return to watching Aaron Judge en route to another stunning season and a second M.V.P. award, slugging and scoring along with his co-star, Juan Soto. College football begins this weekend and pro football ends the pre-season. Plus the U.S. Open is around the corner. I will check out the Yankees’ Old Timer’s Day, honoring the 1998 World Champions. 

While my son wears his 2024 Spain Olympics shirt commemorating the squad’s gold medal, I will continue to wear my Yankees cap like I did in Spain. There were so many different colored NY hats adoring heads of both men and women in Spain, which caused me to wonder how popular the team really is. Even while walking in the resort with my cap on, a man commented to me about the good season the Bombers are having. 

That’s me—sports wherever I go. 

Adios For Now

  Here’s my seminal moment watching the Paris Olympics. Not watching Simone Biles take more golds; when she unexpectedly landed out of bounds on her final floor route, Biles had to settle for a silver medal (for the record, she told Lester Holt of NBC News that she was fine with her haul in Paris).

It wasn’t watching Sydney McLaughlin-Leverone obliterate the field in the 400 meter hurdles. Way to go Jersey girl! But not that either.

It certainly wasn’t seeing Snoop Dogg’s mug at a number of events. Or viewing the harrowing road of the US Women’s soccer team getting to the Olympic finals. None of that. 

Definitely not watching US citizen Armand Duplantis, born in Lafayette, Louisiana and who went to LSU, compete for his mother’s country, Sweden, and repeatedly set world records in the pole vault. Although quite interesting. Nor was it Noah Lyles winning the 100 meters race by the slimmest of margins. 

Instead, it was a moment that I could not have predicted. I went to my gym—Brooklake Country Club in Florham Park where my wife and I are gym members only—and walked into the gym area. There I saw one William Joseph Raftery watching the TV screen intently. 

Those who follow sports and specifically basketball know him as Bill, the former head coach at FDU Florham and Seton Hall, a New Jersey scholastic legend from Hudson County. Or more likely in his second career as an analyst/commentator for the NCAA Men’s Final Four.

Mr. Raftery is a member at Brooklake C.C. He and his wife occasionally frequent the gym. We say hello and goodbye. He does his thing and my wife and I huff and puff through our routines. 

This past Tuesday was different. I came upon him watching the quarterfinal game between Serbia and Australia as the first overtime period wound down. 

And he started to talk to me and another member about Serbia’s Nikola Jokic, the former NBA M.V.P. with the Denver Nuggets and one of the greatest players in the world. It was like time had stopped and this famous announcer was sharing his observations. When Serbia stole the ball in the last seconds, Jokic, to avoid getting fouled, stepped away from a defender and threw an outlet pass to get the ball up court and secure the win for his country. 

I made mention of this occurrence to him and he agreed how talented Jokic was to do this. Mr. Raftery then talked about the line Jokic had—24 points, 14 rebounds and 8 assists. He shook his head at how good Jokic was. 

I added that Serbia came back from a 24 point deficit—which he didn’t see on the screen and he commented that must have been earlier in the contest. And with that, he went back to his workout and I began mine. He said good bye when he left, as he always does.

It will be easy to guess that I will continue to watch more of the Olympics. Heck, I watched the US Men’s team complete a Brazilian BlowOut (hair style aficionados will get that one) later in the day. 

To steal a line from his genre and CBS, this was my shining moment. Better than Al Roker asking me a baseball question at the 2008 MLB All Star Game—he had no clue what was going on. In fairness, I never asked Al about the weather. 

Bill Raftery has a major hoops pedigree. Our interests crossed over an Olympic basketball game. How cool. 

John Schneider is not my favorite manager. He is with the Toronto Blue Jays, and the Jays visited Yankee Stadium this past weekend. Where his team took on the suddenly revitalized Yankees and the red hot Aaron Judge. 

When Judge hit a first inning 477 foot home run on Friday, tying Babe Ruth for the franchise record for homers in the opening frame with his 16th, Schneider had seen enough. In the ensuing at bats, he had his pitches avoid pitching to Judge, or, he took the bat out of Judge’s hands by ordering intentional walks. Three in one game. And even one with two outs and no one on base. 

This was taking the bat away from Judge in his home ballpark, with fans who paid plenty of money for seats in the Bronx stadium. Not fair—and the rabid New York fans let him know it. 

The Yankees rebounded from a loss on Friday to take two of three from the Jays and to win the season series. Judge went 4 for 8 with 2 home runs. 

MLB has to do something to stop this kind of game management. It won’t be until next season. Toronto isn’t making the playoffs unless they go on a torrid winning streak. The Yankees might actually have a chance to make it to the World Series as they are even in their overall record with Cleveland and Baltimore. 

With this type of philosophy, Judge won’t have a shot at breaking his 2022 American League-record 62 home runs. Nor will he have many opportunities to directly help his team to a victory. Which is flat out wrong. 

Let’s talk about the Chicago White Sox, an original American League franchise. They are in the news because they are so bad. Bad enough to tie the 1988 Baltimore Orioles for the longest losing streak in the American League. That fell short of the 1961 Philadelphia Phillies, a team that somehow, in the last year of an eight team league, managed to lose 23 straight games—two more than the Sox and Birds. 

The White Sox were fortunate to play in Oakland on Tuesday night. The A’s, playing in what appears to be their last season in Oakland, are a robust 47-69 and not smelling a whiff of the playoffs. This battle of the worst teams in the American League was played before a paltry 5,867—if that many.

Not to worry about the ChiSox running up a lengthy winning streak. Oakland won Wednesday’s game. The Sox face the Cubs for two games at home this weekend. Then the suddenly resurgent Yankees come visiting on Monday. And the team will have to do all this without manager Pedro Grifol, who was fired on Thursday.

This bunch of White Sox players has a dubious mark ahead of them. The worst record for a MLB season belongs to the expansion 1962 New York Mets. 

That group of rejects and youngsters, managed by the aging Casey Stengel, the former winning manage of the crusty New York Yankees, was flat out horrible. I watched the Mets as often as I could while maintaining my allegiance to Mickey Mantle, Roger Maris, Yogi Berra and Bobby Richardson, whose batting stance I liked to copy. It was painful to see. 

The Mets played in the Polo Grounds, an old ballpark abandoned by the Giants when they moved West to San Francisco for the 1958 season. While the ghost of Willie Mays may have been around, it must have been hiding in the bowels of the dank, decrepit park the Metsies called home—unless the Giants were actually back in town to play the Mets. 

So much bad play was seen by 900,000 fans that first season. Nonetheless, a loyalty grew with the Mets as they tried to find their own footing. Moving to Shea Stadium in conjunction with the World’s Fair in 1964 gave the team a bright new home. It wasn’t until 1969 that the Mets broke free of their losing ways, winning the World Series.

With their 28 wins, the White Sox are on a pace to win fewer games than the Mets did in 1962. I feel for the faithful South Side fans—just a few season ago the team was relevant. It would be ignominious if the team won less than 40 games, the total NYM won, or lost more than the 120 NYM lost. And I don’t think the future is that bright, either. 

My problem is that I don’t have a stake in the plight of the White Sox. I don’t know whether to root for them to break the record or let the Mets still hold the distinction of being the worst team in MLB history.  But I will try to watch. 

I will be on vacation for a while. Where I am going, soccer (futbol) is the main sport. I hope I can follow the Yankees while I’m gone. They are playing those White Sox.

Adios for now.