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Bar Chat

08/01/2011

Ball Chat

Baseball Quiz: The Cy Young Award wasn’t first presented until 1956 and I’ve always felt a panel of experts, like a subset of Hall of Fame voters, should go back and retroactively award it to, say, post-1920, just to pick a date.

From 1956-1966, though, there was only one Cy Young winner for both leagues combined. 1) As it turned out, from 1956-61, of the six winners, three were from the A.L. and three from the N.L. How many can you name? 2) From 1962-66, all five winners were from Los Angeles teams. Name ‘em. Answers below.

Sports’ Greatest Individual Performances

As part of its 125th anniversary celebration, the Sporting News listed its picks for greatest performances.

1. Don Larsen, 1956 World Series perfect game. “No. 1? Don Larsen. I mean, come on.” --Phil Simms. Larsen only had one 3-ball count the entire game.

2. Reggie Jackson, 1977 World Series. 3 home runs in three consecutive at-bats.

3. Magic Johnson, 1980 NBA Finals. Kareem sprains an ankle and the rookie, Magic, goes off for 42 points and 15 rebounds.

4. Jack Morris, 1991 World Series. 10-inning, 1-0 shutout in Game 7.

5. Babe Ruth, 1916 World Series. 14-inning, 2-1 win on the mound, plus he knocked home a run in Game 2 of a series the Boston Red Sox would eventually win.

6. Bill Walton, 1973 NCAA Championship Game. 21 of 22 from the field, plus 13 rebounds, in 87-66 UCLA win over Memphis State.

7. Jerry Rice, Super Bowl XXIII. 11 receptions for 215 yards and a touchdown as the 49ers defeated the Bengals, 20-16.

8. Vince Young, 2006 Rose Bowl. In a game for the ages, Young throws for 267 yards and rushes for an amazing 200 more – scoring three times on the ground, the last on fourth-and-5 from the 8 with 19 seconds to play, as Texas beat USC 41-38 (Young running for the 2-point conversion).

9. Mark Messier, 1994 Conference Finals. With the Rangers down 3 games to 2 to the Devils, Messier guarantees a win in Game 6. The New York media has a field day. The Rangers are then down 2-1 after two periods. But Messier has that look in his eyes and notches a third-period hat trick! Rangers win, then win Game 7 in double-OT and go on to defeat Vancouver in the Cup Finals in Game 7, with Messier scoring the game-winner.

10. Doug Williams, Super Bowl XXII. Denver goes up 10-0 over Washington, then Williams goes nuts, completing 18 of 29 for 340 yards and four touchdowns to become the first (and still only) black quarterback to win a Super Bowl. “Everybody sometime is put in position for history. Fortunately, I was in that position,” he says.

Ball Bits

--The Cleveland Indians apparently gave up a lot for Colorado hurler Ubaldo Jimenez, like their two best pitching prospects. Jimenez was 15-1 at the 2010 All-Star break though since then has won just 10 of his last 36 starts. But he still has nasty stuff and he has been pitching much better recently.

--Television ratings, from The Sporting News.

1. Cleveland…+80%
2. Texas…+35%
3. San Francisco…+35%

27. Mets…-29%
28. Houston…-34%
29. Tampa Bay…-37%

--I’m going out on a limb and say Matt Kemp wins the triple crown as the Mets’ Jose Reyes settles down in the .320 range.

--The Yankees scored 12 runs in the first inning of their game against Baltimore on Saturday night, an inning that started off with Derek Jeter striking out looking. It was a team record for first-inning runs, and only two shy of their record for any inning.

--Jim Thome is still three shy of 600 home runs after hitting one on Sunday. He has never been linked to performance-enhancing drugs, he’s always been known as a great guy, but I’m just not sure about him. No doubt in terms of perception he’s a victim of the era, and assuming he’s always been clean, that’s a shame. [Note to Pat Borzi of the New York Times…Thome hit seven homers in 2005, and thus has not “hit at least 20 home runs in every season since 1994.”]

--We note the passing of former hurler Hideki Irabu, who committed suicide at the age of 42. It was in 1997 that the New York Yankees signed the Japanese star to a four-year, $12.8 million contract. In his first game, July 10 of that year, 51,900 packed the old Yankee Stadium and Irabu responded by striking out nine in 6 2/3 as the Yanks defeated the Tigers, Irabu earning a curtain call. That was basically the peak in what would be a hideous career, 34-35 with a 5.15 ERA. He was a deceiving 29-20 in his three years with the Yankees because he was continuously hit hard and in his lone postseason appearance, the 1999 ALCS against Boston, Irabu gave up 8 runs (7 earned) in 4 2/3. Owner George Steinbrenner didn’t help matters by calling Irabu a “fat toad.” 

--Toronto’s Jose Bautista had seven home runs in the first nine games of June to reach 31 homers for the season, but suddenly he has none in his last 13 contests so 50 is looking unlikely for anyone in baseball this year.

--Yankee reliever David Robertson has 68 strikeouts in 42 1/3 innings. As Ronald Reagan would have said…not bad, not bad at all.

Blyleven was called up to the Twins in 1970 as a 19-year-old and was instructed in a telegram to immediately report to manager Bill Rigney.

“So when Blyleven arrived at the team hotel at 2 a.m., he went immediately to Rigney’s room to wake him.

“Rigney, wanting to share Blyleven’s naivety, told him, ‘I want you to go to all of your teammates’ rooms now and tell them that you’re here and get back to me.’

“Blyleven reported back to Rigney at 3:30 a.m. When Rigney asked whether Blyleven introduced himself to everybody, Blyleven said, ‘I tried. But nobody was in yet.’

“ ‘I made my manager a lot of money (in fines) that night, but not a lot of friends,’ added Blyleven.” [Star-Ledger…I apologize. I clipped out the story and forgot to write down the author of the piece.]

Foot-Ball Bits

--I’m really trying to keep up with all the moves but it ain’t easy. One thing is for sure, it’s not a great year to be a rookie, not having had the minicamp experience and now having to go through a crash course to learn what the pro game is all about, let alone playbooks.

Plus rookie contracts will be slashed, as they should. In 2009, Lions quarterback Matthew Stafford received $41.7 million in guaranteed money, and then last season QB Sam Bradford received $50 million…guaranteed! Totally absurd. But no longer. As Sports Illustrated reported, this year’s No. 1 pick, Cam Newton, was expected to receive four years for $28 million. [Actually, I see it was four years for ‘only’ $22 million according to ESPN.]

--Goodness gracious…if I’m an Eagles fan, I’m fired up, what with the signing of All-World corner Nnamdi Asomugha ($60 million, five years) and the trade for All-Pro corner Dominique Rogers-Cromartie. [Philly is also taking a flyer on Vince Young to be Michael Vick’s backup after trading Kevin Kolb for Rogers-Cromartie.] My Jets were supposed to get Asomugha, who would have teamed with Darrelle Revis to form the best cornerback tandem in the history of the game, and because they had to wait on him we lost ultra-valuable/versatile Brad Smith to Buffalo. I mean this sucks, kids.

--Separately, the Jets re-signed receiver Santonio Holmes to a five-year, $50 million deal ($24 million guaranteed), after which Holmes posted a picture of himself chugging a bottle of champagne, wearing little but shorts; not exactly what the team wanted to see from the substance-abuse challenged Holmes. As the New York Post’s Mark Cannizzaro put it, he’s being paid to play like a star on the field “and act like one off it as well.”

--And this just in…Plaxico Burress signs a one-year, $3 million fully guaranteed contract with the Jets! So between Burress and Holmes, where’s the party?!

--Not that there was any doubt Peyton Manning would finish his career in Indianapolis, but he just signed for five years and $90 million. Yet you do kind of have to wonder about a guy who recently had his second neck operation since March 2010.

In Manning’s 14-year career (wow, time flies), he has led the Colts to the playoffs 12 times, with two Super Bowl appearances (one win), starting all 227 regular-season and playoff games. His next touchdown pass will be No. 400.

--Donovan McNabb went from Washington to Minnesota, ending a disastrous partnership with the Shanahans, father and son. McNabb can be such a jerk, not that the Shanahans aren’t as well. One of the issues last season was that Donovan refused to wear a wristband with the plays, even though he needed the help, plus he never practiced hard enough.

--The Patriots picked up two-time All-Pro defensive tackle Albert Haynesworth, one of the more apathetic people on the planet, this after the Redskins had given him a 7-year, $100 million deal in 2009, $41 million of which was guaranteed!! And the Pats got receiver Chad Ochocinco and all his Twitter baggage.

--Don’t buy your individual NFL game tickets yet. With the surge in interest prices have spiked but they will come down. Alas, the downside is they’ll come way down if your team sucks. I think I’d rather have a good team and watch on TV…just sayin’.

--At the World Swimming Championships, Ryan Lochte won five golds to Michael Phelps’ four, plus Lochte beat Phelps in their two head-to-head matchups, making Lochte top dog for now as they both look to London. I admire Phelps for wanting to stay in the game, and despite his talk of not being in shape winning seven medals total.

--Watching CBS’ coverage of the PGA Tour event from The Greenbrier on Saturday, during a weather delay the conversation among all the broadcasters and analysts turned to Tiger Woods’ sudden decision to return next week at the W.G.C.-Bridgestone Invitational at Firestone Country Club, an event he has won seven times in the past, but also a place he had the worst 72 holes of his professional career, last year, when he shot 18-over to finish 78th in an 80-man field (there’s no cut in this one).

And just what kind of physical shape is Tiger really in? He last played on May 12 and afterwards announced his assortment of injuries. What kind of swing shape? His coach, Sean Foley, conceded that when they got together Friday it was for the first time since May. Why isn’t Tiger waiting longer? He’s also committed to the PGA Championship in two weeks. Some of the CBS commentators wondered if Tiger could even walk 72 holes. 

And then you have the Steve Williams issue; Tiger replacing the caddie with longtime friend Bryon Bell, who runs Tiger’s course design group. Bell was implicated by Rachel Uchitel in Tiger’s sex scandal as having been the gopher and fixer, such as in securing her plane tickets for her trip to Melbourne for the Australian Open in 2009.

But back to the PGA, as the New York Times’ Larry Dorman noted:

“Would the folks at the PGA of America think about livening things up for featured TV pairings the first two days of that event? Maybe with a threesome of Woods, Scott* and, well, why not Rory McIlroy? Or the freshly-minted British Open champion, Darren Clarke? Or Lee Westwood or Luke Donald or Martin Kaymer?

“Think golf fans, casual, lukewarm and hard-core, might tune in for that?”

*For those who forgot, Steve Williams is now on Adam Scott’s bag.

--Back to The Greenbrier, Scott Stallings had an impressive first win on Tour as he defeated Wake’s Bill Haas and journeyman Bob Estes in a playoff. But would someone please tell Ian Baker-Finch, an Aussie, that Wake Forest is the Demon Deacons, not Deacon Demons?

Meanwhile, a guy I imagine a lot of weekend golf fans are beginning to warm to is Gary Woodland. He’s entertaining, no doubt. Man can he hit it. This week he hit 8-iron from 249 yards and on Sunday hit 7-iron from 228.

I’m your typical (lousy) casual golfer and at 53, I have to jump on a 7-iron to hit it 150. [But I did have a respectable, for me, 44 on my back nine this week.]

--Olin Browne won the U.S. Senior Open.

--Rory McIlroy’s life is racing a little too fast these days and he’s been screwing up since his U.S. Open triumph at Congressional. This week, at the Irish Open, he got into it with Jay Townsend, a former European Tour professional and American media pundit.

Townsend criticized McIlroy’s course management this week and specifically targeted Rory’s caddie, JP Fitzgerald, in his commentary on the Golf Channel and then in Tweets.

“It was some of the worst course management I have ever seen beyond Under 10 boys’ golf competition,” wrote Townsend.

“Shut up,” Rory tweeted angrily, adding: “You’re a commentator and a failed golfer. Your opinion means nothing.”

As an editorial in the Irish Independent noted, “As soon as he pressed the button to post this tweet, McIlroy multiplied by more than a hundred-fold the impact of Townsend’s tweets.”

As in Townsend’s Twitter page had just 3,956 followers when he lashed into McIlroy, but after McIlroy commented, that skyrocketed to 544,000.

It was at the British Open that McIlroy made some stupid comments about his dislike for playing in windy conditions. And as the Golf Channel’s Erik Kuselias said after the Townsend tussle, Rory “comes across as a spoiled brat who feels entitled. This is dumb from someone we’ve all probably anointed just a little too quickly.”

--You have to feel sorry for the Rev. John Foundation Little League team of Uganda. They were the first from Africa to qualify for the Little League World Series but on Friday they learned they couldn’t come because their visas were denied. The State Department said some of the applications included birth dates that “several parents admitted had been altered to make some players appear younger than they actually are.”

Rules are rules, and the age restriction for the LWS, 11- and 12-year-olds, is important, but still you can imagine the living conditions for some of the kids on the Ugandan team.

--Paul Menard made his first NASCAR Sprint Cup win a biggie, the Brickyard 400.

--Could it be? Did Duke b-ball coach Mike Krzyzewski violate NCAA rules when he reportedly offered a kid a scholarship during a summer tournament? NCAA rules prohibit contact with players until after the tournament is finished. Could Duke be put on probation for 21 years? OK, maybe a slap on the wrist but I was just dreaming for a minute.

--Meanwhile, just nine days before the start of training camp, the University of North Carolina fired football coach Butch Davis after he had guided the program through the disastrous NCAA investigation into all manner of improprieties, though Davis himself had not been directly connected to any of the potential violations the NCAA will be ruling on in October or later.

Nonetheless, Chancellor Holden Thorp said that while there had been no change in the NCAA’s inquiry, he had “lost confidence in our ability to come through this without harming the way people think of this institution….Our academic integrity is paramount, and we must work diligently to protect it.”

“I can honestly say I leave with the full confidence that I have done nothing wrong. I was the head coach and I realize the responsibility that comes with that role. But I was not personally involved in, nor aware of, any actions that prompted the NCAA investigation.”

Davis was 28-23 in four seasons at Chapel Hill, but it was last July that investigators descended on the campus and over the course of last season 14 players missed at least one game and seven were forced to sit the entire year; all due to former associate head coach John Blake and his steering of players to late NFL agent Gary Wichard, for which Blake received a reported $31,000.

A day after Butch Davis was fired, Dick Baddour stepped down after 14 years of running UNC’s athletic department, though he will stay on until his replacement can hire the new football coach. Defensive coordinator Everett Withers was named interim head coach. Davis, incidentally, is owed $2.7 million on his contract but if he’s found to have been involved in the violations, the balance could be voided.

--It is totally impossible to keep up with all the NCAA violations these days when it comes to -football and basketball. The other day Oklahoma asked the NCAA to place its men’s basketball program on two more years of probation and vacate all wins from the 2009-10 season for two major violations by former assistant coach Oronde Taliaferro.

--Bloomberg Businessweek has a piece on youth quarterback camps, such as that of Steve Clarkson, “NFL washout and youth football eminence,” who charges $600 for his four day Air 7 program. Clarkson is number one. His list of students includes Ben Roethlisberger and he commands up to $10,000 per month for private lessons.

--Hot on the heels of the Univ. of Texas’ decision to form their own television network with ESPN, the Pac-12 Conference announced it would create six regional channels and a national one. All will carry 35 football and more than 100 men’s basketball games. So many choices! Is this a great country or what?!

--Wake Forest is picked not only last in its division in the ACC for this coming football season, but it was voted by the media in the preseason poll as worst among the 12 teams in the conference. Oh yeah, I’m fired up.

--Jurgen Klinsmann is the new coach of the U.S. men’s national soccer team. Even I have heard of him, one of the greatest players in German history. He also coached the Germans to a third-place showing at the 2006 World Cup. Klinsmann replaces Bob Bradley, who was fired after five years. The U.S. advanced to the Round of 16 of the 2010 World Cup but expectations were far greater. The thing is Bradley was given a four-year extension just last August. I don’t know how contracts work in this case but I assume U.S. Soccer still has to pay him, whatever that is.

“A Boston Herald reporter live-tweeted the memorial service for Myra Kraft, the late wife of Patriots owner Bob Kraft, posting 17 notes (sample tweet: ‘The Patriots QB arrives…’) from a synagogue in Newton, Mass.”

“In 1996, Yen Nguyen (who left war-torn Vietnam in 1975 and settled in Houston) started running to get in shape. A few months later she tackled her first 26.2 She’s since averaged more than two marathons or ultras a month. On Sept. 4, Nguyen, 48, will run her 400th marathon-or-longer race at the Kauai Marathon in Hawaii.”

“Running was not a choice until I came to America. During the war, we were constantly in fear. This sport has taught me what freedom really means.”

[Your editor jogged three miles on the high school track, Sunday, in 90-degree heat, thus sweating out the previous day’s Tsingtao…a treat to myself.]

--Actress Scarlett Johansson turned down an invitation to November’s Marine Corps Ball, as she’ll be in Europe on a film project, but she said she is “incredibly honored” and is sending Sgt. Dustin L. Williams a case of champagne.

Of course what else was Johansson to do? I’m now on record as saying the Marines need to stop this. It was cute with Mila Kunis, but now it’s verging on stalking, though Williams appears to have handled everything in the same classy manner Johansson did. The head of the Marine Corps, however, should tell his men and women to stop.

--In a survey, women said they would rather exercise by having sex than go to the gym. As reported by the Daily Mail, 76% of women said they were more inclined to have sex if they thought it would help them lose weight. The Mail reports that according to some sex experts, “a half-hour bedroom session can burn as many as 350 calories. Kissing for an hour burns more than 200 calories.”

--Interesting piece in USA TODAY for those of you who hike the Appalachian Trail. The effort by the U.S. Postal Service to close 3,700 branches over the coming years could have a real impact on trail traffic because some of those targeted for closure are critical to hikers in that they supply food and gear.

“Closing the post offices in Fontana Dam, N.C.; Glencliff, N.H.; and Caratunk, Maine, would leave hikers without an easy way to get food and switch out equipment at critical points during their treks, which usually take between four and six months.”

I know I wrote of this once before, but my own experience on the Appalachian Trail lasted all of  three nights. Me and two high school buddies started around West Point and hiked to the New Jersey border and were planning on taking a full week when we heard it was going to rain so we called my dad to pick us up. Was that wimpy or what?! Of course this was back in 1975 when the biggest threat on the trail wasn’t bears, because there were very few in those days, but drinking from a stream or swimming in a lake because everything was polluted (think the worst days of acid rain). But I’ll never forget when we came upon these older guys at a lake and they gave us two beers to share among the three of us. Seeing as how we were only 17, this was huge.

Anyway, some 2,000 a year complete the entire 2,200-mile trail each year.

But I didn’t know this. The Pacific Crest Trail, which runs from Mexico to Canada, is actually longer…2,650 miles.

You will never, ever hear me contemplate planning a hike the rest of my life unless it was one of those English countryside deals, village to village with lots of pubbing each night. [I would love to do that someday.]

Nope, when it comes to something like the Appalachian Trail, give me a Four Seasons.

--Back to sex…Chrystal Harris has apologized through Twitter to Hugh Hefner, not for dumping him just days before their June 18 wedding, but for making fun of Hef’s sexual prowess in revealing on Howard Stern’s show that sex with the 85-year-old lasted “like two seconds.” Now she says her time-keeping may have been a little off, let alone heartless.

--Remember Chuck Wepner, the Bayonne Bleeder? He’s now 72 and I saw an interview with him in the paper the other day as Wepner promotes some sports documentaries ESPN is doing this fall. Wepner, you’ll recall, lasted 15 rounds against Muhammad Ali and even knocked Ali down, though Wepner lost the fight. He was of course the inspiration for Stallone’s Rocky Balboa.

Anyway, this is an old story but I’m guessing a few of you haven’t heard it before.

Wepner says he was very confident in going up against Ali. How confident?

“So confident that he took his wife out the night before the fight and bought her a powder blue negligee.

“ ‘I want you to be wearing this because tonight you are going to be sleeping with the heavyweight champion of the world,’ he told her.

“After his defeat, Wepner went back to his hotel room to find his wife sitting on the end of the bed in the new negligee.

“She said, ‘Am I going to Ali’s room, or is he coming to mine?’” [MCT]

--I’m glad to see “Entourage” will become a movie, probably for summer 2012, I’m guessing. It’s definitely a natural.

Top 3 songs for the week of 8/3/74: #1 “Annie’s Song” (John Denver…anytime you see his name it’s a reminder to always fill your gas tank when it gets to about a quarter full, just as we try to do here at Bar Chat) #2 “Don’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me” (Elton John…sun setting here as I type this…just to give you a ‘you are there’ feeling) #3 “Feel Like Makin’ Love” (Roberta Flack…guys would have to get geared up to make love to Roberta these days…just sayin’)…and…#4 “Rikki Don’t Lose That Number” (Steely Dan…great band, period) #5 “The Night Chicago Died” (Paper Lace…good trivia question) #6 “The Air That I Breathe” (The Hollies…blows) #7 “Rock And Roll Heaven” (The Righteous Brothers…Amy Winehouse will not be there) #8 “Please Come To Boston” (Dave Loggins…great restaurants and bars, but otherwise I have no reason to go to Boston today…give me one, and I’ll be there) #9 “Call On Me” (Chicago) #10 “Sideshow” (Blue Magic…eh…)

Baseball Quiz Answers: 1) 1956…Don Newcombe, NL, Brooklyn; 1957…Warren Spahn, NL, Mil; 1958…Bob Turley, AL, New York; 1959…Early Wynn, AL, Cleveland; 1960…Vern Law, NL, Pittsburgh; 1961…Whitey Ford, AL, New York. 2) 1962…Don Drysdale, Dodgers; 1963…Sandy Koufax, Dodgers; 1964…Dean Chance, Angels; 1965…Sandy Koufax, Dodgers; 1966…Sandy Koufax, Dodgers.

In 1967, the first year with two winners, the AL award winner was Boston’s Jim Lonborg, while the NL’s was San Francisco’s Mike McCormick. [I’m betting a ton of people miss McCormick. Everyone gets Lonborg, who then went skiing and broke his leg.]

Next Bar Chat, Thursday. Some very funny golf bits courtesy of Carl Hiaasen.

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