More of the Above

Yesterday proved tough on my daughter, who was going back to work and sending baby Leo off to daycare. I provided some diversion by answering a question she called with: What’s up with Matt Scherzer? By that, Clare meant why did the Mets sign the 37-year old right hander to a three-year deal for $130 million, complete with an opt out after season two? “Wasn’t he injured during the playoffs?” my little one asked. No, it was just arm fatigue that kept him from taking the mound in game six of the NLCS that saw his then-Dodgers’ team eliminated by Atlanta. But, hey, it ain’t my money, because if it were, I’d be spending it in different ways than the Mets. The New Yorkers might be better off rebuilding the Polo Grounds. Why not, if you’re going to sign a bunch of players north of 30? Free-agent signees Starling Marte, Mark Canha and Eduardo Escobar will all be 33 come Opening Day 2022. If Scherzer isn’t too fatigued to start (and if it isn’t too cold at Citi Field) to start March 31 against the Nats, that will give New York a starting lineup with at least four out of nine players heavy on the experience, you might say. Or old. Then again, the Rangers reportedly have signed shortstop Corey Seager to a ten-year deal; Seager will be 38 when his contract expires. He and Marcus Semien could be the All-AARP middle infield of the mid 2020s and beyond. You’d think there’d be an analytic or two that predicts decline.

Hand to Head, Scratch

If reports are correct, ex-White Sox infielder Marcus Semien has signed a seven-year, $175-million deal with the Rangers. Good for Semien, by all accounts a very decent human being, less so for the Rangers and MLB. A few more deals like this, and owners will be pleading for a hard salary cap. Stop me before I sign again. Semien turned 31 in September. There aren’t many older players starting at second base; all I could find were Eduardo Escobar (32) and DJ LeMahieu (33), both of whom played more games elsewhere. Where does Semien play in three years? It won’t be shortstop, where he proved to be a better second baseman. Third? OK, but how many 34-year old third basemen are there? First? Probably, assuming he keeps putting up big power numbers. DH? Only if he wants to. (See Eloy Jimenez.) The Rangers have a new stadium they want to fill; they figure Semien will help them do that. Only he’s a career .256 hitter who in nine seasons has batted over .261 just once (.285 in 2019). Me. I would’ve overpaid for three years, four tops, but that might have been impossible given how Scott Boras is Semien’s agent. Then I do without. But I don’t own or general manage a team. Too bad those people who do keep making decisions they’ll come to regret.

Looking Backward

The appearance of a grandchild may have something to do with it, or just the aging process. Either way, with sports I find myself looking increasingly backward than ahead. As for the Bears, can you blame me? Why bother with a bad team full of anonymous players when I can think of bad teams that had the likes of Gayle Sayers and Dick Butkus on them? The Bulls don’t look to be nearly as helpless, yet where are Jerry Sloan and Norm Van Lier, or Bob Love and Tom Boerwinkle? I read The Athletic; hold my nose and look at MLB.com; plow through two sports’ sections daily, all in pursuit of baseball news. Only every story I read of a possible lockout or how much this free-agent shortstop will sign for leaves me feeling slightly more alienated from a game I’ve loved since childhood. Maybe it’s age, and my grandson will see baseball for the sport while being oblivious to the business. I was like that once. I get as much baseball out of eBay as anything. Most every day I check for “White Sox press photos”; “Comiskey Park photo”; “1930s [and 1940s and 1950s] White Sox”; “Moe Berg photo [and Minnie Minoso]”; “White Sox 1962 ticket stub”; and a few other categories. Never once has a labor dispute gotten in the way. A few weeks ago, I bought a negative of Minnie Minoso from 1960; for Christmas, I asked Clare to develop it as an 8”x 10” photo I’ll frame; with luck, he’ll be in the Hall of Fame by then. I also bought a White Sox yearbook from 1954, a year I would’ve been toddling about our South Side bungalow. The Comiskey family still owned the team, and, if you believe Arch Ward—he wrote the copy and was the sportswriter who came up with the idea of the All-Star Game—that team was close to toppling the hated Yankees. I didn’t know Ferris Fain had his own fan club. In Looking Backward, Edward Bellamy wrote the story of a young man who fell asleep one day in the late nineteenth century only to wake up over a hundred years later. Lucky for him all the problems of the world had been solved during his time asleep. I’d be happy to wake up and find the Sox starting a homestand against Casey Stengel and his crew. Until then, there’s eBay.

Compare and Contrast

Shakespeare must’ve been a big sports’ fan back in the day. I mean, why else would he have written “ we few, we happy few, we band of brothers,” if not as a motivational tool for use by the coach of his favorite team? That phrase, or some derivation thereof, has probably been a locker-room staple from the second those words were first uttered onstage at The Globe Theater. Of course, when Matt Nagy goes into his “band of brothers” mode, he sounds like he’s trying to rally the Keystone Cops, cue the Benny Hill music. Billy Donovan of the Bulls, though, has it down pat, maybe because he perfected it during those twenty years he spent as a college basketball coach. Plus Donovan throws in a certain “Happy Warrior” vibe that helps fans forget the bad old days of ex-coach Jim Boylan. Nagy addresses a press conference, and he talks in circles. Donovan, he keeps it short and simple. That in itself won’t win a championship, but it sure is refreshing.

So?

The near-hapless Bears beat the hapless Lions (really, three consecutive offensive penalties, twice?) yesterday in Detroit, 16-14. For a change, the Munsters won in the final seconds, with Cairo Santos kicking the decisive field goal as time expired. Matt Nagy, a dead man walking if there ever was one, said after the game how proud he was of his players, how they rose above all the distractions to win. Nagy forgot to mention that his coaching, or lack thereof, is the root cause for those distractions. And they’re not going to go away anytime soon, until Nagy does, that is. If the coach wants a shot at redemption, he won’t have long to wait. The Munsters face the Cardinals and Packers on back-to-back Sundays, starting December 5. Take care of business at home, then beat Green Bay at Lambeau Field, and we can talk redemption. Just don’t hold your breath.

Chump Change

The NFL and Rams’ owner Stan Kroenke have decided to settle a lawsuit filed by St. Louis groups protesting the team’s move back to Los Angeles in 2016. The defendants decided to settle after failing to keep the lawsuit from approaching trial. And the cost? The NFL walked away from St. Louis for $790 million. That might seem like a lot of cash, but the powers that be thought it was less than what a guilty verdict would have cost them. Imagine a league having that much money to get rid of a lawsuit. It makes you wonder why football needs a salary cap.

True Colors

Friday nights, my father often walked or drove over to Talman Savings and Loan, at the corner of 55th and Kedzie, to cash his check from work. I liked to tag along. On the way out, we might pass a member of the Salvation Army. My father would smile, make a donation and give me the copy of War Cry that had been handed to him. He liked the Salvation Army for how it went about its business without drawing much attention. My father hated anything that hinted at self-promotion. On Sundays at Mass, he didn’t use the collection envelope. Instead, he’d fold paper money over and over again until it was no bigger than his thumb nail. When the usher came to our pew with the collection basket, it was impossible to tell what, if anything, my father was putting in. That’s how he liked it. If I’m his son in more than just appearance, my father probably felt about the charity activities of rich people the way I do—give until it hurts, don’t let anybody know. Of course, Chicago sports’ teams do just the opposite. It seems that every penny that gets donated receives oversized media coverage. Oh, how our teams love to boast of their generosity. I just checked online, and both the Cubs and White Sox have posted pictures that make them out to be the saviors of Thanksgiving Day dinner. I suspect the Bulls, Hawks and Bears are doing the same. And, since it’s the start of the holiday season, how about some pictures of players visiting area hospitals to give out gifts? If only the Sox were still playing, fans could indulge in that “split the pot” raffle, with the team portion going to charity, don’t you know? So much giving by our teams, the letter to the editor in yesterday’s Tribune would seem out of character, if only the giving were heartfelt. No, what matters is the bottom line, that and the over-under. By signing their names to that letter, the owners of the Sky; Bulls and White Sox; Cubs’ and Hawks admitted as much. The above teams, unless they’ve stated otherwise and I’ve missed it, are all interested in on-site sportsbooks, for the fans, of course; the Tribune recently ran an editorial opposed, not for moral reasons, mind you, but as a way to provide a kind of monopoly to a big city casino, should one ever get built. And I thought Bingo was bad. All these moguls wanting to take yet more money out of the pockets of their fans, how unsightly. Especially now, with all the attention being paid to players doing charitable things in the name of their teams. Maybe the Sky et al can bankroll a gambling addiction facility among their future charitable enterprises. With my dad, it was just the Salvation Army and church.

A Rogues' Gallery

Matt Nagy is toast, the only questions being when the Bears’ coach gets tossed and who does the tossing. The peasants want to see GM Ryan Pace get the boot, too, if only they can locate what rock he’s hiding under. How did it come to this? I’m glad you asked. Long story short, the Bears are an organization that has never moved beyond their founder-coach George Halas or the man he anointed as keeper of the flame. I mean, of course, Da Coach, Mike Ditka. His Ditka-ness would still be growling on the sidelines if he hadn’t gotten distracted with endorsements for everything under the sun, and I do mean everything. The Bears after Ditka are a lot like France after Louis XV, all flood no high ground. Dave Wannstedt took over for Ditka in 1993 and lasted six years, until a .417 winning percentage did him in. Wannstedt resembled Nagy in his rah-rah approach, with a strong dose of intensity thrown in; he looked a little crazy after losses. This may be a Chicago thing. The Bulls’ Doug Collins was the same way. One more year at the helm and Collins might have suffered a total breakdown. Ditto for Wannstedt in Chicago. Miami suited him a whole lot better. Following Wannstedt was Dick Jauron for five years and a .438 winning percentage. Jauron was just a guy who caught lightning in a bottle (13-3 in 2001) one season and not much else the other four. Jauron was succeeded by Lovie Smith, who hung around for nine years while amassing 81 wins and a .563 winning percentage. Make no mistake about it, Smith was a defensive genius, only that affected his approach to offense; it was like he couldn’t wait to get his defensive unit back on the field quick enough. So, naturally, the front office goes out and gets him Jay Cutler to build his offense around. Oops. Oil and water do not mix. Then again, neither did Marc Trestman and a head coaching job. Smith’s successor lasted all of two weird seasons. If Trestman had walked into a press conference wearing a cap wrapped in tin foil, nobody would’ve been surprised. Trestman was so bad people probably didn’t notice what a miserable human being his replacement John Fox was. Fox combined Smith’s disdain for the media with an inverse Midas touch—nearly everything he touched turned into a loss, as evidenced by a three-year .292 winning percentage. And that, my friends, is how Matt Nagy came to stand at the podium as Bears’ coach.

What Goes Around Comes Around

The McCaskeys love that Chicago is a football town. Like I said yesterday, “baseball hat” means Bears’ cap in these parts. Unfortunately for the heirs of Halas, they’re clueless on how to how a football franchise. Any ownership not collectively asleep at the wheel would have thought long and hard about giving head coach Matt Nagy a fourth season. Even if that ownership decided thumbs up, I doubt they would have jabbered on about how important collaboration is to a team. Yesterday, Nagy’s Munsters fell to 3-7 after a 16-13 loss to the visiting Ravens, playing without star quarterback Lamar Jackson. Not to worry. Second-stringer Tyler Huntley made his first-ever start and led a touchdown-winning drive after the Munsters went ahead with 1:41 left to play. What’s the kids’ song? Right, We All Fall Down. Well, that’s the Bears’ defense in a nutshell, allowing back-to-back winning scores in the final seconds of a game. There’s just so many examples of ineptitude on defense, on offense (hello, Justin Fields), from coaching (tell me again, no, tell the Munsters, what timeouts are for), I wouldn’t know where to start. After the game, a defeated-looking and -sounding Nagy said something about how his “guys are battling,” as if that matters. Nagy’s tendency to talk in cliches heavy on the feel-good may have been affected by the way he was treated coming off the field by fans. Some shouted, “Fire Nagy!” while others accused him of committing an act that police won’t tolerate in public. The peasants, fed on stories of glory about Da Coach and His Boys or the great warriors of the past (Butkus, Grange, Payton, Sayers, repeat), see only incompetence set before them, not a good thing where football is the talk of the town. Nagy should be gone by season’s end. If the Munsters lose to the winless Lions on Thanksgiving, he will be. And GM Ryan Pace, who shows himself during the season less than Dracula in the daytime? I doubt he can collaborate his way out of this mess.

You Are Getting Sleepy, Very Sleepy

The Tribune had a holiday gift insert in today’s paper, so I took a look. You never know; there could be a stocking stuffer, or more. Right now, I have my eye on some Wedgwood coffee mugs on eBay. Blue Pacific, a perfectly named pattern to counteract Chicago gray. Anyway, I was thumbing through the guide and saw the recommendation for “baseball hat”; it was a Bears’ cap. There, my friends, is a perfect example of the hold a less than mediocre sports’ franchise exerts over the good people of Chicago. We really do deserve better.

Man-splaining

MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred addressed us commonfolk Thursday on the state of labor relations between management and labor. Management’s mouthpiece, er, the commissioner admitted owners could lock out players next month, but not to worry. “Honestly, I can’t believe there’s a single fan in the world who doesn’t understand that an offseason lockout that moves the process forward is different than a labor dispute that costs games.” But doesn’t a lockout move baseball one step closer to games being lost, after which a season, in part or whole? Isn’t the wiser course for both sides to sit down and bargain until they have an agreement? Doesn’t locking out one side tempt the other side to sit there, arms folded, tongues stuck out, until the cows come home? The commissioner didn’t say.

MVP*

So, Shohei Ohtani and Bryce Harper won the MVP Award in their respective leagues. Without casting too many aspersions, if these two are the cream of the crop, I’d hate to see the mere mortals who play the game. The thing is, they’re not the best, not if stats count as much as sabermetrics. Ten hitters had more than Ohtani’s 100 RBIs, topped by Salvador Perez with 121. My vote would’ve gone to Vladimir Guerrero Jr., who hit .311 with 48 homeruns; 123 runs scored; and 111 RBIs. Compare that to .257; 46; 103; and 100 for Ohtani. Not only did Guerrero put up better numbers, those numbers counted for something, with the Blue Jays missing the playoffs by all of one game. Ohtani’s Angels went 77-85, textbook also-rans. But Guerrero didn’t post a 9-2 record on the mound, and the voters must’ve been impressed with Ohtani for doing that. I saw it as more of a sideshow. Harper is another headscratcher. How do 84 RBIs and 101 runs scored translate into a most valuable player? Juan Soto and Austin Riley both had more of each. Or take Freddie Freeman, with his 120 runs scored to go with 83 RBIs. Oh, and his team won the World Series while Harper’s Phillies faded down the stretch. But Harper had a league-leading 1.044 OPS, like that mattered. If adding on-base and slugging percentage leads to a magic number, then Guerrero should be the AL MVP with a second-best in baseball OPS of 1.002. Go figure. I can’t.

Maybe This Time, Contd.

Well, that didn’t take long. A month after the National Pro Fastpitch women’s softball league suspended operations in August, a new league—Women’s Professional Fastpitch—was announced a month later. Maybe things will go better this time around, but I wonder. A league press release from October said the WPF was “aiming for six to eight teams for their inaugural season,” which is slated to run from June to August. Wouldn’t it have looked better to hold off on announcing the league’s formation until franchises had been lined up? And how many games can you play in two months.? Fan interest would seem to depend on the length of schedule as well as quality of play. You can have one without the other, but the game will never catch on with fans. Right now, women’s sports in Chicago is enjoying…attention, something it’s never really had before. The Sky won the WNBA Championship last month, and the Red Stars are in Saturday’s championship game of the National Women’s Soccer League. I mean, you actually see stories where before there was nothing, and I do mean nothing. Chicago supported pro softball for as long as the NPF was around, with the Bandits usually going deep into the postseason. But softball remains the stepchild of women’s pro sports. I don’t know what will change that, outside of more games played, longer basepaths and a pitching rubber moved back a good ten feet or so. I guess will see starting next summer.

Maybe This Time

Believe it or not, I was too young to see Minnie Minoso in his prime. My only real memory of him, outside of the Bill Veeck stunts in 1976 and 1980, was when he returned to the South Side for a third time, a cup of coffee in 1964. I was too young to understand, Minoso was too old to make an impression. But that didn’t stop me as an adult from seeing that No. 9 deserved, deserves, enshrinement in Cooperstown. This is pretty much an article of faith for any real White Sox fan, not that HOF voters care; they’ve passed over him too many times to count. And now he’s up for reconsideration as part of the “Golden Days” ballot (really, you couldn’t come up with a better name?). This time may be different. Why? Because the NYT says so. How nice of them. Consider the headline from Monday’s story: Baseball Gets Another Chance to Honor a Legend. And this sentence: “ The Hall of Fame is considering Minoso again this off-season, reviving one of its most curious candidacies.” Curious how, you might ask. That the East Coast didn’t see what was obvious from the start to Sox fans in Chicago? Yeah, that is curious. Minoso broke barriers like Jackie Robinson did, only he didn’t have the benefit of English as a way to express himself as Robinson could. Being Black and Cuban constituted two strikes against him. Not playing in New York earned him strike three. Consider Minoso’s rookie year stats from 1951: 173 hits; .326 BA; 112 runs scored; and 76 RBIs. Yet Minoso finished second to the Yankees’ Gil McDougal for Rookie of the Year. Now, compare McDougal’s stats: 123 hits; .306 BA; 72 runs scored; and 63 RBIs. You mean to tell me the East Coast fix wasn’t in? Minoso finished fourth that year in the AL MVP vote that Yogi Berra won with fewer hits and runs and only twelve more RBIs. Four times Minoso landed fourth in MVP balloting, and three of those times he had a solid case for being first. Berra won in 1954, despite Minoso having the better WAR, 8.2 to 5.3. Roger Maris in 1960? Really? Yes, so it would be nice if that part of the baseball establishment east of the Alleghenies would get on the Minoso bandwagon. Better late than never.

Wasted Space

Today’s installment of “All Bears All the Time” that has taken up residence for what remains of the Chicago Tribune’s sports’ section, we have this page-one gem: Rookie OT finally in pads. Offensive lineman Teven Jenkins, the Munsters’ second round pick, is healed—maybe—from back surgery and ready to show what he can do. How Bears, to draft someone other teams shied away from because of concerns over his health, and how Chicago media, to treat the appearance of a player at practice as a major event. Truly, only in the Land of Halas. Can it get worse? In fact, it already did. Yesterday, the Trib devoted a full page to “a look at the 7 newest NFL stadiums, from capacity to best amenities.” Only the story offered absolutely nothing on what most fans would consider amenities, e.g., parking, concessions, seating and sightlines. Do fans really care about this playing surface or that retractable roof? The Trib staff seemed to think so. For some reason, the story listed the construction cost of each stadium without mentioning the level of public subsidy. I guess if you’re not going to talk about the cost of parking, why bother with the cost of construction? Or a sense of the size of the new revenue stream, or where it goes, or…

Knowing What's Important

There used to be two kinds of people in these parts—those who shopped at Sears and those who employed people who shopped at Sears. My family belonged to the first group. Sears is a dead store walking these days, that is, if you can find one still open; the last one in Illinois closed after business hours yesterday. When Sears mattered, the company operated in excess of 3,000 outlets. My parents were both the children of immigrants, and they were raised to believe it was a sin to waste money. (And it is, yes?) Because Sears offered value, my parents shopped there for the items that helped a blue-collar family feel middle class. It didn’t hurt that Sears also offered a discount to Chicago firefighters like my father. Sears employed a sizeable workforce to staff those 3,000 stores and offered a generous pension plan, if only to keep the unions away. (Yes, in many ways Sears was what Amazon is, except for the generosity shown workers.) As an adult, I never thought to work for Sears or buy my clothes there, but appliances? Where else would you go? Julius Rosenwald was the creative genius behind the company. He captured material dreams to put in the Sears Catalog; what couldn’t be bought out of this paycheck would wait patiently on page 523 for the next. Rosenwald also pioneered the freestanding Sears store. I have memories of going to the first one ever opened, part of a vast network of Sears-owned buildings on west Arthington in Chicago. This was far from our house on the South Side, but my parents would drive anywhere for a good bargain. Rosenwald was also a philanthropist whose support made possible the Museum of Science and Industry; ironically, there’d be no U-505 without Julius Rosenwald. Or those nearly 5,000 “Rosenwald schools” built in the early decades of the 20th century Whatever education African Americans got in the Jim Crow South was in large part made possible by schools that Rosenwald helped finance through a matching-grant system. For Southern states, this no doubt felt like a win-win, having a Northerner—and a Jew, no less—defray the cost of educating Black children. For those children, it was a win-win. For Rosenwald, it was more a matter of duty. If only Jeff Bezos understood. Yesterday, Sunday, the Tribune did a frontpage story on the closing of that last local Sears’ store. It consisted mostly of comments from passersby and reminiscences of the reporter; there was nothing on Sears as an economic engine or on Rosenwald the philanthropist. The Sun-Times didn’t even bother, unless the story was so small I missed it entirely. But the Trib’s sports section was a real revelation, nearly four full pages devoted to the 2001 Bears. That’s right, a 13-3 Bears’ team that did absolutely nothing in the playoffs and reverted to mediocrity (4-12) the next season. Such is the power of the Munsters of the Midway. They can get the news media to confuse the important with the ephemeral. We get what we deserve, I guess.

Don't Touch That Dial

I know, I’m like a dog with a bone because I won’t let go. But I think I might if I can just get sports’ talk radio out of my system. Going back to my drive from Madison, the best thing about listening to “The Score” were the commercials. That’s right, any kind of plug for anybody or anything was better than listening to two toddlers babbling on, all the while confusing noise with speech. One ad in particular, for the only woman on-air talent at the station, stood out. It was a clip from her show, and she was talking about the Bears. She offered reasoned, intelligent analysis, stuff you might disagree with but not at all consider dumb. Keep in mind the ad played on a show where the two dimwits were throwing hosannas at the Rams for signing wide receiver Odell Beckham Jr. And what’s wrong with that, you might ask. Well, first they brought up what you might call Beckham’s baggage of antics, only to dismiss it because the Rams are so committed to winning blah, blah, blah, and Beckham and newly acquired Rams’ linebacker Von Miller are friends, blah, blah, blah. Here’s the thing. A frat-boy atmosphere permeates sports’ talk and draws listeners with the exact same mind-set; a serious female broadcaster doesn’t stand a chance unless she wants to start making disparaging remarks about an obnoxious listener’s penis size, or lack thereof. She could, and maybe even should, but I doubt that would stop the frat boys from calling in, tweeting, texting and whatnot, all with the same misogynistic message. The Score used to have a woman on the broadcast team, and she gave as good as she got, until she was axed in a cost-cutting move last year. Her successor, sort of, is also doing TV sports, and this is where it gets interesting—there’s a long history of women local sportscasters. They’ve all been highly respected and have had long runs. Maybe it has something to do with TV sports not having call-in segments.

Walk Away?

Is it me, or are sports teams making it harder for fans to cheer for them while retaining a shred of self-respect? This has been going on for a while, I think. At the very least, it dates to the public funding craze for stadiums. If fans want to keep their teams, they have to agree to become the most generous landlords known to humanity. Or we move. Did I mention personal seat licenses? Bears fans are learning they’re not transferable should the Munsters move into a new stadium in Arlington Heights. Let’s not forget PEDs, while we’re at it. How any Cardinals’, A’s or Giants’ fan can not be upset over the apparent or admitted steroids’ use by Barry Bonds, Jose Canseco and Mark McGwire is beyond me. In Chicago, Cubs’ fans were spared having to confront the validity of Sammy Sosa’s stats, thanks to Sosa making a fool of himself every time the issue of PEDs is brought up. Kryptonite knocks out Superman, the P-word does the same to Sosa. Over on the South Side, we have a manager seemingly oblivious to the PEDs’ usage of Canseco and McGwire when he managed them. See No Evil LaRussa—that’s what Tony LaRussa’s HOF plague should have on it, with a monkey shielding its eyes. And now we have the situation in Las Vegas, where the Raiders are stinking up the joint, at least for anyone who has a conscience. First, coach Jon Gruden is forced to resign for comments racist, homophobic and misogynistic made in emails while he was between coaching gigs. (Class guy that he is, Gruden is now suing the NFL for letting those emails go public.) Now, they’ve gotten rid of their two most recent first-round draft choices. Why? Because they had no choice. One posted a video of himself waving a gun and threatening to kill someone; the other was involved in a high-speed car collision that did kill someone. Las Vegas was made to cough up $750 million in public funding for a new stadium and the “privilege” of having owner Mark Davis move his team from Oakland. Was it worth it? Why does Davis get to keep his team in the wake of such gross incompetence? At what point do you stop following a team and just walk away? It’s a question for these times.

Landscape and Wasteland

Life has been happening a lot the past few weeks, which is as a good an explanation as any for why I had to drive to Madison, Wisconsin, twice over the course of three days this week. I didn’t expect to see so many dead deer on the side of the road once I crossed over into Packer Land. Clare drove me yesterday so I could pick up a relative’s SUV. It started off typical Midwest November, with gray skies, cold in the air and rain to wash it all down. The rain stopped around Rockford—home of Cheap Trick, you know—and the sky offered hints every now and then of showing some blue. That passed for hope. We talked a little of this, a little of that, life, death and why the Sox didn’t offer Carlos Rodon a qualifying offer. As a parent, you learn to appreciate your children in their adulthood. I still can’t get over how well Clare drives. Then again, she had an excellent teacher. How well I remember the question, “Dad, which one is the gas, again?” All good things come to an end, and that started when we found the SUV; so began the drive back. As a rule, I try not to touch other people’s stuff; that includes mirrors, seat settings and radio stations. Not mine, I just want to get home and have next week better than this one. I turned the radio on for reasons other than boredom; the Wisconsin countryside rolls in a most delightful fashion, with a dash of farm animals and fall color to keep one’s interest. Illinois is flat, but that’s OK, too; it feels like you can see forever, which gives rise to thoughts of eternity and whatnot. But too much reverie can lead to distracted driving, so the radio it was. What a waste. My great misfortune was to have a Chicago sports-talk station on, two “personalities” offering what the station website calls “in-your-face Chicago sports talk with great opinions, guests and fun.” Only for the near two hours I listened, there was none of that. To call the on-air duo “adolescent” would be grossly inaccurate. “Infantile” was more like it. One guy thought it was “cool” to sit so close to Dallas Mavericks’ owner Mark Cuban, in town Wednesday night with his team playing the Bulls. Cuban has really helped make the NBA what it is today, you know. And there was a near-endless digression on the taunting call in Monday night’s Bears-Steelers’ game that probably sealed the Munsters’ loss. That was separate from the near-endless, adolescent, puerile treatment of remarks superagent Scott Boras made at the baseball general managers’ meeting this week in California. Boras likes to hear himself talk; these guys do, too. They played all of Boras’ cutesy remarks about his clients, of Kris Bryant being like Sean Connery; Nick Castellanos as “ol’ St. Nick” bringing presents by way of his bat; Carlos Rodon, “the thinking man” of a good pitching staff. I swear the guffaws between snippets stretched from the state line to Cook County. Then, they played what Boras had to say about the current state of baseball, which apparently is very bad because of the bonus-pool system that’s been in effect since 2012. From what I can tell, Boras thinks teams should pay huge bonuses to players who then flame out or get injured early on. Isn’t that what used to happen, and isn’t that how the current system came into existence? Neither Boras nor the two radio hyenas considered the possibility. Mercifully, the trip came to its end. I got the SUV to its owner, someone I’ve known since I was eight years old, back in the days of JFK. We talked a little, and then Clare drove me home. Her son was waiting for her. He’d been in Grandma’s care all day. And life kept happening.

Instant Karma

I’m starting to think that the only way to win a sports championship in Chicago is by deal making, as with the devil, and he never plays fair. Take a look at the Cubs. They break a 108-year championship drought in 2016, and then what? Theo Epstein has all but disappeared; ditto Joe Madden managing the Angels. Do you think any of those free-agent ex-Cub core people—Baez, Bryant, Rizzo, Schwarber—is going to add a second World Series ring? I don’t. The Bears are another perfect example. The last, and only time, the Munsters won the Super Bowl was in 1986. Anyone care to venture how long ago that was? The cost of that deal seems to be in the form of ownership. The team will forever be controlled by the McCaskeys. Read it and weep (and at some point, you may want to do the same with the Ricketts). And now we have the Blackhawks, winners of the Stanley Cup in 2010, 2013 and 2015. Everything is suddenly, and maybe irrevocably, tarnished in light of the Kyle Beach allegation surrounding former video coach Brad Aldrich. The scandal has cost Stan Bowman and Joel Quenneville their current jobs, if not their careers. In true Chicago fashion, the curse may include “forever” ownership: Ricketts, McCaskey, Wirtz, what a rogues’ gallery. The Hawks have gotten off to a terrible start, so bad that a 13-year, 535-game home sellout streak ended last month. After going 1-9-2, they fired Jeremy Colliton as head coach, which got me to thinking about the White Sox. Maybe Charles Comiskey made a deal with the devil to win championships in 1906 and 1917, maybe not. Either way, the Black Sox scandal devastated the franchise. Recent scholarship argues that Comiskey was anything but a tightwad and the active fixers among his 1919 squad anything but angels. No matter. After Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis laid down his lifetime ban against eight players, seven of them starters, Comiskey never found a way to replace the talent lost, and that pretty much continued long after his death in 1931. It took the team forty years to get back to the World Series and another forty-six to win one. Time will tell with the Blackhawks, but right now it sure looks like they’ve got that bad Chicago sports’ karma coming their way.

There But for the Grace of God

I was leafing the Saturday NYT (doesn’t everyone?) when a story caught my eye: Colorado Skeleton Is Thought to Be Hiker Who Vanished on Ski Trip 38 Years Ago. Take away the snow; add another nine years; and that could be me, had things gone in a different direction, so to speak, one day in August of 1974. The story in the paper concerned a 27-year old West German national who started off on a two- or three-day ski trip into Rocky Mountain National Park. Give me this much—I knew to avoid avalanches. Glaciers are another story. It was a few weeks before the start of law school. I wanted to go out West but couldn’t get anybody to come along, so I went alone. I more or less bribed my father, use of the Ford Galaxie provided it came back with a backseat full of Coors Beer, back before it was distributed east of the Missippi. It was long ago. The Saturday in question I started off on a trail in Rocky Mountain National Park without telling anyone for the simple fact there was no one to tell. Thoreau didn’t need other people, and neither did I. My mistake, not unlike the decision to attend law school. I made my way above the tree line, all the while admiring Nature, as if Nature cared what a human did or thought. I marveled at the shadows cast by clouds, how they raced across some distant valley. I heard but never saw the jets flying above. Did somebody looking out a window on their way to JFK see the speck of a young man on the trail below? I doubt it. I rested and had lunch somewhere in the vicinity of 13,000 feet above sea level; it was probably closer to four o’clock before I finally got started back down. For no good—and definitely not smart—reason, I stepped on a glacier and rode it like a down escalator; that was fun. About two-thirds of the way through, I had a real lightbulb moment--that I was going at a good clip and would have a hard time stopping once the ice and snow stopped, oh, about a hundred feet ahead. What a desperate Fred Flintstone I made, digging my feet down, and hard. Somehow, I managed to stop before the glacier gave way to rock and gravel. It was probably at that moment I realized this was no walk in the park, even if it was. No matter how fast a pace I set, I saw I was losing daylight. Trust me, the shadows cast by a setting sun are darker than anything a passing cloud can throw down. All too soon it was dark, then night, and I had no flashlight. But like Robert Frost, I still had miles to go. I have no idea how I made it back to my car; I could just as easily have broken my neck on the trail in the darkness. The story in the paper noted 49 people died at Rocky Mountain National Park between 2010 and 2020; since the park’s opening 106 years ago, four people have gone missing and yet to be found. There but for the grace of God, I could’ve been number five. I may not have appreciated the flatness of the Great Plains back then. I do now, along with the relative flatness of the terrain my Schwinn takes me along.

Feet of Clay

COVID-19 is taking a toll on athletes, with their credibility if not their health. LeBron James, in the forefront on social justice issues, doesn’t want to tell people what to do when it comes to vaccinations. And now Aaron Rodgers just doesn’t want to tell people the truth. Asked in August if he’d been vaccinated, Rodgers shook his head, Yes, while saying, “Yeah, I’ve been immunized,” only he didn’t mean “vaccinated.” He came up with some old quarterback’s cure instead. Unfortunately, it didn’t prevent Rodgers from testing positive for COVID on Wednesday. And now Rodgers wants to imply it’s the media’s fault for not asking him any follow up questions back in August. Sorry, Aaron, you shook your head in the affirmative while being asked the question; I saw you do it and heard your response. A reasonable person would have concluded you were using “immunized” and “vaccinated” interchangeably. You can call yourself a “critical thinker,” as you did yesterday in a damage-control interview, but only if you shake your head, No. Anything else would be a lie.

With Their Collective Heads in the Sand

As ever, the MLB website is all roses and sunshine. If you want, you can watch the Braves’ victory parade or see the biggest need for each ballclub going into the offseason. You will not, however, find anything about TV ratings for the 2021 World Series. That’s because they’re down, way down. According to the Hollywood Reporter from Wednesday, the 2021 World Series was the second “least watched since total-viewer tallies became available in the early 1970s”; only last year’s series generated lower numbers, in light of the pandemic. Maybe there weren’t enough bat flips, or pitching changes, or commercials. It’s reaching a point where the only thing that will stem the decline will be a reverse Ted Lasso. The national pastime revived by Manchester United, with commercials, of course.

Comparison Shopping

The White Sox spotted the Astros two wins on the season, 93 vs. 95, and lost the ALDS in four games. The Braves spotted the Astros eight wins and took them four games to two in the World Series. Apparently, some underdogs play better than others. Atlanta general manager Alex Anthopoulos could be excued had he thrown in the towel midway through the season, after the Braves suffered season-ending injuries to outfielder Ronald Acuna Jr. and pitcher Mike Soroka; in addition, outfielder Marcel Ozuna was both injured in late May and then put on what turned out to be season-long administrative leave stemming from domestic violence charges. Not a good situation by any means. So, what did Anthopoulos do? He went out at the trade deadline and acquired Adam Duvall; Joc Pederson; Eddie Rosario; and Jorge Soler. Duvall and Pederson helped carry their new team into the postseason where Rosario (NLCS MVP) and Soler (World Series MVP) took over. I hope Anthopoulos is adding a shelf in his office for the awards that should be coming his way. And Sox GM Rick Hahn would do well to consider where he went wrong. Oh, Hahn was busy at the trade deadline, too, picking up Cesar Hernandez, Ryan Tepera and Craig Kimbrel. Out of that trio, only Tepera acquitted himself will. With the other two, it's more a case of, when’s your flight out of town? The Braves had to deal with one other injury, losing starter Charlie Morton to a broken leg in the first game of the Series; credit Atlanta manager Brian Snitker with guiding his team across the finish line. Like Charlie Brown trick-or-treating, we got Tony LaRussa.

Isn't It Ironic?

The Tribune is probably on its last legs, at least as a real newspaper. About a month ago, the Sunday auto section disappeared without a word. The sports’ section is usually an anemic six pages. Coverage of games from the night before? If it ain’t the Bears, forget it. So, there was nothing on the Braves beating the Astros 7-0 to win the World Series last night. But what perfect timing for the AP story the Trib ran, “Long nights grow tiresome,” on the length of Series games. The first five games clocked in at an average of 3:41. That’s closing in on three and three-quarters hours, folks. I guess that makes last night’s 3:22 seem quick in comparison, and fun, if you like pitching changes. The Astros went with seven as Houston’s Dusty Baker did everything he could think of to manage a championship team. Didn’t happen with Barry Bonds in SF, didn’t happen with the Cheat Squad (pardon any redundancies) at Minute Maid. According to the AP story, the average length of a game in the regular season this year was a numbing 3:10:07 vs. 2:49 in 1991 and 2:33 in 1981. Wow, 2-1/2 hours for a baseball game. That’s so fast the Tribune might even cover it. Supposedly, the powers that be are concerned about games growing ever longer and ratings getting ever smaller. So, expect to hear all sort of ideas on how to speed up the pace. Pitch clock, anyone? Just don’t expect the length of commercial time to change, unless it gets longer. More money is more revenue, and no owner or player wants to do with less. Too bad the owners and players refuse to dictate under what terms their game—their content, if you prefer—can be shown. Get baseball games back to 2:33, and watch the ratings grow.

No, It's Not

NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman has been taking heat for the size of the fine, or lack thereof, he levelled against the Blackhawks for their handling of sex abuse allegations by former player Kyle Beach. The poor, poor Wirtz family has to come up with $2 million. Bettman told ESPN “people have debated the amount of the fine, but it was substantial by any measure.” But Nancy Armour of USA Today put things in context by noting the Blackhawks’ are valued a little north of $1 billion. So, exactly how does $2 million hurt? By my liberal art’s math, the fine equals .2 percent—or 1/500 for anyone out there more comfortable with fractions—of the team’s value. Is that even a slap on the wrist? Then we have assistant commissioner Bill Daly explaining why the NHL didn’t act when the Hawks gave the league a “head’s up” about the claims back in December. Daly says he was told by the team then “there was no merit” to Beach’s allegations. Oops. This is the kind of crisis management you get from a commissioner who owes his job to team owners. If nothing else, at least one team owner has to be satisfied.

Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?

The Astros beat the Braves by a score of 9-5 last night in a game that went four hours on the dot. Houston used six pitchers to Atlanta’s five. Through it all, FOX acts as if fans in the stands cheering—remember, these are people who’ve talked themselves into paying God knows how much for a ticket—is proof they’re broadcasting an exciting game. If only. Again, for contrast let’s go back to game seven of the 1960 World Series, when Bill Mazeroski’s walk-off home run gave the Pirates a 10-9 victory over the Yankees. Pittsburgh went with four pitchers, New York five. The game was over in 2:36. Baseball predicated on matchups and a fear of starters having to face a lineup more than two times is no different that baseball on pogo sticks. Just because everyone’s doing it doesn’t make it right. Or watchable, for that matter.