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05/02/2019

Remembering Gino Marchetti

[Posted Wed. a.m.]

MLB Quiz: Stolen Bases... 1) Name the last player in the NL to steal 70 bases in a season.  2) Name the last player in the AL to steal 70.  3) Name the only four, post-1900, to steal 100 in a season.  Answers below.

NBA Playoffs

--Philadelphia evened its series with Toronto at 1-1 with a 94-89 win Monday night, in Toronto.  Jimmy Butler led the way with 30 points and 11 rebounds for the Sixers.

The Raptors were down 19 in the first half, then cut it to one late in the third, only to go cold at the start of the fourth, missing six of their first seven.

But a pair of 3-pointers by Kyle Lowry cut it to 90-87 with 1:36 to go, and then a layup from Pascal Siakam made it a one-point game.  But Joel Embiid, playing with the flu, hit a driving shot at the other end, restoring the three-point advantage, and that was it, Danny Green missing a potential tying 3, Philly’s Tobias Harris came up with the rebound, he was fouled and made a pair of free throws for the final margin.

The Sixers got a strong game off the bench from James Ennis, 13 points and 6 rebounds.

Kawhi Leonard had another terrific  game from the field, 13 of 24, in scoring 35 points, but the rest of the team was just 20 of 67...putrid.  The Raptors were 10 for 37 from three-point range.

--I have to go back to Sunday’s Game 1...Warriors 104 Houston 100.

Brian Windhorst / ESPN.com

“It’s easy to forget there are three teams on the floor at all times. Ideally, one of them remains anonymous and forgettable.  The stakes and the nature of these teams make that most difficult.

“When referees prepare for games, they go over film and tendencies, just like the teams.  It is well known that the Rockets have a penchant for drawing fouls on 3-pointers.  This is a part of their attack.  James Harden drew 95 fouls on 3-pointers this season.  He is one of the best in the history of the game at it.

“It was clear that part of Golden State’s game plan is to crowd the Houston 3-point shooters. And the Houston game plan involves 3-point shooters twisting their bodies and ripping their arms into their defenders. Both teams are good at it.

“So here it was. There were 10 seconds left and the Rockets were down 3.  Harden, one of the greatest ever at drawing a foul, takes a 3-pointer to try to tie the score, Draymond Green, one of the great defenders of this era, leaps to challenge it.

“Green comes forward into Harden’s area.  Harden’s legs jackknife toward Green and Harden spills to the ground.  Two officials, Courtney Kirkland and Josh Tiven, stare and call nothing....

“ ‘When you land 3 feet ahead of where you shoot the ball from, that really ain’t my issue,’ Green said.  ‘I’ve been fouled by James on a James 3-pointer before.’”

Well, the discussion was all about the officiating after Game 1, as we learned the Rockets sent game film of a playoff contest last year to the league office, showing how they are constantly ripped off, and, really guys, just play the game.  I don’t care.

I’m not a Draymond Green fan, but he put it best.  “That’s just the nature of the game we play.  Refereeing is an inexact science.  So it is what it is.”

So last night the Rockets fell behind in the series 2-0, as the Warriors won 115-109, Kevin Durant with 29, while Andre Iguodala continued to contribute in a big way in the absence of DeMarcus Cousins, the 35-year-old with 16 points on just nine shots.

But in the game, James Harden went down, writhing in pain, after being accidentally poked in the eyes by Draymond Green.  In the postgame, he said he was having trouble seeing, though he did return to the court. 

Steph Curry dislocated the middle finger on his left hand, but after an X-ray was negative, he returned following a tape job on the finger.  He didn’t sound concerned it would limit him going forward.

--Going back to Monday night, the Nuggets won Game 1 of their series with the Trail Blazers in Denver, 121-113, as Nikola Jokic, the least-known superstar in the game, had 37 points, 9 rebounds and 6 assists.

Jokic is averaging 24.9, 11.8, 8.8 this postseason, after averaging 20.1, 10.8, 7.3 during the regular season. 

Game 2 in the series tonight.

--The Bucks evened their series against the Celtics last night, 123-102, as Khris Middleton had 28 for Milwaukee, including 7 of 10 from three. Giannis had 29 points and 10 rebounds.  Kyrie Irving had a miserable night for Boston, 4 of 18 from the field, 9 points.

--The Knicks continued to pack Madison Square Garden this season, some would say inexplicably, but to go to a game is more a ‘happening,’ and a place to be seen, if you travel in certain circles.  You also get a lot of out-of-towners, tourists, business travelers at the games.

But according to Sports Business Journal, Knicks telecasts on MSG Network saw their ratings drop a whopping 38 percent this season over last.  That is more of a true reflection of interest, the Knicks finishing with an NBA-worst 17-65 record.

Meanwhile, the surprising Brooklyn Nets saw a 22 percent increase in their ratings, whilie having the league’s lowest attendance (14,941).

--Last time I wrote of Earl “The Pearl” Monroe and his college days at Winston-Salem State.  So ‘Shu’ wrote in and I knew he grew up in the area roughly around that time, and while he didn’t see The Pearl live, he told me he got to see Gene Little, who went to High Point, and ML Carr and Lloyd Free, who went to Guildford College, as Shu was within walking distance of the Elon gym.  Very cool.

Stanley Cup Playoffs

Last night, the Columbus Blue Jackets took a 2-1 series lead over the Bruins, with a 2-1 win in Columbus, while San Jose is now up 2-1 in its series with Colorado, the Sharks defeating the Avalanche in Denver, 4-2.

MLB

--Just one note...as I’m rushed this morning with other obligations...CC Sabathia, by all accounts, just punched his ticket to the Hall of Fame as he became the 17th pitcher in baseball history – and only the third left-hander – to strike out 3,000 batters last night, joining Hall of Famers Steve Carlton and Randy Johnson as the only lefties at that plateau.

Sabathia is also just the third African-American to achieve the milestone, following Bob Gibson and Ferguson Jenkins.

“Being a ‘Black Ace’ is something that I take very seriously,” said Sabathia, one of only 15 African-Americans to win 20 games.

Maybe CC isn’t a first-ballot Hall of Famer, but he’s getting his plaque in Cooperstown.  A 247-154 career mark, a Cy Young, five top-five finishes (big in my book), a World Series championship....

But some will say his ERA, 3.69, is too high and indeed it would be the third worst of any pitcher in the Hall.  But that won’t matter to 75%+ of the baseball writers filling out their ballots.

Last night, CC took the loss, the Yankees losing to the Diamondbacks 3-1, with Sabathia giving up two runs in 5 1/3, plus five strikeouts.

--College Baseball Top Ten (Baseball America)

1. UCLA
2. Stanford
3. Vanderbilt
4. Oregon State
5. Arkansas
6. Mississippi State
7. Louisville
8. Georgia
9. East Carolina
10. Georgia Tech

NFL

Steve Klingaman / Baltimore Sun

“He was rugged, rangy and relentless in his pursuit of quarterbacks. For 13 years during their heyday, the Baltimore Colts were defined by a slab of a man known simply as Gino.

“No Colts player epitomized the club – or the city – better than Gino Marchetti, the Hall of Fame defensive end who died Monday of pneumonia.  Mr. Marchetti, 93, passed away at Paoli Hospital in Paoli, Pa. ....

“The son of an immigrant coal miner, Mr. Marchetti rose from a lunch-pail environs to become captain of the two-time world champions (1958-59) and one of the most feared pass rushers in NFL history.  He often played hurt; he always played hard. Colliding with the 6-foot-4, 245-pound Marchetti, Detroit quarterback Bobby Layne once said, was ‘like running into a tree trunk in the dark.’

“ ‘Swift and smart, Mr. Marchetti was the prototype of the modern defensive end,’ said Don Shula.

“ ‘He revolutionized the way you play that position in the NFL,’ said Mr. Shula, former Colts player and coach.  ‘Prior to Gino, the attitude [of pass rushers] was to try to physically overpower the offensive tackle. Gino showed that with good instincts and a lightning quickness, he could get around his man without really engaging him.

“ ‘The offensive tackle’s uniform never got very dirty, but the quarterback’s sure did.’”

Marchetti became the favorite of Baltimore fans.

“ ‘Gino romanticized defense,’ The Evening Sun’s Bill Tanton wrote.

“Dark-haired and swarthy, Mr. Marchetti won the city’s heart with a string of gritty comebacks from injuries.  Appendicitis in 1954.  A dislocated shoulder in 1955.  Neither sidelined him for more than a month.

“In 1958, while making a saving tackle in the NFL championship game, Mr. Marchetti’s ankle snapped.  Lying in the Colts dressing room, waiting to hear the outcome, he muttered, ‘If we win this game, it’s worth getting a broken leg.’

“Four months later, egged on by the club’s owner, Mr. Marchetti and two teammates opened a burger joint on North Point Road in Dundalk. Crowds flocked to the drive-in for the double-decker ‘Gino Giant’ and a chance to meet the sandwich’s namesake.  By 1982, ‘Gino’s’ had mushroomed into a nationwide chain of 469 fast-food restaurants when it was sold to Marriott International for $48 million.

“Though he played in the era before sacks were an official NFL statistic, Mr. Marchetti’s legacy has never depended on numbers.  In 1969, he was named the best defensive end of the NFL’s first half century.  Three years later, in his first season of eligibility, Marchetti entered the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

“In 1994, he was one of three defensive ends selected to the NFL 75th Anniversary All-Time Team, alongside David (Deacon) Jones and Reggie White.”

Marchetti also had a hand in the decision-making with Colts’ management.  After the team fired coach Weeb Ewbank following a 7-7 season in 1962, on Marchetti’s advice they hired Don Shula, then 33 and the youngest head coach in NFL history. Shula led the Colts to seven consecutive winning seasons, before moving on to Miami.

Finally, of all his accolades, Marchetti said his overall reputation as a clean player meant the most.

“I never got hit with a 15-yard penalty,” he said. “No late hits.  No clipping.  No hitting out of bounds.  I didn’t make stupid mistakes or put the team in trouble.”

Champions League Semis

Ajax defeated Tottenham on the road in the first leg of their semifinal, 1-0, yesterday.  A listless first half for my Spurs, followed by spirited play in the second that fell short.  This was one game where they really missed injured striker Harry Kane.

Today, in the other semifinal, Barcelona hosts Liverpool in their first leg.

Kentucky Derby       

It is going to be pure mayhem, and excitement, Saturday with a 20-horse field for the Derby, but in such a field you don’t want to be starting on the rail and the two favorites, Omaha Beach (4-1) and Game Winner (5-1) are starting from the No. 12 and 16 positions, respectively.

Richard Mandella is the trainer for Omaha Beach and he has Hall of Fame jockey Mike Smith up top; Smith winning last year’s Derby for Bob Baffert aboard Justify.  Baffert is the trainer for Game Winner, as well as Roadster (No. 17 post) and Improbable (No. 5), who are co-third choices at 6-1.

Since 1930, only five winners have come from the 16, and zero from the 17.   The most winners have come from the 5, with ten.  [Only three from the 12, where Omaha Beach starts from.]

But this year’s Derby has a shadow over it, as I’ve been writing since December...the 23 deaths at Santa Anita Park in California in a three-month span.  It’s depressing.  The future of the sport is at stake.

Joe Drape / New York Times

“One hundred nine years ago, Arthur B. Hancock moved his thoroughbred breeding operation atop a slab of mineral rich limestone carpeted by thick, lush bluegrass.  He called it Claiborne Farm.

“It is to horse racing what the Yankees are to baseball: the bedrock of more than 75 champions and the land where the immortal Secretariat stood as a stallion.

“Now, Walker Hancock, who is the fifth generation of his family to run Claiborne Farm, is afraid there will be nothing left to pass down to the sixth.

“He is terrified, he said, that the sport is living on borrowed time, as are most people in what remains the heart and soul of the thoroughbred industry....

“ ‘The way it’s going right now, it’s not sustainable,’ Hancock, 29, said of the sport.  ‘We got to change the public’s perception and clean this thing up if we are going to survive.’....

“Nearly 10 horses a week, on average, died at American racetracks in 2018, according to the Jockey Club’s Equine Injury Database.  That’s a fatality rate that is anywhere from two and a half to five times greater than in the rest of the racing world....

“Cracking down on drugs is essential, reformers say, because the drugs allow horses to run unnaturally fast and mask pain, which leads to more breakdowns.

“This is a crisis for people in the sport whose livelihoods depend on the breeding and nurturing, and the buying and selling, of racehorses.”

So now the horsemen, ironically, need the support of PETA.  Kathy Guillermo, a PETA vice president, is working with Santa Anita to draw up new rules.

“You are now dealing with a public that has become intolerant of broken bones, whipping, drugging and death,” Guillermo said.  “I make them nervous,” she said of the horse industry, “though we should be on the same side, really.”

Joe Drape:

“Claiborne [Ed. which has four horses from sires in the Derby] is the center of a $5.2 billion ecosystem that puts 61,000 people to work on more than 831,000 acres.  But for how long?

“Horse racing has been on the decline for nearly two decades.  In 2002, more than $15 billion was bet on races in the United States; last year, the handle fell to $11 billion.  In 2002, nearly 33,000 thoroughbred foals were registered as racehorses compared with 19,925 last year.”

Game Winner is your winner, by the way.

Golf Balls

--I didn’t have a chance last time to comment on last weekend’s Champions Tour event, the Legends of Golf at the Top of the Rock course at the Big Cedar Lodge in Ridgedale, Mo.  But it ended up being pretty historic.  Wake Forest’s Scott Hoch, teamed with Tom Pernice Jr., became the oldest winner in PGA Tour Champions history at 63 years, five months.  [My old friend, cough cough, Carlos Franco, was among those finishing T-2, playing with Vijay Singh.]

Hoch won 11 times on the PGA Tour, with a very famous second-place finish that enough has been said about, for decades, but he hadn’t won on the Champions Tour since 2008 (he now has four senior titles).  He’s always injured and just hasn’t played well when he is participating.  So good on Scott!

But I had to remind myself if he was a performer on the 1974 and 1975 Wake Forest NCAA Championship teams, the latter the best in college history, according to most, and Scott wasn’t, though he was technically on the team in ’75.

Those two championships were anchored by Curtis Strange, Jay Haas, David Thore and Bob Byman...all truly outstanding.

I arrived at Wake in the fall of 1976, after Curtis had exited that spring, Haas the year before, but Hoch didn’t really shine until 1977-78, his junior and senior years.

The late, legendary Jesse Haddock was their coach.

Anyway, Hoch became the oldest winner since Mike Fetchick won an event in 1985, five months younger than Hoch.

Pernice, by the way, long known as Vijay Singh’s best friend, is four months shy of his 60th birthday.  This was his sixth Champions Tour victory.

“You’ve got one of the greatest iron players to ever play this game,” Pernice said of Hoch.  “He was just a great partner...I just tried to hang on and help when I could.”

That statement is very true.  Hoch was always one of the great iron players in the game.  Other parts of his game kept him from greatness.

Stuff

--Breaking news this morning....Jere Longman / New York Times:

“The highest court in international sports issued a landmark but nuanced ruling on Wednesday that will force female track athletes with elevated levels of testosterone to take suppressants to compete in certain races against other women.

“The ruling is a defeat for Caster Semenya, a two-time Olympic champion at 800 meters from South Africa, who had appealed the regulations and has fought to compete in women’s events despite her naturally elevated levels of the muscle-building hormone testosterone.

“The court addressed a complicated, highly-charged question involving fair play, gender identity, biology and human rights that the world of track and field has been grappling with for a decade: Since competition is divided into male and female categories, what is the most equitable way to decide who should be eligible to compete in women’s events?”

This is a huge victory for track and field’s governing body, the International Association of Athletics Federations, or I.A.A.F.

The 2-1 ruling did state that the panel wants the I.A.A.F. to apply its rules only up to 800 meters, because the evidence was not clear that women with elevated testosterone levels have a competitive advantage in the 1500 meters.

Semenya tweeted just after the ruling: “Sometimes it’s better to react with no reaction.”

More next Bar Chat.

--We note the passing of John Singleton, the great film director, who died following complications from a stroke at the way too young age of 51.  His family said he had a history of hypertension.

Singleton’s amazing debut film “Boyz N the Hood” is on my top ten all-time list, a masterpiece, for which he became the first African-American to earn an Oscar nomination for best director.

“Boyz” was a bleak, realistic film about three teenagers growing up amid gang violence in South Central Los Angeles.  Singleton was just 24, and this single film elevated him to the level of more established African-American directors like Spike Lee and Robert Townsend.

“When I was 18, I saw ‘She’s Gotta Have It,’” Singleton said, referring to Lee’s 1986 breakthrough film, in a YouTube video in 2013.  “The movie was so powerful to me, as a young black teen who grew up seeing movies with not a lot of people who looked like me.”

Singleton was just 22 when he began shooting ‘Boyz,’ which follows Tre (played by Cuba Gooding Jr.) and his friends Ricky (Morris Chestnut) and Doughboy (Ice Cube) as they try to avoid gangs and drugs.  When Ricky is shot and killed by a gang member, Doughboy, his half- brother, seeks revenge, but Tre backs away from retribution.

Singleton, who had graduated from USC film school less than a year earlier, conceded he did not know how to direct a film.

“As the movie was going along, I was learning how to direct.  As it becomes more intense and comes on to the third act, the camerawork is more and more fluid, because I’m getting better and better – and taking more chances.” 

After “Boyz” debuted at the 1991 Cannes Film Festival, critic Roger Ebert wrote of its “power, honesty and filmmaking skill.”  “By the end of ‘Boyz N the Hood,’” he wrote, “I realized I had not simply seen a brilliant directorial debut, but an American film of enormous importance.”

Violence erupted on the film’s opening night in or near theaters; at least one person was killed and dozens were wounded across the country.  But the movie did well, $123 million domestically in today’s dollars.

Singleton lost the 1992 Academy Award for best director to Jonathan Demme, who won for “Silence of the Lambs.”  But Singleton remains the youngest Oscar nominee for best director.

No black filmmaker has won the Oscar for best director, but when Spike Lee won this year for best adapted screenplay, for ‘BlacKkKlansman,’ Singleton was ecstatic.

“My brother Spike Lee just won his first Oscar,” he tweeted.  “I’m sooo happy!”  [Richard Sandomir / New York Times]

Top 3 songs for the week 5/2/64: #1 “Can’t Buy Me Love” (The Beatles)  #2 “Hello, Dolly!” (Louis Armstrong)  #3 “Do You Want to Know A Secret” (The Beatles)...and...#4 “Bits And Pieces” (The Dave Clark Five)  #5 “My Guy” (Mary Wells)  #6 “Don’t Let The Rain Come Down (Crooked Little Man)” (The Serendipity Singers)  #7 “Twist And Shout” (The Beatles)  #8 “Suspicion” (Terry Stafford...sounded like Elvis...)  #9 “Dead Man’s Curve” (Jan & Dean)  #10 “Ronnie” (The 4 Seasons...classic week, as the British Invasion was beginning to suck up all the oxygen...)

MLB Quiz Answers:  1) The last to steal 70 in the NL is Jose Reyes, Mets, 78 in 2007. 2) The last to steal 70 in the AL is Jacoby Ellsbury, Red Sox, 70 in 2009.  3) The only four, post-1900, to steal 100 in a season are Rickey Henderson (130 in 1982, 108 in ‘83, 100 in ‘80); Lou Brock (118 in 1974), Vince Coleman (110 in 1985, 109 in ’87, 107 in ’86), and Maury Wills (104 in 1962).

1969 Mets, cont’d:

Apr. 29:  The Mets commenced a 3-game set in Montreal and Jerry Koosman left the game after 4 1/3 shutout innings, Kooz having an arm issue.  Nolan Ryan then came in and threw 4 2/3 of no-run ball, 7 strikeouts, and the Mets won 2-0 on Ed Kranepool’s two solo homers.  Is Koosman OK?  I’m 11 years old, what do I know about sports injuries?
Apr. 30:  Mets win another, 2-1, Tom Seaver (2-2) besting Mike Wegener, both going all the way...because it’s 1969, boys and girls, not 2019.
May 1:  The Expos prevent the sweep, taking it 3-2, Mets starter Don Cardwell (0-4, 2.89) losing it with two outs in the ninth, Coco Laboy with the game-winning hit.

So the Metsies are 9-12, heading to Chicago for four, the Cubbies having taken 3 of 4 at Shea the week before.

I don’t know what my Mets are at this point.  I learned that Mark R.’s brother was thinking the same thing, living near Shea at that time; Mark himself trying not to crash a fighter jet in the States as he wondered if he was headed to Vietnam.

Next Bar Chat, Monday.



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Bar Chat

05/02/2019

Remembering Gino Marchetti

[Posted Wed. a.m.]

MLB Quiz: Stolen Bases... 1) Name the last player in the NL to steal 70 bases in a season.  2) Name the last player in the AL to steal 70.  3) Name the only four, post-1900, to steal 100 in a season.  Answers below.

NBA Playoffs

--Philadelphia evened its series with Toronto at 1-1 with a 94-89 win Monday night, in Toronto.  Jimmy Butler led the way with 30 points and 11 rebounds for the Sixers.

The Raptors were down 19 in the first half, then cut it to one late in the third, only to go cold at the start of the fourth, missing six of their first seven.

But a pair of 3-pointers by Kyle Lowry cut it to 90-87 with 1:36 to go, and then a layup from Pascal Siakam made it a one-point game.  But Joel Embiid, playing with the flu, hit a driving shot at the other end, restoring the three-point advantage, and that was it, Danny Green missing a potential tying 3, Philly’s Tobias Harris came up with the rebound, he was fouled and made a pair of free throws for the final margin.

The Sixers got a strong game off the bench from James Ennis, 13 points and 6 rebounds.

Kawhi Leonard had another terrific  game from the field, 13 of 24, in scoring 35 points, but the rest of the team was just 20 of 67...putrid.  The Raptors were 10 for 37 from three-point range.

--I have to go back to Sunday’s Game 1...Warriors 104 Houston 100.

Brian Windhorst / ESPN.com

“It’s easy to forget there are three teams on the floor at all times. Ideally, one of them remains anonymous and forgettable.  The stakes and the nature of these teams make that most difficult.

“When referees prepare for games, they go over film and tendencies, just like the teams.  It is well known that the Rockets have a penchant for drawing fouls on 3-pointers.  This is a part of their attack.  James Harden drew 95 fouls on 3-pointers this season.  He is one of the best in the history of the game at it.

“It was clear that part of Golden State’s game plan is to crowd the Houston 3-point shooters. And the Houston game plan involves 3-point shooters twisting their bodies and ripping their arms into their defenders. Both teams are good at it.

“So here it was. There were 10 seconds left and the Rockets were down 3.  Harden, one of the greatest ever at drawing a foul, takes a 3-pointer to try to tie the score, Draymond Green, one of the great defenders of this era, leaps to challenge it.

“Green comes forward into Harden’s area.  Harden’s legs jackknife toward Green and Harden spills to the ground.  Two officials, Courtney Kirkland and Josh Tiven, stare and call nothing....

“ ‘When you land 3 feet ahead of where you shoot the ball from, that really ain’t my issue,’ Green said.  ‘I’ve been fouled by James on a James 3-pointer before.’”

Well, the discussion was all about the officiating after Game 1, as we learned the Rockets sent game film of a playoff contest last year to the league office, showing how they are constantly ripped off, and, really guys, just play the game.  I don’t care.

I’m not a Draymond Green fan, but he put it best.  “That’s just the nature of the game we play.  Refereeing is an inexact science.  So it is what it is.”

So last night the Rockets fell behind in the series 2-0, as the Warriors won 115-109, Kevin Durant with 29, while Andre Iguodala continued to contribute in a big way in the absence of DeMarcus Cousins, the 35-year-old with 16 points on just nine shots.

But in the game, James Harden went down, writhing in pain, after being accidentally poked in the eyes by Draymond Green.  In the postgame, he said he was having trouble seeing, though he did return to the court. 

Steph Curry dislocated the middle finger on his left hand, but after an X-ray was negative, he returned following a tape job on the finger.  He didn’t sound concerned it would limit him going forward.

--Going back to Monday night, the Nuggets won Game 1 of their series with the Trail Blazers in Denver, 121-113, as Nikola Jokic, the least-known superstar in the game, had 37 points, 9 rebounds and 6 assists.

Jokic is averaging 24.9, 11.8, 8.8 this postseason, after averaging 20.1, 10.8, 7.3 during the regular season. 

Game 2 in the series tonight.

--The Bucks evened their series against the Celtics last night, 123-102, as Khris Middleton had 28 for Milwaukee, including 7 of 10 from three. Giannis had 29 points and 10 rebounds.  Kyrie Irving had a miserable night for Boston, 4 of 18 from the field, 9 points.

--The Knicks continued to pack Madison Square Garden this season, some would say inexplicably, but to go to a game is more a ‘happening,’ and a place to be seen, if you travel in certain circles.  You also get a lot of out-of-towners, tourists, business travelers at the games.

But according to Sports Business Journal, Knicks telecasts on MSG Network saw their ratings drop a whopping 38 percent this season over last.  That is more of a true reflection of interest, the Knicks finishing with an NBA-worst 17-65 record.

Meanwhile, the surprising Brooklyn Nets saw a 22 percent increase in their ratings, whilie having the league’s lowest attendance (14,941).

--Last time I wrote of Earl “The Pearl” Monroe and his college days at Winston-Salem State.  So ‘Shu’ wrote in and I knew he grew up in the area roughly around that time, and while he didn’t see The Pearl live, he told me he got to see Gene Little, who went to High Point, and ML Carr and Lloyd Free, who went to Guildford College, as Shu was within walking distance of the Elon gym.  Very cool.

Stanley Cup Playoffs

Last night, the Columbus Blue Jackets took a 2-1 series lead over the Bruins, with a 2-1 win in Columbus, while San Jose is now up 2-1 in its series with Colorado, the Sharks defeating the Avalanche in Denver, 4-2.

MLB

--Just one note...as I’m rushed this morning with other obligations...CC Sabathia, by all accounts, just punched his ticket to the Hall of Fame as he became the 17th pitcher in baseball history – and only the third left-hander – to strike out 3,000 batters last night, joining Hall of Famers Steve Carlton and Randy Johnson as the only lefties at that plateau.

Sabathia is also just the third African-American to achieve the milestone, following Bob Gibson and Ferguson Jenkins.

“Being a ‘Black Ace’ is something that I take very seriously,” said Sabathia, one of only 15 African-Americans to win 20 games.

Maybe CC isn’t a first-ballot Hall of Famer, but he’s getting his plaque in Cooperstown.  A 247-154 career mark, a Cy Young, five top-five finishes (big in my book), a World Series championship....

But some will say his ERA, 3.69, is too high and indeed it would be the third worst of any pitcher in the Hall.  But that won’t matter to 75%+ of the baseball writers filling out their ballots.

Last night, CC took the loss, the Yankees losing to the Diamondbacks 3-1, with Sabathia giving up two runs in 5 1/3, plus five strikeouts.

--College Baseball Top Ten (Baseball America)

1. UCLA
2. Stanford
3. Vanderbilt
4. Oregon State
5. Arkansas
6. Mississippi State
7. Louisville
8. Georgia
9. East Carolina
10. Georgia Tech

NFL

Steve Klingaman / Baltimore Sun

“He was rugged, rangy and relentless in his pursuit of quarterbacks. For 13 years during their heyday, the Baltimore Colts were defined by a slab of a man known simply as Gino.

“No Colts player epitomized the club – or the city – better than Gino Marchetti, the Hall of Fame defensive end who died Monday of pneumonia.  Mr. Marchetti, 93, passed away at Paoli Hospital in Paoli, Pa. ....

“The son of an immigrant coal miner, Mr. Marchetti rose from a lunch-pail environs to become captain of the two-time world champions (1958-59) and one of the most feared pass rushers in NFL history.  He often played hurt; he always played hard. Colliding with the 6-foot-4, 245-pound Marchetti, Detroit quarterback Bobby Layne once said, was ‘like running into a tree trunk in the dark.’

“ ‘Swift and smart, Mr. Marchetti was the prototype of the modern defensive end,’ said Don Shula.

“ ‘He revolutionized the way you play that position in the NFL,’ said Mr. Shula, former Colts player and coach.  ‘Prior to Gino, the attitude [of pass rushers] was to try to physically overpower the offensive tackle. Gino showed that with good instincts and a lightning quickness, he could get around his man without really engaging him.

“ ‘The offensive tackle’s uniform never got very dirty, but the quarterback’s sure did.’”

Marchetti became the favorite of Baltimore fans.

“ ‘Gino romanticized defense,’ The Evening Sun’s Bill Tanton wrote.

“Dark-haired and swarthy, Mr. Marchetti won the city’s heart with a string of gritty comebacks from injuries.  Appendicitis in 1954.  A dislocated shoulder in 1955.  Neither sidelined him for more than a month.

“In 1958, while making a saving tackle in the NFL championship game, Mr. Marchetti’s ankle snapped.  Lying in the Colts dressing room, waiting to hear the outcome, he muttered, ‘If we win this game, it’s worth getting a broken leg.’

“Four months later, egged on by the club’s owner, Mr. Marchetti and two teammates opened a burger joint on North Point Road in Dundalk. Crowds flocked to the drive-in for the double-decker ‘Gino Giant’ and a chance to meet the sandwich’s namesake.  By 1982, ‘Gino’s’ had mushroomed into a nationwide chain of 469 fast-food restaurants when it was sold to Marriott International for $48 million.

“Though he played in the era before sacks were an official NFL statistic, Mr. Marchetti’s legacy has never depended on numbers.  In 1969, he was named the best defensive end of the NFL’s first half century.  Three years later, in his first season of eligibility, Marchetti entered the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

“In 1994, he was one of three defensive ends selected to the NFL 75th Anniversary All-Time Team, alongside David (Deacon) Jones and Reggie White.”

Marchetti also had a hand in the decision-making with Colts’ management.  After the team fired coach Weeb Ewbank following a 7-7 season in 1962, on Marchetti’s advice they hired Don Shula, then 33 and the youngest head coach in NFL history. Shula led the Colts to seven consecutive winning seasons, before moving on to Miami.

Finally, of all his accolades, Marchetti said his overall reputation as a clean player meant the most.

“I never got hit with a 15-yard penalty,” he said. “No late hits.  No clipping.  No hitting out of bounds.  I didn’t make stupid mistakes or put the team in trouble.”

Champions League Semis

Ajax defeated Tottenham on the road in the first leg of their semifinal, 1-0, yesterday.  A listless first half for my Spurs, followed by spirited play in the second that fell short.  This was one game where they really missed injured striker Harry Kane.

Today, in the other semifinal, Barcelona hosts Liverpool in their first leg.

Kentucky Derby       

It is going to be pure mayhem, and excitement, Saturday with a 20-horse field for the Derby, but in such a field you don’t want to be starting on the rail and the two favorites, Omaha Beach (4-1) and Game Winner (5-1) are starting from the No. 12 and 16 positions, respectively.

Richard Mandella is the trainer for Omaha Beach and he has Hall of Fame jockey Mike Smith up top; Smith winning last year’s Derby for Bob Baffert aboard Justify.  Baffert is the trainer for Game Winner, as well as Roadster (No. 17 post) and Improbable (No. 5), who are co-third choices at 6-1.

Since 1930, only five winners have come from the 16, and zero from the 17.   The most winners have come from the 5, with ten.  [Only three from the 12, where Omaha Beach starts from.]

But this year’s Derby has a shadow over it, as I’ve been writing since December...the 23 deaths at Santa Anita Park in California in a three-month span.  It’s depressing.  The future of the sport is at stake.

Joe Drape / New York Times

“One hundred nine years ago, Arthur B. Hancock moved his thoroughbred breeding operation atop a slab of mineral rich limestone carpeted by thick, lush bluegrass.  He called it Claiborne Farm.

“It is to horse racing what the Yankees are to baseball: the bedrock of more than 75 champions and the land where the immortal Secretariat stood as a stallion.

“Now, Walker Hancock, who is the fifth generation of his family to run Claiborne Farm, is afraid there will be nothing left to pass down to the sixth.

“He is terrified, he said, that the sport is living on borrowed time, as are most people in what remains the heart and soul of the thoroughbred industry....

“ ‘The way it’s going right now, it’s not sustainable,’ Hancock, 29, said of the sport.  ‘We got to change the public’s perception and clean this thing up if we are going to survive.’....

“Nearly 10 horses a week, on average, died at American racetracks in 2018, according to the Jockey Club’s Equine Injury Database.  That’s a fatality rate that is anywhere from two and a half to five times greater than in the rest of the racing world....

“Cracking down on drugs is essential, reformers say, because the drugs allow horses to run unnaturally fast and mask pain, which leads to more breakdowns.

“This is a crisis for people in the sport whose livelihoods depend on the breeding and nurturing, and the buying and selling, of racehorses.”

So now the horsemen, ironically, need the support of PETA.  Kathy Guillermo, a PETA vice president, is working with Santa Anita to draw up new rules.

“You are now dealing with a public that has become intolerant of broken bones, whipping, drugging and death,” Guillermo said.  “I make them nervous,” she said of the horse industry, “though we should be on the same side, really.”

Joe Drape:

“Claiborne [Ed. which has four horses from sires in the Derby] is the center of a $5.2 billion ecosystem that puts 61,000 people to work on more than 831,000 acres.  But for how long?

“Horse racing has been on the decline for nearly two decades.  In 2002, more than $15 billion was bet on races in the United States; last year, the handle fell to $11 billion.  In 2002, nearly 33,000 thoroughbred foals were registered as racehorses compared with 19,925 last year.”

Game Winner is your winner, by the way.

Golf Balls

--I didn’t have a chance last time to comment on last weekend’s Champions Tour event, the Legends of Golf at the Top of the Rock course at the Big Cedar Lodge in Ridgedale, Mo.  But it ended up being pretty historic.  Wake Forest’s Scott Hoch, teamed with Tom Pernice Jr., became the oldest winner in PGA Tour Champions history at 63 years, five months.  [My old friend, cough cough, Carlos Franco, was among those finishing T-2, playing with Vijay Singh.]

Hoch won 11 times on the PGA Tour, with a very famous second-place finish that enough has been said about, for decades, but he hadn’t won on the Champions Tour since 2008 (he now has four senior titles).  He’s always injured and just hasn’t played well when he is participating.  So good on Scott!

But I had to remind myself if he was a performer on the 1974 and 1975 Wake Forest NCAA Championship teams, the latter the best in college history, according to most, and Scott wasn’t, though he was technically on the team in ’75.

Those two championships were anchored by Curtis Strange, Jay Haas, David Thore and Bob Byman...all truly outstanding.

I arrived at Wake in the fall of 1976, after Curtis had exited that spring, Haas the year before, but Hoch didn’t really shine until 1977-78, his junior and senior years.

The late, legendary Jesse Haddock was their coach.

Anyway, Hoch became the oldest winner since Mike Fetchick won an event in 1985, five months younger than Hoch.

Pernice, by the way, long known as Vijay Singh’s best friend, is four months shy of his 60th birthday.  This was his sixth Champions Tour victory.

“You’ve got one of the greatest iron players to ever play this game,” Pernice said of Hoch.  “He was just a great partner...I just tried to hang on and help when I could.”

That statement is very true.  Hoch was always one of the great iron players in the game.  Other parts of his game kept him from greatness.

Stuff

--Breaking news this morning....Jere Longman / New York Times:

“The highest court in international sports issued a landmark but nuanced ruling on Wednesday that will force female track athletes with elevated levels of testosterone to take suppressants to compete in certain races against other women.

“The ruling is a defeat for Caster Semenya, a two-time Olympic champion at 800 meters from South Africa, who had appealed the regulations and has fought to compete in women’s events despite her naturally elevated levels of the muscle-building hormone testosterone.

“The court addressed a complicated, highly-charged question involving fair play, gender identity, biology and human rights that the world of track and field has been grappling with for a decade: Since competition is divided into male and female categories, what is the most equitable way to decide who should be eligible to compete in women’s events?”

This is a huge victory for track and field’s governing body, the International Association of Athletics Federations, or I.A.A.F.

The 2-1 ruling did state that the panel wants the I.A.A.F. to apply its rules only up to 800 meters, because the evidence was not clear that women with elevated testosterone levels have a competitive advantage in the 1500 meters.

Semenya tweeted just after the ruling: “Sometimes it’s better to react with no reaction.”

More next Bar Chat.

--We note the passing of John Singleton, the great film director, who died following complications from a stroke at the way too young age of 51.  His family said he had a history of hypertension.

Singleton’s amazing debut film “Boyz N the Hood” is on my top ten all-time list, a masterpiece, for which he became the first African-American to earn an Oscar nomination for best director.

“Boyz” was a bleak, realistic film about three teenagers growing up amid gang violence in South Central Los Angeles.  Singleton was just 24, and this single film elevated him to the level of more established African-American directors like Spike Lee and Robert Townsend.

“When I was 18, I saw ‘She’s Gotta Have It,’” Singleton said, referring to Lee’s 1986 breakthrough film, in a YouTube video in 2013.  “The movie was so powerful to me, as a young black teen who grew up seeing movies with not a lot of people who looked like me.”

Singleton was just 22 when he began shooting ‘Boyz,’ which follows Tre (played by Cuba Gooding Jr.) and his friends Ricky (Morris Chestnut) and Doughboy (Ice Cube) as they try to avoid gangs and drugs.  When Ricky is shot and killed by a gang member, Doughboy, his half- brother, seeks revenge, but Tre backs away from retribution.

Singleton, who had graduated from USC film school less than a year earlier, conceded he did not know how to direct a film.

“As the movie was going along, I was learning how to direct.  As it becomes more intense and comes on to the third act, the camerawork is more and more fluid, because I’m getting better and better – and taking more chances.” 

After “Boyz” debuted at the 1991 Cannes Film Festival, critic Roger Ebert wrote of its “power, honesty and filmmaking skill.”  “By the end of ‘Boyz N the Hood,’” he wrote, “I realized I had not simply seen a brilliant directorial debut, but an American film of enormous importance.”

Violence erupted on the film’s opening night in or near theaters; at least one person was killed and dozens were wounded across the country.  But the movie did well, $123 million domestically in today’s dollars.

Singleton lost the 1992 Academy Award for best director to Jonathan Demme, who won for “Silence of the Lambs.”  But Singleton remains the youngest Oscar nominee for best director.

No black filmmaker has won the Oscar for best director, but when Spike Lee won this year for best adapted screenplay, for ‘BlacKkKlansman,’ Singleton was ecstatic.

“My brother Spike Lee just won his first Oscar,” he tweeted.  “I’m sooo happy!”  [Richard Sandomir / New York Times]

Top 3 songs for the week 5/2/64: #1 “Can’t Buy Me Love” (The Beatles)  #2 “Hello, Dolly!” (Louis Armstrong)  #3 “Do You Want to Know A Secret” (The Beatles)...and...#4 “Bits And Pieces” (The Dave Clark Five)  #5 “My Guy” (Mary Wells)  #6 “Don’t Let The Rain Come Down (Crooked Little Man)” (The Serendipity Singers)  #7 “Twist And Shout” (The Beatles)  #8 “Suspicion” (Terry Stafford...sounded like Elvis...)  #9 “Dead Man’s Curve” (Jan & Dean)  #10 “Ronnie” (The 4 Seasons...classic week, as the British Invasion was beginning to suck up all the oxygen...)

MLB Quiz Answers:  1) The last to steal 70 in the NL is Jose Reyes, Mets, 78 in 2007. 2) The last to steal 70 in the AL is Jacoby Ellsbury, Red Sox, 70 in 2009.  3) The only four, post-1900, to steal 100 in a season are Rickey Henderson (130 in 1982, 108 in ‘83, 100 in ‘80); Lou Brock (118 in 1974), Vince Coleman (110 in 1985, 109 in ’87, 107 in ’86), and Maury Wills (104 in 1962).

1969 Mets, cont’d:

Apr. 29:  The Mets commenced a 3-game set in Montreal and Jerry Koosman left the game after 4 1/3 shutout innings, Kooz having an arm issue.  Nolan Ryan then came in and threw 4 2/3 of no-run ball, 7 strikeouts, and the Mets won 2-0 on Ed Kranepool’s two solo homers.  Is Koosman OK?  I’m 11 years old, what do I know about sports injuries?
Apr. 30:  Mets win another, 2-1, Tom Seaver (2-2) besting Mike Wegener, both going all the way...because it’s 1969, boys and girls, not 2019.
May 1:  The Expos prevent the sweep, taking it 3-2, Mets starter Don Cardwell (0-4, 2.89) losing it with two outs in the ninth, Coco Laboy with the game-winning hit.

So the Metsies are 9-12, heading to Chicago for four, the Cubbies having taken 3 of 4 at Shea the week before.

I don’t know what my Mets are at this point.  I learned that Mark R.’s brother was thinking the same thing, living near Shea at that time; Mark himself trying not to crash a fighter jet in the States as he wondered if he was headed to Vietnam.

Next Bar Chat, Monday.