— Yesterday, I complained about what a terrible umpire Angel Hernandez is, which is true; well, here is the other side of the coin.
Friday night, Chad Whitson worked home plate at the Chicago-Seattle game; of the 129 pitches that were taken by hitters, Whitson only missed one call the whole freakin’ game. Now that is what a major league umpire is supposed to do.
— Padres 6, Dodgers 3
Second night in a row, start of a game at Dodger Stadium was delayed by rain.
San Diego is surprisingly 9-9; Manny Machado hit a home run for the Padres.
Dodgers are 4-5 in their last nine games.
Dodger pitchers walked 14 batters, had only 3 strikeouts.
— A’s 7, Nationals 6
Trailing 6-1 in sixth inning, A’s scored six times in bottom of the 6th.
After a 1-6 start, A’s are 6-3 in their last nine games.
AL West standings, after 18 days of games:
Texas 8-8
LA Angels 7-8
A’s 7-9
Seattle 6-10
Houston 6-11
— Most career home runs, leading off a game:
81- Rickey Henderson
57- George Springer
54- Alfonso Soriano
53- Craig Biggio
— Toronto Blue Jays are 4-2 at home; they’ve scored in first inning in five of those six games.
— If the baseball playoffs started today (they do not):
AL: New York, Cleveland, Texas. Wild Cards: Royals, Orioles, Tigers
NL: Atlanta, Milwaukee, Los Angeles. Wild Cards: Pirates, Reds, Cubs
— Famous birthdays for April 15:
Julie Sommars, 83
Ted Sizemore, 79
Michael Cooper, 68
Emma Thompson, 65
Jason Sehorn, 53
Brock Huard, 48
Seth Rogen, 42
— Movie of the Day: Prince of Tides (1991)- A high school football coach from the South comes to New York City to meet with his suicidal sister’s psychiatrist about their family history and falls in love with her in the process.
Nick Nolte is the coach, Barbra Streisand is the psychiatrist. George Carlin is her neighbor, Blythe Danner is the coach’s wife.
Not the most pleasant movie, but a very good one.
— Fresno State hired Vance Walberg as its new basketball coach; he is the innovator of the dribble drive motion offense, and has coached in high school, junior college, college and the NBA. He was once head coach at Pepperdine, was an assistant for three NBA teams and has coached in high school for 20+ years.
Walberg is 67 years old; his last college job was 13 years ago, but if Fresno gets some NIL $$$ to recruit better ballplayers, they’ll make some noise in the Mountain West.
— Knicks 120, Bulls 119 OT— Knicks win 50+ games for the first time since 2013.
— Tuesday’s NBA play-in games:
Lakers @ New Orleans
Warriors @ Sacramento
— Wednesday’s NBA play-in games:
Heat @ Philadelphia
Hawks @ Chicago
— Panthers 34, Roughnecks 20
Michigan outscored Roughnecks 22-3 in third quarter.
Panthers converted 7-12 third down plays.
Houston is off to an 0-3 start.
— Battlehawks 31, Brahmas 24
St Louis led 17-9 at halftime.
Butler caught six passes for 87 yards and a TD.
There were only five penalties called in this game.
