Triple Crown Quiz: 1) Name the last three horses and jockeys to
win the Triple Crown…all in the 70s. 2) Since 1997, six horses
have won the first two legs and then failed in the Belmont. How
many can you come up with? [If you get four of six, tell your
boss you’re heading out for a premium beer and will be back in
45….I’m counting time to get there and back, of course.]
Answers below.
Queen Elizabeth II
I just have to note some on the guest list for the state dinner at
the White House the other night.
You’ve gotta love that winning Kentucky Derby jock Calvin
Borel was invited. But then you have the suck up guys; Peyton
Manning and Jim Nantz. If Imus were still on, Nantz would be
insufferable in his spots on that show.
However, Arnold Palmer was there and no one deserves it more.
Also pitcher Robin Roberts…………………………..I was just
informed this was ABC broadcaster, Ms. Robin Roberts, and not
the Hall of Fame hurler of the same name.
And what did they serve?
Spring Pea Soup with Fernleaf Lavender…what?
Chive Pizzelle with American Caviar…featuring Passaic River
sturgeon eggs
Newton Chardonnay “Unfiltered” 2004
Dover Sole Almondine
Roasted Artichokes, Pequillo Peppers and Olives…hope the
pepper pickers washed their hands
Saddle of Spring Lamb
Chanterelle Sauce
Fricassee of Baby Vegetables
Peter Michael “Les Pavots” 2003…better than the George
Michael Pinot Noir
Arugula, Savannah Mustard and Mint Romaine
Champagne Dressing
Trio of Farmhouse Cheeses…not as good as Ramsey Lewis Trio
“Rose Blossoms”
Schramsberg Brut Rose 2004
Stuff
–Well, I hope not too many of you fall in the overzealous parent
category, in terms of how you handle your children and
their/your ambitions.
Here in New Jersey, however, it seems some parents just got the
coach of the Don Bosco Prep baseball team booted. Leon
Matthews “was fired by the Ramsey school after parents
complained that he belittled a player after the teams’ first loss of
the season.”
The school is ranked in the state top 20 and is perennially ranked
among the top football schools in the nation.
But according to Bob Behre of the Star-Ledger (Tony Soprano’s
paper of choice):
“The incident came after the team (lost) a 3-2, extra-inning game
to sixth-ranked St. Joseph of Montvale.
“Matthews, who is not a teacher at the school, said some players’
parents complained to school officials that his postgame
conversation with the team involved obscenities and personal
insults.
“ ‘We had a short, one- to two-minute huddle after the game, and
all I told the kids was that they played a good game and to keep
their heads up.
“ ‘A parent told the school that I told one of my players that he
‘sucks.’ Anyone who knows me knows that those are not words
I speak. That is not my character.’”
Matthews is threatening to sue.
“ ‘A few parents went to the school and made accusations, and
the school is believing them,’ he said. ‘It’s just a matter of
people who are mean-spirited. It comes back to playing time and
the positions these kids play. It’s the star system for their kids.’”
Now we all know too much of this stuff to understand that there
is a 95% chance Matthews is totally telling the truth. I was
discussing this with a friend I went to high school with, both of
us participating in various sports, and we agreed that while our
parents were very supportive, they couldn’t have cared less what
the coach was doing. In the old days you had maybe one parent
with each team who was too involved in their kid’s life and these
days it seems 90% of them are. They can’t all be superstars, you
know. And heaven help them if they don’t learn how to deal
with life’s hard knocks.
–New York Mets pitcher Tom Glavine on Barry Bonds, as told
to the New York Daily News’ Lisa Olson.
“You see the turmoil the situation causes now, and the way
people look or talk about it. We don’t even know anything for
sure yet. If the day comes out where we do something definitive,
I can only imagine what discussion that’s going to start. It’s
certainly not going to be good for baseball. I can’t bear to think
what the headaches are going to be or would be if that were to be
the case.
“I don’t know what I would feel or how people would feel if they
put themselves in a position where they root for Barry to do it,
and they find out something in five years from now or 10 years
from now that they didn’t want to find out.”
So do you think this is all driving everyone crazy? As Lisa
Olson wrote, “(Glavine) is hardly alone. Just do it, Barry. The
headache still won’t disappear.”
–In a poll by ABC News and ESPN, 37% said they are rooting
for Bonds to break Aaron’s record, while 52% said they hope he
falls short and 11% had no opinion.
First off, if you are a serious baseball fan, how can you possibly
want Bonds to break it, knowing what you know…that he is
guilty of cheating? [As I’ve pointed out in countless columns,
don’t fall back on the “he hasn’t been convicted yet” claim. You
know the truth.]
But I love how this is increasingly a racial issue. 28% of whites
hope Bonds succeeds and nearly 75% of blacks do. Don’t get me
started.
–But wait…there’s more!
In an interview with the Boston Herald, as relayed by
ESPN.com, Red Sox star David Ortiz weighed in on Bonds and
steroid use.
“There are supposed to be guys using steroids in the game, and
there’s nobody close to Barry Bonds. What’s that mean? He
was using the best [stuff]? Know what I’m saying?”
Ortiz said no one has proven Bonds knowingly used steroids, but
even were it so, “I look at it hitting-wise, because I don’t know
what steroids can do to you as a baseball player. You’ve still got
to swing the bat, man. If I ever use steroids, and then I know
what the difference can be and I’m using them, I’ll tell you,
‘Yeah, whatever,’ but I don’t know what the feelings are when
you use the steroids.”
Mr. Ortiz is not a bright guy, know what I’m sayin’? But,
according to him, he isn’t quite sure he hasn’t taken steroids
himself.
“He told the Herald that when he was a young player in the
Dominican Republic, he used to drink protein shakes for sale
there. He explained he no longer does so because he can’t be
sure they don’t include banned substances.
“ ‘I tell you, I don’t know too much about steroids, but I started
listening about steroids when they started to bring that [stuff] up,
and I started realizing and getting to know a little bit about it,’
Ortiz told the Herald. ‘You’ve got to be careful…I used to buy a
protein shake in my country. I don’t do that any more because
they don’t have the approval for that here…But it can happen
anytime, it can happen. I don’t know. I don’t know if I drank
something in my youth, not knowing it.’”
Oh, shut up. Look at what’s happening among those in the
majors and minor leagues. A majority of those being caught are
from the Dominican Republic. [A New York Mets minor league
pitcher, Jorge Reyes, was just suspended 100 games for his
second offense. Another Met, Guillermo Mota, is currently on
the 50-game list.] As Johnny Mac said, look how quickly some
will now try to get ahead of the story, and that list of 30+ names
that Sen. Mitchell is now in possession of is highlighted by
Rafael Palmeiro and Sammy Sosa, as we learned on Wednesday.
–Good old Roger Clemens…along with A-Rod among the more
disingenuous folks on the planet.
Mike Lupica / New York Daily News
“So the Yankees agreed to pay Clemens $18 million over the rest
of the season, and when you add in a 40% luxury tax, that means
he really costs them $25 million. And if, for fun, you want to
project his salary across 162 games, you can say a pitcher who
turns 45 in August effectively became the most expensive
ballplayer, for one season, the Yankees or anybody else has ever
had.
“The Yankees don’t care and their fans don’t care and if you
want to know why, look at the standings. The Yankees have
been wrong about too many pitchers lately and were willing to
pay anything to be right about somebody. If you consider the
money Steinbrenner’s Crack Baseball Committee has wasted on
pitchers not good enough to win another World Series since the
Yankees beat the Mets in 2000, Clemens’ new salary – even as
he moves closer and closer to ‘senior softball,’ as he himself
joked yesterday – probably seems like a steal.
“The Yankees spend big on him, the biggest pitching name there
is, to make the money they have wasted on other pitchers go
away. Clemens does something that Steinbrenner can’t do and
Joe Torre can’t do and general manager Brian Cashman can’t do,
as much as they all would like to.
“Clemens stood there after ‘God Bless America’ yesterday and
made one of the most miserable Yankee Aprils of recent memory
go away. After that, it was not just Yankee business as usual, it
was business as usual for Clemens as well. He will still say
anything. He left because of his family, remember. Now he is
only coming back, or so he wants us to believe, because his
family has signed off on it.
“ ‘My family had to be okay with it,’ he said with Michael Kay
and Al Leiter on television. He talked about his kids then, talked
about his late mother, talked about his former teammates.
Clemens talked about how gosh-darned important it is to win one
for ‘the three or four guys down here that still don’t have a
championship ring.’ What a guy. At $4.5 million a month, plus
taxes.
“This all happens, by the way, in a year when the Yankees talk
almost solemnly about cutting payroll. The rest of baseball
needs to look out when the Yankees, now back over $200 million
again, really start spending.
“To the end under George Steinbrenner, money is no object, not
when it comes to a Yankee moment like the Stadium got
yesterday, out of the sky, with The Rocket. Not even when it
comes to staging the most expensive seventh-inning stretch in
history.”
Murray Chass / New York Times
“Randy Hendricks, one of Clemens’ agents, said yesterday that
he told all three contenders that Clemens wanted to begin
pitching at the end of this month. After he spoke with the Red
Sox and the Astros, Hendricks talked to Clemens about getting
‘ready to play now with the Yankees, or you’re going to have to
delay it for another month.’ ….
“That left the Yankees, who – am I repeating myself? – wanted
Clemens yesterday. They were so eager to get him that they
agreed to allow him the same privileges he had with the Astros
last year, the same privileges that the Yankees said last year they
wouldn’t grant him.
“If he is not scheduled to pitch on a trip, he doesn’t have to
accompany the team. Special perks for special people. ‘He may
be here sometimes and not be here sometimes,’ General Manager
Brian Cashman said. ‘We’ll be happy when he shows up every
fifth day to pitch for us.’”
Mike Vaccaro / New York Post
“There is some good that can emerge from the bluster and the
ballyhoo of Roger Clemens’ return to duty. From this point
forward, on into forever, we can finally, officially dismiss the
nonsensical notion that the Yankees exist on a separate plane
from the rest of baseball, and the rest of sports….
“Clemens gets to come and gets to go as he pleases now, gets to
spend his off days however he wants. He would have you
believe he spends those days in the warmth of hearth and home,
although Phil Garner claimed on the radio yesterday afternoon
that Clemens sometimes opts for golfing junkets far away from
Katy, Texas….
“Shame on the Yankees, who took great delight in reminding the
world they weren’t about to listen to any of Alex Rodriguez’s
perceived demands when they acquired him a few years ago….
“Why? Because they are the Yankees. Because things are done
differently in The Bronx, done better in The Bronx, done with
alleged respect for all the successes that came before. That’s the
Yankee Way, right? The uniform looks exactly the same in 2007
as it did in 1977 and 1957 and 1927….
“Gone are the days when the Yankees can even pretend their
dirty socks don’t smell the way everyone else’s do.”
–Mark R. said we (yes, all of us) need to pay attention to
Philadelphia Eagles free agent punter Saverio Rocca, a 6’5” 243
lb. Australian rules football player who is an intriguing prospect,
to say the least. Hell, take a look at his picture (just Google his
name) and you can see he should make the Eagles for special
teams, if nothing else.
–Phil W. notes that the New York Rangers took a dive after I
threatened to hop on the bandwagon. That’s a fair criticism.
Phil also noted he had a co-worker who placed $5 each for him
on Street Sense to win and place. Phil then noted he was using
the winnings to help subsidize his dinner date this week. I
suggested he still might be going to Shoney’s.
–A few of the New York area sportswriters are saying us Mets
fans shouldn’t boo David Wright. Hey, I’ll boo David Wright if
I feel like it, OK?! [Sorry, didn’t mean to get testy.]
You see, Mr. Wright, as detailed in these pages, has sucked wind
since last year’s home run derby at the All-Star game and has hit
a whopping nine homers in his last 109 games (going into
Wednesday’s contest), including the playoffs. Plus the Mets
signed him to a giant contract extension last year.
Now that he’s going to make the big bucks, he has to produce;
it’s as simple as that. And when he gets hot again, I reserve the
right to hop back on the bandwagon. So there.
–Golf Bits:
Just have to note someone who is familiar to long-time readers,
since I went to Paraguay because of the guy…Carlos Franco. I
see where he is now playing the Nationwide Tour, his game has
fallen that much. Of course he didn’t make the top 125 on the
money list last year; further proof that it isn’t easy, sports fans.
Yes, the top 30 or so make gobs and gobs of money but for the
rest of them, it is nearly a yearly struggle to keep one’s sanity,
and game, together.
Sports Illustrated came out with its sixth annual PGA Tour
survey (71 players) and following are some of the questions.
Q: Would you rather win the PGA Championship and $1 million
or the FedEx Cup and $10 million?
PGA…74%
FedEx Cup…26%
Q: Would you allow a daughter of yours to date Sergio Garcia?
Yes…28%
No…72%…one golfer (anonymously) said “I know him too
well.”
Q: Which TV analyst do you prefer, Nick Faldo or Johnny
Miller?
Faldo…82%
Miller…18%
[Ed. The criticism of Miller is that he doesn’t hang out at the
range or in the locker room, and, thus, how can he analyze one’s
game like he does? Seems valid to me, as much as I like Johnny.
Faldo, on the other hand, was obviously not a popular guy in his
playing days but he’s learned how to play the game and the
players today largely respect his analysis because he’s trying to
find out what makes them tick. Except for Tiger, that is, who
wants nothing to do with anyone.]
Q: Should the U.S. send more troops to Iraq or withdraw?
Send more…50%
Withdraw…50%
[Ed. I’ll tell you why this is significant. For you casual fans,
golfers are a most conservative lot and I see a 50/50 split and
remember when it would have been 95/5 for sending more.]
Q: Who is your least favorite playing partner?
Rory Sabbatini…25%
[Others with 8% each are Ben Crane, who is ridiculously slow,
Garrett Willis, ditto, and Phil Mickelson.]
Q: Would you elect Barry Bonds to the Hall of Fame?
Yes…58%
No…42%
–Here’s a great story from Golf World.
“Robert Barnes knows there are skeptics, but the director of golf
at Mission Hills CC in Rancho Mirage, Calif., says there have
been witnesses all along as club member Jacqueline Gagne
recorded ‘eight’ holes in one between Jan. 23 and April 24.
According to the Palm Springs Desert Sun, Gagne, 46, has made
seven of her aces at Mission Hills and one at nearby Mountain
View CC. A transplant from Rhode Island, Gagne took up the
game in 2003 and today plays to a 7-handicap. ‘People ask if it’s
getting old, said Gagne. ‘It never gets old…For the most part,
everyone is very supportive.’”
–Slumping Justin Leonard “has two new mental coaches.”
Geezuz. Two?! I think we’ve just found Justin’s problem.
–Hank Kuehne, a former U.S. Amateur golf champion, who has
been hampered by injuries, is dating Venus Williams. Huh.
–I’ve decided “For Better or For Worse” is kind of like the last
run for “The Sopranos.” Just as David Chase appears to be tying
up loose ends, gearing up for a whopper of a conclusion (at least
us fans hope he is!), Lynn Johnston is making us deal with
Grandpa Jim, even though, frankly, most of us would rather not.
But maybe as in “The Sopranos” and Uncle Junior a few weeks
ago, some young psycho kid is going to come along and make
things exciting for Grandpa Jim. One can only hope so because
otherwise this story line sucks.
–Trader George and I were musing about all the blowhards on
the tube who are worried we may actually have a hurricane this
year. “One might hit the East Coast” said one forecaster on
Tuesday. RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!
Look, I’m not trying to downplay the threat after what we saw
two years ago, but fear mongering is never good.
That said, it’s time for your EXCLUSIVE BAR CHAT
HURRICANE FORECAST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Yes, you can take this one to North Carolina’s Outer Banks!
This is no ordinary forecast, folks. Our crack staff examines 42
different indicators, including overpaid ballplayers, and I am
here to tell you that “Erin” will be a Category 3 storm and cause
quite a stink. [I don’t want to say where for liability purposes.]
Also, look for “Pablo” to hit CAT 4 status end of September.
“Humberto,” incidentally, will be a CAT 1 dud.
As we get closer to storm season, we’ll estimate rain totals.
[The Bar Chat Hurricane Forecast is not to be confused with any
information you see associated with The National Weather
Service, The National Hurricane Center, Dr. William Gray at the
University of Colorado, or AccuWeather’s Joe Bastardi. Family
members of Bar Chat’s editor and his staff are ineligible for any
cash prizes affiliated with the site’s predictions. Do not operate
heavy machinery after reading the above.]
Top 3 songs for the week of 5/9/64: #1 “Hello, Dolly!” (Louis
Armstrong) #2 “Do You Want To Know A Secret” (The
Beatles) #3 “My Guy” (Mary Wells)…and…#4 “Bits And
Pieces” (The Dave Clark Five) #5 “Can’t Buy Me Love” (The
Beatles) #6 “Don’t Let The Rain Come Down” (The Serendipity
Singers…ughh) #7 “Ronnie” (The 4 Seasons) #8 “Dead Man’s
Curve” (Jan & Dean) #9 “Suspicion” (Terry Stafford…sounded
like Elvis) #10 “White On White” (Danny Williams…can’t
think of this one…killed that brain cell in ’77)
Triple Crown Quiz Answers: 1) Last three winners: 1973 –
Secretariat (Ron Turcotte); 1977 – Seattle Slew (Jean Cruguet);
1978 – Affirmed (Steve Cauthen). 2) Six since 1997 to have
won first two legs and then lost the third: 1997 – Silver Charm
(Finished 2nd in Belmont to Touch Gold). 1998 – Real Quiet (f.
2nd to Victory Gallop). 1999 – Charismatic (f. 3rd to Lemon
Drop Kid). 2002 – War Emblem (f. 8th to Sarava). 2003 –
Funny Cide (f. 3rd to Empire Maker). 2004 – Smarty Jones (f.
2nd to Birdstone).
C’mon….Street Sense!
Next Bar Chat, Monday pm.
