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Bar Chat

11/23/2017

Jana Novotna...David Cassidy

[Posted Wednesday a.m.]

Baseball MVP Quiz: Final one to clean up postseason awards.  Barry Bonds has seven MVP awards, no one else has even four.  Name the nine with three.  [Hint: One player received all three in the 1930s, not Ruth (just 1 in his career) or Gehrig (2).]  Answer below.

College Football

CFP Rankings...just one change, which really doesn’t mean anything.....

1. Alabama 11-0
2. Miami 10-0
3. Clemson 10-1...Miami and Clemson flip-flopping
4. Oklahoma 10-1
5. Wisconsin 11-0
6. Auburn 9-2
7. Georgia 10-1
8. Notre Dame 9-2
9. Ohio State 9-2
10. Penn State 9-2
11. USC 10-2
12. TCU 9-2
15. UCF 10-0
20. Memphis 9-1...about Group of Five, New Year’s Six with these last two
24. South Carolina 8-3....helps Clemson, slightly

Michigan dropped out of rankings....does not help Ohio State.

Here’s the deal....only three games matter this weekend for the CFP...Alabama-Auburn, which is beyond massive...Clemson-South Carolina...and, very slightly, Ohio State-Michigan.

At this point, commentary and over analysis is useless until the games are played.  We all know now the final four is going to be set by the ACC, SEC, Big 12, and Big Ten championship games the following weekend.

We also know that there is going to be a raging debate after Dec. 2 and the final selection Dec. 3 over the 4 and 5 rankings.

For example, Ken P. asked, prior to tonight’s new ranking, “Who’s your fourth team in the playoff if ‘Bama, Miami and Wisconsin win out, but TCU wins the Big 12?”

That’s a realistic scenario that would be a mess. 

But Alabama-Auburn is going to clear up a lot.

--The other day I wrote of Baker Mayfield’s behavior in last Saturday’s Kansas game:

“The Sooners, and coach Lincoln Riley, will be under pressure to penalize Mayfield in some way. OU finishes the regular season at home next week against West Virginia, which isn’t a cupcake, so you can’t suspend him for the game (plus from a PR standpoint, the ‘school’ doesn’t want to ruin his Heisman chances, potentially, with such a drastic move), but I’m guessing Mayfield probably won’t start...perhaps sit out the first quarter.  He did apologize after the game.”

Bingo.  Coach Riley did not suspend Mayfield, as some wanted, announcing instead that he would not start, although he will play.  Nor will he be a team captain.

“We all know what provoked it,” Riley told reporters, “but it’s something that cannot happen and stand by.”

Riley was referring to the pathetic display of sportsmanship, or lack thereof, at the pregame coin toss, when the Kansas captains refused to shake Mayfield’s hand. And then there was a late hit on the quarterback, that I wrote of before.

NFL

--Boy, the Eagles sure looked outstanding in their 37-9 win over the Cowboys Sunday night, Dallas’ worst home loss in eight years at AT&T Stadium, Cowboys quarterback Dak Prescott throwing a career high three interceptions and losing a fumble that was returned for a touchdown.

So Eagles fans have visions of a Super Bowl dancing in their heads, Philly with a 9-1 record, Dallas falling to 5-5.

--Monday night the Falcons won their second straight to get to 6-4, showing shows of getting their Mojo back, 34-31 winners over the Seahawks (6-4) in Seattle.  After, many were talking about coach Pete Carroll and another of his wacky play calls, a fake field goal on fourth-and-one at the Atlanta 17, seven seconds left, Seattle down 24-17.  It ended up being an embarrassing failure and a loss of four yards.

Asked later about the call, Carroll said: “Look, we were trying to score, we were trying to take a shot.”  Then they lost by a field goal.

--After ten games for all....eight have records of 7-3 or better.

NFC: Philadelphia 9-1, New Orleans 8-2, Minnesota 8-2, Carolina 7-3, L.A. Rams 7-3

AFC: New England 8-2, Pittsburgh 8-2, Jacksonville 7-3

So it should be no surprise, looking at the above, that the top five teams in total offense are:

1. New Orleans
2. New England
3. Philadelphia
4. L.A. Rams
5. Minnesota

On the relegation line.....

Giants 2-8
San Francisco 1-9
Cleveland 0-10

Can you imagine if the NFL had relegation?  Not sure who’d you’d replace them with, but you would have some fan bases going absolutely nuts.

Jacksonville, by the way, is in undisputed possession of first place in their division after Week 11 for the first time since 1999.

--I found this kind of startling.  Baltimore is just the fifth team in the past 30 years to record three shutouts in a season.  Three of the previous four (’91 Redskins, ’00 Ravens, ’03 Patriots) won the Super Bowl.  Baltimore is 5-5.

But the Ravens have just the sixth best defense in the league. Jacksonville is No. 1, allowing a mere 14.1 points per game.

--The league is still buzzing over the move Bills coach Sean McDermott made after a 5-4 start, opting to replace solid starting quarterback Tyrod Taylor with fifth-round rookie Nathan Peterman, a move that proved to be one of the big failures of all time in the NFL, Peterman throwing an unheard of five interceptions in his single half of play as  the Bills are now 5-5 following a 54-24 loss to the Chargers, the third straight bad loss for Buffalo.

McDermott said after, “I don’t regret my decision. I regret the result.  It wasn’t what he or we hoped for, but young players experience things like this.”

Peterman’s five picks (Taylor replaced him after halftime), tied the NFL record for most INTs thrown in a quarterback’s first start, but in a single freakin’ half!

--Speaking to ESPN’s Dave McMenamin after a Cavaliers practice the other day, LeBron James said that Colin Kaepernick, who has been unable to sign with an NFL team since parting ways with the 49ers in March, has been “blackballed out of the NFL.”  James spoke glowingly of Kaepernick.

“I’ve commended Kap, and for him to sacrifice everything for the greater good for everyone, for what he truly believed in, the utmost respect to him,” James said. “Obviously he had a vision like Martin Luther King [Jr.], and like some of our all-time greats that people couldn’t see further than what they were doing at the point and time.”

James, an avid follower of the sport of football, said: “I watch football every Sunday, every Thursday, every Monday night. I see all these quarterbacks – first-string, second-team, third-team quarterbacks – that play sometimes when the starter gets hurt or are starters that play.  Kap is better than a lot of those guys,” James told ESPN.  “Let’s just be honest.”

“It just feels like he’s been blackballed out of the NFL,” James added.  “So, I definitely do not respect that. ...The only reason I could say he’s not on a team is because of the way he took a knee. That’s the only reason.”

Fox Sports analyst, and Pro Football Hall of Famer Shannon Sharpe, said: “Maybe Colin Kaepernick will never get the respect that he deserves for what he did, but I believe when it’s all said and done, and history is written 30-40 years from now, Colin Kaepernick will be looked upon as some of these mythical figures of the Dr. Kings and Muhammad Alis and the Rosa Parks.”

So with the above, I have to remind you of a bit I wrote about five weeks ago.

“(It) was ten days ago, Sept. 30, that I happened to catch Bob Costas on Michael Smerconish’s Saturday morning CNN show, and I loved what Costas said about Colin Kaepernick, only it took forever for CNN to post the transcript and I wanted to be accurate.

Smerconish was asking Costas in general about the anthem controversy.

COSTAS: As we’ve talked before, Colin Kaepernick’s intentions were good, but when you say I do not vote because the oppressor will never allow you to vote your way out of your repression;  I guess it doesn’t matter to him that people, mostly black but some white, died for his predecessor’s right to vote or were beaten or mistreated in their efforts. And maybe it doesn’t matter to him that when he first took a knee, Barack Obama was President and now Donald Trump is President.  He later shows up at practice wearing socks that depict cops as pigs. He praises Fidel Castro when in Miami.  Maybe that’s why he’s not the quarterback of the Dolphins now and Jay Cutler is. Although, there may be other reasons.

“So you need to move beyond Colin Kaepernick whose intentions were good and has donated and raised millions of dollars, so his heart is in the right place but who sounds very politically naïve.”

--Mark Maske of the Washington Post reports that some NFL owners believe there is a strong possibility the league will decide in the offseason to change the national anthem policy if the players’ protests during the anthem persist through the end of this season, “reverting to a previous approach of keeping players in the locker room while the anthem is played, according to several people familiar with the league’s inner workings.”

But you won’t hear much more on this until the annual league meeting in March.

Just do it now.  [President Trump used the above to once again blast the NFL this morning.]

--Cowboys owner Jerry Jones has changed his mind and will not sue the NFL, or the six-team owners on the committee that is negotiating a contract extension for Commissioner Roger Goodell.

Jones wrote to Falcons owner Arthur Blank, the chairman of the committee, to explain he is walking back the threat because the group is finally “receiving valuable feedback from a number of owners,” according to the New York Times.

Jones, in his letter, again denied that Ezekiel Elliott’s suspension had been his motivation.

The compensation committee had denied Jones’ request that all NFL team owners be included in a final vote for the commissioner’s contract.

--We note the passing of former NFL wide receiver Terry Glenn, 43, who died early Monday after a car crash in Irving, Texas; a “single roll-over crash.”

Glenn played for the Patriots, Packers and Cowboys during his 12-year career and retired in 2007 with 593 catches and 44 touchdowns.  He was the seventh overall pick in the 1996 NFL draft following a standout junior year at Ohio State, when he won the Biletnikoff Award for his 64 catches for 1,411 yards and 17 touchdowns.

In his rookie year for the Patriots, Glenn caught 90 passes for 1,132 yards and six touchdowns to help New England reach the Super Bowl.  Five years later, Glenn caught Tom Brady’s first career touchdown pass.

Glenn was then traded to the Packers, and Dallas, with back-to-back 1,000-yard seasons and totaled 13 touchdowns.

NBA

--A few games of note on Monday....

The Knicks returned home and blitzed the Clippers (5-1) 107-85, the Knicks now 8-3 at home, 1-4 on the road.  Doug McDermott had 16 off the bench and the duo of McDermott and Enes Kanter (16 rebounds) has been paying huge dividends, these two coming over in the Carmelo Anthony trade that is one of the better examples of ‘addition by subtraction’ that we’ve had in the sports world in recent years.

Boston won its 16th in a row, now 16-2, following a 110-102 overtime win down in Dallas against the hapless Mavs, now 3-15.  Kyrie Irving had another superb game, 47 points on 16 of 22 from the field.  He’s now 26 of 34 his last two, including 10 of 13 from three.

And I can’t help but note that Wake Forest’s John Collins had another big game off the bench for Atlanta, though the Hawks fell to 3-14 with a 96-85 loss to San Antonio. Collins had 21 points on 10 of 12 shooting, with 9 rebounds.

--A story broke today that Manute Bol, the former NBA player who stood 7-7 and weighed just 200 lbs., may have been in his 40s, possibly 50 years old, rather than the 23-year-old he was listed as when starting out in the league.

Former Cleveland State coach Kevin Mackey, who recruited Bol out of Sudan, listed his birthday as October 12, 1962.

“I gave him his birthday because they didn’t know how old he was,” Mackey, currently a scout with the Indiana Pacers, told ZAGSBLOG.  “It was in October, I wanted to make it after Sept. 1.  I wanted to make sure he was young enough because he didn’t have an age.  I think he was [in his 40s], I really do. But there’s no way of ever really knowing.”

Bol never played at Cleveland State and ended up at Bridgeport, where he played one season before being drafted by the then-Washington Bullets in the first round.  He led the league in blocks twice, but otherwise never stayed on the court much in his career, averaging just 2.6 points per game.

Bol died in 2010.  Age now unknown.

College Basketball

Nothing earth-shattering going on in the sport, but for the record, the latest AP Poll has the following...I won’t post W-L marks for another few weeks.

1. Duke
2. Arizona
3. Kansas
4. Michigan State*
5. Villanova
6. Wichita State...BC “Pick to Click”
7. Florida
8, Kentucky
9. North Carolina
10. USC
11. Miami
13. Notre Dame
20. Seton Hall...Johnny Mac and Paul J. are the latest to join yours truly on the Pirates’ train (a  local from Summit to South Orange).  We all love their veteran experience and the ability to get it done both inside and outside.

*Star Miles Bridges is OK....day-to-day after spraining his ankle over the weekend.  Spartans fans can breathe easy.

--I see that Malik Pope of San Diego State (3-1) is finally, in his senior season, fulfilling his immense potential (16 points, 8 rebounds in just 25 min. per).  He remains a very intriguing NBA prospect.

MLB

--The Baseball Writers’ Association of America ballot for the 2018 Hall of Fame class was released on Monday, with three potential first-ballot selectees: Chipper Jones, Jim Thome and Omar Vizquel, though I’m guessing just Jones makes it in this first go ‘round.

Others on the ballot from last year include Trevor Hoffman, who was just five votes shy at 74 percent last year (75 percent required), with Vladimir Guerrero coming in last time at 71.7 percent.

And other newcomers who will receive some votes are Johan Santana, Jamie Moyer and Andruw Jones.

As for the four returnees who have been tracking higher in recent years – Edgar Martinez, Roger Clemens, Barry Bonds and Mike Mussina – Martinez received 58.6 percent and is in his ninth of ten years allowed (beginning five years after retirement).

Mussina had 51.8 percent with five more years after this one.

But once again most eyes are going to be on the tally for Clemens and Bonds.  Clemens was at 54.1 percent a year ago, and Bonds at 53.8 percent. Both have four more years of eligibility after this one.  My guess is 58 percent or higher signals they will eventually get in.  If they were to drop at all, that wouldn’t bode well, to say the least.

Curt Schilling is another name on the ballot, but his support fell from 52.3 percent in 2016 to 45 percent in 2017 and he has four years after this one as well.

Voters have until Dec. 31 to file their paper ballots and the results will be announced on Jan. 24.

But the next day, Hall of Famer Joe Morgan, the Hall’s vice chairman and a member of its board of directors, sent a letter to voters with a list of three criteria that he thinks should disqualify future candidates for admission to the shrine.

Morgan said he was representing the views of many who are concerned by what they see as eroding standards for admission.

“The more we Hall of Famers talk about this – and we talk about it a lot – we realize we can no longer sit silent. Many of us have come to think that silence will be considered complicity.  Or that fans might think we are ok if the standards of election to the Hall of Fame are relaxed, at least relaxed enough for steroid users to enter and become members of the most sacred place in Baseball. We don’t want fans ever to think that.

“We hope the day never comes when known steroid users are voted into the Hall of Fame. They cheated. Steroid users don’t belong here.

“Players who failed drug tests, admitted using steroids, or were identified as users in Major League Baseball’s investigation into steroid abuse, known as the Mitchell Report, should not get in. Those are the three criteria that many of the players and I think are right.”

Morgan acknowledged in his letter that Hall of Fame voting is a “tricky issue” and the electorate has to deal with “shades of gray” in assessing individual candidates.

“But it still occurs to me that anyone who took body-altering chemicals in a deliberate effort to cheat the game we love, not to mention they cheated current and former players, and fans too, doesn’t belong in the Hall of Fame,” Morgan wrote.  “By cheating, they put up huge numbers, and they made great players who didn’t cheat look smaller by comparison, taking away from their achievements and consideration for the Hall of Fame. That’s not right.

“And that’s why I, and other Hall of Famers, feel so strongly about this.

“It’s gotten to the point where Hall of Famers are saying that if steroid users get in, they’ll no longer come to Cooperstown for Induction Ceremonies or other events.  Some feel they can’t share a stage with players who did steroids....The Hall of Fame means too much to us to ever see that happen.  If steroid users get in, it will divide and diminish the Hall, something we couldn’t bear.”  [Jerry Crasnick / ESPN]

--I was reading a piece by the Hall of Fame’s Bruce Markusen on celebrities and baseball, circa 1940s/50s, and many of you know how HOFer Ralph Kiner had a thing for the ladies, dating some of Hollywood’s leading starlets, and there was this concerning Bing Crosby.

“So how is it that Harry Crosby, better known as Bing, came to own part of the Pirates?  He was a close friend of Pirates majority owner John Galbreath, whom he came to know through their mutual interest in horse racing. That relationship led to Crosby purchasing shares in the team, beginning in 1947.  Crosby did not sit idly by, but at times took on an active role.  According to son Nathaniel, Bing played a role in recruiting high school pitching prospect Vernon Law, who would become a Pirates mainstay. Crosby also signed a prospect named Tom Mulcahy in 1956; Mulcahy would never pitch in the big leagues, but would become a longtime scout with the San Diego Padres.

“In particular, Crosby became close with Kiner, the Pirates’ leading power hitter from 1946 to 1952.  It was Crosby who set up a date between Kiner and a young actress named Elizabeth Taylor.  At Crosby’s request, Kiner accompanied Taylor to a premiere for the Gregory Peck film, Twelve O’Clock High.  As Kiner put it years later: ‘He didn’t have to ask twice!’

“Crosby maintained his ownership interest in the Pirates into the mid-1960s. As part of his intriguing baseball legacy, he owned a kinescope recording of the televised broadcast of Game 7 of the 1960 World Series. That recording eventually made its way to the MLB Network, which aired the tape in 2010.  For that, we can thank Bing Crosby, baseball fan and owner.”

Crosby sidekick Bob Hope was a longtime part owner of the Indians, once appearing on the cover of Sports Illustrated in full Indians regalia.  And of course the most famous majority owner who was a celeb was Gene Autry, the “Singing Cowboy,” who became majority owner of the Angels in 1961, continuing until his death in 1998.

Good lord...19 years since Gene Autry died?!  Yikes.

World Cup 2018

If the Thanksgiving dinner conversation becomes too contentious, just go, “Hey, let’s pick a winner for the World Cup!”

Peru beat New Zealand 2-0 the other day to take the final sport so the 32-team field is set.

[Geographically....as Fifa sees it.]

Europe: Russia (hosts), Belgium, England, France, Germany, Iceland, Poland, Portugal, Serbia, Spain, Croatia, Denmark, Sweden and Switzerland.

Africa: Egypt, Morocco, Nigeria, Senegal and Tunisia.

North and Central America and the Caribbean: Costa Rica, Mexico and Panama.

South America: Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Peru and Uruguay.

Asia: Australia, Iran, Japan, Saudi Arabia and South Korea.

The draw is Friday, Dec. 1, in Moscow.  Teams are seeded based on Oct. 2017 Fifa world rankings.

1. Germany
2. Brazil
3. Portugal
4. Argentina
5. Belgium

The only team in the Top Ten NOT to qualify for the WC is 9 Chile.  14 Wales and 15 Italy also failed to move on.

Host Russia has the worst ranking at 65.

The U.S. is ranked 27...#chokejob

--Champions League play continued this week.  In Tuesday’s games, Tottenham beat Borussia Dortmund 2-1 and Manchester City defeated Feyenoord 1-0, the two already into the knockout round.

But Liverpool blew a 3-0 halftime lead and allowed Sevilla to get a 3-3 draw in extra time, which means that Liverpool needs a draw in its final Group stage game against Spartak-Moscow to secure a position in the round of 16.

Manchester United and Chelsea have matches today, Wednesday.

--In the Men’s Division I Soccer Championship, No. 1 seed Wake Forest faces Butler this weekend in the third round, while upstart Colgate goes against 4-seed Louisville.

Fordham goes up against 6-seed Duke, while 2-seed Indiana squares off against New Hampshire, among other matches in the Sweet Sixteen.

Golf Balls

Wally Uihlein, CEO of Titleist parent company Acushnet Co., wrote a letter to the Wall Street Journal that there is no evidence that golf is being negatively impacted by players hitting the ball farther; a response to an earlier piece about golf’s governing bodies exploring the possibility of creating different sets of ball regulations for different levels of the game.

As reported by Brian Costa: “Uihlein offered a point-by-point rebuttal to the arguments made by USGA executive director Mike Davis, who said the costs of lengthening courses were trickling down to all golfers and slowing the pace of play.”

Uihlein: “Is there any evidence to support this canard...the trickle down cost argument?  Where is the evidence to support the argument that golf course operating costs nationwide are being escalated due to advances in equipment technology?”

Uihlein saying the ball is just one reason among many that has today’s players hitting it farther than ever, citing improved player fitness and instruction.

Needless to say, Titleist is the dominant player in the golf ball market, with part of its pitch being you and I can play the same ball the pros play, but the USGA would set different ball levels.

Stuff

--Former Wimbledon champion Jana Novotna has died at the age of 49; the cause was cancer.  The Czech player had lost in the Wimbledon final in 1993 and 1997 before winning in 1998, defeating Nathalie Tauziat in 1998, Novotna becoming the oldest first-time Grand Slam singles winner in the Open Era at 29 years and nine months.

Novotna had won over the Wimbledon faithful in 1993 when she lost her finals to Steffi Gaf, 7-6 (8-6), 1-6, 6-4...Novotna being up 4-1 in the third before Graf stormed back to take the next five games, Novotna then breaking down in tears, to be comforted by the Duchess of Kent after receiving the loser’s trophy from her.

Chuck Culpepper / Washington Post

“The words ‘Wimbledon champion’ describe so few human beings that they alone make for lavish compliment even when simply accurate. Yet in the case of Jana Novotna...they do remain insufficient. For a Czech player probably obscure to Americans who seldom follow tennis, Novotna came to live as a towering emblem of a crucial sports tenet.

“High among the reasons we bother with sports, from its Olympics to its high schools, is the idea that we might witness somebody overcome something or even a lot of something....For anyone who would look – and people forever should – Novotna’s five-year path to her 1998 Wimbledon title was a marvel because it was so graphically human.

“She overcame the frightful beast of her own central nervous system.  Every single one of us seven billion can identify with that.

“As a storytelling flourish in that, Novotna accomplished this with the serial company of a picture of elegance, the Duchess of Kent, the first cousin-in-law of Queen Elizabeth II.  In the enduring image of Novotna’s career, the Duchess, in presenting Novotna the runner-up plate in 1993, pulled a sobbing Novotna to her exquisitely dressed shoulder. She assured her that she would win Wimbledon someday. In the grand, royal, formal history of Wimbledon trophy presentations, it did come as a beautiful outlier.”

The Independent of London called Novotna’s 1993 loss “A Kafkaesque self-destruction.”  It was in the third set that Novotna, up 40-15, looked to be on the verge of going up 5-1.  Opponent Steffi Graf told Bud Collins in the post-march interview, “I felt I lost already the match.”

Culpepper: “What followed was an unmistakable choke.”  Double faults, missed volleys.  Graf won 17 of the final 21 points.

But Novotna kept returning to Wimbledon, lost the final again in 1997 and then triumphed the next year.

Culpepper:  “(Her) losses had magnified her win, in that odd capability of all losses. She had become a one-time Grand Slam champion and unforgettable.  The perseverance, the overcoming, all the things that make competition so compelling, all filled Centre Court.  For all the understandable memory of when a duchess pulled a runner-up to her shoulder, it’s also worth remembering the Duchess of Kent’s words when fixing to present Novotna with the champion’s Venus Rosewater dish.

“Even a novice lip-reader could discern them:

“ ‘I’m so proud of you.’”

--Awful story from the Irish Independent that is going to be costly to ‘Man’ on the All-Species List.

“A dog has reportedly died after spending a month at an airport awaiting its owner’s return.

“The dog, which was named ‘Nube Viajera’ or ‘Wandering Cloud’ by vets who treated her, is believed to have been dumped at the airport by her owner.

“She spent her days mingling with passengers and sniffing them, presumably looking for her owner, before she gave up and lay in a corner of the terminal at Palonegro airport in Columbia.

“The young dog was offered food by passengers and staff at the airport but refused to eat and her condition deteriorated.

“The Mirror reported that the dog was treated by vets at a shelter after somebody alerted an animal rescue charity, but she was already unable to stand.

“She received food and treatment intravenously but continued to deteriorate and vets said her cause of death was depression.”

‘Man’ is hereby knocked down another notch to No. 374 on the ASL.

--So I’m reading a story in the Rapid City Journal (S.D.) and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist David Philipps has written a book titled “Wild Horse Country,” which Philipps has designated as the dry, desolate pockets of the intermountain West where most wild horses – aka mustangs – are found.

The population of wild horses in America was nearly annihilated in the 1920s and ‘30s, as they were rounded up in great numbers, slaughtered, and processed into dog food.

Today, the population has bounced back, owing to activism and legislation that has pushed horse slaughterhouses out of the country and resulted in legal protection on designated federal lands in the West.

Philipps writes of the horses: “They are freedom. They are independence. They are the ragtag misfits defying incredible odds. They are the lowborn outsiders whose nobility springs from the adversity of living a simple life. In short, they are American.  Or at least they are what we tell ourselves we are, and what we aspire to be.”

But today there are 73,000 roaming 31.6 million acres, despite the U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s assertion that the land can only support 27,000 wild horses.

45,000 have been rounded up and placed in 60 off-range holding areas, including corrals, pastures and sanctuaries.  About 1,200 are in South Dakota in a narrow area, around Newell and East Butte.

Get this: “The Newell land is owned by Neal Wanless, who bought it with the proceeds of a $232 million Powerball jackpot he won in 2009.”

Anyway, Philipps has a solution to the overpopulation.  Mountain lions.

--Brad K. passed this one along from Emily Crane of the Daily Mail.

“Three African elephants bizarrely ended up grazing on the side of a Tennessee highway after the semi-truck trailer they were in suddenly caught fire.

“Police found the elephants when they responded to a call about the fire on the Interstate 24 in Chattanooga on the Tennessee state line early Monday morning.

“The owners got the animals out of the trailer safely before emergency crews arrived.”

The Chattanooga Fire Department chief described the elephants as being “huge but well behaved.”

The elephants were being transported from an Indiana wildlife park where they live to Sarasota, Florida for the winter. The owners secured a new truck and they were back on their way south.

I know there are some parents out there, facing long drives over the holidays, wishing their children behaved this well.  Yet another reason why ‘Elephant’ remains No. 2 on the All-Species List.

--Finally, if you aren’t of a certain age you’ll never understand what a massive teen idol David Cassidy was, the former star of “The Partridge Family” TV hit of the 1970s that yours truly was a big fan of.

In recent months Cassidy had announced he was suffering from dementia and he died of multiple organ failure at the age of 67.

“I will always be eternally grateful for the love and support you’ve shown me,” he said in a statement earlier this year.  “I still love very much to play and perform live. But it’s much more difficult for me now.  I’m not going to vanish or disappear forever.”

Cassidy had small acting gigs before he shot to fame playing singer Keith Partridge, the sitcom being a take on the family-band genre.  The series also starred Cassidy’s real-life stepmother, Shirley Jones, debuting in 1970 and running for four seasons.

Based on the musical family known as the Cowsills, “The Partridge Family” was a smash hit, particularly with teenage girls (and guys who had a crush on Susan Dey).

David Cassidy had the looks, smile and stylish clothes of the era and every teenage girl, it seemed, had his poster on their bedroom wall.

Cassidy sang on more than a dozen band and solo albums during his “Partridge Family” years.  “I Think I love You” topped the charts in 1970, and the following year you had the top ten “Doesn’t Somebody Want To Be Wanted” and “I’ll Meet You Halfway.”  The group played in sold-out stadium tours.

Cassidy was born in New York City (and raised in New Jersey) on April 12, 1950. His father, Jack Cassidy, was a Tony Award winning stage performer and his mother, Evelyn Ward, an actress.  Jack Cassidy died in an apartment fire in West Hollywood in 1976.

David Cassidy was never entirely comfortable with his squeaky-clean image and the fan frenzy over the “Partridge Family.”  He wanted to perform more edgy rock fare, which his teenage image didn’t fit.

Cassidy once said: “It seemed whenever I’d read my name, it would be David ‘former teen idol sex symbol’ Cassidy.’ I used to think, ‘Well, I guess I’m going to have to do something more significant in my life, like David ‘convicted felon’ Cassidy or something,’ anything that would erase that convenient label.’” [August Brown / Los Angeles Times]

Oh, there were tons of low points, including at a 1974 London show where a girl was killed in a crush of fans at the front of the stage, and he had drug and alcohol issues, and in the last five years a bunch of DUIs.  Three marriages.

But now teen idol sex symbol David Cassidy from an era many of us will long remember has died.  RIP.

Top 3 songs for the week 11/24/79:  #1 “No More Tears (Enough Is Enough)” (Barbra Streisand/Donna Summer) #2 “Babe” (Styx)  #3 “Still” (Commodores)...and...#4 “Dim All The Lights” (Donna Summer) #5 “Heartache Tonight” (Eagles) #6 “Please Don’t Go” (K.C. & The Sunshine Band)  #7 “You Decorated My Life” (Kenny Rogers0  #8 “Send One Your Love” (Stevie Wonder) #9 “Tusk” (Fleetwood Mac)  #10 “Pop Muzik” (M...ugh...back to the ‘60s, friends....if I go into the ‘80s, I’ll commit hari-kari...)

Baseball Quiz Answer: Nine with three MVP Awards....

Musial, Pujols, Berra, Campanella, DiMaggio, Foxx (all in 1930s), Mantle, A-Rod, Schmidt

Next Bar Chat, Monday.

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

 

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