[Posted Wednesday a.m.]
Detroit Tigers Quiz: [Think old-timers on this one.] 1) Ty Cobb hit .420 in 1911, and .409 and .401 two other years, but what Tiger once hit .403? [Post-1920] 2) Who am I? I once had 227 hits, 144 runs scored and 60 doubles in the same season. [Not Cobb or the answer to No. 1] 3) Hank Greenberg hit 58 home runs in 1938, Cecil Fielder 51 in 1990, and then who is third on the single-season list with 45 (different player). Answers below.
NBA Playoffs
Frank Isola / New York Daily News
“LeBron James is now all that stands between the Golden State Warriors and a season for the ages.
“The NBA Finals rematch everyone wants is here and all it took was the unlikeliest of comebacks from the defending champs to make it happen. Steve Kerr’s team, which posted a league-record 73 wins during the regular season, simply won’t go away.
“The Warriors have now won a total of 85 games, including playoffs, with none bigger than the last three. All three were elimination games and each game proved just how resilient, tough and talented this team really is.
“The Warriors eliminated Oklahoma City in Game 7 of the Western Conference finals 96-88 after falling behind three games to one in the series. The crucial win, of course, was Game 6 in OKC when the Warriors, behind Curry and Klay Thompson, rallied from a 13-point deficit.
“ ‘No game was easy,’ Thompson.
“On Monday, Golden State again trailed by 13 but it was a barrage of 3-pointers from the Warriors’ backcourt in the third quarter that changed the game for good.
“The loss could have lasting ramifications for the Thunder, which fell apart in the final four minutes of Game 6 at home and now heads into an uncertain offseason.
“Kevin Durant becomes a free agent on July 1 and may have played his last game for the Thunder. If so, it was a disappointing finish for Durant, who has threatened to leave for a championship contender. Someone should remind Durant that he currently plays for a contender. But in the biggest game of his season, a passive Durant didn’t do enough early to get OKC to the Finals….
“(Last year) the Warriors eliminated Cleveland in six games and suddenly the knock was that the Warriors won the title by beating four teams – New Orleans, Memphis, Houston, Cleveland – that weren’t at full strength. They also avoided playing two main rivals; San Antonio and the Los Angeles Clippers.”
This year Houston and Portland had issues, but OKC was healthy and hot off the win over the Spurs.
Isola:
“That’s what makes the last five days so special and validates what the Warriors have become the last two seasons. The Warriors needed to win three games to stay alive and here they are: still standing and ready for one last challenge.
“ ‘This is what we worked for,’ Curry said. ‘We wanted to get back to the Finals. We’re back.’”
Harvey Araton / New York Times
“What is the point, really, of historical comparison? How do you measure a basketball mutation, which is what the Golden State Warriors have become, with their long-distance dialing that makes comparing them with storied NBA teams of yore like distinguishing between a smartphone and a land line?
“You watched Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson dishearten and finally defeat a resolute Oklahoma City team on Monday night in Game 7 of the Western Conference finals. You watched them make 3-point shots over the outstretched arms of men much taller, and you found yourself saying the unbelievable, ridiculous, stupefied words you mouth when you can’t quite believe what you’re seeing.
“It is practically a reinvented game these so-called Splash Brothers are playing, having drastically extended the standard scoring range, the acceptable area from which to consistently unload and succeed….
“Curry and Thompson each surpassed the previous individual high of 28 3-pointers (held by Ray Allen and Dennis Scott) made in a single NBA playoff series, Curry with 32, Thompson with 30.
“Amid it all, Bill Simmons posted on Twitter that 30 years ago, in the 1986 finals, Boston and Houston combined to hit 17 3-point shots in an entire six-game series won by the Celtics….
“Now the Warriors’ reward is James, a two-time champion and an NBA finalist for the sixth straight season, and a Cavaliers team at full strength….
“The Warriors made 73 wins look almost too easy, tempting those commonly referred to as haters to question or deride the quality of the competition, in the interests of historical context.
“Forget all that now. Extreme playoff adversity has been met and surmounted, and here comes LeBron. This Warriors title defense has taken on a degree of difficulty as formidable as the nightly audacity of their 3-point marksmen.
“If Curry and Thompson continue making them, even the haters may have to mimic Joe Lacob, the Warriors’ owner, who, upon spotting Thompson after Game 6, went down on one knee and bowed.”
One aside from your editor, I thought the key play on Monday was Shaun Livingston’s breakaway dunk at the end of the third period.
As for Kevin Durant and his pending free agency, I’ve been saying that there is no way he leaves OKC, owing to the fact he can make far more by staying and the fact the Thunder are obviously just one or two players away.
But the way the Western Conference finals ended, losing three straight in the fashion the Thunder did, has to have left a sour taste in Durant’s mouth. That said, he’ll re-up.
MLB
–Well whaddya know…after trashing Matt Harvey, the Mets’ one-time ace rewarded management for keeping him on the big league roster rather than sending him to AAA Las Vegas, with Harvey throwing seven scoreless against the White Sox on Monday, allowing just two hits and striking out six, while his fastball had its best pop of the season. Harvey got the win when Neil Walker hit a home run in the bottom of the seventh for the lone run of the game, 1-0. So Harvey improved to 4-7, 5.37.
Good for the Dark Knight. But as he was the first to say after (yes, he did finally talk to the media), he needs to back it up.
Tuesday, the Mets then suffered their worst loss of the season, blowing a 4-0 lead and losing to the White Sox 6-4 as the bullpen, which just recently had the best ERA in baseball, has been struggling mightily.
They need a win desperately Wednesday afternoon before heading on a 10-game road trip.
[The Mets received significant good news on the Bernie Madoff front. Mets ownership was originally hit with a $303 million lawsuit in 2012 that claimed they were willfully blind in taking fake profits from Madoff’s investment group (which they deny), and in a deal with the courts, they owed trustee Irving Picard $162 million. But as was just announced, Picard has been able to reclaim far more than expected and the Mets have worked out a new deal with Picard that will have them paying at most $61.2 million, with $45 million of it paid out from 2017-2020.]
–While Clayton Kershaw didn’t pick up the win in L.A.’s 4-2 victory over the Mets on Sunday, the Dodgers are 10-1 in games he has started and he finished the month of May with a 5-0 record and a 0.91 ERA. He struck out 65 batters last month and walked only two.
For the year, Kershaw is 7-1, 1.56, with a stupendous 105 strikeouts and just 5 walks. I told you about two weeks ago that the record ratio for strikeouts vs. walks is Phil Hughes’ 11.625 in 2014.
For a career, Curt Schilling holds the modern-day record at 4.382!
–Tuesday, the Cubs’ Jake Arrieta threw seven scoreless against the Dodgers in L.A., but Chicago’s bullpen blew it and the Dodgers won 5-0, thus snapping the streak that had seen the Cubs win 23 straight games in which Arrieta started, going back to July 25, 2015. Arrieta, though, remains 9-0 and his ERA is also down to 1.56.
—Bryce Harper finished the month of May with a .200 batting average, 16-for-80, with just 4 homers and 10 RBIs.
But teammate Daniel Murphy hit .416 in May with 7 HR and 23 RBIs, tying the franchise record for hits in a single month with 47! Murphy is at .397, 9-34. Remarkable. There is no reason to believe this guy can’t hit .370 for the full season.
–Recently the Red Sox’ Jackie Bradley Jr. had a 29-game hitting streak that was snapped, but now Xander Bogaerts has a 24-game streak as of Tuesday’s 6-2 win over Baltimore. In the same game, Mookie Betts had three home runs, accounting for five of the six runs, and he now has 12 homers and 40 RBI out of the leadoff spot.
Talk about excitement in Beantown. Bogaerts, hitting .350, and Betts are just 23. Bradley, who clearly is finally coming into his own, is 26, the same age as new third baseman, Travis Shaw, also playing well.
Boston as a team is batting .294, having scored 308 runs, while hitting .299 with runners in scoring position.
The Mets, by contrast, are batting .231, and even though they are second in baseball with 74 home runs, they have scored only 194 and are last in hitting with runners in scoring position at .212. Yuck.
—In College Baseball….
The field of 64 for the Division I Baseball Championship was announced Monday and a record-tying 10 ACC teams were selected, including bubble teams Boston College, Duke and Wake Forest. [The SEC had 10 in 2014.]
Congratulations to Alabama State, Fairfield, St. Mary’s (Calif.) and Utah Valley for making the tournament for a first time.
Can you imagine…Miami is in the tournament for a 44th consecutive season, extending their own record. Florida State is in for a 39th consecutive appearance, second all-time.
The 16 regionals will be conducted Fri., June 3, to Monday, June 6 (if necessary). Then the 16 winners head into eight super regionals, with the eight survivors heading to Omaha for the 70th Men’s College World Series. Virginia is the defending champion.
I do have to note that the Patriot League representative is Navy. Princeton is the Ivy League entrant.
Golf Balls
–The NCAA Men’s Golf Championship is being contested in Eugene, Oregon, with 15 of 30 teams advancing after the first three rounds of stroke play. Among those teams not making the cut were Stanford and Georgia, 3rd and 4th, respectively, in the final Golfweek poll before NCAA regional qualifying for the championship took place. Wake Forest finished 23rd.
So the fourth round was Monday, when the field was cut to a final 8 schools that would then pair off in match play competition, while the individual title was settled Monday, which Stanford’s Maverick McNealy shockingly didn’t qualify for either. [9 individuals whose teams didn’t make the final 15 qualified for the last round of the individual title chase.]
And the winner is…Oregon sophomore Aaron Wise, taking advantage of his home course.
Texas, Oklahoma, Illinois, South Carolina, Oregon, LSU, USC and Vanderbilt qualified for match play….
Texas, USC, Illinois and Oregon then making it to the semis….
And now in Wednesday’s final, it’s Texas vs. Oregon. Quack quack!
–Meanwhile, in the women’s competition…Washington took the championship, a 3-2 victor in the match play final over 2015 winner Stanford.
Duke’s Virginia Elena Carta won the individual title, Carta a 19-year-old freshman from Italy. She defeated Arizona’s Haley Moor by eight strokes; as Carta brilliantly mapped the course.
—Tony Finau gets a Good Guy award for his act last week at the Colonial golf tournament. Finau’s errant shot left a girl with a nasty blow to the head as his ball ricocheted back into play. The next day, Finau showed up at the girl’s home with flowers, chocolates and a get well card, and he stayed and talked to her for a while. “Elisa” posted afterwards on Instagram her warm regards for his move, saying in part, “I wish you the best of luck in the tour going forward! –Signed, your new favorite fan, #classact”
NFL
–As I reported last time, the issue with Ryan Fitzpatrick and his negotiations with the Jets is all about years 2 and 3 of the contract being offered. While he gets $12 million guaranteed in the first year, the deal only pays him $6 million in 2017 and $6 million in 2018 unless he hits incentives that could drive the total value up to $36 million.
I see where Fitzpatrick is coming from, but I have no problem with the way the Jets are handling it. Yeah, receivers Eric Decker and Brandon Marshall are comfortable with the QB and want him back, and he should return…but there is also the reality, especially from a business standpoint, that no one else is interested in Fitzpatrick!
I mean I have been consistent since day one. I’m totally ambivalent. Sure, if he comes back I’ll support him. But the overriding issue is I don’t think the Jets are a playoff caliber team this coming season and I really don’t care who they play at QB. I’d be satisfied with Geno Smith, at least to start out, because we can go 6-10 with him (or whoever replaces him mid-season), or no better than 8-8 with Fitzpatrick. What’s the difference? [Actually, a better draft pick at 6-10.]
And this is a guy, Fitzpatrick, that in all his years, still hasn’t led a team into the playoffs.
Next….
CFB
–The other day I heard one of those CBSSports’ 60 seconds bits with John Feinstein and he was talking about the need for the NCAA to have a football commissioner, which I guess is being bandied about, and his piece was how on why the position is needed (which makes sense to me…take stuff out of the control of the NCAA itself), the rumored top choice, former South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier, wouldn’t be a good selection…even though Spurrier would be outspoken, and tell it like it is, which isn’t necessarily how a commissioner needs to act. [You’re representing the owners/school presidents after all….see Roger Goodell.]
I agreed with Mr. Feinstein. I like Spurrier (even met the guy in New York briefly years ago), but he wouldn’t be the right figure for that kind of position.
So I’m in my car when I heard this, musing, and I immediately thought the perfect candidate to be NCAA football commissioner would be former Wake Forest coach Jim Grobe. A man with impeccable credentials, integrity, and someone who has been in the trenches and ran programs that were largely above board…and pretty successful given the odds against them.
Grobe coached at Ohio and Wake from 1995 to 2013 and was 110-115-1, including 2006, when Grobe guided the Deacs to an unlikely ACC championship and the Orange Bowl; getting selected AP coach of the year in the process.
Well, those were my thoughts about a week before I saw the news that the scandal-plagued Baylor Bears hired Grobe to be their interim coach, following the firing of Art Briles, whose program has been rocked by allegations of sexual assault by players and efforts to cover it up.
Grobe is 64 and last coached Wake in 2013, stepping down after a 4-8 season, his fifth consecutive losing one. Both parties, including alumni, were ready for a change.
But Grobe is the perfect guy to guide Baylor during this trying time. He has one year. That’s what “interim” means in this situation. Regardless of how he does he may not even want the job for more than that.
But I hope he does well. I also have no clue on how you define that.
[Briles was 65-37 in eight seasons at Baylor, winning 10 or more games in four of the last five seasons and playing in six consecutive bowl games. Athletic Director Ian McCaw also resigned on Monday, McCaw having been at the school since 2003.]
Stuff
—Pittsburgh took Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Finals, defeating San Jose in Pittsburgh, 3-2, on Nick Bonino’s goal with 2:33 remaining. Game 2 Wednesday.
–We note the passing of Rick MacLeish, a former star forward for the Philadelphia Flyers teams, known as the Broad Street Bullies, which won back-to-back Stanley Cups in the 1970s. He was 66.
MacLeish played 14 years in the NHL, almost all of it with Philadelphia. In 1972-73, his first full season, he became the first Flyer to score 50 goals in a season, which ended up being his most productive season, scoring an even 100 points.
MacLeish actually played most of his career at center, anchoring the Flyers’ second line with Gary Dornhoefer and Ross Lonsberry.
But as good as he was, MacLeish was overshadowed by Bobby Clarke, Bill Barber, goaltender Bernie Parent, and notorious enforcer Dave Schultz. [Schultz’s 472 penalty minutes in 1974-75 remain a league record.]
The Flyers won the Cup in 1973-74, defeating Boston, and then ’74-’75, ousting Buffalo in the Finals. MacLeish led the team in scoring in both playoffs.
MacLeish had 328 of his 349 career goals with the Flyers, sixth most in team history.
–Tough to get fired up about the French Open with all the rain…all I know is that Serena Williams advanced to the quarters on Wednesday, after No. 2 Agnieszka Radwanska and No. 6 Simona Halep were eliminated on Tuesday.
If you knew Radwanska was seeded second, advance to the head of the class. Imagine what women’s tennis will look like when Serena is gone.
–In college lacrosse (as this exciting college spring sports postseason unfolds), UNC defeated Maryland in the final in overtime, 14-13; Chris Cloutier with the game-winner in OT.
North Carolina was unseeded this year, while Maryland was the No. 1 seed. It was UNC’s first men’s lacrosse championship since 1991.
But it was further heartbreak for Maryland, which is now 0-9 in title games since the 1975 squad captured that championship.
And in the women’s title game, the same two schools matched up. This time it was 3-seed North Carolina beating 1-seed Maryland.
–So, again, don’t forget the Copa America tournament that starts this Friday, USA vs. Colombia. It could be fun.
Before he plays for Argentina, though, superstar Lionel Messi has to go to court in Spain where he will appear in front of a judge to defend himself from accusations he failed to properly pay taxes for his earnings from Barcelona.
Messi is but one star futbol player having to deal with Spanish tax authorities (Neymar being another known ‘name’) and as the New York Times reported, the cases threaten Spanish soccer and could start scaring some players away.
The Spanish league (La Liga), despite its success in Champions League play, pales in comparison to the Premier League in terms of financial power and the P.L. has the wherewithal to go after nearly every top player in the world.
Neymar’s father said last year his kid is constantly being harassed over his taxes and he’s seriously contemplating leaving Barcelona.
Messi and his father have been charged with three counts of tax fraud that could send them to prison for up to two years if found guilty of defrauding the government of $4.5 million from 2007-09.
Messi’s name also emerged in the Panama Papers, which doesn’t help his cause.
The complaints against athletes in Spain normally involve fictitious corporate structures to avoid paying taxes on income from image rights.
–Mexican police rescued kidnapped soccer player Alan Pulido, a 25-year-old forward with Greek soccer club Olympiakos, who was seized by gunmen as he left a party Saturday night in the northeast border state of Tamaulipas, which borders Texas.
It turns out he was able to call police while his abductors were distracted. He was being held for ransom.
Pulido, a member of Mexico’s 2014 World Cup squad, is not on Mexico’s Copa America roster, seemingly because of a contract dispute he is having with the club Tigres of Monterrey, Mexico, who he left for Olympiakos.
—Awful story out of Thailand as 1,000 police and wildlife officials took over a Buddhist temple that has been accused of wildlife trafficking and animal abuse.
Police started an operation to remove all the living tigers at the Tiger Temple, 137 in all. And then they found 40 tiger cub bodies in a freezer.
The site is a popular tourist attraction.
Said an official with Thailand’s Department of National Parks, “They must be of some value for the temple to keep them. But for what is beyond me.”
Since 2001, authorities have been locked in a battle with the monks at the temple to confiscate the tigers amid allegations of trafficking and abuse.
–All kinds of animal action that I didn’t learn of until after I last posted.
A woman swimming off the coast of Corona Del Mar in California was bitten by a shark, suffering large bite marks to her torso and shoulder. CBS Los Angeles reported it “was a Great White.” The woman was expected to survive but her injuries are serious.
Great White sightings have spiked along the Orange County coastline.
But there are also rumors that because officials haven’t released much information, people are wondering if it couldn’t have been another ocean animal like a sea lion! The victim was 150 feet offshore.
You need photos of the bites and wetsuit to help determine the type of animal and size.
As L. Connelly of the Orange County Register reported: “Many people don’t realize that (sea lions) can be dangerous.”
Meanwhile, researchers have been studying about a dozen juvenile great whites in the area who have been sticking around longer than normal due to the warmer waters.
There have been fatal shark encounters in the waters off California in 2008, ’10 and ’12.
Meanwhile, Sunday afternoon at Neptune Beach, Fla., a 13-year-old boy swimming in shallow water was bitten on the right calf by a shark that was estimated to be 5- to 6-ft. long. The boy suffered severe lacerations to the calf and shin, First Coast News reported. While it was the first shark attack of the year at this beach, it was the third in this general area.
–Then we have this one…from the Irish Independent:
“A woman struggled in vain to drag her friend from a crocodile’s jaws during a late night swim off an Australian beach.
“The pair were in shallow water at Thornton Beach in the World Heritage-listed Daintree National Park in Queensland state when the 46-year-old woman was taken by the crocodile at 10:30 pm local time on Sunday.
Police Senior Constable Russell Parker said: ‘Her 47-year-old friend tried to grab her and drag her to safety but she just wasn’t able to do that.’
“He said the two women were not locals and might not have been aware that the area was well known as a crocodile habitat.”
Heck, even I know about that area. The survivor was taken to a hospital suffering from shock.
Another official said, “The report that we have from the surviving woman is that they felt a nudge and her partner started to scream and then was dragged into the water.”
Warren Enstch, who represents the area in the Australian Parliament, said the creek is a popular one for tourism operators running crocodile-spotting tours and said the women had to have seen numerous croc warning signs in the region.
“You can’t legislate against human stupidity,” Mr. Entsch said. “If you go in swimming at 10 o’clock at night, you’re going to get consumed.”
Amen, Brother Entsch!
“The attack occurred near where a five-year-old boy was taken and killed by a 14-ft. crocodile from a swamp in 2009 and a 43-year-old woman was killed by a 16-ft. croc while swimming in a creek in 1985….
“Crocodile numbers have boomed across Australia’s northern tropics since they became a protected species in 1971, and they pose an increasing threat to humans.”
–On the alligator front… “Police divers in South Florida have recovered a body that was being eaten by a pair of alligators.
Davie police captain Dale Engle said the man’s body, found in a canal in Southwest Ranches, about 20 miles west of Fort Lauderdale, on the eastern edge of the Everglades, appeared to have been there for a long time, according to The Sun Sentinel.
“Capt. Engle said officers, who were called to the gruesome scene by two fishermen on Monday, scared the reptiles from the body, but they lingered nearby as they tried to recover it.”
Wally Alligator was heard commenting to his friend, Pete, “Tasted like chicken, don’t ya think?”
–I am making a major change to the “All-Species List”. Octopus is entering with a bullet at No. 9. There have simply been far too many stories on its intelligence not to celebrate the cephalopod.
Nic Fleming of the BBC was the latest to weigh in:
“In 2007 I was snorkeling in Dahab, Egypt, when I came face-to-face with a common octopus.
“It was an intense experience. I felt it was sizing me up, and there was an ill-defined but somehow profound communication. Our meeting only lasted a few seconds, but I was left with an enduring impression of having encountered a great intelligence.
“The experience may help explain the loud cheer I let out in April 2016, when I heard the news of Inky the octopus’s great escape from the National Aquarium of New Zealand. The lid of Inky’s tank was left ajar at night, and he took advantage of this by climbing out, walking across a room to a drain opening, and squeezing down a 160-ft pipe to the open ocean.
“His successful bid for freedom was one more piece of evidence that octopuses are some of the most intelligent creatures on Earth.”
Yup…
1. Dog
2. Elephant
3. Tiger
4. Gibbon…keeps same partner for life…Mets and Jets fans….
5. Great White Shark
6. Grizzly Bear (includes Kodiak Bear)
7. Beaver…off suspended list, still honored for avoiding subprime crisis…
8. Pig…all about the bacon…
9. Octopus
10. Robin…simple bird sings at least 12 different tunes, from Nat King Cole to the Beatles. Granted, sometimes it starts singing a little too early in the morning to suit our tastes, but life would suck without the robin.
Others knocking on the door…Swordfish (down from No. 7), African Grey Parrot, Leopard Seal, Lion, Crow, Orca, Hawk, Wolf, Croc, Ocelot, Mountain Lion, Gorilla Rhino, Yak, Polar Bear and the Mallard. House Cat is mired in the 90s. Man is No. 323, behind the squirrel (it’s that time of year when squirrels, for all their skill in reaching birdfeeders, remind us how stupid they are in refusing to look both ways while crossing the street).
–Unreal how much national press the Cincinnati Zoo shooting of Harambe continues to receive, but it’s too easy a story for the networks, I guess. Of course some of the a-holes and dirtballs on social media are going online and sending threatening messages to women who share the name of the boy’s mother, which is outrageous. One man messaged the wrong woman, “that animal is more important than your s— kid.” Another woman wrote the wrong person: “u should’ve been shot.”
I repeat what I said last time…it was a tragedy. But the Zoo did the right thing.
—Bruce Springsteen sold out two huge gigs at Dublin’s Croke Park, 80,000 each of Friday and Sunday nights. Bono joined Bruuuuce onstage for the second gig to sing a rendition of “Because the Night,” which Springsteen penned for Patti Smith.
Saturday night Springsteen went bowling, which you can imagine the locals got a kick out of, while earlier that evening he popped into a pub for a pint. That would be such a pisser.
Top 3 songs for the week 6/3/67: #1 “Respect” (Aretha Franklin) #2 “Groovin’” (The Young Rascals) #3 “I Got Rhythm” (The Happenings)…and…#4 “Release Me (And Let Me Love Again)” (Engelbert Humperdinck) #5 “Creeque Alley” (The Mamas and the Papas) #6 Him Or Me – What’s It Gonna Be?” (Paul Revere and The Raiders) #7 “The Happening” (The Supremes) #8 “Sweet Soul Music” (Arthur Conley) #9 “Somebody To Love” (Jefferson Airplane) #10 “All I Need” (The Temptations…solid week…I think ’67 is my favorite year…)
Detroit Tigers Quiz Answers: 1) Hall of Famer Harry Heilmann hit .403 in 1923. He also had seasons of .398, .394 and .393…batting .342 for his career. 2) Hall of Famer Charlie Gehringer had an awesome 1936, 227 hits, 144 runs, 60 doubles, 12 triples, 15 homers, 116 RBI and a .354 average, while striking out just 13 times! For his career, Gehringer hit .320 with a .404 on-base percentage. 3) Rocky Colavito is third on the Tigers’ single-season home run list with 45 in 1961.
Next Bar Chat, Monday.
