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Bar Chat

05/01/2017

The New York Mess

[Posted Sunday p.m.]

Cleveland Indians HR Quiz: Name the eight to hit 200 home runs in an Indians uniform.  [Hint: Two did their damage in the 1930s.]  Answer below.

MLB

[The following is written day by day for both the Mets and Yanks....]

--The Mets suffered a devastating loss on Thursday to the Braves, 7-5 at Citi Field, their sixth straight defeat, dropping them to 8-13 after a 7-3 start, as they also lost slugger Yoenis Cespedes to a pulled or strained hamstring (the Mets still haven’t really told us the truth), and the fact is the team is 114-83 with him in the lineup, and, after Thursday, 18-27 without him.

The Mets were dead.  Suddenly 7 ½ back of the 16-6 Nationals.  As the Mets traveled to Washington for a three-game set this weekend, the headlines in D.C. were about the opportunity to bury the Mets for good, by the end of April!  If the Mets got swept, as many thought would be the case, they’d be 10 ½ back, 8-16.

But a funny thing happened on the way to burial.  After Thursday’s game, manager Terry Collins read the team the riot act, essentially saying, ‘No one is going to feel sorry for you...you can’t use the weather as an excuse anymore...everybody has injuries...get out there and f’n play baseball.’

So Friday night, after taking a 7-3 lead, owing to Travis d’Arnaud’s two home runs off Max Scherzer, and Jacob deGrom’s 7-inning, 12-strikeout effort, the Mets’ Addison Reed, so reliable last season but this year not so much, gave up a two-run homer to Ryan Zimmerman, his second of the game, to make it 7-5 and that’s where it stood, bottom of the ninth, Mets closer Jeurys Familia, allowing three straight hits to load the bases, Mets fans reaching for their swords.

Familia got a strikeout for the first out and then, out of nowhere, Terry Collins pulled him for Josh Edgin to face Bryce Harper.

We were all stunned.  Edgin was stunned.  Familia was super pissed.  But Edgin induced Harper to hit a comebacker to the mound and Edgin started a 1-2-3 double play, game over.  Mets fans, read moi, were pumped.  Collins, much-maligned at times, was hailed as a genius.

[The Nats suffered a huge blow in this game, as they lost new center fielder Adam Eaton for the season to a torn ligament in his left knee on a play where he jammed it running to first.]

Then Saturday, Michael Conforto, who is now guaranteed playing time with Cespedes’ injury, slammed two home runs (six in 51 ABs this season), driving in three and the Mets took a 5-3 lead into the bottom of the ninth, after Reed gave up another home run to Zimmerman in the eighth, and Familia was called on again.  This time it was easier...1-2-3.  The Mets were still alive.  It also appeared, even if just for one game, they had their closer back.

So on to Sunday...and it happened again....

Here’s the deal.  The Mets’ ace, Noah Syndergaard, missed Thursday’s start due to what he and the team described as bicep tendonitis, but Noah insisted he’d be ready for a start Sunday.

The Mets wanted to take an MRI, but Noah bullied them and insisted two days before he was just fine.  The Mets allowed him to pitch.

I wrote Johnny Mac prior to the start of the contest expressing my concern, having seen this game too often (as has Johnny, and Phil W. and all other Mets fans).

Boy was I right.  “Thor” gave up five runs in the bottom of the first, hit hard, and when he came out for the second, two batters in he threw a changeup and immediately clutched under his armpit...Noah was out of the game.  The Mets’ season in jeopardy, bigly.

What pisses some of us off, millions as the story evolves, is the Mets didn’t insist Cespedes sit another few days, when clearly his hamstring wasn’t 100%, and we saw what happened there, and then the f’n club allowed stud Noah, who of course sees himself as indestructible, even though he’s the only one in the Big Five (Harvey, deGrom, Matz and Wheeler being the others) not to have Tommy John surgery yet.  It was totally inexcusable to allow him to pitch today.  Sit the guy down, for at least a week, to see how he was progressing, and obviously demand an MRI!

What a joke of a ballclub.  For years, it’s one freakin’ misdiagnosed injury after another.

What did I tell you just a week or so ago?  Don’t let your mother ever be diagnosed for whatever ailment by the Mets!  And now it’s clear, for all the toughness Marine Sandy Alderson likes to portray, for a guy in charge he blew it in the case of both Yoenis and Noah.  He should have jacked them up against a wall and said, ‘You play when we think you’re ready!’  [For those who aren’t from the area, Alderson runs the team, not manager Terry Collins.]

Anyway, the Mets proceeded to lose 23-5 as the Nats’ Anthony Rendon became the 13th player in Major League history to drive in 10 or more runs*, 10 (a franchise record), as he went 6-for-6 with three home runs.

*Jim Bottomley and Mark Whiten hold the record with 12 ribbies in a game.

So after all the positive feelings from Friday and Saturday, my team is history...finis...for 2017.  Far more next time as the New York scribes weigh in.  It’s going to be ugly. 

[I just saw Bryce Harper set a record for most runs scored in April, 32, passing Larry Walker’s 29 in 1997. That is awesome.... more on the slugging Nats next chat.]

--Meanwhile, Yankee fans have every reason to be psyched, with the latest run starting Wednesday in Boston, a 3-1 win behind Luis Severino’s 7 scoreless innings, followed by Masahiro Tanaka’s complete game shutout, 3-0, outdueling Chris Sale, who fell to 1-2, but with a 1.19 ERA.

So the Yankees came back home to face the first-place Orioles and Friday was one of those touchstone games, the Yanks coming back from 9-1 and 11-4 deficits to take the Orioles 14-11 in ten innings on Matt Holliday’s three-run, walk-off home run.  Truly stirring.

Saturday was much easier for New York, whipping Baltimore 12-4 as Aaron Judge hit his tenth home run, Judge having homered twice the night before in the comeback.  I told you the other day, Judge is as exciting as any player in baseball, and he’s just getting started.  His confidence is soaring.

Sunday, the Yanks lost 7-4 in 11 as they blew a ton of early opportunities, but as all Yankees fans know, if you told them before the season started they’d finish the first month 15-8 and tied for first, they’d have signed up for that in a heartbeat.

--The Phillies’ Jeremy Hellickson is off to a 4-0, 1.80 start.

--It was confirmed...Giants ace Madison Bumgarner will be out three months, until after the July 10-13 All-Star break.  Bumgarner suffered a Grade 2 AC joint sprain in his pitching shoulder in the April 20 dirt bike crash in Colorado.

--After I wrote of his last start, a disappointing two-inning, 4 earned run effort, the Mariners placed ace Felix Hernandez on the 10-day disabled list because of right shoulder inflammation.

--The bid for the Marlins by a team led by Derek Jeter and former Gov. Jeb Bush is not a done deal, as first reported by Bloomberg, and parroted by yours truly and countless others.  There are other bids out there, Commissioner Rob Manfred has hastened to add.  Completion of the sale by owner Jeffrey Loria could take months.

--The other day I wrote of influential baseball books and one was Ted Williams’ 1971 treatise, “The Science of Hitting,” which I noted was being used today by a lot of the current Red Sox players.

So it was cool to see in the weekend papers a story by the Chicago Tribune’s Mark Gonzales that the Cubs’ Kris Bryant is a major disciple of Williams’ approach, which is only appropriate as the Cubs squared off against Boston at Fenway Park this weekend.

Bryant’s father, Mike, relayed to his son the lessons he learned from Williams 36 years ago.  Mike had read Williams’ book as a teen and the slugger personally emphasized those principles to him as a spring training instructor when the elder Bryant was a struggling minor league outfielder in the Red Sox organization in the early 1980s.  Mike then passed it on to Kris.

Williams preaches hit the ball as hard as you can and get it up in the air (wait for your pitch, of course), which is what Daniel Murphy has used to such success, and as Mike Bryant told Gonzales, “Look at the players reviving their careers – Josh Donaldson, Justin Turner and Ryan Zimmerman. And I’m sure Zimmerman learned from Daniel Murphy and his swing....Ted never has gotten the credit he deserves.”

--Great cover story in the current Sports Illustrated on high-schooler Hunter Greene, as in “Hunter Greene is Exactly What Baseball Needs.”

“A socially conscious high school shortstop-starter who rakes, throws 102 and makes scouts believe in hardball unicorns.”

The senior out of Notre Dame High in Sherman Oaks, Calif., sure seems like the real deal.  Heck, he plays the violin, for crying out loud.  And, yes, he’s African-American, which could be a real shot in the arm for that segment of the population that baseball so dearly wants in terms of what sport some great athletes may choose in the future.

As in, root hard for this kid’s success if you give a damn about baseball.

The Twins will have the first pick in the June draft.  That part sucks.  We need him in a media center.  No offense to my Minnesota fans, the city having some of the most beautiful women in the country...but I’m about to get in major trouble so we need to move on....

NBA Playoffs

Thursday, San Antonio wrapped up its series with Memphis, 4-2, taking Game 6 103-96 behind Kawhi Leonard’s 29 points, and Tony Parker’s superb 27-point effort on 11 of 14 from the field.

Toronto beat Milwaukee 92-89, as the Raptors took their series 4-2.

Friday, Boston wrapped up its comeback from a startling 2-0 deficit to Chicago, taking the next four handily, including Game 6, 105-83.  So much for the panic.  [Ditto the likes of San Antonio, Toronto, and Washington, whose fan bases were rather concerned early on as well.]

Speaking of Washington, these are the playoffs John Wall is recognized for his greatness, and what an effort he had on Friday as the Wizards wrapped up their series with the Hawks (after it was tied 2-2), as Wall had 42 points, including 19 in the fourth quarter.  As Washington Post reporter Jerry Brewer wrote, “Wall didn’t just play well, didn’t just do what an all-star does. He arrived as an NBA superstar.”

On to Sunday, and Game 1 of the Eastern Conference semis, with Boston taking Washington 123-111 behind Isaiah Thomas’ 33 points and 9 assists, while Al Horford had a rather complete performance...21 points, 9 rebounds and 10 assists.  The Wizards’ John Wall had 20 and 16 assists.

But back in the West, the Utah Jazz beat the Clippers in L.A. in Game 7, 104-91, as Chris Paul sucked.

Stanley Cup Playoffs

--In Game 1 of the Ottawa-New York series, the Senators defeated the Rangers in crushing fashion, 2-1, with a late score off the back of goalie Henrik Lundqvist.  It was freakish.  Just sucked for us Rangers fans.

But Game 2 was even worse, as Lundqvist, who otherwise played heroically in the first contest, coughed up leads of 3-1, 4-2, and 5-3, as Jean-Gabriel Pageau of the Senators, who had scored just 12 goals in the entire regular season, scored four on Saturday, including the final two in regulation to tie it, at the 16:41 and 18:58 marks, and then the game-winner in the second overtime, Ottawa stealing another 6-5.  [Pageau had scored the Senators’ first goal of the game as well.]

Larry Brooks / New York Post

“The game was a mess, but what a glorious, unpredictable, entertaining playoff mess it was.  Unless, of course, you are Henrik Lundqvist, one of his teammates or one of the citizens of Rangerstown.

“Then it was a disaster.”

Amen.

--In the Washington-Pittsburgh series, in Game 1 Thursday, Pittsburgh took a 3-2 lead with about 7 minutes to play and then held on in an unbelievably tense final few minutes (with Doc Emrick in classic form).

Saturday, the Penguins won in a rout, 6-2, forcing Caps goaltender Braden Holtby to the bench.  In the two games, Holtby has allowed six goals on just 35 shots.

Yes, it’s a cliché, but an apt one...when it comes to the playoffs, you only go as far as your goaltender can take you.

--In the West, the Nashville Predators took a 2-1 series lead over the Blues in Nashville (with a rather impressive crowd...as in love the fanaticism!)

NFL Draft

--Personally, I was excited about my Jets’ draft, with two safeties, including perhaps the best player, overall, in the draft in Jamal Adams out of LSU, two cornerbacks, two wide receivers, and a solid tight end in Jordan Leggett out of Clemson.  We need help everywhere, and while we didn’t select a quarterback, every Jets fan since about Week 10 of last season knew that 2017 was going to be another putrid campaign, but for the first time in a long time, Jets fans accept that.  It’s about tanking and getting a top three pick in next April’s Sam Darnold Sweepstakes.  Hopefully the players will cooperate...but try to keep the games close, boys, for fan interest, and develop the younger players.

Anyway, Nate Davis of USA TODAY, just to select one ‘expert,’ gave the Jets a B+, which was top 11 for him.  I’ll buy that.

Davis gave Cleveland and San Francisco the highest marks.  The Browns chose DE Myles Garrett with the No. 1 overall pick and didn’t select Mitch Trubisky (more on him later), yet picked up Notre Dame QB DeShone Kizer at No. 52, which was solid.  The Browns also dealt out their No. 12, netting them a 2018 first rounder, which means Cleveland has five picks in the first two rounds next year.

They also selected Jabrill Peppers (Michigan) at No. 25, and tight end David Njoku (Miami) in the first at 29.

Davis also gave the 49ers an ‘A,’ as “new GM John Lynch picked up two third-rounders and a fourth for simply flipping his No. 2 choice for Chicago’s No. 3 – a nice payout given the rebuild facing Lynch and new coach Kyle Shanahan.”

Lynch took DL Solomon Thomas No. 3 and LB Reuben Foster, at No. 31, a steal, as Foster fell due to controversy over his urine sample at the combine (and other stuff).

I didn’t understand the 49ers’ selection of Iowa quarterback C.J. Beathard, but I can see how some teams would view him as a quality NFL backup, though you won’t find anyone thinking he is a starter.  [I followed Beathard’s career....just a very nice college QB, which are a dime a dozen.]

Nate Davis had the Chicago Bears and Giants at the bottom with C-, and the Rams last at D+.

What Chicago GM Ryan Pace was doing taking Mitchell Trubisky at No. 2, everyone who follows the sport is wondering.  And to do so moving up just one slot, and then giving up all the picks to Cleveland...that’s nuts!  Pace did recoup some of his later round losses in dealing the 36th selection to Arizona.

But with Trubisky, this makes zero sense after signing free agent QB Mike Glennon to a three-year, $45 million pact in March, though Glennon’s contract has a financial escape hatch in 2018 if Trubisky were to supplant him.  Meaning, Chicago could cut Glennon but they will have paid him about $20 million for one season.  But if they kept Glennon, that likely means Trubisky isn’t ready in Year 2 and that would be a disaster for GM Pace.

As for the Giants, they took TE Evan Engram out of Ole Miss in the first round, though he is hardly a classic tight end.  I do think he could be a very good receiver, however, and second-round DT Dalvin Tomlinson out of Alabama is a great story on a number of levels, and we all should want this guy to succeed.

And the Giants took what they hope is the heir in 3 years or so to Eli Manning, quarterback Davis Webb out of Cal, who generated a fair amount of pre-draft buzz.

I liked the selection of Clemson running back Wayne Gallman by the Giants in the fourth.  I guarantee he has a solid 5-year career.

As for the D+ accorded the Rams, I don’t know what the heck they were doing.

Meanwhile, I’ll give the grades handed out by ESPN’s Mel Kiper.

He has the top five as:

Chargers – A
Patriots – A (it’s complicated)
Bills – A-
49ers – A-
Bucs – A-

The Jets get a B+, while the Browns are just a B in Kiper’s eyes.

The Bears are a C+, ditto the Giants, while the Rams are also the worst for Kiper, C-.

Bits and Pieces....

--A day after the draft, the dysfunctional Bills fired GM Doug Whaley.  He was GM four seasons as the franchise’s postseason drought extended to 17 years following a 7-9 finish in 2016.

And the team dismissed their entire scouting staff.

Heck, Kiper gave the Bills an A- for their draft.

--I was surprised Texas Tech QB Patrick Mahomes went to Kansas City at No. 10, though wasn’t that surprised at Deshaun Watson to Houston at No. 12.  That’s where I would have put him.  Watson should sit and learn a year, then he’ll be ready to shine.

The Steelers believe they have their possible successor to Ben Roethlisberger in fourth-round pick Joshua Dobbs out of Tennessee.  Dak Prescott was a fourth-rounder.  Dobbs has the luxury of not being rushed into a situation he’s not ready for.

--If you were thinking, ‘Gee, it sure seems like a lot of safeties and cornerbacks are being selected’ in the first three rounds, you were right – a record 18 cornerbacks and 11 safeties, 29.  The total of defensive players selected in the first three, 63, was also a record in the common draft era.

And an offensive lineman didn’t go until the 20th pick, when Denver took Utah tackle Garett Bolles, which according to NFL Network’s Rich Eisen is the longest it has taken at that position.

--The Jags taking LSU running back Leonard Fournette with the fourth pick was kind of predictable, as new team president Tom Coughlin loves a good running game.

--Stanford running back/receiver/kick returner Christian McCaffrey was taken eighth by Carolina.  I’ve said he would be a “middling” pro.  I may have major egg on my face down the road, but I can’t back down now.

--Boy, never thought O.J. Howard would fall to 19 in the first round, but he did, taken by Tampa Bay.

--Corey Davis, Western Michigan WR, was taken fifth by the Titans.  I love this guy.

--Can’t believe Florida State running back Dalvin Cook fell to the second round, 41st, taken by the Vikings.  “They” say off-the-field issues have cropped up.  Shoot, I have off-the-field issues, but I still do my job.  Cook is a steal, but being second round I can’t officially tab him “my steal of the draft,” ditto O.J. Howard at 19.

--Cincinnati selected troubled Oklahoma running back Joe Mixon in the second at 48.  How appropriate, the franchise being known as football’s Boys Town, except Boys Town actually works and the Bengals’ don’t.  [To be fair, Mixon has done and said all the right things recently.  This is a huge gamble, but could pay off.]

--The Steelers took Pitt running back James Conner in the third round.  I would have thought he’d go no earlier than the fourth, but this could be one of the real feel good stories if he sticks and continues to regain his strength, which I’m convinced is still not totally there after his bout with cancer.  I’d love for this guy to be a star.

--Well, my “Steal of the Draft,” which in my informal rules has to be 3rd round or higher, is Oklahoma wide receiver Dede Westbrook, selected in the fourth (110) by Jacksonville.

--Michael Powell / New York Times

“It is showtime at the NFL meat market in Philadelphia, as teams begin the business of drafting players and relentlessly flogging their product.

“The league oversees this phantasmagoria with a blend of Area 51 paranoia and P.T. Barnum hucksterism. And it began a few months earlier at the butcher shop that is the NFL scouting combine in Indianapolis, where big young men were weighed, measured and poked, and had family medical histories and genes analyzed as if they were the finest Wagyu cattle.

“Coaches, scouts, coordinators and fans watched young men in spandex shorts run the 40-yard dash and jump and bench-press.  Away from the cameras these young men submitted to MRIs and X-rays and full disclosure of their mental health and prescriptions.  Many results were quickly publicized....

“The combine offered deeper humiliations. Each year league-hired wizards administer intelligence tests, known as the Wonderlic. And each year, including 2017, these supposedly secret scores are ritually leaked to reporters before the draft.

“This struck me as a premeditated invasion of privacy.  So I counted my good fortune when the University of Pennsylvania Law Review landed in my inbox this week. In it, four law professors explored the way in which the NFL and its teams demanded intimate details from would-be players and exposed much of it to the world.

“The law professors concluded that the league often ‘violates existing federal employment discrimination laws.’  Federal law prohibits a potential employer from testing, say, the cardiovascular capacity of a job applicant, or administering an EKG.  The United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission also prohibits employers from using genetic information in making decisions about whom to employ.

“If employers learn any of this information, they are forbidden from disclosing any details.”

“ ‘They are never supposed to be asked about genetic and family medical history and yet this is going on publicly,’ Jessica L. Roberts, director of the Health Law and Policy Institute at the University of Houston Law Center, told me....

“The exposure of players’ medical privacy becomes systematic once they enter the league. Teams routinely disclose medical ailments. So there is the running back, his knees pounded to sawdust by too many years of too many hits, who fails his physical, or the linebacker who has sustained his fourth concussion and feels as if his cranium is packed with confetti.

“When they quit football, these players will have three or four decades of work life ahead.  Will a future employer shy from hiring a man who gets splitting headaches from too many concussions?....

“There is a final, Orwellian quality to this process. The young men who show up at the combine and the draft already have survived years at institutions of higher learning.  In service of the bottom line of these universities, these young men have wrenched shoulders, twisted knees, broken ribs, and ripped ligaments and tendons.  And their heads got hit again and again and again – were all of these hits concussions?  That’s a connoisseur’s distinction.

“And if these players survive all of this and get drafted into the NFL, they become eligible for a graduate course in the destruction of their bodies and minds.

“If federal law gets in the way just a little, well, wouldn’t that be grand?”

Golf Balls

--It was a unique Zurich Classic of New Orleans (Avondale), a two-man team format.  Because of this, the normally lackluster event in this “Masters Hangover” portion of the Tour schedule, attracted six of the world’s top nine, and 13 of the top 25.  Compare that with one top-15 player between the RBC Heritage and Valero Texas Open (that being Patrick Reed, who played in San Antonio).

There were tremendous awards at stake: Each winning team member is credited with an official PGA Tour victory, earning a two-year exemption that goes along with it, with each also picking up a seven-figure payday: $1,022,400, plus lots of FedEx points.

And they get invites like to The Players and the PGA Championships.

But failing to make the cut were the pairs of Justin Rose-Henrik Stenson and Jason Day-Rickie Fowler.

Anyway, as I go to post there appears to be a playoff after an extensive weather delay, and I assume, since I can’t find an exact explanation, that it’s tomorrow morning, as, you know, it’s dark and the only light would be from the eyes of the alligators on the course, which would be discomforting.

--Ian Poulter was to have lost his tour card as he played under a major medical extension and didn’t earn the required money in his allotted tournaments to go further without sponsor exemptions.

But the Tour ruled this week that it didn’t take into consideration a modification to the FedEx Cup Points Curve and the bottom line is that Poulter (and Brian Gay) were granted extensions for the rest of the year, a huge break for Ian as he battles back to form.

--I didn’t see this until after last chat, but last weekend at the “Skins Shootout” at the Bass Pro Legends of Golf tournament at Big Cedar Lodge in the Ozarks, with the PGA Tour Champions’ event won by Carlos Franco and Vijay Singh, the prelim “Skins” tourney had one team of Jack Nicklaus and Kid Rock, both, coincidentally, being big Donald Trump supporters.

The two had never played together and Kid Rock told a local reporter after, “It was nuts man. I don’t get nervous much but I was a little bit today and then I started swinging and I’m like, ‘Man, stuff’s working out.’”

Kid Rock hit eight out of nine greens in regulation.  Nicklaus commented: “He hit the ball great.”

Kid Rock belongs to Jack’s Bear’s Club in Florida but they had never gotten together.  Love it.

Premier League

--Since last chat, some big games, like on Wednesday, when Tottenham needed to steal a win at Crystal Palace, Palace playing great recently, and the Spurs’ Christian Eriksen scoring one of the great goals in franchise history at the 78-minute mark, thus securing a 1-0 victory to keep Tottenham in the title race, at least until Sunday.

So Chelsea’s lead was back to 4 points with five to play.

Thursday, Manchester City and Manchester United played to an ugly 0-0 draw.

Saturday, it was about the relegation battle, and in losing at home to Bournemouth 1-0, Sunderland was officially relegated after a 10-year run in the Premier League; just crushing for its fans, though it’s been expected for weeks...or longer.  You should have seen the looks on the faces of the faithful.

Meanwhile, Southampton and Hull City played to a 0-0 tie, Hull picking up a critical point.  And then Sunday, Swansea picked up a point, shockingly, at Manchester United, 1-1, while Middlesbrough, hosting Manchester City, snagged a point of its own, 2-2.

For Swansea, it gives them a final shot with three games to play, but unfortunately they don’t play Hull.  Middlesbrough is still essentially finished.

17. Hull City 35 (games) – 34 (points)
18. Swansea 35 – 32
19. Middlesbrough 35 – 28
20. Sunderland 34 – 21

Back to the top, Chelsea had its final big test, at Everton on Sunday, and it was scoreless through 65 minutes as I was praying for a draw, but alas the Blues pulled away for a 3-0 victory, meaning Tottenham, to have one last shot, needed to beat Arsenal at home and the Spurs came through on goals by Dele Alli and Harry Kane, 2-0.

So with four to play for the leaders....

1. Chelsea 34 – 81
2. Tottenham 34 – 77
3. Liverpool 34 – 66
4. Man City 34 – 66
5. Man U 34 – 65
6. Arsenal 33 – 60

What it all means really is that Tottenham has essentially wrapped up second, which is pretty, pretty good.  No collapse this year.

NASCAR

Joey Logano won his 18th career race, taking the Toyota Owners 400 at Richmond on Sunday.

Separately, I do have to say I caught the end of the Russian Grand Prix in Sochi Sunday, with Finland’s Valtteri Bottas winning his first career race in his 81st start over Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel.  [Just terrific footage of Vettel’s attempt to catch up at the end.]

Don’t take this the wrong way, but it was fascinating watching Russian President Vladimir Putin during the race in the VIP Box, and then afterwards in congratulating the drivers.  If you knew nothing of the man and only saw these exchanges, you’d think, ‘what a cool guy.’

Stuff

--Anthony Joshua, the home town favorite, defeated Wladimir Klitschko before the largest heavyweight title crowd lured to Wembley Stadium since World War II on Saturday night. 

Lance Pugmire / Los Angeles Times

“In a rousing display of his toughness and fighting skill, Joshua picked himself off the canvas and hammered (Klitschko) relentlessly in the 11th round, winning by technical knockout in a showing that vanquished the tag of inexperience.

“ ‘I’m not perfect, but I’m trained,’ Joshua told the 90,000 roaring the man who took a major step toward becoming the sport’s next big thing....

“ ‘I said it’d be a classic. I came back to fight my heart out.  That’s what I’m about.’

“Joshua, who won the country’s heart first by claiming the gold medal at the 2012 Olympics in London, had never fought beyond seven rounds.

“And the 27-year-old’s interest in flexing his younger muscles and power punches on the 41-year-old former long-reigning champion was pulled from the same script that allowed Joshua to win his first 18 fights by knockouts to become International Boxing Federation champion.

“With Klitschko’s old World Boxing Assn. belt also on the line Saturday, Joshua (19-0) stood stoutly upright and threw heavy blows that caused Klitschko to back off even after the veteran hit Joshua with a good punch early in the second round.”

And it was back and forth from there. Oh to have been in that crowd.

--Maria Sharapova made her return at the Porsche Grand Prix in Stuttgart, Germany, and lost in the semifinals to Kristina Mladenovic, 3-6, 7-5, 6-4.

Mladenovic has been a vocal critic of Sharapova’s return to tennis after a 15-month doping ban, and on the eve of their semifinal, accused her of getting “extra help” because she had been handed wild cards to play at tournaments in Stuttgart, Madrid and Rome.  Sharapova will learn May 16 whether she will be granted a wild card for the main draw at the French Open.

--The Kentucky Derby is Saturday, and I’ll have your ‘Pick to Click’ next time, but all are in agreement; this year’s Run for the Roses is as wide open as any in recent history and as I noted a while ago, we do have a shot at like five horses battling down the stretch, which would be way cool...but probably virtually guarantee the winner wouldn’t be worth a darn two weeks later in the Preakness, having expended so much energy at Churchill Downs.

Classic Empire should be the favorite come post-time, but that will mean little.

--As Phil W. passed on, kudos to the University of Georgia and head football coach Kirby Smart for rescinding the scholarship of an incoming freshman following his arrest last Saturday night on charges of simple battery and criminal trespass-damaged property in downtown Athens.  I’m not going to give the kid’s name, he’s already in enough trouble, but the evidence, as reported by Rivals.com, is overwhelming; the player having allegedly assaulted a woman in a bar, pushing her up against a wall and clutching her by the back of her neck.

Brenda Tracy, a member of the NCAA’s Committee to Combat Sexual Violence, was ecstatic that the university, and Coach Smart, acted so swiftly after Tracy herself, ironically, had spoken the day before to the Bulldog football team about this very subject.

So, yes, good job, Georgia.  The kid was a major recruit.

--I missed something in the current Sports Illustrated that Dr. W. pointed out to me...in “Faces in the Crowd”...Sage Surratt, of Lincolnton, N.C.  The 6’3”, 200-pound senior “became the first athlete to be named North Carolina’s AP player of the year in football and basketball. He set single-season state records for catches (129) and receiving yards (2,104); on the court he averaged 34.6 points, 11.8 rebounds and 5.5 assists.  Sage will play receiver at Wake Forest.”

That I knew.  But I had no idea on the guy’s hoops prowess.  No doubt he’ll walk-on as a bench player, maybe in his second or third year.  He’d be a great addition to Danny Manning’s program.  Clearly a committed kid. 

I hasten to add this is totally my idea, but makes sense.  Remember, Rusty LaRue was Wake’s QB and ended up playing a crucial role on the basketball team.

Actually, looking back, for the last 20 years, LaRue was one of the great two-sport athletes of this era.  Hell, he made the NBA, while lighting it up at QB for the Deacs.

--There was a story on alligators in USA TODAY and how areas like Orlando, Sarasota, Fort Myers and Naples rank among the highest in gator removal, according to data from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

“State contractors captured and removed alligators in more than 6,500 locations in Florida in 2016, resulting in 8,050 captured animals, most of them killed.”  [You just can’t relocate them like, say, a black bear.]

Florida’s alligator population is about 1.3 million, and alligators live in all 67 counties.

The worst year for human fatalities was 2001, when there were 16 reported alligator bites with three of them fatal.  There have apparently been 24 fatal alligator attacks in Florida since 1973.

--We note the passing of Oscar-winning filmmaker Jonathan Demme, 73. The cause of death was cancer.  Demme is best known for two films from the 1990s, “The Silence of the Lambs” (1991), for which both Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins won Oscars for their roles.  The other biggie was two years later, “Philadelphia,” which starred Tom Hanks and Denzel Washington. Hanks won a Best Actor Oscar.

Top 3 songs for the week 5/7/77: #1 “Hotel California” (Eagles)  #2 “When I Need You” (Leo Sayer)  #3 “Southern Nights” (Glen Campbell)...and...#4 “Sir Duke” (Stevie Wonder)  #5 “Don’t Leave Me This Way” (Thelma Houston)  #6 “Right Time Of The Night” (Jennifer Warnes)  #7 “So In To You” (Atlanta Rhythm Section)  #8 “I’ve Got Love On My Mind” (Natalie Cole) #9 “Couldn’t Get It Right” (Climax Blues Band)  #10 “I Wanna Get Next To You” (Rose Royce...I was finishing up my freshman year at Wake Forest, and despite excessive [deleted for sake of future job searches], I would finish up with a 2.5.  I thought it was upward from there.  I was badly mistaken....)

Cleveland Indians HR Quiz Answer: 200 homers in an Indians uniform....

Jim Thome 337
Albert Belle 242
Manny Ramirez 236
Earl Averill 226
Hal Trosky 216...1934-39; 104+ RBI each season, including a league-leading 162 in 1936.
Larry Doby 215
Andre Thornton 214
Travis Hafner 200

Al Rosen 192
Rocky Colavito 190

Next Bar Chat, Thursday.

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