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Bar Chat

04/15/2024

Scottie Scheffler wins The Masters Again

[Posted Sunday after The Masters.]

No Add-on this week.

Baseball Quiz: The Angels’ Mike Trout is off to a solid start, six home runs, through Saturday’s play.  Last Monday, he homered and tripled against Tampa Bay, the 14th time in his career that he has had such a game.  Since 1950, according to Baseball Reference, only four players have had more such games...a home run and a triple.  All four had at least 400 career home runs and 90 stolen bases.  Name them.  Answer below.

The Masters

The rains came as expected Wednesday night into Thursday morning, but Augusta didn’t get hit as bad as initially forecast and they were able to start off the first round around 10:30 a.m.  After the first eighteen was completed Friday morning, we had....

Bryson DeChambeau -7
Scottie Scheffler -6
Nicolai Hojgaard -5
Max Homa -5

Tiger Woods +1

Tiger got a tough break, needing to come out early Friday in cold and windy conditions to play his final five holes and then he had a 40-minute turnaround to start his second round....so 23 holes in all.

But he played very well in extremely windy conditions, even-par, and broke the record with his 24th consecutive cut made at Augusta, a really great performance.

After two rounds...the cut at +6....

Scheffler -6
DeChambeau -6
Homa -6
Hojgaard -4

Tiger +1.

Among those missing the cut...Viktor Hovland, Sam Burns, Euro budding star Adrian Meronk, Dustin Johnson, Jordan Spieth, Brian Harman, Sergio Garcia, Justin Thomas*, Justin Rose and Wyndham Clark.

*JT was at Even through 14 holes on Friday when he finished double, double, bogey, double to miss the cut ty a shot.

Defending champion Jon Rahm, aka Darth Vader for jumping to LIV, made the cut at +5 and bitched about the extremely blustery conditions.

“A couple times, [I found myself] questioning why we were out there,” Rahm said, “especially when I got to 18 and saw the whole front of the green just full of sand.”

He did add, “I understand they want us to finish,” after the rain-delayed opening round.  Get back on schedule, though some of the afternoon groups who had the worst conditions approached six hours for their rounds.

But Tiger was playing in the same conditions and he did just fine.

On to round three...and what a topsy turvy affair we had but, in the end, as one headline writer put it, ‘moving day’ was subtle.  Scottie Scheffler still on top.

Scheffer -7
Collin Morikawa -6 ...his 69 the best of the day among the leaders
Homa -5
Ludvig Aberg -4
DeChambeau -3
Xander Schauffele -2
Cam Davis -2
Hojgaard -2 ...led after ten holes at -7

Tiger had a tough day, a Masters career-worst 82.  As Tony Soprano would have said, ‘Whaddya gonna do...’

And in round four...after seven holes we had this....

Scheffler -6 thru 7
Morikawa -6...7
Aberg -6...7
Homa -5...7

But Scheffler birdies 8, 9 and 10...while Morikawa doubles 9....

Scheffler -9 thru 10
Homa -7...10
Aberg -7...10
Morikawa -5...10

Aberg then puts it in the water on No. 11...huge mistake. Double bogey.

Morikawa puts in the water on 11...double...

Scheffler bogeys 11.

Homa doubles 12.

Thru 12....

Scheffler -8
Homa -5
Aberg -5
Tommy Fleetwood -4...thru 15
Morikawa -3

As Yogi said, it ain’t over ‘til it’s over.

[The Ben Stiller/Jordan Spieth commercial is brilliant.]

Aberg birdies 13 and 14...-7

Scheffler birdies 13...-9

And then stiffs his approach on 14 for another birdie!  He’s -10!

Three clear of Aberg, whose ‘Q-rating’ is soaring. Nine tournaments this year, zero missed cuts.  Second at Pebble...8th at The Players...highly likable....

Scheffler birdies 16!  11-under...game over.

Scheffler -11
Aberg -7

And Scheffler picks up his second Green Jacket...ninth win overall on the PGA Tour (all in the last two years, since 2022).  Best to him and his wife on the impending birth of their child.

Scheffler -11
Aberg -7 ...fantastic performance in first major
Morikawa -4
Homa -4
Fleetwood -4

I would have no problem if Scottie Scheffler wins every freakin’ major the rest of my life.

LIV was not a factor in the end...which is very good. 

--Tiger finished +16...last...his worst performance in a 72-hole event.  But, heck, he made the cut.

Can Tiger win any tournament to break his tie with Sam Snead at 82?  Yes.  But he’d have to play the fall circuit with flat courses and I’m not sure he’d do that.  He should!  WTF. A win is a win.

--Congratulations to Verne Lundquist on his 40th and last Masters.  I met him...he is as good as they say he is.  A gentleman and an icon.  I wish the world was peopled with Verne Lundquists...alas, it isn’t.

--At Tuesday’s night’s annual Champions Dinner, Tom Watson asked Augusta National chairman Fred Ridley if it would be appropriate to say something about the second gathering of Masters champions that included players from both the PGA Tour and LIV, which, of course, included guest of honor Jon Rahm, the 2023 winner who joined LIV in December.  Ridley welcomed it.

“I got up and I’m looking around the room, and I’m seeing just a wonderful experience everybody is having,” Watson said.  “They are jovial. They are having a great time. They are laughing. I said, ‘Ain’t it good to be together again?’  And there was a kind of a pall from the joviality, and it quieted down, and then Ray Floyd got up and it was time to leave.”

As Golf Digest’s Dave Shedloski put it: “Way to kill the mood.”

But Watson later said the ending could be read as a hopeful sign that soon the men’s game will be reunited.  Wishful thinking?

“In a sense, I hope that the players themselves took that to say, you know, we have to do something,” Watson, 74, said.  “We all know it’s a difficult situation for professional golf right now.  The players really kind of have control, I think, in a sense. What do they want to do?  We’ll see where it goes.  We don’t have the information or the answers.  I don’t think the PGA Tour or the LIV Tour really have an answer right now. I know the three of us [referring to Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player and himself] want [the game] to get together.  We want to get together like we were at that Champions Dinner – happy, the best players playing against each other.  The bottom line:  That’s what we want in professional golf, and right now, we don’t have it.”

Nicklaus said he purposely told PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan he didn’t want to know how negotiations were going so he wouldn’t have to comment on it.

Player said the rift is “a big problem.  Because they paid all these guys to join the LIV Tour fortunes...beyond one’s comprehension, and the players that were loyal, three of us and others...now these guys come back and play [on the tour], I really believe the players [that were] loyal should be compensated in some way or another; otherwise, there’s going to be dissension.”

--The LIV players all wore their stupid team logos, as if there is a single person on the planet who would buy it.  I loved that there was one exception...Brooks Koepka, who stuck with his Nike garb.

NBA

--The Knicks entered play Sunday in third place in the Eastern Conference, needing to beat the Bulls at the Garden to assure they stayed there, while having a shot at the 2-seed, Milwaukee.  The Knicks had beaten Boston and Brooklyn their previous two games to solidify their position.

So today, in a terrific final regular-season game, the Knicks held on to defeat the Bulls in overtime, 120-119, and, coupled with losses from the Bucks and Cavs, New York grabbed the second spot and will play the winner of the Philadelphia-Miami play-in game.

And Tom Thibodeau gets a 50-win season despite the fact he was without All-Star Julius Randle like the final 30+ games.

By the way, the Knicks are 20-3 with O.G. Anunoby in the lineup.

Eastern Conference final standings....

1. Boston 64-18...--
2. Knicks 50-32...14
3. Milwaukee 49-32...15
4. Cleveland 48-34...16
5. Orlando 47-35...17
6. Indiana 47-35...17
7. Philadelphia 47-35...17
8. Miami 46-36...18
9. Chicago 39-43
10. Atlanta 36-46

The Western Conference is wrapping up action later.

--Going back to some individual oddities since I last posted.  Milwaukee and Boston in a game Tuesday night combined for a record low two free throw attempts.  The Celtics also became the first team in NBA history to not shoot one.  The Bucks committed just four fouls, the lowest in league history, as they beat the Celtics 104-91.

But Giannis Antetokounmpo, who shot the only two free throws in the game, making one, left with a calf strain that kept him out of the remaining regular season games, his playoff status uncertain.

Meanwhile, entering Sunday’s play, Doc Rivers was 17-18 as coach after Milwaukee fired Adrian Griffin, who was 30-13.  I said at the time the move to bring in Rivers made zero sense.

--For Wake Forest fans, Jake LaRavia, who should have stayed with the Deacs one more season, 2022-23, but he was still a first-round draft pick, has gotten playing time in his second season with Memphis due to all their injuries and his last two games, losses to the Cavs and the Lakers, Jake has had 32 points (a career-high on 8 of 11 from 3) and 28.  So he’s put himself on some teams’ boards for next season, if he doesn’t stay with the Grizzlies.

College Basketball

--John Calipari did become the new head coach at Arkansas after 15 seasons, 410 wins, two Final Fours and a national championship at Kentucky.

Calipari’s contract is for five years and $38 million.  He gets a maximum of two rollover years for qualifying for the NCAA Tournament, a $1 million signing bonus, $500,000 retention bonuses annually, and additional bonuses for making the NCAA Tournament and advancing through each round.  [The contract starts at $7 million per.  He was making $8.5 million at Kentucky.]

Kentucky then turned to Baylor coach Scott Drew, but he took a pass, which some found shocking.

The 53-year-old Drew is one of seven active head coaches to have won a national title, turning Baylor into one of the best programs in the sport. 

Drew weighed taking the Kentucky job for a day before opting to remain in Waco.  The family likes their Texas lives, and that ultimately outweighed the appeal of perhaps the highest-profile job in the sport.

So then Kentucky turned to BYU coach Mark Pope, which former Wildcats coach Rick Pitino called an “unbelievable choice.”

Pope won a national championship under Pitino at Kentucky in 1996, and then played seven seasons in the NBA before entering the coaching ranks.  He had a 110-51 mark during his tenure at BYU, but lost to Duquesne in the first round of this year’s NCAA tournament.

--No surprise...UConn’s Donovan Clingan entered the NBA Draft, ditto Duke’s Kyle Filipowski and Jared McCain.  McCain is going to be a superstar.

--For the record, the men’s national basketball championship game drew 14.8 million viewers across TBS, TNT and TruTV, according to Nielsen, a slight increase over 2023’s title game between UConn and San Diego State, which was 14.7 million.

The women’s title game between Iowa and South Carolina drew 18.7 million across ESPN and ABC to become the most-watched women’s basketball game ever.

MLB

--Shohei Ohtani is off the hook and can focus on baseball.

Federal prosecutors charged interpreter and one-time close friend Ippei Mizuhara with stealing more than $16 million from the superstar to pay debts with an allegedly illegal bookmaker.

The U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California, Martin Estrada, announced the charge Thursday at a news conference in downtown Los Angeles.

“Mr. Ohtani is considered a victim in this case,” Estrada said.

He said that Mizuhara impersonated Ohtani in conversations with bank officials, placed thousands of wagers and deposited winnings in a bank account the interpreter controlled.

“Mr. Mizuhara did all this to feed his insatiable appetite for illegal sports gambling,” Estrada said.

Mizuhara faces a single count of bank fraud.

We got the facts, and now baseball fans, the Dodgers and Major League Baseball can breathe a sigh of relief.

During a press conference on March 25, Ohtani alleged that Mizuhara kept him in the dark about the media inquiries: “Ippei didn’t tell me such reporting was taking place. ...Ippei told everyone, including my agent, that I made payments not on behalf of Ippei, but on behalf of another friend.”  Ohtani said it was a “complete lie” that he paid Mizuhara’s gambling debts and denied betting on sports.

“I myself have never bet on anything or bet for anyone on a sporting event, or asked someone to bet for me, and I’ve never asked anyone to send money to a bookmaker from my bank account,” Ohtani said.

He added: “The conclusion is that he was lying to everyone, including everyone around me.”

Friday, after Mizuhara made his first court appearance, Ohtani said at Dodger Stadium he was “very grateful” for the investigation and would focus on baseball going forward.

I was one of the many doubters, but waited for the facts and now we have them.  As Bill Plaschke of the Los Angeles Times, another of the doubters, wrote this week, “The legend lives.”

Ohtani is doing just fine at the plate...after an 0-2 night in a 5-2 win over the Padres last night, with two walks and a sac fly, Ohtani is batting .343, 4 home runs, 10 doubles, 10 RBIs and a 1.078 OPS, L.A. 11-6.

I can’t help but note another Dodger, righty Tyler Glasnow.  The guy has shown over the years he has terrific stuff and can be as good as any starter in the game, but he’s never thrown more than 120 innings.

So L.A. signed him to a mammoth 5-year, $136.5 million extension; an extension onto his existing Tampa Bay contract after a trade.  But these are the Dodgers and thus far so good.

Four starts, 3-0, 2.25 ERA, 24 innings, just 11 hits, 29 Ks (including 14 in seven innings his last time out).  It will be interesting to see if they get 28-30 starts out of the guy.  He’s never made more than 21 starts (last season).

--The Yankees (12-3) continue their hot start, sweeping the Guardians (9-5) in Cleveland Saturday, 3-2 and 8-2.  Juan Soto had a 3-run homer in the nightcap and now has 15 RBIs.

But they lost today, 8-7 in 10.

--The Mets honored former ace Dwight ‘Doc’ Gooden today by retiring his No. 16.

For those of us living, working in the New York area in the mid-1980s, Doc Gooden was a one-of-a-kind superstar who burst on the scene in 1984 as a 19-year-old flamethrowing rookie in spectacular fashion, going 17-9, 2.60 ERA and a rookie-record 276 strikeouts in 218 innings.

Quickly, every time he took the mound it was an “event” for all baseball fans in the region.  You just can’t imagine the buzz his starts elicited.  I was working in New York then and you planned your after-work schedules around his appearances.  The bars were hopping, for one.  The television and radio ratings were ginormous.

Gooden followed up his Rookie of the Year campaign with one of the best seasons of the last 60 years for a starting pitcher, 24-4, 1.53, 268 Ks in 276 innings, winning the Cy Young Award.

In 1986 he was 17-6, 2.84, but his strikeouts began to decline, 200 in 250 innings.

Gooden had a poor postseason, even as the Mets won the World Series, and we began to learn of his now well-chronicled problems with drugs.

But he was still productive, going 15-7 and 18-9 in 1987-88, and 19-7 in 1990.

Gooden would end up 157-85, 3.10, for his Mets career; 194-112, 3.51 overall.  He had three other Cy Young Award finishes in the top five.

So, as he prepared to see his number unveiled at the top of Citi Field, we all knew it would be an emotional moment.  Dwight Gooden could have been among the game’s all-time greats, but he fell short because of his demons.

The guy is extremely appreciative that despite all his issues, the Mets organization and the fans still embrace him for one simple reason...he gave us such enduring memories.

As for the game today, the Mets held on 2-1 to move to 7-8 after their 0-5 start, taking 2 of 3 from the Royals (10-6).

--Baltimore’s Jackson Holliday made his debut this week.  The 20-year-old consensus No. 1 prospect in baseball then went 0-for-11, 7 strikeouts, in his first three games, playing second base.  The Orioles gave him Saturday off to ‘get his mind right,’ as the Warden in ‘Cool Hand Luke’ would have said.

And Holliday got his first hit today, 1-for-4, two more strikeouts, as the O’s beat the Brewers 6-4.

--The Atlanta Braves confirmed star righthander Spencer Strider will miss the rest of the 2024 after undergoing surgery to repair the ulnar collateral ligament in his right elbow, his second Tommy John surgery (the other in 2019 while at Clemson).  Strider made only two starts in 2024.

He led the majors last season with 20 wins and 281 strikeouts.

--We note the passing of former Yankee pitcher Fritz Peterson, 82.

Peterson was a Yankee hurler from 1966-74, a good one, 109-106, 3.10 ERA [Overall in his MLB career, 133-131, 3.30], a 20-game winner in 1970 and one-time All-Star.

Peterson, who overcame prostate cancer, revealed to the New York Post in 2018 that he was battling Alzheimer’s disease.

But he was most famous for his off-field life, which included swapping wives and families with teammate Mike Kekich in a story straight out of the ‘70s.

The trade happened 51 years ago in March, approximately a year after Peterson and his wife Marilyn, along with Kekich and his wife, Susanne, attended a party at the home of longtime New York Post writer Maury Allen on July 15, 1972.

“We did that and we had so much fun together, Susanne and I and Mike and Marilyn, that we decided, ‘Hey, this is fun, let’s do it again,’” Peterson told the Palm Beach Post in 2013. “We did it the next night. We went out to the Steak and Ale in Fort Lee (N.J.).  Mike and Marilyn left early and Susanne and I stayed and had a few drinks and ate.”

Well, eventually Fritz fell in love with Susanne and Mike fell in love with Marilyn.

On March 4, 1973, the two pitchers held separate press conferences to announce they’d swapped wives, kids and even their dogs.

Peterson and Susanne were married in 1974.  Kekich and Marilyn never wed and broke up soon after.

“That’s the only thing I feel bad for, that they didn’t work out because we all figured it could all work out,” Peterson said.

Peterson was traded to Cleveland ahead of the 1974 season.

You have to understand, this was such a huge deal in the local area back in those days. 

I was also shocked that when I saw that Fritz had died, without reading anything further, I remembered Susanne’s name.  Can’t remember where I parked the car, but remembered this little factoid.

--In College Baseball, Wake Forest took 2 of 3 against Boston College up in Chestnut Hill to move to 9-9 in ACC play.  Nick Kurtz continued his assault, three more home runs, 13 in his last nine games, 19 RBIs in his last five!  This is major college baseball.  Not tee ball.  No doubt Kurtz is back to being in the top five of the upcoming MLB Draft.

He’s also the only player in Division I college baseball who has played 100 games and has an on-base percentage over .500!

NHL

--As the NHL regular season winds down this week, the New York Rangers had a crucial 3-2 shootout win over the streaking Islanders at the Garden Saturday afternoon, the Isles having won six straight coming in.

The Rangers are fighting for home-ice, at least for all Eastern Conference playoff action, and the Presidents Trophy for the NHL’s best regular-season record after setting a new franchise high with their 54th win.

Artemi Panarin, 118 points, has a point in 12 straight games for the Blueshirts.

--As we enter the final week of play, Toronto’s Auston Matthews has 69 goals, attempting to become the first in 30 years to hit the magical 70 plateau.

And Edmonton’s Connor McDavid (99) and Tampa Bay’s Nikita Kucherov (98) are on the verge of becoming just the 4th and 5th players in NHL history to have 100 assists in a single season.

--Sidney Crosby became the 14th player in NHL history Thursday to have at least 1,000 career assists.

Wayne Gretzky leads the category at a phenomenal 1,963.  Ron Francis is second way back at 1,249.

--In Men’s College Hockey’s Frozen Four, in the semis, Boston College beat Michigan 4-0, and Denver defeated Boston University 2-1 in overtime.

But B.C. fell to Denver 2-0 in the championship game last night in Saint Paul, MN, goaltender Matt Davis stopping all 35 shots he faced, including 23 in the third period.  It was Denver’s NCAA-record 10th title, surpassing Michigan who it was tied with at nine apiece.

NFL

--The Jaguars locked up Josh Allen for the long term, a huge five-year, $150 million extension, $88 million guaranteed.

The $30 million per year is the third-highest average annual value for defensive players, only behind Nick Bosa ($34 million) and Chris Jones ($31.75 million).

Allen, 26, had 17.5 sacks last year, a franchise record and tied for second in the NFL, trailing only T.J. Watt (19).

--The Draft is just ten days away!  April 25th.

O.J. Simpson

Sam Farmer / Los Angeles Times

“The terse response from the Pro Football Hall of Fame to O.J. Simpson’s death says so much in so few words.

“No flowery language.  No hyperbole. Straight facts.

“ ‘O.J. Simpson was the first player to reach a rushing mark many thought could not be attained in a 14-game season when he topped 2,000 yards,’ Pro Football Hall of Fame president Jim Porter said in a statement.  ‘His on-field contributions will be preserved in the Hall’s archives in Canton, Ohio.’

“Therein lies the difficulty in writing about Simpson, whose feats on the field were unquestionably historic. Football is meaningless, however, in comparison to the murder of two people.

“No matter where you fall on that double murder, and the subsequent acquittal of Simpson, a huge segment of American society will never believe he was innocent of the crime.  He was later found liable in a civil suit for the deaths of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ronald Goldman.

“Simpson subsequently spent nine years in a Nevada state prison after a jury in 2008 found him guilty of 12 charges including armed robbery and kidnapping.

“The bottom line Thursday: A onetime football hero and pop-culture superstar died and, while they might know how to feel, no one knew exactly what to say.

“In the immediate aftermath of the news, neither his alma mater, USC, nor the Bills rushed to make public proclamations.  The NFL has no plans to release one.

“In truth, can you blame them?”

Simpson was one of the greatest athletes of his time*, starring at USC, where he won the Heisman Trophy in 1968, with 1,709 yards rushing in ten games, 22 touchdowns.

In his first season, 1967, having come out of junior college, he led USC to the national title.

*He reportedly ran the 100-yard dash in 9.3 seconds for the USC track team, at a time the world record was 9.1, and as a member of the 440-yard relay team set a world record of 38.6 seconds in 1967.

O.J. was the No. 1 overall pick in the NFL Draft by the Buffalo Bills in ‘69, where he was far from a superstar early on, failing to live up to expectations. The Bills didn’t have a good offensive line (yet), and Simpson’s Hollywood career was taking off, so he was distracted.

But after a breakthrough 1972 season where he ran for 1,251 yards, he began his historic 1973 by rushing for 250 yards on 29 carries in the Bills opener against New England, a single-game rushing record at the time, which is kind of amazing to think about.

And over the course of that season, behind an offensive line dubbed “the Electric Company” because it “turned on the Juice,” Simpson cracked 2,000 yards in the final contest of a 14-game regular season, rushing for 200 on 34 carries in the snow against the Jets at Shea Stadium.  His total of 2,003 yards (6.0 yards per carry) surpassed the record of 1,863 set by Jim Brown in 1963, a record that stood until 1984, when the Rams’ Eric Dickerson rushed for 2,105 yards in 16 games.  O.J. was league MVP that season.

Simpson felt like he was “floating,” he said of the day he set the record.  “I was in the locker room all by myself right before the game ended.  I started walking around thinking how I couldn’t wish to do anything more or be anyone else, I was part of the history of the game,” he said.  “If I did nothing else in my life, I’d made my mark.”

Simpson rushed for 1,000 yards the next three season, including 1975 when he piled up 1,817 yards, and from 1972-76 he led running backs with 7,699 yards, a remarkable total, especially considering the number two during that period wasn’t within 2,500 yards.

His numbers then declined dramatically in 1977 and he left for San Francisco, where he gained just over 1,000 yards combined in the 1978 and 1979 seasons, retiring after ’79 and finishing his career with 11,236 rushing yards, 2,142 yards receiving and 990 kick return yards in 135 games.  He scored 76 touchdowns – 61 on rushes, 14 on receptions and one on a kick return.

In 1985, his first year of eligibility, Simpson was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame.  Hs bust remains on display in Canton.

Simpson acted in more than 20 Hollywood movies, he was iconic corporate pitchman – famously sprinting through airports for Hertz Rent-a-Car – and a TV sports commentator.  He had good looks, a warm smile and a poised manner that made him a popular sports media personality long after his playing days had ended.

The double-murder charges shattered his reputation, and as details about his marriage to Nicole Brown Simpson were also revealed.

The trial that followed became what Time magazine called “the Godzilla of tabloid stories.”

Evidence linked him to the crime, but in 1995 a mostly Black jury accepted the defense teams’ claim that Simpson had been framed by racist Los Angeles police.  Members of the jury took less than three hours to acquit him following a marathon eight-month trial that was nationally televised and made stars of many media members, let alone the defense team, including one Johnnie Cochran, and Robert Kardashian, whose family went on to become media gossip fodder for decades.

I’ve written how in 1996, at the Atlanta Summer Olympics, Phil W. and I were in prime seats watching the women’s high jump right in front of us, about the eighth row, when suddenly who appeared in the aisle but Cochran.  If you’re younger, you just can’t imagine what a celebrity he was back then.  I have his picture somewhere of that moment.

I have an unforgettable memory of being in Los Angeles International Airport during this same period, at a phone booth calling into my office when I was at PIMCO, and who appears at the booth next to me but Greta Van Susteren, who had become a huge media celebrity as a result of the trial.  I seem to remember just smiling at her, as if to acknowledge I know who you are and I’ll respect your privacy.  [She of course didn’t acknowledge me.]

Such were the times we lived in.  I was working in Stamford, Conn., during this time and remember rushing home (if you can call a 75-mile drive back to New Jersey rushing) to catch the end of the chase on the 405.  And then a year later, we all gathered in the office to watch the jury verdict, which left most of us aghast.

Premier League

We had some stunning action this weekend as both Liverpool and Arsenal lost at home, the former to Crystal Palace 1-0, the latter to Aston Villa 2-0.

The Villa win was deadly for Tottenham, which had lost Saturday at Newcastle 4-0.

Meanwhile, Manchester City is on top and in the driver’s seat after a 5-1 win over Luton Town.

Standings after 32/33 of 38...played – points

1. City...32 – 73
2. Arsenal...32 – 71
3. Liverpool...32 – 71
4. Aston Villa...33 – 63
5. Tottenham...32 – 60

Stuff

--Track and field is introducing prize money at the Olympics, with World Athletics saying Wednesday it would pay $50,000 to gold medalists in Paris.

The governing body said it was setting aside $2.4 million to pay the gold medalists across the 48 men’s, women’s and mixed events on the track and field program.  Relay teams will split the $50,000 between their members.  Payments for silver and bronze medalists are planned to start from the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles.

Many of the national committees have long awarded cash for gold.  The United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee awarded $37,500 to gold medalists at the last summer Games in Tokyo in 2021.  Singapore’s National Olympic Council promises $1 million for Olympic gold, a feat only achieved once so far by a Singaporean competitor.

Top 3 songs for the week 4/19/80:  #1 “Call Me” (Blondie)  #2 “Another Brick In The Wall” (Pink Floyd)  #3 “Ride Like The Wind” (Christopher Cross)...and...#4 “With You I’m Born Again” (Billy Preston & Syreeta)  #5 “Special Lady” (Ray, Goodman & Brown)  #6 “Lost In Love” (Air Supply)  #7 “Fire Lake” (Bob Seger)  #8 “I Can’t Tell You Why” (Eagles)  #9 “Working My Way Back To You / Forgive Me, Girl” (Spinners)  #10 “Off The Wall” (Michael Jackson...surprised this only peaked at #10...C+ week...as the editor prepared to graduate from Wake...barely...)

Baseball Quiz Answer: Four players with 15 or more games in which they had a home run and triple in the same contest...Barry Bonds, 17; Frank Robinson, 16; Willie Mays, 15; Billy Williams, 15.

No Add-on this week.  Little trip to visit family.  Next Bar Chat, next Sunday p.m.

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