Cleaning out the Inbox

    The cleaning of the inbox is overdue, so we'll start the new year by pulling everything out of the inbox to start fresh.

WTOP.com celebrates the fiftieth anniversary of the opening of the Capital Centre, the former home of the Washington Bullets, Washington Capitals, and Georgetown Hoyas, along with title defenses by Muhammad Ali and Sugar Ray Leonard, professional wrestling, ACC basketball tournaments, and many other events as well from 1973-2002.

The Capital Centre was the first arena of its era to have a closed circuit television feed on its scoreboard that could be seen from each side of the arena as well and was among the first of the move to the suburbs by teams for new stadiums/arenas.

The Capital Centre was closed with the teams moving to the new downtown arena in 2002 and now things are starting to swing back to the suburbs with the Wizards/Capitals announcing plans for a future arena in Alexandria, Virginia.

ESPN writes of the plans for the third leg of horse racing's Triple Crown, the Belmont Stakes, to be moved to Saratoga Race Course for 2024 and possibly 2025.

Belmont Park is undergoing major renovations to the country's only one and a half miles course and Saratoga is a natural site to host the Belmont, although the mile-and-a-half classic will be shortened to a mile-and-a-quarter due to the configuration of Saratoga.

I've thought for years that the answer to the power hitters in golf making classic golf courses obsolete due to distance was to change the golf ball itself.

Slow-pitch softball has used two different types of balls for decades, the "blue dot" made as a normal softball, while the "red dot" is a restricted flight ball that doesn't leap off the bat for the stronger hitters and I've been a proponent of golf doing the same with their ball, rather than changing the length of courses that changes some of the history and charm as well as the costs involved.

The Athletic writes of the pros and cons of the move which will begin in 2028 for the professionals and 2030 for the rest of the golf-playing world.

The Athletic also writes of the troubles with the once-proud Louisville Cardinals basketball program under second-year coach Kenny Payne.

The former Cardinal star returned home to turn the Cardinals around but finished 4-28 last season and started 5-8 this season to date amid players leaving the program, struggling attendance, and questions about the program's future under Payne.

Problems in the Atlantic League just before Hagerstown opens their new stadium next season.

The problem isn't the league as much as one franchise, the Gastonia Honey Hunters, who have been ordered to vacate their home stadium and have their franchise revoked from the league.

The Honey Hunters have left a trail of unpaid bills to the Atlantic League and the city of Gastonia for use of the stadium that the city built for them.

The stadium opened in 2021 and the Atlantic League has announced their intentions to field a Gastonia team in the league in 2024, although I'm not sure if they will be the Honey Hunters or under a new nickname as I'm not sure if the owners of the team or the league owns the trademarks to the name and intellectual property such as logos etc. 

We wrap with The Athletic's story of how Tino Livramento left the Chelsea academy to move to Southampton before his eventual move to Newcastle last summer.

It's an interesting piece on how young players progress through a sports system that doesn't use either college or a minor league system like in the United States.

Livramento is one of the few Newcastle that is playing very well during a poor run of play from the Magpies.

Cleaning out the Inbox

    It's been quite a while since I cleaned the inbox and surprisingly it's not nearly as full as usual although the recent passings are starting to pile up a bit. 

I seem to find these a lot for the inbox but yet another rare colored lobster has been caught, this one in Maine.

The "Cotton Candy" Blue Lobster doesn't look much more remarkable than the average blue lobster (which is a rarity itself) but the picture of "Haddie" doesn't do it justice as she is reported to have every color BUT blue in her shell and under lights has an oyster shell color to the shell.

Haddie was shipped to the Seacoast Science Center in Rye, New Hampshire to live out her remaining days.

It may not have the same resonance as Jim Croce's "Time in a Bottle", but  "Trash Can across the Atlantic" showed just how the Gulf Stream can work as it carried a beach trash can with the stickers from the city of Myrtle Beach South Carolina to Ireland on a trip that carried it over 3.500 miles from Myrtle Beach.

No idea how long the voyage took for the waste receptacle but when it arrived in Ireland, it did have barnacles on some of its surface.

ESPN writes a terrific article on the fiftieth anniversary of the 1971 Nebraska-Oklahoma "Game of the Century with comments from figures from both sides including Nebraska's 1972 Heisman winner Johnny Rodgers and Oklahoma star Greg Pruitt with coaches from both teams as well.

When the college football community celebrated its 150th anniversary two years, the game was voted the greatest game ever with the 1971 Cornhuskers earning the title of the best team ever and the 1971 Sooners winning the vote for the greatest team with one loss.

The Hustle tells the story of the University of Florida and just why they receive twenty million dollars a year from Gatorade.

The inventor of the sports drink, Dr.Robert Cade, discusses why there was the need to invent such a beverage, the business arrangement behind the scenes, why the University gets paid, and why they could have been making two to three times the amount each year had they been a bit more forward-thinking.

The Pepsi Co. which now is in charge of Gatorade has attempted to change the face of the product with changes to the logo that uses a "G" rather than the traditional Gatorade logo but despite efforts to change or eliminate an agreement with the Gatorade trust, Pepsi is still paying those rights fees every year.

We wrap up with the Hagerstown Herald-Mail writes of the future Atlantic League team coming to Hagerstown for 2023 asking the city to have Municipal Stadium remain available for the 2023 season in the event of the new downtown stadium not being completed for the opening season.

The "Supply Line Disruption" has the owners and the Atlantic League concerned that they may have some issues in being able to procure the needed materials on time to have the stadium ready for business.

Municipal Stadium was scheduled for demolition in 2022 in order to prepare for a sports complex that has been a pet project of city councilman Kristen (yes, that's his name) Aleshire for years even when the Hagerstown Suns were attempting to finance a new stadium, so the council would have to approve keeping Municipal standing for another year in case it would be needed.

This of course has made the councilman unhappy but Atlantic League rules do require teams to have an alternate place to play when a new stadium is built to house a new team in case of potential construction issues.

I'm not sure how many times each season that I'll be visiting the new park but I'd definitely go to a game or two played at Municipal even if only to say the goodbye that the pandemic didn't allow me to say in 2020.