Good morning!
Last weekend, big leaguers suited up to look like White Walkers on the home side and Darth Vader on the visiting side; one team dipped in white paint, the other dipped in black paint.
ESPN’s Matt Vasgersian compared it to Spy vs. Spy, failing to mention that Ron Darling used the same line two nights earlier during the Mets-Braves game.
Players Weekend simply didn’t translate. As Cleveland manager Terry Francona told The Athletic: “What’s the slogan — Let the kids play ball? Let the grown-ups look like morons.”
Indeed, MLB needs to stop listening to its promotions department. Next year they’ve scheduled a Yankees-White Sox game in an Iowa cornfield. It’s meant to pay homage to Field of Dreams, which is one of the most overrated baseball movies in cinematic history.
It was released in 1989, and starred Kevin Costner. It showed baseball players walking out of a cornfield and Costner leaving his tractor in the barn to build a baseball field. The Onion ran a headline that said, “Bush Tearfully Addresses Nation after Watching Field of Dreams.”
George H.W. Bush played first base at Yale and regularly attended Texas Rangers games. After he watched Field of Dreams he reportedly said words to the effect, “What the hell was that about?”
It’s hard to say who’s worse, math wizards from SABR or literature geeks from Yaddo embracing the national pastime. One thing’s for sure, when the media circus comes to Iowa next summer, they can leave the manure spreader in the barn.
The Boston College football team hosts Virginia Tech this afternoon at Alumni Stadium (4 p.m., ACC Network), and it’s as close to big time college football as we’ll get in these parts. The Eagles are 4½-point underdogs as of press time, and their grueling schedule figures to be bumpier than a drive on Deerfield Street. They have road games against No. 1 Clemson, No. 9 Notre Dame and No. 22 Syracuse.
Consequently, the game is already a must-win, and the Hokies might be looking ahead to next week against Old Dominion after their shocking 14-point loss to the Monarchs last season.
Crosby Hunt grew up in Old Deerfield and his father Mo Hunt taught English and coached the Deerfield Academy track team. In Gainesville last winter, he recalled wandering down to watch his father’s team practice when he was eight years old.
Most times, a lanky pole vaulter would smile and welcome him.
“It was David Koch,” said Hunt, referring to the conservative philanthropist who died last week at age 79. The 6-foot-5 Koch graduated from Deerfield in 1958 and studied chemical engineering at MIT, where he graduated as the school’s all-time leading basketball scorer. During a game against Middlebury he scored 41 points, a record that stood for 47 years.
Greenfield native Beth Davenport decided to pass on Sunday’s N.E. Green River Marathon. She lives in Santa Fe and is on her fifth tour of running a marathon in every state.
“I’m sorry to be missing Green River,” emailed the 58-year-old Davenport, who finished last year’s GRM in 5:11:34. “It was a week earlier last year and easier to plan. There’s a new marathon in Springfield on Oct. 6. It’s called the Hoop City Marathon and I’m already registered.”
Eaglebrook trustee Bill Gutfarb is a partner in the Mosaic Racing Stable, operated by Monica Driver. Friday at Saratoga, their horse Appointment was a 67-1 longshot, finished fourth in an eight-horse field and even if it finished last it has a future.
The barn’s motto is “Responsible Horse Ownership” and Driver’s steeds are cross-trained in dressage and hunter-jumping.
Driver was mentored by Hall of Fame trainer Allen “The Chief” Jerkins. “Monica graduated Smith,” wrote Gutfarb. “She got a masters from Johns Hopkins in art history, married, had a daughter and when the daughter went off to school she got a job as a hot walker for Jerkins. Incognito to the other workers, this is how she learned the business.”
Talk show host Jim Rome interviewed former welterweight champ Sugar Ray Leonard on his Rome is Burning show last week. Leonard fought toe-to-toe against Marvin Hagler, Thomas “Hit Man” Hearns and in 1980 lost a unanimous decision to Roberto Duran in Montreal.
Noting that the rematch was just five months later, Rome asked Leonard, “Why did you want such a short turnaround, Ray?”
“Because I knew Roberto Duran’s lifestyle,” said Leonard. “I knew that he would party, that he would gain more than a few pounds — he would gain an enormous amount of weight, I mean talkin’ 30 to 40 pounds or more.”
The strategy worked when Duran told the ref “no mas” in the eighth round of their fight at the New Orleans Superdome.
Two years earlier, Leonard fought Armando Muniz at the Springfield Civic Center. The nationally televised bout was announced by Howard Cosell and former featherweight champ Willy Pep. Leonard won by a TKO, and in a hockey locker room after the fight Muniz told an interpreter that Leonard was destined to be the world champion.
Todd Walker has moved past Steve Lyons on the NESN depth chart. Walker batted .283 and was Boston’s second baseman in 2003, and behind the mic his knowledgeable and easy going style works well alongside Dave O’Brien.
Lyons meanwhile has been relegated to pre- and postgame analysis this season. Boston’s No. 1 draft pick in 1981, he was traded to the White Sox for Tom Seaver. He was nicknamed “Psycho” during a game against Detroit when he unhitched his pants and dusted himself off at first base.
“I forgot where I was for a second,” he told MLB.com. “I guess I thought I was back in the dugout. I pulled them down to get the dirt out.”
And a psycho was born.
The Crimson Tide kicks off the season today against Duke (3:30 p.m., ABC). Earlier this week CBS Sports dug up ’Bama coach Nick Saban’s classic quote about keeping his team focused: “I’m trying to get our players to listen to me instead of listening to you guys. You know all that stuff you guys write about how good we are? And all that stuff they hear on ESPN? It’s like poison, you know what I mean? Like rat poison.”
■■■■
SQUIBBERS: In the wake of Andrew Luck’s unexpected departure, the Colts went from $120 to win $100 to win the AFC South, to $100 to win $260. Luck’s spot will be taken by Jacoby Brissett, the pride of Dwyer (Fla.) High School. … The media uses catchy terms like Power Five for FBS conferences. The latest is “New Year’s Six” by Sports Illustrated to denote New Year’s Day bowl games. … UMass football coach Walt Bell is a big fan of mixed martial arts. “He’s always showing us clips of MMA fights,” said a player on his way to a team meeting last week. … Thirty-one penalties in the Jets-Saints game last weekend means the NFL won’t be throwing laundry just for the “Cadillac Calls” as local ref Tim Schmitt refers to them. … North Dakota State — FCS champ seven of the last eight years — is rated 35th overall by USA Today’s Jeff Sagarin. … UMass was rated 151st going into last night’s game and Rutgers was 106th, but the line had dropped 4 1/2 points in recent days. … The Detroit Tigers have a shot at matching their all-time record for futility that was set in 2003 when they were 43-119 under GM Dave Dombrowski. At this writing the Tigers had 39 wins — but remember they won only four games last September. … There’s no quit in the Yankees, which as of Thursday needed to go 20-7 to match the Red Sox’ total 108 wins last season. … The NFL season starts on Thursday, but Patriots fans will have to wait until Sunday at 8:20 p.m. to watch them play the Steelers. The Pats have only six scheduled 1 p.m. Sunday kickoffs this year. … “If you are sensitive,” said Bill Parcells, “you will have a hard time with me.” … You take stone-faced Jackie Bradley Jr., I’ll take hyped-up Jimmy Piersall.
Chip Ainsworth is an award-winning columnist who has penned his observations about sports for four decades in the Pioneer Valley.