Armadillo: Tuesday's six-pack
-- Both road teams won second round NBA games, with unheralded Washington looking like a dangerous team in the east.
-- Penguins blanked the Rangers for the second night in row; cruel schedule for New York, playing five games in seven nights.
-- Bronx bullpen imploded in Anaheim; they walked six Angels in 8th inning, with Halos scoring three runs without a hit in a 4-1 Anaheim win.
-- Royals blew a 3-0 6th inning lead, 4-3 9th inning lead, 5-4 12th inning lead in a hideous 6-5 loss at San Diego- they snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.
-- Pirates botched a bunt play in 13th inning and lost 11-10 at home to the Giants, who are now 21-11. Pirates are 12-20, just 8-10 at home.
-- If you look at first five innings of the 13 games Monday, both teams scored in first five innings in only three of those 13 games. Under was 9-4 overall Monday.
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Armadillo: Tuesday's List of 13: Tuesday's List of 13: Doing some thinking out loud.......
13) In case you don’t think eliminating (or at least greatly reducing) PEDs in baseball has made a difference, check this out: in 2000, 17 of 30 major league teams scored 800+ runs for the season; last year, only the Red Sox scored 800+. In 2004, 37 guys hit 30+ homers; LY, 14 did. Hmmm.....
12) Ben Affleck has been banned from playing blackjack at the Hard Rock Casino in Las Vegas; why? He was making too much money, and was suspected of card counting, which isn’t illegal, but casinos can banish you if they think you’re doing it. Affleck is married to Jennifer Garner, so he gets no sympathy here.
11) Starting in 2015-16, Big East/Big 14 will open basketball season against each other with a series of made-for-TV games, some to be shown on the Big 14 Network, some on Fox Sports1. It’ll get confusing when Rutgers plays in one of these games; which league will they be representing (Big 14, from now on).
10) In 14th inning Friday night, having already been taken out of the game, Rays’ OF David DeJesus was watching the game on the top step of the Tampa Bay dugout while eating an ice cream bar.
Looked like a Nestle Crunch bar. Never saw that before.
9) Jeff Samardzija threw 126 pitches on a cold night against the White Sox last night at Wrigley, which tells me two things.....
a) Cubs management really wanted to beat the White Sox (they didn't)
b) On August 1, Samardzija will be on another team; they're not protecting his arm at all- if he is a part of your future, Samardzija doesn't throw 126 pitches on May 5 in a rivalry game, but a game between non-contending teams. On a cold night. .
8) UConn got scared by rumors of the Lakers’ interest in Kevin Ollie, and all of a sudden wants to double his $1.25M salary. This is where a reporter can do a coach a huge favor; plant some bogus rumor like that, and all of a sudden the coach hits the lottery. Maybe the Lakers really are interested; maybe they’re not, but Ollie’s bank account is going to get fatter pretty soon.
7) Speaking of which, Wes Welker won some cash on the Kentucky Derby in Louisville Saturday; he was so happy about it, he started handing out $100 bills to random strangers, before cops stopped him from inciting a stampede. Must be nice to be rich.
6) Did you know that Michael Jordan was born in Brooklyn?
5) I’d love an NFL team to draft a QB then say, “We’re not going to play Player A for a year or two, so he can learn by watching, then step in and play when he is good and ready." Eli Manning sat behind Kurt Warner for 6-7 games as a rookie, but since Ryan/Flacco in 2008, patience and development have been abandoned- it hurts the player involved and the team. Nothing wrong with letting a kid observe and learn.
4) I wish I was making this up: The guy who wore the Mr Met costume in 1994 has written a book. Seriously. “Yes Its Hot In Here” is the name of the book. No I have not read it. Hard to believe its that good a book, but then again, its got to be better than Kenny Mayne’s book was and I wasted $26 on that, so there……..
3) Oregon PG Dominic Artis has left the Ducks, will transfer with two years left to play; he has a terrific freshman season, but his second year was marred by injury, off-court issues-- he got buried on the Oregon bench. He’ll help some team, starting in the fall of 2015.
2) Oregon State sacked basketball coach Craig Robinson, paying him $4M to go away; the President’s brother-in-law didn’t get the Beavers to the NCAAs in six years in Corvallis, and with no returning starters, this coming season didn’t look to be much better. President Obama only makes $400,000 a year; Robinson got $4M to go away. Go figure.
1) If I’m the Oregon State AD, I’m hiring Eric Musselman as head coach; he has NBA head coaching experience and knows the Pac-12, having been an assistant at Arizona State up until last month. That said, it appears that Ben Howland is the guy Oregon State is targeting- he has coached in three Final Fours.
