Armadillo Sports

With the NBA Draft going on, here are some basketball-related thoughts……..

— My friend Joe Gill pointed this out to me yesterday— how much the NBA has changed.

The 3-point shot came into the NBA in the 1979-80 season, Magic/Bird’s rookie season. Here are the Lakers’ TEAM TOTALS FOR THE SEASON on 3-point shooting in their first six years the 3-point shot was in the NBA:

1979-80: 20-100, 20%
1980-81: 17-94, 18.1%
1981-82: 13-94, 13.8%
1982-83: 10-96, 10.4%
1983-84: 58-226, 25.7%
1984-85: 90-295, 30.5%

This past season, 2016-17, Lakers were 730-2110 (34.0%) on 3-pointers for the season; Golden State was 982-2563 (38.3%).

The game has changed in 37 years. A lot.

— Magic Johnson’s first six years in the NBA, he was 29-164 (17.7%) behind the arc; in his last seven NBA seasons, he improved to 32.5% on 3-pointers.

— Wednesday, CBS SportsNet ran an hour special on the draft; their four experts all picked who they thought the best player in the draft was- they gave four different answers, which sums this draft up well. There is no one player who is head and shoulders above the rest.

— 76ers have sold out over 14,000 season tickets for next year, a franchise record; their corps of talented young players have to prove they have the durability to play an 82-game season.

—  Chicago Bulls traded Jimmy Butler to Minnesota for Zach LaVine, Kris Dunn and the 7th pick, who wound up being Lauri Markkanen from Arizona.

— Little odd that the last two #1 picks in the draft (Fultz, Ben Simmons) had a combined record of 29-36 in their one season of college basketball and both coaches got fired within a year of coaching that player.

— Four quick non-basketball notes:
a) Weird Al Yankovic is getting a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
b) Jose Abreu is the first major leaguer since 1966 whose first 13 home runs have all been on the road.
c) I graduated high school 40 years ago tonight.
d) I just realized a Saskatchewan-Montreal CFL game is on ESPNews.

— First seven picks in the draft were all college freshmen; Knicks broke the trend by taking Frank Ntilikina, an 18-year old point guard from Europe— he is 6-5.

— Jay Bilas’ comment on NC State’s Dennis Smith, #9 pick by the Mavericks: “He is not always a focused defender.” A nice way of saying, “He sucks on defense.”

— Sacramento traded the #10 pick to Portland for picks #15 and #20; Gonzaga’s Zach Collins was the #10 pick.

— December of 2013, just 3.5 years ago, I sat in the gym at Bishop Gorman HS in Las Vegas with my friend Mike and we watched some high school basketball. Bishop Gorman’s 3rd-string center was a 10th grader who played pretty well when he got into the game- that was Zach Collins.

Last night, Collins was the 10th pick in the NBA Draft, by Portland. Not bad for a kid who was a 3rd-string center on his high school team three years ago, behind Stephen Zimmerman and Chase Jeter. Zimmerman is in the D-League with Orlando, Jeter just transferred from Duke to Arizona. Collins has a shot to be the best of the three.

— NBA commissioner Adam Silver is a tall, bald man who wears glasses, which obviously makes him very handsome— ha!!! Oh, Charlotte just took Malik Monk, best shooter in the draft who apparently is also adept at hunting squirrels.

— Detroit took Duke’s Luke Kennard with the #12 pick; he plays basketball lefty, but when he was a high school QB, he threw the ball righty. Go figure.

— Utah traded Trey Lyles and the #24 pick to Denver for the #13 pick- Jazz took Donovan Mitchell from Louisville.

— Halftime: Saskatchewan 10, Montreal 7. Season opener for both clubs. We’ll have write-ups on all the CFL games, starting next week.

— ESPN’s guy with the touchscreen who is a salary cap guru predicts the Bulls will buy out Dwyane Wade’s contract as they totally rebuild. Thats an expensive deal right there.

— John Calipari was in Colorado Springs Thursday morning coaching the U19 team, then was in Brooklyn for the draft; I’m assuming he is headed back to Colorado as soon as all of his guys get drafted. I’m assuming Calipari has a really nice house, but is he ever home?

Calipari is now holding  court on ESPN; in eight years at Kentucky, he’s coached 64 players. Half of those 64 players have been drafted by the NBA.

— I’ll say this: Oklahoma State guard Jawun Evans is really good. He’ll be a very good NBA player, but he hasn’t been taken yet.

— In his next contract, Paul George will either get $177M for five years or $132M for four years, depending on if he switches teams or not.

— Sacramento took Harry Giles, who has already torn the ACL in both knees and wasn’t good at Duke last year— there is very little chance this ends well. Giles scored 3.9 pts/game while playing in 20% of Duke’s possessions last year. Can he recover enough to withstand an 82-game schedule? Wish the young man well, but this figures to be another Sacramento disaster.

— My point here: Taking Giles over Jawun Evans is basketball malpractice.

— Oklahoma City took Terrance Ferguson with the #21 pick; he skipped college (Arizona) and shot 30% in an Australian pro league LY. They say he needs to get stronger- if he such a great shooter, why did he shoot 30% in an Australian league? He is a developmental project.

— Host Brooklyn Nets took Jarrett Allen, a big kid from Texas. He scored 13.4 pts/game with 8.4 reb/game LY. This young man built his own computer, which is very impressive.

Nets are 41-123 the last two years; three short years ago, they were 44-38 and in Eastern Conference semis. It is easier to get worse than it is to get better. They need a lot of players.

NHL information every day on NHL page……college/pro basketball every day on Hoops page. Baseball information on MLB2 page

Thursday’s six-pack
— Indians 5, Orioles 1— Carrasco tossed six shutout innings for the Tribe.
— Toronto 7, Texas 5— Blue Jays scored six runs in the first inning.
— Braves 5, Giants 3– Kemp hit a walk-off HR in extra innings, just after midnight.
— Twins 4, White Sox 2— Berrios is 7-1, 2.67 for Minnesota.
— Cardinals 7, Phillies 6 (10)- -Philly led 5-1 in sixth inning.
— New Orleans Pelicans traded G Tim Frazier to the Washington Wizards for the No. 52 pick in tonight’s NBA Draft.

Quote of the Day
“What the world needs are less mental hospitals and more minor league baseball.”
Bill Murray

Thursday’s quiz
Which major league team has their AAA farm team in Nashville?

Wednesday’s quiz
Dwayne Wade played his college basketball at Marquette.

Tuesday’s quiz
Lou Piniella is the only person to manage both the Tampa Bay Rays and the Cincinnati Reds.

13) Miami 2, Washington 1— Nationals are way ahead in a weak NL East, but this was a tough  loss. Max Scherzer had a no-hitter in the 8th inning, but gave up an infield hit that bounced off his glove, then Trea Turner bounced a throw to 1B for an error that kept the inning alive, before a wild pitch tied the game 1-1.

Giancarlo Stanton hit Scherzer’s 119th pitch for a single to left that drove in the winning run.

Scherzer and Nolan Ryan are now only two pitchers in history to go 8 IP, not give up an earned run, give up two or less hits, strike out at least 11 and lose the game.

Game ended when Adam Lind was called out on strikes on a pitch that was a good six inches outside. Home plate ump Dana Demuth should be fined for that— I could care less who won the game, but to end the game on a pitch that bad was disgraceful.

12) Odd news note #1 of the day: Police in Winfield, WV say a man found asleep in a stranger’s home has been charged with burglary.

A homeowner called police dispatchers after finding a glass door broken in his house and a stranger asleep in his bed. The napping trespasser was charged with burglary and destruction of property.

11) Surprising stat: Angels are 11-10 since Mike Trout got hurt; Braves are 16-17 since Freddie Freeman got hurt. Would’ve thought both teams would’ve done much worse.

10) Matt Adams has been so productive for the Braves that when Freeman comes back from his wrist injury, he may give third base a try, to keep both bats in the lineup.

9) Justin Verlander apparently thinks Major League Baseball has changed the actual baseball that is used in games- he says since the 2015 All-Star break, baseballs used are harder and also the seams are different, which has resulted in batted balls traveling farther.

As soon as I typed this sentence, Ian Happ hit a home run at Wrigley. Maybe Verlander is right.

8) Odd news note #2 of the day: A couple has gotten back nearly $100,000 they mistakenly donated to Goodwill Industries in Ohio.

Two Goodwill employees in Zanesville, OH  initially thought it was play money or counterfeit cash after finding $97,000 in hundred dollar bills in a duffel bag inside a box of clothes last week. The duffel bag also contained legal documents and the last will and testament for the couple. Oy.

7) Best cumulative scores at the Hartford Open the last five years: Bubba Watson -52, Marc Leishman -43, Chris Stroud -41, Charley Hoffman -35. Ryan Moore -32

6) When Dwight Howard plays for the Charlotte Hornets this fall, they’ll be his 5th team in the last seven years.

5) Quote of the Day, part 2, from Browns’ QB Brock Osweiler:

“The best part is I’m getting coached hard on my fundamentals. And I believe firmly that when your fundamentals and your feet are right as a quarterback, you’re going to make great decisions and you’re going to throw accurate footballs.

I think that’s something that slid last season. I’m not going to go into great detail on that, but they did. My fundamentals slid, and because of that, you saw some poor decisions and some poor throws. If you go back to 2015, I feel like my fundamentals were pretty tight.”

Coaches in Houston, Osweiler’s last stop, should just love that quote.

4) San Diego Padres CF Franchy Cordero found out the hard way yesterday that there is a brick wall underneath all that ivy on the outfield fences at Wrigley Field. He caught the ball on the warning track, then got a face full of ivy and ran into that brick wall that has zero give to it. Terrific catch.

Wind must’ve been blowing in, since Contreras did a bat flip when hit the ball, thinking it would wind up in the bleachers.

3) Golf Channel and NBC Sports will show every shot of the British Open, which means you have to get up pretty darn early if you want to watch it all.

Couple years ago, I was in Las Vegas during the British Open; they had the start of the golf on at one of the bars, while at the same time, the Diamondbacks’ game was in the 13th inning, so I was watching Wednesday night baseball and Thursday morning golf at the same time. Muy bueno.

2) Quote of the Day, part 3, from Kansas’ Josh Jackson, who declined to work out for the Celtics after they traded down into the #3 slot:

“They did a little bit of moving around with their pick. I felt like they made it pretty clear who they were going to draft with the No. 1 pick, so I didn’t really feel like it was worth either of our times for me to work out with them. But then when they, you know, did the flip and went to No. 3, by then it was too late.”

1) Mike Krzyzewski came out again in favor of high school players being eligible for the NBA Draft; the baseball rule makes sense— here is who is eligible for the baseball draft:

•- High school players, if they have graduated from high school and have not yet attended college or junior college.

•- College players, from four-year colleges who have either completed their junior or senior years or are at least 21 years old. (So college players play three years before they can be drafted)

•- Junior college players, regardless of how many years of school they have completed

13) Cavaliers really didn’t consult Lebron James before they fired GM David Griffin? Does this mean they’ve given up hope of Lebron being in Cleveland after next season?

Related item: the NBA Draft is Thursday, as in tomorrow. In the history of the world, how many teams fire their GM three days before the bleeping draft?

12) How long will Griffin be out of work? Cleveland was in the Finals the last three years (I know, they’ve got Lebron which is all that really matters) so some NBA team will be happy to sign the guy up, right?

Will the fact that he went to Arizona State instead of an Ivy League school hinder him in finding another job? Listen to the guy talk; he is very sharp, yet Cleveland just fired him, apparently against the wishes of Lebron James, an iconic player.

Why? Life makes no sense sometimes.

11) Lakers are trading Timofey Mozgov, D’Angelo Russell to the Brooklyn Nets for Brook Lopez and 27th pick in tomorrow night’s draft. Lakers dumped Mosgov’s salary ($48M over next three years) as they clear cap space to eventually wind up with Paul George.

Elsewhere, Charlotte is sending Miles Plumlee, Marco Belenelli and the 41st pick to Atlanta for Dwight Howard and the 31st pick. Howard plays on a lot of different teams.

10) Why teams lose: On June 19, 2016, the Mariners traded Chris Taylor to the Dodgers for Zach Lee. Taylor is hitting ,302 with 32 RBI for the Dodgers- he bats in the middle of the order.

Lee was selected off waivers by the Padres last December and just got DFA’d, meaning he is either headed back to AAA, or to free agency. He has an 8.53 ERA in 12.2 IP in the majors.

9) Clayton Kershaw has given up 17 homers in 103.1 IP this season; he allowed 8 taters in 149 IP all of last year.

8) Phil Mickelson and his caddy for the last 25 years, Bones Mackay, have parted ways.

7) Oakland A’s got two hits in their first-ever game in Oakland, in 1968; a pinch-hit by future Hall of Fame manager Tony LaRussa and a home run by future Dodgers’ radio guy Rick Monday.

Monday was a very good player; he had a 19-year career with A’s-Cubs-Dodgers, had a .361 career on-base %, made two All-Star games, but what he might be most famous for was when two morons ran on the field during a day game at Dodger Stadium and tried to burn an American flag in left-center field.

Monday sprinted over and snatched the flag away from the father/son combo and kept the flag safe.

6) One of Jon Gruden’s sons won a gold medal at the IPF World Powerlifting Championships in Belarus; the young man has very, very big arms (obviously).

5) I laugh when I see that Michelle Pfeiffer is a year older than I am; she looks 20 years younger. My favorite two movies of hers: Fabulous Baker Boys and Tequila Sunrise.

4) It hit 117 degrees in Las Vegas Tuesday, just the 4th time since 1942 its gotten that hot in Las Vegas.

3) A bookmaker in Europe posted 1.5 games as the over/under for the number of games rookie QB Mitch Trubisky starts for the Chicago Bears this season. Yes, you can wager on this stuff.

2) Joe West umpired his 5,000th major league game last night in Denver, the 3rd-most games anyone has ever umpired, so good for him.

1) Anthony Rizzo homered leading off the 1st inning last night; he is now 6-6 with a walk as the leadoff hitter in the 1st inning, with three home runs.

13) Colorado Rockies are 46-26, the Cinderella team of baseball; their pitching rotation has four rookie starters. Here is their experience and IP last year:

Tyler Chatwood: Most experienced of the five- he threw 158 IP LY, missed all of 2015, most of 2014 with an injury. Has started 20+ games three times in six MLB seasons. He’s tossed 90.1 innings this year.

German Marquez: 187.1 IP LY, only 20.2 of them in majors. He’s thrown 63.2 innings this year, technically still his rookie season.

Jeff Hoffman: 150 IP LY, 31.1 of them in majors; 76 IP this year, 32 of them in the majors.

Antonio Senzatela: Threw only 34.1 innings LY, has thrown 83.1 this year, his rookie season. He threw 144 innings in 2014, 154 in 2015.

Kyle Freeland: Threw 162 innings LY, has thrown 81.2 this year, his rookie season.

Pitching home games in Coors Field figures to be more stressful than most big league ballparks; can these rookie pitchers stand up for 3.5 more months? I’m not saying they can’t, but it is a fair question to ask.

12) Golfers Brooks Koepka and Daniel Berger were teammates at Florida State in 2012; now they’ve won on the PGA Tour in consecutive weeks.

Koepka finished 11th in the ACC tournament in 2012. Wonder what those other 10 guys are thinking today?

I looked at the 10 names who finished ahead of Koepka; only ones I recognized were Berger and Ollie Schneiderjans, who were in a 4-way tie for 7th.

Last seven golf majors have all been won by first-time major winners.

11) Former Minnesota Timberwolves’ GM David Kahn told this story on CBSSports.com:

“In 2009, just days after my May 22 hiring as President of Basketball Operations for the Minnesota Timberwolves, the agent for Steph Curry told me that Steph’s father, Dell, did not want his son to be drafted by Minnesota — “No offense,” as I recall Jeff Austin, his agent saying to me at the Chicago draft combine.”

Archie Manning did the same thing with the Chargers and his son Eli, forcing a trade, so Lavar Ball is not the first dad to meddle in his son’s dealings, he is just the loudest one.

10) Kahn didn’t do too well with Minnesota; he went on NBAtv once during a summer league game in Las Vegas, and Chris Webber, the analyst on the game, ripped him to shreds over some of his moves. When Kahn compared one of the Wolves to Webber as a player, Webber lit into him and the interview quickly degenerated from there.

9) Obscure movie trivia: At the end of The Bodyguard, when Kevin Costner’s character is guarding some police chief at a Rotary Club banquet, the actor who introduces the chaplain to give the invocation is Bert Remsen, who played the basketball coach Gabe Kaplan’s team had to beat at the end of the great basketball movie Fast Break, one of my favorite movies.

8) I’m not sure which one confuses me more, Michael Strahan as host of the $10,000 Pyramid or Drew Carey hosting The Price is Right. I watched both of these shows a lot during my misguided youth, when Dick Clark/Bob Barker were the hosts.

If they bring back Gambit and Wink Martindale isn’t the host, I ain’t gonna be happy.

7) Washington Redskins benefit from a Supreme Court ruling in a dispute over trademark issues- it likely increases the chances of the Redskins being allowed to keep the trademark for their controversial nickname.

6) Earlier this spring, I read a cool article on ESPN.com about Houston Rockets’ coach Mike D’Antoni and his wife, who have been together for a long time.

This from the article: “Many of D’Antoni’s best qualities as a coach— patience, humor, a refusal to scream and yell for the sake of screaming and yelling— are infused with her advice.”

it was just cool to read that a guy can be a really good coach, a good guy, and be happily married.

5) Cleveland Cavaliers fired their GM David Griffin Monday night; after all, they’re 161-85 the last three years, with three straight trips to the Finals and one NBA title- Griffin is obviously a slacker.

Cut the pretense; name Lebron James as GM on personnel side, hire a paper pusher to do the office work, and be done with it.

4) Injury updates:

— Reds’ SS Zack Cosart is hitting .320 but is on the DL now with a quad injury.
— Bronx Bomber SS prospect Gleyber Torres  needs Tommy John surgery on his non-throwing elbow after he was hurt in a collision at home plate— he is out for the year…
— Michael Brantley (Indians) goes on the DL with a sprained ankle.
— JJ Hardy is out 4-6 weeks with a broken wrist; Ruben Tejada will get his AB’s- they’re not going to move Manny Machado back to short.

3) Major leaguers whose at-bats end up the most in either a walk-strikeout-HR: Joey Gallo 55.9%, Chris Davis 55.6%.

2) ESPN the Magazine is usually a waste of time, but their most recent issue, with Manny Machado on the cover, has some interesting stuff in it about Hispanic players playing pro baseball and some of the stuff they go thru when they’re here, living in a foreign country.

If you own a major league team, how can you not insist that your coaches/trainers be bilingual?

We have a NY-Penn League team about 10 miles from where I live, Class A team of the Astros; I met someone last summer who is a tutor for the players on that team, helping them learn English as they start their pro baseball careers. Has to be tough living somewhere where you don’t know the language.

1) April 5, 2015, the Padres traded Cameron Maybin, Carlos Quentin, Matt Wisler and a draft pick to Atlanta for closer Craig Kimbrel and Melvin Upton. San Diego went 74-88, 18 games out of first place in the NL West. Manager Bud Black was fired during the season, his 8th with the Friars.

222 days later, on November 13, 2015, the Padres traded Kimbrel to Boston, for four prospects, two of whom have yet to make the majors, as well as 2B Carlos Asuaje and OF Manuel Margot. Asuaje is back in AAA, Margot has shown promise but is hurt right now.

San Diego is 96-136 since that trade; their GM, AL Preller, has been suspended twice by MLB for a month each for misdeeds, once when he worked with Texas, once with the Padres.

But hey, Preller went to Cornell so he must be smarter than the rest of us. Forget that Bud Black is now managing the Colorado Rockies, who are 46-26 and are the surprise team in baseball. San Diego is 28-42 this season, 17 games behind the Rockies.

If I owned the Padres, I’d be wondering what the hell is going on.

13) After the Markelle Fultz trade goes thru, the Celtics will have eight first round picks in the next three drafts— seriously, I’m not sure what they’ll do with all of them.

12) Fultz played 35:00+ in 11 of 13 Pac-12 games for Washington last winter, but sat out six of the Huskies’ last eight games with “a sore knee”; wonder how that knee is now. He played 30-31 minutes in the two games he played less than 35:00 in.

11) Paul George told the Pacers he won’t re-sign with them next summer; sounds like he is headed back to LA to play for the Lakers. Helps Lonzo Ball’s chances of being drafted by the Lakers, since it decreases chance that LA will draft Josh Jackson this week.

10) On December 19, 2014, this baseball trade was made:

Padres sent Joe Ross and Trea Turner to Washington.
Padres sent Jake Bauers, Rene Rivera and Burch Smith to Tampa Bay.

Rays sent Ryan Hanigan, Wil Myers and two minor leaguers to San Diego.

Washington sent Steven Souza Jr and a minor leaguer to Tampa Bay.

Unusual trade: all three teams got a very good player in the deal; Tampa Bay probably got the worst of it, unless Bauers develops into a good big leaguer.

9) Steven Souza Jr and Colorado’s Pat Valiaka homered on both Mother’s Day and Father’s Day this season.

8) Movie trivia: The quarterbacks from Varsity Blues and Friday Night Lights both wound up in Fast & Furious movies- there have been at least eight of those movies made. Just discovered ‘em, so I’m withholding comment until I’ve seen them all.

7) June 26, Ice Cube’s 3-on-3 basketball league debuts on TV; I’ll watch it once out of curiosity, but it is up to them if I watch it more than once.

6) Submitted for your perusal, as Rod Serling used to say at the start of the Twilight Zone: The day Johnny Miller shot 63 at the US Open at Oakmont. three players broke 70. On Saturday, with Justin Thomas also shooting 63, 18 players broke 70.

5) Western Kentucky football coach Mike Sanford Jr has his dad on his staff as special teams coordinator and running backs coach – the elder Sanford was head coach at UNLV from 2005-9.

4) Pitcher Brock Stewart warmed up for the Dodgers late in the game Sunday; his agent picked him up at the Cincinnati airport in the fifth inning, after his call-up from AAA Oklahoma City. Not a lot of time for stretching there. The agent’s name is Joe Speed, by the way, which is a tremendous name.

3) In five games batting leadoff for the Cubs, Anthony Rizzo is 9-22 with three homers, five runs scored, eight RBI. We’re going to see more of this, elite hitters moving to the top of the order.

2) They were talking on TV the other day about some major league infielders practice with flat gloves, which forces them to use two hands to field grounders.

I actually tried this coaching Little League in 1998, with the kids using their winter gloves, but we only did it one day, I can’t remember why. It went pretty well and it is a good idea. Got the idea from an umpire who recommended it to m

1. Rockies 7, Giants 5— Not only did Nolan Arenado hit a walk-off homer for first-place Colorado, he hit for the cycle. Rockies are having a storybook season with a lot of young starting pitchers. Will they hold up?

13) Rumors are rampant that the Celtics/76ers will make a trade that will wind up with Philly having the #1 pick in Thursday’s draft, so they can select Washington PG Markelle Fultz.

Danny Ainge is stockpiling a ton of draft picks over the next few years; at some point, he has to cash them in, but truth is, if the Celtics don’t love one of this year’s prospects more than the others, it makes sense to trade the pick and acquire more assets for down the road.

12) Las Vegas Summer League runs July 7-17 from UNLV. Fun event to attend. ESPN and NBAtv are showing all the games for those of us who won’t be in the desert then. 24 NBA teams will be represented, but the Knicks aren’t sending a team this year, which is unusual.

It is odd, but I’m looking forward to watching these games, moreso than the non-competitive games we saw in the playoffs. Guys playing for their careers are more fun to watch.

11) Joe Maddon got tossed Friday night in Pittsburgh during the first batter of the game, after umpires called a long drive that Anthony Rizzo hit a foul ball. Would’ve been third game in a row where Rizzo homered leading off a game, in only his third game as a leadoff batter.

Cubs also had a runner forced at third from the outfield during that inning, but still scored three runs. Pirate TV announcers were calling it one of the strangest innings they’d ever seen.

10) 12,000 people showed up at City Hall in Los Angeles Thursday night when the city projected the Batman logo onto City Hall to honor the late Adam West.

9) Thursday night, Chad Pinder became only the 3rd player ever to play SS/RF in the same game for the Oakland A’s, joining Tony Phillips and Bill Almon, who did it six times.

Oakland won that game 8-7 in 10 innings, despite allowing a run in the last five innings- they blew four saves in the game.  No bueno.

Eric Orns posted this on Twitter; only one MLB game EVER has gone extra innings, with both teams scoring in every half-inning from innings 6-9. Red Sox-Indians July 31, 1948. This game Thursday missed by one half-inning of becoming the second one.

8) Quote of the Day, part 2: ”I’m just not a fan of it. I don’t like it. I’m not a Home Run Derby guy. I’m not going to do it.” George Springer of the Astros

7) Brendan McKay was the #4 pick in the baseball draft, by Tampa Bay. He is going to try and be both a pitcher and a DH as he climbs the ladder in pro ball. Will be a fun experiment to follow— apparently Tampa Bay is going to let him try and do both.

6) Last year in the NFL, there were eight FG’s missed that were shorter than 30 yards; Seattle’s Steven Hauschka was the only kicker with two of them.

5) Pete Rose got a statue outside Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati this weekend; the statue depicts one of Rose’s trademark head-first slides. Too bad the powers-to-be don’t put Rose up for election for the Hall of Fame. Would be a HUGE weekend in Cooperstown.

4) Best wishes to Tigers’ DH Victor Martinez, who is on the DL after he had a rapid heartbeat, dizziness and cold sweats Thursday night— he was in the hospital for a while but is out now. He is not expected to travel with the team on its trip out west next week.

3) Bill Cosby’s trial resulted in a hung jury, so a mistrial was declared; prosecutors said they will re-try the case, so the whole thing will come down to selecting a more favorable jury, or maybe the prosecution calling other witnesses who’ve accused the 79-year old Cosby of bad deeds. This jury was made up of four white women, six white men, one black woman and one black man.

2) Underrated great defensive player: Orlando Arcia, shortstop for the Brewers. I watch lot of Milwaukee games; Arcia is one of those guys who make tough plays look simple.

William Shatner does a commercial for a law firm in Milwaukee that airs on Brewer games; I have no idea why/how they got a star like him to do a commercial on local TV. Good get.

1) Happy Father’s Day to all the dads out there; please make sure you call you dad or give him a hug, thank him and tell him how much you love him.

Taking a look at some trends involving Pac-12 football teams…….

USC scored 45+ points in three of its last four bowls, last three of which were decided by a total of 8 points. Underdogs covered 4 of their last 5 bowls. Since 2011, Trojans are 23-12 as home favorites.

UCLA is 2-8-1 vs spread in its last 11 non-conference games; they’re 0-4 vs spread in last four games as a home underdog.

Utah won its last four bowls; Kyle Whittingham is 10-1 in bowls. Utes are 28-11 the last three years, with a +24 turnover ratio- they covered eight of last ten as a road underdog. That said, Utah has only nine starters back this year and could regress some.

Last year, Colorado played in its first bowl since 2007; their last bowl win was in ’04. Under coach MacIntyre, Buffaloes are 10-2 as a home favorite.

Arizona State is 11-14 the last two years; they didn’t go to a bowl LY. ASU is 2-3 in its last five bowls, with average total of 76.4 in those games. Sun Devils are 17-9 as home favorites, 5-10 as road underdogs under Todd Graham.

Arizona has 14 starters back this year its offensive line has 89 returning starts. Wildcats are 3-1 in bowls under RichRod, scoring 41.5 pts/game, but were favored in all four games (1-3 vs spread). Arizona is 5-13 vs spread as a road dog under RichRod.

Washington is 27-14 under Petersen, with a +36 turnover ratio- they were +18 LY. Huskies are 6-3 in last nine games as a road favorite- their OL has 97 returning starts this season.

Since 2010, Stanford is 76-18; they won their last three bowls. Cardinal is 7-2-1 vs spread as an underdog in the Shaw era. All that, and they’re -2 in turnovers the last four years. Unusual for a team to win that much without a really good turnover ratio.

Oregon has 17 starters back and a new coach; from 2012-14, they were +55 in turnovers, but were +5/-3 last two years. Ducks are 3-10 vs spread in last 13 home games, 3-8-1 in last dozen non-league games. Oregon is 12-7-1 vs spread in last 20 road games.

Washington State has improved dramatically under Mike Leach, but they started last two years by losing to a I-AA team. Since 2013, Coogs are 14-4 as road underdogs, 10-6 as home favorites. Senior QB Falk has 28 starts under his belt.

Oregon State is 0-11 on road (5-6 vs spread) under Anderson; they have 15 starters back, should be much-improved. Since 2013, Beavers are 4-9 vs spread in non-league games.

Cal Bears have #110 experience team this year, with a new coach; they’re 7-2-1 vs spread in last 10 non-league games, but since ’07, they’re 5-15 as a road favorite. Cal’s coordinators were both head coaches LY, one at I-AA Eastern Washington, the other at Fresno State.

13) Jerry West left his role as a consultant with the NBA champ Warriors to take a job as a consultant with the Clippers— this job apparently has more clout than his job in Oakland.

Mr West is 79 years old, one of the greatest hoop players ever, also one of the league’s best executives- he is the NBA’s logo. Big get for the Clippers.

12) Also sounds like the Clippers are going to build a new arena near the Rams’ new football stadium, where the old Hollywood Park racetrack was located.

11) Colorado Rockies’ manager Bud Black was 121-116 as a big league pitcher- he started 296 games. He once threw 151 pitches in a complete game win at Detroit.

If a pitcher today threw 151 pitches in a game, the manager would get fired that night.

10) On June 15, 1974, Nolan Ryan threw 235 pitches, struck out 19, during an 13-inning game against the Red Sox. Ryan may not have been mortal, though; he went 12-6 when he was 44 years old. It is grossly unfair to compare anyone else to him.

9) Astros’ rookie Derek Fisher is the first player with two hits in an inning in his first major league game since Adam LaRoche on April 7, 2004.

8) Chicago White Sox drafted pitcher Riley Crean in the 35th round Wednesday; he is the son of former Indiana basketball coach Tom Crean.

White Sox also drafted a kid named Sam Abbott who will now decide between pro baseball and going to Long Beach State……..on a water polo scholarship.

7) Surprising tidbit: This week’s US Open is first time since 1992 (Pebble Beach) the Open is being played on a par-72 golf course.

6) Green Bay Packers’ safety HaHa Clinton-Dix is working as an unpaid summer intern for a judge in Wisconsin, as part of his studies to get his degree at Alabama.

5) Talk about being thorough; Celtics’ coach Brad Stevens called the assistant director of academic support at Markelle Fultz’ high school, to learn more about the Celtics’ potential #1 pick in the draft. Of course, Fultz was still in high school just last year, so it makes sense.

4) Golden State Warriors project to spend close to $240 million in 2017-18: $151.7 million in salary and $88.7 million in luxury tax for being over the salary cap.

It still boggles my mind that Stephen Curry will be making $41M a year.

3) Nationals 8, Mets 3— Daniel Murphy went 3-for-5; he is now 41-104 (.394) against his former team, with 28 RBI in 26 games.

2) This season is now another train wreck for my A’s; they fired pitching coach Curt Young- he pitched for Oakland for 10 years, and has been pitching coach for 13 years. there is no way on God’s green earth that the team’s struggles are his fault. He is a very good coach.

Someone in the front office, maybe more than one somebody, needs to be fired. Players win games; the people who acquire Oakland’s talent have done a terrible job recently.

One more thing that aggravates me about this, maybe more than anything: they know its a BS thing to do, so they fired Young the day the Warriors had their championship parade, so its gets buried in Friday’s local news. A gutless maneuver.

1) Mountain West/Missouri Valley will have a 10-game basketball series in pre-conference play; here are the pairings:

Nov 28: Loyola @ Boise State, Utah St @ Valparaiso, Colorado State @ Missouri State
Nov 29: UNLV @ Northern Iowa, Air Force @ Indiana State, Illinois State @ Nevada, Evansville @ New Mexico
Dec 2: San Jose St @ Southern Illinois, Drake @ Wyoming,
Dec 3: Bradley @ San Diego State

13) Happy Armadillo Day everyone!!! 16 years ago today, I started this site and hoped that someone, anyone would read it and not hate it. Actually, even if they hated it I hoped they would still read it.

9/11 happened three months later and I hardly wrote for a week- there wasn’t anything to say.

Now it is 2017 and here we are. I have opinions, you have opinions; it is extremely important that while we disagree, maybe even vehemently disagree, we have to respect each other’s opinions and go on with our lives. It is what living in a free country is all about.

12) Golden State winning the NBA title means Bills’ RB LeSean McCoy cashed his $200,000 bet on the Warriors, recording a profit of $62,500. He made the bet at Planet Hollywood in Las Vegas, right next to where they sell the biggest pizza slices on earth (really, really good pizza).

11) Speaking of the Warriors, Stephen Curry is an unrestricted free agent- how would you like to be HIS agent right now? He is in line for a 5-year, $205M deal— $41M a year!!!!

So if that happens, and his agent gets 3% of the deal, that is $1.23M a year for the agent, just for representing Curry. He should hire his parents as his agent.

10) Red Sox are in Philly for a couple of days, which has to be strange for Boston 1B coach Ruben Amaro Jr; he was the Phillies’ GM for seven years before they fired him and he went back on the field as a Red Sox coach.

9) Anthony Rizzo has batted leadoff the last two nights; he hit first-inning homers in both games. I like batting my best hitters high in the order. Miami has done well since they moved Giancarlo Stanton to the #2 spot.

8) Latin-born players make up 26.4% of major league rosters.

7) Michigan Wolverines had spring football practice in Italy; I’m not sure why, but they did and the trip cost around $800,000— the tab was picked up by an anonymous donor, so the school didn’t pay a nickel for it.

6) San Diego Padres’ pitcher Clayton Richard, a former backup QB at Michigan, threw 127 pitches Tuesday night, but came up an out short of the complete game in San Diego’s 6-2 win over the Reds. 127 pitches are the most anyone has thrown in the majors this season.

5) The Stanley Cup was at the Pirates’ game Tuesday and not just in the press box; the Cup made its way all around the stadium, with groups of fans getting their pictures taken with it.

I have a picture of myself with the Stanley Cup in my living room, from when the Devils won the Cup (they had a farm team in Albany at the time, so the Cup came here for a night). Very cool.

4) UConn-Villanova are starting a home/home basketball series in January, renewing their rivalry from the Big East days. Since it is on a Saturday, must mean it is a made-for-TV deal.

3) Oregon’s coaches are getting lot of kudos on social media from basketball people praising how well Oregon players are doing during NBA workouts.

Stuff like this is great for the Ducks’ recruiting; Dana Altman is a great coach and he will get his guys ready for pro basketball. Hearing that from NBA types has to impress high school kids.

2) Back when I was a kid, in the 70’s, the non-waiver trading deadline was June 15 (it is July 31 now). June 15, 1976 was not one of my favorite days……..

I became an A’s fan when I was five years old— 1965- they were awful, but they got better and became one of the best teams ever, winning world titles in 1972, 73, 74.

They won the AL West in ’75 but lost in the playoffs; free agency was becoming a thing, and the A’s didn’t draw anyone at all at home, way worse than now, so they couldn’t afford to keep their stars. Owner Charles O Finley decided to sell some guys off.

On June 15, 1976, the A’s traded Joe Rudi, Rollie Fingers and Vida Blue, dismantling the team. The trades were later disallowed by the commissioner- the players stayed in limbo for a week, but those A’s teams were never the same again.

1) Anyway, I was 16 at the time and I loved playing basketball; my parents bought me this great pair of Puma low-cut sneakers— the Walt Frazier model. I would play in those sneakers, then change out of them and walk home in different sneakers, thats how much I liked them.

So I’m walking down the street and my dad is sitting in a chair under the tree on the front lawn- he is smiling as he looks at me- something is up.

He tells me the trades have been made, that my team was being dismantled. I’m hot, tired and now not happy; I take my prized sneakers and throw them over the house, one at a time— very lucky they didn’t land on the roof.

Not my finest moment…….lol

Anyway, today should be better than that day was.

Happy Armadillo Day!!!!

13) Will the Warriors visit the White House? Delicate issue in today’s world.

Someone in the media tweeted Monday night that the team had voted “unanimously” to skip a White House visit, but it is unclear whether that is true or not. Clemson’s football team was in Washington DC Monday for their visit after they won the national championship LY.

CEO of the Pittsburgh Penguins said his team will accept, if invited to the White House, but in the NBA, this is a more volatile subject.

12) Hall of Fame pitcher John Smoltz was saying on TV the other night that when Joe West umpires games behind the plate, occasionally he will call a perfect pitch a ball early in the game, just to see how the pitcher would react, as if to say to the pitcher, “I’m in charge here.”

Smoltz didn’t seem terribly amused telling the story.

11) Speaking of Smoltz, he is a great example of how scouting is an inexact science. He was the 574th player taken in the 1985 draft (22nd round), then he was traded from Detroit to Atlanta on August 12, 1987, in exchange for Doyle Alexander. Detroit needed a pitcher for the stretch drive; they made the playoffs, but lost a Hall of Fame pitcher in the process.

10) In spring of 2016, Wisc-Milwaukee fired basketball coach Rob Jeter, despite fact that he had won 19+ games five of the last seven years- there was internal dissension- the longtime radio announcer later quit and ripped the new athletic director very publicly.

This past season, Milwaukee went 11-24 with its new coach, who somehow just got hired by Butler of the Big East (he is a former Butler assistant), so now Milwaukee will be looking for its third head coach in three years— it is not great to be looking for a new coach just before the July recruiting period.

9) Nick Pratto was the Kansas City Royals’ 1st round draft pick Monday; six short years ago, he hit a walk-off single to win the Little League World Series in Williamsport.

8) Do umpires own houses? No way they’re home much from March 1-October 1, thats seven months right there. Baseball teams are home half of the season, but not umpires- if they’re not married, seems pointless to own a house that you’re rarely in. Condos seem more likely.

7) An 11-year-old quarterback was offered a scholarship by University of Hawaii last weekend. The kid’s older brother played LB for the Rainbow Warriors- his father coached Marcus Mariota at St Louis HS. I mean, the kid doesn’t graduate high school for seven more years.

6) Quote of the Day, part 2, from Rory McIlroy:

“Really? We have 60 yards from left line to right line. You’ve got 156 of the best players in the world here, if we can’t hit it within that avenue, you might as well pack your bags and go home.

These are the widest fairways we’ve ever played in a U.S. Open. Even the first and second cut is another 10 yards on top of that. So if you’ve got 50 or 60 yards to hit into and you’re complaining about the fescue that’s wider than that, I don’t think that’s an issue.”

This was after some players complained about the complained about the length of the rough— it was cut down a little bit on Tuesday.

5) Marlins drafted NC State infielder Joe Dunand Jr in the 2nd round; he is Alex Rodriguez’ nephew. Dunand played SS at NC State, but the Marlins announced him as a 3B.

4) Kid who is a kicker at Central Florida has made 41 videos about what it is like to be a college athlete, and he put them on YouTube. Because the videos got over 10,000 visits, he could sell ads for the videos, but making money off them could jeopardize his amateur status, which seems both childish and hypocritical but that is today’s world.

The NCAA hasn’t gotten involved yet; let’s hope they let the kid do his thing.

3) Brewers called up pitching prospect Brandon Woodruff to start the first game of their twin bill Tuesday in St Louis, but his hamstring tightened up when he was warming up and he was scratched from the start, and went on the DL. Baseball players get hurt a lot.

Not often a guy goes on the major league DL before he ever appears in a game.

2) Cubs 14, Mets 3— Rough night for Mets’ pitcher Zach Wheeler; he faced 14 batters- 8 of them scored.

Cubs batted Anthony Rizzo leadoff; he scored twice and knocked in three runs. Ian Happ had a grand slam and four strikeouts, first big leaguer in two years (Derek Norris) to do that.

1) 28 of 60 players drafted in last year’s NBA Draft were born outside this country; supposed to lot less this year.

13) Obscure Fact of the Day: On January 3, 2013, Nick Swisher signed with the Indians as a free agent, leaving New York (AL). As a result of that, New York got a compensatory draft pick.

With that compensatory pick, New York drafted Aaron Judge.

12) Michael Jordan played on the 1984 Olympic team; a pair of sneakers he wore then sold recently for $190,373 at an auction.

They were Converse All-Stars, not Nikes.

11) Golden State 129, Cleveland 120— Basketball season is over until next month, when the NBA has its summer league in Las Vegas- there is a smaller tournament in Orlando, too.

In the NBA Finals, Cleveland Cavaliers were -6 in 212:00 with Lebron James in the game, -22 in 28:00 with Lebron on the bench.

10) Josh Rawitch comes up with our Stat of the Day: Arizona catcher Chris Herrmann has homered in 17 big league games and his team won 17 all of them.

9) Red Sox relief pitchers have their high school pictures on wall of the Fenway bullpen dugout and they have to sit in front of where their picture is, like a seating chart.

8) Pittsburgh Penguins are first team since ’98 Detroit Red Wings to repeat as Stanley Cup champs; congrats to them.

7) Astros put Lance McCullers on the DL, meaning their two best starters are on the shelf; luckily for them, they have a huge lead in the AL West. Could be lot of “over” games involving the Astros coming up.

6) Butler hired Milwaukee coach LaVall Jordan as its new hoop coach; this job is a little different, since their AD is Barry Collier, who was himself the Bulldogs’ basketball coach from 1989-2000.

This is like the football job at Wisconsin, where former head coach Barry Alvarez is now the AD. Makes it a more appealing job, I think.

5) Former NBA/Knicks’ point guard Greg Anthony has a son who is a top 10 point guard in the Class of 2019. Young man plays at Archbishop Molloy in Queens.

4) ESPN’s Jay Bilas runs a couple of 3-day camps for high school basketball players, one in Oklahoma City, one in Charlotte.

The camps focus on developing fundamental skills instead of just playing games, but the cost ($599) is pretty steep— it includes two nights lodging.

There are also clinics for high school coaches ($199) and young coaches ($300).

Would be curious how much he rakes in from this venture.

3) Mets’ TV guy Keith Hernandez is back from knee replacement surgery; when he is engaged in the game, he can be very good, but he often gets bored and his mind wanders.

Anyway last night he was good; he was asking why Yoenis Cespedes would want to be squatting 500 pounds; how does that help him be a better baseball player? Does it contribute to his many injuries? Interesting questions. Then Cespedes got hurt again. Oy.

2) Good news/bad news department:

Good news: Fire fighters in Maine rescued a 37-year old woman from a rock in the Saco River after her inflatable raft was punctured by a rock.

Bad news: A sheriff’s deputy did a background check on the woman, which is routine; turns out she was wanted on an outstanding warrant for not paying a $720 fine related to DUI conviction, so she was immediately arrested. No bueno.

1) Headline in the Arizona Republic newspaper recently:

“Arizona physic hit by car says he never saw it coming”

That can’t help his psychic credentials any.

13) The 2017 Golden State Warriors are competing against the 2017 Cavaliers, not the 1970 Knicks or the ’85 Lakers or Jordan’s Bulls or Russell’s Celtics. They’re trying to win this year’s championship, and thats it, no matter what bored people rant about on social media.

They’re trying to win THIS YEAR’s CHAMPIONSHIP, thats it. Fans always think when their team wins it is the greatest thing ever, because for them, it was. For me, Super Bowl XXXIV is the greatest football game ever played. Most people would disagree with that, but thats the beauty of sports/discussion, we all have our opinions.

12) The hotel in Oakland that the Warriors practice in is hosting the National Cannabis Business Summit & Expo, starting Monday. Insert your own joke here.

11) On the Marlins game Saturday, they were discussing whether or not it is a good idea for every team to be represented at the All-Star Game.

I rooted for the 1979 A’s, a truly dreadful (54-108) team that was just a bad team, other than a very young Rickey Henderson, Dwayne Murphy and a couple decent pitchers.

One of the few highlights that season was when Jeff Newman was introduced before the All-Star Game in Seattle, as the A’s only representative. It was like, “Yeah, we suck but we have nice uniforms.”

So I’m in favor of each team being represented.

10) Saturday, 17 people (11 adults, six kids) were pelted with goose droppings at Disneyland in Anaheim. Actual geese did the damage from up above. Thats the definition of a crappy day.

9) Texas Tech signed a 19-year old Italian guard as a recruit to join the Red Raiders this fall. Davide Moretti scored 14.8 pts/game for the Italian team in the U18 World Championships.

Recruiting is so damn competitive now, teams look for players wherever you can find them. I’m guessing it is a very long journey from Italy to Lubbock, TX.

8) 2020 Olympics will have 3-on-3 basketball, but sounds like it will be without NBA players.

7) Damien Jefferson is transferring from New Mexico’s basketball program, the sixth Lobo to transfer since last season ended.

6) Random update: Tim Tebow is hitting .223 in the Class A South Atlantic League.

5) Georgia Tech’s punter is giving up his last year of college football in order to study at a seminary— he is going to become a priest.

4) How small market teams try to do things (for better or worse, mostly worse):

November 5, 2009, the A’s got Matt Holliday from Colorado for Carlos Gonzalez, Greg Smith and Huston Street. Smith was a lefty pitcher, Street is obviously still a (oft-injured) closer and CarGo is a fine player for the Rockies.

Holliday played 93 games for Oakland, then on July 24, he was traded to St Louis, for Clayton Mortenson (P), Shane Peterson (OF) and Brett Wallace (DH-type). Not good.

Holliday was a free agent after 2010, which is why the deals were made in the first place. He re-signed with the Cardinals.

You can hire all the Ivy League geniuses you want in the front office, but that Ivy League degree looks a lot less glossy when you screw things up this badly. I’d go over the Cespedes and Josh Donaldson trades, but I don’t want to puke on my laptop.

Oakland’s record since the Cespedes trade on July 31, 2014: 186-255. I’ll stop now.

3) In the interest of fairness, A’s did same thing with Ben Zobrist, who was with Oakland for less than one season, before they dealt him to the Royals on July 28, for two minor league pitchers, one of which was Sean Manaea, who has great promise.

So if you replenish your young pitching, it can be worth it; if you don’t, its a freaking disaster.

2) Major league baseball amateur draft is Monday; think it is 40 rounds now over a couple days. Baseball is different than other sports in that these kids get drafted, then disappear into the minor leagues before some of them resurface in the majors a couple years from now

1) It never gets old when a kid makes his major league debut, and they show his family in the stands; the mom is usually crying, the dad is trying to act cool and everyone else in the group is going crazy rooting for the kid. It is the culmination of many years of effort; what a feeling that must be.

Minnesota Twins have the #1 pick; they’re in first place now. Last team to draft first while they were in first place? The 2001 Twins, when they drafted Joe Mauer.

13) RIP Adam West, 89, TV’s Batman from the late 60’s, one of my favorite TV shows when I was a little kid, maybe my first favorite TV show. Late in his life, West did voiceovers for animated TV shows; Showtime did a special couple years ago on his family’s (successful) efforts to get their dad a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Lot of famous actors were guest villains on Batman; the show was great fun. RIP, sir.

12) I’m in a 16-team dynasty fantasy baseball league, which means you keep your players from year-to-year. Our league is 12 years old; I’ve had Giancarlo Stanton on my team since he was an 18-year old in the Class A Florida State League.

So I turn the Marlins’ game on Saturday and Ichiro Suzuki is already on first base, Yelich is batting— I figure they gave Stanton the day off, but no, he got drilled on the wrist and has already left the game.  This is not good.

Jose Abreu got drilled on the knee Friday night and left the game— he’s on my squad too. No bueno when your two best hitters are both hurt, though Abreu did come back and played Saturday night.

11) Which reminds me of a story: I’m coaching a Little League All-Star tournament in Spring Valley, NY, about two hours south of where I live. This is 1995; my team needs to beat the same team twice in one night to win the title- they only had to beat us once to win.

So the first inning of the first game, one of our batters gets hit; then my pitcher gets hit in the head while batting in the same inning. Kid is lying on the ground; as we’re trying to make sure he is OK, have to tell the 2nd game pitcher to warm up to pitch this game.

Out of the blue, one of our fans (we’re in the third base dugout) yells out: “Stop throwing at our players!!!” Now this is a game in a foreign environment; the nightcap, if there is one, will be an actual night game under the lights— I don’t need this. Umpires did a good job of keeping most everyone calm.

Story has a happy ending; we win the first game, the kid who got hit in the head showed lot of guts by pitching (and winning) the second game. We advanced to Maryland for the next round of the tournament, a great example of the players carrying their coach!!!

10) Clark Griffith and Rockies’ manager Bud Black are only two men in baseball history who won 100+ games as a pitcher, and then 600+ games as a manager. Griffith wound up owning the Washington Senators; he was 237-146 in a career than spanned from 1891-1914.

9) Cardinals shook up their coaching staff Friday and also DFA’d SS Jhonny Peralta. Apparently the assistant hitting coach was put on a leave of absence; hard to believe their slump is that guy’s fault.

8) South Florida’s leading scorer Geno Thorpe (15.1 pts/game) will play at Syracuse next season as a graduate transfer. Hope he has some warm clothes.

7) Rays’ OF Kevin Keirmaier broke his hip on an awkward slide at 1B this week, is on the DL.

6) Detroit Lions’ LT Taylor Decker tore his labrum, could be out 4-6 months.

5) Houston Astros have some hard decisions to make; if Dallas Keuchel’s neck injury is serious, then they have to trade for one, probably two starting pitchers. Even if Keuchel comes back, the Houston pitching is shallow- they have a ton of good position players.

4) Milwaukee Brewers lost their last six extra-inning games.

3) Quote of the Day, part 2, from ESPN.com and Washington Nationals’ GM Mike Rizzo, which refer to the rescheduling of a rained out Nationals-Orioles game to this past Thursday:

“It rained all day that day (May 11), and the forecast said it would rain until 9:30 or 10. I sat in Buck’s (Showalter) office at 6:30, and we talked about it for 20 minutes. He was 100 percent on-board. He didn’t say anything about not canceling the game.

Their GM [Dan Duquette] was nowhere to be found for three, four hours. We wanted to play the next day. They refused to play then, so the next [open] day was [Thursday]. They drove 32 miles to get there. We flew 3,000 [expletive] miles, and we beat their [behinds]. So quit your whining. Quit whining.”

2) College football teams with best turnover ratio last year:
Washington/Western Michigan, both +18. Ohio State +!5

Teams wth worst turnover ratio last year:
Purdue/Southern Miss, both -17, East Carolina/Bowling Green, both -16.

1) Three college football teams with most returning experience on the offensive line this year:
San Jose State, Tennessee, Auburn

13) If you don’t think Lebron James is one of the three most valuable players in the NBA, think again. He sat out the last 1:49 of the first quarter in Game 3— Golden State went on a 10-0 run, turning a 7-point deficit into a 3-point lead. Warriors won the game by 5.

If a team can’t survive its star sitting out two freakin’ minutes, he is a very valuable player.

12) Utah Valley State’s basketball team is coached by Mark Pope, who played for Kentucky for two years- he was on a national title team as a senior. His Wolverines open this season Nov 11 in Rupp Arena against Kentucky, then the next day, they play Duke in Cameron Indoor Stadium.

Utah Valley will start the season 0-2, with two very healthy paychecks and probably a lot of publicity for masochistic scheduling. They should also take a lot of pictures for the cover of their media guide- playing Duke/Kentucky should help their recruiting, long-term.

11) Cam Johnson finally got his release to transfer from Pittsburgh and will play basketball for ACC rival North Carolina as a graduate transfer this coming season.

10) Ohio State’s search for a basketball coach is on-going; there were rumors they offered the job to Creighton’s Greg McDermott, but turned the job down. Butler’s Chris Holtmann is the latest name in the rumor mill.

9) Western Kentucky had the #9 recruiting class in America this year, which is very surprising; they play in Conference USA- their games with Middle Tennessee should be fun this winter.

8) Eric Sogard hit .239 in 1,210 AB’s over six years with the A’s; thats  a pretty big sample size. Now he is on the Milwaukee Brewers, batting leadoff and he is hitting .404. WTF?

Sogard played college ball at Arizona State; his coach was Pat Murphy, who is now the bench coach for the Brewers (Milwaukee manager Counsell played for Murphy at Notre Dame). Is it that simple, that playing for someone who has confidence in you can improve your performance this much?

7) Dallas Keuchel (neck) goes back on the DL, with no timetable for a return, which is ominous. Astros’ pitching is not at all deep.

6) St Louis Cardinals are 6-14 this season in games where the winning run scored from the 7th inning on.

5) Since 2013, alums of these schools have won the most money on the PGA Tour:
5) Oklahoma State $46M
4) Georgia Tech $47.2M
3) Arizona State $50.1M
2) UNLV $50.6M
1) Georgia $85.4M

4) Ohio State named Chris Holtmann basketball coach; he went 70-31 in three years at Butler, 34-20 in Big East play. Other than $$$, I’m not sure Ohio State is a better job than Butler, so I’ll be curious to see who the Bulldogs replace Holtmann with.

3) 3-on-3 basketball will be a sport in the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo; how they going to decide who plays in that?

2) Thursday night, Robinson Cano called the batboy out during his at-bat and changed batting gloves; never saw that before. Then he got a hit. You can’t change bats during an at-bat unless the bat gets broken.

1) MSNBC is showing a movie on June 17th, which is unusual; All the President’s Men. I’m sure it is just a coincidence- it is the 45th anniversary of the break-in at the Watergate Hotel after all, but still, not like they’re trying to plant a seed in anyone’s mind or anything…….