Note: I had a rough weekend, ahem, ahem, at the Jersey Shore with old friends…golf, poker, wiffle ball, basketball…and one or two beers. Thus the short chat this time as I struggle to stay awake.
NBA Quiz: Name the six who scored in double figures for the 1994-95 championship Houston Rockets team that defeated the Orlando Magic of Shaq, Anfernee Hardaway, Nick Anderson, Dennis Scott and Horace Grant in the finals, 4-0. [Two of the six were involved in a mid-season trade; one for the other.] Answer below.
Derby Shocker
The unheralded colt, I’ll Have Another, sold as a yearling for $11,000 and ridden by a rookie jockey, shocked the railbirds at Churchill Downs to take the Kentucky Derby. For jockey Mario Gutierrez, what a story.
“By all reasonable tenets of racing, Gutierrez should not have been on (the 15-1 colt’s back). He came north of the border in 2005 [Ed. via Veracruz, Mexico] and settled in at Hastings Race Course, a little track no one outside of Canada ever has heard of. He became Canada’s leading apprentice, even won a couple of riding titles at Hastings, which is in British Columbia. No big deal.”
Gutierrez was discovered by owner J. Paul Reddam, who instructed trainer Doug O’Neill to give Gutierrez a chance, the jock and I’ll Have Another then won a few, but was Gutierrez the right pick to ride the horse in the Derby?
“Do you give the ride to someone who has no real experience in the big time, who never has seen Churchill Downs, let alone ride over it? Not in a million years, babe. That’s not the way it’s done, if you have any brains. You hire the best jockey money can buy, the most experienced, the most brilliant.
“But not owner Reddam. Loyalty was king for him. He rolled the dice and stuck with the kid, and yesterday it paid off for him, his jockey and trainer with a dazzling triumph they all will remember to the end of their days. Virtue sometimes can be more than its own reward.”
Gutierrez simply observed afterwards, “I don’t know what to say.”
I’ll Have Another, purchased by Reddam for $35,000, now has winnings of in excess of $1.8 million.
As for co-favorite Union Rags (along with second-place finisher Bodemeister, who set an absolutely blistering pace), he once again found himself at the back of the pack right from the start and finished seventh.
Ball Bits
—Albert Pujols’ batting average dropped to .194 on Friday night as his homerless skid reached a career-high 108 at-bats, he was booed heavily by the hometown fans, and then benched on Saturday. Pujols, he of the 10-year, $240 million contract, told USA TODAY Sports:
“People are talking all of this [stuff]. They’re making such a big deal out of it. I can take it. I’m a big boy.
“I’ve been through this before. By the end of the year, my numbers will still be there. You’ll see.
“The expectations on this team were so high. It’s like people expected us to be 27-0. And I have that biggest contract of the winter, so I’m the one getting blamed.”
Pujols is 32, and Joe Posnanski observes, “It means something, I think. Does it mean that Albert Pujols is done as a great player? Of course not. But baseball can be a cruel game. Cal Ripken never had a great season after age 30. Willie McCovey had his last great season at 32. Al Kaline’s last great season was around 32 too. The years are harsher than people ever want to believe. And they turn in one direction. I suspect that Pujols will soon have a stretch of hitting awesomeness that will blow the mind and once again remind America that he is Albert Pujols. But it might not be that easy.”
[Since my last chat, the Angels’ Jered Weaver tossed his no-hitter on Wednesday night, walking one and striking out nine. It was the franchise’s 10th no-no.]
–Unbelievably, the New York Yankees now face life without Mariano Rivera following his season-ending, career-threatening torn ACL injury that he suffered while shagging fly balls, part of his pre-game routine.
The greatest reliever of all time, Rivera told his teammates, “I’m coming back. Write it down in big letters.”
But he is 42, after all. If this is the end, you’re talking the career saves leader with 608, and the stupendous postseason ERA of 0.70 in 141 innings (allowing just two home runs).
–It’s now safe to say Chicago White Sox slugger Adam Dunn has successfully put last season’s historic disaster behind him. In 2011, Dunn hit .159 with 11 homers and 42 RBI. This season, in the ChiSox’ first 28 games, Dunn is hitting .250 with 9 home runs and 23 RBI.
–Mets pitcher Johan Santana won his first game since Sept. 2, 2010, completing his comeback from serious shoulder surgery that cost him all of 2011.
–The Mets’ Ike Davis is 3-for-49 at home this season.
–Mike Lupica / New York Daily News, on pitcher Andy Pettitte’s weasley testimony at the Roger Clemens trial, where now he’s not so sure if he understood Clemens’ HGH statement or not.
“(If) you give Pettitte every possible benefit of the doubt, he comes up looking like a huge phony here.
“He comes up a phony no matter how tough a spot this is for him, even though you can understand that he wouldn’t want his old buddy Roger to get convicted of perjury and have to do jail time, in the time of his life when he was sure he’d be on his way to the National Baseball Hall of Fame.
“So you’re clear, here is the money exchange between Michael Attanasio, one of the heavy hitters on Clemens’ legal team, and Pettitte a few days ago.
“Attanasio: Sitting here now, you’re 50-50 that you misunderstood him, is that fair?
“So he knew what he heard four years ago, only now he’s not so clear, and what is really clear is that Pettitte does want it both ways, he wants to look like some sort of God-fearing, stand-up guy truth teller, but go easy on his old buddy Roger. It’s good that Andy’s coming back to baseball now. In baseball it’s either a ball or a strike, you can’t make the count up as you go along.”
–The baseball that rolled through the legs of Bill Buckner in the ’86 Series sold at auction for $418,250. The buyer was from Dallas and wanted to stay anonymous. After the game, an umpire gave the ball to Mets executive Arthur Richman. Charlie Sheen bought it for $93,000 in 1992. Los Angeles songwriter Seth Swirsky then purchased it for $64,000 in 2000.
–The family of deceased 12-time Pro Bowl NFL star, linebacker Junior Seau, has decided to allow researchers to study his brain for evidence of damage as a result of concussions. Seau died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to his chest. He left no suicide note.
“The smile. Whoever will forget Junior Seau’s magnetic, coast-to-coast smile? Or his greatest passions in life: football, family, the disenfranchised….no one seemed to know what might have precipitated such a final act of desperation. Those who spent time with Seau recently said he did not act depressed. If he was deeply troubled, Seau concealed his private misery to most, even to family members who desperately sought answers to confounding questions.”
–I can’t believe the Knicks actually won game four of their series against the Heat as Carmelo Anthony went off for 41 in an 89-87 win, thus snapping the team’s record 13-game playoff losing streak. While in Philly, the 76ers extended their series lead to 3-1 over the Derrick Rose–less Bulls.
–At the Wells Fargo Championship in Charlotte, N.C., Rickie Fowler finally won his first PGA Tour event, besting Rory McIlroy and D.A. Points in a playoff. Tiger Woods missed the cut for just the eighth time in 267 events on tour.
–Buzz Bissinger, author of “Friday Night Lights,” on the state of college football, as penned in the Wall Street Journal.
“In more than 20 years I’ve spent studying the issue, I have yet to hear a convincing argument that college football has anything to do with what is presumably the primary purpose of higher education: academics.
“That’s because college football has no academic purpose. Which is why it needs to be banned. A radical solution, yes. But necessary in today’s times….
“Who truly benefits from college football? Alumni who absurdly judge the quality of their alma mater based on the quality of the football team. Coaches such as Nick Saban of the University of Alabama and Bob Stoops of Oklahoma University who make obscene millions. The players themselves don’t benefit, exploited by a system in which they don’t receive a dime of compensation. The average student doesn’t benefit, particularly when football programs remain sacrosanct while tuition costs show no signs of abating as many governors are slashing budgets to the bone.
“If the vast majority of major college football programs made money, the argument to ban football might be a more precarious one. But too many of them don’t – to the detriment of academic budgets at all too many schools. According to the NCAA, 43% of the 120 schools in the Football Bowl Subdivision lost money on their programs. This is the tier of schools that includes such examples as that great titan of football excellence, the University of Alabama at Birmingham Blazers, who went 3-9 last season. The athletic department in 2008-2009 took in over $13 million in university funds and student fees, largely because the football program cost so much, The Wall Street Journal reported….
“I can’t help but wonder how a student at the University of Oregon will cope when in-state tuition has recently gone up by 9% and the state legislature passed an 11% decrease in funding to the Oregon system overall for 2011 and 2012. Yet thanks to the largess of Nike founder Phil Knight, an academic center costing $41.7 million, twice as expensive in square footage as the toniest condos in Portland, has been built for the University of Oregon football team….
“Call me the Grinch. But I would much prefer students going to college to learn and be prepared for the rigors of the new economic order, rather than dumping fees on them to subsidize football programs that, far from enhancing the academic mission instead make a mockery of it.”
–The NFL players union has challenged commissioner Roger Goodell’s authority to suspend the four players involved in the bounty scandal.
—Miguel Cotto made Floyd Mayweather bleed in their W.B.A. super welterweight title bout on Saturday night, which few have done, but Mayweather prevailed and remained undefeated in a unanimous decision. The hated Mayweather is scheduled to report to jail for misdemeanor domestic violence and harassment charges on June 1.
—Usain Bolt opened up his 2012 season with a 9.82 100 meters in Kingston this weekend, besting the year’s best time of 9.90 set by his training partner, Yohan Blake. Bolt was pleased with his performance as he gears up for London this summer. He holds the records in the 100 at 9.58 and the 200 meters at 19.19.
“A brown bear ‘pounced’ on a hunter Saturday on Kodiak Island, biting the head of the man after he had shot and killed another bear nearby, troopers say.
“The hunter, 48-year-old Rodd A. Moretz of Fairbanks, escaped the tussle with only minor scalp injuries, according to a trooper report…
“Mating season is approaching for the roughly 3,500 brown bears on Kodiak and nearby islands, said Larry Van Daele, an area wildlife biologist for Fish and Game. The aggressive brownie that chomped Moretz – likely a sow – may have confused the hunter with male brown bears itching to kill her cubs, he said….
“The trouble started about 6:30 p.m. Saturday. Moretz was walking toward a 9-foot male brown bear he had just killed among the tundra and alder hillsides of Sulua Bay….
“As he approached the dead animal, Moretz walked past a bear den about 100 yards from the kill, troopers said.
“A brown bear erupted from the den and charged the hunter, according to troopers. The bear collided with Moretz. Man and bear rolled roughly 50 feet down a hill, said trooper spokeswoman Megan Peters.
“ ‘While they were tumbling, they separated,’ she said.
—Jim Nabors will miss out on performing “Back Home Again in Indiana” at this year’s Indy 500 due to heart surgery he is having later in the month. Instead, he will record the song in Hawaii this week for playback during pre-race festivities. Nabors started performing it in 1972 and since 1987 has sung it every year but one.
–And George Lindsey died. He was 83. Lindsey was Goober on “The Andy Griffith Show” and then played the same character on “Hee Haw,” spanning about 30 years. Lindsey joined Andy Griffith in 1964 when Jim Nabors, portraying Gomer Pyle, left the program.
In a statement released through the funeral home, Griffith said, “George Lindsey was my friend. I had great respect for his talent and his human spirit…Our last conversation was a few days ago…I am happy to say that as we found ourselves in our eighties, we were not afraid to say, ‘I love you.’ That was the last thing George and I had to say to each other. ‘I love you.’”
–“The Avengers” debuted with an estimated $200.3 million, the No. 1 domestic opening of all time – not adjusting for inflation. The figure easily surpassed the $168.2 million 2011 debut of previous record-holder “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2.”
Top 3 songs for the week 5/5/73: #1 “Tie A Yellow Ribbon Round The Ole Oak Tree” (Dawn featuring Tony Orlando) #2 “The Cisco Kid” (War) #3 “Little Willy” (The Sweet)…and…#4 “You Are The Sunshine Of My Life” (Stevie Wonder) #5 “The Night The Lights Went Out In Georgia” (Vicki Lawrence) #6 “Drift Away” (Dobie Gray) #7 “Stuck In The Middle With You” (Stealers Wheel) #8 “The Twelfth Of Never” (Donny Osmond) #9 “Sing” (Carpenters…not their best) #10 “Frankenstein” (The Edgar Winter Group)
NBA Quiz Answer: The six on the 1994-95 Houston Rockets who scored in double figures…
Hakeem Olajuwon, 27.8; Clyde Drexler, 21.4; Vernon Maxwell, 13.3; Otis Thorpe, 13.3; Kenny Smith, 10.4; Robert Horry, 10.2. Thorpe was traded to Portland for Drexler in February. Other key players on the Rockets were Sam Cassell, Mario Elie, Carl Herrera, Chucky Brown, and Pete Chilcutt.
