Wednesday’s 6-pack
Odds to win the Quad Cities Open golf tourney this week:
9-1— Daniel Berger
14-1— Brian Harman
16-1— Russell Henley, Sungjae Im
18-1— Kevin Streelman
27-1— Cameron Davis, Si Woo Kim
29-1— Alex Noren
Quote of the Day
“Hey, the other team gives scholarships too!!!”
Football coach Lou Holtz, asked by a reporter at halftime why his heavily favored team was only ahead by a couple points.
Wednesday’s quiz
Who was manager of the Seattle Mariners, last time they made the playoffs?
(Hint: He won a World Series managing a different team)
Tuesday’s quiz
Matthew Stonie (62 hot dogs) was the last male other than Joey Chestnut to win the Nathan’s hot dog eating contest, in 2015.
Monday’s quiz
Joe Girardi was the manager of the Bronx Bombers before Aaron Boone.
*************************
Wednesday’s Den: Mid-week musings……..
13) Suns 118, Bucks 105:
— Chris Paul scored 32 points for Phoenix.
— He has 73 points the last two games, most points he’s ever scored in consecutive games.
— Giannis Antetokounmpo played 35:00, scoring 20 points, with 17 rebounds.
Before the 1969 NBA Draft, a coin was flipped in New York City to determine who got the first pick in the draft. Milwaukee won the coin flip, got Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, then won 332 games over the next six years, winning the 1971 NBA title, losing the Finals in ‘74.
Phoenix lost that coin flip in ‘69; they drafted Neal Walk, a center from Florida. Not ideal.
Later that summer, the Suns had a coin flip with Seattle for rights to ABA star Connie Hawkins. The second flip was more better for Phoenix; the won that coin flip and the rights to Hawkins, who became one of the greatest players in Suns’ history.
Suns went 136-110 the next three years, with Hawkins lasting 4.5 years in the desert.
12) With all the talk about Shohei Ohtani, I decided to look into Babe Ruth’s career, since he also was a great hitter who did some pitching. Here is what I found:
Babe Ruth played five years for Boston, but played in 100+ games only in the last two seasons. He went 89-46 as a pitcher for Boston, winning 47 games in 1916-17. He threw 35 complete games in 1917. His last year in Boston was the only time he batted 400+ times for them.
When he was traded to New York, he became a full-time hitter, and pitched only five games. Ruth hit 659 home runs for New York, and had a candy bar named after him.
(A person who is smarter than me informed me that the candy bar was probably named after President Grover Cleveland’s daughter Ruth)
Obviously there was no DH back then, or he probably would’ve hit more for Boston.
11) In 1975, there was a TV show called When Things Were Rotten, a comedy set in Sherwood Forest, where Robin Hood, Maid Marian, and Robin’s band of Merry Men. Pretty good cast: Dick Van Patten, Bernie Kopell, Dick Gautier, Ron Rifkin.
I was reminded of that this week, thinking about the catchers on my fantasy baseball team; over the last 23 days, the catchers on my fantasy team have been a combined 2 for 44.
2 hits. 44 at-bats. 2 more hits than a dead person.
In the big picture of life, this isn’t important, but it is driving me nuts; there are very few big league catchers who can hit. I’ve had six different catchers on my team in only 14 weeks. Next step is to leave the spot blank, then at least they won’t kill me in on-base %age.
As I was typing all this, one of my team’s pitchers, Luis Castillo, left a game in Kansas City with a 6-1 lead after 7 innings; of course the Cincinnati bullpen blew the lead for him.
Thats what happens when things are rotten.
10) Braves, Marlins, Rangers are only three major league teams who haven’t been over .500 at any time this season.
9) Angels’ 3B David Fletcher has a 20-game hitting streak, longest in the AL this season.
8) Top under teams in the majors:
— Washington under 52-29-1
— Cubs 50-33-2
— Marlins 45-31-6
— Bronx 46-36
Top over teams in the majors:
— Twins 53-28-2
— Angels 51-33
— Astros 48-35-3
— Rays 46-36-3
7) Jacob deGrom was supposed to pitch for the Mets on Tuesday, then again on Sunday, the last day before the All-Star break, but the weather didn’t cooperate and last night’s game got rained out, so deGrom won’t pitch on Sunday.
The Mets really, really wanted him to pitch last night night, then on Sunday; last night’s game wasn’t postponed until 9:40 or so. It was a scheduled 7:10 start.
6) Baseball players signed by big league clubs at age 18 or younger have to be added to the team’s 40-man roster within five years, or that player becomes subject to the Rule 5 Draft, where other teams can draft them away from the original team.
Players signed by big league clubs at age 19 or older have to be put on the 40-man roster within four seasons, or else they risk losing that player for nothing.
5) Cities where the Nathan’s hot dog eating contest got the best TV ratings:
Cincinnati, New York, Milwaukee, Pittsburgh, Columbus.
4) In 440 games played in empty arenas during the NBA regular season, the home team won by an average of 0.39 points.
In 507 games played with fans, the home team won by an average of 2.13 points.
3) Jaguars’ rookie QB Trevor Lawrence signed his first pro contract, for $36.8M, with $24.1M of that guaranteed. By way of contrast, when Sam Bradford signed his rookie contract in 2010, it was worth $78M. NFL has done a good job of toning down the rookie deals since then.
2) Phillies 15, Cubs 10
— Cubs lose their 11th straight game
— Chicago’s last 67 home runs have all come with either the bases empty or only one man on base, the longest stretch in franchise history.
1) When umpire Joe West first umped in the major leagues in the mid-70’s, there were five current major league managers who weren’t even born yet.
