[Posted early Wednesday a.m.]
San Francisco 49ers Quiz: 1) Who are the three with 7,000 yards rushing in a San Francisco uniform? 2) Who are the five with 500 receptions for the 49ers? Answers below.
College Football
Jerry Palm is CBSSports.com’s bracketologist so before the release of the latest College Football Playoff ranking, he had (1) Alabama vs. (4) Washington [Peach Bowl, Dec. 31]; (2) Clemson vs. (3) Ohio State [Fiesta Bowl, Dec. 31]
He also has Western Michigan as the Group of Five representative in the New Year’s Six, the Cotton Bowl vs. Penn State, Jan. 2.
Palm’s projections for the other three:
Sugar Bowl Jan. 2…Oklahoma vs. Texas A&M [Noooo!]
Rose Bowl Jan. 2…Wisconsin vs. Utah
Orange Bowl Dec. 30…Louisville vs. Michigan
Man, the non-Final Four matchups suck. We want Oklahoma-Michigan, or Oklahoma-Louisville (just because of Lamar Jackson).
If you’re wondering why no Colorado, Jerry Palm has the Utes beating them at Colorado this weekend and then USC losing to Washington in the Pac-12 championship game, with, in that scenario, Utah then having head-to-head wins over both Colorado and USC.
By the way, if Boston College beats Wake Forest and both finish 6-6, it appears as of now that both would get bowl games after all.
–The University of Texas is firing coach Charlie Strong after he has gone 16-20 and 12-14 in Big 12 play in three seasons, but as I write, he still hasn’t been told by the school and at a very uncomfortable press conference on Monday, Strong said the school hadn’t notified him, while his players, standing in the back, applauded and hugged him after.
Strong is owed a buyout of $10.7 million for the remaining two years on his contract, which would be reduced if he takes another job. His loss Saturday night to a Kansas team that entered the game 1-9 sealed his fate.
Texas plays TCU on Friday.
–Chuck Culpepper / Washington Post:
“Following on their monster upset at Clemson, the Pitt Panthers did the grueling work of staying grueling. They throttled Duke, 56-14….And with their two wins over top-10 teams (Penn State and Clemson), they have done as much as anyone to shape the national landscape.”
–And then this hit late Tuesday….
From Matt Fortuna / ESPN
“The NCAA has ordered the Notre Dame Fighting Irish to vacate all the wins from their 2012 and 2013 football seasons in an academic misconduct case, it was announced Tuesday.
“Notre Dame announced it will appeal the decision.
“According to the decision, the agreed-upon violations centered on academic misconduct by a former athletic trainer and two football student-athletes during a three-year period. The trainer also provided six other football players with impermissible academic benefits across 18 courses in two years.
“The NCAA committee on infractions prescribed a public reprimand and censure of Notre Dame, one year of probation, a two-year show-cause order for the former trainer, a two-year disassociation of the former trainer, a vacating of all records in which ineligible student-athletes participated while ineligible during the 2012-13 and 2013-14 seasons, and a $5,000 fine.
“Notre Dame football coach Brian Kelly, speaking at a regularly scheduled news conference, said the entire school has been cooperative throughout the investigation, and he thanked it for its support.”
Kelly said: “This is a discretionary action by the committee. That’s No. 1. No. 2, student-on-student cheating, nobody implicated. The NCAA agreed across the board with that finding, and it was clearly excessive, so we’re gonna appeal this, and one of the options or clear reasons for appeal is that the penalty is excessive in its discretion and we believe we have obvious grounds there.”
Kelly said he bears no culpability for the academic misconduct, and that he also plans on being back in 2017 for an eighth season.
The school believes it did everything right in investigating the case back in 2014 once it became aware of potential academic misconduct by one former player and one current player. It immediately suspended the two and, at the conclusion of the honor-code process, dismissed four other players and imposed retroactive grade changes in the courses affected.
ND was the national runner-up during the 2012 season, losing to Alabama in the BCS title game and finishing with a 12-1 mark. The Irish went 9-4 in 2013.
I have said many times over the years that being forced to vacate wins, unless it was for something totally egregious (like gambling) is beyond absurd. Put the team on probation and prohibit Notre Dame or any other team from the postseason for whatever period.
But you can’t take away the result of games already played. Every fan understands that.
*So here’s the new CFP Ranking (released Tuesday night)….
[First four unchanged from last week]
1. Alabama
2. Ohio State
3. Michigan
4. Clemson
5. Washington
6. Wisconsin
7. Penn State
8. Oklahoma
9. Colorado
10. Oklahoma State
11. Louisville…down 6 after loss to Houston
12. USC
13. Auburn
14. Florida State
15. Florida
19. Boise State
20. Houston…NR
21. Western Michigan
25. Navy
We’ll obviously know a ton after Ohio State-Michigan and Washington-Washington State (Friday) this weekend.
But as I wrote last time, the looming controversy with the CFP rankings remains Washington vs. the Penn State/Wisconsin Big Ten Conference Championship winner, if it comes down to that. That’s assuming that the Michigan-Ohio State loser is out of the picture, totally, but if it’s a 13-10 outcome in that one, and Washington loses, either Friday or in the Pac-12 title game, I’m not so sure.
As for the whole Western Michigan vs. Boise State and others deal for a Cotton Bowl berth, the former just needs to win out. Two more games. [However, 9-2 Toledo this Friday is no pushover.]
—Division I-AA (FCS) Coaches Poll (Nov. 21)
1. Sam Houston State
2. Jacksonville State
3. North Dakota State
4. Eastern Washington
5. James Madison
6. The Citadel
7. South Dakota State
8. North Dakota
9. Chattanooga
10. Charleston Southern
15. Lehigh
So this was the poll…but then came the bracket for the 24-team FCS Championship and the first thing that stands out is Sam Houston State is not a 1-seed, it’s a 5! The winner of the last five championships, N.D. State, is No. 1.
2 is Eastern Washington, 3 Jacksonville State, 4 James Madison and then Sam Houston. Talk about controversy…though I don’t see any major protests outside my place as yet. #SamHoustonMatters
With 24 teams, that means 16 are playing this weekend to face off against the 8 seeded teams.
Among the first-round matchups you have Villanova vs. St. Francis (Pa.) and New Hampshire at Lehigh.
Actually, an intriguing game is Chattanooga-Weber State, if you’re into these things. The Mocs acquitted themselves well against Alabama on Saturday. The winner of this one plays Sam Houston. Winner of New Hampshire-Lehigh plays James Madison.
NFL
–I did something I haven’t done in a long time Monday, watch the entire MNF game without flipping to something else in between, and it was a pretty entertaining affair, Oakland moving to 8-2 with a 27-20 come from behind win over 6-4 Houston. Raiders quarterback Derek Carr (21/31, 295, 3-1, 117.0) threw two fourth-quarter TD passes after Houston had taken a 20-13 lead on a Nick Novak field goal with eleven minutes to play.
In hitting receiver Amari Cooper for the deciding 35-yard scoring strike, it was the eighth fourth quarter or overtime game-winning drive for Carr since the start of the 2015 season; Detroit’s Matthew Stafford being the only one to have more in that time with nine.
Raiders linebacker Khalil Mack continued his stellar play with his seventh sack in the last five games. Oakland is just operating on all cylinders. They’re the real deal.
But this contest could have easily gone the other way if Houston hadn’t been the victim of awful officiating early when a Brock Osweiler (26/39, 243, 1-1, 81.5) touchdown pass to DeAndre Hopkins was negated when the sideline official ruled Hopkins stepped out of bounds on his dash to the end zone when replays showed he clearly hadn’t. Houston would only get a field goal out of the drive. And then in the fourth quarter, Houston was the victim of two awful spots on running plays for first downs, the second on fourth down that resulted in the ball being turned over to Oakland.
–Sunday night, after I posted, the Washington Redskins continued to surprise with a 42-24 win against the collapsing Packers at FedEx Field, Washington now 6-3 after an 0-2 start. Kirk Cousins continues to show he deserves a long-term contract, going 21/30, 373, 3-0, 145.8…just a terrific performance, while Robert Kelly rushed for 137 yards and three scores on 24 carries. Next up Dallas on Thanksgiving Day.
But for 4-6 Green Bay, it is definitely time to…Well I’ll let the Washington Post’s Mark Maske say it: “This is no time to R-E-L-A-X….Quite the opposite, in fact. It’s time to panic. They’re pretty dreadful right now and their season is slipping away, and it’s mostly not about quarterback Aaron Rodgers and Coach Mike McCarthy. It’s about their defense, which can’t cover anyone and can’t stop anyone.”
Green Bay has now lost five of six and they’re two games behind both Detroit and Minnesota in the NFC North. The ‘D’ has given up 153 points during the four-game losing skid.
–How good is the Cowboys’ Dak Prescott? Try 17 touchdowns and just two interceptions, with a rating of 108.6, the second-highest in the league to Matt Ryan’s 115.1. Fellow rookie Carson Wentz of the Eagles, though, has come down to earth and his splits are now 11-7, 84.2. [The aforementioned Kirk Cousins is 17-7, 98.8.]
–The 3-7 Jets emerge from their bye week to play New England on Sunday and after second-year QB Bryce Petty finally got his first start against the Rams, it was assumed he would be the signal-caller the rest of the way, the season being over, so the team could evaluate him and figure out if he’s the future or if once again they have to go in a different direction. Or so we thought.
Monday, coach Todd Bowles said otherwise…Ryan Fitzpatrick was coming back.
Mark Cannizzaro / New York Post
“Damning.
“That’s the best word to describe Todd Bowles’ decision to start Ryan Fitzpatrick at quarterback against the Patriots at MetLife Stadium Sunday and presumably beyond.
“The decision by the Jets coach, announced on Monday after the team’s bye week, is damning on numerous levels.
“ – It’s damning to backup Bryce Petty because it tells you exactly what the Jets think of the second-year quarterback, which is not a lot. This is a clear message they don’t see him as starting material.
“ – It’s damning to Jets fans, because they seem doomed to have to watch another six games of the same-old, same-old as the rest of this season bleeds deeper into the oblivion of the AFC East basement with no glimpse into who the future quarterback could be.
“ – It’s damning to the chain-of-command structure of the franchise’s front office, because it tells you general manager Mike Maccagnan has little influence over the players Bowles decides to play. It’s difficult to imagine Maccagnan needs or wants to see more of Fitzpatrick, who has as much a chance to be on the team in 2017 as Mark Sanchez does for an Act II.
“ – Mostly, the Bowles decision is damning because all starting Fitzpatrick does is stunt the growth of the Jets in a time when they’re trying to rebuild on the fly….
“The only winner on Monday was Fitzpatrick, who gets one last chance to reestablish himself as an NFL starter despite the fact he owns the worst passer rating in the league and has thrown 13 interceptions in nine starts. Because this surely is Fitzpatrick’s last stand as a starter after 12 seasons and no playoff berths.
“ ‘Fitz.’
“That was Bowles’ one-word answer – and every Jets fan’s worst nightmare – at the top of his press conference Monday, when asked whom he decided on to start.
“ ‘He’s healthy, he’s been our starter [and] I don’t see anything that can change that right now,’ Bowles said. ‘I don’t give away jobs. You’ve got to take a job. Bryce has gotten better. He’ll be ready to play if called upon. Petty’s time will come. We’ll be patient with that.’….
“The notion Bowles went back to Fitzpatrick because he feared a locker-room revolt had he stayed with Petty is utter nonsense. Petty is a popular figure in the Jets’ locker room, and the world knows Fitzpatrick has not lit it up….
“When he was asked what he has to say to the scores of Jets fans who want to see Petty play so they can find out who he is, Bowles replied: ‘I don’t say anything. There’s nothing to say.’
“Bad answer. That was, in fact, Bowles’ worst answer of all on Monday, an answer that reeked of arrogance at a time when the Jets owe their fans a bit more than that.”
Dear Owner Woody Johnson:
Please fire Todd Bowles.
–Can the Cleveland Browns become the second team in NFL history to go 0-16? [The only team to do so being the 2008 Detroit Lions.] Cleveland hosts the Giants this week, then has Cincinnati at home, Buffalo on the road, San Diego at home, and Pittsburgh on the road.
Last week the Steelers sacked Browns quarterbacks Cody Kessler and Josh McCown eight times, with Kessler suffering his second concussion in five games.
Maybe they can beat San Diego on Christmas Eve…the Chargers being 1-4 on the road.
Separately, Jason La Canfora of CBS Sports reports that the Browns are big-time interested in North Carolina quarterback Mitch Trubisky, who is expected to go out after this his junior year. One top evaluator from another NFL club said, “They love him.”
The Browns are once again loaded with picks in 2017, two in the first round and probably the No. 1 overall selection.
Trubisky is 6-feet-3 and has the arm strength for the adverse conditions of the AFC North. He’s also from nearby Mentor, Ohio.
–Meanwhile, in Cincinnati, there are calls to fire coach Marvin Lewis, with the Bengals a disappointing 3-6-1 and a virtual certainty to miss the postseason for the first time since 2010. Lewis has led the team to seven playoffs in 14 seasons, including the last five in a row, but the Bengals are 0-7 in those appearances. It’s just would Cincinnati really be better off with someone new? Who is out there?
What seems pretty clear is Cincinnati isn’t likely to go on a winning streak to close out this season with receiver A.J. Green now out for possibly the rest of the year with a hamstring injury, and running back Giovanni Bernard out after tearing the ACL in his left knee. And this has not been Andy Dalton’s best season by a long shot.
Green has vowed, however, he will be back before the end of the year and one incentive is that he is 36 yards shy at 964 of joining Randy Moss as the only receiver with 1,000 yards receiving in each of their first six seasons. Moss did it from 1998-2003.
–For the record, after a missed extra point Sunday night, that made 12 for the day, a single-week NFL record for PAT futility. That is four more misses than NFL kickers had in the entire 2014 season before the league put the longer extra point into effect. In 2013, kickers missed just five….1,262 for 1,267.
I missed that Colts kicker Adam Vinatieri, who had made a record 44 consecutive field goals entering Sunday’s play, finally missed one against Tennessee, though he converted all three of his extra-point attempts and hit a 49-yard field goal in the fourth quarter in Indy’s 24-17 victory.
–When the Rams’ Jared Goff lost his NFL debut on Sunday, he became the 10th straight quarterback drafted first overall to lose his first NFL start, following Carson Palmer, Eli Manning, Alex Smith, JaMarcus Russell, Matthew Stafford, Sam Bradford, Cam Newton, Andrew Luck and Jameis Winston. [Mark Maske / WP]
–Lots of PED use in Chicago these days, with inside linebacker Jerrell Freeman joining receiver Alshon Jeffery on the suspended list for four games after he was found to have violated the league’s policy.
–The Bears’ Jay Cutler would appear to be out for the season with a shoulder injury, while if you selected Andrew Luck for your Mon-Thurs. DraftKings’ parlay, you’re out of, err, luck, because he won’t be on the field Thursday night against Pittsburgh due to a concussion.
–For all my criticism of the NFL this year, we are setting up for a fascinating last two weeks of the season because, setting wild-card issues aside, these races are going down to the wire.
NFC North
Detroit 6-4
Minnesota 6-4
NFC South
Atlanta 6-4
Tampa Bay 5-5
AFC North
Baltimore 5-5
Pittsburgh 5-5
AFC South
Houston 6-4
Indianapolis 5-5
Tennessee 5-6
AFC West
Oakland 8-2
Denver 7-3
Kansas City 7-3
College Basketball
AP Poll (Nov. 21)
1. Kentucky (42)
2. Villanova (21…who agree with my own ‘eye test’ the other day)
3. Indiana (2)* …Doh!
4. North Carolina
5. Kansas
6. Duke
7. Virginia
8. Arizona
9. Xavier
10. Louisville
11. Gonzaga…just put this one in because they defeated my “Pick to Click” San Diego State earlier, which on Monday had a solid win against what would be No. 26 Cal if you carried out the votes, 77-65. The game marked the return of Malik Pope, who had 14 points and 5 rebounds before fouling out. As SDSU doesn’t play many strong opponents out of conference, the Aztecs now need Cal to go on and have a very good campaign to help SDSU come Selection Sunday.
*Tuesday, actually early Wednesday morning, we had a shocker…Fort Wayne, a school that moved from Division II to Division I in 2001-02 and had lost all nine previous games against ranked foes, not even playing a Top 25 opponent in almost four years, upset Indiana 71-68 in Fort Wayne. The Mastodons trailed for just 90 seconds and won despite making only two baskets over the final 14 ½ minutes.
Fort Wayne coach Jon Coffman thanked IU coach Tom Crean for even playing a mid-major program on the road, with Crean saying he knew before the game his team was going to learn a lesson – one way or another. And boy it sure did. Cue the movie “Hoosiers,” to cite the obvious.
MLB
–Mets fans continue to be on pins and needles as all indications are free agent Yoenis Cespedes will be deciding who he will play for next season fairly soon, the Mets not willing to offer a fifth year that Cespedes wants.
—Starting pitchers this year averaged fewer than 5 2/3 innings per start, the fewest in any season since the sport expanded to 30 teams in 1998.
–The Hall of Fame ballot was announced on Monday, the Class of 2017 to be revealed on Jan. 18. Jeff Bagwell, Trevor Hoffman and Tim Raines will be anxiously awaiting the results, while steroids-tainted stars Manny Ramirez and Ivan Rodriguez are on the ballot for the first time, along with Vladimir Guerrero.
Ramirez was suspended 50 games in 2009 while with the Dodgers and retired in 2011 instead of facing a 100-game suspension for testing positive a second time. He ended up appealing and had the suspension reduced to 50 games but he never played in the majors again.
Rodriguez was never disciplined for PEDs, but former teammate Jose Canseco alleged in a 2005 book that he injected the catcher with steroids. Rodriguez also was rumored to be on the 2003 ‘survey’ list by MLB, saying in 2009 when asked about it: “Only God knows.”
Rodriguez will eventually get in. Ramirez, despite his spectacular numbers (555 HR, 1,831 RBIs) is another story. One need just look at Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds, both on the ballot a fifth time, with Clemens gaining just 45.2 percent last time and Bonds 44.3 percent. With the recent rule change cutting the length of eligibility from 15 to 10 years (save for a few final ones who are grandfathered), Clemens and Bonds are running out of time.
As for Vladimir Guerrero, he certainly has Hall of Fame numbers; a .318 average, 449 homers and 1,496 RBIs in 16 big league seasons, and without any obvious steroid allegations.
Back to Bagwell, he appeared on 71.6 percent of the ballots last year, 75 percent being needed for enshrinement, so one can assume he’s in.
But for Raines, who received 69.8 percent, this is his last year of eligibility.
Hoffman debuted with 67.3 percent in his first year and will get in soon, if not this year.
Golf Balls
I missed a few items last chat….
—Jordan Spieth won his second Australian Open in three years in an sudden-death playoff over locals Ashley Hall and Cameron Smith. So in three appearances at this prestigious event, Spieth has two wins and a second. As Ronald Reagan would have said, ‘Not bad, not bad at all.’
–On the European Tour, the Race to Dubai wrapped up on Sunday with 22-year-old Matthew Fitzpatrick winning the DP World Tour Championship there, his third win, thus becoming the youngest Englishman to win three European Tour events – eight months earlier than Nick Faldo.
But Henrik Stenson, in finishing ninth, took home the Race to Dubai Cup, capping off one helluva season, in which he won The Open Championship and picked up the silver medal at the Olympics. [In 2013, Stenson had become the first to win the Race to Dubai and FedEx Cup in the same season.]
–American Kent Bulle won the Visa Open de Argentina on Sunday, and while I have never heard of Kent Bulle, the significance of this for him is that for the first time, the winner of this receives an exemption for The Open, which next year is being held at Royal Birkdale.
–Monday morning I watched the four-man sudden-death playoff at the RSM Classic at Sea Island, Ga., Billy Horschel, the fifth member of the playoff, having been eliminated in the glom late Sunday.
So picture, it was cold as hell at 8:00 a.m., the cold front having pushed through, and the players were starting on the par-3 17th – Camilo Villegas, Henrik Norlander, Mackenzie Hughes, and Blayne Barber. A victory was huge for any of the four, none of whom were ranked inside the top 250 in the world, and all but Villegas (who has been suffering through some lean years) seeking a breakthrough tour title. At stake was a two-year exemption on Tour, berths in the Masters (a tradition unlike any other…on CBS), Tournament of Champions, PGA Championship and the Players.
All four then proceeded to miss the green with their tee shots, and not one of them hit a great second. Yet in the end, the Canadian Hughes, in just his ninth PGA Tour event, holed a clutch par putt while the other three all bogeyed 17. Pretty remarkable finish. Hughes turns 26 today, Wednesday. This is not a one-hit wonder for the man from the land where every domestic is a premium.
Stuff
–I watched my first full Knicks game Tuesday, an entertaining 107-103 win over Portland at the Garden, with Derrick Rose and Kristaps Porzingis playing well in moving the Knicks to 7-7. Meanwhile, my “Pick to Click” Trial Blazers are just 8-8, suffering big time from Al-Farouq Aminu’s lingering calf injury. They miss his defense and rebounding.
–Sweet 16 time for the NCAA Men’s Soccer Championship, with eight of the 16 remaining being from the ACC.
But college soccer fans are still buzzing over Providence’s stunning four goals in 12 minutes against No. 1 seed Maryland on Sunday that leaves No. 2 Wake Forest in the spotlight.
All the Sweet 16 contests are Saturday and Sunday, Wake going up against SIUE. SIUE? Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville, the first meeting ever between these two schools.
Among the eight ACC schools, four go up against each other. Notre Dame-Louisville and North Carolina-Syracuse.
–In the NCAA Women’s Soccer Championship, we’re down to eight.
USC vs. Auburn
Duke vs. West Virginia
Santa Clara vs. Georgetown
South Carolina vs. North Carolina
–Meanwhile, after Team USA lost to Costa Rica in World Cup qualifying play, I wrote of how U.S. coach Jurgen Klinsmann’s future was clearly in jeopardy and on Monday, Klinsmann was fired. As Kevin Baxter of the Los Angeles Times wrote, the coach was “a victim of both heightened expectations and poor performances that have the U.S. in danger of missing the World Cup for the first time in more than three decades.”
Klinsmann is being replaced by Bruce Arena, the Galaxy’s coach, who guided the U.S. to World Cup appearances in 2002 and 2006. Arena had just signed an extension with the Galaxy so the U.S. Soccer Federation had to free him of this.
Federation President Sunil Gulati issued a statement praising Klinsmann’s accomplishments, but, consecutive losses in Cup qualifying “left us convinced that we need to go in a different direction.”
Klinsmann was hired in 2011 and promised sweeping changes that he said would close the gap between the U.S. and the rest of the world, and, indeed, the U.S. team had a record 12-game winning streak en route to a Gold Cup title in 2013, after which he was rewarded with a contract extension through 2018, one that reportedly paid him $3.2 million annually.
But after making it to the knockout round of the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, the U.S. failed to finish in the top three in the CONCACAF Gold Cup for the first time in 15 years, including losing four consecutive games to CONCACAF teams on U.S. soil.
And then we had the back-to-back losses to Mexico (home) and Costa Rica (away) that made Klinsmann the first U.S. coach to start the final round of World Cup qualifying 0-2.
Klinsmann guided his native Germany to a third-place finish in the 2006 World Cup during a two-year stint as coach and he was 55-27-16 in 5 ½ years with the U.S.
Making a change at this time does make sense given the schedule, with the U.S. not having its next round of qualifying until late March.
–Our first NCAA Men’s Division I College Hockey Poll of the season:
1. Minnesota-Duluth
2. Denver
3. Quinnipiac
4. Boston College
5. North Dakota
6. Mass-Lowell
7. Boston University
8. Penn State
9. Harvard
10. Bemidji State*
19. St. Lawrence…Go George R.!
* I always have to look this one up. It’s in northern Minnesota, at the headwaters of the Mississippi River. For good reason, it’s the Bemidji State Beavers. But, alas, the Beaver is still suspended from the All-Species List.
–Rebecca R. Ruiz of the New York Times had an update on the retesting of urine samples from the 2008 and 2012 Summer Olympics, in Beijing and London, and more than 75 athletes from the two Games have been found, upon further scrutiny, to be guilty of doping violations, the majority being from Russia and Eastern European countries. Thus far, at least 40 of them won medals and disciplinary actions against the athletes continue. The numbers are expected to climb, as Ruiz puts it.
Gian-Franco Kasper, an executive board member of the International Olympic Committee, told Ruiz: “The numbers are just impossible, incredible. We lose credibility. Credibility is a major concern.”
The Olympic committee announced penalties on 16 athletes last week and another 12 on Monday.
Ruiz:
“Suddenly – and unceremoniously – some undecorated Olympians are inheriting medals for their performances eight years ago. Even sixth-place finishers who were far from the podium are now bronze medalists.
“ ‘This completely rewrote my Olympics story,’ said Chaunte Lowe, an American high jumper who participated in four Summer Games but had never won a medal.
“Sitting at home last week, Ms. Lowe received a curious Facebook message from a German athlete against whom she competed in 2008: ‘Congratulations, bronze medalist,’ it read.
“After three women who finished ahead of Ms. Lowe were disqualified for doping – Anna Chicherova and Yelena Slesarenko of Russia, and Vita Palamar of Ukraine – she moved up to third place, newly successful in a jump she took when her 9-year-old daughter was an infant.
“ ‘I kept doing the math,’ Ms. Lowe, who originally finished sixth, said. ‘Wait: 6, 5, 4. …Oh my gosh – they’re right. I started crying.’
“Accompanying the joy of her belated recognition, she said, was an awareness of the opportunity costs she suffered. In 2008, her husband was laid off. The couple’s house in Georgia was foreclosed on that year, something Ms. Lowe said would not have happened had she distinguished herself in Beijing.
“ ‘I was really young and promising at that point, and sponsors were interested in me,’ Ms. Lowe, now 32, said. ‘A lot of interest goes away when you don’t get on that podium.’….
“Of the athletes so far implicated on the retests, the vast majority competed in track and field events and weight lifting.”
–The congratulations continue to pour in for Jimmie Johnson, winner of a record-tying seventh Sprint Cup series championship. He really should be considered the greatest driver in NASCAR history, especially when you look back at the five in a row he won during the sport’s most competitive era. And at 41, he’s certainly capable of another title or two.
“I mean, let’s go,” Johnson said Sunday. “I’m so excited to put that in front of myself (and) the team as a hurdle to get over and achieve. This one only gives me more confidence for the future…I think it makes us really dangerous, and I look forward to the challenge of getting No. 8.”
Can you imagine, under the existing format (which many still don’t like…but I do), the pressure if, say, next November at Homestead, Jimmie is in the final four again, just needing to beat the other three for No. 8. Now that would juice ratings, at least for that one week.
—Michael Phelps, in an interview with NBC Sports on Monday, said once again he is “closing the door” on swimming, though no one would be surprised to see him competing in 2020.
That said, Phelps did take a significant step in removing his name from the U.S. drug-testing program, which makes him ineligible for any high-level competition and is as strong a statement as he can make that he’s really retiring.
Phelps told NBC, as reported by Des Bieler of the Washington Post, “that what sealed his decision to finally hang up his goggles was something to which even we mere mortals can relate: He was sick of all the paperwork. Athletes at his level must constantly file updates on their movements, so that drug-testers know where to find them at a moment’s notice.”
Phelps has said the relentless alerting of officials to his whereabouts is “brutal” and he told his agent to get the correct paperwork so they can sign it and be done with the daily updates.
Phelps also said the reason he held a secret wedding in June with then-fiancee, Nicole Johnson, was to make it easier for her and their infant son, Boomer, to travel together under the same name.
–Brad K. passed on a story from Clemence Michallon For Dailymail.com:
“A Chicago politician landed in the OR after what looked like a vengeful attack from a squirrel – just a month after calling for a crackdown on the city’s giant rodents.
“Alderman Howard Brookins, who represents Chicago’s 21st ward, got out of the hospital last week after seeking treatment for a fractured skull, a broken nose and several knocked-out teeth.
“The city councilman was biking on a trail earlier this month when a squirrel jumped in front of him, got caught in the front wheel and sent Brookins flying over the handle bars.
“The incident seemed like a rather violent coincidence, as Brookins had just a month prior raged against the city’s ‘aggressive’ squirrels during a city council meeting, lambasting them for eating their way through Chicago’s trash cans.
“The squirrel, whom Brookins compared to a kamikaze, didn’t survive the apparent attack and died in the councilman’s front wheel.
“ ‘I can think of no other reason for this squirrel’s actions than that it was like a suicide bomber, getting revenge,’ Brookins told the Chicago Tribune Monday.”
Brookins will need several months to fully recover from the encounter.
You never know where the next terror threat may lie, or scurry. Yet answer reason for when you see something, say something.
–From the BBC: “A Japanese man has died after choking on a rice ball during a speed-eating competition.”
It seems the victim tried to eat five onigiri balls in three minutes and he died in the hospital days later without regaining consciousness.
Let this be a lesson to you all, boys and girls, this holiday season.
–Update: Since I mentioned him last time for blowing off a concert after just 30 minutes, as you’ve heard, Kanye West then agreed to go to the hospital for evaluation and the dude is “exhausted,” according to mother-in-law Kris Jenner.
Top 3 songs for the week 11/24/79: #1 “No More Tears (Enough Is Enough)” (Barbra Streisand/Donna Summer… godawful…) #2 “Babe” (Styx…ugh…) #3 “Still” (Commodores… eh…)…and…#4 “Dim All The Lights” (Donna Summer…a few decent passages, but the rest totally blows…) #5 “Heartache Tonight” (Eagles…easily one of their three worst…) #6 “Please Don’t Go” (K.C. & The Sunshine Band…they tried to slow it down and this one just hung around, and hung around, and by first week in January was #1 and now we’re all left to ask, “Why?”…) #7 “You Decorated My Life” (Kenny Rogers…if I’m listening to this one in my wheelchair, sitting outside, please push me down the hill…) #8 “Send One Your Love” (Stevie Wonder…probably took him two minutes to write this and it shows…) #9 “Tusk” (Fleetwood Mac…whatever…save the elephants…) #10 “Pop Muzik” (M…do not YouTube this one…it was actually #1 three weeks earlier but if you listen to it you’re likely to commit hari-kari…Yes, this was now fall of my senior year at Wake. Graduation was still very much touch-and-go…but our football team pulled off a terrific season, the kegs were still flowing, and I was hopeful I could figure out how to get the GPA over the Mendoza line…)*
*For the record, Mendoza hit .215 for his career, but he did have a string of seasons under .200, thus the association with futility that is likely to last another generation or two of baseball fans. At least that would be a terrific sign if it did, because it would show some fans (read Millennials) actually give a damn about the game’s history.
San Francisco 49ers Quiz Answers: 1) 7,000 yards rushing: Frank Gore 11,073 (2005-2014), Joe Perry 8,669 (1948-1963)*, Roger Craig 7,064 (1983-1990). Ken Willard is fourth at 5,930 (1965-1973).** 2) 500 receptions: Jerry Rice 1,281 (1985-2000), Terrell Owens 592 (1996-2003), Roger Craig 508 (1983-1990), Dwight Clark 506 (1979-1987).
*Joe (The Jet) Perry is one of the true underrated Hall of Famers, the first black to play for the 49ers and one of the first African-American stars in the NFL. In 1949, he averaged 6.8 yards per carry; 6.1 in 1954.
**Willard, with a career average of 3.7 per carry wasn’t one of the better players for Strat-O-Matic football. One of my favorite Strat-O cards back in the day was John “Frenchie” Fuqua’s 1970 edition with the Steelers when he rushed for 5.0 per carry. I probably ran him too much, though, and he wasn’t the same after.
Next Bar Chat, Monday. Happy Thanksgiving!
