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07/13/2017

The All-Star Game

[Posted Wed. a.m.]

Baseball Quiz: Each year at this time, USA TODAY Sports takes a look at baseball leaders for the period 7/1-6/30, in this case 7/1/16-6/30/17, which is their way of defining the ‘real All-Stars’.  So for this period... 1) Who are the only four to hit .330?  2) Who are the only two to hit 40 home runs?  3) Who is the MLB leader during this period in RBIs with 129?  4) Who is the only 20-game winner?  Answers below.

MLB

--I watched about the first six innings of the All-Star Game (until the Donald Trump Jr. interview with Sean Hannity), and then picked up the ninth.  But I didn’t see Robinson Cano’s game-winning home run off the Cubs’ Wade Davis in the tenth...A.L. 2, N.L. 1.  The Mets’ Michael Conforto choked with his chance to win it for the N.L. in the bottom of the ninth and I disgustedly turned it off.

--I never miss the player introductions, which even in my youth was my favorite part, frankly.

--I thought Major League Baseball did a great job in honoring the Latin ballplayers in the Hall of Fame.  I got a kick out of seeing Juan Marichal, in particular.

But the gimmicks employed by Fox, especially A-Rod’s on-field interviews, fell flat...or were downright painful.

--I was out Monday night and only saw replays on the Home Run Derby and Aaron Judge’s performance.  Sorry, I’m one of those who really doesn’t care about this event.

But I do agree with Mark R. when he says Judge is a cyborg

--In his annual presser prior to the All-Star Game, Commissioner Rob Manfred said baseball has investigated every component of the soaring home run rate in the game and while the theory of a juiced ball has gained some credence, Manfred said the bat is an item of interest, too.

“One thing that we’re thinking about is bats,” Manfred said.  “We’ve kind of taken for granted that bats aren’t different.”

Manfred continues to maintain there are no real issues with the ball and that they fall within the ‘range of acceptability.’

Commissioner Rob Manfred also said that when it came to expansion, which he wants someday, first, baseball has to take care of the stadium situations in Oakland and Tampa Bay.

But when it comes to new locations, and this could include the Tampa and/or Oakland franchises moving to one of them, Manfred favors Montreal, Charlotte and Mexico City, though the last one isn’t realistic on a number of levels.

--Michael Jordan has joined Derek Jeter’s investment group in bidding for the Marlins.  If Jeter wins, Jordan would have a minority ownership role.

Commissioner Manfred said Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria was expected to choose among three bids soon, all apparently offering about the same amount of money.

--Tim Tebow is 14-for-44 thus far at High-A St. Lucie, .318, which is pretty good.  Attendance is near record, or record, levels wherever he goes in Florida, where he is a god.

--The Washington Post’s Thomas Boswell and Keith McMillan, with input from the other reporters at the paper, came up with a ranking for all 30 major league ballparks.

“Great”

!. Pittsburgh
2. San Francisco
3. Boston
4. Baltimore
5. Los Angeles Dodgers
6. Chicago Cubs
7. New York Yankees
8. St. Louis

“Okay to poor”

25. Miami
26. Arizona
27. Chicago White Sox
28. Toronto
29. Oakland
30. Tampa Bay

[The Mets’ Citi Field is ranked No. 19.]

--I missed this before but USA TODAY Sports’ final College Baseball coaches poll, following the World Series, of course had 1. Florida and 2. LSU, these two facing off for the title.  Previous No. 1 Oregon State fell to No. 3.

But I bring this poll up because Wake Forest moved all the way up to No. 11.  Go Deacs!

Wimbledon

As I go to post this morning, Wednesday, the men’s quarterfinals are just getting started, with Andy Murray (1) going up against the lone American, Sam Querrey (24).  Roger Federer (3) and Novak Djokovic (2) are still in it.

But our dream of the Big Four, including 4-seed Rafael Nadal, in the semis was shattered when Nadal lost in the Round of 16 to 16-seed Gilles Muller, 6-3, 6-4, 3-6, 4-6, 15-13; a true epic.

On the women’s side they are down to the semis and 37-year-old Venus Williams (10) is still in it, having defeated French Open champion Jelena Ostapenko (13) in the quarterfinals.

Williams now faces England’s Johanna Konta (6), while in the other semi it’s Garbine Muguruza (14) of Spain vs. unseeded Magdalena Rybarikova of Slovakia.

Konta is attempting to become Britain’s first women’s Wimbledon singles title winner since 1977, Virginia Wade. 

So regardless of who wins the semi, Konta or Williams, it’s a big deal.  I have to pull for Venus now that we know more of the details of her auto incident in Florida.  I give her a ton of credit for persevering as she has thus far and as I said the other day, she should have the weight of the world off her now.

[I should also note American Coco Vandeweghe (24) lost in the quarters to Rybarikova.]

Golf Balls

--The U.S. Women’s Open is this week at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, N.J., and what has surprised many of us locally is there has been absolutely zero attempt on the part of the USGA to market the event.

But it was two years ago that the USGA was considering moving it from Trump’s course as his bid to run for president was getting started, as reported by USA TODAY Sports, but the USGA was ‘persuaded’ to keep the Open at Trump National under direct threat of a lawsuit from The Donald.  “More than anything, it was very pre-emptive, before the storm if he did get elected president,” a source told USA TODAY.  “We were starting to get some pressure and so it was brought up and he said he would sue us if we moved it.”

On a conference call with the USGA’s executive committee at the time, Executive Director Mike Davis said, “We can’t get out of this.  He’s going to sue us.”

Davis told USA TODAY on Monday that it would be “inappropriate if I said that it happened or that it didn’t.”

As I go to post, it would appear Trump is spending the weekend at the course, his summer retreat, which means it will be interesting to see how it all is covered...the event, kind of  ironically, being televised by Fox.

--Ernie Els had an extensive interview with Golf Magazine in the Aug. 2017 issue and I liked this comment of his on the topic of “Meet Your Heroes.”

“I met Nelson Mandela several times. He was the leader of South Africa after apartheid.  He loved kids.  On a plane, he sat my six-year-old daughter on his lap and spoke with her for an hour.  When I’d win, he’d call to say, ‘The country’s so proud of you.’  He made my wins a victory for our nation.  He was nation-building.  In the U.S., there’s a split over Trump. We had a bigger split in South Africa. We got through it.  Mandela brought us together, and he used sport to help do it.”

Ernie also picked the best of the best from the Els Era.

Best driver: Davis Love III

Best iron player: Fred Couples

Best short game: Seve Ballesteros and Jose Maria Olazabal

Best putter: Tiger Woods

Best mental game: Jack Nicklaus

--Golf Magazine’s Alan Shipnuck had a story where he tried to answer questions such as “Best Player with Only One Major” (Fred Couples, “an uber-talent who seemed to find more joy in sitting on his couch than winning tournaments”), and “Worst Player to Have Won a Major”:

“So many strong candidates!  Jack Fleck is often cited as the archetype of the fluky major champion, but the Hogan-slayer actually won two PGA Tour events after the ’55 U.S. Open. Todd Hamilton gets some consideration, but he won 11 times in Japan, which is not nothing.  No, we have to go with Shaun Micheel, whose out-of-nowhere win at the 2003 PGA Championship remains his only Tour victory, and for the rest of his career he finished better than 22nd in a major only once.”

--Johnny Miller announced he would be back one more year at NBC doing his thing in the booth with Dan Hicks.  Miller, 70, was considering retirement at the end of the year.  Miller told Golfweek that “NBC basically said we need you to do some tournaments next year. So they’re not settled on who might be the next guy in line to take my position.”

Miller has been teamed with Hicks for 18 consecutive seasons, an industry record.

NBA

--Oh, to be a Knicks fan.  It really, really sucks.  And how dysfunctional are they these days? They signed Tim Hardaway Jr. to an obscene four-year. $71 million contract, when they could have gotten him for a few $million and a washer/dryer.

And then when they re-introduced him to the press on Monday (Hardaway having previously spent two seasons in New York), owner James Dolan, acting team president Steve Mills, and coach Jeff Hornacek weren’t there!   No one has ever heard of such a thing, but clearly they didn’t want to face any tough questions.

But there’s Hardaway, and he proceeds to offer up some honest commentary, including that he was surprised at how much money the Knicks offered!

--The Knicks have no plan...but the Brooklyn Nets do.  They are bound and determined to rebuild the right way, and so they traded with Toronto for forward DeMarre Carroll and his unreasonable four-year, $60 million deal that he signed as a free agent in 2015,  a contract Toronto wanted to dump, but in the process the Nets picked up a first- and second-round pick in the 2018 NBA draft.

The Nets had made an effort to sign free agent forward Otto Porter Jr. from Washington, but the Wizards matched their offer, and then the Nets went after veteran Carroll, who is serviceable but has had injury issues.

But it doesn’t matter if Carroll is around and plays well.  It’s about what General Manager Steve Marks has done while failing to bag four straight free agent prospects (Porter, Tyler Johnson, Allen Crabbe and Donatas Motiejunas...all of whom opted to return to their old teams).

Marks saved a ton of cap space with all the failed offer sheets and he has now swung trades for Andrew Nicholson, Carroll, and the key, the Lakers’ D’Angelo Russell, a potential franchise player, who was the No. 2 overall pick in the 2015 draft.

But wait...there’s more!  Marks got two first-round picks and a second-round pick.  Terrific job.

The Nets are now loaded with interesting young players and more to come.  Their future is looking pretty solid.

The Knicks’?  Hardly.

Stuff

--Manchester United legend Wayne Rooney’s best days are behind him, though at 31 he is hardly ancient for a soccer player.  He was just receiving less and less playing time.

So he asked for his release so he could rejoin his old club, Everton, ignoring the lure of big money to play in China or the United States.

Rooney scored 253 goals for Man U and is England’s top scorer in national team history.  He scored his first Premier League goal five days shy of his 17th birthday in 2002.

Manchester United recently acquired Everton’s 24-year-old star striker, Belgian Romelu Lukaku, who scored 25 league goals last season, second only to Tottenham’s Harry Kane.

--Paris and Los Angeles are going to receive the 2024 and 2028 Summer Olympic Games, as they are the only two bidding for them and the International Olympic Committee voted in favor of naming successive hosts.

But the IOC wants the two cities to decide between themselves by September 13 as to who gets to go first.  If there is no agreement, then the IOC will vote to select the 2024 host.

--Joe Gibbs Racing is replacing NASCAR’s oldest full-time driver, Matt Kenseth, 45, with Erik Jones, 21, next season.

Jones has been on a one-year loaner contract for Gibbs’ sister team Furniture Row Racing, and Gibbs had to put Jones somewhere in 2018.

Kenseth is the 2003 Cup champion and a two-time Daytona 500 winner with 38 career victories.

--Run For Your Lives!  From NJ.com:

“A venomous fish washed up on a beach in Long Beach Island...Harvey Cedar Beach Patrol found a Portuguese Man O’War.”

The tentacles can reach up to 160 feet in length!  And a sting from one is incredibly painful, though not necessarily fatal.

--A man swimming at a South Florida beach was bitten on both legs by a shark, as reported by WPLG-TV, the incident occurring last Sunday afternoon.  The man’s condition was not immediately known.

Officials said it was a possible bull shark, which is scary as hell.  They are more efficient killers than Great Whites.

--And there was this....

“A teenager who teaches wilderness survival fought off a bear after waking to find the animal biting his head and trying to drag him away.

“The 19-year-old woke up around 4am to a ‘crunching sound’ with his head inside the mouth of the bear, which was trying to pull him out of his sleeping bag.

“The teenager punched and hit it and other people who were sleeping nearby yelled and swatted at the bear, which eventually left.

“The incident happened at Glacier View Ranch in Colorado, 48 miles northwest of Denver.”

The teenager was treated briefly at the hospital and released. The bear had yet to be found as of Monday.

This was another black bear attack, a disturbing trend after they killed two people in Alaska recently.  So much for their historically docile nature.

--Don’t forget to watch ESPN’s “30:30” on Mike and the Mad Dog, Thursday, 8:00 p.m., especially if you are a fan of sports radio.

--“Game of Thrones” returns Sunday!!!

--Finally, Denise D. first gave me the great news that “Curb Your Enthusiasm” is returning on HBO, October 1!  While details are sketchy, Jeff Garlin (Larry David’s agent), JB Smoove (Leon), and Susie Essman, Garlin’s wife on the show, are all slated to return.

But I’ll tell you what’s depressing.  Can you believe it has been six years since it was last on the air?!  Good lord. Where did the freakin’ time go!

Top 3 songs for the week 7/16/77: #1 “Da Doo Ron Ron” (Shaun Cassidy)  #2 “Looks Like We Made It”  (Barry Manilow)  #3 “Undercover Angel” (Alan O’Day)...and...#4 “I Just Want To Be Your Everything” (Andy Gibb)  #5 “I’m In You” (Peter Frampton)  #6 “Angel In Your Arms” (Hot) #7 “My Heart Belongs To Me” (Barbra Streisand)  #8 “Jet Airliner” (The Steve Miller Band)  #9 “Margaritaville” (Jimmy Buffett)  #10 “Do You Wanna Make Love” (Peter McCann)

Baseball Quiz Answers: For the period 7/1/16-6/30/17... 1) .330 BA: Joey Votto, .354; Daniel Murphy, .338; Justin Turner, .334; DJ LeMahieu.  2) 40 home runs: Khris Davs, 44; Brian Dozier, 42.  3) 129 RBIs: Nolan Arenado.  4) 20 wins: Max Scherzer.  [Matt Cederholm / BaseballHQ.com and USA TODAY]

Next Bar Chat, Monday.

 



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Bar Chat

07/13/2017

The All-Star Game

[Posted Wed. a.m.]

Baseball Quiz: Each year at this time, USA TODAY Sports takes a look at baseball leaders for the period 7/1-6/30, in this case 7/1/16-6/30/17, which is their way of defining the ‘real All-Stars’.  So for this period... 1) Who are the only four to hit .330?  2) Who are the only two to hit 40 home runs?  3) Who is the MLB leader during this period in RBIs with 129?  4) Who is the only 20-game winner?  Answers below.

MLB

--I watched about the first six innings of the All-Star Game (until the Donald Trump Jr. interview with Sean Hannity), and then picked up the ninth.  But I didn’t see Robinson Cano’s game-winning home run off the Cubs’ Wade Davis in the tenth...A.L. 2, N.L. 1.  The Mets’ Michael Conforto choked with his chance to win it for the N.L. in the bottom of the ninth and I disgustedly turned it off.

--I never miss the player introductions, which even in my youth was my favorite part, frankly.

--I thought Major League Baseball did a great job in honoring the Latin ballplayers in the Hall of Fame.  I got a kick out of seeing Juan Marichal, in particular.

But the gimmicks employed by Fox, especially A-Rod’s on-field interviews, fell flat...or were downright painful.

--I was out Monday night and only saw replays on the Home Run Derby and Aaron Judge’s performance.  Sorry, I’m one of those who really doesn’t care about this event.

But I do agree with Mark R. when he says Judge is a cyborg

--In his annual presser prior to the All-Star Game, Commissioner Rob Manfred said baseball has investigated every component of the soaring home run rate in the game and while the theory of a juiced ball has gained some credence, Manfred said the bat is an item of interest, too.

“One thing that we’re thinking about is bats,” Manfred said.  “We’ve kind of taken for granted that bats aren’t different.”

Manfred continues to maintain there are no real issues with the ball and that they fall within the ‘range of acceptability.’

Commissioner Rob Manfred also said that when it came to expansion, which he wants someday, first, baseball has to take care of the stadium situations in Oakland and Tampa Bay.

But when it comes to new locations, and this could include the Tampa and/or Oakland franchises moving to one of them, Manfred favors Montreal, Charlotte and Mexico City, though the last one isn’t realistic on a number of levels.

--Michael Jordan has joined Derek Jeter’s investment group in bidding for the Marlins.  If Jeter wins, Jordan would have a minority ownership role.

Commissioner Manfred said Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria was expected to choose among three bids soon, all apparently offering about the same amount of money.

--Tim Tebow is 14-for-44 thus far at High-A St. Lucie, .318, which is pretty good.  Attendance is near record, or record, levels wherever he goes in Florida, where he is a god.

--The Washington Post’s Thomas Boswell and Keith McMillan, with input from the other reporters at the paper, came up with a ranking for all 30 major league ballparks.

“Great”

!. Pittsburgh
2. San Francisco
3. Boston
4. Baltimore
5. Los Angeles Dodgers
6. Chicago Cubs
7. New York Yankees
8. St. Louis

“Okay to poor”

25. Miami
26. Arizona
27. Chicago White Sox
28. Toronto
29. Oakland
30. Tampa Bay

[The Mets’ Citi Field is ranked No. 19.]

--I missed this before but USA TODAY Sports’ final College Baseball coaches poll, following the World Series, of course had 1. Florida and 2. LSU, these two facing off for the title.  Previous No. 1 Oregon State fell to No. 3.

But I bring this poll up because Wake Forest moved all the way up to No. 11.  Go Deacs!

Wimbledon

As I go to post this morning, Wednesday, the men’s quarterfinals are just getting started, with Andy Murray (1) going up against the lone American, Sam Querrey (24).  Roger Federer (3) and Novak Djokovic (2) are still in it.

But our dream of the Big Four, including 4-seed Rafael Nadal, in the semis was shattered when Nadal lost in the Round of 16 to 16-seed Gilles Muller, 6-3, 6-4, 3-6, 4-6, 15-13; a true epic.

On the women’s side they are down to the semis and 37-year-old Venus Williams (10) is still in it, having defeated French Open champion Jelena Ostapenko (13) in the quarterfinals.

Williams now faces England’s Johanna Konta (6), while in the other semi it’s Garbine Muguruza (14) of Spain vs. unseeded Magdalena Rybarikova of Slovakia.

Konta is attempting to become Britain’s first women’s Wimbledon singles title winner since 1977, Virginia Wade. 

So regardless of who wins the semi, Konta or Williams, it’s a big deal.  I have to pull for Venus now that we know more of the details of her auto incident in Florida.  I give her a ton of credit for persevering as she has thus far and as I said the other day, she should have the weight of the world off her now.

[I should also note American Coco Vandeweghe (24) lost in the quarters to Rybarikova.]

Golf Balls

--The U.S. Women’s Open is this week at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, N.J., and what has surprised many of us locally is there has been absolutely zero attempt on the part of the USGA to market the event.

But it was two years ago that the USGA was considering moving it from Trump’s course as his bid to run for president was getting started, as reported by USA TODAY Sports, but the USGA was ‘persuaded’ to keep the Open at Trump National under direct threat of a lawsuit from The Donald.  “More than anything, it was very pre-emptive, before the storm if he did get elected president,” a source told USA TODAY.  “We were starting to get some pressure and so it was brought up and he said he would sue us if we moved it.”

On a conference call with the USGA’s executive committee at the time, Executive Director Mike Davis said, “We can’t get out of this.  He’s going to sue us.”

Davis told USA TODAY on Monday that it would be “inappropriate if I said that it happened or that it didn’t.”

As I go to post, it would appear Trump is spending the weekend at the course, his summer retreat, which means it will be interesting to see how it all is covered...the event, kind of  ironically, being televised by Fox.

--Ernie Els had an extensive interview with Golf Magazine in the Aug. 2017 issue and I liked this comment of his on the topic of “Meet Your Heroes.”

“I met Nelson Mandela several times. He was the leader of South Africa after apartheid.  He loved kids.  On a plane, he sat my six-year-old daughter on his lap and spoke with her for an hour.  When I’d win, he’d call to say, ‘The country’s so proud of you.’  He made my wins a victory for our nation.  He was nation-building.  In the U.S., there’s a split over Trump. We had a bigger split in South Africa. We got through it.  Mandela brought us together, and he used sport to help do it.”

Ernie also picked the best of the best from the Els Era.

Best driver: Davis Love III

Best iron player: Fred Couples

Best short game: Seve Ballesteros and Jose Maria Olazabal

Best putter: Tiger Woods

Best mental game: Jack Nicklaus

--Golf Magazine’s Alan Shipnuck had a story where he tried to answer questions such as “Best Player with Only One Major” (Fred Couples, “an uber-talent who seemed to find more joy in sitting on his couch than winning tournaments”), and “Worst Player to Have Won a Major”:

“So many strong candidates!  Jack Fleck is often cited as the archetype of the fluky major champion, but the Hogan-slayer actually won two PGA Tour events after the ’55 U.S. Open. Todd Hamilton gets some consideration, but he won 11 times in Japan, which is not nothing.  No, we have to go with Shaun Micheel, whose out-of-nowhere win at the 2003 PGA Championship remains his only Tour victory, and for the rest of his career he finished better than 22nd in a major only once.”

--Johnny Miller announced he would be back one more year at NBC doing his thing in the booth with Dan Hicks.  Miller, 70, was considering retirement at the end of the year.  Miller told Golfweek that “NBC basically said we need you to do some tournaments next year. So they’re not settled on who might be the next guy in line to take my position.”

Miller has been teamed with Hicks for 18 consecutive seasons, an industry record.

NBA

--Oh, to be a Knicks fan.  It really, really sucks.  And how dysfunctional are they these days? They signed Tim Hardaway Jr. to an obscene four-year. $71 million contract, when they could have gotten him for a few $million and a washer/dryer.

And then when they re-introduced him to the press on Monday (Hardaway having previously spent two seasons in New York), owner James Dolan, acting team president Steve Mills, and coach Jeff Hornacek weren’t there!   No one has ever heard of such a thing, but clearly they didn’t want to face any tough questions.

But there’s Hardaway, and he proceeds to offer up some honest commentary, including that he was surprised at how much money the Knicks offered!

--The Knicks have no plan...but the Brooklyn Nets do.  They are bound and determined to rebuild the right way, and so they traded with Toronto for forward DeMarre Carroll and his unreasonable four-year, $60 million deal that he signed as a free agent in 2015,  a contract Toronto wanted to dump, but in the process the Nets picked up a first- and second-round pick in the 2018 NBA draft.

The Nets had made an effort to sign free agent forward Otto Porter Jr. from Washington, but the Wizards matched their offer, and then the Nets went after veteran Carroll, who is serviceable but has had injury issues.

But it doesn’t matter if Carroll is around and plays well.  It’s about what General Manager Steve Marks has done while failing to bag four straight free agent prospects (Porter, Tyler Johnson, Allen Crabbe and Donatas Motiejunas...all of whom opted to return to their old teams).

Marks saved a ton of cap space with all the failed offer sheets and he has now swung trades for Andrew Nicholson, Carroll, and the key, the Lakers’ D’Angelo Russell, a potential franchise player, who was the No. 2 overall pick in the 2015 draft.

But wait...there’s more!  Marks got two first-round picks and a second-round pick.  Terrific job.

The Nets are now loaded with interesting young players and more to come.  Their future is looking pretty solid.

The Knicks’?  Hardly.

Stuff

--Manchester United legend Wayne Rooney’s best days are behind him, though at 31 he is hardly ancient for a soccer player.  He was just receiving less and less playing time.

So he asked for his release so he could rejoin his old club, Everton, ignoring the lure of big money to play in China or the United States.

Rooney scored 253 goals for Man U and is England’s top scorer in national team history.  He scored his first Premier League goal five days shy of his 17th birthday in 2002.

Manchester United recently acquired Everton’s 24-year-old star striker, Belgian Romelu Lukaku, who scored 25 league goals last season, second only to Tottenham’s Harry Kane.

--Paris and Los Angeles are going to receive the 2024 and 2028 Summer Olympic Games, as they are the only two bidding for them and the International Olympic Committee voted in favor of naming successive hosts.

But the IOC wants the two cities to decide between themselves by September 13 as to who gets to go first.  If there is no agreement, then the IOC will vote to select the 2024 host.

--Joe Gibbs Racing is replacing NASCAR’s oldest full-time driver, Matt Kenseth, 45, with Erik Jones, 21, next season.

Jones has been on a one-year loaner contract for Gibbs’ sister team Furniture Row Racing, and Gibbs had to put Jones somewhere in 2018.

Kenseth is the 2003 Cup champion and a two-time Daytona 500 winner with 38 career victories.

--Run For Your Lives!  From NJ.com:

“A venomous fish washed up on a beach in Long Beach Island...Harvey Cedar Beach Patrol found a Portuguese Man O’War.”

The tentacles can reach up to 160 feet in length!  And a sting from one is incredibly painful, though not necessarily fatal.

--A man swimming at a South Florida beach was bitten on both legs by a shark, as reported by WPLG-TV, the incident occurring last Sunday afternoon.  The man’s condition was not immediately known.

Officials said it was a possible bull shark, which is scary as hell.  They are more efficient killers than Great Whites.

--And there was this....

“A teenager who teaches wilderness survival fought off a bear after waking to find the animal biting his head and trying to drag him away.

“The 19-year-old woke up around 4am to a ‘crunching sound’ with his head inside the mouth of the bear, which was trying to pull him out of his sleeping bag.

“The teenager punched and hit it and other people who were sleeping nearby yelled and swatted at the bear, which eventually left.

“The incident happened at Glacier View Ranch in Colorado, 48 miles northwest of Denver.”

The teenager was treated briefly at the hospital and released. The bear had yet to be found as of Monday.

This was another black bear attack, a disturbing trend after they killed two people in Alaska recently.  So much for their historically docile nature.

--Don’t forget to watch ESPN’s “30:30” on Mike and the Mad Dog, Thursday, 8:00 p.m., especially if you are a fan of sports radio.

--“Game of Thrones” returns Sunday!!!

--Finally, Denise D. first gave me the great news that “Curb Your Enthusiasm” is returning on HBO, October 1!  While details are sketchy, Jeff Garlin (Larry David’s agent), JB Smoove (Leon), and Susie Essman, Garlin’s wife on the show, are all slated to return.

But I’ll tell you what’s depressing.  Can you believe it has been six years since it was last on the air?!  Good lord. Where did the freakin’ time go!

Top 3 songs for the week 7/16/77: #1 “Da Doo Ron Ron” (Shaun Cassidy)  #2 “Looks Like We Made It”  (Barry Manilow)  #3 “Undercover Angel” (Alan O’Day)...and...#4 “I Just Want To Be Your Everything” (Andy Gibb)  #5 “I’m In You” (Peter Frampton)  #6 “Angel In Your Arms” (Hot) #7 “My Heart Belongs To Me” (Barbra Streisand)  #8 “Jet Airliner” (The Steve Miller Band)  #9 “Margaritaville” (Jimmy Buffett)  #10 “Do You Wanna Make Love” (Peter McCann)

Baseball Quiz Answers: For the period 7/1/16-6/30/17... 1) .330 BA: Joey Votto, .354; Daniel Murphy, .338; Justin Turner, .334; DJ LeMahieu.  2) 40 home runs: Khris Davs, 44; Brian Dozier, 42.  3) 129 RBIs: Nolan Arenado.  4) 20 wins: Max Scherzer.  [Matt Cederholm / BaseballHQ.com and USA TODAY]

Next Bar Chat, Monday.