The price of success

 The Atlanta Dream keep running into scheduling conflicts in the WNBA Finals, proof once again that the WNBA is a joke of a league and only still alive because of Caitlin Clark, the only player anyone comes to see.

Or …

Or it’s more proof that the WNBA is more than just CC, no matter how crucial she’s been to the league’s viability and elevated profile.

I say this because even though the Dream wasn’t farsighted enough to book the 17,000-plus seat State Farm Arena ahead of time in case the Dream made the Finals, the fact they needed the facility at all is illuminating.

What it illuminates is, in spite of the haters who tell us the WNBA can’t draw without Caitlin in the building, the Finals are drawing without Caitlin in the building. That’s why the sixth game of the Finals between the Dream and the Golden State Valkyries is being played at 12:30 this afternoon.

The NBA Hawks, see, have State Farm booked for a home game. And in spite of Title IX and the advances women’s sports have made since the cavewoman days of the early 1970s, a nothing men’s game in October still trumps a women’s Finals game.

“The Dream have another arena,” you’re saying now. “Why aren’t they playing there?”

Because it only seats 3,000 or so. And (yes, even without Caitlin) the home Finals games in Atlanta are drawing good-gobs more than that.

Every Finals game in Atlanta, see, has sold out State Farm Arena. Yes, all 17,000-plus seats. Ditto for the games at Golden State, where the Valkyries play in the 18,000-seat Chase Center. 

So I guess you can call what’s happening today the price of success. Whether the haters want to acknowledge it or not.

Brew rule

 I don’t care what you say, ya party poopers. Bob Uecker was in the front roooowww last night,  and that’s all there is to it.

Yeah, sure, you couldn’t see him down there in Tampa, but that is the way of things ethereal. He was there, holding an incorporeal Miller Lite.  He was in the visitors clubhouse, trying to touch the Big Trophy with an invisible hand. Thankfully, an incorporeal Eddie Mathews (1931-2001) was there to stop him.

“Better not, Ueck,” the ghost of Eddie whispered. “You never had the best hands, you know.”

But they were there, the two of them, and who knows, maybe the joint pwas crowded with the ghosts of old Milwaukee Braves and Brewers (And old Seattle Pilots! Hell, yeah, Jim Bouton) as these new-age Brewers beat the Tampa Bay Rays 4-1 to win the World Series first time in franchise history.

The Brewers Crew did it in style, too, sweeping the moneybags Dodgers in the NLCS and nearly sweeping the Rays in the Series. Only a walk-off single in the bottom of the 12th in Game 4 saved the Rays from the Dodgers’ fate.

Otherwise, it was all Brewers, who had the best record in baseball in the regular season and then showed everyone why by going 11-2 in the playoffs and wining eight straight at one point.

This was a team of young, hungry, impeccably disciplined players, who never took an at-bat off and were relentless in their approach. They were simply a joy to watch.

In which case raise a Blatz, if you’ve got one, to the Brewers and the city they represent. It’s been a long time — 69 years — since Milwaukee got to celebrate a World Series championship, and then it was the Braves. The Brewers had never won one, not in 56 summers.

Or 57, if you count the one season they were the Seattle Pilots. And why not? 

That was 1969, the year Jim Bouton immortalized the Pilots in “Ball Four.” And so, yeah, raise a glass, too, to Bouton and Gerry McNertney and Gary Bell. To Don Mincher and Merritt Ranew and Diego Segui. To Steve Hovley and Tommy Harper and of course Joe Schultz, the Pilots manager who told his boys to pound that Budweiser after every rare Pilots win.

No doubt an incorporeal Joe (1918-1996) is pounding a Budweiser at this very moment.

Or, in deference to Milwaukee, a Blatz. You betcha.

Chasing the past

 So I texted my sis the other day wondering what was up with NASCAR, on account of it's pretty much off my radar these days, especially once college football starts up, and it's still kinda on hers.

"So what happened to the playoffs?" I asked. "Aren't they doing that anymore?"

She said, yes, there's still a 10-race Chase, with 16 drivers in the field, but they did away with the elimination rounds. Now it's just a points deal, with the 16 qualifiers all starting from zero. Guy with the most points after the 10 races wins the Cup.

"Wait ... isn't that pretty much what they had before the Chase?" I asked. "And isn't NASCAR just turning back the clock to the days when the points leader wrapped up the title early, making the last couple of races moot?"

Well, no, she said, and yes. Yes, right now Kyle Larson, who came from 11th to first on the last lap to win at Talladega last week -- a 'Dega finish if ever there was one -- leads by enough points that he may have already clinched the title by the time everyone rolls into Homestead for the last race of the season. But, no, because only 16 guys are vying for the title now.

Which doesn't sound like much of a difference to me. After all, when was the last time 16 drivers all had a shot at the title in the last month or so of the season?

I'll take "never" for $800, Alex.

All of this makes me want to look up Matt Kenseth on the old Magic Google-ey Search Engine Machine, because he's the guy who's responsible for the Chase to begin with. In 2003, see, Kenseth was so dominant -- he won just one race but had 11 top-fives, leading the points for the last 33 weeks of the 36-week season -- that the season was almost anticlimactic. Finishing 90 points ahead of runnerup Jimmie Johnson, he clinched the championship with one race to go.

The next year, NASCAR's honchos said to heck with that. No one wanted to see a guy claim the Cup while winning just one race and clinching it a week early. So they dreamed up the Chase -- and they've been tinkering with it ever since, to the mutual displeasure of pretty much everyone.

Now they're back to Square One, without actually calling it Square One. (Of course, they still have the stage racing they instituted a few years ago, which is only the most heinous bit of phony sporting event  manipulation to come down the pike in some time. Stopping and then starting over again twice between the actual start and actual finish?  Who's the genius who came up with that one, and how many  bourbon-and-branch-waters had he put down his neck?)

Anyway ...

Anyway, it looks to this casual observer like NASCAR's chasing the past, and catching it. Can't wait 'til the boys go full throwback and bring back that old skyscraper-wing Dodge Charger. Those were the days, boy. 

 

Everything must go

 And now … let the teardown begin.

Quentin Nelson, the anchor of the offensive line?

Traded to Seattle.

Forest Buckner, the keystone of the defense?

Traded to San Francisco.

Jonathan Taylor? Daniel Jones? Anthony Richardson? Head coach Shane Steichen and his staff?

Stay tuned.

Everything must go: This is what Indianapolis Colts owner Carlie Irsay-Gordon signaled when she told general manager Chris Ballard to hit the bricks a week ago. And if you at all have been paying attention for the last seven years — ever since a battered Andrew Luck abruptly walked away, a wise decision from a wise man — you know it’s been a long time coming.

The rot in this franchise has been obvious for awhile, after all. The Horseshoes haven’t won a playoff game since 2018. They haven’t even made the playoffs since 2020. Since then they’ve done this: 9-8, 4-12-1, 9-8, 8-9, 8-9.

Beige on beige, in other words.

In that time, they’ve tried journeyman Carson Wentz and Geezer Patrol alums Philip Rivers and Matt Ryan at quarterback. Then they drafted a kid barely two years out of high school — 20-year-old Anthony Richardson, an off-the-charts athletic talent who’d started just 13 games at Florida — threw him into the deep end right off the bat.

No seasoning. No learning curve. No bring-him-along-slowly. Just, “yep, he’s good to go.”

And then they were shocked when he wasn’t.

So here we are, three fruitless years later, and Richardson is backing up Daniel Jones, which was likely the plan all along when the Colts got him from the New York Giants.  Jones was a revelation for nine games last season, and then he got hurt, and now he’s back to being New York Daniel Jones: Serviceable, occasionally more than serviceable, but rarely the guy who’s gonna win games for you when no one else can.

So is he on the block now?

Maybe. Probably. Everything must go, right?

 When you’re 2-5 this season and 2-12 since that 8-1 start a year ago, after all, that’s not just a sales catchphrase. That’s your mandate.

A few brief thoughts on NFL Week 7

 And now this week’s edition of The NFL In So Many Words, the bigly Blob feature of which critics have said, “Hey, you ain’t all THAT bigly,” and also “Come over here, Bigly, and lemme small-ify you.”:

1. “Ha! Ha-ha-ha-ha! Told ya we were bigly good!” (The Dallas Cowboys, after paving the floundering,  Jalen Hurts-less Eagles 38-21 to get to, um, 3-4 on the season)

2. “Hey, lookit us, baby! We’re 5-2 and you’re not! If that ain’t bigly good, what is?” (The Cleveland Browns, after squeaking by the 1-6 Tennessee Titans)

3. “Yeah, but it was the 1-6 Titans.” (Unimpressed America)

4. “Yeah, but that sorry Deshaun Watson’s still your quarterback.” (Also unimpressed America)

5. In other news, the Dolphins won a game; the previously 1-5 Buccaneers crushed the Panthers 43-13; the previously winless Dolphins beat the Jets in the Meadowlands; the previously 2-4 not-really-the-Super-Bowl-favorite-anymore Rams trucked the Raiders; and the Giants scraped by the Texans with Cam Skattebo and JJ Abrams, er, McCarthy, at quarterback.

6. “See? We do not either suck!” (The Rams, the Bucs, the Giants)

7. “But we do!” (The Raiders)

8.  “And we kinda did Sunday!” (The Panthers and Texans)

9. “Hey, we beat the Jets on the road! You know how hard that is?” (The Dolphins)

10. “Eh, not very.” (Unimpressed America — and thoroughly disgusted Jets fans.)

(Manning)cast aside

 Your Indianapolis Colts lost again yesterday, in typical Indianapolis Colts fashion, which is to say they looked pretty good for awhile until they didn't. 

They were actually leading at halftime in Minneapolis against unbeaten Minnesota, 10-6. Then the Vikings prize-winning defense shut 'em down, until they weren't. Wound up losing 16-10 to fall to 2-5 on the season,  as Daniel Jones threw for just 108 yards and a pick and was sacked four times. The Colts managed just 218 total yards, averaged just 3.7 yards per play, and even their most reliable offensive weapon -- placekicker Spencer Shrader -- missed two field goals.

So, another dreary Sunday afternoon for a franchise owner Carlie Irsay-Gordon has already begun the tear-down on. Things were never like this when Peyton Manning was throwing and Marvin Harrison and Reggie Wayne were catching.

And speaking of Peyton Manning ...

Adam Schefter of ESPN confirmed over the weekend that the Colts have not reached out to Peyton for the Colts now-vacant general manager job, for the excellent reason that Peyton does not now nor has ever shown an interest in being an NFL front-office guy. He's far too busy with his various business ventures, including the Manningcast co-piloted with his brother Eli. And who would want that job right now, anyway?

So, no, Peyton's not coming back to save the day, even if there is a nine-foot statue of him outside Lucas Oil Stadium. This will undoubtedly disappoint the same flavor of fan who always thought Brad Stevens was going to come back to IU from the Boston Celtics to return the Hoosier basketball kingdom to its former glory.

There was, of course, never a chance Stevens was going to do that. Just as there was almost certainly never a chance Peyton was going to do the same for the Colts.

Sometimes the knight in shining armor's white horse is riderless. Home truth.

 

Survive and …

 … survive. That’s enough, right?

Your sixth-ranked Indiana Hoosiers won the toughest game it will play all year yesterday, and, listen, don’t respond by saying “Yeah, but …”

Yeah, but nothin’. A win is a win is a win.

And, sure, it was only 13-6, and the Hoo-Hoo-Hoo-Hoosiers had to go overtime to do it, and it was against a Michigan team that’s not, you know, Michigan. But you know why it was the toughest game they’ll play all year?

Because it came a week after they lost the Big One at home to Ohio State by the width of Nick Marsh’s foot — their first L in 23 games.

Because seven days later they had to play Michigan in the Big House, which ain’t easy even if Michigan is Michigan Lite this year.

Because a bunch of other teams in a similar position couldn’t do what they did.

For instance: Know what happened a week after Minnesota beat Michigan in the Little Brown Jug game in Minneapolis for the first time in 50 years?

The Golden Gophers went down to Purdue and got their hinders handed to them, 41-13.

Know what happened a week after then-No. 1 Texas was upset by unranked Oklahoma in the Red River Rivalry?

The Longhorns came home and lost again, this time to Florida. 

Refocusing is hard. Sometimes teams can do it; sometimes they can’t.

Indiana?

Scratched and clawed and gasped and wheezed but found a way to win when Josh Hoover — so banged up Curt Cignetti thought about pulling him for Grant Wilson — barged into the end zone in overtime to save the day.

This on a day when Auburn, which last week shocked No. 1 Georgia between the hedges in Athens, came home and got filleted 38-17 by LSU. And on a day when BYU, a week after knocking off No. 2 Notre Dame in the biggest game ever played in Provo, went on the road and lost in two overtimes to Central Florida.

Refocusing is hard.

But Indiana did. And now the Hoosiers are 7-1. And as an IU fan told me when it was done yesterday, nothing’s wrong with 7-1.

Nope. Nothing at all.