Category Archives: Sports news

Sports news

Rarified air in grid polling

Allow me this brief admission, which is that a long-suffering fan of the University of Oregon football program is finding it hard to breathe while the Ducks are perched at the tippy-top of a list of elite programs.

Yes, the Ducks have been good for some time now. They were ranked No. 1 briefly during the 2012 season. Then they ran into the Stanford Cardinal, which knocked the Ducks off their lofty perch.

I didn’t attend the U of O. I attended Portland State University. However, as a red-blooded American patriot who loves college football, I am enjoying the dickens out of watching the Ducks take care of business on the field.

A couple of points need to be made about Oregon’s rise to the top of the heap. One is that the Ducks now compete in the Big Ten, which for us Pacific Coast natives is akin to cheering for the enemy on the battlefield. In the old days, the Pac 12 competed for the right to play in the Rose Bowl, in which the other team was the Big Ten champion.

It’s all a mixed-up jumble now, with the Rose Bowl game tossed into the mix of bowl games designed to determine the national football champion.

The other thing is this “transfer portal” that seems to dominate college athletics. Student-athletes now are able transfer to schools just to compete in football or other top-drawer sports. The Ducks ‘ lineup now features a kid named Dillon Gabriel, who transferred to Oregon from Oklahoma.  Last year, the stud was QB Bo Nix, a transfer from Auburn. This transfer business makes it hard for fans like me to latch onto players who only are there for a season or two. They have zero loyalty to the school.

Marcus Mariota played QB for the Ducks and won the Heisman Trophy as the best college football player in the nation. He entered school as a freshman and stayed until he earned his degree … and then used up his football eligibility.

However, all this is just chatter. The college football know-it-alls think the Ducks are the top college team in the country and have them ranked No. 1. Those of us who remember all those lean years in Eugene will accept this new “elite” status happily … and with pride that the gridiron glory brings to the state of my birth.

Sports news

Big Ten: tough to swallow

It’s a beautiful, sun-splashed Saturday afternoon in North Texas … so let’s talk a little college football for a brief moment.

We’re about halfway through the season and I am still trying to get used to my favorite college football team, the Oregon Ducks, competing in the Big Ten conference.

Here’s a bit of history that will explain my discomfort.

Since the beginning of time, the Pacific Coast football gods had embarked on a program that would pit the winner of the Pacific Coast football conference (which has had several names) against the winner of the Big Ten in the final game of the season.

That would be the Rose Bowl. The so-called “granddaddy of bowl games.”

Those of us on the Left Coast hate the Big Ten. Why, many of us who don’t live in southern California, even hate the University of Southern Cal and UCLA. Then beginning this season, the Pac 12 dissolved and several of its member schools merged with the Big Ten. Oregon, Washington, UCLA and USC all became Big Ten members. The Big Ten came into being as a collection of schools gathered around the Great Lakes. It now comprises 18 schools stretching from coast to coast.

To be honest, the Ducks are having a stellar season. They are 6-0, having beaten dreaded Ohio State in a thriller in Eugene, and thrashing Michigan State and Purdue. But … what is wrong with this picture?

Oregon normally wouldn’t play a Big Ten foe until the final game of the year, presuming they would qualify for a Rose Bowl bid. The Ducks only recently ascended to the “elite” level of college football status. So, their appearance in the big game was a rare treat. for those of who hail from Oregon.

Whichever school came out of the Pac-12 to play the hated Big Ten — except for USC and UCLA — became the “favorite” team of Pacific Coast fans to whip the snot out of the Big Ten rep in the Rose Bowl.

That’s all changed. We now play a Big Ten school every weekend until the end of the regular season.

I just want to tell you this arrangement is going to test me … until I get used to it.

Sports news

Charlie Hustle got what he deserved

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One of Major League’s Baseball’s fiercest competitors has died and thus he never will be around if the MLB makes what I consider to be a regretful decision.

That would be to include Pete Rose in the Hall of. Fame.

Rose, the all-time leader in hits, at-bats and games played is gone. His legacy, though, will remain stained forever by a decision he made consciously and with a full understanding of the consequences of that decision.

In the late 1980s, Rose bet on baseball games. He competed in some of those games on which he wagered. The MLB rule book speaks with crystal clarity: Anyone caught betting on baseball shall be banned from the organization for the rest of his life.

OK, now he’s gone. Does that mean he becomes eligible for the Hall of Fame?  If I were King of the World, I’d say “no!”

The late Bart Giamatti, MLB’s commissioner at the time of the infraction, made the right call in banning Charlie  Hustle from the game.

Rose wasn’t the most talented player ever to suit up for big-league hardball. He arguably was the most driven. Sadly, though, that drive led him astray … and he paid the price he knew he would pay.

Sports news

RIP, ‘Say Hey Kid’

Willie Mays has passed away. He was 93 years of age. He lived a full, fruitful and joyful life.

I am going to share on this very brief blog post something I once read about Willie Mays, considered by many baseball experts to be among the greatest athletes ever to play the Grand Old Game.

Someone once said — I cannot remember who it was — that Mays never made a mistake playing baseball. He had the sharpest baseball mine of anyone on the field. He never threw to the wrong player. His mind was always completely in the game.

He played the game with flair, his hat would fly off as he raced around the bases after connecting on one of his 3,283 base hits.

He always was the smartest player on the field … always!

Sports news

Does he belong in the Hall?

One more brief word about Bill Walton, the college and pro basketball legend who died today of cancer at the age of 71.

I once doubted whether Walton deserved to be in the Naismith Hall of Fame. Not any longer.

My doubt stemmed from his professional career stat line, which wasn’t great. He was injured for much of his career, suffering an assortment of foot and ankle injuries. His first two seasons with the Portland Trail Blazers — my hometown NBA franchise — were an exercise in futility and frustration for us fans.

Season No. 3, though, was a breakout year. The Blazers won the NBA championship, defeating the favored Philly 76ers in six games. The Sixers had Julius Erving and George McGinnis, Darryl Dawkins and Bobby Jones on their roster. The Blazers had Walton, Maurice Lucas and a bunch of other guys few NBA fans remember.

No. 4 figured to be even better. The Blazers rocketed off to a 50-10 start; then Walton went down with an injury. He was voted MVP that year, but the Blazers failed to repeat as NBA champs. Then he was gone. Walton sued the Blazers for medical malpractice and ended up in Boston playing for the legendary Celtics team. He won another championship with Boston before retiring.

Prior to joining the NBA, though, Walton was a stellar standout at UCLA. He won two NCAA titles in college.

It dawned on my a while ago that the Naismith hall of fame honors college players as well as pros.

Ok, so Walton’s pro career fluttered a bit before soaring to great heights. He did, however, stand out as the nation’s pre-eminent collegiate player at UCLA. Taken together, I will declare that Bill Walton’s legacy as a basketball player deserves a spot in the Hall of Fame.

Sports news

Tiger is ‘bigger than the game’

Maybe it’s just me, but I doubt it, but I believe most eyes tomorrow belonging to golf fanatics are waiting to see how one pro golfer performs at the Masters Tournament in Augusta, Ga.

That golfer is Eldrick “Tiger” Woods.

He hasn’t played much competitive golf in recent years, having to recover from surgeries and the effects of that near-fatal car crash in California.

Woods is teeing it up tomorrow. A lot of fans — and I am one of them — want Woods to do well. If he doesn’t and falls out of the race for the trophy early, well, I am not likely to watch much of the event.

That is, unless one of the older guys rises to the top, which can — and does — happen on occasion.

Still, I am rooting for the fellow who truly is larger than the game he plays.

Sports news

End the all-star games!

Here’s a thought, and I admit it’s not an original one … but the National Basketball Association needs to end the annual all-star game.

The same for the National Football League and the National Hockey League. End ’em! Don’t bother putting on these charades where the athletes play zero defense.

The NBA’s latest disaster this past weekend had one of the teams scoring 211 points. 211 points! What the hell?

This is preposterous! I get that the athletes don’t want to get hurt. I don’t blame them for that. I do believe that the NBA is doing a disservice to them and to the fans who show up to watch these guys perform. Same for the NFL, which too often has players going through the blocking and tackling motions. Oh, and the NHL, which often produces all-star games with scores like 12-10.

OK, that all said, Major League Baseball should continue its all-star contests, which because of the nature of the sport can produce actual competition featuring players working hard to win the game.

Perhaps the most famous — or infamous — MLB all-star moment came in 1970 when Cincinnati’s Pete Rose sought to score a run and crashed into Cleveland catcher Ray Fosse who was guarding the plate. Rose was running full tilt down the third base line. The crash injured Fosse so seriously that he never was able to play the game at a high level; the event essentially ended his playing career.

The rest of the major pro sports leagues, though, need not bother to stage these idiotic exhibitions. They aren’t worth watching.

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Dallas Stadium? For real … ?

A mild bit of grumbling can be heard in some North Texas communities over the temporary renaming of AT&T Stadium in Arlington.

The place — known colloquially as Jerry World — was named over the weekend as a semifinal site for the 2026 World Cup soccer tournament. The locals had hoped the place would become a site for the finals. But … no dice.

FIFA, the World Cup governing body, doesn’t like to have corporate names on its venues, so it demanded they take down the name of the telecommunications giant. The new name?

Dallas Stadium!

The name has rankled some folks. I tend to agree with their hurt feelings.

The place is 30-some miles from Dallas. It’s closer to Fort Worth than to Big D. I can think of several non-corporate names one could have put on the place other than Dallas Stadium.

North Texas Stadium. D/FW Stadium. Arlington Stadium. They all come to mind. I’d even settle for Cowboys Stadium.

It just ain’t in Dallas. I get that FIFA wanted to have a name associated with the largest city in the region. That would be Dallas, with its towering skyline full of gleaming office buildings. Then again, Fort Worth has its share of cowboy glitz and glamor, too.

I should point out as well that the Dallas Cowboys, the pro football team that calls the place home, hasn’t played in Dallas since the team’s founding in 1960, when they played their home games in the Cotton Bowl. They have since moved to Irving and then to Arlington … where team owner Jerry Jones built the place now known temporarily as Dallas Stadium.

As for the grumblers, well, I’m with ’em.

Sports news

Get real, theorists

Conspiracy theorists, seemingly to a person, seemingly have too much time on their hands.

Thus, they need to find something to occupy their usually vacuous skulls. Absent anything constructive, they are left to concoct idiotic theories that simply defy any sense of what’s real.

Example? The conspiracy theory du jour involves the Kansas City Chiefs, their tight end Travis Kelce and his girlfriend Taylor Swift. The Chiefs and Kelcie are playing in the Super Bowl a week from Sunday. The conspiracists have come up with a beaut, I’m going to tell ya.

Republicans across the land have glommed onto a notion that the National Football League has rigged the Super Bowl to ensure that the Chiefs defeat the San Francisco 49ers, that Kelce will bring his squeeze onto the field to celebrate and that Swift will endorse President Biden’s bid for re-election on the spot.

Supposedly well-informed conservative talking heads are actually breathing life into this nonsense by endorsing the notion they said could possibly be true.

Oh, my ever-lovin’ goodness. The insanity of it makes me want to hurl.

This kind of baloney too often takes on a life of its own. I mean, we do live in an era of social media where such nonsense spreads so damn quickly that the truth never seems to catch up.

I should point out, too, that Kelce happens to be a pro-vaxxer, displaying proudly in recent days a bandage on his arm that reveals his belief in the vaccines that protect him against contagions such as, oh … the COVID-19 virus. That’s anathema to the right-wing MAGA crowd that looks for reasons to despise public figures.

Social media is pervasive to be sure. It produces plenty of good in this world of ours. It also is largely to blame for the nonsense that permeates the atmosphere, which then gains even more traction when ostensibly bright people believe it.

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Try someone new … Jerry

Jerry Jones, the egomaniacal owner of the Dallas Cowboys, won’t accept any advice from someone who in truth doesn’t really give a crap about the organization he calls “America’s Team.”

But I’m going to offer it anyway.

A Dallas man submitted a letter to the editor of the Dallas Morning News, which published it in this morning’s paper. The fan writes that the team has gone “28 long years” since it last played for an NFL championship; the team has burned through 1,484 players, six head coaches and one general manager. “Can you guess the common denominator for all these … failures?” he writes.

Sure. That’s Jones, who doubles as GM as well as the guy who signs the ample paychecks.

Jones’s ego compels him to pretend he knows something about pro football. He won’t give up the GM post to a real football pro. But he damn sure should.

The Cowboys choked this past weekend against a team described as “upstart.” The Green Bay Packers came to play tackle football. The Cowboys didn’t. There likely should be a coaching change in the Cowboys’ immediate future.

As for the GM matter, that’s up to the owner … who must decide whether to “fire” himself and then hire someone who knows how to build and maintain a professional football team.

That won’t happen. It certainly should, if only the owner’s ego would allow it.