Update: 9:30 AM ET, Wednesday. I said I wasn’t doing a BC midweek, but found a little time to clean up some stuff. The next few weeks the schedule is going to be a little different. Time issues, you understand.
Ball Bits
–I’m bored to tears with interleague play, especially since my Mets have to play the Yankees every year, when the Yanks have been the superior team virtually each year since this all started in 1997. On Monday the Mets played the Yanks at Citi Field and the announced crowd of 32,911 was the lowest in the 92-game history of their matchups* (Tuesday’s was even lower, but the weather was awful). The White Sox drew only 30,000 to their game against the Cubs on Monday, while fewer than 35,000 saw the Royals-Cardinals in Kansas City. [Ken Belson / New York Times]
Well, the Mets did have a nice comeback win over the Yanks on Monday night, 2-1, and then on Tuesday, out of nowhere, the Mets strung together consecutive hits by Daniel Murphy, David Wright, and Lucas Duda to plate two runs in the bottom of the ninth against Mariano Rivera for a 2-1 stunner. Rivera entered the game 18-for-18 in save opportunities in this his final season.
In fact, incredibly, this was the first time in his 19-year career that Rivera entered with a save opportunity and failed to get an out.
For Mets starter Matt Harvey (5-0, 1.85), it was another no-decision, his sixth in eleven outings. The Mets just refuse to score for him.
[The New York Post’s Mike Vaccaro had an extraordinary fact about Tom Seaver. “In 143 of the 395 games that Seaver started for the Mets during 11 full seasons and portions of a 12th, the Mets scored two or fewer runs in back of him.”]
NBA Fever
–I’m one of those who when my favorite teams, in the case of the NBA the Knicks, are eliminated from the playoffs, I lose interest in the rest of the action.
But there are two exceptions. First, if the Spurs and Tim Duncan (he went to Wake Forest, you know) are still in it I’ll definitely tune in. Second, to see LeBron and the Heat lose.
So here we are. Timmy D. and his Spurs swept Memphis in four, with Tony Parker having a spectacular night in Game 4 (37 points on 15-of-21 shooting from the floor), while LeBron was directly responsible for one Miami loss and certainly played a major role in the second defeat that evened the Heat-Pacers series at 2 on Tuesday night, 99-92.
I do want Miami to win in the end so San Antonio can take ‘em out. But I’m on record as also saying Indiana, while they were defeating the Knicks, was a likable team, too.
Regardless, Duncan and Co. get to rest…and that is a good thing. Bring on the Finals. My Timmy D. jersey is out.
—Jeff Hornacek, one of the most popular players in Phoenix Suns history, was named the new coach, inheriting a team that went 27-55 last season, second-worst in franchise history.
–The Atlanta Hawks hired Mike Budenholzer as their next head coach, he being a longtime Spurs assistant. Budenholzer has been with Gregg Popovich for 19 years overall, the last 17 with San Antonio.
The Spurs allowed the Hawks to interview Budenholzer during the playoffs and then gave approval to the Hawks to negotiate a contract with him after they advanced to the NBA Finals. He’ll remain on the Spurs bench until the conclusion. The Hawks have all kinds of cap space and will be aggressive in the free agent market.
–The Charlotte Bobcats have hired Los Angeles Lakers assistant Steve Clifford to become their new coach. Whatever. The Bobcats should be relegated to the Developmental League.
“The firing of Vinny Del Negro remains troublesome. The obvious involvement of Chris Paul remains perplexing.
“Both are class people*, the kind with whom you’d enjoy sharing dinner and talking about books and family. Both worked hard for an entire season and, collectively, fell short of their goal. The Clippers’ first-round loss to Memphis in the NBA playoffs didn’t cut it for either.
“But clearly the player had all the leverage over the coach. Clippers owner Donald Sterling did everything but confirm that scenario when he told The Times’ T.J. Simers that ‘you have to keep the players happy.’
“Say all you want about Sterling – and many people have for many years – but his responses to those questions were refreshingly lacking in the usual public relations spin and drivel. The prevailing theory for years is that Sterling didn’t know what was going on. Suddenly, he’s the one telling it like it is….
“For the last half of the season, as the Clippers ran off to a franchise-record 56-26 mark, swept the Lakers and took the Pacific Division, the internal discussion was about how to keep Paul. Del Negro was an afterthought, a sacrificial lamb, if needed….
“Paul, a point guard supreme in a league that has become point-guard-centric, is a free agent. The Clippers can start negotiating with him July 1. With them, he has the right to sign for as many as five years and as much as $107.3 million. If he goes elsewhere, his maximums are four years and $80 million. That $27.3 million edge should be enough.
“But, to Paul’s credit, he wants a title. And if Paul didn’t think Del Negro was the one to take him and his teammates to the NBA’s promised land, then $80 million might have sufficed, might still. One thing is indisputable. If Paul had walked into the Clippers’ front office, any time in the last few months, and even whispered favorable words about Del Negro, there would have been no change….
“Del Negro’s firing was silly, but not even that surprising in the NBA. It was change for the sake of change. There was panic stemming from the same things that panic all team officials these days – restless fans, Internet noise and pundits perseverating on the easy fire-the-coach topic.
“Now, the Clippers will look for a mid-40s coaching talent, somebody with about five years in the league and maybe four trips to the playoffs; somebody who was once a good player in the league – especially as a point guard – and maybe even played under the likes of the masterful Gregg Popovich at San Antonio.
“Chris Paul is a great player and a good person. The league should have protected him from himself.”
The Rutgers’ Debacle, Part Quatre
The appointment of Julie Hermann to be Rutgers’ next athletic director has blown up into yet another humongous embarrassment for the school. Politicians in my state are astonished that Rutgers didn’t know, or opted to look the other way, when it comes to Hermann’s past as volleyball coach at the Univ. of Tennessee.
State Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver (Dem.) said she had lost “any semblance of confidence” that the state’s largest public university could fix itself.
“The questionable decision-making at this program so heavily funded by taxpayers continues to astound me,” Oliver said.
Former Democratic Gov. Dick Codey called for the ouster of Rutgers president Robert Barchi.
“This is becoming Comedy Central,” Codey said. “It’s an embarrassment to the students and alumni of a great university and it’s time Mr. Barchi takes his show on the road.”
“I was sobbing, crying, shocked, sick, ever since I read this,” said Kim Tibbetts, an assistant under Hermann at the Univ. of Tennessee… “My first thought when I read it: Why are they trying to take her down like this?”
For her part, Julie Hermann said on Monday she wouldn’t resign, calling the allegations “heartbreaking.”
“I am truly sorry that some were disappointed during my tenure as coach,” she said in a statement. “For sure, I was an intense coach, but there is a vast difference between high intensity and abusive behavior.”
Sunday’s Star-Ledger said all 15 of Hermann’s players wrote her a letter in 1997 accusing her of calling them a variety of insults, including alcoholics and learning-disabled. Hermann said she was “never notified of the reported letter outlining the concerns of some former athletes.”
The whole abuse deal is on top of what I highlighted in my last Bar Chat; the situation where Hermann advised an assistant of hers on the volleyball team not to get pregnant.
President Barchi said the search and background check on Hermann were thorough.
Barchi did not explain why the allegations against Hermann did not come out in the vetting process.
“The true palm-to-forehead part of this is buried in the long-winded statement from Rutgers president Robert Barchi, who tries to make a common-sense argument for standing behind his new AD.
“ ‘Looking at Julie’s entire record of accomplishment, which is stellar, we remain confident that we have selected an individual who will work in the best interests of all of our student athletes, our athletics teams, and the university,’ Barchi said.
“Those first seven words are the ones that matter here. Looking at Julie’s entire record of accomplishment. So, Barchi is saying, a good leader can make a few mistakes along the way as long as the overall track record is positive.
“Which begs the question: Why didn’t this magnanimous approach apply to the man Hermann is replacing?
“Tim Pernetti was forced to resign for one mistake, and this is not an attempt to reopen that can of worms. Pernetti should have fired Mike Rice in November when he saw those damning video clips, and that means pushing harder against the red tape and lawyers at Rutgers that stood in his way.
“He’ll be the first to tell you he was wrong – in fact, he said exactly that, which is more than Hermann said in the face of this controversy. I’m not one of these people who think Pernetti was a scapegoat, but whether you think his decision was a fireable offense or not really doesn’t matter here.
“Rutgers was clear that this one decision, in an otherwise stellar career, was enough to kick him to the curb. Forget the inroads he made in fundraising. Forget the bringing the school to the Big Ten. Forget that he had largely become the face of the athletic department.
“So what happened in two months? How does Rutgers decide that Hermann, less than two weeks after her introduction on campus, should be judged on her ‘entire record of accomplishment’ when Pernetti, a successful and popular AD who graduated from the school, didn’t get the same benefit of the doubt?
“The answer is that this was the worst kind of leadership. Barchi caved to the political pressure in April to demand Pernetti’s resignation after the Rice scandal exploded, and this time, he calculated that the outrage wasn’t nearly as widespread. He forced out Pernetti because it was politically expedient, and now he’s standing behind Hermann for the same reason.
“As a result, Rutgers is writing its standards in sidewalk chalk. Rice was fired for those video clips, even as many of his players defended him. Pernetti had to go, too, because he was too soft on the abusive coach. Even a lacrosse coach was suspended with pay based on foul language in a locker-room setting.
“But Hermann, who has at least a dozen former players describing her coaching tactics as somewhere between questionable and downright abusive, gets to explain it away as being ‘super-intense?’ And gets to be described by her new boss as ‘a proven leader in athletics administration with a strong commitment to academic success as well as athletic excellence?’
“Yes, it is possible to forgive an abusive coach for past transgressions. It is possible to learn from the error of your ways, and to realize, however you feel about this, coaches are expected to respect their athletes, and their dignity, in 2013.
“Though the empty suits who run Rutgers failed to uncover this, or the $150,000 lawsuit won by a former assistant who claimed Hermann fired her for getting pregnant – you wouldn’t want these bumbling fools running a video store, let alone a major research university – even that isn’t what’s most troubling here.
“That was Hermann’s first reaction when a reporter read the accusatory letter written by her players all those years ago.
“This is where it is impossible to believe Rutgers can allow Hermann to assume this job….
“Rutgers, where the university president twiddled his thumbs rather than investigate charges his basketball coach was physically and verbally abusing players.
“Rutgers, where nobody bothered to see whether the new coach, Eddie Jordan, actually had earned his degree while being referred to, in every school-sanctioned bio, as a graduate.
“Rutgers, where a few weeks ago Julie Hermann had the audacity, the shameless gall, to state the following: ‘It is a new day. It is already fixed.’
“Fixed? The AD doesn’t have the courage to own up to old mistakes, to admit she, as much as anyone, might be the perfect person to detect red flags among the pool of future coaches with anger issues to be considered at Rutgers.
“No. She doesn’t even bother to deny the charges. Because she says she can’t remember them.
“Honestly, you couldn’t make this stuff up if you locked the 10 most creative screenwriters in the world in a room overlooking the Raritan River.
“Except at Rutgers, currently led by a president, Robert Barchi, who is either the dumbest smart guy or the smartest dumb guy you’ll ever see, this is what it’s called: business as usual….
“Somehow, he kept his job after the Rice fiasco. Somehow, he was kept out of the fire when the Jordan issue flared. If he skates now, along with his AD? You wonder if they’re even trying anymore.”
As for Gov. Chris Christie, on Tuesday he said, “As governor, I’m not going to micromanage every hire at Rutgers University. I have absolute confidence in Bob Barchi. I think he is the right man for the job and he has my complete confidence and support. And he came out very forcefully Tuesday in support of Julie Hermann.”
Back in April, Christie’s demeanor was far different when asked how he would have dealt with Mike Rice when shown a videotape of him throwing basketballs at players and yelling homophobic slurs:
“I I had been shown this tape in November, I would have used my persuasive powers to make sure that Coach Rice was gone,” he said. “Fire him and let him sue you. And let the courts decide. But get him away from the student-athletes. That would’ve been my call on it.”
Now, Christie is saying when it comes to the charges against Hermann: “Let’s not engage in the character assassination going on here.”
Christie added: “I don’t know Julie Hermann. I have never met Julie Hermann. I have never spoken to Julie Hermann. I wasn’t involved in her recruiting or her vetting or anything else, as I should not be. I’m the governor of New Jersey. I’m not the recruiter for Rutgers University. My point on all this is: Let Rutgers handle this. Past mistakes by Rutgers has led to this intense media attention and I understand that and I don’t argue with it.”
All this as it has come to light that Hermann, on top of the other accusations, was at the center of a 2008 sex discrimination lawsuit at Louisville. In that case, an assistant track and field coach said she went to Hermann to complain of what she considered sexist behavior and “discriminatory treatment” by the head coach. Within three weeks of her taking her concerns to Louisville’s human resources department, the assistant coach, Mary Banker, was fired. Hermann was a senior athletics administrator at the time. The suit holds her largely responsible for Banker’s dismissal.
—Los Angeles defeated San Jose in Game 7 of the NHL’s Western Conference semis and now awaits Wednesday night’s Game 7 winner of Blackhawks-Red Wings. Doesn’t get any better than that.
The winner in the West then plays the Boston-Pittsburgh winner, their series starting on Saturday.
Not sure who I want at this point…I’m still licking my wounds from the Rangers’ losing to the Bruins (who we all agree were the superior team in that series).
–The NCAA Division I baseball tournament opens this weekend with North Carolina the No. 1 overall seed (one of eight ACC teams in the 64-team field).
—Duke defeated Syracuse for the Men’s Division I lacrosse title on Monday, 16-10. For the Blue Devils, it was their second championship in four years.
–A Ferrari that competed in the 1953 Le Mans 24-hour race sold for $12.3 million at an auction at Lake Como, Italy. The red V-12 MM Berlinetta (talk about a gorgeous car) was estimated by RM Auctions Inc. to sell for at least $6.7 million. But after a 20-minute battle between three bidders, one on the telephone, it sold to an unidentified buyer in the saleroom for $12.35 million with fees.
Michigan-based Hagerty’s “Blue Chip” index of the best collectible autos was at an all-time high of 240.9 in April.
