Cleaning out the Inbox-Non Sports Version

   Time for some cleaning of the inbox, this time with an all non-sports version.

The Washington Post Magazine's Patricia McCormick tracked down the whereabouts of Mary Ann Vecchio known by almost everyone as the "Kent State girl" from what I would rate as one of the most famous photos of the last 100 years.

McCormick does a deft, but thorough job of talking to Vecchio about her life since that day, how it was affected by the incident, and some of the backstory behind that day with some surprising pieces of info that Vecchio discusses concerning the immediate aftermath after she was returned to Florida.

Read the article to find out what I mean.

The Atlantic asks the question of what if a single vaccine could cure all of Covid-19 and all its variants for 100 years?

The first step would be a universal vaccine to eliminate Covid and the variants with the second phase developing a vaccine that would check future coronaviruses of all types.

The Atlantic argues that such an achievement would be a generational achievement, yet one that could be closer than you may think.

The key is finding a common protein in the SARS virus and find a way to recognize a common portion (most likely the stem of the virus) that all forms of the virus carries and would inhibit the developments of common variants, therefore stemming the tide of the wave of variant viruses.

It makes sense to take things seriously and put the time in to develop attacks before they arise, but I am more likely to believe that these types of developmental processes will be given enough to work on a problem, but not enough to truly make a dent.

Humankind celebrates immediate triumph and moves on to the next battle rather than being proactive and avoiding a future one.

The Bulletin takes a reasonable and scientific look at the origin of Covid and the question of did it escape from the infamous Wuhan China lab or was there a deliberate release by the Chinese?

The article discusses both theories and then offers which is the more likely scenario.

It's a pretty deep read, but a very interesting one.

Hakai Magazine writes of the unlikely success of fish sticks, those rectangle-shaped pieces of fish that most of us thrived on as kids as quick dining in school lunches, tv dinners, and as fast food in various packaging.

The article writes of the process of making fish sticks, which hasn't really changed since they began to show up in your grocer's freezer with their surprising start as "fish bricks".

Fish bricks were sold in the shape and style of a gallon of ice cream with the idea that you would cut off what you served that evening and then put the remaining brick into the freezer.

If that doesn't make you wonder, read the article and see what you think about how they are formed today!!

Through the years in the inbox, I've found notes on different oddball colors of lobsters, but I've never seen one such as this- the calico.

This calico lobster almost found its way to a plate, as workers at a Virginia Red Lobster found this guy

(?) during an April seafood delivery to the restaurant in Manassas Virginia.

The speckled orange and black lobster is the third rarest lobster in the world behind the split-colored and albino versions and the chances of catching one in one in thirty million.

The calico's color would make it an easier target for predators in the wild due to its brighter coloring.

"Freckles" will be living its life at the Virginia Living Museum in Newport News Virginia 

Vaccine

    I've been away for a few days and despite my intentions to write about victories by the Cavaliers (over Houston), and the Devils (over Buffalo), I was feeling ill.

On Wednesday, I received my second dose of the Covid vaccine (Moderna version) as my job provided it for their employees, which I applaud them for.

I didn't feel bad at all after the first dose and other than some mild pain in my arm, I wouldn't have thought anything extra would have happened had I not thought about it!

The second dose has reported possible side effects for a day or two following the injection and I can confirm that they do exist.

The worst part was the pain in my arm, which was much much worse than after the first dose.

The first day after the shot, my arm hurt very badly to the point of not being able to lie on or lean against anything.

I also had some stomach sickness and some weakness, but nothing that couldn't be gotten past and I did struggle through the workday, but the second day was much improved and it was just about gone except for the arm pain, which still hurts a bit but not nearly as much as on the first day.

Other than that, I feel no different and if you are a person that wonders about getting the vaccine when the time arises that you have an opportunity, I would hope that you would consider it.

I've never gotten a flu shot in my life and I'm not sure that I'll go and get a Covid shot every year, but the process was smooth, the side effects brief, and considering the need to get our country back to normal, I didn't have a problem going and knocking this out.

It seems like every day another expert shows up on television or online and declares that things are close to breaking and normal life could resume by the late summer or says that we are close to hitting another "surge" with variants evolving and problems continuing into the future.

Since we just don't know which extreme to believe, it's hard to lock in on what to think (Which is some of the problems that we have politically currently) about the vaccine and the confusion around us all is certainly enough to make all but the concrete partisan think a bit.

I understand why anything right now could make anyone take pause, but think about it.

It's not so bad...

Browns crushed by Covid- Lose Stefanski, Bitonio

    The Cleveland Browns euphoria of making the playoffs lasted less than 48 hours as head coach Kevin Stefanski, Pro Bowl guard Joel Bitonio, wide receiver KhaDarel Hodge, and assistant coaches Drew Petzing (tight ends) and Jeff Howard (defensive backs) have tested positive for Covid-19 and will miss the playoff game Sunday night in Pittsburgh.

Stefanski, who calls the plays for the offense, will be allowed to be part of the preparation for the game, but will not be allowed to participate in any way during the game and the temporary head coach for the game will be special teams coach Mike Preifer.

The Browns will also be without offensive line coach Bill Callahan and possibly wide receivers coach Chad O'Shea, both of whom missed the win over the Steelers. O'Shea has been mentioned as possibly returning for the trip to Pittsburgh.

While Stefanski's loss is important, offensive coordinator Alex Van Pelt has called plays in his coaching career previously and is more than capable of replacing Stefanski in calling plays.

The bigger loss may prove to be Joel Bitonio at left guard, where Bitonio was named to the Pro Bowl team this season.

Bitonio would have likely be replaced with rookie Nick Harris, who filled in for Wyatt Teller and Chris Hubbard at right guard earlier this season,  but Harris was placed on injured reserve today eliminating him from consideration. 

That leaves Michael Dunn as the most likely candidate at left guard. 

Dunn has spent time on practice squads, the AAF (Birmingham), and XFL (Seattle) in his career and has been active for a few games this season, but I don't remember seeing the former Maryland Terrapin on the field.

No matter who enters the lineup,, Bitonio is going to be a very difficult player to replace, and when you consider that Dunn (or anyone else) has played left guard for a single snap (Bitonio has not missed a snap over the last four seasons) and will spend a large chunk of their game blocking Cameron Heyward, the loss of Joel Bitonio could loom larger than the loss of Kevin Stefanski when this game is over.

KhaDarel Hodge has been used as the Browns' third wideout this season with eleven catches for 180 yards, but the loss of Hodge will be felt most on special teams where he is often the first man downfield against punt returns and on kickoffs as well.

What I'm not sure about is the NFL's reasoning for allowing this game to go on as scheduled.

The league allowed both Baltimore and Tennessee to have delays earlier this season and when each team was proven to have done things wrong in their Covid-19 protections, they were punished with fines, but then allowed to delay their games.

Yet in other cases, such as the Browns WR's against the Jets and Denver's quarterbacks in a game against New Orleans, the NFL forced both teams to play.

If this is not a double standard, the league needs to do a better job in letting everyone know what a universal standard is in the current situation- because how they are handling things currently seems to be lacking consistency.   

Browns fumble away opportunity-Upset by Jets 23-16

   The Cleveland Browns could have punched their ticket to the postseason with a win over the hapless New York Jets, and although after the Covid-19 affair that cost the Browns their top four wide receivers along with two starting linebackers, nothing could be taken for granted.

Still, one would think that the Browns would find a way to squeeze this one out and celebrate- even with backup receivers, but what they didn't count on was the player that they relied on most to develop butterfingers as Baker Mayfield fumbled three times, including on the final drive on a fourth and one from the Jets 16-yard line and left the Browns still awaiting a clinching for the postseason after a 23-16 Jets win.

Baker Mayfield threw a career-high 53 passes, completing 28 for 253 yards, but turned the ball over on those awful three fumbles.

Nick Chubb and Kareem Hunt each rushed for a touchdown, but rushed a combined total of a mere 39 yards on the afternoon.

Austin Hooper led the receivers with seven catches for seventy-one yards, while recent practice squad promotee JaMarcus Bradley caught six passes for sixty yards in the defeat.

The now 10-5 Browns still can make the playoffs with a win over Pittsburgh next Sunday at home in Cleveland or an Indianapolis loss at home against the one-win Jacksonville Jaguars (Yeah, right).

Brownie Bits

1) Look, there are plenty of factors that contributed to this loss and it is cliche' to use the term a "team loss", but this one truly was. 

There were very few players that had good games and when you have to dig deep to find them,  it has been a bad day.

2) I know the Jets were putting eight or nine men in the box and daring the Browns to try to pass, but the Browns didn't try enough to bust through with the running game-especially in the first half.

The Jets were running the modern version of the Ampipe Bulldogs "6-2 Stack Monster" (All the Right Moves reference) and shutting down the run game, but the Browns only tried eighteen runs against the Jets for the game.

3) And since you only ran the ball eighteen times, not only did you not use your best offensive weapons nearly enough, you also allowed Baker Mayfield to throw 53 times!

The Cleveland Browns are not set up to be the type of team that throws 53 times and wins with their top pass catchers in the lineup, let alone without them!

4) Even more, what has been the number one factor in Baker Mayfield's improved play over the last month?
The ability to run play-action passing plays.

By not running the football, the Jets didn't respect the run, could sell out on the pass rush, and not bite on play-action fakes.

That means that Baker Mayfield became just another undersized quarterback.

5) So who to blame?

Baker Mayfield gets plenty of blame for losing the ball three times and his receivers that he thought that he could count on such as Austin Hooper and Kareem Hunt, dropped the football far too often.

Baker deserves plenty of blame, but he deserves an honorable mention for this loss.

6) Give it up for Kevin Stefanski, who may have lost the coach of the year award on the same field that he won over the Giants one week before.

To be fair, Stefanski would have had significant problems changing an entire gameplan in less than 24 hours for a 1 PM game, but coming a week after watching Ryan Day spend three-quarters of a game against an inferior team refusing to do what it takes to give the best chance for his team to win, Stefanski's stubborn refusal to try to wear down the Jets defense especially in the first half didn't do that.

7) How many times over the last three seasons have I complained about Baker Mayfield's throws hanging his receivers out to dry with passes that are needlessly high?

It bit the Browns on the final drive when on a second and ten Mayfield had a lane to hit JaMarcus Bradley along the sideline inside the Jets five.

If the ball is on the money, the Browns would have had first and goal inside the five with four shots at the tying touchdown, but Mayfield forced Bradley to lay out to catch the ball, and just as Bradley began to haul the ball in, Bradley was hit by Arthur Maulet and couldn't hold on.

8) Kevin Stefanski was so desperate for the running game to do anything in short-yardage that he was running Baker Mayfield on QB sneaks rather than his stud running backs.

Three times on 3rd or 4th down and short, including the final fumble, it was quarterback sneaks and when Mayfield coughed the ball up for the last time, Kareem Hunt recovered the ball but due to the "Holy Roller" rule, could not advance it and the Jets took over on downs.

9) The Browns pass defense let them down on three occasions as the much-maligned Sam Darnold threw two touchdown passes and another on a trick play when Jameson Crowder threw a 43-yard touchdown pass to Braxton Berrios, which was very similar to what the Browns ran earlier in the season with Odell Beckham and Jarvis Landry.

10 ) On Sam Darnold's pass to Chris Herndon for a touchdown, Herndon was wide open to the point that anyone could have caught the toss.

Yet another breakdown by the safeties and Andrew Sendejo per usual was multiple steps behind the play.

11) You want to see how a young quarterback can be either ruined or at least have his development stunted?

Just take a look at Sam Darnold, where the Jets seemed desperate to replace him in three seasons filled with a bad offensive line (other than this year's top pick Mekhi Becton, who looks like a keeper), aging running backs, and not a lot of targets until the end of this season when his starters began to get healthy.

12) Sam Darnold is barely two years older than Trevor Lawrence and has been given no chance to succeed. 

The Jets had been connected to Lawrence with the first pick in the draft before their back to back wins, and they are still connected to a QB in the very early mock drafts with the Jets being mentioned with Justin Fields of Ohio State, Zach Wilson of BYU, and Trey Lance of North Dakota State.

13) Should the Jets decide to not pick up the option of Darnold and/or trade him before next season, he is a prime candidate to buy low and rehabilitate him with a team that knows how to build around a QB 

Teams to consider?

Kyle Shanahan and the 49ers seem a good fit with the constantly injured Jimmy Garoppolo with two high-priced seasons on his contract, yet cannot be depended on stay healthy.

New England would be an interesting spot, but no way do the Jets trade Darnold inside the division.

Indianapolis makes sense with their need with an aging Phillip Rivers and depending on who the Falcons hire as their head coach, Darnold might make sense to backup Matt Ryan for a year or two of development similar to what New Orleans is doing with Jameis Winston.

Carolina might be a team to watch especially if they still have Joe Brady as their offensive coordinator and the final team? 

Watch out for Pittsburgh with a lack of a young quarterback and an increasingly battered Ben Rothlisberger getting more infirm by the hit.

14) The Browns offensive line misses Wyatt Teller, but they expected not to have Jedrick Wills and then thought they would have him back and then on game day lost him again.

The Jets seemed to be in the backfield constantly with Tarel Basham with a sack and a half and a forced fumble, the big star for New York.

Without both of those two players, a top-notch line becomes a merely average one.

15) Physically whipped on the line- the Browns were pushed around on both sides of the ball and perhaps that's why Stefanski decided to run the ball less and Jets runners finished 131 yards rushing, although the absence of B.J. Goodson and Jacob Phillips may have had something to do with that.

When you build your team around a physical line and you get whipped by a 1 win team, you are always going to have a rough day.

16) Sheldon Richardson is the exception to that rule.

Richardson finished with three solo tackles, seven assisted tackles and blocked a Jets field goal attempt and an extra point.

The effort that Richardson gives every week makes him well worth his expensive salary and I don't say that lightly.

17) More Cody Parkey struggles as he missed an extra point off the upright that would have cut the lead to three points rather than four in the fourth quarter.

It didn't matter as much when the Jets turned a Baker Mayfield fumble into a field goal on the next Browns possession, but the struggles are concerning despite Parkey connecting on his only field goal try from 44 yards away.

18) The Browns playoff scenario is very simple- Beat Pittsburgh and you are in.

Lose that game and you have to hope that 1-14 Jacksonville can beat the Colts in Indianapolis.

Good luck there, but they had a little wiggle room going into the games against the Jets- that is now gone.

19) Is it possible that this game will be looked back at in the same fashion that the 2007 Browns are remembered for an awful loss in Cincinnati in the next to last game of the season when they could have locked up a playoff spot in a win?

Baker Mayfield surely doesn't want to be remembered as Derek Anderson is by Cleveland fans.

20) And finally, a big raspberry to the NFL for making the Browns play this game on Sunday.

They have postponed games for other teams this season, most notably Baltimore, and all of the Browns receivers were not Covid-19 positive, they were caught up in tracing.

It would not have been against precedent to push this game back a day or two considering the importance of the game in the playoff race. 

I wrote so many notes on this, I've run out of time to write about the Cavaliers' win over Philadelphia.

I'll try to get back later for a few Cavalier thoughts.

Browns lose six on eve on Jets visit

  On the evening before a potential playoff-clinching game on the road against the 1-13 New York Jets, an already intriguing game became even more so as the Cleveland Browns lost six players before the plane to New York lifted into the air with the potential to ground a season that has excited Browns fans more than any in years.

The top four wide receivers and two starting linebackers will be staying in Cleveland watching on television as their team attempts to either clinch a playoff spot or at minimum continue to control their own destiny.

Linebacker B.J. Goodson tested positive for Covid-19 and his contact with the remaining five in the team's recovery pool area and resulted in the other five being placed on the contact list.

What that means for beyond next week is this- Goodson will also miss the season finale' against Pittsburgh, while the four WR's and linebacker Jacob Phillips can return for the Steelers game, assuming that they do not test positive in the next five days.

For the game against the Jets, this takes the wide receiver and linebacker depth chart and tosses it into the trash for the week.

The Browns lose their top wide receivers in Jarvis Landry, Rashard Higgins, KhaDarel Hodge, and Donovan Peoples-Jones and two starting linebackers in Goodson and Phillips.

Cleveland will use recent waiver claim Marvin Hall at one receiver and elevated two others from the practice squad in Derrick Willies and JaMarcus Bradley.

The interesting name of the three receivers is Willies, who caught three passes in the Browns' upset overtime win over Baltimore in 2018 before fracturing a collarbone the following week in practice.

Hall caught four passes for over 100 yards for the Lions in week eight this season but was waived a month later and was claimed by Cleveland.

While the losses at the receiver position are major, the Browns have two excellent running backs in Nick Chubb and Kareem Hunt to attempt to grind it out and Hunt is capable of lining up at receiver as well.

Cleveland also stresses the tight end position in the Kevin Stefanski offense and carry four capable pass catchers in Austin Hooper, Harrison Bryant, David Njoku, and Stephen Carlson, so look for action from all four of these players.

The bigger concern may be an already weak linebacker corps losing Goodson and Phillips.

Mack Wilson is likely to return to the lineup after being inactive last week against the Giants and the Browns promoted Montrel Meander from the practice squad.

Malcolm Smith and Tae Davis will also see increased snaps at linebacker and the Jets could see an already vulnerable Browns defense as even more so without Goodson and Phillips and decide to play smashmouth football themselves.

Special teams could also be affected with Kha'Darel Hodge as a key downfield man and Donovan Peoples-Jones returning punts in recent weeks.

Backup running back D'Ernest Johnson should be the replacement on punt returns.

It'll be an interesting Sunday for the Browns on a day they need to win most....

Buckeyes stomp Spartans 52-12

  Ohio State managed to squeeze their game in against Michigan State and despite three missing starters on the offensive line and others on defense, Ohio State scored the first thirty-five points and easily dispatched the Spartans 52-12 in East Lansing.

Justin Fields threw for two touchdowns and ran for two more, while Trey Sermon topped 100 yards in rushing while Chris Olave did the same in receiving yards.

The now 5-0 Buckeyes are scheduled to play Michigan next Saturday, but the Wolverines canceled their game with Maryland on Saturday and may not be able to play next week either.

Ohio State may be able to play another game if someone has an opening or they can hope the Big Ten changes their edict on teams needing to play six games to be eligible for the Big  Ten title game in two weeks.

Olentangy Offerings

1) This one is shorter than usual after a crazy day and more Ipad problems, but rumblings have begun that should Michigan not be able to play and Ohio State finishes 5-0 that the Buckeyes may be allowed to play in the Big Ten title game after all.

2) Justin Fields showed lots of poise in a situation that begged for poise to be lost, but what was most impressive was as simple as concentrating on getting the snap.

Harry Miller's snaps often weren't on the money, forcing Fields to move around to get the football like a shortstop roaming the infield.

3) Haskell Garrett's tip and grab of a Rocky Lombardi pass in the first half in the end zone was a score that when you know about Garrett's offseason has to make you feel good for Garrett.

Garrett was shot in the face while breaking up a fight and it wasn't sure that Garrett would be able to play this season at all, let alone at a high level.

4) Trey Sermon's day was paced by a long run of sixty plus yards, but Sermon showed that he has the breakaway speed to keep defenses honest.

Sermon has been a mild disappointment since arriving from Oklahoma as a grad transfer, but he seems to be rounding into form at just the right time.

5) The offensive line played well for missing both starting tackles and their center and shows one thing above all others- Recruit well and emergency situations become far easier to handle.

Ohio State was plugging in backups that most schools would be thrilled to see as starters and yet didn't really miss a beat.

6) Guard Wyatt Davis did play but was injured in the fourth quarter.

Davis limped off the field, but no word on how serious the injury is.

7) Larry Johnson might finish his career as a head coach at 1-0 as he replaced Ryan Day for the game with Day sidelined by Covid.

I get the feeling that Johnson might have been an excellent head coach for someone and that they missed out on quite a coach.

8) I don't know if Ohio State will play Michigan next week, Northwestern in the Big Ten title game, or the winner of next week's Iowa-Wisconsin game in the Big Ten showdown Saturday game, but the Buckeyes will have to be impressive to keep their playoff hopes alive..

However, the victory will come first and I'm starting to think that the one scenario that could damage the Buckeyes most would be a Clemson ACC title win over Notre Dame and a Florida upset of Alabama in the SEC championship.

Clemson is likely to do the former, Florida is unlikely to do the latter and of the remaining teams, the only possible team to worry about would be if the SEC pushes one-loss Texas A&M for the 4th slot.

If it is the Aggies or the Buckeyes, I think Ohio State is OK.

Covid cancels Buckeyes trip to Maryland

 The Ohio State Buckeyes will have to shrug adversity off like Big Bubba Rogers taking a Dusty Rhodes chair shot as their visit to College Park, Maryland has been canceled with the ugly head of Covid-19 making an appearance with the Maryland program with several members being unable to participate in the game safely.

Ohio State will return a week from Saturday at home against the currently undefeated Indiana Hoosiers in a game that surprisingly could determine the East Division title and accompanying trip to Indianapolis.

A few words about the Covid crisis that is returning to the country with a roar.

I'm becoming more and more negative on many things involving Covid-19.

I'm extremely skeptical that we are going to see the college football season come to its conclusion and if it should, I think it is likely that there will be controversy over the four selected teams.

Ohio State started late and now has lost a game, will that cost them a spot, and should it?

Alabama is losing their game this weekend vs LSU, and there are already rumblings after Notre Dame's upset of Clemson (Minus Trevor Lawrence) that the SEC and ACC should each send two teams and to hell with any other qualifiers.

Granted, this is the usual M.O. of ESPN's Heather Dinich, who spoons out this garbage every year it seems ( Before you hit me as a chauvinist, the definition of equal treatment is being able to say someone is liked or disliked regardless of an outside reason), but it is going to result in controversy no matter how things tumble out.

Bill Landis of the Athletic offered this scenario, which is not farfetched in this environment.

Indiana defeats Michigan State on Saturday.

Next week's Indiana visit to Columbus is canceled.

Both teams run the table with Indiana winning the East at 8-0 to Ohio State's 7-0 and the Hoosiers play in the Big Ten title game.

Indiana wins that game (vs either Wisconsin or Northwestern of this writing) and yet it's Ohio State that gets the ticket to the playoffs.

Imagine that uproar- Do you take the better team that had a game (or two) canceled or the team that did finish the season undefeated, but did so likely because their game with team A was canceled?

Especially when the argument could be made that one team is always in the hunt and the other would be in the middle of a once in every forty years season.

What it's going to take to finish this season is the bubble version of housing teams and college football just isn't set to handle that with college students.

Perhaps they could do it if they make it to the final four teams, but nothing more than that.

The NFL can make it because they have the type of money that they can sequester teams in their town, bus players to the hotel to practice, and otherwise only leave a controlled area when they travel to a road game.

I'm also skeptical that basketball and hockey are going to start on-time and even more skeptical that either league will see more than maybe a scattering of fans for their games.

The NHL with a weaker television package and relying so much more than the other leagues on the gate revenue could be in the biggest danger zone of all, but the NBA isn't out of the woods.

Even boxing, which has handled things well thus far, could be in some danger of shutting down under certain conditions, should interstate travel become restricted.

No matter the side of the political side of the street that you reside on, I fail to see how the country has handled this crisis even close to an average manner, and the lack of empathy by so many boggles my mind.

As our country craves a return to normalcy on so many topics, the irony is this- we so desperately want our day to day life to be what it once was, but many don't want to pay a small fee such as wearing a mask.

Until the steps are taken by both the leaders and their followers to finish the job, we may not have a normal life for quite a while.

I tell ya' Herbie:

It's been a while since our last "I tell ya' Herbie", which is a weekly post based on thoughts from the college football world.

I tell ya, Herbie:
                          It's been tough getting into a season where half the teams that I follow closely (Ohio State and Boise State) aren't playing, but it's even harder when you cannot count on games from week to week to be played.
It's even tougher when you hear things about teams having Covid already as LSU coach Ed Orgeron stated earlier this week.
I'm not sure that it's a good thing for college football to be playing, mainly because it's just so hard keeping the 18-22 year olds doing the things that need to be done in order to play this game and keep healthy doing so.
The one edge that the NFL has over the college game is the money that the league has to spend to keep things as healthy as possible.
No matter the school or how much the football budget is for a school, that school doesn't have what the NFL has and there is why if I had to wager on the NFL completing their season, I'd bet yes.
And why I'd bet on some sort of stoppage, even a temporary one, for the college game.


I tell ya, Herbie:
                          The Big Ten seems to be dragging their feet on a possible return in late October.
Each of the last three days, the rumors started that the conference was planning an announcement for a return to action.
To this writing, no announcement has taken place.
I'm not sure who to blame for this mess..
Commissoner Kevin Warren doesn't want to play (although he seems to be fine with his son playing with Mississippi State) and he has some school presidents on his side.
He is opposed by the league's coaches and athletic directors and if the playing leagues manage to shove some sort of a season through and the Big Ten cannot, look for Warren  to suddenly "decide to spend more time with his family" sometime next year- No matter the amount of dollars that the league has hauled in.

Editors note: As I am writing this column, the Big Ten announced their football return for October 24.

I tell ya, Herbie:
                           As someone that likes Group of Five football, few were as tickled as I was to see the Sun Belt defeat three Big 12 teams with Louisiana (minus the Lafayette) dumping a ranked Iowa State team, Arkansas State dropping Kansas State, and Coastal Carolina pounding a hapless Kansas squad with all of those games at the Big 12 teams homes.
The Sun Belt has quite a few schools that have been playing Division I for less than two decades and you can make an argument that they have surpassed the MAC and Conference USA on the G-5 totem pole.
I would even say this- If conference realignment comes along sooner than later (which is rumored with television contracts possibly being ripped up after the pandemic "disappears"), the Sun Belt may have a choice- be a shark or a minnow.
The Sun Belt could watch some of their teams be poached- Appalachian State, Georgia Southern, Louisiana (no Lafayette), Troy, and Arkansas State could all be targeted by other leagues.
The league could also go all in and build a really G-5 football league by grabbing the top CUSA teams that would be a geographic fit from a group including Marshall, Western Kentucky, UAB, Charlotte, Florida Atlantic and International, and maybe Middle Tennessee or Southern Mississppi.
You don't want your league to be too bloated, but some type of merger between the Sun Belt and CUSA would be a pretty damn good football league.

I tell ya' Herbie:
                           With the floating schedule that has come with Covid-19, the Houston Cougars get a big opportunity on the national stage.
Louisiana Tech was forced to drop out of their game with Baylor and the Bears needed an opponent.
Houston jumped on the chance to renew an old SWC rivalry and national television as the main game on Fox.
If I can, I may cover this game for TRS mainly because I'd like to see a college game that I care about even a little!

I tell ya' Herbie:
                           Ohio State may have helped bring the Big Ten back, but the conference's foot dragging has still damaged the Buckeyes with the losses of two All-Americans in guard Wyatt Davis and cornerback Shaun Wade.
While I wouldn't rule those two players deciding not to play anyway, the close to a week delay in announcing the league's return might have cost Ohio State the two players, both of which decided to train for the NFL draft in that time period.
                         

Cleaning out the Inbox:

A long-overdue cleaning of the inbox with two items having languished near the bottom for almost six weeks!

We start with the Athletic with the first of a few links from their site and their story about the home of the Buffalo Bisons, which is being used by the Toronto Blue Jays for this season.

Sahlen Field was built for Buffalo's attempt to be one of the teams chosen when baseball expanded in 1993 (the selected teams were the Rockies and Marlins) and even today, Sahlen Field is the largest stadium in AAA and even though it is now 32 years old, it is the only stadium in the minors that could be expanded to meet major league standards.
The article discusses the stadium's past and the present as the Blue Jays attempt to retrofit Sahlen Field to the needs of television and the spacing needed for the reasons of the pandemic.

I'm fortunate enough to have the two teams that I pull for in the National League play in the best two parks in baseball.
Unless you are a ridiculously biased homer, your rankings for the best park in baseball must have Pittsburgh's PNC Park and San Francisco's Oracle Park at either 1-2 or 2-1.
If you don't, well you are wrong.

The Athletic writes of the rejected designs for PNC Park that might have ruined such a terrific stadium and takes a glance at the past to the stadium hat was so awful that Oracle Park was needed in order to keep the Giants in San Francisco.
A few of the designs for PNC Park that didn't make the cut included using red brick as the material, trying to give the exterior an appearance of a neighborhood with rowhouses painted around the stadium, and another bought fully into the Pirate motif with a huge pirate ship in the right-field concourse.
In San Francisco, the article searches for the point in time that the city and the Giants discovered that building Candlestick Park in the location that was decided led to disastrous conditions such as constant heavy wind conditions.
Candlestick was also baffled with several issues in building the stadium as the architect and contractor couldn't get along, a heating system that was planned turned out to be a flop, and did I mention the wind??

The final Athletic note discusses the fall of pro basketball in Pittsburgh after the ABA Pipers and Condors ended their run in the Steel City with pro basketball never to return.
Quite a few stories about the ABA and a theory on how the final blow was Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who never played in Pittsburgh.
My favorite is the oft-told story of the Condors giving away 1,000 cupcakes to a fan and when the fan was asked about the cupcakes, he responded that he was diabetic and the few members of the crowd predictably booed.

Sports Illustrated remembers the 1984-85 Cavaliers as the NBA playoffs begin.
Those Cavaliers were coming off the Ted Stepien years that endangered the franchise on the court with terrible teams and off the court with threats from Stepien that he would move the team to Toronto or a bizarre idea that would change the name to the Ohio Cavaliers and split home games between Cleveland, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, and Toronto- the final two not residing in Ohio (And skipping the largest Ohio city in Columbus).
With rookie coach George Karl running an offense that didn't accentuate the positive of the team's best scorer, World B. Free, the Cavaliers stumbled to a 2-19 start before finishing 34-25 to earn the final spot in the Eastern Conference and giving top-seeded Boston all they wanted in losing three games to one.
The three Boston wins were by a combined seven points which shows how close to beating Boston the Cavaliers were to what would have been the biggest upset in NBA playoff history.

The New York Post finishes with an article on former 1980 American hockey star Mark Pavelich and his recent troubles.
Pavelich was part of the Miracle on Ice team that stunned the world with their gold medal run and his NHL seven-year career was solid, spent mostly with the Rangers.
Pavelich scored over thirty goals twice with his career-high 37 goals in 1982-83, but had a few tragedies in his post-NHL career and may have brain issues from concussions suffered during career.
Pavelich has spent the last year in a psychiatric facility after beating a neighbor with a pipe but was recently moved from a high-security facility to a lower-level facility for his continued treatment.

Boxing Challenge: Verdejo demolishes Madera

A late recap for the boxing challenge saw a little bit of shine return to the once-promising star of lightweight Felix Verdejo from the Las Vegas "Bubble" on Thursday night as Verdejo demolished previously undefeated (although that includes three draws) Will Madera in one round.

Verdejo's win climbed to the main event after the "Negative, Positive, Negative" Covid-19 testing of WBO junior lightweight champion Jamel Herring caused the cancellation of Herring's title defense against Jonathan Oquendo, but the spectacular performance by Verdejo in front of a national audience will make fans want to see more of the former Puerto Rican Olympian in the future.

The right, right, left combination that left Madera prone in a corner near the end of the first round showed why so many tabbed Verdejo as a future superstar when he turned pro in 2013.
Verdejo has been working with a new trainer this year with Ismael Salas and Salas has a track record of working well with reclamation projects in recent years, so even if this victory still leaves Verdejo with plenty to prove, training with Salas and the knockout gives hope for Verdejo.
Although it seemed a bit silly for Verdejo to call out Vasily Lomachenko after this win (Verdejo still has never beaten a top ten lightweight), it does make him an interesting fighter to watch in the division and should he defeat a tougher opponent in his next fight, I would not be surprised to see him in the mix for one of the three vacant lightweight titles that could be vacated by the Lomachenko-Teofimo Lopez winner (Lomachenko has talked of returning to junior lightweight and Lopez is likely to move up to junior welterweight).


Ramon Malpica and I each added one point for the Verdejo win to move the total to 69-61 in the boxing challenge.

Goodbye MILB

The press release that we all knew was waiting finally was released yesterday as the 2020 minor league season was officially canceled.

While not unexpected, it still was a sad day to have things confirmed that there will be no baseball in most Mudville's for 2020.

And while today isn't the saddest day for me as that day is yet to come- when the Rob Manfred-led power play to eliminate 40 plus teams from the minors and depriving those teams fans even a chance to say goodbye is announced will be that day, it still has a degree of sadness to me.
You wait all winter during the worst months of the year (Jan, Feb, and March), battle through short days and cold nights, and wait out the darkness until the warmth begins to arrive with it the fun that comes with the baseball season.
And this year, I feel that fans all over the country have been cheated of that.

Not only the minors, but the majors too.
The players hearts aren't in this sham of a season and the excitement from the viewers won't be either.
I'm not paying for a MLB package for this "exhibition" (Ok, if its 20 bucks or so, maybe) and should I not do that, I may not watch much.
My teams aren't going to be televised often and I'm not watching the Orioles get beaten 10-1 every night by their rivals or listen to one of my least favorite announcers in sports (F.P. Santangelo) blither for the Nationals every night, so I may not be as involved.
MLB should do the right thing by allowing the blackout rules to be dropped and giveaway their Extra Innings and MLB.TV packages for the year.
It would be a small gesture of goodwill towards a fan base that is in desperate need of it.

There are many culprits to blame for killing what would have been the final season for Hagerstown baseball via Covid-19.
The WHO, China, countless people that are so reckless and stupid by not taking precautions around the country, and of course Donald John Trump, but most of all Rob Manfred, who has to be quite pleased with himself for being able to kill minor league baseball's leverage ( They were beginning to gain ground with Congress before Covid-19 arrived) and cannot wait to get his plan for the minors installed- a plan that was thought up by a man so disgraced that he was run out of the game, mind you.
I want to add a special tip of the cap not only to that gentleman but to his two former assistants who now run the Brewers and Orioles, who I hope will be as successful as a salesman selling snow blowers in the Caribbean in their current positions.

This is a sad day and the worst is yet to arrive.
But I'd like to add this on masking before I finish.
Please don't make this about political stances, toughness, the media, or even your belief.
It's about none of these.
It's about courtesy and teamwork.
Courtesy towards others that may not affect the person you contact, but it may affect the people that they contact.
I know you feel silly, I do too and I've joked that I feel like I'm the bad guy in an old Western film, but be safe.
I know it sucks breathing with it on after a while and I get all of that.
But we've lost so much in sports already-the Final Four and I'll believe that MLB, NBA, and NHL complete their seasons when they are on their fields of play raising their trophy, and even if they do it won't mean as much and will delay the start of the next season.
Football is next and professionals far higher on the medical chain than me have stated- You want football in the fall? Wear your mask and do what you need to do to kill the virus hygencially.

Don't want to do it for yourself or the people you care about and care about you or even your fellow man?
Do it for your team!
Want to see sports again with the excitement of fans?
Don't be selfish-wear the mask, at least around others.
It is the best chance to bring fun activities back, keep the spread down, and keep our essentials and workplaces open until the vaccine can be developed- hopefully affordably so!

Thanks for reading.

Boxing Challenge- WE"RE BACK!

FINALLY- Some live sports to write about!!

Whew!
Honestly, I've missed boxing the most during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Both the Cavaliers and Devils were lousy and once they started canceling games to ruin my trips for the season, baseball continued to really piss me off with their actions towards the minors and now Rob Manfred's shoving a very flawed concept down the throats of the fans- I found I was living OK without it.
But boxing isn't seasonal, for me, it's been a consistent part of my everyday life and I've found that I missed it more than the rest.

Anyway, Bob Arum and Top Rank are the first to return and the ESPN platform is hungry to show something live, so Top Rank is going to have an aggressive return with cards on Tuesday's and Thursday's for each of the next five weeks.
Each of the shows will be from Las Vegas, except for a June 27th Saturday card from Mexico City.
They won't be top fights, but you will see top fighters as they attempt to crack the lesions of inactivity and in the final week, Jamel Herring will be defending his WBO junior lightweight title.
Some of the fights wouldn't normally be of the caliber for the boxing challenge, but with the dearth of sports action, I'm going to include them to have things to write about.

We start with Tuesday's main event with WBO featherweight champion Shakur Stevenson in a non-title event at junior lightweight against Felix Carabello.
The former Olympic silver medalist looked tremendous in his last fight against bitter rival Joet Gonzalez to win the vacant title and it was Stevenson, who was the last fighter to be affected by Covid-19 as his first title defense against Miguel Marriaga in New York was literally hours away before the card was canceled.
Stevenson will be fighting for the huge exposure that is expected and he should look very good against Caraballo, who appears to be overmatched and hasn't fought against a world-class level opponent, let alone one with the ability of Stevenson.

Thursday's card will feature Jessie Magdaleno in a junior lightweight fight against Yenifel Vincente.
Magdaleno, who lost his WBO junior featherweight title in April 2018 to Issac Dogboe by eleventh round knockout, has looked better in his two comeback fights at featherweight in wins over Rico Ramos and Rafael Rivera.
Vincente is a tough veteran that is a cut below Magdaleno, but has never been stopped in his four defeats and should give Magdaleno some steady work.

The co-feature pits Adam Lopez facing Luis Coria in a featherweight battle.
Lopez was a last-minute replacement against undefeated and former WBO featherweight champion Oscar Valdez in November and gave the bigger Valdez all he wanted in dropping Valdez in the second round and leading on my card after six rounds before Valdez stopped Lopez in the seventh in what I thought was a premature ending much to the relief of Valdez and Top Rank, who had to be sweating a bit at the thought of their planned Valdez challenge of WBC junior lightweight champion Miguel Berchelt flying out the window.
Lopez drops back to featherweight for this one against Coria, who despite a 12-2 record, has faced two fighters with winning records and is 1-1 against them with the loss against a 10-9 fighter.
Still, Coria's November 2018 to the best fighter on his resume' 17-3 Thomas Valdez was a close split decision loss, so he may give Lopez a tussle.

We return to the boxing challenge from hiatus with a lead over Ramon Malpica 45-40.

Junior Lightweights. 10 Rds
Shakur Stevenson vs Felix Caraballo
R.L: Stevenson Unanimous Decision
TRS: Stevenson KO 6

Junior Lightweights. 10 Rds
Jessie Magdaleno vs Yenifel Vincente
Both: Magdaleno Unanimous Decision

Featherweights. 10 Rds
Adam Lopez vs Luis Coria
Both: Lopez Unanimous Decision

NHL Plans Return-Devils Season Ends

The NHL announced their plans to return in July to conclude the 2019-20 season with a set of playoffs that will include an expanded playoff format with twelve teams making the postseason from each conference and with a play-in series that brings back memories of the NBA and NHL of the 1970s playoffs.

The league's return still is far from certain, but there is a plan in place with an unofficial agreement with the players, so now it's a matter of things falling into place for these playoffs to take place.

Under these terms and the additional eight teams making the "Postseason", the New Jersey Devils still did not qualify, which places them in the draft lottery for the third time in the last four seasons.

The Devils will hope for a lucky draw as in their previous two lotteries, New Jersey won the whole damn thing (Paraphrasing Jake Taylor in Major League) allowing them to select Nico Hischier and Jack Hughes with those picks.

New Jersey will have a 7.5 percent chance of pulling the top pick in the draft and could have as many as three first-rounders or only their own first-rounder as the Devils await the results of the Arizona vs Nashville and the Vancouver vs Minnesota series to determine if the Devils will receive picks from Arizona ( from the Taylor Hall trade) and Tampa Bay ( the Vancouver pick was acquired through Tampa Bay in the Blake Coleman trade) in this draft or wait until the 2021 draft.

New Jersey's own pick could range from first to eighth, depending on how the lottery balls would bounce.

New Jersey would receive the Arizona selection unless the Coyotes would lose in the first round of the playoffs to Nashville and then make their way into the top three picks.

Should that occur, the Devils would have to wait until 2021 for that pick to arrive.

Arizona is the eleventh seed and the underdog to the sixth-ranked Predators, who finished with four more points in one fewer game played.

As for the pick added from Vancouver (Through Tampa Bay), if the Canucks win their series against the Minnesota Wild, New Jersey would add the Canucks 2020 first-rounder.

Should Minnesota pull the mild upset ( Vancouver is seeded seventh to Minnesota's tenth, but Vancouver finished with only one point more than the Wild ), the Devils will be receiving the 2021 top pick of the Lightning.

The perfect scenario for the Devils would be the Coyotes losing in the first round and not reaching the top three in the lottery, which would see the Devils pick as high as eighth (this would take Montreal and Chicago winning in the first round), ninth (Montreal OR Chicago winning in the first round), or tenth (should Montreal and Chicago both lose).

The wrench in the works could be one of the first-round losers winding their way into the top three lottery picks and dropping that pick by one spot.

As for the Vancouver pick, I'm rooting for the Canucks to win that series because even though that means that pick would be between sixteenth and twenty-third, I still think that will be a more desirable pick than Tampa's 2021 choice, which I would think would be near the bottom of the first round.

The Devils finish the disappointing and abbreviated season with 68 points, which placed them firmly in the basement of the Metropolitan Division and eleven points behind the closest team in the New York Rangers.

However, the team was playing well when the season was interrupted and had they won their final game in Pittsburgh against the Penguins, the Devils would have slid into the playoffs ahead of Montreal for the twelfth spot which would have paired them against Pittsburgh.

I may do a season recap for the Devils later, but in case I do not- Kyle Palmieri led the team in goals and points with 25 and 45, Nikita Gusev led the Devils in assists with 31 and of players that played more than 45 games and remained with the team, Kyle Palmieri finished with the best plus/minus at negative four and led in power-play points with eighteen.

Damon Severson led the defensemen in goals and assists with eight and twenty-three as well as power-play points with twelve.

Mackenzie Blackwood led the goaltenders across the board in his first season as the number one netminder with twenty-two wins, a save percentage of .915 and a goals allowed average of 2.77.

The Devils would win only six games that Blackwood did not start with Cory Schneider and the departed Louis Domingue splitting the half-dozen victories.

So, I do have an interest in those two first-round series, should the league manage to make its way back to play due to their effects on the Devils draft.

It was a disappointing season for New Jersey, one that I had hoped would have seen possibilities for a playoff berth.

Instead, it was a season filled with losses and one that seemed to only to tease with promise.

The late-season rush did give me some hope, but there is a longer path to walk than I had hoped to see and the Devils will need to address gaps before I get excited again.

Not sure whether the next post will be another Friends and Family, inbox cleaning, or boxing ratings, but I'll be back tonight!

The road to a special week

I've been struggling with things to keep moving with the sports world being stuck in concrete during Covid-19.

So, I reached to my family and friends, including the two biggest backers of TRS, and asked them what they wanted to see me write about.

I've heard back from some of them already and what I am planning to do is give them "their day" in what I write about.
Hopefully, it will be fun and pass a week or so here with topics that you enjoy reading about my opinions and memories.

I'll be starting tomorrow unless something breaks in the sports world that needs to be addressed quickly.

Let me know what you think.

Catching the bug.

Finally, a few weeks into quarantine the sports bug is back as far as watching goes with a few events from the past.

Between DVD's and YouTube, there are tons of great events available to watch, it was just a matter of wanting to watch.

I completed the 1986 Masters today with Jack Nicklaus coming from off the pace for the surprise victory at 46 and I'm currently watching the opening game of the USFL as the Chicago Blitz travel to Washington for the return of George Allen to town against the Federals.
Later tonight could be some basketball or maybe even boxing as I'm going to rewatch what may be the best fight that I have ever watched and that could be my next post.

It's funny about classic sports when you rewatch them- it's not as much about the actual performance of the athletes, but the memories that return of you looking back at the person that watched that particular event.
That's not always the case because in some cases I might not have seen it before or if I did, I may not have remembered where I was watching, but often the fun in watching is the story-telling of viewing the first time.

I've tried to find a mix between events that I have personal memories and ones that perhaps I don't and would be fun to watch on a different level.
I'll be back from the work office tonight with either an inbox cleaning or a tributes edition.

Staying home

I'm not supposed to be here.
I'm not supposed to be at the road office and I'm damn sure not supposed to be bummed out about the state of baseball, the minors to be specific, and our country in general.

I'm supposed to be hanging out with my buddies after a day of baseball in Myrtle Beach and Charleston with three days to go in the official kickoff to the end of the downtime-I.E- Non-Baseball season and instead I'm sitting at work, bored, depressed, and generally discouraged about more than missing a trip.

Reality has set in and it looks to me that we will not have minor league baseball or live in-person baseball at all this season.
While this means more money for other things and less time spent on the road, the loss is the time with my friends and around the game that you can't get back.

And the final irony is this- I'm not sure what things will be like when baseball does come back.
A sport that even before Covid-19 that was in the middle of a campaign to lessen their player's contact with its fans will likely use Covid-19 as an excuse to go even further in moving their stars away.
Covid-19 makes sense for the time being to be very safe, but I have the feeling that things have changed for good with the players.
Place aside the drawn royal flush for Rob Manfred to get away with his planned demolition of the minors and think of this- Imagine a baseball world without players interacting with season ticket holders, autograph collectors, franchises not wanting their players to stay with host families, and players being separated by netting for now (I'm convinced that eventually the netting around the field will be changed to fiberglass similar to hockey) for a different fan experience at whatever level you watch baseball at.

I'm already trying to plan a summer without baseball and it's likely to be a summer without traveling as well.
That's unfortunate because I'd be more than willing to travel without baseball, but unless I'm surprised, it appears to be a local-bound summer.
While I'm struggling with so many things that we all are dealing with right now, I'm finding things to do, still have that metal detector to use, and playing a lot of games, which I'll update later this week.

While I'm disappointed about my summer travels going down the drain, I'm even dismayed about the current state of the political discourse.
I see so many people on the left and the right each thinking that the other controls the country that it's sad to see a lack of common ground.
Left-leaning people that won't vote for Joe Biden because their guy (Bernie Sanders) lost and there is no difference between Biden and the President and the right side of the crowd believing that Biden is no different than Sanders is both ridiculous and a non-starter.
It's saddening to see our country so splintered and unwilling to work together even on the most important topics, although the first stimulus did show some cooperation for a need that even the most fervent partisan couldn't be against.
I'll be very interested in seeing if this can be repeated for the next wave of stimulus packages, which is almost surely going to be repeated in the summer- if not exceeded.

I've been critical of the President and feel that my initial assessment of his character has proven to be correct, but I'm not rooting against him right now as so many are.
I'd much rather see the same folks put their energy into defeating him in a fair election in November rather than root for him to fail currently.
I've never understood the saying "not my President".
Win or lose, the winner is our President for four years and while we don't have to agree with policies, we should hope for the best.

Today's not a great day considering what I'd rather be doing, but there are so many people around that are far worse than me and my family are and it's hard to be too whiny when you think of others.
Here is hoping that that 2021 is much better than 2020 because the standard doesn't seem to be too hard to match.

This was the XFL...

Yet another victim was claimed by Covid-19 as the XFL announced the
suspension of their operations and their lack of plans for 2021.

The XFL didn't do poorly at the gate and even though their television ratings slid from their opening week, I believe that had the perfect scenario not occurred with Covid-19, the league would have returned for the second season and then who knows what could have happened.

I really enjoyed the XFL as I did the AAF and I'm sad to see the XFL go because I still think there is a market for spring football.
However, I'm at a loss on how best to present the product.
Both the XFL and AAF struggled with quarterback play and when the quarterbacks struggle, fans don't always stick with the product.
If you are going to be what is in effect a minor league, the casual fan doesn't seem interested and only wants to compare the league to the NFL.
That's a dumb reason because college football isn't the NFL either and it's plenty popular.

The USFL had some very good quarterback play with two eventual Hall of Famers in Steve Young and Jim Kelly, but that avenue has its problems as well.
Going after star players means you are stepping on the NFL's toes and having to pay to land those players.
Paying big money means even larger losses as you attempt to get the league off the ground and almost every new league professes a business plan and plenty of cash to offset the initial losses.
That lasts until the losses start coming in and that's followed by panic.

The WLAF tried in the spring with NFL backing and it too failed, although there were some successes with a few of the European teams.
The NFL's problem in these matters seems to come down to this- They would like to see a league like the WLAF (or the AAF, who they came close to an agreement with) be available for training and developmental purposes, but the teams are then skittish about potential injuries.
That concern alone would likely see only undrafted free agents allocated to a league and almost certainly not a quarterback with questions about the also developmental status of offensive lines in such a league.

Vince McMahon tried going gimmicky with XFL 1 and more football-based with XFL 2 and neither succeeded, although I'm going speculate that the reasons that the XFL isn't back for a second season are the losses from Covid-related cancellations and the recent huge tumble in WWE stock may have combined to make McMahon hesitant to continue with the venture.

I don't have an answer for what would work for spring football, but I wonder why these investors/owners start leagues/buy franchises if they don't have the stomach for early losses.
Any new venture in sports is going to lose money and lots of it- if you can't afford to lose money for years and one would think that you would know that before even considering getting into sports, why would you throw your money away knowing you are (no pun intended) out of your league.

In the end, it's another failed team to add to the graveyard of teams with the Kentucky Colonels, Cleveland Crusaders, Southern California Sun, Chicago Blitz, Arizona Wranglers, Memphis Showboats, San Francisco Demons, Arizona Hotshots and now the D.C. Defenders.
R.I.P.

Counting Flowers on the Wall

Covid-19 certainly has made keeping busy a challenge without sports.
While I've been working regular hours (and extra this week), I've been trying to follow the edict to stay inside and away from the vulnerable folks.
Decisions to follow or not has to be a choice made by each individual and I respect that, if not agree.

However, I'm not going to live with ending someone's life because I  think Covid-19 cannot reach me, so I've visited no one and seen few other than Ryan, going to work and whomever I would see while gathering supplies.
When I type that, I sound like I'm Radar O'Reilly getting ready to hit Kempo to trade a case of beets for some penicillin to keep the 4077th afloat!

To a certain degree and without live sports and the roster freeze that baseball has enacted due to the virus, it seems like all I've been writing about of late has been tributes.
And while I think of the tributes posts as just that, I can't lie and say too many in a short period isn't pretty depressing.
Many times I feel like I'm just killing time with sorting 2020 Topps Heritage ( If anyone reading this has any of the short prints, let me know as I'm trying to make those as part of my set), binging television shows, playing games, and what seems often to be counting Flowers on the wall.
Hence, the above picture of the Statler Brothers and contrary to popular belief, that photo is not a 1971 Heimberger family outing!
BTW- The Statlers made some great music, but once Lew DeWitt got sick and the little short guy with the shrill voice came in, the Statlers became more of a comedy team that sang rather than a great singing group.


So, what have I been watching and doing specifically?
I've watched the entire run of the CBS program "Under The Dome" which I thought was pretty good for the first two seasons and its final season was pretty weak and I barely finished the season.
I've also finished a long-time favorite in "Cold Case" and Cherie and I have begun "Without A Trace", another past favorite that Cherie and I haven't seen in quite a while.
I've been watching "Star Trek" on DVD at work, finishing the original series and moving on to the 1973 animated version before I'll start "Deep Space Nine".
I always like to bring the shows that lasted a while to the road office because it enables me to skip watching for a bit if I need a change occasionally.
Work has also added "Criminal Minds" as it's on every night as I work and it's pretty good from what I've seen, although some seasons are better than others.
Unlike Cold Case and Without a Trace, Criminal Minds was hit off and on with cast changes and some characters I like better than others, so when they aren't around, those episodes aren't quite as good.

I've also been watching YouTube videos with people who treasure hunt with metal detectors and underwater diving.
I've mentioned that Cherie and Rachel purchased me a detector for Christmas and I'm trying to learn more about how to use it before I take it out seriously.
I might be using it more often this year than I expected with the minor league baseball season heavily shortened at best and eliminated at worst, so I'm enjoying getting to know how detectors work and what to expect.

You might have noticed a lack of sports at this point.
To my surprise, I haven't missed things as much as I expected.
That doesn't mean that I don't miss sports, but that I have been able to fill that hole thus far with other programming.
Let's see if that continues as the quarantine drags on.

And with all this time, I've been playing various seasons of Action PC sports.
I just finished a replay of the 1967 NFL season that ended with the Los Angeles Rams of George Allen defeating Tom Landry's Dallas Cowboys in the NFL championship game 20-14 in double overtime to win the title when Rams linebacker Maxie Baughan intercepted a Don Meredith pass and ran twenty-five yards for the championship-winning score.
I was in the middle of that project when the quarantine hit, so that wasn't a new season.
I'll likely be beginning the 1968 AFL season next as I played the 1967 AFL season last year with Joe Namath and the New York Jets winning that title over the Oakland Raiders.

I haven't started a baseball project as I am trying to decide just what season I'd like to play.
When you play a 154 or 162 game season, you see these teams for quite a while, so I want to make sure that I want to play a certain team for a while.
Contenders are the 1951 Giants, 1971 Indians, 1977 Rangers, 1979 Indians, and 1990 Pirates along with a possible "Ball Four" replay in which I replay the 1969 Seattle Pilots until Jim Bouton is traded to Houston and when I would then jump to the Astros.

I've started a hockey season months ago and I've played in starts and stops with the expansion 1974-75 Kansas City Scouts.
The Scouts were terrible and finished ahead of only fellow expansion mate Washington in the standings with a record of 15-54-11.
My version of the Scouts has played about as bad as one would expect with five wins, seventeen losses, and a tie.
The funny part of these Scouts so far- four of their five wins were over Atlanta and Vancouver, both of whom are in first place in their division.
I don't score a lot with the expansion Scouts and as I attempt to compete, I play a much more defensive game to keep the games close.
Kansas City's first-round pick Wilf Paiement, who is one of two players on the team to have a nice career, is tied for the team lead with Ed Gilbert with only seven goals.
Paiement scored 26 goals on the season to tie Simon Nolet for the team lead in the actual season.

I started a basketball season yesterday and decided to move oppositely from the Scouts as I'm playing the same 1974-75 season with the ABA champion Kentucky Colonels.
The Colonels lost their first game 118-113 at home to the Denver Nuggets.
The Nuggets finished the regular season with the league's best record, so that's not an awful defeat.
Kentucky rebounded to even their record at 1-1 with a 126-117 home win over the Indiana Pacers.
Artis Gilmore scored 28 points in the win with Louie Dampier adding 27 for the victorious Colonels.

There you have it- how I've been running the Four Corners offense to wind down the clock.
Next time, I'll have some recent links of note, and if any of these interests you, let me know.
I might be able to work another post out of this.

Cleaning out the Inbox- Send it in Jerome Edition

I know this will be a non-sports edition with links from the political world and most of those are notes from The Bulwark, but one of the links by Amanda Carpenter "Mail It In" made me think of what I think of every time I hear the phrase "Send It In"- the 1988 backboard breaking dunk by Pitt's Jerome Lane with color commentator Bill Raftery screaming the phrase that lives on 32 years later.

We'll start with two Bulwark columns from Amanda Carpenter with the first being the aforementioned "Mail It In" with the discussion centered around having voting more accessible by mail for November's election.
Sixteen states currently require a "reason" to vote absentee and even though Maryland is not one of those states, I still think that giving voters more avenues to cast their votes can be a good thing.
I've voted absentee on several occasions and for a country that doesn't have a holiday to allow people to have the day off to vote, it only makes good sense.
While I understand that the chances of fraud do increase with paper/mail ballots, I'm not sure it is any higher than tabulating results via computer and we've seen how that can turn out.
With the almost guaranteed heat and fury that November's election is going to bring from supporters of and against the President, absentee voting might avoid some potential incidents at polling places and that alone might be worth the effort to expand the paper voting into all states for at least this November's election.

Carpenter also writes of conservative commentator Michelle Malkin and her gradual drift downstream from conservatism to radicalism.
Malkin, who once was a regular on cable news networks, has become almost persona non grata for television or even mainstream conservatives and unless you still read her column on a dwindling amount of news outlets, has faded from the scene.
Carpenter gives far more detail than I can in her article, but the article shows that no matter the topic or belief just how quickly one can fade from the scene.

More Bulwark as Richard North Patterson writes the six lessons learned from the Democratic primaries and how they could relate to the November elections.
The analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of various candidates and how they define the party entering the next stage is quite interesting and could say a lot on the eventual message for the showdown with Donald Trump and maybe even 2024.

One final Bulwark note as Gregg Hurwitz tells the reader that "We can wake up now" from the Donald Trump experiment.
Many voting for Trump in 2016 did so because they wanted someone that would "blow things up", "wanted a businessman" or just plain couldn't stand Hillary Clinton.
While I could understand all of those various reasons, I couldn't seriously consider voting for Donald Trump and didn't do so (For the record, I didn't vote for Hillary Clinton either) because I knew the background, the record, and I wasn't remotely convinced that any of the hype was sincere.
I don't hold the Democrats innocent for 2016 for shoving a candidate to the forefront that was so disliked that they lost an election that was handed to them to win and I also hold the left accountable for being so stringent to their beliefs that they didn't bother to show up at the polls.
Hurwitz writes how it happened in 2016, how it led to where we are today, and what it will take to reverse the decision in November.

The Atlantic's Peter Wehner wraps us up with the temperament of the President for dealing with the Covid 19 crisis and why he is so ill-suited to lead in times of stress.
I'm not going to mention why this is so, although even the most fervent supporter of the President knows that these are the actual characteristics as in many cases it's those characteristics that earned their vote.
Covid 19 won't roll over in fear, it could care less about a nasty Tweet, it cannot be affected by changing its name and it will not give the time of day to "as I like to call" mundane nicknames.
Whether you think Covid 19 is a crisis or simply media-hyped flu (and I know plenty of friends and others that believe either side), the tactics of the last four years isn't going to stop it cold.
Finally, the President has to deal with something that will not be intimidated and won't dodge in fear or shame.