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Bar Chat

03/09/2017

Mid-Majors in the Spotlight

[Posted early Wednesday a.m.]

Baseball Quiz: Name the four active pitchers with 170 wins. Answer below.

College Basketball...AP Poll (March 6)

1. Kansas (59) 28-3
2. Villanova (2) 28-3
3. UCLA (3) 28-3
4. Gonzaga (1) 30-1
5. Oregon 27-4
6. North Carolina 26-6
7. Arizona 27-4
8. Kentucky 26-5
9. Baylor 25-6
10. Louisville 24-7
11. West Virginia 24-7
12. SMU 27-4
14. Duke 23-8
19. Saint Mary’s 27-3
20. Wichita State 30-4

Monday....

Iona (22-12) punched its ticket with an 87-86 overtime win over Siena in the MAAC title game.  Again, Monmouth (27-6) should have been the MAAC entrant in the Big Dance but they lost to Siena in the semis, 89-85.  Monmouth, with a veteran roster, had a chance to pull off a first-round upset...but noooo!  NIT for them instead.

Iona is a fun program if you’re a student there.  Always highly competitive and this is their fourth NCAA appearance in six years.

East Tennessee State (27-7) is the NCAA entrant out of the Southern Conference after a 79-74 win over UNC Greensboro (25-9), the Buccaneers first NCAA bid since 2010.  [When I was at Wake, we’d road trip to party at UNCG, but I digress.]

UNC Wilmington gained its second consecutive NCAA tournament berth with a 78-69 victory over College of Charleston in the Colonial Athletic Assn. championship game.  The Seahawks are 29-5 and will be a tough out.

Tuesday....

Mt. St. Mary’s won the NEC title 71-61 over St. Francis (Pa.) to gain its fifth NCAA tournament bid.

Northern Kentucky, in its first year of eligibility for the NCAAs, is going dancing after a 59-53 win over 11-24 Milwaukee in the Horizon League title contest.

South Dakota State secured its NCAA bid with a 79-77 win over Omaha in the Summit League championship.  The Jackrabbits’ Mike Daum, who came in averaging 25 points per game, had 37 with 12 rebounds.  The 6-9, 245 lb. big man also shoots .416 from three.

And Gonzaga, 32-1, beat Saint Mary’s (28-4) handily, 74-56, for the West Coast Conference title; three of Saint Mary’s four losses to the Zags.

Lastly, my Wake Forest Demon Deacons (19-12) should have officially locked up an at-large bid with a 92-78 win over Boston College in the first round of the ACC Tournament.  Wake has a rematch with Virginia Tech tonight at the Barclays Center.  I’m assuming the result of this one won’t matter in terms of an invite for the Deacs, but if we beat Tech again, we deserve a 10-seed, not an 11.

For the record, Bryant Crawford had 20 for Wake, 11 of 12 from the free throw line (24 of 26 his last two games), while John Collins had 19 points and 12 rebounds.

One more...while Collins continues to rocket up the draft board, supposed top five in the lottery, North Carolina State point guard Dennis Smith Jr., was awful in State’s first-round ACC loss to Clemson, 75-61, Smith going 3 of 12 from the field, 7 points, when his team needed him to step up in the worst way.

--USA TODAY All-America teams:

First Team

Lonzo Ball, Fr., G, UCLA
Dillon Brooks, Jr., F, Oregon
Josh Hart, Sr., G, Villanova
Frank Mason III, Sr., G, Kansas
Caleb Swanigan, So., F, Purdue...great personal story

Second Team

Josh Jackson, Fr., G, Kansas
Justin Jackson, Jr., F, North Carolina
Luke Kennard, So., G, Duke
Malik Monk, Fr., G, Kentucky
Nigel Williams-Goss, Jr., G, Gonzaga

--All-ACC hoops team:

First Team

Luke Kennard, Duke
Justin Jackson, North Carolina (Player of the Year)
John Collins, Wake Forest (second in POY voting...Most Improved)
Bonzie Colson, Notre Dame
Donovan Mitchell, Louisville

Second Team

Dwayne Bacon, Florida State
Dennis Smith Jr., NC State (Freshman of the Year)
Ben Lammers, Georgia Tech
Joel Berry II, North Carolina
London Perrantes, Virginia

In all honesty, I’d take the ACC first team against the All-America first team.

--72-year-old San Diego State coach Steve Fisher said he’ll do his usual before deciding whether to come back one more year (in what would be the final year of a three-year extension), following SDSU’s disappointing 17-13 season as they head into Mountain West Conference Tournament play on Wednesday.

His habit is to go to his condo in Fort Myers Beach, Fla., sit on the porch, and make a decision then.

The Aztecs have made the postseason 10 straight seasons, including six straight NCAAs, 2010-2015, but unless they run the table in the conference tourney, they are likely to turn down one of the lesser postseason deals, seeing as they won’t get an NIT invite.

--In women’s hoops, UConn won the American Athletic Conference Tournament final on Monday, 100-44 over South Florida, as Katie Lou Samuelson had a record-breaking night, scoring 40 points and hitting all 10 of her 3-ponit shots, the later a record for consecutive threes in a game.  As Ronald Reagan would have said....

NBA

--Unbelievably, newly acquired center Andrew Bogut, in his first game for the Cleveland Cavaliers on Monday night, fractured his left tibia 58 seconds into his debut; colliding with Miami Heat forward Okaro White.  LeBron James said “I heard it crack.”  Yikes.

“It’s very deflating,” James added.  “It’s a tough moment.  We all were excited about the acquisition, you know, bring him in here.”

Bogut signed with the Cavs last week after being waived by the 76ers (who acquired him at the trade deadline from the Mavericks).  He is still a solid defender and rebounder and was going to be a help in a projected NBA Final against Golden State, who he had played for.  [Or against San Antonio.]

Meanwhile, Miami defeated Cleveland a second-straight time, 106-98, to move to 30-34 and just 1 ½ games from a playoff berth in the East.  Cleveland fell to 42-20, as LeBron and Kyrie Irving combined for 62 of the 98 points, which isn’t always a formula for success.

--Speaking of San Antonio, in a big game Monday, the Spurs beat the Rockets 112-110...Kawhi Leonard vs. James Harden.  While both MVP candidates ended up with 39 points apiece, Leonard outscored Hardin 17-4 in the fourth, with his usual strong defense.  Advantage Leonard.

So in the Western Conference it’s....

Warriors 52-11
Spurs 49-13
Rockets 44-20

--I reported on the Knicks-Warriors game Sunday, but I didn’t watch a second of it (golf, college basketball and NASCAR for moi), so I didn’t realize until after I posted that the Knicks elected to go without music in the first half.  The Warriors’ Draymond Green was none too pleased.

“That was pathetic,” Green said after his team’s 112-105 win.  “It was ridiculous. It changed the flow of the game. It changed everything.  You get used to playing a certain way. It completely changed it. To me, I think it was completely disrespectful to everyone from [NBA senior VP of entertainment and player marketing] Michael Levine to [Warriors president and COO] Rick Welts and all these people who’ve done these things to change the game from an entertainment perspective.

“[It] gives the game a great vibe.  That’s complete disrespect.  You advance things in the world to make it better.  You don’t go back to what was bad.  It’s like, computers can do anything for us. It’s like going back to paper.  Why would you do that? So it was ridiculous....

“You turn on music, it just helps you get into a certain area, takes you to a certain place.”

Oh brother.

I’ll never forget, eons ago when I was splitting Nets season tickets at the Meadowlands (I’d end up going to five games, stay for the first half, and drive home), and I took my father to see Shaquille O’Neal.  The music was so freakin’ loud, Dad hated it (he having grown up with organ music at sporting events), I hated it, and I’ve probably attended about three professional basketball games since.

--Ben Cohen of the Wall Street Journal has a piece on Seth Curry, the younger brother of Stephen Curry, who since he was inserted into the starting lineup for the Dallas Mavericks has been lighting it up, threatening to become a member of the exclusive 50/40/90 club...make 50% of your field goals, 40% from three, and 90% of your free throws.

In the 24 games Seth has started, Curry is at 52.2%, 46.9%, and 90.2% [For the season, though, he’s 48.5%, 43.2% and 84.2%.] 

*The preceding doesn’t include his performance Tuesday night in a 122-111 Mavs win over the Lakers...18 points, 7 of 12 from the field, 4 of 7 from three.

Seth won’t play enough to qualify for official membership but for the undrafted 26-year-old (out of Duke and Liberty) in his third NBA season, he’s proven he belongs.  He’s also on a two-year, $5.9 million deal, after Dallas had scooped him up from Sacramento last summer...ergo, the kid is super cheap for a starting guard.

After a 6-20 start, Dallas is just two games out of the No. 8 seed in the West, and a matchup for Seth against his brother.

And in the aforementioned Mavs win last night over the Lakers, Dallas legend Dirk Nowitzki joined the NBA’s 30,000-point club in scoring 25.

Nowitzki is just the sixth...joining Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Karl Malone, Kobe Bryant, Michael Jordan and Wilt Chamberlain.

Looking back on his 19 seasons with Dallas, he had 12 straight, 2000-01 thru 2011-12, where he averaged 21+ points per game, with 7+ rebounds (save for one year during the streak where he averaged 6.7).  Nowitzki is also a 13-time All-Star.  And he’s made over $240 million in his career, which isn’t too shabby either.

One other NBA item from Tuesday, Russell Westbrook scored a career-high 58 points for the Thunder, but they still lost, 126-121 to the Trail Blazers.

NFL

--Last time I talked about the status of Patriots QB Jimmy Garoppolo, which I think is one of the better stories for armchair quarterbacks to mull over (what to do with him), and then we have a  similar situation down in Tampa Bay and QB Mike Glennon.

Probably every fan base has heard Glennon’s name at least once since this 6-7, 225 lb. signal-caller was taken in the third round out of North Carolina State by the Bucs in the 2013 draft, and for four years, he has started all of 18 games, 30 TDs, 15 INTs, 84.6 passer rating (but a 5-13 record), yet he’s always brought up as someone else’s solution.  For example, I’d have no problem if the Jets made a deal for him and handed the guy the job.

Glennon is 27, has all the tools, but now he’s stuck behind Jameis Winston.  The Bucs, though, apparently offered him a deal of at least $7 million a year to hang around.

Glennon can become a free agent, though, and someone is likely to give him $12 to $14 million to start (contracts can be announced beginning Thursday at 4 p.m., the official start of the league year...legal tampering commenced Tuesday afternoon).

I don’t know.  These days, I’d be tempted to sign a long-term deal to be the backup, say $30 million guaranteed, and look good on the sidelines, instead of getting your brain bashed in.  Then retire.  [Half-kidding.]

--The Oakland Raiders informed the NFL it had received a commitment from Bank of America to finance their proposed $1.9 billion, 65,000-seat domed stadium in Las Vegas, sources told ESPN.

So the team remains on course to relocate to Vegas and will apply for formal permission at the NFL owners meeting in Phoenix, March 26-29, with 24 of 32 owners needing to approve the move.  [They will.]

Casino magnate Sheldon Adelson had withdrawn his $650 million pledge in late January to be part of the project, which was to include $750m in hotel tax receipts and $500m from the Raiders.

The Raiders have identified a location west of Interstate 15 and near the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino on the south end of the city.

MLB

--Guess I have to follow the World Baseball Classic a little, after Israel upset host South Korea 2-1 in its opener, Korea ranked No. 3 in the world, and then Israel won its second, 15-7 over Chinese Taipei.  Ike Davis has 4 hits in 6 at-bats for Israel.

Israel’s next game is against the Netherlands, Wed. night, EST.

The U.S. opens play Friday night against Colombia.

--Because of the WBC, many MLB teams have depleted rosters, such as in the case of the Mets. So Wednesday, Tim Tebow is set to be the Mets’ designated hitter in a split-squad game against the Red Sox, with Rick Porcello on the mound for Boston.

Tebow has shown legitimate home run potential, but it’s a long way to the big leagues for him.  In the Arizona Fall League, he hit .192 with 20 strikeouts in 62 at-bats.

I have zero problem with what the Mets are doing.

--Mets fans, and Major League Baseball, mourn the passing of the brilliant television director, Bill Webb, who died at the age of 65 after a long bout with cancer.

As John J. Filippelli, a former producer at Fox who is the president of production at YES Network, put it last year, “Webby’s the master of being able to capture the drama in the stands and on the field.”

Webb, a member of the Sports Broadcasting Hall of Fame, worked 17 World Series aside from being lead director for Mets games since 1979.  We’ll miss his work. RIP.

Golf Balls

--I did watch a lot of the golf over the weekend and for the record, Dustin Johnson’s win in the WGC was his fifth in his last 17 events.  And that last approach shot to No. 18 out of the sand, what Johnson described as a perfect “dink” sand wedge from 125 yards to 20 feet to close it out was one sweet shot.

Johnson’s fourth WGC title is second only to Tiger’s 18, which is a reminder of Tiger’s awesomeness in the day, seeing as the fields for these events are as good as you see all year.

--Tim Rosaforte explains that the WGC event that was moved to Mexico, after years at Donald Trump’s Doral, was not about the PGA Tour not wanting to associate itself with Trump, but simply Cadillac, the longtime sponsor, wasn’t willing to take its hits in being linked to Trump; nor were any other potential sponsors approached by the PGA Tour.

New Commissioner Jay Monahan told Rosaforte for the Golf Channel, “If we had a title sponsor, we wouldn’t have made this move with this event to Mexico City. We got to a point in time where we had to make a decision on the future of our schedule, and we just felt like this was the perfect opportunity to take the World Golf Championship to Mexico City.”

Monahan said he failed to see the irony.  “I can see how others would or will, but I don’t because I lived it and was part of it, and I know how hard we worked to try to stay at Trump Doral and Miami.”

The Tour had been at Doral since 1962.  The event still doesn’t have a tournament sponsor, but what you saw on television over the weekend was it has the financial backing of media mogul Ricardo Salinas and his son. Grupo Salinas has made a seven-year commitment to underwrite the tournament as part of an investment into Mexico’s golf future.

I was pleased to see how well it seemed to come off, and the players appeared to like the course.  So Go Mexico.  Good job.

--Phil Mickelson, who was T-7 at the WGC, has been playing outstanding golf for a guy who turns 47 the weekend of the U.S. Open.  7 events in the 2016-17 season, 7 cuts made, 5 top 25s including the T-7 and a T-8.

I caught David Feherty’s interview with Phil (part I) on “Feherty” Monday and it’s worth checking out.

--The HSBC Women’s Champions event in Singapore is one of the bigger ones on tour and this past weekend, Michelle Wie played her best golf in years, leading after 54 holes before finishing T-4 to Inbee Park (last year’s gold medal winner in Rio); encouraging since Wie hasn’t won since the 2014 U.S. Women’s Open at Pinehurst, having had to deal with various injuries.  The LPGA Tour desperately needs her to play well.  It would certainly help draw crowds.

Can you believe Wie is still just 27?

--We note the passing of five-time Champions Tour winner, Simon Hobday.  The South African (born there, raised in Zimbabwe) was 76.  Hobday was a character, with a sweet swing, who won the 1994 U.S. Senior Open.

Gary Player, who Hobday beat in the 1971 South African Open, tweeted: “My condolences to the charismatic & sweet swinging Simon Hobday. He was so good for golf.  RIP amigo.”

Hobday had a good-time reputation.  Player once said to him, “Simon, you really should take this game more seriously.  You have a lot of talent, and if you put in the effort and went to bed nice and early, you could go far.”  To which Hobday replied, “Gary, you’re right.  My father always told me that if I’m not in bed by 9, I should go home.”  [Barry Havenga / Golf World]

Premier League

Monday, Chelsea defeated West Ham to build their point lead back up to 10 over Tottenham, though third place Manchester City can cut it back to 8 with a win today, Wednesday, against Stoke City.

Separately, Leicester City is offering the manager’s job to interim coach Craig Shakespeare for the balance of the season, the Foxes having won both of their games with Shakespeare in charge.  The 53-year-old has never managed full-time.

And a follow-up...last time I mentioned the chippy (dirty) play in Manchester United’s 1-1 draw with Bournemouth on Saturday, specifically the play of Man U star Zlatan Ibrahimovic.  The Swedish national on Tuesday received a three-game suspension after admitting to a “violent conduct” charge.

Division I Hockey Poll (March 6)

1. Denver
2. Harvard
3. Minnesota-Duluth
4. Massachusetts-Lowell
5. Minnesota
6. Union
7. Western Michigan
8. Boston University
9. Cornell
10. Providence
19. St. Lawrence

Stuff

--Lots of animal chat...most of it not good.

From AFP: “One of Africa’s oldest and largest elephants was killed by poachers in Kenya on Monday, according to a conversation group that protects the dwindling group of giant ‘tuskers.’

“Richard Moller of the Tsavo Trust told AFP that Satao II, named after another famed giant killed in 2014, was found dead on Monday and was believed to have been shot with a poisoned arrow, though this had not been confirmed.

“ ‘Luckily, through the work we do with the Kenyan Wildlife Service, we were able to find the carcass before the poachers could recover the ivory,’ said Moller.

“The elephant, believed to be about 50 years old, was beloved by visitors to the Tsavo National Park where he roamed.

“Not long after his carcass was spotted in routine aerial reconnaissance of the park, two poachers believed to be responsible for the killing were apprehended.

“The incident comes just two days after a KWS officer was killed during an anti-poaching incident in the park, the second to die in less than a month at the hands of poachers, according to the wildlife authority.”

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And here’s an awful one from The Sun and New York Post:

“Ruthless poachers have shot and killed a rhino and sliced off its valuable ivory with a chainsaw after breaking into a zoo near Paris.

“In the first case of its kind ever in Europe, the tragic 4-year-old animal, named Vince, was found brutally slaughtered in Thoiry, west of the French capital.

“The astonishing raid happened late Monday, but it was not until 9 a.m. Tuesday that zookeepers made the horrifying discovery.”

The details are even worse than this, but I’ll leave them out.

Vince was one of the most popular attractions at the hugely popular African Animal Park Reserve.

Vince, a white rhino, was fairly docile and its keeper, to say the least, is “deeply affected.”

Two other white rhinos living in Thoiry escaped the massacre and are safe.

Rhinoceros horns, said to be an aphrodisiac, can fetch up to $220,000 on the black market.

It is the first known time an animal has been slaughtered at a French zoo.

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My brother passed this one along from The Jaffe Briefing:

“This takes ‘clingy’ to a new level. A trucker figured he lost his treasured cat, named Percy, when it jumped out the window while he was napping at a rest stop in Ohio.  After a long and painful search, the trucker had no choice but to leave Percy... What the trucker didn’t know was that the cat was clinging to the undercarriage of the 18-wheeler as it plowed 400 miles through snow, sleet and ice to Shoals, Indiana.  When the trucker got out for a restroom break, he spotted what looked like a stray, filthy cat.  It was Percy!”

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But we did at least have the story of the blind Labrador retriever who was miraculously found alive in the Santa Cruz mountains after being lost in the woods for eight days. 

From the San Francisco Chronicle:

“The Boulder Creek’s dog’s rescue went viral on Facebook among San Lorenzo Valley residents who have weathered a wet winter and needed something positive to happen.

“The sightless dog, named Sage, wandered into the forest on the night of Feb. 24 and vanished. Sage’s owners mistakenly thought their pooch had been brought inside for the night.

“Beth Cole said neighbors and friends helped her look everywhere for the beloved dog. But when seven days passed, hope began to fade. There were several mountain lion sightings that week, and overnight temperatures dropped....

“Then the unexpected happened.

“Neighbor Dan Estrada and his friend, Victor Lopez, were out hiking with two dogs Saturday when they saw a white dog in a stream. They feared the lab may be dead.

“When Sage sensed their presence, the lab perked up and lifted her head....

“The dog had not wandered far from home, but the terrain was steep and slippery down to the stream.

“Sage was too weak to walk, so Estrada carried Sage over his shoulders up a canyon.

“Now the dog is doing well back home.”

But while this last item is a positive for ‘Man,’ we are taking him down to No. 352 on the All-Species List due to the other actions.  Severe sanctions are also being contemplated by the board, to be announced next Monday on the ASL site.

--Jeff B. returned from his annual celebrity trip to Antigua and after missing Robert DeNiro by yards (he didn’t know he was sitting nearby, and then DeNiro left the resort), Jeff saw nothing.  So he doesn’t pick up the $42,000 bonus Bar Chat was offering for two sightings.  Maybe next year, I told the disconsolate long-time friend.

--Finally, a coroner confirmed Tuesday that singer George Michael died of natural causes related to heart and liver problems, when he passed on Christmas Day at age 53.  He suffered from a dilated cardiomyopathy with myocarditis and fatty liver, according to the senior coroner for Oxfordshire, the BBC reported.

Top 3 songs for the week 3/7/64: #1 “I Want To Hold Your Hand” (The Beatles...had made their debut on Ed Sullivan four weeks earlier, Feb. 9...)  #2 “She Loves You” (The Beatles)  #3 “Dawn” (The Four Seasons)...and...#4 “Please Please Me” (The Beatles)  #5 “Java” (Al Hirt)  #6 “California Sun” (The Rivieras)  #7 “Navy Blue” (Diane Renay)  #8 “Stop And Think It Over” (Dale & Grace)  #9 “Fun, Fun, Fun” (The Beach Boys)  #10 “See The Funny Little Clown” (Bobby Goldsboro)

Baseball Quiz Answer: Active pitchers with 170 wins...

Bartolo Colon 233
CC Sabathia 223
John Lackey 176
Justin Verlander 173

Zack Greinke 155
Felix Hernandez 154
Jered Weaver 150

Next Bar Chat, Monday.

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