Reverie for an October morn

(Yesterday, Oct. 12, 2025, Penn State fired football coach James Franklin, less than 24 hours after the Nittany Lions lost their homecoming game to Northwestern ... a week after they gave up 42 points and lost to a previously winless UCLA team that scored 47 points all season ... and just two weeks after they were undefeated and ranked third in the country.

 What follows, from the Blob's own admittedly diseased mind, is an imagined (or not) phone conversation between Indiana University athletic director Scott Dolson and IU president Pam Whitten on Oct. 13, 2025:)

"Scott? Pam here."

"Yes, El Presidente?"

"Come on. I told you not to call me that."

"Sorry. Just trying to lighten the mood after the news from Pennsylvania yesterday."

"Ah, so you've heard. Well, what do you propose to do about it? I mean, this couldn't have happened at a worse time."

"You mean because Coach Cignetti just pulled off the biggest road win in our admittedly beige football history? You mean because it was our first win over a top five team since beating Purdue to go to the Rose Bowl in 19-freakin'-67? You mean because we're now ranked No. 3 in the nation, the highest we've ever been ranked in 138 years of playing football?"

"Yes, of course I mean that! Jesus, you're dim sometimes."

"Sorry."

"Anyway ... Coach Cig's stock has never been higher. And now Penn State, one of the legendary programs in all of college football, is looking for a head coach? Gee, where do you think will be the first place they look?"

"I know, I know. But what do you propose I do about it? We're already paying the man an arm and a leg."

"So make it an arm and two legs, then. You have my green light."

"I don't know. How's that gonna look now that you're eliminating entire programs and firing faculty members left and right? 'Yeah, we don't need any of those snowflake-y liberal arts programs or history professors who refuse to stick to the Whitewash 101 script, but we'll spare no expense for football.' People will think we're Ohio State, for heaven's sake -- or, god forbid, Alabama."

"Hmm. Yeah, bad optics, I get it. Well ... why don't you just confiscate Coach Cig's phone? I mean, if Penn State can't contact him, it can't poach him. Can't you do that?"

"Not without breaking about fifty laws. Besides, he's probably got a couple of burner phones tucked away. Coaches usually do."

"So get ICE to raid his home and office. Hell, those guys do that all the time."

"Because that would be against the law, too."

"Are you kidding? Those cowboys don't worry about laws. They just kick in your door and zip-tie your toddler. This is 2025, Scotty. Laws are for losers."

"You would know."

"What was that?"

I said 'You would know.'"

"Damn straight, I would know. Never forget I'm the one who illegally changed the rules overnight and then called in the staties to run off all those damn protesters. Even had 'em deploy a sniper. God, it was beautiful."

"Well, I'm not gonna do it. I mean, what if Coach Cig is having a cookout for the team? You want to see half our players get bundled into unmarked vans and taken God knows where? Think about it."

(Pause)

"OK, OK.  Didn't consider that. Well ... maybe we can kidnap Coach Cig's wife and kids and hold 'em in an undisclosed location until Penn State hires a new coach."

(Another pause)

"Nah, I'm just kidding."

(Another)

"Maybe."

For real

 Listen to the narrative one last time, before it fades to a whisper and then the memory of a whisper. Listen to it riding out from the Pacific Northwest, out from an unfathomable scoreboard and a stadium awash in yellow and green, out and out until it's gone.

What were the naysayers naysaying about Indiana football, before Indiana 30, Oregon 20?

Overrated.

Fraud.

Never beaten anyone who's actually good.

Travesty of the century, making the playoffs last year.

And this morning, of course, this one, as surely as night follows day:

Gee. Obviously Oregon wasn't as all that as we thought.

Because you know it's coming. Because even as Indiana continues to kick it to shards, the narrative is Indiana football simply can't be THAT good, not really, because it's INDIANA FOOTBALL. It's all a trick of the light, smoke and mirrors, a bunch of wins over Who's That State, Nobody Tech and the Big Ten's table scraps.

Well. What can the naysayers naysay now, after 30-20 in Autzen Stadium?

What can they say after the Hoosiers destroyed a ranked Illinois team, 63-10, and won out in Iowa City, and took down third-ranked Oregon with an attack dog defense and just enough offense to get the job done?

They can say, yes, that obviously Oregon wasn't as all that as everyone thought.

Except the Ducks marched into Happy Valley and took down then-No. 3 Penn State before Penn State had begun to unravel.

Except they hadn't lost in Autzen since 2022, the year Dan Lanning arrived as head coach.

Except everyone was looking at quarterback Dante Moore and his guys as 1A to Ohio State's 1 in the Big Mathematically Challenged, and that if Indiana presented a challenge surely the Hoosiers weren't going to be that much of a challenge.

Because when you win 18 straight home games, and you've got Dante Moore going for you, that's how you're gonna think.

But then here came that Indiana D, a couple thousand pounds of bad attitude and grievance, intercepting Moore twice and sacking him six times and making eight tackler for loss. And here came Moore's counterpart, Fernando Mendoza, throwing for 215 yards and a score. And here came Elijah Sarratt and Omar Cooper Jr., who made 15 catches between them for 179 yards and a six, and Roman Hemby, who bulled and quicked his way to 70 yards and two touchdowns on 19 carries.

Want to hear something crazy?

If Mendoza doesn't hang the ball and throw a pick six in the second half, Oregon finds the end zone just one time, on a busted-coverage throw from Moore to Malik Benson. It gets outscored 17-3 in the second half. It scrapes out just 13 points all day.

Thirteen points. At home. From a team that came in averaging 47 points per.

Conclusion: Yes, Indiana is for real -- really for real -- and the unglamorous past is the unglamorous past. And the narrative that attended that past?

Can barely hear it anymore.

A fall classic

 This is why we still watch baseball in October, and why we can still sometimes hear it even over the metal howl of the industrial NFL. It's why there's still magic in it, even as its fan base ages and it lives more and more in our memories than in the present day.

They played a baseball game out in Seattle last night, see, and even if our erstwhile pastime lives another 155 years, people will still be talking about it. It was a fall classic,  and it went on for15 innings and just shy of five hours. The Seattle Mariners finally won, 3-2, on Jorge Polanco's walkoff single. In so doing they eliminated but did not bow the Detroit Tigers, who were not only brave in the attempt but damn near indomitable.

The Tiges sent their ace, Tarik Skubal, to the mound to finish the deal, and all he did was strike out 13 Mariners and depart after six innings and 99 pitches with a 2-1 lead. You can argue that was a mistake -- maybe the mistake -- and it probably was. Skubal was still throwing 100-plus when he and Detroit manager AJ Hinch called it a night, and he rung up the last batter he faced. So he still had plenty of juice left in the wing.

What followed was grim, riveting hand-to-hand combat that chewed up both bullpens, neither of which would give an inch. Seattle used seven pitchers, including two other starters (Logan Gilbert and Luis Castillo, who got the win). Detroit burned through eight -- the last of them Tommy Kahnle, who finally surrendered the last run.

"An epic game," Hinch declared when it was done.

"From the eighth inning on, I had a massive headache," said Seattle starter George Kirby, who matched Skubal pitch-for-pitch for five innings. "I am glad that game is over."

Kirby is still a young man (27), so you can forgive him the missteps of youth. Because he couldn't have been more wrong.

That game isn't over.

That game will never be over, so long as baseball and memory both live.

Nun better

 An American icon passed yesterday in Chicago, and if the country still had a soul flags would be lowered in every burg that loves March and its Madness and its holy brackets. Certainly we have lowered them for lesser mortals than Sister Jean Dolores Schmidt, God and all the saints preserve her.

She was 106 years old when she died -- a life full to the top by any measure -- and she was already 98 when the nation found her. Across a couple of magical weeks in March 2018, she became simply Sister Jean to America, the spiritual groundwire/good luck charm for a bunch of gritty overachievers from Loyola University of Chicago, who became that year's beloved underdog in the NCAA Tournament.

Went all the way to the Final Four, the Ramblers did. And Sister Jean, the basketball team's chaplain, went with them, becoming in the process one those unwitting celebrities fame sometimes lands on with its full weight.

As the Ramblers kept winning, Sister Jean went from a humble nun dedicated to a life of service to, well, Sister Jean.  There were Sister Jean bobbleheads and Sister Jean T-shirts and all manner of Sister Jean accoutrements. The teevees interviewed her endlessly, endlessly. When Loyola reached the Final Four in San Antonio, tournament officials even conducted a Final Four news conferences for her.

Loyola fans broke out "Win One For The Nun!" T-shirts at the games. And in the national semifinal against Michigan, signs blossomed in the Alamadome demanding the Wolverines follow "Jean's Plan."

Alas, the Wolverines didn't listen. They dispatched Loyola by 12, and the Ramblers' -- and Sister Jean's -- glorious run was over.

Over, but not forgotten. For the rest of her days, Sister Jean would never be just a nun employed by a Catholic university. She would be the nun. 

And there would be, pardon the pun, nun better.

An oops for the ages

 Somewhere today Fred Merkle is throwing a spectral arm around Orion Kerkering's shoulders and saying, "Don't sweat it, son. No one will remember this."

Then he'll laugh and add: "Just kidding. No one's ever gonna forget this. And not just because your parents named you 'Orion.'"

That's because last night, with the season in the balance, Orion Kerkering, a relief pitcher for the Philadelphia Phillies, pulled a Fred Merkle. And every baseball fan worth the name knows instantly what that means. 

It means even after 117 years, every baseball fan worth the name remembers what Fred Merkle of the Giants did on a late September day in 1908. Locked up in a death struggle with the Chicago Cubs, Merkle cost the Jints a crucial victory over their rivals when, after an apparent game-winning single, he veered off and headed to the dugout rather than finishing his jaunt to second base.

By failing to touch second, he was ruled to have made the third out of the inning, and the game remained tied 1-1. Called because of darkness, the Cubs won it the next day, wound up tied with the Giants for the NL pennant, and ultimately went to the World Series after beating the Giants again in a one-game playoff.

Forever after, the notorious blunder was known as Merkle's Boner. It was a dark cloud that followed him for the rest of his days as a player.

Orion Kerkering?

His blunder was throwing the ball halfway to, well, Orion on a slow roller in the 11th inning, with the Phillies and Dodgers tied and the bases loaded. It allowed the Dodgers to score the winning run in Game 4 of the NLDS, and win the best-of-five series 3-1.

Everyone was going when Andy Pages' broken-bat squib glanced off Kerkering's foot, and panic swallowed him up. Rather than going to first for the out, he tried a hurried throw home, and it eluded catcher J.T. Realmuto by roughly ten light years.

Game, set, match to the Dodgers.

"Just a horses**t throw," Kerkering said in the postgame, manning up.

He can take solace in the fact that, no, everyone likely won't remember his oops-for-the-ages for, um, ages, the way everyone remembers Fred Merkle's. That's because baseball doesn't consumer America the way it did back in the old-timey days. Nowadays it's pro football that does that.

Which is why talk radio in Philly today likely will have a lot more folks griping about the Eagles getting rinse-cycled by the Giants last night ("34-17? To the bleeping Giants? What the hell was THAT?") than by Orion Kerkering.

Unique name or no unique name. 

Fading bloom

 The headline has been parked in the nether reaches of my brain for a couple of weeks now, or since it became apparent Bill Belichick was just another guy struggling to deal with college kids. It awaits the day the University of North Carolina finally realizes, "Damn, Bill Belichick is just another guy struggling to deal with college kids," and picks up his buyout.

On that day, the Blob's aforementioned headline would be this: "Beli-Chucked!"

Yeah, I know. You were expecting something better.

("From YOU?" you're saying now)

Anyway, that day may or may not be imminent, depending on whether you believe the always-reliable rumor mill or the equally always-reliable Official Statement. The former claims the University and Belichick are already negotiating a lower buyout, five games into Belichick's ballyhooed tenure; the latter says, nah, that's not true at all, Coach Bill still has the school's "full support."

What we know for sure is the Belichick Era in Chapel Hill is off to an underwhelming 2-3 start in which the two victories came against Charlotte and Richmond. The Tar Heels' three Power Four opponents, meanwhile, have crushed them by a combined score of 120-33.

That includes last week's 38-10 erasure by Dabo Swinney's struggling Clemson Tigers, in which the Clemsons scored on two of their first four offensive snaps and led 28-3 after quarter. And it includes the opening game of the Belichick Era, when Beli-Fever had the campus in a tizzy until TCU parachuted into all that Carolina blue and paved Belichick's boys like a county highway, 48-14.

It was just about then a thought bubble appeared over Belichick's head. It said, "Dammit, they all told me I was a genius."

OK. So I'm making that up.

What I'm not making up is the fact the bloom, if not entirely off the rose, is fading fast. The rumor mill (remember: always reliable) says a planned documentary about Belichick's first season as a college coach is now on the scrap heap, and there's growing discontent with Coach B in the locker room. Meanwhile, The Athletic reports cornerbacks coach Armond Hawkins has been suspended for recruiting violations.

Which in the anything-goes landscape of 2025 must take some doing.

So, yeah, matters seem to be getting perilously close to the dreaded term "disarray." And thus the sentiment grows that perhaps Belichick, at 72, is clueless about the college game and should have just stayed on the coaching Mount Rushmore -- where, if nothing else, the view is better.

(The sentiment also grows that it mainly was Tom Brady who put Belichick on that promontory. This owes to the fact that Belichick, at New England and now North Carolina, has a decidedly beige 31-41 record post-Tom. On the other hand, it ignores the fact he was astute enough to recognize a sixth-round pick who'd started all of one season in college had the potential to be something better -- like, for instance, the greatest quarterback ever to play the game.)

Now, where were we?

Oh, yeah. Belichick. North Carolina. Down from the mountain, as it were.

Shoulda stayed up there, Bill. You really should have.

A fine(d) mess

 Somewhere today Coach Slobberknocker is giving up on 'Murica. After all, it ain't the 'Murica he  learned all the words to The Star-Spangled Whatchamacallit for, and you can take that to the bank and do whatever it is you do when you take something to the bank.

"Finin' a coach for yellin' at his dumbass runnin' back?" he's saying, incredulously. "The hell's the world comin' to?"

What it's comin' to, it seems, is the Arizona Cardinals indeed fining head coach Jonathan Gannon for a sideline, um, discussion with running back Emari Demercado on Sunday. It was right after Demercado dropped the ball before crossing the goal line on a 72-yard jaunt to Six City, costing the Cardinals a score it could have used in their loss to the Tennessee Titans. So it stands to reason Gannon was not in the best of moods.

Still, it's worth noting Gannon did not do what Coach Slobberknocker would have done, which is maintain a good grip on Demercado's facemask while informing him that he was one sorry sumbitch, and a damn dumb sumbitch besides. Also, if he had a brain, he'd be playin' cornhole with it or somethin'.

No, sir. All Gannon did was walk over to Demercado and yell at him a little, and then yell at him a little more, and then maybe/maybe not brush his arm as Demercado walked away. 

Of course, modern times being what they are, it was all caught on video. And apparently that was embarrassing for certain people in the Cardinals organization (which, considering it's the Cardinals organization, they ought to be used to). And so they're getting in Gannon's folding cash for $100,000.

All Coach Slobberknocker can do is shake his head and maybe laugh a little at the sheer ridiculousness of it all.

"Good gravy," he says, or something like it. "They're actin' like this was Georgie Patton slappin' that soldier. Or ol' Woody Hayes punchin' that Clemson linebacker. Shoot-fire, yellin' at his players was nothin' but jumpin' jacks for Woody. Got him all warmed up for tearing up sideline markers and punchin' photographers.

"Why, I bet he and Bo are howlin' up there in Headset Heaven."

They probably are. A lot of crusty old coots no doubt are. Because, no, this is not the 'Murica they came up in, or at least not the 'Murica proscribed by sidelines and 100 yards of turf and large people stomping around on it.

It is, after all, 2025, not 1925, and the world has changed, as the world tends to do. Len Dawson isn't firing up a dart at halftime of the Super Bowl anymore. Fans don't wear jackets and ties and jaunty fedoras to the games. And if Dick Butkus were playing in today's NFL, he wouldn't be playing in today's NFL. He'd be in jail for hitting people too hard.

Some of this has been to the game's detriment. Some of it has not. All of it is the consequence of a corporatized America whose first loyalty is to quarterly earnings, and whose second loyalty is to the omnipotence of the Franchise and its Brand.

So, yeah, a viral clip of Coach yelling at his dumbass running back won't play, even if the dumbass running back did something really dumbass this time. (And  DeMercado did). A marquee quarterback getting blown up by a Butkus-channeling edge rusher won't, either.  

The quarterback is, after all, the Face Of Our Franchise. And the Franchise -- aka, the product -- is inviolate.

"Good gravy," Coach Slobberknocker says, or something like it. "Football ain't supposed to be a 'product.' It's supposed to be football. Blockin', tacklin', yellin' at your dumbass running back for forgettin' to take the ball into the end zone with him. THAT'S football."

Was football, Coach. Sorry.

A few brief thoughts on NFL Week 5

 And now this week's edition of The NFL In So Many Words, the alternative-reality Blob feature of which critics have said "Alternatively, I'd rather read 'What's New This Month in Paper Products'," and also "How 'bout an alternative reality where you fall in a black hole that carries you to the far corners of the Klingon Empire?":

1. The Colts and Jaguars are 4-1. The Chiefs are 2-3 after blowing Monday night to the Jags. The Ravens have the exact same record as the Browns (1-4).

2. Also, Daniel Jones is third in the league in passing, leads all starters in yards per attempt, and has been sacked an NFL-low four times.

3. "What is this, some alternative reality?" (The Chiefs and Ravens)

4. "Daniel who?" (Patrick Mahomes, Lamar Jackson)

5. "Hey, look, in this reality, I'm SECOND in the league in passing. Suck on that, losers!" (Dak Prescott)

6. In other alternative reality, the previously winless Saints excommunicated the Giants and their shiny new quarterback Jaxson Dart, 26-14; the Patriots flag-waved the previously undefeated Bills,23-20 in Buffalo; the Colts frisky-ed the Raiders to death 40-6; and the Broncos came from two touchdowns back to throw the previously unbeaten Eagles 21-17 in Philadelphia.

7. "Jaxson who?" (The Saints)

8. "It's not Drake WHO, it's Drake MAYE, bitches, and I am comin' for your ass!" (Patriots quarterback Drake Maye)

9. "Oh, yeah, THAT Daniel Jones." (Raiders coach Pete Carroll)

10. "Imma throw this bleepity-bleep cup of bleepity-bleep beer at your bleepity-bleep bleepin' alternative reality. The bleep is a Bo Nix, anyway?" (Eagles fan, probably drunk)

Question for the times

 I could be snarky here, a couple of days after. I could do that.

I could say if Indianapolis really wants to do something about violent crime in the downtown area, it should keep Mark Sanchez out of the city.

I could say Mark Sanchez forgot the first rule of a rumble, which is never bring an NFL analyst to a knife fight.

I could joke. I could make light. I could go for the big laugh and the "Oh, man, you are so bad."

But Mark Sanchez, NFL analyst and former New York Jets quarterback, lies in a hospital bed after being knifed in Saturday's wee hours, a circumstance he apparently bought with his own dime. According to Indianapolis police, he got angry because a 69-year-old delivery man wasn't moving his truck out of the loading dock area fast enough, jumped in the truck with him, and started a scuffle that didn't end until the delivery man stuck a blade in him.

Tried to fend Sanchez off with pepper spray, the delivery man did, and that didn't work. Sanchez kept coming after him, so the delivery man did what he had to do to stop him.

Now Sanchez, who was in town to work the Colts-Raiders game, is facing three misdemeanor charges -- one of them, as might be guessed from the past-midnight time of all this, public intoxication.

And now my wife Julie, as we discussed this whole deal the other day, raising a question uniquely suited to these times: Is Mark Sanchez suffering from CTE?

It's a question sprung from the landscape of decades, of case after case of former athletes flying into rages over nothing or committing suicide because they couldn't stand the chaos in their heads anymore. It's about Dave Duerson shooting himself in the chest so the docs could study his brain, and Junior Seau jumping off a cliff, and a former Steelers defensive lineman named Justin Strzelczyk ending his life one September day in 200 by crashing head-on into tanker truck at 100 mph while driving on the wrong side of busy New York toll road.

A post-mortem examination of Strzelczyk's brain indicated that, sure enough, he was suffering from CTE.

I don't know if that's the case with Mark Sanchez. But the sheer irrationality of what apparently went down in Indy early Saturday morning makes it a fair question.

This is, after all, a man who played in 79 NFL games across eight seasons, and was sacked 168 times in those 79 games. Seventy-three of those sacks came in 2011 and 2012 alone, when the Jets went 14-18 and had the sort of offensive line you'd figure a 14-18 team would have.

It was also right about the time the NFL was reluctantly admitting that, yes, head trauma was a problem in its national game. Which means concussion protocols and helmet-to-helmet hits were not as rigidly policed as they are today.

So, yeah. You read about Sanchez going after a 69-year-old delivery man over, well, nothing, really, and it makes you wonder what Julie wondered the other day.

Could CTE be at work here?

A question for the times. A question for the times indeed.

Saturday's America*, Part Deux

 (*Hat tip as usual to legendary sports scribbler Dan Jenkins)

So, you know what was great about Saturday?

No, not sitting five rows behind the home bench watching my Ball State Cardinals pull off the Big Upset, taking down the defending MAC champion Ohio Bobcats 20-14. Although that was pretty special. Made the out-of-season sunburn (October, and I'm sunburned? What backward freaking pageantry is this?) worth it.

But enough about the mighty Cardinals.

Let's journey out to the west coast instead, where college football did the sort of thing that makes it college football. Which is, deliver us the Really Big Seismic Upset.

That would be winless UCLA shocking the world by upsetting No. 7 Penn State, 42-37.

It was one of those "Wait, that can't be right" moments, an Appalachian-State-beating-Michigan vibe blended seamlessly into a Chaminade-beating-Ralph-Sampson-and-Virginia-in-basketball vibe. It's tempting to say there won't be a Bigger or more Seismic upset in college football this fall, but because it's college football and college football is crazy and wonderful that way, it's probably wise not to.

It's important, first of all, to understand the context here. The Nittany Lions, ranked third in the nation just a week ago, were coming off a prime-time clash of the titans with fellow Big Ten power Oregon. The Ducks marched into Happy Valley and stole the biggest W of the season so far, a titanic 30-24 struggle that wasn't decided until a former Purdue Boilermaker, Dillon Thieneman, intercepted Penn State quarterback Drew Allar in the second overtime.

Until that game, Penn State's defense had given up 17 points all season. They came to California having given up just 34 in regulation in four games. Barbed wire was more accommodating.

As for UCLA ...

Well, they were awful. Oh-and-four, and the most points they'd scored were 23 against UNLV. Utah bounced the Bruins by 33. New Mexico strafed 'em by 25. They'd already fired their head coach, and they were coming off a 17-14 loss to Northwestern.

So what happens?

The Bruins drop 27 on the Penn States in the first half.

After Penn State goes from 20 down at the break (27-7) to six down early in the second half, the Bruins do not do what 0-4 teams are supposed to do in that situation. Which is fold like a card table and wind up losing 44-27 or something.

No, sir. What UCLA does instead is, they keep answering back.

And somehow they win by five.

And score almost as many points as the Nittany Lions had given up all season.

And make internet wise guys snark that just to prove he not only can't win the big ones, Penn State coach James Franklin went out and lost a little one.

It was the alarmed exclamation point on a day when Cincinnati toppled Iowa State, Arch Manning's woes continued in a Texas loss to "meh" Florida, and (yes, I'm going to mention this AGAIN) Ball State outscored Ohio 20-0 in the second half to beat a Bobcats team that earlier in the season had taken out West Virginia. 

It was the Cardinals' first conference game, so they're 1-0 and in third place in the MAC.

Penn State, meanwhile, is 0-2 and sits 14th in the Big Ten.

Saturday's America, boys and girls. Ain't nothin' like it.

The caprice of October

 Playoff baseball and playoff baseball's month came in together this week, and the usual quirks and eddies came with it. It is both odd and wonderful what October does our former national game, bringing everything odd and wonderful about it into the sharpest of focus after the long slog of summer.

In other words, the Cubs beat the Padres 3-1 in a winner-take-all Game 3 of the wild-card, but not without doing what the Cubs do, which is surrender a leadoff home run in the ninth and then load the bases before allowing their faithful to breathe again.

And your Detroit Tigers?

Blew a 15-game lead and lost the division title to the onrushing Cleveland Guardians in the last days of the season, then eliminated the Guardians by taking two-of-three in Cleveland.

And then, of course, there was Cam Schlittler.

"Who?" you're saying now.

Exactly.

Can Schlittler, rookie arm for the New York Yankees, who suddenly was the very epitome of playoff baseball. He was the 24-year-old kid with 15 lifetime starts and 85 days in the bigs who was thrust suddenly into the spotlight's glare, the full weight of the playoffs coming down on his shoulders the way it so often does.

The kids, the washed relics, the pinch hitters deep on the dugout bench: Playoff baseball somehow finds them all. And then, for at least one afternoon or evening, infuses them with magic.

Schlittler, see, had never pitched a major-league playoff game until the Yankees sent him to the hill last night to save their season against their mortal enemies, the Boston Red Sox. The best-of-three was tied at a game apiece. Every anxious soul in Yankee Stadium was projecting its hopes and prayers and raw nerve endings on Schlittler's 6-foot-6, 225-pound frame. 

So what did the kid do?

Well, not unravel like a cheap sweater, the way a mortal would.

Instead, the young righty pitched the game of his life in, well, the game of his life, striking out 12, walking none and giving the Red Sox straight zeroes for eight fairy-tale innings. Got the shutout win, 4-0, and a piece of history to go with it: According to the folks who keep track of such things, it was the first time a pitcher had ever thrown eight playoff innings with at least 12 strikeouts and zero walks in a postseason game.

The 12 punch-outs were the most in a winner-take-all game in baseball's ancient history. They were also the most in a playoff debut in Yankees history.

Which, includes, you know, some guys. Whitey Ford, Ron Guidry, Andy Pettitte, those kind of guys.

None of 'em did what Schlittler did last night -- against, by the way, his hometown team, Schlittler having grown up in Walpole, Mass., 27 miles southwest of Boston.

The caprice of October rarely has been more capricious. Or more true to its nature.

Hot seat

 I don't know if WNBA commissioner Cathy Engelbert is hearing footsteps yet, but if she isn't she's either not paying attention or she's in willful denial. Because the footsteps are shaking the ground all around her.

First it was WNBA star Napheesa Collier flame-broiling her leadership, or lack thereof, in a brutal but carefully crafted four-minute takedown.

Then it was ESPN blowhole Stephen A. Smith calling for Engelbert's resignation -- significant not because it differed much from a lot of Stephen A.'s spew, but because it was Stephen A. Who, let's face it, is on your TV screen more than a 1950s test pattern these days.

Then it was former WNBA player Stacey Dales lighting her up with a story about how Engelbert basically ignored the rollout of the WNBA's new Toronto franchise.

Then ...

Well. Point made.

That point being Engelbert is on an exceedingly hot seat these days, and it's not apt to get cooler in the days ahead. Among league players and coaches, for instance, there's all but a full-scale mutiny going on over the WBNA's glaring officiating issues, and no amount of fining or suspending can seem to slow it down.

Collier's ripped the officiating. Caitlin Clark and Sophie Cunningham have. And when Engelbert suspended Minnesota Lynx coach Cheryl Reeve for her profanity-laced rant about the officiating in the Lynx-Phoenix Mercury series?

Fever coach Stephanie White and Las Vegas Aces coach Becky Hammon both publicly backed Reeve's play, essentially saying, well, hell, she's not wrong.

Engelbert's lost the locker room, in other words. This will happen when, according to Collier, the commissioner all but sneers at the league's most prominent seat-filler (Clark), and says the players should be on their knees thanking the commish for the chunky TV deal, she got for them.

That was part of Collier's four-minute manifesto the other day, and it tracks with the contempt the boardroom seems to have for its working stiffs here in the Oligarch America of 2025 -- i.e., you should be grateful you have a job, ya bunch of bellyachers. Now go away and let me count the pile I'm making off you.

I don't know if that's Engelbert's mindset, but she did come to the WNBA from the corporate world (Deloitte) and seems to have brought those above-the-little-people sensibilities with her.

This from Sports Business Journal: "She hasn't connected; she's not a relationship builder, which you have be in that job with the teams, with the players," a source familiar with league office dynamics said last month. "I think she's a wicked smart business person, and the success she gets a lot of credit for. But a commissioner has to have a personality element that can touch every constituent that they have. I think she's lacking in it."

Which makes her appallingly tone-deaf, not to say appallingly wrong. To say Clark owes the WNBA for her off-the-court endorsement haul (as Collier claims Engelbert did) is to ignore the fact Clark was making major endorsement coin before she ever stepped foot on a WNBA floor. And, of course, it ignores the fact the fan base and attention Clark brought to Engelbert's league gave the commish major leverage in negotiating that aforementioned TV deal.

In other words, Engelbert ought to be on her knees thanking Caitlin Clark. And doing something about the league's officiating instead of fining and suspending players and coaches for criticizing it.

Because they're right, and she's wrong. And the spotlight that's on her league now is glaringly exposing just how wrong.

And as those footsteps get louder and louder.

A W of an L

 The Indiana Fever departed the 2025 season out in Vegas last night, but sing no sad songs for them. They went out on their feet, not on their shields. They went out the way champions go out, even if their names will not be inscribed on the championship trophy in a couple of weeks.

In the win-or-get-packin' Game 5 of the WNBA semis, after all, they pushed the Las Vegas Aces to overtime, on the road, before running out of weapons and gas in a 107-98 loss.

And if it seems vaguely obscene to use that word ("loss") this morning, that is entirely on the Fever. Because they didn't lose, really; they just didn't win. It was a W of an L. 

It was the Fever pushing a superior team to the cliff's edge on its home floor, and doing it, by the end, with all but empty hands. Kelsey Mitchell, the Fever's playoff engine, had departed with a leg injury in the third quarter after playing just 23 minutes. Aliyah Boston, their other playoff engine, had fouled out. Lexi Hull (43 minutes) and Odyssey Sims (41) had barely been off the floor; Brianna Turner and Shey Peddy had played heavy minutes off the bench.

And, of course, there was the Casualty Brigade over on the sideline in streets: Damiris Dantis and Chloe Bibby and Sydney Colson and Sophie Cunningham  and Aari McDonald and, of course, Caitlin Clark.

Another entire lineup plus a sixth woman, in other words.

To couch it in inappropriate but perhaps inevitable language of war, the Fever were surrounded and out of ammo. But they clubbed their muskets (to use a handy Civil War nerd term) and went down swinging.

Every one of the starting five scored in double figures, led by Sims with 27 points. Boston put up 11 points and 16 rebounds before fouling out. Natasha Howard had a16-point, seven-rebound, five-assist line. Hull scored 12 points, took down seven boards and dished three assists.

Mind-numbing stat of the night: The Fever outrebounded the Aces 40-21. And no that is not a misprint.

What it was, instead, was the evening's clearest demonstration of the Fever's will, because will is mostly what rebounding is. He (or she) who most wants the ball usually gets the ball when it goes up on the glass.

I don't know who's going to be the WNBA coach of the year. But if it's not the Fever's Stephanie White, Congress should convene one of those investigations of which it's so fond.

She essentially lost one entire team and had to cobble together another entire team in mid-season, and somehow managed to get cohesion and heart from both. That's a hell of a coaching job, is what that is. And last night?

Hell of a not-loss, Fever. Hell of a not-loss.

Historical shenanigans

 This decision is now final, and their place in our nation's history is no longer up for debate.

-- Secretary of Defense/War/Whatever Pete Hegseth, on Wounded Knee

And with that, another coat of whitewash gets slapped on our national narrative.

(And, yes, before you start, I am wandering away from the Sportsball enclosure again. The standard procedures apply.)

Anyway, this time the whitewashing brush reaches all the way to a snowy field of frozen corpses in South Dakota, where on the next-to-next-to-last day of 1890 a detachment of U.S. Army forces, backed by four Hotchkiss cannon, opened fire on a Lakota encampment to which the Army had escorted the group the day before. Before the killing was done, anywhere from 230 to 300 Lakota -- most of them women, children and disarmed men -- lay dead.

Army casualties were 25 killed and 39 wounded, most by friendly fire. Nineteen of the soldiers were later awarded the Medal of Honor for their part in the day's festivities.

Which is where Hegseth and the Regime come in.

Last week they declared an investigation into the merits of those 19 Medal of Honor winners null and void, ruling that the recipients would retain those medals. Hegseth, ever the loyal mouthpiece, said the previous administration's investigation -- aimed at preserving the high ideals of the MOH, and what's wrong with that? -- was more about "political correctness" than "historical correctness."

Well, of course he did. These people are nothing if not consistent, not to say consistently wrongheaded.

"Historical correctness"?

The Regime has been hard at work leaving that in the dust since seizing the levers of power nine months ago, and they've made some fair progress with it. In some cases the whitewashing has been all but literal, like removing the famous photo of the scarred back of a slave from the Smithsonian; in some cases, acolytes of the Regime, like the meathead head of public education in Oklahoma, have decided certain historical un-pleasantries are not fit for Our Children to contemplate.

Such as, in Oklahoma, the murderous 1921 burning of Black Wall Street in Tulsa by an angry white mob. The meathead in question decreed that, yes, you can teach it, but only if you make it clear race had nothing to do with it.

No, really. He said that.

In like fashion, the Regime has decided slavery is too much discussed in our national history museums, which accounts for the removal of the aforementioned photograph and other energetic scrubbing. This of course ignores the clear truth that slavery is and always has been one of the singularly defining threads in our history -- from the founders' inability to reconcile its contradictions, to the breaking apart of the nation over it, to its shadow legacy of Jim Crow and the atrocities committed to keep that shadow legacy alive.

These  matters, and the legacy of the "brave soldiers" of Wounded Knee (as Hegseth characterized them) are still very much open to debate, no matter what the Secretary of Defense/War/Whatever says. History is like that, you see. It is layer upon layer upon layer, and the peeling back of each reveals fresh insights that spark, yes, eternal debate.

So it is with Wounded Knee, where Hegseth's interpretation of "historical correctness" sounds more like historical shenanigans. The so-called "Battle of Wounded Knee," after all, was a straight-up massacre of a people reduced to begging for scraps from a government that had all but erased them from the earth. That they were in any way capable of fighting a "battle" against that government was beyond laughable.

And those 19 Medal of Honor winners?

Hardly Audie Murphy or Alvin York or Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, or any of the other recipients across the decades who brought distinction to the military's highest honor. The soldiers of Wounded Knee, conversely, were mostly officers and men spooked by a native dance craze (the Ghost Dance) into believing a pitiful band of Lakotas was somehow planning an armed uprising.

Of such unreasoning fear is born the slaughter of innocents.

It was carried out that shameful day not by heroes, but by scared men who were products of a time when native Americans were regarded as something less than human. The scared men likely weren't all monsters, in other words, but they certainly weren't Medal of Honor material, either.

No matter how much the Regime tries to shenanigan history.

A few brief thoughts on NFL Week 4

 And now this week's edition of The NFL In So Many Words, the astonishing Blob feature of which critics have said "I'm astonished you can be this silly week-in and week-out," and also "You're still doing this? I'm astonished!":

1. "Wait, the Bears won this game? That can't be right!" (Raiders fans, and probably Bears fans)

2. "Wait, our guys beat the Colts because AD Mitchell dropped the ball before crossing the goal line and a 53-yard Jonathan Taylor touchdown got called back because of a completely unnecessary hold? I'm astonished!" (A Rams fan)

3. "I'm not! I'm just pissed!" (A Colts fan. OK, so probably a bunch of Colts fans)

4. "Wait, this was a Monday night game? I thought you said TUESDAY!" (The astonished Bengals, who went missing in a 28-3 Monday night loss to the Broncos)

5. In other news, rookie quarterback Jaxson Dart and the Giants beat the Chargers; the Packers tied the Cowboys; Aaron Rodgers and the Steelers beat the Vikings in Dublin; and the Struggling Chiefs floor-waxed the Even More Struggling Ravens 37-20 as Patrick Mahomes finally emerged from seclusion.

6. "A tie? A freaking tie?" (astonished Packers and Cowboys fans)

7. "Wait, we got floor-waxed by the Struggling Chiefs?" (astonished Ravens fans)

8. "Yeah, but you're Struggling more!" (not-so-astonished Chiefs fans)

9. "Jaxson Dart? Wasn't he that one Ferengi in 'Star Trek The Next Generation?'" (astonished Chargers fans)

10. "Jaxson Dart? Greatest Giants QB since, I don't know, Joe Pisarcik, maybe!" (astonished-but-would-never-admit-it Giants fans)

Cruds alert!*

 (*Last of the season. Promise.)

The baseball season wrapped up Sunday, and now it's on to the playoffs this week, where the Yankees open against the Red Sox because it's like a national law that the Yankees and Red Sox have to play each other at least three times every two weeks.

Also, the Cubs open against the Padres. Also the Tigers, who blew a 10-game lead in the last month and lost the AL Central title to Cleveland, open at ... Cleveland.

First, however, the aforementioned last Cruds Alert of the season, in which both the Colorado Rockheads and Chicago What Sox managed to finish as winners of a fashion, and the Blob has decided it needs to make a fashion statement.

Let's begin with the Rockheads.

Who lost their last six games to easily secure the not-coveted title of Worst Team In The Majors (And Maybe The Minors, Too). The 'Heads finished the season with a 43-119 record, which is demonstrably awful but NOT historically awful. This is because they won two more games than the 2024 Chicago What Sox, who WERE historically awful.

So crack open a magnum of Cold Duck for them. When you only finish 50 games out of first in your division and 37 out of next-to-last, it seems the thing to do.

Speaking of the What Sox, those hardy souls finished 60-102, dead last again in the AL Central by 10 games (and 28 out of first). However, the 60 wins represented a 19-win improvement over last year's catastrophe. So crack open, I don't know, a warm Old Style or something for them.

Meanwhile ...

Meanwhile, my very own Pittsburgh Cruds were practically a rousing success by comparison. They finished 

Yeah, they finished dead last in the NL Central again, but only by seven games (26 out of first). At 71-91, they were a staggering 28 games better than the Rockheads, and five games better than the last-place team in the NL East, the Washington Nationals.

So not only were the Cruds not the worst team in the National League, they weren't even the second-worst team.  So they had that going for 'em.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, I can't decide) they finished last again even with the most remarkable pitcher in baseball taking the hill for them every four or five days. That would be Paul Skenes, who became the first pitcher ever to have back-to-back seasons with an ERA below 2.00 and 10 strikeouts per nine innings in at least 100 innings.

This time around, Skenes had 1.97 ERA and 214 punch-outs. But because he played for the Cruds, his won-loss record was just 10-10.

That makes Paul Skenes not just a diamond in the rough, but a diamond in a steaming pile of chronically awful awfulness. And it's prompted the Blob to start thinking about having a T-shirt made in his honor.

FREE PAUL SKENES, it will say.

Rebuttal

 Give our American lads this much: They made a bunch of headline writers change horses in mid-stream.

Presumably they had "Bloodbath At Bethpage" all ready to go, and then the Americans finally got on the stick. Or on their sticks, as the case may be.

Trailing the Europeans by seven points after the first two rounds of the Ryder Cup golf tournament, our lads mounted a stirring comeback in Sunday singles, winning six of the 12 matches to turn an embarrassing rout into ... well, not a win, but at least a less-embarrassing loss. Europe won 15-13, prompting the aforementioned headline writers to hop off the "Bloodbath At Bethpage" pony and go with something else.

"Better Luck Next Time At Bethpage," perhaps. "Yeah, But At Least Scottie Beat Rory At Bethpage," maybe. Or how about this: "Rebuttal At Bethpage."

This is a reference to the week our Fearless Leader had, which was the usual run of buffoonery and toy-throwing, only better. First F.L. got stuck on an escalator with the missus at the United Nations; then his teleprompter fritzed out. Then, as only he can, he cry-babied about it to the assembled Nations, as if it were their fault (It wasn't).

Then, to top it off, he launched into a braggy lecture about how the United States of America was the bestest country in the entire history of countries, and how it was all his doing, and how every other country was loser trash by comparison. Needless to say, it struck JUST the right tone for an address to representatives of a bunch of those other countries.

(A brief aside: So how does one get stuck on an escalator, anyway? If it stops, you just climb it like an ordinary set of stairs. Which makes me wonder if some irreverent flunky or Secret Service type was secretly thinking: "Ah, geez, Mr. President, quit whinin' and move your fat ass.")

(But that's just me.)

Anyway, after Fearless Leader showed the rest of the world what a bunch of douche nozzles we are, he hurried over to Bethpage Black, where America's most amazing 79-year-old golfer strode with solemn purpose to the first tee with Bryson DeChambeau. Huzzah, 'Merica!

DeChambeau and the rest of the 'Merican team proceeded to spend the next two days getting kicked around by those inferior Europeans.

Which is where the "Rebuttal At Bethpage" comes in.

Because just a few days before at the U.N., Fearless Leader essentially said this: "Your countries all suck."

"But not at golf," Rory and the Europeans might have responded, hoisting the Ryder Cup on American soil.

Boom.

Saturday's America*

 (*Title of the late, great Dan Jenkins' compilation of pieces about college football. Just so you don't think the Blob is committing plagiarism or anything)

Anyway ...

Anyway, I'm borrowing Jenkins' title because Saturday's America was what we had yesterday, and it was once again more proof that Saturday's America beats Sunday's America every day and twice on, well, Sunday. Or Saturday, actually. Or ... oh, hell, you know what I mean.

Saturday's America?

That's what you have when the No. 3, No. 4, No. 5 and No. 8 teams in the nation all go down in the same week.

It's what you have when No. 3 (Penn State) and No. 5 (Georgia) go down at home.

It's what you have when Virginia knocks off  Florida State, and Oregon beats Penn State, and Ole Miss beats LSU, and Alabama beats Georgia.

It's what you have the weekend's biggest clash -- No. 6 Oregon vs. No. 3 Penn State is 3-3 at the half, and then 17-3 in favor of Oregon with 11 or so minutes to play, and then 17-17 at the end of regulation after Drew Allar leads two Nittany Lions' scoring drives in those last 11 minutes.

Penn State then went ahead in overtime, and Oregon tied it, and then Oregon went ahead in the second overtime, and finally the Ducks sealed it 30-24 when a former Purdue standout (Dillon Thieneman) intercepted Allar to end it. 

Saturday's America?

It's what you have when both quarterbacks -- Allar and Oregon's Moore -- do heroic things under suffocating pressure, and Moore prevails by throwing for 238 yards and three scores and picking up a game-on-the-line first down with his legs on fourth-and-1 in overtime.

None of this, of course, even gets into what Ty Simpson and Alabama did, which is snap the nation's longest home winning streak (33 games) by beating No. 5 Georgia 24-21 in Athens. Or what No. 11 Indiana did, which was beat pugnacious Iowa 20-13 in Iowa City on a 49-yard Fernando Mendoza-to-Elijah Sarratt touchdown pass with 1:28 to play.

And how about what Ole Miss did in Vaught-Hemingway Stadium?

Knocked off No. 4 LSU 24-19, that's what. Did it behind a 6-foot backup quarterback with a storybook name (Trinidad Chambliss), who threw for 314 yards and a touchdown and ran for 71 more yards on 14 carries. Added one more chapter of lore in the 114th renewal of a rivalry that goes back to 1894.

You know who was president then?

Grover Cleveland.

Know what was happening on Sunday afternoons in the fall?

Nothing, because the NFL wouldn't be born for another quarter of a century.

Saturday's America wins again.

An official mess

 It's starting to look like the Phoenix Mercury vs. the Las Vegas Aces in the WNBA finals -- the Mercury lead top-seed Minnesota two games to one in the best-of-five semis and the Aces are up 2-1 on the battered Indiana Fever -- and I, for one, am anticipating a real slugfest.

As in, a Mercury player slugs an Aces player. An Aces player slugs a Mercury player. A good old-fashioned "West Side Story/Anchorman" rumble ensues; Brick materializes out of nowhere with a grenade.

And, yes, OK, I'm being facetious. But how can you not be when you're talking about the WNBA?

The spotlight turned on the league by Caitlin Clark last season was supposed to highlight the skill and precision of the basketball the women are playing these days, but instead the spotlight illuminated the glaring incompetence of the league's officiating. It's not quite the WWE, but at times it's come damn close. The only thing missing some nights is a top rope for players to leap off of and land on poor Caitlin.

And, yes, OK, again I'm being facetious, but not by much. The playoffs are supposed to be any Sportsball league's showcase, but to the WNBA's dismay its playoffs have only showcased coaches being dragged off practically foaming at the mouth over the heinousness of the officiating.

Enter Cheryl Reeve of the Lynx, who wasn't foaming at the mouth but did have to literally be dragged away last night at the end of the Lynx's 84-76 loss to Mercury, in which Lynx star Napheesa Collier suffered an ankle injury while being stripped of the ball by Alyssa Thomas of the Mercury.

Not long thereafter, Reeve marched into the postgame and ... well, unloaded both barrels.

"If this is what the league wants, OK, but I want to call for a change of leadership at the league level when it comes to officiating," she said. "The officiating crew that we had tonight, for the leadership to deem those three people semifinal-playoff worthy, it's f***ing malpractice."

And also: "We were trying to play through it, trying not to make excuses. But one of the best players in the league (Collier), she had zero free throws and she had five fouls. She had her shoulder pulled out and finished the game with her leg taken out."

And also: "I can take an L with the best of them. I don't think we should have to play through what we did."

After which Reeve left the room without taking questions, with this benediction: "They're f***ing awful."

 Now, lest you think this was just fine whine from a coach on the brink of elimination, hers is hardly an isolated opinion.  A couple of nights before, Aces coach Becky Hammon -- after a win, mind you -- blasted the officiating too, saying the level of physicality that was being allowed would never be tolerated in any other league. Clark was fined last week for criticizing the officials. And so on and so forth.

Of everyone, Clark probably has more personal insight into the WNBA's officiating problem than anyone. Although claims that she was being targeted because she was white or straight or out of simple jealousy have been grossly overblown, she has gotten knocked around as much as anyone. This season she played just 13 games, and was finally sidelined for the season because of two groin injuries. 

She has plenty of company. Just check out the Fever's half of the boxscore from last night's loss:

Damiris Dantis DNP-CONCUSSION PROTOCOL

Chloe Bibby DNP-LEFT KNEE INJURY

Sydney Colson DNP-LEFT KNEE INJURY

Sophie Cunningham DNP-RIGHT KNEE INJURY

Aari McDonald DNP-RIGHT FOOT

Caitlin Clark DNP-RIGHT GROIN

Yikes. George Pickett had a shorter casualty list.

Meanwhile, the rest of the Fever soldier on, for one more game at least. Ditto the Lynx. Ditto, I suppose, the game officials -- who called just 14 fouls on the Lynx and 15 on the Mercury last night, in a physical 40-minute game.

Methinks Cheryl Reeve might have a point.

And Becky Hammon. And Caitlin Clark. And a whole bunch of others.

Fixin' a flat

 Comes now the time of year when America says "Oh, yeah, NASCAR, is that still going on?" and all sorts of hand-wringing commences in the sport's corporate offices because DAMMIT WE'RE STILL HERE, and also FOOTBALL ISN'T EVERYTHING, YA KNOW.

Except it pretty much is, ya know.

Seen the TV numbers from the latest playoff race in Loudon, N.H.?

I don't have the exact figures, but lemme tell you, they ain't pretty. Apparently, like 12 people watched.  And nine of them thought they were dialing up the Bills game.

This has launched the almost annual discussion about what NASCAR can do to not disappear into the ether after Labor Day, followed by the almost annual inevitable conclusion: Not a hell of a lot. Facts are facts, and the fact is football is the 2,000-pound gorilla standing bestride Sportsball World like a Colossus holding a black hole that swallows everything else. 

Still, NASCAR tries. This time around, the bright idea gaining traction is to scrap the whole playoff system and go back to the Time Before when Matt Kenseth locked up the title by mid-September. In other words, do a complete reset and go back to a 36-race season decided by points instead of a 26-race regular season and a 10-race playoff.

Let me tell why that's doomed to fail, too.

It's because NASCAR's problem is simple, but it's also unfixable: Its season is too damned long. Absurdly long. In fact no other major American sport -- not even the NBA and NHL, whose seasons span entire epochs -- has a season as long as NASCAR's.

It begins with the Clash the first weekend in February, and ends in Phoenix the first weekend in November. That's nine months to you and me, kids. 

Nine months. Not even the director's cut of  "Heaven's Gate" was that long.

By contrast, the NBA's regular season runs from October to mid-April; ditto the NHL regular season. That's seven months and change. Last season, the playoffs for each began April 20 and April 19, respectively. They ended June 22nd and June 20th, respectively.

That's two months.

NASCAR?

Its playoffs last two-and-a-half months.

The solution, obviously, is for NASCAR to go on a serious diet. The Blob's suggestion is a 20-race regular season and a four (or five) race playoff. That's 24 or 25 races, and everyone's off the stage by Labor Day.

It's what IndyCar does, wisely, because for all its blockheaded legislatin' it understands  it's going to disappear like D.B. Sweeney as soon as football starts up. So it wraps up its season, crowns a champion and gets out of the way before that happens.

NASCAR needs to do that, too. But NASCAR is not going to do that because lopping 11 races off the schedule means lopping off all the revenue that comes with them, too. And even if the ratings do a swirly once college and pro football enter the room, less money across those 11 weeks still beats NO money every time.

So, basically, NASCAR is stuck.

Its season is way too long, and the suits running the sport -- most of whom we can assume are at least smarter than a bag of hammers -- undoubtedly know that. But economics are economics, and bidness is bidness.

You can't fix a flat if you're unwilling to change the tire. Home truth.

Rivalry weak

 God bless that Lane Kiffin. You might think the head football coach at Ole Miss is a trifle slow on the uptake, but some guys never even get to the uptake and by gumphrey you can't say that about ol' Lane.

The other day, see, the SEC rolled out its reworked future football schedule, and someone asked Lane about it at the weekly SEC teleconference. And what Lane said is it's good the new sked preserves the annual Egg Bowl rivalry game against  Mississippi State and other traditional rivalries like the LSU game, but some other conference matchups left much to be desired.

Like, for instance, Ole Miss vs. Oklahoma.

"Really disappointing," Kiffin characterized that. "We don't have anything in common with them or our fans, so that doesn't make any sense at all."

To which the Blob would say: Well, look who just showed up.

Of course Ole Miss-Oklahoma doesn't make any sense. It makes no more sense than Army vs. Alaska-Anchorage. But in case Kiffin is just now noticing (kudos on finally catching up to the uptake, Coach), college football stopped making sense awhile ago.

It stopped making sense when Nebraska joined the Big Ten and stopped playing Oklahoma every year, because Nebraska-Oklahoma actually has some history to it while Ole Miss-Oklahoma, as Kiffin pointed out, does not.

It stopped making sense when Texas-Alabama became a conference game, and Michigan-USC became a conference game, and Stanford-Florida State became a conference game.

It stopped making sense when the Big Ten and the SEC got their own TV networks and decided, hell, if we've got our own TV networks we must be a bigger deal than everyone else, and so we should BE bigger, numerically and in every other way. Rivalry games? Intriguing inter-conference matchups between established powers that almost never see one another except in bowl games? Geographic footprints?

Buncha sissy stuff. Who needs it?

Well ... I guess Lane Kiffin, for one. And me.

See, here's what college football loses when conferences become money-grubbing monsters like the Big Ten, SEC and (to a somewhat lesser exent) the ACC: Identity. And by that mean a unique identity. The Big Ten no longer has a Midwest identity that plays the game with a bullheaded Midwest ethos. The SEC no longer is southern football in its purest form.  The ACC, the Big 12 ... they all play the same game with the same motivation: To make a pile as high as an elephant's eye.

If Maryland and Rutgers and UCLA and USC are Big Ten schools, in other words, no one's a Big Ten school anymore in the traditional sense of the word. If Texas and Texas A&M and Oklahoma are SEC schools, no one's an SEC school. And if two west coast schools can become members of the Atlantic Coast Conference ...

Well. That's just more homogeneity, to the detriment of the college game. It means there's no longer anything distinctive and wonderful about Midwest football or West Coast football or Southern football or even Eastern football; it's all just football. And it makes the bowl games and intersectional clashes a hell of a lot less fun.

Oklahoma-Ole Miss?

Lane Kiffin is right. Won't be a lot of reminiscing going on in the Grove about that storied rivalry on game day in Oxford.

Hey, C.W., you 'member the time Archie dropped four sixes on those sorry-ass Sooners back in '69?  Had us a good ol' time THAT night, I tell you what. 'Course I ain't even gonna mention what happened a couple years later, when Jack Mildren 'n' Greg Pruitt 'n' them came to town and whipped our butts ...

Yeah. Ain't happenin'.

More's the pity.

Trigger happy

 The what-have-you-done-for-me-lately crowd has had a banger of a week so far, and I'm not sure what to make of that. No, actually, I am.

What I make of it is twofold:

1. "Lately" sure seems to be getting sooner and sooner these days.

2. Where's the fire?

I say this after the WNBA's New York Liberty fired head coach Sandy Brondello and Oklahoma State sent longtime head football coach Mike Gundy packing within 24 hours of one another. Two worlds; same itchy trigger finger.

In New York, Brondello coached the Liberty to the WNBA title just last season, and the Liberty were back in the playoffs again this season. But she's out.

In Stillwater, Ok., Gundy, an Oklahoma State alum who's the winningest coach in school history, hadn't had a losing season since 2005 before last year. Just two years ago he went 10-4; four years ago, he coached the Cowboys to a 12-2 mark, coming within literal inches of the Big 12 title -- a fourth-down run that barely missed the pylon -- and a possible berth in the College Football Playoff.

That team went on to beat No. 5 Notre Dame in the Fiesta Bowl. It was one of nine Oklahoma State teams in the Gundy regime to win nine or more games.

But he's out, too.

Mainly this is because Gundy's Cowboys fell off the table after 2023, going 3-9 last season and losing 11 straight to FBS opposition between 2024 and 2025. The Cowboys were 1-2 when the school announced Gundy's firing the losses were a 69-3 embarrassment to Oregon in Eugene, and last weekend's loss at home to Tulsa.

The university cited the significant investment it had made in Gundy's program after last season, and the clear lack of results after three games, as the reason it was pulling the plug on Gundy in his 21st year at the helm.

The key phrase there, at least for the Blob: "After three games."

Which is to say, when a school elects to fire a coach three games into a 12-game season, the clear and logical message is it's declaring that season a wash. And when, in Brondello's case, an organization fires you less than a year after you delivered a championship, the clear and logical message is you've for some reason decided to start over.

The Blob's response in both cases: Why?

Why fire Gundy after three games, while in the same breath declaring you're going to honor the rest of his contract? What's the point? If you've decided to give up on this season anyway (and Oklahoma State pretty clearly has), and you're going to keep paying the man, why not let him finish what he started?

Especially since for two decades he delivered Oklahoma State a pile of wins and, oh, by the way, a not-inconsiderable pile of bowl and ticket money. Some gratitude.

And the Liberty?

Again, the question is "why?" Why are you starting over when you've already got a championship team? What's the thinking behind that?

Well, we didn't win the title again this year, so screw it. Let's dump the coach and bring in a fresh pair of eyes. And maybe an entirely new system. This team obviously needs it.

I'm sorry, but ... what?

Also, one more time: Where's the fire?

Cruds, er, choke alert!

 Hey, Detroit! So how 'bout those Tigers, huh?

Sorry. That was cruel.

It was cruel because the Tiges lost to Cleveland last night, 5-2, after their formerly peerless ace Tarik Skubal blew a 2-0 lead in the sixth inning and the Guardians hit him for a five-spot. It was a hell of show, boys and girls. The Detroits went full-on Colorado Rockheads in the sixth, handling the baseball like a grenade while Skubal A) made a throwing error, B) hit a batter, C) threw a wild pitch, and D) committed a balk.

After which the Tigers outrighted him to Williamsport, Pa.

OK, so not really. What they did do is drop their seventh straight game, lose to the Guardians for the fourth straight time, and scooch over to make room for Cleveland, which is now tied with the Tiges for first in the AL Central.

This is an epic collapse, in case you haven't been paying attention. The Tigers have been cruising atop the division since, I don't know, Ty Cobb was beating up black people or something. They had a 15 1/2 game lead on July 8, a 10 1/2 game lead on the first of September and a 9 1/2 game lead two weeks ago. But since then?

Since then they've been backing up so fast the loudest sound in Tiger Stadium these days is beep ... beep ...beep.

Of course, Cleveland's greatly assisted that process by winning 16 of their last 19 games. The Guardians are 9-1 in their last 10, while the Tigers are 1-9. The Guardians are on a roll; the Tigers look like they're toast.

Somewhere the Georgia Peach must be cussing and throwing things and foaming at the mouth, just like the old days. And somewhere else, Gene Mauch, whose 1964 Phillies famously blew a 6 1/2-game lead with 12 to play, must be sighing and saying, "Oh, dear."

He feels your pain, Detroit. He surely does.

A few brief thoughts on NFL Week 3

 And now this week's edition of The NFL In So Many Words, the surprise-filled Blob feature of which critics have said "How about a surprise disappearance?", and also, "I got your surprise right here, pal.":

1. "Super Bowl tickets now on sale at the box office." (Packers front office before Sunday's game against the lowly Cleveland Browns)

2. "OK,  so, never mind, then." (Packers front office, after the Packers lost to the lowly Cleveland Browns)

3. In other surprising news, the Bears crushed the Cowboys as Caleb "I Do Not Either Suck" Williams played like a real quarterback; the Panthers shut out the Falcons 30-0 a week after the Falcons floor-waxed the Vikings in Minny; the Buccaneers beat the J-E-T-S Jets-Jets-Jets on a walk-off field goal to stay unbeaten; and the Steelers beat the Patriots, who turned it over five times.

4. I'm sorry, what? It's Tuesday morning and the Patriots just turned it over again?

5. "How come THOSE Falcons didn't show up last week?" (The Vikings)

6. "No worries, guys, we're playing the Bengals this week." (Carson Wentz -- Carson Wentz! -- who quarterbacked the Vikings to a 48-10 blowout of the sad, sad Cincinnati Bengals)

7. "God, we are so sad." (The Bengals)

8. Meanwhile, the Chiefs!

9. Finally won a game!

10. But it was only the Giants, so, you know ...

Mortality 4, Hockey 0

 Remember the other day, when the Blob opined that God must have a mad-on against hockey -- and goaltenders in particular -- because Ken Dryden and Eddie Giacomin went to their reward within a week of each another?

"No," you're saying now.

Well, I DID. And now it turns out God still has a mad-on against hockey (and goaltenders), because Bernie Parent is dead.

Passed in his sleep the other day at the age of 80, and, geez, Lord, what's up with that? Three Hall of Fame 'tenders in less than a month? This is not the kind of roll we were talking about when we prayed "Please, God, get on a roll" in church last Sunday.

This time around it took the man who backstopped the rowdy Philadelphia Flyers of the 1970s, whose leaders were guy with no front teeth (Bobby Clarke), and a guy nicknamed the Hammer who liked to rearrange people's faces (Dave Schultz), and another guy everyone called Cowboy (Bill Flett). Therefore you will not be surprised to learn that America came to know them as the Broad Street Bullies.

And it was a goalie named Bernie who was their backbone.

In 1974 and '75 he won the Stanley Cup, Conn Smythe and Vezina trophies back-to-back, which is a hell of a double trifecta. The Flyers were the first expansion team to win Stanley, and Bernie was one of the main reasons why.

And now he's gone, called home to that big goal crease in the sky. May he and Ken and Eddie stand shoulder-to-shoulder for all eternity at the pearly gates. Ain't no shady characters gettin' past them.

Giddy-in' up

 Look, I know it's stupid early. I know the NFL season lasts so long Zephram Cochrane will invent warp drive and meet up with the Vulcans before it's over (rando "Star Trek" reference). And I know we're only three games into it, which means ol' Zeph probably isn't even born yet.

But holy Tom Matte, Batman. What the heck is up with these Indianapolis Colts?

They won again yesterday, cruising past the Titans in Nashville 41-20, and now they're 3-0 and everyone else in the AFC South is landfill, and golly gee willickers and heavens to Murgatroyd besides. Is it possible they're actually, you know, a pretty damn good football team?

So far they've handled the Dolphins, Broncos and Titans, and even though the combined record of those teams is 1-8, attention must be paid. Daniel Jones is playing quarterback like he just discovered it ("So THAT'S how this is supposed to work!"). Jonathan Taylor leads the league in rushing with 338 yards, averaging 5.6 yards per tote. And Jones leads the league in QBR, has thrown for 816 yards and three scores with a completion rate of almost 72 percent, and has yet to throw a pick.

Yesterday he was his usual -- I guess we can say "usual" after three games, right? -- efficient self, completing 18-of-25 throws for 228 yards and a touchdown to Michael Pittman Jr., who caught six balls for 73 yards. Fellow wideouts Alex Pierce and Josh Downs chipped with four catches for 67 yards and two snags for 34 yards, respectively. And Tyler Warren, a rookie tight end who doesn't play like one, caught three passes for another 38 yards.

And on the other side of the ball?

Kenny Moore II set the tone early, baiting the Titans' No. 1 draft pick Cam Ward into a pick six three plays into the game. The Horsies went on to smoosh the Titans' run game (86 yards), hold them to five first downs on 14 third downs, sack Ward four times and make eight tackles for loss.

A couple of exciting historic stats for FOCs (Friends of the Colts): 

1. The Colts are 3-0 for the first time since 2009, when Peyton Manning was still upright and rolling.

2. Jones has QB'ed the Horsies to 103 points in the first three games, and did Peyton ever do that? No he did not. In fact, no Colts quarterback -- not even Mike Pagel -- has ever done that since the team moved to Indianapolis 41 years ago. 

"What the hell, Mr. Blob?" you're saying now.

Couple of things.

One, JT hasn't gotten hurt yet, and when he's not hurt he's still one of the best and most versatile backs in football. Two, Daniel Jones is not playing for the Giants anymore. He's playing for the Colts, who, unlike the Giants, have an offensive line that gives him at least a second or two to breathe, plus a roomful of wideouts who can get open pretty much whenever they feel like it. Plus Tyler Warren.

This will do wonders for an NFL quarterback you assumed was trash. It's doing wonders for Jones, certainly, who was trash until he came to a place where guys get open and there's plenty of 'em. Just look what happened to Baker Mayfield -- who suddenly became a pretty damn good QB once he went over the wall and escaped Cleveland for Tampa.

I'm not saying that's who Daniel Jones is. But I'm not saying he's not, either.

In any case, we're three games in and the Colts are giddy-in' up. I suppose you could get all spiritual here and say this is Jim Irsay pulling some mystic strings out there in the Great Beyond, but I prefer to think it has more to do with the wide receivers, a healthy JT and an offensive line that doesn't leave its quarterback looking up at the sky on the regular.

What I think all that means is the AFC South is Indy's for the taking. But then I've always been a cockeyed optimist.

Gettin' better

 So remember that scene in "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" where the peasant says a witch turned him into a newt?*

(*Obligatory periodic "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" reference. Because this is my Blob, and in Blob World, "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" is a masterwork of the comedic craft)

Anyway, everyone looks at the peasant who said this, because he's clearly not a newt.

"I got better," he explains.

Thought about this last night while I was watching Notre Dame's Jeremiyah Love and Jadarian Price run wind sprints through the Purdue defense. 

Love ran for 157 yards and two touchdowns in 19 carries. Price ran for 74 yards and three scores in just nine totes, and took a kickoff to the house for a fourth score. The Irish washed the Purdues 56-30, and as far as I know, Love and Price might still be running. Depending on which direction, I figure they're close to either Kokomo or Kalamazoo by now.

To sum up, the Irish ... got better.

There was plenty of doubt about that wafting around South Bend last week, after Texas A&M surfed through the Notre Dame defense to take down the Irish 41-40 on a last-second touchdown pass. It dropped the Irish to 0-2 to start the season, both losses coming against ranked teams by a grand total of four points.

Nonetheless, sporadic instances of people's hair catching on fire were observed. The Irish defense was trash. The defensive coaching staff was trash. Head coach Marcus Freeman ... OK, so he wasn't trash (he did, after all, coach the Irish to the national championship game last season), but remember how he lost to freakin' Northern Illinois last year?

In other words, there was a lot of grumbling. And then Purdue came to town, and the Boilermakers didn't have Bob Griese or Leroy Keyes with them this time, and they had a bulldog of a new coach (Barry Odom) still trying to imprint his bulldoggish-ness on virtually an entirely new roster. And Notre Dame ... got better.

Now, the Boilermakers didn't lay down like last year, and Ryan Browne did some decent quarterbacking for awhile there, and it was still a tight 14-10 game five minutes into the second quarter.  

But then Price busted a 21-yard jaunt for six on his first carry, and then he ran nine yards for another score, and then he returned that kickoff for another score. Purdue kept pace for awhile -- it was 35-23 at halftime -- but the Irish piled on three more scores in the third quarter, and the D shut down Purdue's workhorse Devin Mockobee (14 carries, 16 yards), and without a run game Browne and the Boiler offense were toast.

By the end of the third quarter, it was a 56-23 blowout. Purdue got one more score in garbage time, giving Domerville an opportunity to gripe some more about the defense this week (Thirty points! Thirty points to PURDUE!).  But the thing was done.

Will this launch Notre Dame on a run to 10-2, like it went 13-1 after the loss to Northern Illinois last season?

Maybe, although you might want to circle Notre Dame vs. Syracuse in late November as a potential toe-stubber.

If they make that run to 10-2, will the Irish make the CFP again?

Pretty good chance they will, it says here.

Will the Irish faithful still be grumbling about the defense if they do, albeit less loudly?

Come on. Like that's even a question.

Rocky Mountain medium

 You probably missed it because of all the FOOTBALL FOOTBALL FOOTBALL out there these (FOOTBALL!) days. But on Friday the worst team in Major League Baseball, your Colorado Rockheads, achieved something that undoubtedly unleashed mad celebrations all along the Front Range.

They won a baseball game!

OK, so even the Rockheads have won a few baseball games this lost season, but this one was different. This one was significant. Because by beating the lowly Angels 7-6, the Rockheads reached the 42-win plateau (if 42 wins in September actually constitutes a plateau). This means the '25 Rockheads will not supplant the '24 Chicago What Sox as the cruddiest baseball team of the modern era.

The What Sox, see, finished 41-121 a year ago.

The Rockheads, by virtue of Friday's stirring victory, now can only finish 42-120 at worst.

So crack open a warm Hamm's or Blatz or Carling Black Label, and raise a huzzah to our noble lads from Denver. Forty-two dubs ain't exactly a Rocky Mountain high, but it's maybe a Rocky Mountain medium. Kinda. Sorta.

Salut!

Asked and answered

 Well, now. I guess that takes care of THAT.

Can Indiana play?

Yes, Indiana can play.

Are the Hoosiers for real?

Yes, the Hoosiers are for real.

Are they still unbeaten and untried?

Well ...

I mean, Illinois tried. The Illini did. They just got tsunamied.

By 53 points, they got tsunamied. The final was 63-10, and, listen, I'm not gonna be That Guy. I'm not gonna be the prisoner-of-the-moment guy who watches the Hoosiers treat the ninth-ranked team in the nation like it was Directional Illinois instead of For Real Illinois, and decides this Indiana team is GOING TO THE COLLEGE FOOTBALL PLAYOFF again this year.

On the other hand, I'm not gonna say they won't, either.

What I will say is when you pile up 31 first downs and 579 total yards against another ranked Big Ten team, and out-rush it 312 yards to 2, and hold it to nine first downs and 161 total yards while sacking its quarterback five times ... people will talk. They'll take notice. They'll say, "Gee, either Indiana is really, really good, or Illinois is nowhere near as good as it was cracked up to be."

Because truthfully there was probably a bit of the latter at work last night, too. 

On the other hand, these are the same Illini who went down to North Carolina a couple of weeks ago and rinse-cycled Duke -- a legitimate team from a legitimate Power 4 conference -- by four touchdowns a couple weeks ago. The same Duke, by the way, who rinse-cycled previously unbeaten North Carolina State 45-33 last night.

So, you know, Illinois isn't exactly Kennesaw State, either. Or Old Dominion or Indiana State, either.

Those were the three warm bodies with whom Indiana opened the season, leaving it an open question as to just how good Curt Cignetti's second Hoosiers edition was. Needless to say, that question was more than asked and answered Saturday night.

Because here was quarterback Fernando Mendoza pretty much doing to Illinois what he did to Indiana State last week, completing 21-of-23 passes for 267 yards and five touchdowns.

And here were Elijah Surratt and Omar Cooper Jr. catching 15 of those throws for a combined 170 yards and three of the five sixes.

And here were Khobie Martin, Kaelon Black and Roman Hemby lugging the pill a combined 36 times for 261 yards and three more scores. Martin (12 carries for 107) and Black (10 for 89) both averaged a percentage point under nine yards per tote.

It all added up to another milestone deal for Cignetti, who was his usual obnoxious self in the postgame, saying Indiana broke the Illini's spirit. It likely did no such thing, but you can get away with that sort of bloviation when you laminate someone 63-10.

Also when you become the first Indiana coach to beat a top-ten team in Bloomington since the Bucket game in 1967, when Harry Gonso, John Isenbarger and Jade Butcher did their thing for John Pont against No. 3 Purdue. That's 58 years to you and me, kids.

So what's next for the lineal descendants of Gonso, Isenbarger et al?

Next week they're at Iowa, which handled Rutgers 38-28 on the road yesterday. Then they're at No. 6 Oregon. Later on they get No. 2 Penn State in Happy Valley. So we shall see what we shall see.

One thing's for sure now, though: It oughta be some quality entertainement.

The Big Reveal

 Your undefeated and untried Indiana Hoosiers welcome Illinois to Bloomington tonight for a primetime tilt, and at last, finally and unequivocally, we'll find out if they can actually play. 

This is because the 19th-ranked Hoosiers are not playing a team they paid to come get their heads kicked in, but someone in their own tax bracket. The Illini, after all, are also undefeated, and ranked ninth. It'll be the first time Indiana and Illinois have faced one another as ranked teams since 1950, when Harry Truman was president and football players were named Deno and Milford and Merritt and Elie. 

There've been a lot of dry years since for the Hoosiers and Illini, and but lately. Indiana, of course, went 11-1 in Curt Cignetti's first season and made it inside the College Football Playoff ropes a year ago. The Illini put up a 9-3 record in Bret Bielema's first season in Champaign and then beat South Carolina in the Citrus Bowl to get to double digits in Ws.

So far this season, the Illini are also largely untried, although they did laminate Duke, an actual Power 4 school, 45-19 on the road. In their other two games, they smooshed a pair of directionals (Western Illinois and Western Michigan) by a combined score of 90-3.

Needless to say, all this feasting on lesser mortals has resulted in some impressive numbers for both of tonight's pugilists. The Hoosiers, thanks in large part to blowouts of outmanned Kennesaw State and Indiana State, are averaging 52 points and 591.7 yards per game. Illinois is averaging 45 and 405.7.

Both are ranked in the top 15 in the country in points and points allowed per drive. Neither has played a team ranked higher than 65th by whatever formula the slide-rule boys use to determine who's good and who's not.

Which makes tonight a bowl game, sort of. 

Ladies and gents, welcome to the Big Reveal Bowl. Or the Maybe Bowl, if you prefer.

As in: Maybe Indiana and Illinois really are as good as all that. Maybe at least one of is not. Stay tuned.

The chill

(And so again the Blob feels it necessary to stray from its Sportsball enclosure because the guards were asleep. You know the drill: Hall pass, library, return when the Blob begins griping about his cruddy baseball team again).

Once upon a time I had an English teacher who thought Martin Luther King Jr. got what was coming to him.

It was the morning after MLK was gunned down in Memphis, and I was a seventh grader at Village Woods Junior High, which is what we called middle school back then, children. Time has done what time does -- blurring details, thinning memory -- but what I remember is this teacher asking us if we were saddened by King's death. And when many of us said yes, he replied something to the effect that MLK was a troublemaker and this was the fate of all troublemakers.

Now, I don't know if he meant that the way it sounded. I didn't then, and don't now, know anything about this teacher's political leanings, or any racial animus he might or might not have harbored. So it's possible it was not a negative reflection on MLK at all, but just a weary acknowledgment that the world is a cruel place and especially so to people who stir things up.

However.

However, it didn't come off that way. Especially to a classroom of seventh graders -- including one (me) who uttered a snort of contempt and drew a withering teacher's stare in response.

Anyway, what brings this all back is what happened at Ball State University this week, where an administrator was fired for not being properly devastated by the cold-blooded murder of right-wing provocateur Charlie Kirk. This was deemed unacceptable to Indiana governor Mike Braun, attorney general Todd Rokita and their legion of online snitches, who've sworn to purge the state of teachers who either publicly "celebrate" Kirk's death or have spoken of it with any sort of nuance.

This is how Suzanne Swierc, BSU's director of health promotion and advocacy, found herself on the street this week.

She was fired for calling Kirk's death "a tragedy" on her personal Facebook page, and that she "can (and does) feel for his wife and children."

Then she went on to invoke that old devil nuance by saying his death was a reflection of what he sowed. "It does not excuse his death, AND it's a sad truth," she wrote.

Which it is. Or which it could be more than reasonably argued, at least in the world before the current Regime.

There, it's a fireable offense. There, no deviation from the Regime's party line will be tolerated, and those who violate that will be cast into outer darkness.

Sorry. I tend to get a bit overwrought when the jackboots start marching.

In any case, Ball State eighty-sixed Swierc, because Ball State is a state institution and thus compelled (or feels it's compelled) to carry water for its bosses in Indianapolis. And it was all very legal, especially in a right-to-work state like Indiana where you can fire an employee for wearing the wrong tie if you so desire. You don't have to have, you know, a reason.

You might be expected to come up with a more defensible reason than Ball State did, however.

In its official release the University said it went strictly by official guidelines, which state that a public institution can justify a dismissal by applying a two-part test to determine whether or not an employee's speech disrupts the workplace. The release went on to say the University determined Swierc's post did exactly that.

"... Our administration evaluated the impact of the significant disruption to the University's mission and operations and the effect of the post on her ability to perform her work in her leadership position," the release said, in a masterwork of handbook-speak.

And to which the Blob -- a 1977 graduate of Ball State, by the by -- says this: Oh, balls.

Tell me how, precisely, Swierc's post was a "significant disruption" of her ability to (what did she do again?) promote and advocate health issues. Tell me how, again precisely, a post entirely unrelated to her job made it difficult for her to do that job. Explain yourselves -- or to put it in more educational terms: Show me your work.

This is the problem, see, with all this deadening of free expression by the Regime and its compliant acolytes. Unless they get dragged into a courtroom which might or might not be presided over by their fellow travelers, they never have to show their work. They never have to prove any of what they claim; they only have to claim it. They never have to explain, in this instance, what they mean by "celebrating" Charlie Kirk's heinous murder, or "justifying" it, because they're in charge and only they get to determine that.

Even if it's total eyewash. Even if no rational person could consider a specific opinion "celebrating" or "justifying."

Suzanne Swierc's specific opinion, for instance.

Once upon a time I had a history teacher who insulted his female students in the crudest way possible.

He said, once upon a time, that the reason prostitution was such a hard dollar in the city where he worked is because they got too much competition from "the amateurs" at the school where he worked.

That city was Muncie, In. And that school was Ball State University.

As far as I know, this teacher was never so much as reprimanded, though by all rights he at the very least should have been. (And might have; again, memory is tricky). Of course, social media was years in the future then. Of course, we weren't the nation of grimy snitches we've become.

And of course, the Regime wasn't running things with an iron fist, imposing its version of reality on thoroughly cowed institutions of higher learning and television networks and news organizations.

Where I live here in northeast Indiana, the mercury's supposed to top out at 86 degrees today. But you know what?

I feel a chill in the air. A most definite chill.

Early-onset carnage

 We've got the Dolphins at the Bills tonight in the NFL's weekly Let's See What Happens When We Make Teams Play Two Games In Four Days extravaganza, and the best thing you can say about that is both starting quarterbacks are still upright.

Josh Allen is doing Josh Allen things for the unbeaten Bills. Tua Tagovailoa went 26-of-32 for 315 yards and two scores for the Dolphins last week, but the 0-2 Fish still lost at home to the Patriots because apparently that's who they're going to be this season.

But, hey. At least they're not the Bengals, who have to get along without Joe Burrow for the next three months because he mangled his toe bad enough to require surgery.

Ditto the Vikings, who lost J.J. McCarthy to a high ankle sprain for an indeterminate length of time Sunday.

Ditto the Jets, who lost Justin Fields perhaps for the season with a concussion. Ditto the Washington Commanders, whose precocious star Jayden Daniels is day-to-day this week with a knee sprain. And ditto the 49ers, who already had lost Brock Purdy by week 2 and are hopeful he'll be good to go this week. 

So two weeks into a season that lasts longer than the director's cut of "Gone With The Wind", five QB1s have already gone on the shelf or partly on the shelf. Makes you wonder where we'll be 16 weeks from now, when the NFL finally and reluctantly says "OK, that's enough games I GUESS" and calls it a season.

I figure either Virgil Carter or Ken Anderson will be suiting up for the Bengals by then.

And where's Richard Todd these days, speaking of the Jets?

Paging Joe Kapp. Paging Joe Kapp. The Vikings need you to come down from your celestial abode, lower your head and run over a linebacker or two.

And bring Sammy Baugh's heavenly spirit with you. The Commanders aren't the Racial Slurs anymore, but they're still Slingin' Sam's old team.

I exaggerate for effect, of course, but if the league's going to lose or partly lose five starting quarterbacks every two weeks, that means all 32 starters are going to be in the MASH unit by season's end. This is highly unlikely to happen, of course, but the prospect of tuning in Colts-Texans in week 18 and seeing Riley Leonard squaring off against Graham Mertz still exists.

Look. I get it. It's the NFL, giant humans crashing into one another like Mack trucks at 70 mph. Owies are going to happen. Ligaments will tear. Muscles will pop like balloons. Joints will come unjointed.

But the annual carnage season starting so early, and including five quarterbacks, must surely be disquieting for the NFL's boardroom set. QBs being the league's most valuable asset, rule czars have bent over backwards to all but bubble-wrap them.

You can still touch a quarterback, but you can't, you know, TOUCH HIM. You can't hit him above the chest. You can't hit him below the chest. You can't throw him to ground in a disdainful manner, or plead gravity if you land on top of him, or hit him really really hard when he's not looking.

 And of course, you absolutely cannot -- cannot -- accidentally touch his helmet, because the zebras will dust for fingerprints to make sure. 

And yet.

And yet, two weeks in, the quarterback trauma unit is already filling up. 

It's gonna be a long season. Keep your phone handy, Slingin' Sam.

Dodging the point

 Perhaps I'm just a hair slow on the uptake. I have been accused of such. It is not an accusation devoid of evidence, regrettably.

So I'm reading this story about Tom Brady being caught on camera wearing a headset in the Las Vegas Raiders' coaching booth Monday night, and how the NFL rolled out a statement saying it was fine, A-OK, he didn't violate any league rules. This is because, as a man with a minority stake in the Raiders, there are restrictions about what he can and can't do.

The league said being in the coaching booth with a headset on wasn't a can't-do. So no problem-o.

This is where I said, "Yeah, but ..."

Yeah, but what about Tom's other gig? You know, the one for which Fox is paying him $375 million over the next 10 years?

The league didn't address that. And the story I read didn't mention the (to me, anyway) sketchy optics of a part-owner pal-ing around with the help in the coaching booth when he's also being paid a good chunk of change as an NFL broadcaster. 

At least until well down in the buried-lede section, that is.

"As a broadcaster, he gets access to other teams' players and coaches that other owners do not have, raising concerns about a conflict of interest," the story finally mentioned, nine paragraphs down.

Well, NO S***, SHERLOCK.

"Concerns about a conflict of interest"? Well, I sure would hope so. There should be concerns, because it is a conflict interest. A great big steaming pile of a conflict, especially when Tom Brady the partial-owner-who's-also-a-broadcast shows up on Monday Night Football wearing a headset in an NFL team's coaching booth.

To me, that's the story here, not that Brady may or may not have violated any rules as a partial team owner. I didn't think there was anything egregious about that, although the league clearly thought it was egregious enough to release a statement. No, the egregious part is Fox paying TB12 major jack to cover the NFL while also being a part of the NFL.

A part made glaringly obvious by what happened Monday night. Or so it seems to me, Mr. Slow-On-The-Uptake.

The less slow, after all, will point out that the NFL initially allowed Brady to work for Fox only with certain restrictions, many of which it's since relaxed. They'll also point out, by-the-by, that the league pays the networks a truckload of cash to broadcast the games, which by extension advances the NFL brand. It's a symbiosis that makes crusty old journos like me queasy, but we are after all relics of a prehistoric time when conflicts of interest were something to be avoided, not enthusiastically embraced.

The networks and the leagues threw all that over the side years ago. Ditto the Meathead Brigade steering the national tour bus right now, whose conflicts are many and brazen. The day when they were a black mark for a public servant is as over as zoot suits and rumble seats.

In which case, reserve me a seat in your '37 DeSoto. Because I think everyone dodged the point on Headset Tom, and I ain't changin' my mind.

As a broadcaster, he gets access to other teams' players and coaches that other owners do not have, raising concerns about a conflict of interest.

The NFL recently relaxed some of its restrictions for Brady in that role, including allowing him to take part in production meetings -- when a broadcast crew meets with that game's head coaches and key players -- this season. He must take part in those meetings remotely, and he isn't allowed to attend practices at team facilities.

Mortality 3, Hockey 0

 I don't know if the good Lord's hot at hockey, or if he's just a Maple Leafs fan who's mad at the game because the Leafs keep choking in the playoffs. But lately he sure has been kicking around the Sport of Kings (the Los Angeles Kings, that is).

Why, just look at what's happened in the last two weeks.

Lonnie Loach, local Fort Wayne Komets legend and the guy who scored maybe the most important goal in the franchise's 74-year-old history, was taken from us by cancer at the way-too-soon age of 57.

A couple of days later, cancer also took Ken Dryden -- arguably the greatest goaltender in the history of the game, and certainly the greatest for the nine years he backstopped the mighty Montreal Canadiens in the 1970s. Apparently the Big C was being even more of a jackwagon than usual that week.

And just today, a week after Dryden passed ...

Comes now the news that Eddie Giacomin has died at the age of 86.

If you don't remember Eddie G, hop a plane to New York and you'll get an education. Rangers fans remember him well there, and not just because no Ranger has worn his No. 1 since 1989, when the club retired it. It's the least they could do for the prematurely graying goalie who wore the Ranger blue for 11 seasons, finished up with the Detroit Red Wings and retired after the 1977-78 season with 290 wins and 54 shutouts in 610 regular-season games.

Nine years later, he was inducted into the Hall of Fame. Probably shouldn't have taken that long.

So, not quite three weeks, three hockey leges gone. Mortality 3, Eddie Shore 0, some such thing.

Please, Lord. Root for someone else. Hockey needs a break.