Formula One Quiz: [Gotta mix it up now and then] Name the all-time top five in wins on the Grand Prix circuit…none of whom are still active though all post-1965. Answer below.
The reason for the above quiz was because the sport was on my mind after reading the horrifying account of Formula One driver Felipe Massa’s crash in qualifying for the Hungarian Grand Prix on Saturday. From ESPN.com:
“The crash occurred after a spring had fallen off another car and flew up and struck Massa in the helmet. An apparently dazed Massa continued driving over a curb and across the track. He went through the gravel area alongside the Formula One circuit before striking a tire-lined barrier.
“The impact of the rear suspension part – a standard component that Brawn GP team principal Ross Brawn believed was made of steel – damaged the left side of Massa’s helmet, ripping out the visor and leaving a long dent on its side. Blood was seen above Massa’s left eye.
“ ‘Following a complete medical examination it emerged that he had suffered a cut on his forehead, bone damage to his skull and a brain concussion,’ Ferrari said in a statement….
“Massa appeared to regain consciousness just before the crash at Turn 4 as his front brakes seemed to lock before the violent impact….
“The front of his Ferrari was shredded, with both tires having come off and the front nose open.
“The crash comes less than a week after Henry Surtees, the son of former Formula One champion John Surtees, died in an F2 race on Sunday. Surtees was struck in the head by a tire from another car, causing him to lose consciousness and drive into a barrier.”
At first it was thought Massa would die, but at last word his condition has stabilized.
Hank Aaron said that baseball’s steroid users should still be eligible for the Hall of Fame if the writers believe they are worthy, but added, “The thing is, do you put these guys in, or do you put an asterisk beside their names and say, ‘Hey, they did it, but here’s why?’ To be safe, that’s the only way I see that you can do it.’”
Harmon Killebrew, reflecting the sentiment that still exists among many of the old-time Hall members, said, “As far as I’m concerned, Hank Aaron is the all-time home run champ, and Roger Maris should still have the [single-season] record at 61, but Barry Bonds is the name you see in the record book.”
Some Hall members told Aaron they will walk off the stage if a confirmed steroids user is ever inducted.
Speaking of steroids, from Bill Madden’s column in the New York Daily News.
“The stat geek Bill James, who has made a fortune taking credit for having invented on-base percentage, last week revealed to the waiting world his position paper on steroids in baseball, which, essentially says that there is no harm in steroids and steroids have had no harm on baseball.
“Mind you, this is coming from a guy who is employed by the Red Sox as a special assistant to GM Theo Epstein: ‘One of the characteristics of the steroid era was that we had several dozen players who continued to improve beyond the normal aging time frame, so that many of them had their best seasons past the age of 32….But what does it mean? It means that steroids keep you young….Well, if steroids keep you young, what’s wrong with that?’
“James goes on to say that he believes the Baseball Writers Association will eventually come to the same conclusion – that steroids didn’t enhance performance, merely prolonged it, and that they will eventually vote all of the steroid cheats – Barry Bonds, Sammy Sosa, Roger Clemens, Mark McGwire, Rafael Palmeiro – into the Hall of Fame where they belong, ignoring evidence that the performance of some steroid users actually improved over time. He also said steroid users will be called ‘pioneers’ in the future, when everyone in America, he said, will be on drugs.
“This is just what Bud Selig needs as he desperately tries to enforce and enhance baseball’s drug policy and hold the game up as a model for young kids. I can only suppose James also agrees with Carl Everett that dinosaurs never existed and men never walked on the moon. Then again, didn’t he just tell us a couple of years ago that teams would be more successful bringing their closers into the game in the seventh inning, and that bullpens-by-committee were the way to go? Obviously, the resident baseball stat geek wants to make sure all big stat players, however performance-enhanced those stats were, are properly enshrined in Cooperstown.”
Meanwhile, great story from ESPN.com’s Greg Garber on inductee Jim Rice and the single moment he is most proud of from 27 years ago.
On Aug. 7, 1982, Tom Keane attended a game at Fenway with his two sons, Jonathan, 4, and Matthew, 2. He obtained his second row field box tickets from Red Sox EVP Haywood Sullivan. “It was a seat that everybody would dream of when they had little kids and you wanted to get them close to the action,” said Keane.
In the fourth inning, Boston second baseman Dave Stapleton “swung late and slashed a foul ball into the stands to the right of home plate.”
“Keane didn’t see the ball, but heard a cracking sound. He thought the ball had hit the side of the dugout. Until he heard the slightly delayed scream from his son.
“ ‘I immediately turned and blood was coming down Jonathan’s face,’ Keane said, tearing up at the memory.
“Rice, standing with his left foot on the top stair of the dugout, couldn’t see exactly where the ball had gone but he heard the sickening crack, the ‘oooh’ of the crowd – and the awful silence that followed.
“ ‘You try to raise up and see if it hits anyone,’ Rice said, ‘and then when it hits someone that’s when you react, especially when blood is involved.’
“In retrospect, Rice believes, he negotiated the distance in about one dozen steps and less than 10 seconds.
“ ‘Jim Rice was right there with his arms immediately,’ Keane said, ‘I mean immediately.’
“Rice, a father of two young children, was thinking of one thing. ‘My child,’ he said. ‘Just someone, myself, just taking care of my child, picking my child up and taking him into the clubhouse.’
“Rice, without hesitation, scooped up Jonathan and carried him briskly into the dugout. Red Sox team doctor Arthur Papas, who was sitting on the other side of the dugout, rushed from his seat to the trainers room, where he met Rice.
“ ‘I saw a boy that was unresponsive,’ Pappas remembers. ‘There was blood on his face, his head, there was blood coming from his nose and his mouth, so these are all indicative of a significant head injury.’”
Jonathan was whisked to Children’s Hospital. His skull had been fractured and he had lost a lot of blood. But he was released after surgery five days later.
At the time, the trainer, Charlie Moss, criticized Rice for moving the kid, but it was later clear Rice had saved Jonathan’s life because had he continued to bleed, he probably doesn’t make it. The next season, Jonathan Keane threw out the first pitch, Opening Day. Today, 31, he lives in Raleigh, N.C. and there are no ill effects.
As for Rickey Henderson and his induction speech, it didn\’t provide too many classic Rickey being Rickey moments, outside of blasting Reggie Jackson for not giving him an autograph as a kid. But I will try to put something together on Henderson for next time. No one in the history of the game like him, that’s for sure.
[Back to Aaron, he wants Pete Rose reinstated, thus clearing Rose to be elected into the Hall. Joe Morgan and Frank Robinson share this belief.]
“Besides indulging in their usual high jinks – ripping open plastic garbage bags, scaring children in parks, pooping on passersby – crows have been sabotaging the city’s high-speed Internet network. Hundreds of fiber-optic cables have been slashed open by crows scrounging high-tech stuffing for their nests. The birds are also blamed for periodic blackouts. At least one has been implicated in shutting off power to a bullet train in northern Japan.
“These are jungle crows (Corbus macrorhynchos), and they are bigger, badder and uglier than their kin in North America. They weigh in at about 1 ½ pounds and have a yard-wide wingspan. They can clench their claws into fists and punch people in the head, local bird experts say. They sometimes dive-bomb Tokyoites from the rear, with an unnerving whoosh that has been known to cause people to crash their bicycles or fall down stairwells.”
So it’s war on the crows and even animal rights groups get it as the population soared from 7,000 to 36,400…as of 2001…but at last count the city had exterminated over 105,000, with 21,000 still at large. The best defense is to bait traps with lard…then the birds are gassed and cremated.
Not sure where to place jungle crows on the All-Species List, which I’ll get around to updating one of these days…trying to give ‘man’ a chance to climb out of his hole.
But it’s tough to do so when you see stories like the following from this weekend.
Sophie Tedmanson / London Times
“A passenger cruise ship arrived at port in Vancouver on the weekend with a dead fin whale lodged on its bow.
“The Sapphire Princess, from the Princess Cruise Lines, arrived in Canada from Alaska on Saturday morning with the whale speared to the ship’s bulbous bow, the part of the bow which cuts through the water.”
Like from the picture, folks, straight down the middle. The whale is an estimated 70 feet! and it’s not known how long the dude was dragged in this fashion.
Princess Cruise Lines issued a statement saying it was “shocked and saddened” by the discovery.
Well that’s not good enough. I hope the whale community takes Princess to court and extracts $millions. Too bad Johnnie Cochran isn’t around anymore.
“Mr. Fin Whale was just swimming along, eating plankton, when WHAM! It’s 70-feet long…and Princess says it didn’t see it? You have got to be kidding me.”
I didn’t comment on allegations the star Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback had raped a woman in Lake Tahoe a year ago when I wrote my last column because if you didn’t know by now, I have a “wait 24 hours” policy on most matters of this kind. For each one of these cases that have proven to be true, there seem to be 2 or 3 that were made up. [I’m referring only to those involving high-profile sports figures.]
But ESPN, who puts themselves out as America’s source for all sports news, refused to cover the story for the first day or so, even while every other major media outlet, including the New York Times and Washington Post, did. For this ESPN was heavily criticized for shielding its NFL TV partner. And as the Times’ Richard Sandomir pointed out, ESPN reported last month on the intent of a woman to file a civil lawsuit against Lakers guard Shannon Brown on sex-related charges.
Meanwhile, the Daily News’ Mike Lupica urges everyone not to prejudge the case until you’ve read the actual 36-page complaint that the former hostess, Andrea McNulty, filed. It doesn’t make Roethlisberger or others associated with the case look too good. But at the same time, law enforcement officials have said there is no reason to open a criminal investigation.
–Pretty interesting that the Cambridge Police Department’s Sgt. Joseph Crowley was once involved in another high-profile incident. From the AP’s Glen Johnson:
“(Crowley) was a campus cop at Brandeis University in suburban Waltham when he was summoned to the school gymnasium in July 1993 after Boston Celtics player Reggie Lewis collapsed of an apparent heart attack. Crowley, also a trained emergency medical technician, not only pumped the local legend’s chest, but put his mouth to Lewis’ own and attempted to breathe life back into the fallen athlete.
“ ‘Looking back on it, he was probably already gone,’ Crowley said Thursday during an interview with WEEI-AM in Boston. ‘But I did to him what I would do to anyone else in that situation.’”
–Just one week after the death of the world’s oldest man, and one of only two surviving World War I vets, Henry Allingham, 113; Harry Patch, 111, died. So Britain lost its last survivor of the trenches. Patch was wounded in 1917 at the third battle of Ypres, which he remembered as “mud, mud and more mud mixed together with blood.”
Patch, who was reluctant to talk about the war for 80 years, later said, “Anyone who tells you that in the trenches they weren’t scared, he’s a damned liar. You were scared all the time.”
As reported by the AP, Patch said “His most vivid memory of the war was of encountering a comrade whose torso had been ripped open by shrapnel. ‘Shoot me,’ Patch recalled the soldier pleading. The man died before Patch could draw his revolver. ‘I was with him for the last 60 seconds of his life. He gasped one word: ‘Mother.’ That one word has run through my brain for 88 years. I will never forget it.’”
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said, “The noblest of all the generations has left us, but they will never be forgotten. We say today with still greater force, ‘We will remember them.’” Queen Elizabeth II said, “We will never forget the bravery and enormous sacrifice of his generation.”
About 20 million died in what proved to be perhaps the dumbest war of all time. And for the younger readers of this column, if perchance you’ve never seen the 1930 classic “All Quiet on the Western Front,” it’s must viewing. In fact I might pull it back out myself.
[But if Forrest didn’t have a gun, is he alive today?]
—Mark Calcavecchia broke a PGA Tour record by making nine straight birdies at the Canadian Open. He also had two bogeys and shot 65 on the par-72 course. But the tournament has been plagued by rain and doesn’t finish up until Monday.
—Chris Brown and Rihanna checked into separate rooms this weekend at the Trump International Hotel & Tower. Understand Brown is supposed to be barred from seeing Rihanna by a restraining order.
–I missed that Rachel Alexandra is running against Belmont Stakes winner Summer Bird at the Haskell Invitational this Sunday at beautiful Monmouth Park. [I get paid 25 cents each time I throw in the word ‘beautiful.’ And gosh darn it, Monmouth is a nice track.]
–From the Daily Record: “Police in northern New Jersey needed pepper spray to thwart a groundhog on the attack. Boonton resident Alex Scott told police the rodent chased him when he entered his garage and tried to get his truck. Police Sgt. Mike Danyo [“Book ‘em, Danyo”] and Officer Paul Ryan said the groundhog went on the attack when they arrived.
“Police said Danyo tripped and fell. His partner sprayed pepper spray into the groundhog’s face, giving the officers time to snare it.
–Former Chicago White Sox pitcher Jim Parque, who had a 31-34 career mark from 1998-2002, admitted to using HGH.
–I can’t believe there are actually defenders of the Mets’ assistant general manager Tony Bernazard, who has done some pretty bizarre things over the years and treats those around him like crap. The guy is just a bad person. Why doesn’t everyone see this (including some of my friends)?
More importantly, there are some who believe Bernazard shouldn’t be the fall guy for the team’s dreadful performance, that it should be GM Omar Minaya instead; to which I say, well can them both. My point being, how does it help the Mets organization to retain Bernazard, a psycho by many player accounts, when you’re trying to lure free agents here in the future? This guy has been poison in the clubhouse, but for some reason the Wilpons, the owners, trust Bernazard’s ability to evaluate talent. Oh yeah, that’s worked out well. [I do have to say that the Jeff Francouer for Ryan Church trade looks good for us.]
–Time to give a shout-out to A-Rod for something positive. According to Crain’s New York Business, he donated $250,000 toward a mobile dental clinic that will serve his old New York City neighborhood. Good for you, Alex. [I’m tired of getting on the guy, until the Yankees get in the playoffs and he whiffs with runners on 2nd and 3rd, Yanks down a run in the bottom of the ninth. Because that’s the only thing that matters at this point…his performance in the playoffs.]
–In an article by Albert Chen of Sports Illustrated on baserunning, specifically Tampa Bay’s Carl Crawford, there were some comments from my man, Willie Wilson.
“When it came to baserunning, Willie Wilson never had a plan. ‘To be honest, I didn’t know what I was doing out there,’ says the former Royals outfielder. During his 19-year career, from 1976 to ’94, Wilson swiped 668 bags, mostly for Royals teams that had a reputation for brash baserunning. (\’Guys like George Brett and Frank White, they weren’t the fastest, but we used to ‘first-to-third’ teams to death,’ he says.) Wilson, now 54 and living in Kansas City…has no secrets to reveal about the art of baserunning. ‘You just have to be willing to sacrifice your body,’ he says. ‘For me, going into a base was like driving 20 mph and jumping out of the car.’
“Wilson played in a golden age for burners: Three of the game’s top six career stolen base leaders – Henderson (first), Tim Raines (fifth) and Vince Coleman (sixth) were his contemporaries, though Wilson, who ranks 12th all time, is quick to point out that he could have been higher on the list. ‘I never stole third,’ he says. ‘My teammates didn’t like me jumping [around] at second while they were at the plate. They always said, ‘We’ll just get you home.’
“ ‘Rickey,’ he adds, ‘had the most steals but he wanted to break records. I wanted to win ball games. I like to think I was a better overall base runner.’”
Now I love Rickey, too. But consider this. Wilson had 147 triples in his career, hitting double digits on six occasions, plus another five seasons with at least 7. Henderson, on the other hand, had only two seasons where he topped out at 7, and, after age 24, never had more than 5! Why? Because he wanted to steal third, that’s why, and juice his total.
And back to Wilson’s point about first-to-thirding a team to death, boy, that is something that seems to be sorely lacking in today’s game, or maybe it’s because I watch the Mets, who more often than not appear to be more interested in just collecting paychecks.
–Interesting piece by Austin Murphy in SI on Tim Tebow, Florida’s phenomenal QB who surprisingly (at least to many of us) opted to come back for his senior season after winning two national titles. You just have to have tremendous respect for the guy, including for his off-the-field charity work. You learn his story and you can’t believe anyone can be that perfect, and you want to be cynical about it all, but you can’t. Just embrace him. Be glad the world still has people like this.
—Heinz Edelmann died. He was 75. And what is his claim to fame? He was art director for the Beatles’ “Yellow Submarine” film.
—Megan Fox has reportedly turned down being a Bond girl. She apparently wants to be more of a leading lady than an accessory. Personally, I still want to ask her, “Whassup with the tattoos?”
But this fall, Fox plays the role of a zombie killer in a flick titled "Jennifer\’s Body" where she\’s a cheerleader who comes back from the dead and kills and eats her classmates. So I\’m thinkin\’….actually, I better not go there.
—WARNING: The following is for mature audiences only. Children must log off at this point.
And now…the sex tape of the lovely Patrizia D’Addario and Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. [London Times]
PD: A young man would have come in a second…I mean he would have come…Young men usually have a lot of pressure. [Ed. Tell me about it. You try dealing with the Mets the last three seasons!]
SB: But if you will allow me…(muffled) I believe it is a family thing. [Ed. Yeah, the Wilpon family, specifically. Having been fleeced by Bernie Madoff for up to a reported $700 million, who knows where their heads are at.]
SB: Having an orgasm. [Ed. And what’s the deal with the Mets’ team doctors? Can they handle their injuries any worse? Dr. Kildare and Ben Casey they aren’t.]
PD: You know how long it has been since I had sex like I had with you tonight? It’s several months, since I broke with my boyfriend. Is this normal? [Ed. All I know is the Mets are on pace for less than 100 homers, which has been done like twice since 1993, if memory serves me right.]
SB: May I? You should have sex with yourself. You should touch yourself often. [Ed. One thing the Mets can’t touch is good pitching…or even the mediocre variety.]
“The questions were asked of U2, and they were answered in pretty spectacular fashion at Croke Park last night. Magnificent, if you must.
“ ‘I surrender,’ Bono told the masses as he walked along the outer circle of the famous stage, arms outstretched, wallowing in the adulation early in the evening. He had, in fact, already won us over….
“These guys have been under pressure in recent times. The self-styled ‘biggest band on the planet’ has been struggling, relatively speaking. They are hardly flavor of the month here in Ireland, partly because of their tax affairs, partly because of our suspicion of success, and partly because, like everything else, they were better in the old days. It meant they didn’t sell out 240,000 tickets for Croke Park in an instant. There are suggestions of in-fighting. The latest album was coolly received both here and abroad….
“And so U2 – one of our biggest success stories – were left in the slightly-surreal situation of having to prove themselves again. And to their own, and in their own backyard. We should never have doubted them.”
The current world tour, soon to come to America, “their spiritual homeland,” is a risk during the economic crisis, but the fact is they have already sold out the bulk of their dates in the States. Rock on, Bono. And to those who haven’t caught them yet, go.
–As for yours truly, Saturday night I caught a legend, Randy Travis, at a theater in Morristown, N.J. I say ‘legend’ because while he just turned 50, as I was sitting in the theater I couldn’t help but think that on a lesser scale, Randy Travis is kind of like Tiger Woods. How, you might ask? Just as today’s golfers owe everything to Tiger in terms of greatly increased purses, today’s country stars owe Randy a ton as well because in 1986-87, it was Travis who dragged country music out of its Kenny Rogers doldrums and went back to the genre’s roots…becoming the first real Neotraditionalist.
I had just been transferred to Raleigh, N.C., in 1988, when Randy’s second album, “Always and Forever” with the classic “Forever and Ever, Amen” single first hit and with that Travis was really off and running and all the other acts followed. Ah, those were the days…the barbecue tour, as I’ve said frequently, when I’d have long drives between offices and the radio only played country (by choice).
Anyway, Randy has an 8-piece band backing him up and he was terrific. And he smartly finished with “Forever and Ever…,” the perfect conclusion.
So while I don’t consider myself a huge country fan, I have seen Keith Urban, Kenny Chesney and Randy Travis the past two years. As Ronald Reagan would have said; not bad…not bad at all.
[Actually, I really want to see Montgomery Gentry, but their touring schedule doesn’t fit mine.]
Top 3 songs for the week 7/26/80: #1 “It’s Still Rock And Roll To Me” (Billy Joel) #2 “Magic” (Olivia Newton-John) #3 “Little Jeannie” (Elton John…little did Joel and John know then that they’d be touring together 29 years later…though I saw where Billy has been pretty sick recently)…and…#4 “Cupid / I’ve Loved You For A Long Time” (Spinners) #5 “Shining Star” (Manhattans) #6 “Coming Up” (Paul McCartney & Wings) #7 “Steal Away” (Robbie Dupree) #8 “Tired Of Toein’ The Line” (Rocky Burnette) #9 “Take Your Time (Do It Right)” (The S.O.S. Band…love this one*) #10 “The Rose” (Bette Midler)
You know you ought to slow down
You been working too hard
And that’s a fact.
Formula One Quiz Answer: Top five in wins. In this category, career starts is important as well to gauge the percentage.
Michael Schumacher…91 in 249 starts [a record 7 driving titles]
Alain Prost…51 in 199 [4 titles]
Ayrton Senna…41 in 161 [2 titles…and last F1 driver to die on the track, 15 years ago]
Nigel Mansell…31 in 187 [1 title]
Jackie Stewart…27 in 99 [3 titles]
Jim Clark (72 starts) and Niki Lauda (171) each had 25 wins. But Juan-Manuel Fangio won 24 of 51, a staggering 47%, and five titles in the 1950s. So along with Schumacher, those are your two best…though no telling what Clark would have ended up doing had he not been killed.
