Leading Up To My Birthday

Plenty to write about as I speed towards my 71st birthday on Monday. By time I am of a new age, the opponents in the World Series will be determined, the Jets and Giants may have lost again, the Golden State Warriors might be 3-0 and Rutgers will not have lost a football game—it is their bye week. 

Opening with the baseball playoffs, Atlanta and Houston return home to close out their respective series. Which might not be so easy. The Dodgers and Red Sox have been worthy foes. 

In the NLCS, the Atlanta bats have hit the vaunted Dodgers pitching fairly hard. Not that I feel sorry for Los Angeles. LAD awoke form its slumberi on Thursday night to thrash the Braves behind a 3 homer, 6 R.B.I. night from Chris Taylor, a hero in the NLDS. He became the first player ever to strike 3 home runs when his team faced elimination. Taylor is invaluable; he can play multiple positions; on Thursday night, he was slotted in at third base to spell an ailing Justin Turner. AJ Pollock added two homers in the 11-2 rout, a game which was another successful bullpen game for LAD, despite losing reliever Joe Kelly to a biceps strain after surrendering a two run shot to Freddie Freeman in the first inning. 

I have seen articles declaring this to be a momentum shift to the Dodgers. That remains to be seen. LAD is set to pitch its aces, Max Scherzer and Walker Buehler in Games 6 and 7. Atlanta counters with Ian Anderson in Game 6, with veteran Charlie Morton pitching the next night, if necessary.  

Have the Dodgers bats awakened? Can Taylor, Pollock, Cody Bellinger, Mookie Betts and company defy the long odds so as to not see the epic 106 win season go down in flames? Or are the Braves the team of destiny this year, despite losing two top players from their powerful lineup and finally vanquish the hated Dodgers? Will Jac Pederson’s pearls bring him more luck versus his old team? Good story lines for late October games. 

Houston has acted like the superior team in their battle with Boston. Clutch hitting, especially by second baseman Jose Altuve, who my wife still holds responsible and unpunished for his role in the sign stealing episode, along with strong pitching, has allowed the Astros to be on the brink of returning to the World Series. 

Boston will start Nathan Eaovaldi in Game 6. Eaovaldi’s last outing, coming into close out Game 4, didn’t end top well. With the umpire blowing a called strike three, the at bat turned into a disaster and ultimately led to a big ninth inning for Houston, taking victory from the Sox and placing the Astros on the precipice of winning the series. Eaovalid is the last hope for Boston. I just cannot see him shutting down the Astros.

Sticking with baseball, the Yankees have rehired Aaron Boone while jettisoning three coaches and a fourth has left the staff. There are a lot of fans who disagree with this move. With all that happened in 2021 regarding injuries, COVID and some classic underperforming, the Yankees were remarkable in winning as many games as they did. 

Is Boone as good a manager as Joe Torre? No. Then again, Torre had a better team to manage. Torre didn’t have to deal with a pandemic and the amount of injuries that accumulated in 2021. And Boone’s decision-making at times was as brilliant as it was bad.

Boone has the trust of his players. They went to bat for him, telling management how they like him. Now it is time for management to replace the broken parts in the coaching staff and on the field. A lot is going to happen between now and the start of Spring Training. Hopefully it will make this team store enough to contend with the teams in its own division—Tampa, Toronto and Boston are all strong competitors. This story line has just begun to unfold. 

Let’s also discuss the strike zones for the playoffs. The ball and strike calls have been so fundamentally wrong at times that they have directly impacted on the outcome of games. Clear balls are called strikes and strikes, especially two strike calls which are in the corner or even in the heart of the strike zone are called balls. 

I know that this dichotomy has been forever. It is magnified by the strike zone projected onto the screen. Viewers at home get to see the errors which the umpires make. 

Yes, I know they are human and humans make mistakes. But when it is on the verge of an epidemic and the calls greatly influence the action, then further review of the system must be undertaken. I don’t know what the end result will be. What is happening now is unacceptable. 

Next up is hockey. I have actually watched a couple of Devils games. The team was far improved in their home wins over Chicago and Seattle. Losing former top draft choice Jack Hughes to a separated shoulder is a very bad blow for the team. Which showed in their performance against Washington, an elite team.

As for the Kraken, they are a gritty bunch. I don’t think they will be as successful as the Vegas Golden Knights were in their inaugural season. But they won’t be as inept as the Capitals and Islanders were in their first year. 

What Seattle has is a state-of-the-art arena. The refurbished Key Arena, now called the Climate Pledge Arena, is as eco-friendly a building as can be found in professional sports. I watched a video narrated by ESPN’s Emily Kaplan, which was an explanatory guided tour of the repurposed building.  Take a peek at her tour—it is amazing what the architects have done to welcome the NHL to the Pacific Northwest. 

A little bit of NFL is next. I found two games of interest to me this past weekend. Dallas played at New England. Dak Prescott is spectacular at QB for the Cowboys. The team seems to be a legitimate NFC championship-caliber group. 

Meanwhile, New England has a bright future with Mac Jones at the helm. Even with the Jets coming off of a bye week, the Patriots remain clear favorites to prevail in the rematch in Foxborough. 

I watched Monday night’s Buffalo-Tennessee contest with greater interest. If Buffalo had won and the cumulative point total was 50, my daughter and I would have won the weekly FOX News pool.

Alas, going on fourth and short in the waning minutes didn’t work out for the Bills. Tennessee hung on to win the game. QB Ryan Tannehill was good enough to win the game for the Titans, who, with the win, interjected themselves back into the AFC playoff picture. And Derrick Henry, the NFL’s leading rusher is still a beast as well as a legitimate M.V.P. candidate.

That stay on the periphery of playoff contenders might take a hit this weekend when Patrick Mahomes II and the Kansas City Chiefs visit Nissan Stadium. This version of the Chiefs is at 3-3, and Mahomes has uncharacteristically thrown 8 interceptions thus far, second only to the Jets’ Zach Wilson, who leads the NFL with 9 INT. Still, the smart money is on KC, as the Titans are too inconsistent right now—remember, this team put up a clunker a couple of weeks ago in the Meadowlands in an OT loss to the Jets.

Moving on to college football, Rutgers fans can rejoice. After last week’s debacle in Evanston, Illinois resulting in a 21-7 loss to Northwestern, there is no game this week. The calls for Offensive Coordinator Sean Gleeson’s head have intensified. 

Remember this, RU faithful. The O-line is depleted and includes walk-ons. Speedy WR-KR Aron Cruickshank is sidelined. Thus, the offense is limited. Will Greg Schiano listen to the objectors and replace Noah Vedral with freshman Gavin Winsett? Or will the team hope to improve despite the offensive woes?  Illinois on the road is the next opponent. 

For D III enthusiasts, the Centennial Conference leaderboard is now jumbled after Muhlenberg downed previously-unbeaten Johns Hopkins last Friday night in Allentown. Susquehanna is the lone unbeaten CC team. The trio of Muhlenberg, Susquehanna and Hopkins are ranked 18, 19 and 20 in the latest D3 Football Top 25.  Susquehanna obviously has to play the other two title contenders, hosting Hopkins on October 30 and traveling to Muhlenberg on November 6. After that, there could be clarity in the standings or a three-way tie. Saturday, Muhlenberg hosts lowly Juniata, a school which F&M roared back in the second half to down 41-13, The Eagles were previously clobbered by Hopkins 77-0. Muhlenberg wins by at least 60 points?

In the NESCAC, the trio of Trinity, Wesleyan and Williams are all 5-0. The team that might decide the NESCAC title winner could be 3-2 Amherst, which plays all three in consecutive weeks. Those three weeks might be fun as the leaves have turned past peak and cold settles into the region as a harbinger of Winter. 

Finally, a note on the rankings. The top 14 teams teams seemingly year after year have high rankings, with the possible exception of Union. At numbers 16 and 17 are Cortland and Ithaca, both 6-0. Union stands in the way of Ithaca, playing the Bombers on the turf in Ithaca. Cortland has an easier schedule to their date with Ithaca in the regular season finale on November 13. Too bad this game isn’t next season, when it would be played at Yankee Stadium.

I took a peak at the current FCS poll. The athlonspots.com Top 25 included two of the three unbeaten in the Ivy League. Dartmouth sits at #19 and Princeton is #25. Harvard is unranked. The FCS Coaches Poll has Harvard at #16, Princeton at #17 and Dartmouth is unranked. It is hard to judge the ivies at any time because their interplay with other schools is limited. Yale, 2-3 has lost to Dartmouth by 7 and came close to UConn, a low DI program, losing 21-15 in East Hartford. Meanwhile, Dartmouth has beaten UNH, a past FCS powerhouse. 

Like the CC and NESCAC, this all will be sorted out, beginning with Harvard at Princeton on October 23. After a Friday night trip to play at Cornell, the Tigers travel to Hanover to take on Dartmouth and end the season hosting Yale and traveling to Penn. Dartmouth heads to Cambridge on October 30, with Harvard playing at Columbia, home against Penn and at Yale, while the Big Green has the Harvard/Princeton gauntlet before easier game with Brown and Cornell. 

My infatuation with Ivy League football began with my reading the Sunday New York Times sports section as a boy. I have seen Ivy League teams at Franklin Field in Philadelphia, old Palmer Stadium at Princeton, the Yale Bowl and I drove by Harvard playing Brown in Providence one day many years ago. I have also seen Columbia play at Rutgers in the 1960’s, and attended games involving Harvard and Penn against Lafayette. I have watched telecasts of Ivy League games; I listened to Rutgers seemingly always losing to Princeton except in the Centennial game at Rutgers Stadium, televised in Lancaster, where I was in 1969. 

That kind of exposure to Ivy League football makes me kind of a non-Ivy grad geek. But probably no more than my interest in so many other conferences in the FBS, FCS, Division II and Division III. Seeing three undefeated teams at the end of October is always thrilling—whether it is in the Ivies, or its little brother, the NESCAC. 

Speaking of conferences, the American Athletic Conference, in light of the poaching by the Big 12 when Cincinnati, UCF and Houston defected, along with the 2019 departure of UConn have accepted FAU, Charlotte, North Texas, UTSA, Rice and UAB to make the AAC viable. Not earth-shattering news. What is more important is that Memphis and UAB can once more battle on the gridiron for “a trophy styled after a giant rack of ribs.” Now that is the real deal.

I will conclude with the NBA. Steph Curry collected a triple-double over the Lakers on opening night. He scored 45 points on Thursday to open the home slate with a win over the Clippers. He was perfect in the first half, collecting 28 points. He is so much fun to watch, It is scary that Reggie Miller, a Knicks killer while with the Indiana Pacers and now a TNT broadcaster, says that Curry’s best days are ahead of him. Are you kidding me? Wow.

The Lakers look lost. There seems to be a lack of chemistry that will integrate Russell Westbrook into the offense. Until Coach Frank Vogel changes the rotations and finds a place for Westbrook to play his own game, Westbrook will remain deferential to Lebron James and Anthony Davis and even Carmelo Anthony. Which spells trouble for the aging Lakers, who sport the NBA’s version of an old age respite. 

The Ben Simmons saga continue in Philly. He has been sullen, sulking, insubordinate. Now he is not mentally ready to play. He is daring management to get rid of him. Charles Barkley, who has a ton of experience with Sixers fans, says Simmons must go. True. Daryl Morey, who wields the power, will hold out for the best deal he can leverage. Except he has very little leverage. And that is lessening by the day. Anybody on board for a Simmons for Kyrie Irving swap?

The NBA 75th Anniversary team was announced in its entirety on Thursday night. To no one’s surprise, there were some disagreements about who should have made the team. Warriors coach Steve Kerr was upset that his guys Klay Thompson and Draymond Green were omitted. Others were miffed that Manu Ginobli and Pau Gasol were left off. How about Bernard King of the Knicks and Wizards? Big Bob Lanier, the giant who patrolled the paint in the 1960[s and 70’s? 

There are probably more names I could think of if I spent more time on the subject. For me, the names that I thought were not necessarily in the Top 75 were Damien Lillard and Anthony Davis. If there was a Top 100, then perhaps they make it. Remember this is a beauty contest with tremendous subjectivity where older and younger minds don’t necessarily agree. This debate will continue because too many people feel aggrieved. Oh well.

Such is the state of sports leading up to my birthday.

In The Middle Innings

So little excitement in the sports world. Pre-season basketball. The NHL has resumed regular season play, with the gems now nationally televised on ESPN and TNT. The NFL chugs along with its season, the Jets and Giants remaining as one win teams. The vaunted Alabama program took a big hit last Saturday night, when Texas A&M corralled the Tide. And MLB has reached the ALCS and NLCS.

Leave it to Jon Gruden, now the ex-Head Coach of the Las Vegas Raiders, to become embroiled in controversy which cost him his job. Somehow, emails were obtained from 10 years ago, when Gruden was an analyst for ESPN on its Monday Night Football program. They were directed towards the head of the NFLPA, DeMaurice Smith. 

Those emails weren’t pretty. They were racist and nasty. They were out of line. At any time.

There were those who came to Gruden’s defense, arguing how non-racist he was. We’ve seen, in the past few years, all sorts of illogical, pretzel-twisting defenses for the inane and rude arguments of others. So that kind of character defense could have been expected. 

Then there were the homophobic emails which emerged later in the week. What was unacceptable at first became a pattern of intolerance by Gruden which left no safe haven for him. 

I have never liked Jon Gruden. I thought he was arrogant and cocky. He made Bill Belichick likable, and Bill is as much a curmudgeon as can be. The constant smirk on Gruden’s face showed an arrogance for others, and I didn’t ever feel sincerity originating from him.

Sure, it can be argued that he’s a football coach and football coaches know only one thing—football. That is so wrong, because a football coach is a manager of men, and while he is determined t make them a team, teams are the composite of many identities deciding to work for the common whole. 

It was once thought that to make a team function as a unit, individual egos must, many times, be suppressed for the good of all. Except that anachronistic view has changed in the past few years. Players have their own identities and backgrounds. 

A smart coach knows how to navigate each of these individuals and to earn their trust. A smart coach knows when to talk and when not to talk. 

To me, Jon Gruden was not a smart coach. For all of his supposed expertise in X’s and O’s, he was a failure in dealing with others who disagreed with his vision of the world. His omnipotence was his everything, and it was his undoing. 

Racial sensitivity isn’t born of the politics of now. It didn’t come about from the George Floyd murder. 

No, racial sensitivity started with the Civil Rights movement in the 1960’s—before Gruden’s time. Jon Gruden was born in 1963, to a father who was a football lifer. Which became his life and was evidently devoid of the teachings of culture and sensitivity in high school in South Bend, Indiana (his father worked for Dan Devine, then the head coach at Notre Dame) or in college first at Muskingum College then at the University of Dayton where he was a seldom-used back QB. 

The apologists say he did nothing wrong. Nothing wrong? Tell that to the communities he betrayed. 

How could he retain his credibility under these circumstances? How could any young man place his faith and trust in a man who has demonstrated an ability to be nasty and anti-social in all of the wrong ways? 

His behavior in the 10 years since the unearthing of the emails in the investigation of sexually inappropriate behavior inside of the Washington Football Team does not matter. I don’t care one iota about his “rehabilitation” since then. More than likely, there are plenty of other misguided emails in a whole host of other locales which would confirm who Jon Gruden really is.

Whether he resigned or was fired does not matter. The fact that Jon Gruden and his snarky demeanor and private thoughts of insensitivity and arrogance are gone from the NFL is what matters. Intolerance is way more important than protecting a football coach of some renown. I only hope, for Gruden’s sake, that he learns from this humbling experience and shows the world by his actions that he has really changed.  

As I alluded, these emails came from the investigation into the horrific culture within the Washington Football Team. In that instance, owner Daniel Snyder was given a slap on the wrist. He was suspended, his wife ran the team and the NFL fined WFT.

Unlike in other instances, most notably when Carolina owner Jerry Richardson was summarily removed as owner of the Carolina Panthers for his unseemly behavior or when NBA Commissioner Adam Silver removed Donald Sterling of the Clippers for his sexual misdeeds amidst a revolt of the NBA players, accountability seems to be nil.

At least in the Richardson probe, there was a written report. Nothing like that in the WFT investigation. Given the fact that these emails about Gruden surfaced in the 650,000 emails reviewed, and given the fact that the WFT is still in turmoil as the F.B.I. raided the team’s Virginia facility and the head athletic trainer is now on leave, it is imperative that another, more microscopic examination of the team must be conducted concurrently by the NFL. 

DeMaurice Smith isn’t just posturing when he asked for release of the emails to the public. What other ticking time bombs are secreted within the obviously sordid culture within the WFT franchise, its ownership and its personnel? 

This kind of institutional malaise makes the New England Patriots look squeaky clean in comparison. And they’re not. One hopes, for the moral integrity of the NFL or, for that matter, professional sports, that there aren’t more of these smoking guns. 

Speaking of bad teams, the Houston Astros entertain the surprising Boston Red Sox in the A.L.C.S. This is Houston’s fifth straight appearance, making them one of three teams to accomplish that feat. But, as we all know, the Astros are the most tainted team in baseball after the whole sign-stealing misadventure which led to the manager and genera manager getting fired, Carlos Beltran losing his chance to manage the Mets and the Red Sox removing Alex Cora as manager for a year. 

Well, Cora is back as the Boston skipper and in an instance of baseball irony, he leads his team against his former team. He was the alleged architect of the scheme, and for his penance, he has a chance to defeat the players he once coached and lead his Boston club into a World Series matchup with either the Dodgers or Braves. 

I’ve read and heard the stories about the abuse heaped upon the Astros players since the scandal broke. How Cora felt the hurt of his former team. 

Well, they brought it upon themselves. They deserve the scorn that each one received for participating in such inappropriate behavior. 

I saw one headline calling this series “An Awkward ALCS.” The blame goes to MLB for not further punishing the Astros players. Or those in management. Like Alex Cora. Carlos Beltran is paying a greater price for perhaps a lesser, if not equal, role. It is their black eye and the ratings will either support the fact that people don’t care to watch or they are watching rooting for both teams to fail (which is, of course impossible). 

Yet we love calamity. NASCAR thrives over crashes and fights among drivers and crews. Nothing sells better than the drama of reality TV.

Yes, I will watch this series and the companion N.L.C.S. series. I am a baseball fan and besides, the Jets are in their bye week, so I am rid of that distraction for one week. I just cannot root for either team—just like I found it hard to root for either Tampa Bay or the Red Sox in the A.L.D.S., which was a great triumph of the underdog downing the giant—Tampa Bay’s Achilles heel proved to be its pitching, which was supposedly the best in the American League. 

Such is baseball life when you are a Yankees fan and teams you hate seem to be winning while your team remains on the sidelines and you wonder what additional moves are going to ensue after the firing of the hitting coach and third base coach Phil Nevin for his botched move of sending Aaron Judge home to be tagged out on a perfect relay to squash a rally in the Wild Card game. Somebody had to be the scapegoat for that move. 

NewYork has a ton of decisions to make. First is whether manager Aaron Boone returns. Which is likely, although there was a surprise firing of the Cardinals skipper, Mike Shildt over “philosophical differences.” That might complicate things a bit, although I warn the Yankees to look at history—firing Yogi Berra and replacing him with Cardinals manager Johnny Keane in 1965 led to the dark times for the franchise. 

In a addition to filling the coaching vacancies, there are issues about signing Judge to a long-term deal; what to do with Gary Sanchez in his arbitration year; the headaches that Gleyber Torres creates; whether to sign Anthony Rizzo to a long-term deal; what to do about the woefully-underperforming Joey Gallo; how to fill the shortstop hole; supplementing the pitching; trading Luke Voit, etc. The list seems to be endless. 

Kudos to the Dodgers and Giants for a thrilling N.L.D.S. It took to the very last pitch by fill-in reliever Max Scherzer, a blown called third strike on a check swing, to give the Dodgers the win. I don’t know if the LAD-Atlanta series will equal that series in roller coaster thrills. Atlanta is a very fine team—even without two of their very young and very talented stars on the shelf. Atlanta lost to LAD last year in a a highly competitive N.L.C.S. last season, so it is not so clearcut which team will emerge. 

There are stars galore in this N.L.C.S. Freddie Freeman of the Braves and Mookie Betts of the Dodgers. Pitchers Scherzer and Walker Buehler for LAD and Max Fried for ATL. 

It will be interesting to see which teams emerge. From a historical standpoint, the Braves returning to Boston, where the franchise originated, would be nice. The Boston Braves actually played their home games in the 1914 World Series, won by sweeping the heavily-favored A.L. champion Philadelphia A’s—the first sweep in World Series history, at Fenway Park , the home home of the Boston Red Sox.

Of course, revenge could be sweet if the Dodgers defeat the Astros. After all, the Dodgers were one of the victims in the Astros’ cheating. And if it ends up as Boston-LAD, the Dodgers owe the Sox one for the 2018 World Series triumph by the Beantowners.  

Finally, a short comment on the Kyrie Irving saga. Irving is another person I have little use for. Any chance he was worth much evaporated when he made that outrageous comment that the Earth was flat. He burned his bridges with Lebron James in Cleveland, acting like the prima donna he is. He did the same in Boston, alienating his teammates and the loyal Celtics fans. 

His behavior hasn’t been much better in Brooklyn, and he has not performed well while he has been a Nets player. Which is not unexpected, given how mercurial and polarizing a figure he is.

The Nets are a talented team heading into the start of the NBA season. James Harden, Kevin Durant and Irving would be a lethal combination if healthy. 

However, Irving, who always has his own agenda, starting from his NJ scholastic playing days, to his one and does at Duke and into the NBA, has become a lightning rod for controversy. His choice not to be vaccinated is just another example of his selfishness.

I am not quibbling with his right to choose what his life will be. He lives with the consequences of his actions. However, this impacts his team’s opportunity to be a realistic contender for the NBA title.  

The Nets did the right thing in stopping him from practicing or even becoming a part-time player. While Irving says it isn’t about the money, which he says he would like to have, his reasons for eschewing the vaccination simply do not resonate. 

If the average worker was under a mandate to be vaccinated, he would be out of a job like the health care workers and teachers in New York. That kind of logic should certainly extend to basketball players, too. 

I saw one of my doctors this past week. He is double Harvard educated. He, like me, was having great difficulty understanding why people are making such an issue out of being vaccinated. He equated it with the polio vaccine and a whole host of other vaccines routinely administered to children. There was no sympathy for those on their hospital death beds bemoaning the fact that they should have gotten the vaccine. Nor did he have kind words for Irving. 

I wish Kyrie Irving well. I want no harm for him, no matter how much I dislike him for a myriad of reasons. He made his bed. Now he has to lie in it. He is no martyr for a cause. Only for himself.

Meanwhile, I will start watching baseball again starting on Friday night. In the midst of the college and pro football seasons. Abetted by the infancy of the NHL season and the NBA commencing later in the week. 

Somehow, I feel like I am in the middle innings of a very long nine inning game.

It Was The Best Of Times, It Was The Worst Of Times

To paraphrase an ancient writer of some note, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times” for me this past weekend. Which all came to a head on Tuesday.

Saturday was the worst of times. I had a growing interest in three games. Tampa Bay-Yankees at 1:00. Franklin and Marshall visiting Baltimore for a date with Johns Hopkins, ranked #14 in D III Football. And Rutgers, coming off a promising showing at Michigan, hosting the rough and tough Ohio State Buckeyes at SHI Stadium. 

The Bronx Bombers were playing for their playoff lives this weekend. They were in control after defeating Toronto on the road on Thursday night. Win on Friday and they would virtually clinch home field in the AL Wild Card. 

The Yankees entered the weekend ahead of Boston, Toronto and fast charging Seattle. But they also had the toughest opponent—Tampa Bay, the A.L. East winners.

There is no love lost between the two squads. So Tampa would have loved to derail the Yankees while prepping the upcoming playoffs where the Rays would host the winner of the Wild Card game on Tuesday night. Additionally, Tampa was shooting for 100 wins, which was a nice sounding figure nearly always a symbol of success. 

The Rays were the superior team for the first two games. Never mind that the Yankees had ben playing great on their final road trip, sweeping the Red Sox at Fenway behind the demoralizing homers from Giancarlo Stanton’s bat, then taking two out of three games in unfriendly Toronto—and losing the middle game of the three game set when they should have won that game too. 

No, the heady roll which the Yankees took into the final series didn’t matter one iota.  They were facing the top team in the American League. 

On Friday night, the Yankees fell behind 2-1 early. Then Domingo German, former starter who was just back from a lengthy layoff due to injury, put men on base in the ninth inning. Manager Aaron Boone then brought rookie Albert Abreu into a high stress situation and he surrendered a single to the Rays’ stellar center fielder, Kevin Kiermaier. 4-1 Tampa. 

New York initiated a comeback, showing heart and grit in the process. Aaron Judge and Stanton were in the middle of this rally. Even the enigmatic Joey Gallo, who was hiding around .160 since his arrival from Texas at the trade deadline, masterfully executed a bunt single to the left side, overcoming the shift which put four players in the outfield and only one infielder on the left side

Veteran Brett Gardner, forced into a larger role than ever expected when Aaron Hicks went down early in the season, contributed with a clutch single to shallow right field. Gardner is the last link to the final Yankees World Series win way back in 2009. He became a leader on a team which needed leadership, even with the talent level so high, demonstrating by his actions what the Yankee way had been. 

But then the other side of the Yankees emerged. Gary Sanchez and Roughned Odor both struck out with tow runners on base to end the game. Tampa emerged as winners by a score of 4-3. 

The Yankees played hard and there was hope. Even if the Red Sox downed the Nationals and the Jays beat up on the lowly Orioles. At least Seattle had lost to the Angels at home.

Saturday was a beautiful day. The hope of the previous night’s rally was on the minds of fans like me. Reliable lefty starter Jordan Montgomery was on the mound. Just one more victory to clinch a Wild Card spot.

Except that Montgomery was shelled, with the Rays’ second baseman Brandon Lowe putting on a batting clinic during the game. Lowe slugged 3 homers to raise his season total to 39. He drove in 7 runs. Catcher Mike Zunino swatted number 33  and Austin Meadows slugged number 27. Tampa collected 19 hits in the 12-2 pummeling. The Yankees were held to 4 hits, scoring one of their runs on the 250th home run of Anthony Rizzo, the late season pickup from the Cubs.

Not to worry. There was Game 162. Surely the Yankees could win on Sunday. However, it didn’t help that the Red Sox won again in Washington, the Jays clobbered the Orioles and Seattle downed the Angels. 

During the Tampa Bay onslaught, I turned my attention to the Franklin and Marshall road game at #14 Johns Hopkins. F&M was struggling at 1-3, having only defeated Mc Daniel while losing close game at Lebanon Valley then in OT to Susquehanna, one of the top teams in the Centennial Conference. However, the Diplomats were coming off of a pasting by the Ursinus Bears, a team which had upset then-eighth ranked Muhlenberg.

Given the track record of F&M against the Blue Jays (yes, there were a lot of Blue Jays on my Saturday), which included an F&M win in their last meeting in Baltimore in 2019, I had plenty of optimism. Sure, JHU had run through their opposition, handily downing those Ursinus Bears while also annihilating Juniata 77-0. Still, I had a good feeling. Like I did when I turned on the YES Network broadcast for the Yankees game. 

F&M fell behind 13-0, then managed to trail 23-10 at the half. And that was it for the Diplomats. Hopkins regrouped and acted like the powerhouse that it seems to be, scoring 29 unanswered points in the third quarter. Final score: JHU 66, F&M 10. 

There I was—0 and 2 for the day. The Rays demolition had not yet ben completed when F&M fell to Hopkins, but it was a fait accompli. 

So I turned my attention to the Rutgers game, a 3:30 start. With the struggles that Ohio State had, losing at home to Oregon and being tested in their opening game at Minnesota, this appeared to be a more vulnerable Buckeyes team than in the past. I knew they had zip tied the Akron Zips in their last game before traveling to Piscataway. 

Still, I felt that the Michigan game of a week ago had shown that Rutgers was playing better ball than last season, when in his first year back on the Banks of the ‘ol Raritan, Head Coach Greg Schiano’s team mustered a surprising 3-6 mark. RU had actual chances to tie the Wolverines, and they certainly weren’t outplayed, having shut down Michigan’s powerful running game in the second half of the game while considerably out rushing Michigan in the process. 

That was all for naught. Ohio State scored quickly on the Scarlet Knights. Trick plays didn’t work for RU, nor did much else. QB Noah Vedral had not tossed an interception leading up to the game. That went by the wayside. The vaunted RU defense was shredded. Final score was 52-13. I gave up on this game early.

My Saturday was crushing. Three defeats. Not even by close scores. What was Sunday going to bring?

My wife and I journeyed to Met Life Stadium to see the Jets host the Tennessee Titans,  led by QB Ryan Tannehill and punishing RB Derrick Henry. I wasn’t overly optimistic. New York, behind rookie QB Zach Wilson, looked ineffectual versus Denver on the previous Sunday. In fact, it looked like it was going to be a long season ahead. Perhaps worse than 2020, which was abysmal.

But there were signs that I didn’t full appreciate. The Titans went into the game without their two top receivers. The Titans had beaten Seattle in OT and downed the Colts. They also were punished by Arizona in the opener. Experts assumed that Head Coach Mike Vrabel’s team was trending towards victory and that the stop in New Jersey was going to result in another win. 

What I learned just before kickoff was that the Jets actually had a good record playing Tennessee in the past, which included a winning record at home against the visitors. In fact the Jets had won the prior two encounters in the Meadowlands. 

Moreover, I had pulled out all of the stops for this contest and the Yankees game. While I wore a Jets T shirt, I had on my Yankees home jersey and a Yankees cap. My wife wore another Jets t shirt and she had on our white Jets jersey. When we arrived at our seats, we learned the Jets were adorned in their white jerseys, too. 

The Jets didn’t make it easy. They kind of kept Henry in check. The defense was solid, not spectacular. New York overcame an early Tennessee lead behind spectacular play from Wilson. The Jets QB looked like the #2 draft pick and his talent was finally on display—even if he made some rookie mistakes which could have cost the team the game. 

Nonetheless, the Jets went down the field in OT. They should have scored from the 1 yard line and ended the game. But one of Wilson’s gaffes cost the team and the Jets settled for a FG. The crowd in the half-filled arena was loud.

Tennessee drove down the field. The defense stiffened. The Titans had to settle for a field goal attempt to tie the score in the last minutes of the overtime period. The kick sailed wide and the Jets won the game. Euphoria shot through Met Life Stadium.

We sat in our car, waiting out the inevitable traffic jam. We were glued to the Yankees radio broadcast of the game with Tampa. Boston was losing. Toronto had won. Seattle was going down. The Yankees could secure home field and a playoff berth.

Except that the Bombers were mired in a 0-0 game, unable to hit the Rays pitching once more. New York managed only 4 hits on Saturday. Through 8 innings, the Rays had again kept the Yankees in check. 

The Yankees competed hard in this game. The pitchers kept Tampa in check, allowing only 5 hits. Third baseman Gio Urshela ran down a pop up and disappeared into the Rays dugout, holding onto the ball while suffering a banged up body. It was highly reminiscent of the Derek Jeter dive into the stands against the Red Sox.

In the bottom of the ninth, the Yankees came to life. With Tyler Wade dancing off of third base, Judge delivered a shot up the middle, which deflected off the pitcher’s glove and Wade slid under the throw by Lowe to put the Yankees in the post-season.

Within an hour’s time, the Jets and Yankees had lifted my spirits from the doldrums of the previous day. Even Boston’s comeback to win at Washington didn’t diminish my elation.

Yes, the Yankees would stink at Fenway two nights later, meekly going out in the Wild Card game. Gerrit Cole looked horrible and the relief pitching didn’t quite hold. And let’s hoot at third base coach Phil Nevin for sending Aaron Boone to try to score from first base after a blast by Stanton ricocheted from the Green Monster in left center field. Hold Judge at third and the Yankees could have scored and narrowed the game to a 3-2 deficit. Instead, that move sealed their fate. Season over, mercifully.

For a moment, I want to return to memory lane. On October 9, 1971, I drove from D.C. to Memorial Stadium in Baltimore, lured by an article in The Washington Post noting that there were a limited number of tickets still available for the World Series between the Orioles and Pittsburgh Pirates.

I purchased an”obstructed view’ seat, which the ticket seller told me would not really hinder my view. I sat underneath the overhang from the second deck behind first base. 

I was treated to a gem of a game. Orioles starter Dave Mc Nally, one of four 20 game winners on the team, masterfully shut down the Bucs on 3 hits in pitching a complete game. Hall of Famer Frank Robinson connected on a solo shot. Merv Rettemund slugged two blasts and the O’s emerged winners by a score of 5 to 3, to my, and the 53,000 attendees’ delight. 

This was the only World Series game I have eve attended. What was even more memorable was the throw made by Pirates star right fielder Roberto Clemente. He caught a ball on the warning track in deep right then wheeled and fired a laser to third base on the fly. It was like the ball had been shot out of a cannon. I have never seen anything more impressive.

Forty-five years ago on October 12th, I was in the upper stands at Yankee Stadium for the American League Championship Series Game 4 between the Yankees and the Kansas City Royals. On that cool night in the Bronx, I watched Catfish Hunter lose to Doug Bird despite two homers from third baseman Greg Nettles. 

I left the next day for Madison, Wisconsin, where I would reconnect with my Washington Semester buddy Chris, who had graduated Baldwin-Wallace College, and was a D III All American high jumper. I would have one of the most memorable weekends of my 25 year old life.

I watched the Chris Chambliss home run which won the series for New York, one day removed from being inside of the Stadium. I went to my only college hockey game, where I saw the Wisconsin Badgers down Michigan in a thrilling match. Badger Bob Johnson was the coach, and he had  his son, Mark, a future Olympian and New Jersey Devils player, on the ice. The Badgers won the NCAA title in 1977 and Johnson was WCHA rookie of the year. I even had my first taste of dee dish pizza and loved it. 

And on Saturday, October 16, I was in Camp Randall Stadium when Ohio State came into town. The weather had turned cold on Friday and I was unprepared—the weather was raw and windy when I ran outdoors on Friday, it was cold and the temperature had reached the freezing mark on Friday night. I am sure that the exposure to the cold led me to be quite sick on the return flight to Newark.

Ohio State soundly defeated the undermanned Badgers. I recall having a cold Coors beer on my way to the stadium which actually warmed me for two quarters. 

The spirit in and around the stadium captivated me. Mascot Bucky Badger tooled around the Madison streets in a fire engine. The marching band played the fight song in its journey to the ballpark. To me, a D III fan, this was heaven. This was what college football was all about. Pageantry and tradition. 

And one other thing. There was a big party afterwards. Which was capped off by a 10:30 P.M. broadcast of Saturday Night Live. Which was my first exposure to the program, and I instantly fell in love with it. 

This week in my history was one memorable one. I was so fortunate to experience events like that in my life. October has been very good to me. 

I read an article which pointed out the fact that New York teams were not champions recently. The Giants were the last team to win a title, and that was in 2011. The Yankees drought went back to 2009. The Rangers, Knicks, Nets, Jets and Islanders have not won anything—the Rangers were winners in 1994, the Jets in 1969 and the Knicks in 1973. The Nets haven’t won a title since they entered the NBA and the Islanders famine is back to the 1980’s. Add in the WNBA’s Liberty, which has won a title at all, and the New York sports scene, since the run of the Jeter-led Yankees has been barren. 

I seem to feel some sadness for the Cubs fans with their “curse.” Yet they won in 2016. We in New York, with so many teams, haven’t had even that kind of modest success. 

Yes, we have had many playoff teams. But no champions in the last 10 seasons. Nary a one. 

To end the this rambling, let’s return to the quote. Here it is in its entirety: 

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the season of despair.”

Should the New York teams suddenly start winning, like they did on Sunday, and F&M and RU join in, it would surely scare the Dickens out of me. Even if that phrase originated from Shakespeare.

50 Years Ago In D.C.

In the midst of this final chase to the playoffs, I want to recount a different story. One that happened 50 years ago on September 30, 1971, continuing into the next day, October 1, 1971.

The place was Washington, D.C. I had been a Summer intern at the office of the Hon. Edward J. Patten in what was the 15th Legislative District in New Jersey. Representative Patten was a lifelong resident of Perth Amboy, a garrulous man of size and warmth. He laughed hard and he worked hard, always carrying a cigar in his mouth, mostly unlit. 

Edward Patten was a loyal Democrat, a product of the Middlesex County Democratic machine. That machine was run by the General, David J. Wilentz, the former N.J. Attorney General. Wilentz prosecuted the Lindbergh baby murder trial in Flemington, which garnered him fame and power in N.J. and the Democratic Party. 

If you wanted to be anybody in N.J. political circles, you had to pay homage to Perth Amboy. An example of this was how John F. Kennedy made a stop in New Brunswick during the 1960 Presidential campaign, which brought out the largest crowd in Middlesex County history at that time. That stop was requested by Wilentz with the promise that the New York media would come and see the huge crowd which would assemble. 

My entree into the Middlesex Democratic machine came through my father. My father was a dentist in Edison. In 1959 he astutely purchased property on Route 27, not far from the major intersection with Plainfield Avenue. He had established his practice in the Township, and it had outgrown the second floor of a house just down the road, so this was a logical move.

He built his own brick-faced office on the lot, but kept the small cape house that originally was there. First he rented it to a gynecologist, and when that doctor purchased his own house and moved his practice, my father needed a new tenant.

Fortuitously, a young attorney named R. Joseph Ferenczi, top of his class at William & Mary and then at Georgetown Law School, wanted to have more room for his practice. Mr. Ferenczi, as I always called him, was tied to Edison politics and thus to the Middlesex machine. 

My father and Mr. Ferenczi developed a friendship beyond lessor-lessee. They talked every morning before my father started seeing patients. They knew everything about each other’s families. 

So when his son came to him about possibly attending the Washington Semester Government Honors Program at American University in the Fall of 1971, Dr. Michael Sperber mentioned it to Mr. Ferenczi. Suddenly, a summer internship which would also run continuously with my time at American, was a done deal. 

I lived in a ramshackle George Washington University dorm on H Street, across from the glaring lights of the World Bank building, which glowed brightly all night long. I shared my second floor perch with a young man who was from a Christian college in Vermont—a nice and shy fellow. We suffered through the intense nighttime heat of the inner city, augmented by the choking exhaust of the busses which ran on a schedule that provided relief only from 2:00-5:00 in the morning. The rusty shower provided little relief from the sweaty nights which I endured, my small fan minimally cooling me enough to permit sleep for the 3 to 4 hours each night I could get. 

Don’t feel badly for me. The time I spent in D.C. was cherished time. I worked in the Congressional office, doing a myriad of things, from typing client letters to answering the phone calls from constituents and those who wanted to provide Mr. Patten with an earful on a myriad of topics. 

Food was subsidized, so I had breakfast and lunch in the basement cafeteria of the Rayburn House Office Building. I found so much to do—sit in on the House and Senate sessions, go to committee meetings, find the best places to get free food—watermelon from Georgia, corn form Iowa—and there was an unlimited supply of Coca Cola everywhere. 

I rode the underground subway system, which connected the buildings to the Capitol. By riding in these cars, I was near people like Senator Edward Kennedy, or in an elevator with the bodacious Rep. Bella Abzug from New York, who taught me new swear words.

Congressman Patten took me many places because he was fond of how I tried to get him to National Airport (now Reagan National), ignoring traffic lights and speeding through the semi-deserted streets of the District under the guise of “Congressional immunity”—something which I look back at dubiously. That was the night that House Minority Leader Gerald R. Ford entered my car as I awaited my boss underneath the House steps. It was a surreal moment—like the Chevy Chase skits on Saturday Night Live once Mr. Ford became President. 

I met so many famous people wherever Mr. Patten took me. I shook hands with Speaker Carl Albert in his office, the same one plundered on January 6th. I was hugged by Tip O’Neill. I met Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield. A couple of the N.J. Representatives knew my name from the frequent interactions I had with them in the company of Mr. Patten. And the U.S. Government paid me for this!

As much as my experience was incredible in that regard, word got around quickly that I had played baseball in college. I had recovered from my injured shoulder so I could throw again. Suddenly, I received a call from Michael Corbett, the Legislative Assistant to Congressman John Barrett, a Democrat from the First District in Philadelphia. He invited me to his office and asked me if I wanted to join his team. It took only a second for me to say yes.

Michael Corbett was a dashing, fast-talking Irishman who had a great smile and a quickness to him. He said his father, Gene Corbett, had played in the big leagues and worked in the Cleveland Indians organization. His team was a collection of friends and people who knew the core group, all of the central people having lived in Salisbury, Maryland and were fans of the Yankees and Baltimore Colts. 

They called themselves “The Balotiniks.” It was a take off on the Li’l Abner character Joe Btfsplk, They were a rowdy bunch, drinking their way through games and continuing afterwards at the famous congressional watering hole on Pennsylvania Avenue, “The Hawk and Dove.” 

While I was under age for consuming alcohol in D.C., I drank with them without being carded and learned about hard liquor. They started me one game at catcher then saw my arm and had me patrolling the outfield for the remainder of the season. 

And what a season it was. We played for Congressman Robert Bergland, a Democratic-Farm Labor member in his first term from the 7th District in Minnesota. He was a graduate of the University of Minnesota and a farmer. And a very nice man who occasionally appeared at our games and he knew my name, too. Congressman Bergland became the 20th Secretary of Agriculture in the Carter Administration. 

To say that I was integral in the success of the team is an understatement. We won the regular season House championship. We lost only three games while we were winners of 23. 

I won a game by hitting a walk off grand slam with the promise from a girlfriend of one of the players, who worked in Admissions at American, that I would get a date with a Jewish cheerleader from New Jersey. And it really happened.

I threw a keg and pizza party for the team in our dorm room. I was flat out drunk and awoke making out with Lorlee Bartos, Congressman Bergland’s Legislative Assistant. She would go on to some national recognition as the 1989 campaign manager for Harriet Miers for Dallas City Council; Miers was unsuccessfully nominated to the Supreme Court of the United States by President George H. Bush. Bartos advised Miers on abortion and it rankled the pro-choice and pro-abortion groups, scuttling the nomination. 

Our team lost in the playoff semi-finals. I went home in August but returned to D.C. for school. My association with Corbett and the group continued. 

There was something new on television. ABC had started Monday Night Football and the group liked to meet for pizza and beer and to watch the game. It was expected that I would attend. Sometimes I would bring my textbook to read; that was not a very good idea. But it was great fun. One time while I was down in SE D.C., my fellow Semester buddies voted me floor representative to the American University Student Government. Because no one wanted to do it. 

Corbett had me to his office. He said that he had tickets to the last game of the season at R.F.K. Stadium, a metal mausoleum in NE D.C., home to the Senators and the Redskins. He said we’re going. 

What made this such a unique game was that it was the last Senators game ever in D.C. Owner Robert Short had decided that he was not making money there (it was stifling to be in the stadium at night and even worse in the afternoon) and the team was moving to richer pastures in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. 

Naturally there had been tremendous outrage in the city. This was the second time a team fled D.C. Longtime Washington Senators owner Calvin Griffith had enough of playing in dilapidated Griffith Stadium and the politicians weren’t giving him a new ballpark. So he took his team to the Twin Cities where they became the Minnesota Twins.

The airwaves and The Washington Post was replete with vitriol directed at Short. Warner Wolf was doing sports back then at WTOP-TV and was a harsh critic of Short—he had a vested interest because he was losing his side gig with televised Senators broadcasts. Attendance lagged at the ballpark. The team was a lame duck squad, and they were mired at the bottom of the American League—even with the great Ted Williams as manager. He could not work any miracles with the group he inherited. 

Despite the new stadium and the hopes for success, the fans didn’t go. There was racial tension in D.C., and the ballpark was located in a heavily African-American area, in a city which had experienced a significant amount of “white flight” to the suburbs. Those fans were not coming to D.C. at night—they supported the Redskins because they played the vast majority of home games at 1:00 on Sundays. 

R.F.K. Stadium had a policy that you could bring in your own beer. Which Mike Corbett did. He was drinking these small cans at a rate of one per half inning. I was expected to follow suit. Except he was a seasoned drinker who stood 6’3” and I was an inexperienced one who was 5’5” tall. 

I remember that the crowd was raucous from way before the start of the game between the Yankees and Senators. Fans were constantly running onto the field. The headline in the paper on October 1 was “Rowdy Fans Hand Senators Final Loss.”

The article described the 14,460 in attendance as having “…a jovial camaraderie for one another and their departing team..” Washington was actually leading 7-5 in the top of the ninth, in part due to a home run on a grooved pitch from Yankees pitcher Mike Kekich to Senators 6’7” slugger Frank Howard, a laser which landed in the second deck of the park. 

With two outs in the books, the night ended. Youths ran onto the field in packs, taking first base with them. The team names on the scoreboard were no longer there, in the hands of some of those perpetrators. Police surrounded home plate, but the rest of the ballpark was in the hands of the mob. It was “a rowdy wake“ as the writers described the scene. 

We had good seats behind the Senators dugout. I took it all in, wide-eyed and amazed at the debauchery on the field. Sure, there was some baseball played between two teams going nowhere. New York ends the season at 82-80. Washington lost 96 contests. 

Baseball Reference.com shows that Bobby Murcer blasted his 25th homer for New York. Roy White hit number 19 and Rusty Torres connected for his 2nd home run, all off of the top Senators starter, Dick Bosman. Thurman Munson went 2 for 4 for the Yankees. The Yankees committed 4 errors. Jack Aker blew the save, surrendering 6 runs in the 6th and 8th innings. 

The umpires declared a forfeit. New York won the game 9-0. The crowd finally was under control after pillaging the field and the stands. We left the stadium and headed to “The Hawk and Dove.” We started pitchers of beer with Congressman William Green, who would later become Mayor of Philadelphia. 

I was trashed. So was Corbett. Belligerently, he sent me to my car to drive back to American. I was far from sober. I had to negotiate the roadways from SE D.C. to NW D.C. where the campus was located. This meant driving by the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial to catch the Rock Creek Parkway. 

That’s when the flashing lights of the green U.S. Park Police came on behind me. I was a dead duck. The officer sad I had gone through a yellow light. I didn’t argue with him. I didn’t want to step outside of the car. 

I took the ticket. I made it back to American, breathing heavily. I paid the fine the next day. My father never knew, otherwise he would have killed me. I never drove again after drinking. And I cut down my drinking to almost none. What a sobering lesson.

I stayed in touch with Patten and his embattled Chief of Staff, Steve Callas, until their deaths. I lost contact with Mike Corbett some years after I graduated from Franklin and Marshall. Same with Lorlee Bartos. The cheerleader date was the night the Knicks played the Baltimore Bullets at the Baltimore Civic Center—the day of the Earl Monroe trade to New York. I went to R.F.K. one last time on a frigid November 7th, using the Congressman’s seat, to see the Eagles and Redskins tie 7-7 on a fourth quarter TD pass from QB Billy Kilmer. The stadium had survived the onslaught of 39 days prior. 

September 30, 1971 and the following day, October 1, 1971 are forever vividly etched in my mind. 50 years ago.