A writer's rant

 Read the other day that a writer on one of Sports Illustrated's platforms got nailed for using artificial intelligence to plagiarize part of some betting piece or other, and here came my Curmudgeonly Old Writer Guy, roaring from his cave. 

I cannot help this. It's who I am. It's probably who I was at 31 instead of 71, come to think of it.

And so I shake my head and grumble and wonder what Dan Jenkins would think this. Or Frank Deford. Or Curry Kirkpatrick or Gary Smith or any of the other SI legends from back in the day.

I'm thinking they wouldn't think too kindly of it. I'm thinking they'd think, one, AI is a cheat for a writerly sort, and lazy, and, by the way, so is plagiarism. In fact if you can't come up with a better way to say something than whomever it is you're plagiarizing, you're not much of a writer and should probably take up a different profession, like arc-welding.

I think that's what the legends would think because that's what I think. Not that I was ever a legend or anything close to it.

What I am is guy who did the sportswriting thing for 40 years, and the idea of stealing someone else's words -- at least without quotation marks and attribution -- would never have occurred to me. This was arrogance, mostly; I figured I usually could express something better in my own way, so why would I bother with someone else's way?

And besides ... it's lazy, like I said. And not nearly as much fun.

As for AI, well, that's lazy squared. And if you're a writer -- the sort of oddball who glories in the written word -- you know AI can't write, anyway. This is because the human brain is infinitely more complex, and every human brain is different. We're all informed by different life experiences, and it's those life experiences that enable us to produce words and images unique to us. The associations we make are ours alone.

AI?

All AI can do is reproduce whatever you tell it to. That's why what it spits out is so wretchedly pro forma. Skynet may live, but it can't write for doody.

Or at least, that's what I tell the young minds I find myself surrounded by these days.

In my retirement, see, I've taken up teaching creative writing for an organization called the Unity Performing Arts Foundation in my hometown, and it's been a revelation. First of all, the students are mostly middle-schoolers to young high-schoolers, and I'd forgotten what kids that age are like. And, second, I'm amazed (and a bit envious at times) at how adept some of them are with the written word at their age.

And so, periodically, I haul Curmudgeonly Old Writer Guy from his cave and rant my little rant about AI. It can, I point out, be a useful tool. But it can't express your thoughts and feelings -- your creativity -- better than you can. All that is yours, and yours alone.

It's why, when I try to coax one of my shy ones to read for the class what they've written, I always say a variation of this: "Come on. Have pride in your work, because you should. It's your work, after all, and no one else's. Don't be afraid to share it."

I almost never add, "And don't ever let AI within a light year of it."

I don't have to. I mean, how many times have they heard that sermon from the old dude?

To Cav not

 So I'm looking up at the TV a few skinny minutes before 9 o'clock last night, and, oh, look, it's the Cleveland Cavaliers and New York Knicks in Game 1 of the NBA Eastern Conference finals, and, wow, the Cavs are up 15 with three minutes to play in the third quarter, and this is HUGE, because they're playing in Madison Square Garden and the Knicks have just been rolling through the playoffs so far ...

I'm sorry, what?

Will this sentence eventually have a period in it?

OK, fine. Here's your period. Three of them, in fact.

Now where was I?

Oh, yeah, right: The Cavs. Rolling themselves. Moving the basketball like a metronome. About to erase homecourt advantage for the previously indomitable Knickerbockers.

And then ...

If you live in Cleveland, you might want to stop reading now.

That's because the Cavaliers' lead was up to 22 points with 8:19 to play in the fourth quarter, and now it was not just a win but a certified freaking blowout. Except ...

Except over on the Knicks' bench, head coach Mike Brown and his assistants noticed something.

What they noticed was James Harden was bouncing the ball an awful lot for the Cavs, as he tends to do. They also noticed his age (36). And they also noticed the age of their own bucket-filler, 29-year-old Jalen Brunson.

That's seven years of fresher legs, if you're keeping score at home.

And so, right about then, the Knicks told Brunson to start attacking Harden offensively. And suddenly the 22-point deficit began to melt like an ice cube on an August sidewalk. And before long the Knicks had outscored Harden and the Cavs 44-11 -- 44-11! -- the rest of the fourth quarter and overtime, and Cleveland's blowout became a shocking 115-109 win for New York.

In that same span, the Cavs shot 29.4 percent, missing six of their seven shots in overtime.

Harden was 1-for-6.

And Brunson?

Scored 16 of his game-high 38 in the fourth quarter and OT.

You could call that a choke job of epic proportions by the Cavaliers. Or, you could be nice and call it an equally epic comeback by the Knicks.

Me?

I prefer to call it a horrendous pun, as is my wont.

To Cav ... and then, to Cav not.

I'll be here all week, folks.

Dark influencers

 (Departing once more from the normal Blobosphere  to talk about non-Sportsball stuff. Standard protocols apply.)

Couple of sick f**** (excuse the potty mouth) attacked a mosque in San Diego yesterday, killing three people in a burst of gunfire, and God forgive me. My first reaction was not horror or shock or even a weary sigh at the perfidy of these days, but the following: Yep. Knew this was comin'.

Knew this was comin', because the fringiest of the lunatic fringies have been stoking the fire on antisocial media, ranting about the "Muslim horde" (hat tip to Secretary of Defense Sir Pete the Lionhearted Hegseth for that 12th-century gem) that's INVADING AMERICA and trying to turn a CHRISTIAN NATION into another Islamic hellscape ruled by Sharia Law. Lord knows from what stinking sewer lint-brains like these crawl, but they're suddenly everywhere.

It's their contention -- and even that of some of our elected boneheads, like that idiot Tommy Tuberville -- that Muslims are evil incarnate and don't belong here, and never mind that freedom-of-religion thing. The First Amendment, they claim, doesn't apply to Islam, because Islam is anathema to American culture and wants only to subjugate it. 

Even though Muslims have been part of the American fabric since the founding. Even though the Muslims I know are a lot more interested in Mohammed Salah and Liverpool subjugating Aston Villa or Arsenal than subjugating America.

No matter. Bigotry has no time for reality, and it's out there every day -- sent out into the online biosphere by beyond-hard-right webheads we've come to know as "influencers."

Being an elderly American hopelessly afflicted with terminal fogey-ism, I can't tell you what an influencer is, exactly. I can't tell you how or why certain people become influencers. From what I can tell, all it takes is a cellphone, a fondness for using it to film your every personal interaction every second of the day, and the massive narcissism it takes to do that.

After which, in some cases, you start up a website where you can share the ravings of your diseased mind with the similarly afflicted. With no consequences whatsoever, because words, apparently, are only words.

Except, in this case, three people are dead. And the two suspects, both teenagers, are dead from apparent self-inflicted gunshot wounds. 

To repeat: Teenagers.

Who cruise the Great And Terrible Interwhatsis 24/7. And who, let's face, seem to be particularly drawn to "influencers."

Mind you, this is not to say all the anti-Muslim poison out there right now triggered these particular teenagers. But I'm not saying it didn't, either. Words do matter sometimes, after all. And it's not like America doesn't have a long and ugly history of hate-stoking; go back to the 1840s, for instance, and the influx of Irish from the Great Famine prompted that era's "influencers" to rail that these Catholic heathen were coming to America to turn us all into Papists.

Stroll on down the timeline, and you'll find similar hysteria leveled at every succeeding wave of immigrants. The Chinese were diseased and incorrigibly foreign; Eastern Europeans were anarchists to the man: Italians were all criminal gangsters; and so on, and so on.

Always has to be an Other in the land of the free, I guess. And now it's the Muslims' turn.

To America's shame.

The Great Inescapable

 Hey, what am I? Chopped liver?

-- Tuesday

Well, you can't blame ol' second-day-of-the-week for being miffed. The Nash-unal FOOT-ball League now has targeted every other day of the week for anointing, but not Tuesday? What's up with that? 

This upon the release of the NFL schedule last week, in which the league announced it would not only play games on Sunday, Monday, Thursday and sometimes Saturday, but on Wednesdays and Fridays, too. So that's six days out of seven the NFL will come flying off the edge into our living rooms, with only Tuesday left to sit around with its hand out.

What is up with that?

I mean, heck, you wanna flood the zone, flood the zone, dammit. If you're gonna crap on high school football by scheduling games on Friday nights, might as well take it all the way to the house, right?

Don't just schedule games on Thanksgiving Eve, a new wrinkle this year that brings Wednesday into play. Schedule a couple of Thanksgiving Eve Eve games, too. Call it the NFL Tuesday Night Two-fer or something.

After all, what's so all-fired special about Wednesday? With Tuesday you at least get tacos. With Wednesday you get ... what? Hump Day Ham Loaf? Boy, howdy.

Oh, I'm sure, in the fullness of time, the League will bring Tuesday into the NFL family of days. It is, let's not forget, the Great Inescapable, or at least aspires to be so. With an expanded European slate this season, NFL Sundays will now be a literal morning, noon and night proposition. And then Monday night! And Thursday Night Football! And now not just Thanksgiving but Thanksgiving Eve, and Christmas Day, too!

Coming soon: The NFL Presents The Night Before Christmas. Best hustle off to bed, boys and girls, or Santa will leave Jets-vs.-Titans in your stocking.

The cautionary tale in all this, of course, is that the NFL risks doing what wildly successful sports monoliths have done since time immemorial: Overreach. To be sure, it sounds silly right now to say the Shield might be perilously close to red-lining market saturation. The public's hunger for its product remains insatiable -- or at least it seems that way.

And so, for now, how-high-is-up remains an open question. And Tuesday awaits.

Pissed off. Feeling abandoned. Bearing tacos.

Palou and the pole

 So, then: Alex Palou, Alexander Rossi, David Malukas.

That's your front row, America. That's who leads the field of 33 six days from now, when the Indianapolis 500 goes off for the 110th time.

Rossi did it for Ed Carpenter with a brilliant final drive after squeaking into the Fast Six as the slowest of the Fast.

Malukas was cool beyond his 24 years in putting Will Power's old ride in a familiar place for Roger Penske.

And Palou?

Well, shoot. Palou was just Palou. Best wheel in IndyCar.

The Spaniard beat out Felix Rosenqvist, who'd been quickest around the ancient place all week until his pole run, when he unaccountably fell off and wound up fourth on the grid. That means the man who's won three of the last four IndyCar titles -- and three of the five races so far this season -- brings 'em to the green on race day.

But if you're inclined to just hand him a second straight bottle of milk and get it over with ... don't.

What, you haven't heard about the Pole Position Curse?

OK, so it's not a curse, exactly, but it might have bought a house in the same block. Since 2009, see, only one polesitter has gone on to win the race. That was Simon Pagenaud in 2019.

In the six 500s since, the guy on the pole has finished 13th, 17th, 21st, 4th, 6th and 26th.

In 109 runnings, the polesitter has won 21 times. 

Which is not nothing, admittedly, but it still means the race winner comes from the pole just 19 percent of the time. And that's taking into account the first decade of this millennium, when the polesitter won four times in eight years, including three in four years between 2006 and 2009.

So, just 17 times in the other 105 Indy 500s. Hardly a lock.

"Yeah, but all those guys who didn't win from the pole?" you're saying now. "None of 'em were Alex Palou."

Oh, really?

Well, one of 'em is A.J. Foyt, the greatest American racer not named Mario Andretti, who won the 500 four times but never from the pole. And one of 'em is Andretti, the greatest American racer not named A.J. Foyt, who started second in 1969 in his only win. And one of 'em is ...

Hey, look at this! It's Alex Palou!

Who, yes, started on the pole in 2023. And finished fourth. So ...

So, don't make him Mr. Automatic yet. It's Indy. No one's automatic, nor ever has been.

Eighty-eight polesitters would agree.

The rain cure

 The mission was a total scrub down in Indianapolis yesterday, as rain washed away what was to have been the setup day of qualifying for the Indianapolis 500. So what happens now?

Well ... a bit of simplification.

Instead of the new Rube Goldberg deal it was scheduled to unveil, IMS is going back to the old ways, or least the less-new ways. Qualifying will begin at noon, with the top 12 qualifiers making four-lap runs for the Fast Six at 4 p.m. and then the Fast Six run for the pole a bit later.

"Gee, Mr. Blob," you're saying now (or should be). "How come they just didn't do it that way in first place? Seems a lot easier to follow."

Weelll ...

That is a very good question. With a variety of answers.

See, the original, brand-spanking-new plan, if you read the Blob a couple of days ago ("Why would we do that?" you're saying) was to fill the field on Saturday, lock in places 16-33, and roll out the top 15 qualifiers for further qualifying on Sunday. 

The deal was, all 15 would make another four-lap trip to winnow it down to 12. The quickest nine from that session would be locked into spots in that 12. The slowest six would all run again to determine positions 9-12. 

Then those 12 would run again to determine the Fast Six. After which the Fast Six would run YET AGAIN in the race for the pole.

No, I don't know why. Oh, wait, yes, I do.

One reason for the revised skeddy is because there's no last-row qualifying as in the past, on account of this year there are only 33 entries. Which means no bumping, and thus no last-row drama to milk.

Consequently, the Speedway needed something to keep the fans from nodding off mid-afternoon. So, presto, let's add another couple layers to the process!

All of this, of course, springs from the fact qualifying in May ain't what it used to be. Perhaps spooked by the death of polesitter Scott Brayton in practice in 1996, the Speedway has engaged in a three-decade campaign to keep all its rocket ships reasonably sub-orbital. It started with the the fledgling Indy Racing League's move to a normally aspirated engine formula in the late 1990s (a move that didn't last) and has continued right up to today.

The consequence is the track record Arie Luyendyk set 30 years ago still stands. And with no track record in play, a good bit of the drama of 500 qualifying went winging off with the angels.

And with no bumping now either ...

Well. There went the rest of the drama.

(A radical notion: If you want to revive bumping and spice up everything else in May, open up IndyCar's closed Honda/Chevy/Dallara shop. Invite Toyota and Ford and, I don't know, Audi or Ferrari inside the gates. Porsche and Mercedes? Sure. Aston Martin? Why not? Hell, let Pratt & Whitney bring back the turbine. Couldn't hurt.)

Anyway ...

Anyway, we're back to a simpler time today, aka, back to last year. Some might call that the rain curing a few ills. IMS, of course, would characterize it as the rain being a pain again, as it so often does in May.

I know which side of that fence I'm on. You?

The Mav!

 So remember, I don't know, a month or  so ago, when the Blob wrote it was going to root for a guy named Maverick McNealy in the Masters? Mainly because "Maverick McNealy" sounded like the kind of name you'd give the hero in a golf movie?

(Or the villain. Works either way.)

"No," you're saying now.

Well, I DID. What, you don't remember this:

 And speaking of random ...

I'm putting my dimes on Maverick McNealy.

He's a 30-year-old pro out of Stanford who's 41st on the PGA money list right now, and I'm not picking him just because his name is Maverick McNealy. OK, so, that's mostly why I'm picking him.

 I mean, come on: Has there ever been a better golfer name than Maverick McNealy? ...

See?

Well ... today, I have some further Maverick McNealy news. And it's very exciting.

Guess who's got a piece of the 36-hole lead at the second major of the year, the PGA Championship?

Yes! The Mav!

(Which is what I'm calling him now)

Shot a 67 yesterday that could have been a 65 if he hadn't  messed up a couple of closing holes, and is tied for the lead with Alex Smalley, who's playing in only his fifth major. They're at 4-under 136 on the tricked-up Aronimink layout outside of Philadelphia, the highest 36-hole total for co-leaders in the PGA in 14 years.

But big whoop! The lead is the lead, right? And not only that, but The Mav's younger brother is caddying for him, and you know what HIS name is?

Scout.

Scout! Scout McNealy! What, you think I could make up something that way cool?

So it's Scout and The Mav in the lead in the freaking PGA, and, listen, if you think it'll be cake taking it away from  them, you're in for a rude awakening. 'Cause you losers ain't never BEEN in a rodeo like this before. 

(Or so The Mav would say in the movie, I figure.) 

The Narcissism Bowl

 We're now in week whatever of America's new favorite game show, "The Pittsburgh Steelers Held Hostage," and what have the Steelers won, Johnny Olsen?

"A NEW CAR for driving around looking for Aaron Rodgers!" Johnny cries.

Uh, no.

"A TWIN-ENGINE BEECHCRAFT AIRPLANE for flying around looking for Aaron Rodgers!" Johnny warbles.

Try again.

"A DELUXE STEEL-TOED BOOT to kick Aaron Rodgers' ass when he finally shows up!" Johnny serenades.

Now you're gettin' warmer.

Now you're gettin' what the Steelers must be feeling but not saying these days, with minicamps underway and the NFL beginning its long post-Draft run-up to more minicamps, and then training camp, and then, at last, the Hall of Fame Game between a bunch of future NFL cuts against a bunch of other future NFL cuts.

So where's A-Aron, that rascally old drama king?

Well, still unsigned. Still MIA. Still a 42-year-old whisper in the wind after not showing up in Pittsburgh last weekend despite all the chatter that he was going to. More smoke without fire, while the Steelers insist everything is fine, no worries, Aaron's going to be here and WHAT THE (REALLY BAD WORD) IS ITWITH THIS (DIFFERENT REALLY BAD WORD) GUY?

Well ... the Packers could have told you. Ditto the Jets.

This is Aaron making it about him, as usual. He's the MVP of the Narcissism Bowl, and the Narcissism Bowl is a semi-yearly event.

He'll play. He won't play. He'll sign. He won't sign. He'll show up ... eventually.

Word on the street this time (according to Mike Florio Pro Football Talk) is that Rodgers wants an out clause that would free him to go to a quarterback-needy team of his choosing should the Steelers decide he's had it. In other words, he wants a guarantee that the team would simply release him if it ever decides to bench him.

This would apparently safeguard him from being picked up by any old team on the waiver wire, if the benching happened before the trade deadline. 

In any event, the Steelers' quarterback room is now Will Howard, Mason Rudolph and rookie Drew Allar of Penn State, whom the Steelers drafted all of three weeks ago. Mike McCarthy's new coaching staff is working hard with all three, just in case A-Aron decides to hell with it and retires. He is, to reiterate, 42 years old.

In the meantime, Aaron continues to be, well, Aaron. Only difference from all the other times he was Being Aaron is he's not really Aaron anymore, but just an old guy trying to play the same games without the status he used to have.

Oh, he had a decent season last year, throwing for 3,322 yards and 24 touchdowns against just seven interceptions. But he threw 16 of those sixes in the first seven weeks; in the last 10, he threw just eight. His season QBR of 44.4 ranked 23rd in the league.

So, yeah. Not the Aaron of old; just the old Aaron.

Playing the same young man's games with management he used to be able to play with some justification. Now, it's just annoying.

Or, you know, just Aaron. Same diff.

Two deaths

 A couple of men passed from this earth too soon this week, and they had two things in common. 

One was basketball. The other were their demons.

This bears some explaining.

Brandon Clarke, one of the men, was just 29 years old when police found him dead from an apparent drug overdose in California. Clarke was a reserve forward for the Memphis Grizzlies of the NBA, an apparently joyous young man whose bright life, and career, had been darkened by one injury after another.

At some point, again apparently, the drugs got their hooks in him. The story is an old and bloody one: A young man succumbing to a demon whose appetite is never sated, and whose legacy of death and ruin stretches to infinity.

And the other man?

His name was Jason Collins, and he, too, was once an NBA player, and still young in the way we measure such things. He was just 47 when the brain cancer he'd been battling for a year killed him, well short of his full complement of years.

And his demon?

Its name is bigotry, and it belongs not to Collins but to those who pass along its sting. Yet it is as old and bloody as Brandon Clarke's, and every bit as potent, given that it hangs out these days in the corridors of power where laws are passed and our meanest impulses no longer skulk in the shadows.

Jason Collins, see, was the first openly gay player in the NBA. Came out 13 years ago in Sports Illustrated, before Pride Months and rainbow flags and the pushback that has made anti-gay prejudice almost chic in America's more reactionary precincts.

You see it most nakedly in the hard-right states, where "Don't Say Gay" laws prohibit educators from so much as breathing the word "LGBTQ+" in a classroom -- even high school classrooms where students struggling with their sexuality already feel isolated and shunned. You see it anywhere a rainbow crosswalk gets painted over, or a rainbow flag is declared verboten, or anti-gay pronouncements are heralded as Christian virtue.

This is not, I believe, the prevailing zeitgeist in this country, founded as it was on the principle of individual freedom. But it's no outlier, either. That's because the bigots hold the levers of power at the highest levels, and thus own the loudest megaphone.

It's OK now, they all but say, to talk about gays and transgenders the way the German Reich talked about Jews in the 1930s -- i.e., as threats to a wholesome and vibrant nation. It's regarded as noble, or at least admirable, to push for laws aimed at effectively shoving the LGBTQ+ community back into the closet where (the narrative goes) it belongs.

In 2013, Jason Collins said "Aw, HELL, no" to that sort of poison. One wonders if, at the end of his life, he felt any dismay that the gay/trans community still had to keep saying it in 2026.

And if perhaps, just perhaps, it is even harder to do so now.

Qual folderol

 No one escapes the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in May without tradition holding a pillow over your face. It grows like crabgrass and creeper vines around the old joint, ancient artifacts from a dig site that's 117 years old, and from the most venerable motor race in the world, which turns 110 this month.

You know all the traditions, if you've ever visited. The yard of brick? Sure. The bottle of milk? You bet. "Back Home Again In Indiana" ... "Gentlemen, start your engines" ... Thirty-three cars coming to the green in 11 rows of three?

Check, check and check.

Well. Apparently we can now add another to the pile: Qual Folderol, or Jacking Around With Indy 500 Qualifications For Fun And Profit. 

The other day, see, an item popped up on one of the TV news channels about 500 qualifying. It said the qualification procedures were being changed for this weekend.

"Again?" I yelped.

Yes, again. Apparently, because there aren't enough entries for bumping to occur, there won't be any bumping. So all of us who were just getting used to the previously revised schedule now have to wrap our heads around another revised schedule.

Previously, Saturday would determine the fastest 12 qualifiers, and on Sunday those 12 would qualify again to determine the Fast Six. Then the Fast Six would each get one crack at the pole late in the day. Also, the slowest four qualifiers would run again for spots in the last row, with the slowest winding up "bumped."

Now?

Well, take a deep breath. This could get a little exhausting.

On Saturday, qualifying will commence at the traditional 11 a.m., and run until 5:50 p.m. At that time positions 16 through 33 will be set.

The remaining 15 qualifiers will advance to Sunday, with the fastest nine locked into the Top 12 qualifying session. The remaining six will have one shot at the last three Top 12 spots in something called the Final 15 qualifying session.

Then it's on to the Top 12 session, from which will emerge  the Fast Six, who'll make the official run for the pole at around 6:30.

Confused yet?

"Gee," you're saying now. "Sounds kinda like NASCAR's playoff system." 

And just look how popular that is with the NASCAR hardcores.

Anyway, all this tinkering and reworking and re-reworking is a desperate attempt to make 500 qualifying a hit again, and it's a relatively new phenomenon. For years and years, after all, qualifications for the Indianapolis 500 were as immutable as sunrise: The first day was Pole Day, the last day was Bump Day, and in between were two days to fill the field. Four days across two weekends.

But times change. Circumstances change. The old ways became the Jacking Around ways.

Two weekends of qualifications became one when not enough entries showed up to make two weekends viable anymore. Bump Day become bump-less for the same reason. And all those six-figure crowds for qualifications went away after the race cars were powered down and the track record -- 30 years old this May -- was no longer in play.

Thus the Month of May became the Fortnight of May, especially after IndyCar and the Speedway decided to squeeze another race into the month. And the Jacking Around commenced.

Excuse me. Continues to commence.

God bless tradition.

Superstition 1, Slump 0

 We all have our superstitions. It's how the rational mind takes a breather every so often.

For instance: Way back in the Before Time, when people frequently died trying to drive faster than the other guy in machines often ill-suited to the purpose, green race cars were considered a herald of doom. Ditto peanuts. Ditto women in the pits. And you never, ever,  wanted to drop your racing helmet.

Well, time and circumstance knocked a lot of that into a cocked hat. Jim Clark came to Indianapolis in a hunter-green Lotus and left everyone choking on his exhaust. Stock cars swaddled in Reese's logos showed up at Daytona, and the gates of Hell do not open beneath them. Janet Guthrie came along and Sarah Fisher and Danica Patrick, and the racing gods did not hurl any lightning bolts to strike down the blasphemers.

So, yes. Superstitions are silly. Even baseball, where it's not just in the movies that stealing Jobu's rum is very, very bad.*

(*Obligatory "Major League" reference)

Case in point: Cal Raleigh of the Seattle Mariners.

Who hit, like, a million home runs last season, but who came to Tuesday mired in an 0-for-36 slump. Couldn't hit a lick. Swung and missed, mostly. If baseballs had vocal chords, they'd have been chanting "Nyah, nyah, nyah-nyah, nyah" as they scooted past his suddenly impotent bat.

Well, Raleigh had had quite enough of that. So you know what he did?

On Monday night, he took a postgame shower fully clothed.

 Marched into the spray wearing all his catcher's gear. Said the idea came from Seattle pitcher Logan Gilbert, and Raleigh decided it wasn't all that crazy considering ... well, considering oh-for-36.

"Logan gave me some good advice to wash off the bad mojo or juju from the baseball gods," Raleigh said.

I know, I know. Silly.

But you know what?

On Tuesday, Raleigh had two base knocks to end the slump. Pair of singles. First hits since April.

Something to think about the next time you're tempted to steal Jobu's rum. 

Not that you would, of course.

Cruds alert*

 (*Pittsburgh Pirates sold separately).

Checked out the latest MLB standings yesterday, and I'll be bumfuzzled. We're 12 days into May, and the Chicago What Sox are in the thick of a pennant race.

OK, so it's only a divisional race, and it's only the AL Central, the used car lot of divisions. And the What Sox are still two games under .500 at 19-21.

But that puts them second in the division, just 1.5 games behind Cleveland. And 19-21 is way better than their record on this date a year ago, which was 12-29.

So, yeah. This Cruds Alert is not about cruds, but who aren't right now.

That would include the Homeless A's, who are playing in Sacramento these days but aren't allowed to tell anyone. That's why they're only identified as "Athletics" in the standings.

But big deal, because "Athletics" are leading the AL West by two whole games.

Yeah, they're only 21-19, and everyone else in the division is underwater. Which makes the AL West the slightly newer used car lot just down from the other used car lot.

But, still. It's May 12, and they're No. 1! Huzzah!

"So who are the actual Cruds these days, Mr. Blob?" you're saying now.

(OK, so you're not. Just employing what we writers like to call a "literary device". Also known as "cheating.")

Anyway, the actual Cruds might still be the Colorado Rockheads, who astonished all of baseball with their epic Cruddiness a year ago. They're dead last in the NL West, 8.5 games behind front-running San Diego. At 16-25, they're the worst team in baseball not named the New York Mutts, er, Mets.

And yet ...

And yet, the Mutts-er-Mets ARE a game worse. And the Rockheads are waaay better than they were a year ago on this date, when they were 7-34 after losing to the Texas Rangers. And right now they're just a game out of next-to-last in the division, nipping at the heels of the San Francisco Giants.

So, you see? Even in Crudsville, hope springs eternal.

Well ... maybe not eternal. But you get the gist.

By their own petard ...

 ... hoist.

That sums up the Indiana Pacers' weekend, pretty much.

When last seen they were losing Tyrese Haliburton to an exploding Achilles heel in Game 7 of the NBA Finals, and then losing Haliburton and everything else for the 2025-26 season. With Halliburton gone, the mojo was gone, and their elevator was Down Only, carrying them to a 19-63 record.

Which put them in the draft lottery.

Which they decided to put up for grabs for a fistful of magic beans.

OK, so it was Los Angeles Clippers center Ivica Zubac. Who's kinda good -- better than magic beans, anyway -- but they also gave up Bennedict Mathurin for him, which seemed an awful lot to pay when you add the possibly-sacrificing-a-lottery-pick factor.

"Hey, what could happen?" the Pacers' brain trust must have said.

Of course, that was when they figured they had a better-than-even shot at that lottery pick.

The deal was this: All the Pacers had to do was get their ping-pong ball/envelope pulled in the top four, and they'd hang onto the pick. If their number was called before that -- fifth or lower -- the Clippers would get the pick.

Well, you know what happened. The lottery got down to No. 5, and, hey, look: It's your Indiana Pacers!

Which of course meant the Clips got the pick, and the Pacers got ... clipped.

Lots of folks in Pacers Nation were saying it wasn't right, it wasn't fair, not after a 19-63 season that had to be worth ... well, something. But, nah. They played their way into the lottery, and then they got zippo. 

No lottery pick, which means no first-round pick. They were out, finished at Faber.

"Why do we have such lousy luck?" Pacers Nation presumably wailed.

To be immediately followed by:

"Why is our front office so dumb?"

Because, listen, bemoan cruel fate all you want, but the Pacers are squarely at fault for what happened last weekend. Who gambles with a lottery pick? No one. Or, at least, no one with the sense God gave floor wax. 

And surely not when the prize is Ivica Zubac and not, say, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

That's no knock on Zubac, understand. But his game wasn't worth a lottery pick.

Almost compels you to ask what Pacers president Kevin Pritchard 'n' them were thinking. If the answer weren't so obvious, that is.

Those darn vibes

The Knickerbockers of New York swept the 76ers of Philadelphia out of the NBA playoffs yesterday by 30 points, 144-114. It concluded a four-game beatdown of a team that came into the series having won three straight itself to  knock the Boston Celtics out of the playoffs.

And now, God help me, I'm starting to get these vibes.

Willis Reed vibes. Dave DeBusschere vibes. Walt "Clyde" Frazier vibes.

Please, Lord. Stop me before history kills me again.

Because, look, I know, this is utter folly. Comparing these Knicks to those Knicks? The legendary Knicks? The NBA champion Knicks? What am I, nuts?

Don't answer that.

Anyway, what got me hearing echoes of Willis and Dave and Clyde 'n' them is what the Knicks have doing so far in the playoffs, which is go through them like Patton through Europe. Swept the Sixers. Beat Atlanta in six games in the first round, booting the Hawks by 51 points in Atlanta in Game 6. 

In the last three games in that series, they won by 16, 29 and 51.  That's a a 96-point combined victory margin if you're keeping score at home.

Oh, and that win yesterday?

 The Knickerbockers led by 24 at halftime, having made 18 threes by that time. That tied an NBA record for most triples in a half.

Also, the 30-point win means they closed out their first two series by a combined 81 points. Both on the road.

That's "holy shite" and "omigod" if you're keeping score at home.

"Does this mean you think the Knicks are going to win it all?" you're saying now.

Oh, heavens, no. They're the Knicks. They'll find a way to crush New York's soul, same as always. And, besides, do you REALLY want to hear celebrity Knicks fan Stephen A. Smith if his guys win it all?

Good lord. He'll be hollering for weeks.

However ...

However, the vibes keep coming. 

Suddenly I'm looking at the way these Knicks distribute the basketball, and it's starting to look like the way Red Holtzman's Knicks distributed the basketball. Is that Jalen Brunson out there, or Clyde? Is Karl-Anthony Towns starting to resemble Willis? And who's DeBusschere in this scenario, Mikal Bridges or OG Anunoby?

By the way, did you know the Knicks' average margin of victory in the playoffs so far is 19-plus points? Which is the largest margin of victory since the playoffs expanded to 16 teams 43 years ago?

 Nineteen points! Why, that's almost 20 POINTS PER GAME.

Please. I'm begging you.

Somebody hit me over the head and bring me to my senses. Now.

Preview ... or not

 Christian Lundgaard won the Indianapolis Grand Prix yesterday at the Speedway, bringing it home for Arrow McLaren with a nervy outside pass of David Malukas with 18 laps to go. This immediately makes him the favorite for the Indianapolis 500 two weeks hence.

"Wait, what?" you're saying now.

I said ... this makes him the favorite for the Indianapolis 500 two weeks hence. Because doesn't the winner of the Grand Prix always go on to win the Greatest Spectacle?

"No," you're saying.

Well, Alex Palou won both last year.

"But Alex Palou won damn near everything last year."

And, um, let's see, didn't Simon Pagenaud win both in 2019? And Will Power in 2018?

"Well, yes. But ..."

But what?

"What about all the other years?"

Ah.

OK, so maybe Lundgaard's win wasn't a preview of coming attractions, although he had his best finish in the Big One last year, coming home seventh. And he's got one of the premier rides in IndyCar with Arrow McLaren. And he's got three other top-ten finishes so far in the young IndyCar season, including second at Alabama.

So, yeah. It could happen. But it could also (and probably more likely) NOT happen.

At any rate, Lundgaard's in the conversation now. But you know who raised an eyebrow in these precincts yesterday?

The guy who finished third.

That guy was Graham Rahal, and it was his second podium in the last three races, and, listen, who knows, who knows. Indy in May is the quirkiest of places, and it has a habit of occasionally meting out both triumph and heartbreak with wild caprice. 

How else to explain the fact Mario Andretti, the greatest American race driver of all time if A.J. Foyt isn't, won the 500 just once in 29 tries? Or Scott Dixon, the greatest IndyCar racer of his generation, winning it at 27 in 2008 and never since? Or Buddy Rice winning in 2004 and then virtually disappearing, putting up just two more wins, five poles and five podiums across an eight-year IndyCar run?

Graham Rahal?

Indy in May's mostly been a nightmare for him, especially lately. In 18 starts he's finished third twice, most recently in 2020. Since then he's finished 32nd, 14th, 22nd, 15th and 17th. Qualifying has been even worse; since 2010, he's started 26th or worse seven times.

And the last three 500s?

Well, in 2023 he failed to qualify but replaced the injured Stefan Wilson in his Dreyer-Reinbold seat and started 33rd. He finished 22nd.

In 2024 he started dead last again and finished 15th.

Last year he started 28th and finished 17th.

But, again, it's Indy. History's eddies course down the weird channels here. So maybe, finally, it will be his year.

Or Christian Lundgaard's. 

Or Alex Palou's again.

Or Josef Newgarden's, Scott Dixon's, Pato O'Ward's, David Malukas's, Kyle Kirkwood's, on and on and on.

Flip a coin. Good as predictor as any.

Speed freak

Maybe you didn't hear about what happened in Milwaukee, Wis., last night, where the hometown Brewers whupped the lordly New York Yankees in fine and thorough fashion.

What happened was, a splinter of a kid named Jacob Misiorowski shut out the Pinstripes 6-0.

Along the way, he struck out 11 batters in just six innings' work.

Also along the way, he threw 95 pitches.

Forty-one of them -- almost half -- dinged the radar gun at more than 100 mph. Ten hit 103 or higher. The fastest pitch he threw clocked in at 103.6,the highest velocity of any pitch tracked by MLB since it started tracking such things in 2008. Misiorowski did it three times.

Now imagine you're a batter standing in the box looking out at this dude, who's 24 years old but looks like he just got back from the prom.

He winds up. You dig in. He lets one fly at 103.6, from 60-feet, six-inches away.

Know how fast that pitch is traveling?

According to Mr. Calculator here, it's traveling 150.9 feet per second. Which means you have less than half-a-second to react.

Ridiculous.

Also ridiculous?

Misiorowski doesn't think the speed freak stuff is the story. Or at least not all of it.

"I'm not real keen on the velo, whether it's 100 or 103 or whatever," he said. "I just know if you don't have your other stuff or don't locate that in the zone or you're throwing it just down the middle, these guys can time up a jet plane."

Maybe so. But I can just hear what a Yankee or two might have said in response:

Oh, yeah? YOU try it, kid.

Indeed.

Wrestle mania

 I haven't checked in on professional wrestling since, I don't know, Rowdy Roddy Piper was playing dirty pool against Hulk Hogan or something, mainly because it's professional wrestling. Hasn't really been on my radar since I was into cartoons, which has been some time ago.

But this morning I was cruising the ESPN site per usual, and suddenly this appeared on my laptop: A picture of some guy with biker hair pounding lumps on some guy dressed as the Gingerbread Man.

"Well, THIS is interesting," I said to myself, and opened the accompanying story.

Let me say right here that things have changed a bit in pro wrestling since the Hulk/Rowdy Roddy days. And certainly since the Dick the Bruiser/Yukon Moose Cholak days.

Bruiser and the Hulk never beat up on a literal cartoon character, for one thing.

But, yes, here was the aforementioned Gingerbread Man, who was last seen cavorting with Trick Williams, a present-day pro rassler. This was supposedly the way Williams chose to troll his opponent, Sami Zayn, the guy with the biker hair. Sayn's hair, you see, is red.

He's a "ginger," in other words. Get it?

Anyway, Williams went on to beat Zayn, but that's not all, folks! You think pro wrestling's gonna turn its back on something as wacky as the Gingerbread Man?

Oh, HELL, no. Because on the next edition of "SmackDown," there the Gingerbread Man was again, celebrating with Williams and his sidekick Lil Yachty. (And, no, I'm not making up these names). Except -- what's this? -- it was actually ZAYN wearing the gingerbread man costume, and he proceeded to attack Williams and Yachty. (Again, not making up these names).

And the next week?

More Gingerbread Man.

This time, however, it was a mannequin Zayn had dressed in the costume. He proceeded to pound the dough out of fake Gingerbread Man, in the process "ripping off its delicious arm" according to the account by ESPN correspondent Greg Wyshynski.

So that's your pro rasslin' these days.

Can't wait for the next WrestleMania, emphasis on the "mania." I predict a cage match between the resurrected Gingerbread Man and the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man. 

Highest sugar content wins.

Canaries in the mine

OK, class, it's Friday morning here at the University of Blob, and ya'll know what means. Quiz time!

"Aw, gee, Mr. Blob," you're saying now. "Do we hafta?"

Yeah, you hafta. Besides, this quiz is easy. It's only one question.

Q: How do you know when an NBA team knows it's up against it?

A: When it starts griping about the officiating.

It's the canary in the mine in the Association, and it  happened last week, when the Philadelphia 76ers rallied from a three-games-to-one deficit to take down the choking-dog Boston Celtics in Game 7 in Boston. As night follows day, the Celts' Jaylen Brown came out in the aftermath and said the officiating in the series was less than impartial, and the league really ought to do something about it.

Fast forward a handful of days later, and here were your Los Angeles Lakers, losing to defending champion Oklahoma City last night by 18 in Game 2 of the Western Conference semis. That put the Lake Show down 2-0 in the series, the Thunder having also beaten it by 18 in Game 1. 

You know what that meant.

Sure enough, Lakers coach JJ Redick crabbed about the officiating in the postgame, saying Oke City gets away with stuff because it hardly ever does what Redick was doing, which is crab about the officiating. He also said it was disgusting the way LeBron James gets pounded on, claiming that LBJ gets "the worst whistle of any star player I've ever seen."

About LeBron, he might have had a point. In two games in this series so far, LeBron's shot a measly five free throws. And, yes, it's an eternal verity in the NBA that the big fellas always get pounded on with impunity. 

However ...

However, Redick didn't pick the most opportune time to take off on the officiating, except for the fact his team is down 2-0 and he likely knows in his heart of hearts that Oke City is just better than his Lakers. 

Hard to make a case for blatant favoritism, after all, when the Thunder was whistled for 21 fouls and the Lakers for 26, in Oklahoma City. Hard to argue Joe Official was a terrible handicap when the Thunder shoots just five more free throws -- again, at home.

Yet, Redick did. Because ...

Well. See all of the above.

A Turner Classic story

 My father never knew Ted Turner. Let's begin today with that obvious factoid.

Dad was a retired International Harvester employee, master woodworker and electrician from Fort Wayne, In., and Ted Turner was ... well, Ted Turner. Multimedia pioneer, professional sports owner, America's Cup champion, Jane Fonda's hubby for ten years. Southern born, southern bred, Atlanta's own.

But they fought the same fight, the two of them. And for one brief moment, Ted provided Dad the ammunition for it, sort of.

Allow me to explain.

See, Ted and my dad both died of Lewy-Body dementia, Dad in 2018 and Ted yesterday, at the age of 86. If you've ever seen it at work close-to, you know Lewy-Body is one hell-borne SOB, little by little erasing a human being's life and taking its time about it. It is, needless to say, excruciating to watch happen; you find yourself searching for any piece of the person you knew, no matter how small and no matter how briefly.

Which brings us back to Dad and Ted.

One day, when much of the man I knew had already vanished, I walked into Dad's room at the memory care unit, and the TV was on. It was tuned to Turner Classic Movies. "The Maltese Falcon" was playing.

Suddenly Dad lifted a gnarled finger and pointed at the screen.

"Humphrey," he said. "Sidney."

Sure enough, there was Humphrey Bogart. And Sidney Greenstreet. And a brief, precious glimpse of my old man, whole and present again.

Anyway, that's my Ted Turner story, on the occasion of his death. Except for this: Along with everything else he was, Ted Turner was the money man who got Michael Shaara's epic Civil War novel "The Killer Angels" onto the screen as a lavish four-hour extravaganza called "Gettysburg."

Which my Dad of course saw, being a former re-enactor whose unit appeared in another Hollywood production ("North and South II"), and a confirmed Civil War nerd of long standing.

Voila: Ted and my old man, on the same page again. 

Two men who never knew each other. But two men who somehow, miles and worlds apart, knew each other.

An eternal debate

 It's May now and down in Speedway, In., that old May soundtrack -- the whine and whoosh of purebred racing machines -- rises again from the erector-set canyon of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.  So I guess it's time once more to dust off the eternal debate.

 This isn't my idea, mind you. It's Stephen A. Smith's.

Or, rather, he's the one who brought it up a couple of weeks ago, when he was running his mouth as usual and said golfers and race-car drivers -- specifically, NASCAR drivers -- are not really athletes. 

"Come on, man," Stephen A. opined. "That don't count. You driving a car!"

This brought withering rebuttals from a number of NASCAR folk -- including, significantly, car owner Michael Jordan and longtime driver Kurt Busch. The latter posted this on social media: "Let's go cupcake. I will personally drive you around a NASCAR track for 30 minutes or when you pass out on lap 30."

Ooh. Shots fired!

Me?

Well, my best friend and I have been having this same debate practically since we've known each other, which is almost the entirety of our mutual 71 years. A confirmed gearhead, I covered the Indianapolis 500 as a sportswriter for 40 years; my friend did not. So he takes the "nay" position, and I take the "yay" position. 

Of course, we both long since concluded neither was going to convince the other, so the debate, eternal as it is, has become something of a pro-forma inside joke. Kinda like that old SNL bit with Jane Curtin and Dan Aykroyd, where Dan would routinely challenge Jane's position by beginning, "Jane, you ignorant slut."

In any case, our debate has gone viral now, and let me say this about that: Stephen A.'s elevator doesn't go all the way to the top.

I say this having watched racers literally being pulled from their cars in exhaustion after "driving" for three or four hours in the suffocating heat of a southern summer. I say it having watched IndyCar drivers circle Indy's fabled, capricious two-and-a-half miles for three hours at 220-plus.

Any twitch, any micro-second of inattention or less-than-superhuman reflex will put you in a world of often literal hurt there. Just as it will for the stock-car boys at Talladega or Daytona or gritty old bullrings like Bristol or North Wilkesboro.

Once, in what I like to call the Before Time, I got roped into a charity race at Anderson (In.) Speedway, another venerable old bullring roughly 50 miles northeast of IMS. I was 28 years old then, played a lot of basketball, and was in decent physical shape. The race was 10 laps on Anderson's banked quarter-mile track. So, what, 2.5 miles, right?

In other words, one lap around Indy. At, I don't know, 50 mph or so top end in a battered late-model I suspected was being held together by duct tape.

And who was utterly exhausted by the end of it?

This guy. Twenty-eight-year-old physically fit humanoid. After 10 laps.

I can't even imagine what kind of shape you have to be in -- or what kind of eye-hand coordination, reflexes and concentration you have to have -- to last 200 laps and 500 miles in a rocket ship traveling roughly 323 feet per second. Or  to make it through a 500-mile stock car race at, say, Talladega, where you're humming along at 180 or 190 mph inches apart from 40-some others for three or four hours.

So, yeah, there's my "yay" perspective in this eternal debate. And Stephen A. Smith?

I think he should take Kurt Busch up on his offer. Might open his eyes a bit.

At least until he passes out.

One smallish leap

 Well, well, well. Now they've gone and done it.

Kinda.

Sorta.

In a really, really careful way, like when you ask someone "Is this safe?", and he or she says "Yeah, it's safe", and then you say "Are you sure?", and he or she says "Sure, I'm sure", and then you say "Gee, I don't know ..."

This was the Indiana High School Athletic Association yesterday.

Which stuck its toe in the NIL waters by voting to approve an NIL structure for its high school athletes, although it won't be called NIL and has restrictions on its restrictions, just to keep high school kids from signing exclusive personal services deals with Big Harve's Gently Used Lawn Tractors, a longtime supporter of Pudville Consolidated High School athletics.

Nah. None of that for the IHSAA. What they voted to approve yesterday will not be called "NIL" but "PBA," which stands for "personal branding activities" and is not to be confused with that other PBA, the Professional Bowlers Association.

Under the  "personal branding activities" PBA, Indiana high school athletes will be allowed to engage in branding activities that include "social media, personal appearances and endorsement activities unrelated to their school athletic participation." In other words, they can't "perform personal athletic services", or appear in their high school uniform, or in any other way use represent their high school in a "branding activity."

That means, presumably, that Big Harve can't say, "This here's Flip Wannamaker, star quarterback for the Pudville Fightin' Pine Knots, demonstratin' what a great job our gently-used lawn tractors do. Go ahead, Flip, fire that puppy up and take it for a spin!"

And Flip dutifully fires it up and mows a strip or two, his aqua No. 17 Pudville jersey proudly rippling in the breeze.

Now, I don't know if the IHSAA's restrictions will prevent some Flip from Indiana to be identified as an athlete at a specific high school in some TV ad, or if he'll just be an unidentified high school kid who shows up eating a cheeseburger at the Burgers 'N' Such Cafe and gets paid for it. Except for the getting paid for it part, after all, it wouldn't be the first time a local high school athlete appeared in the background of a TV commercial or in a social media ad for some local business or other.

So the IHSAA is taking a baby step here. A smallish leap for mankind, if you will. A tentative concession to the new age, when not only good old Flip but his teammates can make a little on the side.

Although I don't know how the IHSAA gets around the obvious fact their "branding opportunities" unavoidably will be tied to their "high school athletic participation," even if the IHSAA says that's a no-no. I mean, those opportunities are going to happen precisely because of their high school athletic participation, right?

Just one Gordian knot the IHSAA will have to hack through now that it's decided (reluctantly) to join modern times. There will surely be others.

However distasteful the IHSAA, and the rest of us, may find that prospect.

Stupid human tricks

 (In which the Blob takes another brief detour from Sportsball World. Standard procedures apply.)

America the Calibrated scored another big "W" last night, except this time there was no body count. Thank God for small favors, and all that.

This time the usual knuckleheads skinned their smokewagons (obligatory "Tombstone" reference) during a party at a lakeside campground in Oklahoma. At least a dozen people wound up going to the hospital with gunshot wounds, and the beat goes on, the beat goes on. The Blob long ago shed its naivete over such incidents, having accepted the sad fact that the knuckleheads far outnumber the sane folk today in these United States.

So hooray for the nation of the Second Amendment ... and all that. Where Lee Greenwood is proud to be an American, where at least he knows he's free to, I don't know, pull out a Sig Sauer and start shooting because someone looked at him cross-eyed. Where every freedom-loving 'Merican thinks it's perfectly normal to pack heat wherever he or she goes, because The Right To Keep And Bear Arms Shall Not Be Infringed.

Also because you never know when a trip to the Piggly Wiggly is going to require some sort of Wyatt Earp cosplay.

"Gee, Mr. Blob," you're saying now. "You sound bitter."

Do I? More like resigned. Not to say weary to death of the knuckleheads and law-makin' lint-brains who enable them.

So, I hereby surrender.

Sure, by all means, let's keep pulling guns out and opening fire at -- in this case -- a first-weekend-in-May celebration called (un-ironically, apparently) Sunday Funday. Let's break up another soiree in Bloomington just a week earlier, when post-Little 500 partiers on Kirkwood were sent fleeing because more knuckleheads decided to pull out their guns and start shooting, winging five of the revelers.

Let the congress critters with their AR-15 lapel pins offer up the usual thought-and-prayers, for all the good it ever does. Let stupid humans performing stupid human tricks become the new normal here in this insane asylum that used to be the greatest country on earth. 

That business on Sunday Funday in Oklahoma, for instance? 

It took place outside of Edmond, a city of 95,000 or so just north of Oklahoma City, where Timothy McVeigh did his deal 31 years ago. Nine years before that, in Edmond itself, a postal worker named Pat Sherrill walked into the post office and shot 20 people before turning the gun on himself. Fourteen of them died.

So Sunday Funday was a legacy calibration event, in a sense. God bless America.

He may be the only one.

Rarity Day

 And now, Alex Trebek, we'll take Stuff  You Don't See Every Day for $100 ...

* He was dead last most of the way. Thirteenth with a quarter-mile to go. Still 13th at the head of the stretch.

But you know what?

Golden Tempo won the 152nd Kentucky Derby anyway.

A 23-1 shot even his jockey, Jose Ortiz, called "lazy", Golden Tempo finally got up and said, "Welp, time to go", swung wide, and passed the field down the stretch like a Maserati passing a bunch of combines. Made 'em all look like statuary except for the betting favorite, Renegade, another late runner whom Golden Tempo beat to the wire by a neck.

Heck of a run for ol' lazybones.

Heck of a piece of history, too, because Golden Tempo's trainer was Cherie DeVaux, who became the first woman trainer in 152 runnings to win horse racing's biggest prize. Eighteen women have trained Derby entries across the years; only DeVaux managed to claim the roses. 

So Derby Day was also Rarity Day, and not just because of DeVaux. Know who was aboard Renegade as he and Golden Tempo came churning down the stretch?

Irad Ortiz. Jose's brother.

To sum up: Two brothers for the win, a woman trainer in the winner's circle for the first time, and, hey, look at this: Was that Ocelli, a late entrant and 70-1 shot, completing the trifecta in third?

Sure was. 

And was that Great White, another heavy 'dog, throwing his rider before being loaded in the gate and getting himself disqualified?

What, you think I could make that up?

Well, I didn't. It happened, speaking of rarities.

 Listen. There's always a horse or two who balks at stepping into the gate ("In there? I'm not going in there. Uh-uh, no way") in these deals. That happens all the time. But I've never seen a horse actually throw his rider ("I TOLD YOU I'M NOT GOING IN THERE!") to avoid it.

So, yeah. Rarity Day indeed.

And speaking of which ...

* Didja see what happened in Boston last night?

The Philadelphia 76ers beat the hometown Celtics109-100, as Joel Embiid went for 34 points, 12 rebounds and six assists, and Tyrese Maxey for 30 points, 11 boards and seven dimes. It was the first time NBA history that two teammates put up at least a 30-10-5 stat line in Game 7 of a playoff series.

But that's not all! Tell 'em what else the Sixers won, Johnny Olsen!

They won a playoff series against the Celtics for the first time in 44 years.

Yessir. The last time Philly knocked Boston out of the playoffs, it was 1982, and Ronald Reagan was president. Dr. J was still a thing in the City of Brotherly Love. Larry Bird was just beginning to burnish his legend. Michael Jordan was a freshman at North Carolina, and LeBron James wasn't even born yet.

Know what else?

The Sixers had to overcome a three-games-to-one deficit to swipe the series.

Which means they had to win two of the last three games in Boston. Which also means they had to do something they'd never done; they were an NBA record 0-18 when trailing 3-1 in a series. And which also means the Celtics had to do something they'd never done: Lose a series they led 3-1.

Going into last night, they were 32-0 lifetime in that circumstance. Thirty ... two ... and oh.

But Embiid, Maxey and the rest got it done. Just like Cheri DeVaux, Jose Ortiz and Golden Tempo got it done.

Great White, though ...

A parting's sweet sorrow

 It appears obvious now the Anthony Richardson Experiment in Indianapolis is done like dinner, with word coming down yesterday that the Colts were not picking up his option for 2027. And if you have any sort of beating heart at all, you should feel something about that.

Sadness, certainly. Pity for a lovely young man. The disappointment of high hopes gone to ash. 

Anger?

Well, yes. That, too.

Anger, first and foremost, that the Colts took a flier on a grass-green prospect of un-surpassing athleticism, and then basically said, "OK, kid, play." Richardson was still just 20 years old at the time, and he'd started just 13 games in college. He likely was still humming his high school's fight song when the Colts plucked him with the fourth pick in the 2023 NFL Draft.

And yet ...

And yet, two weeks into his first NFL training camp, they named him their starting quarterback.

This was insane on its face; the kid was nowhere near ready to be a QB1 in the NFL, and anyone with a working porch light should have known it. And so, as night follows day, we all know what happened next.

He failed.

In 17 starts across three seasons, he threw 11 touchdowns with 13 interceptions, and completed a touch over half his throws in a league where 65 percent or so is the benchmark. He got hurt, over and over, trying to do the sort of things against grown-ass men he did against high school and college kids. As the Colts' starter in 2023 and '24, he missed 17 games; last season he languished on injured reserve after sustaining an orbital fracture in a bizarre pregame mishap involving a resistance band.

By that time, however, it was becoming unnervingly obvious that he might not The Guy the Colts drafted him to be. His immaturity became an issue, because -- hello -- how could it not have been? It culminated when he took himself out of the game to "catch his breath" during a potential winning drive.

He got roasted for that by all the social media brainiacs, and the brainiacs actually had a valid point for once. On the other hand, who handed Richardson the reins -- and the truckload of responsibilities that come with it -- in the first place?

Hint: It wasn't AR.

It was Chris Ballard, Shane Steichen and the rest of  'em, who kept trying to clean up the mess they'd made until they couldn't. So they brought in Daniel Jones, and Jones won the starting job, and then the eye thing happened, and suddenly Richardson was third on the depth chart behind Jones and Riley Leonard out of Notre Dame.

And now, perhaps not even that.

Parting is such sweet sorrow, the bard told us. And all the people in their Horseshoe Blue said, "Amen."

Derby time!

The 152nd Kentucky Derby goes off tomorrow down at Churchill Downs, and, sadly, once again My Friend Flicka is not among the favorites. Neither is National Velvet, Mr. Ed or his smart-aleck son Mr. Ted, who mouthed off one too many times and wound up holding together some second-grader's art project.

"Oh, nice, Mr. Blob," you're saying now. "Don't you think it's time to come up with some new material? You make the same jokes every year."

You mean the one about all the women wearing hats designed by Frank Lloyd Wright?

"Yes," you're saying, through gritted teeth.

The one about how the Derby field is always three or four actual horses and 16 cans of Alpo?

"(Grumble)."

The one about how mint juleps are just Robitussin in a fancy glass? Or how the Twin Spires are great because, look, there's two of 'em? Or how "My Old Kentucky Home" has got nothin' on Dan Fogelberg's "Run For The Roses"?

"Oh, great, let's not leave THOSE out," you're saying.

Wouldn't think of it. Also wouldn't think of failing to mention (again!) how much I love everything about the Derby, even though I've never been and the only thing I know about horses is they have something called a fetlock and something else called withers, which I think once wrote a song called "Ain't No Sunshine."

"Aaaand here comes the Bill Withers joke," you're saying, rolling your eyes.

Anyway ...

Anyway, it's time for another hardy perennial, Derby Advice From A Guy Who Doesn't Know Anything About Horses, Except That Sometimes They "Walk The Shedrow," Whatever That Is:

* The Derby favorite as of this morning is a horse named Renegade, but don't put your money on his nose. This is because the betting favorite hardly ever wins the Derby, and also because Renegade drew the inside post position. Which is kind of like starting 33rd in the Indianapolis 500.

* There's a Japanese horse in the Derby this year, but don't drop your coin on him, either. Not only is he a 20-1 shot as of this morning, he's a Japanese horse. Japanese horses are mutts in the Derbo; ten horses bred there have run the Run for the Roses, and only one has finished better than fifth.

However, this one does have a cool name: Danon Bourbon. No, I don't know what it means. But if you're one of those carefree souls who bet on horses' names, have at it. Hey, it's not my money.

* Speaking of foreign horses, you know who was the last Derby winner to be bred outside North America? Tomy Lee, way back in 1959. I don't know squadoosh about him, either, but you might win a bar bet with that nugget.

* And speaking of mutts ...

As of this morning, there are three 50-1 shots in the Derby field: Six Speed, Great White and the Blob's personal favorite, Ocelli.

Ocelli drew the 20th and last post position, which means he basically starts the race across the river in Jeffersonville. He's winless in six starts, but he does have D. Whitworth Beckman as his trainer.

Now, I don't know anything about D. Whitworth Beckman, which is no surprise. But he sounds like one of those crusty old guys in British horse movies who wears a lot tweed, smokes a pipe and goes around snarling at people to keep their hands off the horse, laddie.

(Alas, my imagination fails me again. D. Whitworth Beckman is actually a local. Grew up in Louisville. And he's only 43 years old.)

And last but not least ... 

* Your Derby pick.

I'm going with a horse named So Happy.

So Happy is a 15-1 shot right now, but at least he's not starting from the No. 1 or No. 20 post position. He's also not starting from the No. 2 post (no Derby winners since Affirmed in 1978); the No. 9 post (last Derby winner, Riva Ridge in 1972); the No. 12 post (Canonero II, 1971); the No. 14 post (Carry Back, 1961); and the No. 17 post, from which no Derby winner has ever started.

No, So Happy starts from the No. 7 hole, and he's got a poignant back-story. Not only was he a bargain buy -- he initially went for just $14,000 at auction -- he's trained by Mark Glatt, who's got a horse in the Derby for the first time at the age of 53. It would be a joyous occasion for him had he not lost his beloved wife Dena in February.

Taking So Happy to the gate will be jockey Mike Smith, who has his own story. Officially he's listed as 60 years old, but Smith keeps insisting he's only 59. So you've got a horse purchased on the cheap, a first-time Derby trainer weighed down by grief, and a jock who's either 59, 60 or, hell, who really knows.

That gets my money.

Two bucks on So Happy to win. I'm goin' all in.