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While We're Young Ideas

TL’s Sunday Sports Notes | February 5th

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By TERRY LYONS

BOSTON – Welcome to the Dog Days of Winter. It’s the first Sunday without NFL football since the weekend of September 11, 2022. That disregards the event formerly known as the Pro Bowl, now being staged in forms other than football.

What do the Dog Days of Winter bring to our sports-loving fandom?

A good look at the NBA of late brings altercations as in fights with guys coming off the bench to “give it a go.” There’s a laundry list of other assorted violations that will keep the NBA Dean of Discipline, the great Joe Dumars, up to his eyeballs with accounting paper and incident reports. Dumars, the most professional, wonderful, honest, down-to-earth player that’s ever played in the NBA, now knows what it was like when his predecessors (Rod Thorn, Stu Jackson) had to deal with the 1987-88-89-90 “Bad Boys” aka the elbow throwing, cheap-shotin’ Bill Laimbeer of the Detroit Pistons.

Suffice to say, Dumars has his hands filled, as did the Veeps of Violence of years past. It’s simply that time of year.

Since February 1st, Dumars has seen his officiating staff dole out 19 technical fouls. They’ve resulted in six ejections, a $25,000 fine for Donovan Mitchell and a one game suspension without pay for Dillon Brooks, estimated to cost the player a cool $78,621 for their efforts this past Thursday.

On Friday night, one of the crazier altercations of out time on earth began with Mo Bamba coming off the Orlando Magic bench to confront Minnesota’s Austin Rivers, who threw several punches as Orlando’s Jalen Suggs joined the melee to tangle with Minnesota’s Jaden McDaniels and Taurean Prince both joining the fracas.

Facing the facts? There will be more.

Players, coaches, referees, and even the hot dog vendors have “had it” at this point in the year. They’re “banged up.” They’re playing hurt and the pressure is being turned up as the playoffs grow closer and closer. From a slow simmer on the back burner of January to a full boil come April, there’s no more room for understanding. The Dog Days call for dukes. No questions asked.

Even the G-League experienced the doldrums of the Dog Days of Winter in balmy Sioux Falls when Skyforce guard Mychal Mulder was suspended one game without pay for making contact with a game official and escalating an on-court altercation while Birmingham Squadron forwards James Kelly, Sr. and Kelan Martin were suspended one game without pay for leaving the bench area and escalating that altercation. The incident resulted in the ejections of Kelly, Sr. and Mulder.

The Dog Days know no bounds! But, it can get very dangerous. “Rudy T” dangerous because the players are BIG and STRONG and QUICK and they can pack a punch. There’s very few face masks, no padding and maybe a couple dozen mouth guards being worn by otherwise fully exposed players. Sheer momentum can bring two players together at warp speed.

It’s time for the league to get the word out – the officials are going to enforce the rules on the books. They need to T-up any and all verbal jabs and the players will adjust. The Holy Grail in the NBA is “Playing Time” and the players know where to draw the line when they know the league, from those in the office to officials at the games are going to come down on the B.S. and a suspension and $78k fine gets the word out.

AT PRESS TIME: The NBA league office came down with the hammer. Here’s the news release on fines and suspensions for the Orlando v Minnesota bout:

Orlando Magic center Mo Bamba has been suspended four games without pay and Minnesota Timberwolves guard Austin Rivers has been suspended three games without pay for their roles in an on-court altercation, it was announced today by Joe Dumars, Executive Vice President, Head of Basketball Operations.

In addition, Magic guard Jalen Suggs has been suspended one game without pay for escalating the altercation by aggressively grabbing Rivers around the neck and pulling him to the floor.

Timberwolves forward Jaden McDaniels has been fined $20,000 for his role in the altercation which included running into the scrum and pushing Bamba in the back.

The incident, for which all four players received technical fouls and were ejected, occurred with 1:32 remaining in the third quarter of the Magic’s 127-120 win over the Timberwolves on Feb. 3 at Target Center.

Bamba and Rivers engaged in an altercation in front of the Magic bench, with both players throwing punches. Suggs and McDaniels then entered the altercation as non-peacemakers, which resulted in a continued escalation of the situation.

Following the incident, Bamba attempted to continue to engage with Rivers in a hostile manner in the corridor outside the locker rooms where he also aggressively shoved a security representative. Both Bamba and Rivers continued the escalation on social media following the game.

GET THE REMOTE: As you begin your Dog Day Sunday Morning & Afternoon, your viewing choices can range from a 9:00am (ET) Leeds United v. Nottingham Forest Premier League soccer game on USA Network to a 12 Noon (ET) DePaul at Seton Hall tilt on FS1.

If you prefer to stick with USA Net, the Fordham Rams and Richmond Spiders will be awaiting tip-off in an A-10 tussle. Or, you can watch Six Nations Rugby or Bowling or Figure Skating or Rodeo or Horse Racing or Women’s Pro Hockey or wait-out some NASCAR race at the LA Coliseum at 8pm (ET) – it’ll be Sunset Grills in Southern California.

HERE NOW, THE NOTES: Only eight days until Pitchers & Catchers report to Spring Training for Major League Baseball teams. That’s a sure sign, Spring is on the way and this cold blast (-10 here) will blow back to Canada and beautiful Spring days are not too far away. Spring Training leads to March Madness and WWYI favorite event of the year with the BIG EAST tournament scheduled for March 8-11th, the 41st year the tournament will be staged at The Garden. … The PLAYERS Championship is aligned with the BIG EAST and will be staged at TPC Sawgrass from March 7-12th. The signature 17th hole at TPC Sawgrass gets the vast majority of the attention, but the entire course is gorgeous and one of the most famous in the world. (More on that later in the column). … After a sometimes chilly March 30th Opening Day for Baseball their are a few other sure signs of Spring in the Northeast United States. The Masters will take place at beautiful August National from April 6-9 and it will be followed by the single best day of the year in Boston. Patriots’ Day, Monday April 17th, and the running of the Boston Marathon is only 71 days away. The great day is enhanced by the 11:00am LA Angels at Boston Red Sox game at Fenway Park. Sheer perfection for a day when the entire city of Boston and the Commonwealth as a whole revolves around sports and celebrates the marathoners as they weave their way through eight local towns and cities: Hopkinton, Ashland, Framingham, Natick, Wellesley, Newton, Brookline, and Boston. … Of recent years, the Boston Marathon was set back severely when the 2013 race was marred by a bombing incident. Two crazed radicals manufactured two homemade bombs and set them off within minutes of each other and some 200 yards from the finish line in Copley. Three spectators will killed immediately while some 260+ people were injured, 17 losing limbs. A few days later, while trying to escape a citywide manhunt with residents sheltered in place, the two brothers killed an MIT police officer and fled to the suburbs. The crime fighters of multiple agencies located the two bothers and one was killed in a shoot-out and subsequent fatal rundown as his younger brother fled the scene. Later, the younger brother was located, hiding in the backyard of a Watertown home, shot and critically injured in a winterized boat. His trial resulted in multiple charges meriting the death penalty. He is currently incarcerated in the Supermax ADX detention center in Florence, Colorado. A March, 2022 court ruling reinstated the death penalty verdict handed down but was being scrutinized by the Supreme Court of the United States.

Here’s a look at some select dates you can circle on your calendar (Partial List of Great Sports Events from Feb to June 1):

  • February 4 – March 18 – Six Nations Rugby
  • February 12 – Super Bowl (Phoenix, AZ)
  • February 19 – NBA All-Star Game (Salt Lake City, UT)
  • March 7-12 – The PLAYERS (TPC Sawgrass)
  • March 8-11 – BIG EAST Tournament (New York City)
  • March 12 – NCAA Selection Sunday (Indianapolis, IN)
  • March 8-21 – World Baseball Classic (Miami and other cities)
  • March 14-15 – NCAA Men’s Basketball First Four (Dayton, OH)
  • March 16-17 – NCAA Men’s Basketball First Round (Multiple cities)
  • March 18-19 – NCAA Men’s Basketball Second Round (Multiple)
  • March 23-24 – NCAA Sweet 16
  • March 25-16 – Elite 8
  • March 30 – Opening Day in MLB (Multiple cities, all 30 teams)
  • March 31-April 2 – NCAA Women’s Final Four (Dallas)
  • April 1 – Final Four (Houston, TX)
  • April 3 – NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship Game (Houston, TX)
  • April 6-9 – The Masters (Augusta, GA)
  • April 11-14 – NBA Play-In Tournament (Multiple Cities)
  • April 15 – NBA Playoffs Begin
  • April 17 – Patriots’ Day – Boston Marathon + Red Sox at 11am (Boston, MA)
  • April 17 – NHL Playoffs Begin
  • May 6 – Kentucky Derby – (Churchill Downs)
  • May 16 – NBA Draft Lottery –
  • May 18-21 – PGA Championship – (Oak Hill, Rochester, NY)
  • May 20 – The Preakness Stakes – (Baltimore, MD)
  • May 28 – Indy 500 – (Indianapolis, IN)
  • May 28 – French Open – (First Matches) – (Paris, France) – until 6/11

Clip and Save ⬆️

TIDBITS: Pick a job, any job. What would you rather do for gainful employment? If you are Secretary of Labor, a Cabinet position, reporting to the President of the United States of America OR become the head of the NHL Players Association? … Similarly, would you prefer to be the Governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts or the President of the National Collegiate Athletic Association? … That is the question for former Boston Mayor Marty Walsh, and recently replaced Governor of Mass, Charlie Baker, who did not seek a third term after serving from 2015 to 2023. Both jobs are prestigious, yet thankless positions with much public scrutiny. The NHL Players association gig potentially pays the most while the NCAA President job has the most heavy-lifting to do, fighting off the influences of the “Power 5” NCAA football programs while juggling multiple issues, including Name, Image and Likeness (NIL) issues and the equal treatment of women within the collegiate framework. … The realities? WWYI can NOT see Baker living in Indianapolis nor Walsh living in Toronto or NYC. … Let’s see how this plays out.

MORE WORDS, PHRASES AND CLICHES TO AVOID: While We’re Young (Ideas) provided the STRONG recommendation to NOT use the word “Narrative” any longer in your written or verbal communications. While you read that piece of advice, you were also urged to stop “Unpacking” or having a “lot to unpack” from a situation. The advice came with a few other gems. … Today, a few more:

  • “Just like that”
  • Ball screen
  • “The crowd is electric”
  • “No Question”
  • True freshman
  • Bubble team
  • “The car’s running a little loose”
  • ‘Turnovers (or protecting the ball) will be the key”

Let’s play cliche BINGO at Super Bowl parties everywhere?

A PEBBLE FOR YOUR THOUGHTS: The PGA Tour made its way to the fabulous Monterrey Peninsula and 17 Mile Drive at Pebble Beach. Thursday was a gorgeous day until the winds kicked-in late in the first round. The scenic course layout prompted the question: Name the most beautiful golf courses in the USA? Here’s WWYI’s take on that open-ended question:

  1. Augusta National (Augusta, GA)
  2. Pebble Beach Golf Links (Pebble Beach, CA)
  3. Cypress Point (Monterrey, CA)
  4. Shinnecock Hills Golf Club
  5. Oakmont CC (Chicago, IL)
  6. Seminole GC (Palm Beach, FLA)
  7. Winged Foot (Westchester, NY)
  8. Muirfield Village (Ohio)
  9. The Country Club (Brookline)
  10. Riviera Country Club (Pacific Palisades, CA)

Noteables: Torrey Pines (San Diego); The Plantation Course, (Kapalua, HI), Whistling Straits (Wisconsin); Bethpage Black, (Long Island, NY); Kiawah Island Golf Resort: The Ocean Course (South Carolina); Shadow Creek (Las Vegas, NV); Pinehurst No. 2 (North Carolina); Baltusrol (Lower) (Springfield, NJ).

Across the Pond?

  1. Old Course at St. Andrews
  2. Muirfield, East Lothian, Scotland
  3. Royal Portrush, Northern Ireland
  4. Turnberry, Scotland
  5. Royal St. George’s, Sandwich, England
  6. Royal Birkdale, Southport, England
  7. Carnoustie Golf Links is in Carnoustie, Angus, Scotland

TL’s Sunday Sports Notes – Jan 29th

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While We’re Young (Ideas) – On the NFL and Much More Important Things

New England Patriots head coach Bill Belichick (File Photo)

By TERRY LYONS

BOSTON – First things first. The AFC Championship is NOT in Foxboro and the Patriots reportedly are pointing fingers at coach Bill Belichick, his assistant coaches and each other on the reasons why. The tail end of that sentence clearly answers the front end declaration. It’s time for a shake-up at Gillette and the re-hiring of Bill O’Brien will not be enough.

While We’re Young (Ideas) is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

O’Brien returned to New England after a two-year stint as Nick Saban’s offensive coordinator at Alabama. O’Brien also had brief stints at Penn State as head coach in 2012-13 and a longer run with the head coach of the Houston Texans from 2014-20.

While the Patriots’ defense ranked No. 9 in Opponent Yards per Game and 11th in points allowed per game, it’s certainly the offensive side of the football that needs work. Looking at Special Teams, the Patriots ranked a league worst, according to ESPN’s DVOA (Defense adjusted-Value Over Average) and, the Patriots finished the 2022-23 NFL season at No. 16 in scoring and No. 26 in Yards per Game. Only Indianapolis, Chicago, Carolina, Tennessee, Houston and the LA Rams fared worse on gaining yards. In 3rd Down conversions, New England ranked No. 27 (of 32 NFL teams).

Belichick quickly addressed the issue, hiring O’Brien before the NFC/AFC Championship weekend. That will fill about 25% of the Patriots’ overall hole. The other 75% is on the players – the players on offense.

An interview with Captain Obvious floats the rumors the New York Jets will attempt to acquire longtime Green Bay quarterback Aaron Rodgers just as they did in acquiring Green Bay’s Brett Favre in 2008. The Favre experiment lasted one season. Rodgers? Maybe two, but the trade would put New England at the bottom of the AFC East ladder predictions come September. (In 2022, New England (8-9) barely bested the J-E-T-S (7-10).

For New England, RB Rhamondre Stevenson, a 1,000+ yard rusher in 2022 will have high expectations as a 25-year old come 2023. RB Damien Harris spells Stevenson nicely, so the concentration for Belichick and O’Brien will be elsewhere.

Quarterback Mac Jones with his 84.9 QB rating over 14 games started in ‘22 will be in a make-it-or-break-it season. Bailey Zappe, who will turn 24 in April, is the No. 2 who will never be compared with Josh Allen of Buffalo or Patrick Mahomes of the KC Chiefs.

The NE receiving corps were abysmal. Jacobi Meyers (804 yards on 67 receptions); DeVante Parker (539 yards on 31 receptions); Kendrick Bourne (434 on 35) and tight end Henry Hunter (509 yards on 41 receptions) didn’t get the job done. Meyers had six TDs and the next three combined for six. The Patriots’ braintrust will need to beef up the WRs and TEs either through the free agency market or draft.

It won’t be until the WRs improve that any blame can be placed upon the shoulders of Mac Jones. Unless a minor miracle is performed at Patriot Place, Jones will be the started QB for 2023.

In the NFL Draft (April 27-29), the Patriots will seek help for the offensive line and for a deep-threat wide receiver. Of course Belichick never remains shy if there’s a top-notch corner available when the Patriots pick at No. 14.

That Patriots forecast leads us to Sunday’s NFC (SF 49ers at Philadelphia Eagles) and AFC (Cincinnati Bengals at KC Chiefs) Championship, arguably the best day of the year on the NFL schedule, unless you enjoy endless, two-week long pregame hype and endless $7-million dollar TV ads.

For those who enjoy a trip to Las Vegas for the Super Bowl or the first Thursday/Friday of the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament, next time, try the NFC/AFC doubleheader which comes along with lesser crowding, better games and some decent regular season hoops (College and NBA) games on Saturday.

From this armchair, the kiss of death for the Philadelphia Eagles and Cincinnati Bengals is that every talking head, every handicapper, former players, known sports gamblers – everybody – is picking a Philadelphia vs Cincinnati Super Bowl.

The lines as of Jan 28th – roughly 24 hours before kick-off:

  • Eagles (-2.5) over 49ers
  • Chiefs (-1.5) over Bengals

The pontificating pigskin public first saw the Eagles at (-1.5) while the Chiefs were getting (+1) on the opening.

The O/U for the Niners v Eagles opened at (45.5) and stands at (46.0).

The O/U for the Bengals at Chiefs opened at (46.5) and is up to (48).

Call me crazy, I like the Niners getting 2.5 and would not be afraid of the (+130) ML while I really like the KC Chiefs. Rumor has it a lot of “sharp” money came in on KC early.

KC will do or die by their secondary coverage of WRs Ja’Marr Chase, Tee Higgins and Tyler Boyd. I think KC can keep Chase under wraps, maybe a TD. Higgins can be the deciding factor as Cincy QB Joe Burrows will hit the open man. RB Joe Mixon on short screens could be a factor more so than via his straight run game.

The emergence of RB Isiah Pacheco for the Chiefs and the sure-fire, can’t stop it QB Patrick Mahomes to TE Travis Kelce will be enough to guide the Chiefs at Arrowhead. That said, a re-injury to Mahomes’ high ankle sprain would be disastrous for KC.

For SF, it’s all about Christian McCaffrey and the 49ers’ solid defense to match Philly. Any wavering by the Eagles in the first half will bring the pressure of the “Linc” down upon a playoff inexperienced roster. The Niners will need (at least) six points from their defense.

It’s kick-off time at 3:00pm (ET) (FOX) at Philly and roughly 6:30pm, call it 7:00pm if the game runs long, at Kansas City on CBS.

HERE NOW, THE NOTES: The NBA announced that they’ll pick sides for the annual NBA All-Star Game right before the game begins. Besides watching the Consumer Products guys flip-out providing proper jerseys and numbers and the Courtside stat inputter have a canary typing in the players/teams into the computers, it should make for a lot of fun.

The bad news, it should result in more “three point shots” being chucked-up as the coaches won’t even have a single practice to put in a few offensive sets to run. The talent of the NBA players will rise when the coaches put in some offense being run by nearly every team, but may God bless the point guards if they can organize any kind of half-court game.

The knee-jerk when the offenses aren’t in sync is for the ball to go up from three-point-land in the Mike D’Antoni style of “Seven Seconds of Less.” That concept calls for a shot to go up before the defense gets back. In other words, get the shot when the 24-second shot clock reads … 18-17. Last February, Steph Curry hit (16) three-pointers, shooting 16-of-27 from behind the arc. He had 50 points.

The number(s) to beat are (90) attempts by Team LeBron in 2019 when the game had a record (167) three-point field goal attempts. Sheesh.

TID-BITS: A copy of “How Basketball Can Save the World,” by David Hollander magically appeared in the mailbox of WWYI on Friday. Funny how that happens, isn’t it? Upon a quick flip today, the book looks like a job very well done. I can’t wait to find time to delve deep and read every syllable, then re-read it all again. First thought was that the book should be REQUIRED reading for every collegiate Sociology and Sports Business Management class in the world. More to come.

They call them “The Joker(s)” because American fans have trouble pronouncing Denver Nuggets’ MVP candidate Nikola Jokic or tennis great Novak Djokovic who will face “the Greek Tzatziki” in Stefanos Tsitsipas at 3:30am (ET) this morning. Set your alarm clock or your iPhone alarms.

QUARTERLY REPORT: As will be the custom – as often as a quarterly basis, the investment wing of WWYI Enterprises will reveal its most recent plays in the market. Some are successful while others are not. We tip our hat and tap our ice hockey sticks to our mentor in the investment world, Ralph Kramden. Old Ralph boy made significant investments in a few beauties. Here are just a few:

  • No Cal Pizza
  • A Parking Lot Next to the Movie Theatre (How would he know it was a Drive-In)?
  • The Handy Housewife Helper (MUST WATCH here)

Here’s our Quarterly Portfolio:

  • Sizable Investment in a new Theatrical Show: Chartreuse Man Group
  • 10,000 Shares in: The Fire-and-Brimstone Tire Company
  • 100,000 Shares in: The Lava Fence (*clinical trial failed in Hawaii)
  • Controlling interest in Oscar Madison Square Garden Network

ONE SMALL STEP FOR HOMA, ONE GIANT LEAP for the PGA TOUR: Did you see the clip of PGA Tour pro Max Homa walking toward his ball on the 13th hole at Torrey Pines? If not, watch this and I’ll pick it up “on the other side.”

Twitter avatar for @GolfonCBS

Golf on CBS ⛳ @GolfonCBS
Mic’d up Max Homa ‼️🎤 “If I can hit this thing to 5 feet then I’m too good to be only 7 under.” 😂
HOME MIC’D UP:

First, let’s credit Max Homa for his participation and willingness to do an interview DURING his round of professional golf.

Secondly, credit the top notch interview skills of newly crowned golf commentator Trevor Immelman who made his CBS lead commentator debut this week. Add, equal praise for both Ian Baker-Finch and Frank Nobilo. With all three, the line of questioning was perfect for both a 1-handicap or a newcomer to the game of golf.

With the pressure applied to the PGA Tour by the LIV golf circuit, there will be more and more interaction with the PGA Tour players during their rounds, in addition to the usual before or after. It seems the players, as a group, realize the stakes have been raised and this is the time to forge cooperation with the Tour’s network partners.

Meanwhile, LIV Golf settled for a US television deal with the CW Network and moved their final event from Miami to Jeddah (Saudi Arabia) to take place November 3-5 – a good two months after the PGA Tour crowns its FEDEx CUP champion at the TOUR Championship to be played at East Lake in Atlanta (before the NFL season kicks-off).

WE LOVE THE TEAM VALUATIONS, HERE’s to the EPL:

Again, tip of the cap to our friends at Sportico for the hard work that goes into making these valuations, here’s the list of the Top 5 English Premier League clubs:

  1. Manchester United – $5.95 billion
  2. Liverpool – $4.71 billion
  3. Manchester City – $4.43 billion
  4. Arsenal – $3.6 billion
  5. Chelsea – $3.47 billion

The “average” Major League Soccer (MLS) franchise is worth $582 million. Not too shabby.

Parting Words

I DO NOT know where to start, so I’ll wing it on a topic far too important to take lightly. Better said, I’ll just try to do my best:

It wasn’t until about 2008 or so when I really learned there are some bad people in this everyday world, all with a single common denominator of evil overtaking them and their minds and actions. It’s prevalent in every single workplace, every field, every industry, in every single corner of the earth. Why? I do not know.

It took me 48 years to understand it and much was taught to me by my friend and former NBA colleague, Bob Delaney, who faced certain evils as a New Jersey State Trooper at the ripe age of 23, as he went undercover to try to bust up a major crime syndicate on the Jersey side of the Hudson. He wrote of it in his book, COVERT, recently re-printed as demand continued for a good true-crime book. Bob stressed they were just a bunch of “regular guys” who would bump off a delivery truck on the way to attend a First Holy Communion ceremony and then meet-up with each other for a Sunday family party.

Yes, I had heard about it. Yes, I had watched it unfold but as psuedo-comedy shows or motion pictures, such as “The Sopranos” or “Goodfellas.” I’d never heard it “live” like we saw on tape from a light pole in Memphis Friday night.

We – at the NBA – had a criminal rogue referee betray all we had done in our basketball lives, a wonderful force of like-minded people were all spreading the basketball gospel. Until THUD. A ref and his high school ‘friends” betting on the games. “GUILTY,” said the Judge.

“There are bad guys everywhere,” said Delaney to me as I was shaken to the core by someone who would undermine our game and all the work that was put-in over the years.

That basketball moment was important to me at the time, but this… this disgrace in Memphis … this total undermining of the entire law enforcement society built to protect us all … is disgusting and CRIMINAL.

Yes, I believe in the “innocent until proven guilty by a jury of your peers,” but damn, it’s on tape.

So, let the justice system do its job. The big Blue Shield has been exposed once again, evil overtaking the good of all the people of Memphis. The people who need their police to protect them, not kick them to death.

It burns me (and everyone on the right side of the law) up. It undermines and disappoints us to the highest degree possible.

What’s left? What can we do other than to pray for the people of Memphis, for the deceased (Mr. Tyre Nichols) and his family. Pray for peace and justice in Memphis at this precise time in our nation’s sorely blemished history.

Pray for healing. It’s not the answer but simply a remedy for the growing illness of evil.

TL’s Sunday Sports Notes | Jan 22

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While We’re Young (Ideas) | Time Flies for Patriots and Sox

By TERRY LYONS

BOSTON – Glance over your shoulder and 2018 doesn’t seem all that long ago. But five years in the NFL equates to a player’s career counted in dog years and Blake Bortles, Leonard Fournette and the Jacksonville Jags laying a 28-14 whoopin’ on the Pittsburgh Steelers is a long way back.

The Steelers battled back that January and Jaguars squeaked by to face the vaunted Patriots defeated Jacksonville, 24-20 to win the AFC Championship on January 21, 2018. The National Football League “Goliaths” somehow lost to the Philadelphia Eagles, 41-33, that February but would bounce back a year later to win their second Super Bowl title in three years, their sixth title in the Tom Brady–Bill Belichick era.

Since then, the Jags built, re-built, sucked and re-built again with two of the best young players in the game today. Tanking a la carte.

How fragile it can be in the NFL.

Over at the old ballpark, the Boston Red Sox won four World Series titles from 2004 to 2018, that magical year at Fenway. Steve Pearce was the World Series and Mookie Betts was the MVP of the American League just five years ago.

A lifetime ago in Major League Baseball years, free agency and all. Old Dog years.

We have just 22 days until Pitchers & Catchers report to spring training and the scouting reports for the Sox project another possible last place finish in the AL East, a division loaded with talent, from the 99-win New York Yankees seemingly on the way up to the Wild Card holders Tampa Bay and Toronto to the immensely talented Baltimore Orioles, winners of 83 games last season.

The 2023 Sox?

One can predict ahead to the strength of a baseball team by looking straight up the middle. For Boston, because of the loss of SS Xander Bogaerts to free agency to the oft-injured Trevor Story, the men-in-the-middle will be challenged. Take a quick look at the depth chart:

  • Catcher: Reese McGuire
  • 2B: Christian Arroyo
  • SS: Kiké Hernandez
  • CF: Rob Refsnyder
  • SP: Chris Sale; Corey Kluber, Nick Pivetta and – maybe – James Paxton

Suspect, at best. Cellar-dwellers, at worst.

So what do those stubborn and spoiled New Englanders do for their sports fix in 2023?

The Boston Bruins of the NHL are a league leading 36-5-4 with a whopping 76 points through 45 games (not including Saturday night). The Bruins are 8-1-1 in their last 10 games and an astonishing 21-1-3 at TD Garden, never a fortress of Ws.

Bruins goalkeeper Linus Ullmark of Sweden is the favorite for the league’s Vezina Trophy for best goaltending with his 1.89 goals against average and his .937 save percentage, both figures topping NHL goaltenders.

Forward David Pastrnak leads Boston in scoring with 63 points, good enough to rank T-4th in the NHL. Pastrnak has 35 goals and seems to be warming up after a bit of a slow start to the 2022-23 season. Forwards Brad Marchand and team captain Patrice Bergeron returned for injuries, Bergeron was considering retirement as his longtime goalkeep Tuukka Raskhad decided to hang-up the skates in ‘22.

Forwards David Krejci (1,000 games into his career) and left wings Taylor Hall and Jake DeBrusk have picked up the scoring to round-out a very consistent offense – both home and on the road.

Some of this might be news to out-of-towners, but for Bostonians the buzz for a busy April-May-and possibly-June surround the Garden.

Across the Hall, the same goes for the Boston Celtics, league leaders in W-Ls, winners of nine-of-ten and nine in a row after gutting out a 121-118 OT win over the visiting Golden State Warriors on Thursday and a 106-104 win over Toronto on Saturday, January 21st, in a game that stayed locked at the final score for the final 1:13.

Celtics forward Jayson Tatum is in a four player race for league MVP, along with international stars Nikola Jokic, Giannis Antetokounmpo, and Luka Doncic, an amazing stat considering only 25% of the NBA player rosters consist of international players. Joel Embiid of Philly by way of Cameroon, might be a distant fifth in the race.

The Celtics, after a 2022 NBA Finals loss to Golden State last summer, are primed, deep and ready for the next step. Only injuries might stand in their way and they are coming quite often. Of late, guard Marcus Smart, last season’s Defensive Player of the Year, and Robert Williams are both sidelined as of Saturday. Smart left the Cs game against the Raptors with an injured ankle while Williams Saturday hyperextended the same left knee he had surgery upon last March. Tatum has been playing through a sore left wrist and might skip some time as he did against the Raptors.

It’s a ways until the NBA All-Star Week in Salt Lake City and the NHL All-Star Game in sunny Sunrise, Florida. Until the mid-season classics are in the book and the dog-days of March play-out, the NBA and NHL playoff seedings are very much up for grabs. Only the health of the players can determine success come springtime.

HERE NOW, THE NOTES: Front Office Sports delved into the wonderful world of Pickleball after Major League Pickleball (we’re not joking) unveiled its A-list team of investors for its 24-team league. KC Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes is in on the action as are tennis stars Naomi Osaka and Chris Evert, nevermind supermodel and adidas influencer Heidi Klum.

Other investors include Major League Baseball pitcher Justin Verlander and his wife, the model and actress Kate Upton, German soccer star Mesut Ӧzil, former National Basketball Association stars Jeremy Lin and Dirk Nowitzki, and former NFL wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald

Major League Pickleball also unveiled its final two franchises to be added to the league, with the St. Louis Shock and Orlando Squeeze joining ahead of the 2023 tournament/season starting this month.

The addition of the two new teams completes the expansion to 24 teams that the league announced in December. The Shock’s ownership group will be headed by Richard Chaifetz and his son Ross, while Ryan DeVos will front he new ownersship group of the Squeeze.

The DeVos family, who own the NBA’s Orlando Magic and Major League Soccer’s Orlando City, invested in the newly formed Pro Volleyball Federation through an ownership group for a new franchise in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

TID-BITS: New York-based venture capital firm Courtside Ventures is now launching its third fund, focusing on early-stage companies involved in sports, digital media, fitness and gaming. Courtside announced a new raise of $100m – much from current NBA team ownership groups.

NBA POWER RATINGS: This listing should probably await the NBA All-Star break, but here’s an early look as the second half of the season fast approaches:

  1. Boston Celtics
  2. Denver Nuggets
  3. Milwaukee Bucks
  4. Memphis Grizzlies
  5. Philadelphia 76ers
  6. Brooklyn Nets (injuries a factor)
  7. Sacramento Kings (winners of six straight)
  8. New Orleans Pelicans
  9. Cleveland Cavaliers
  10. Dallas Mavericks

Perennial NBA playoff qualifiers, like the Miami Heat, Golden State Warriors, Phoenix Suns, LA Clippers and Lakers, Toronto Raptors and Utah Jazz, might be in trouble.

The upcoming NBA Trading Deadline (Thursday, February 9) could put some intrigue in the air around stalled franchises, like hot-start Portland (10-4 start, now sitting at 21-24).

NCAA MEN’S BASKETBALL POWER: The men’s college basketball conference championships and “March Madness” are on the horizon. Teams in the BIG 10, ACC, BIG EAST, Big 12 & Pac 12, SEC, American Athletic (just Houston, really), and the West Coast Conference (figuring Gonzaga will be there in the long haul) are all battling it out within conference. Here’s a short list of the teams to watch through the end of February

  1. Purdue
  2. Houston
  3. Kansas
  4. Alabama
  5. UCLA
  6. Xavier
  7. Texas
  8. Gonzaga
  9. Tennessee
  10. Virginia
  11. Arizona
  12. Iowa State
  13. Kansas State
  14. UConn
  15. TCU
  16. Auburn

There’s still a VERY long way to go. Don’t turn your backs on Duke, North Carolina, Marquette, Miami, Clemson and Providence. It’s 49 days until Selection Sunday.

NHL POWER RATINGS: Lastly, a quick look at the NHL’s best:

  1. Boston Bruins
  2. Carolina Hurricanes
  3. Toronto Maple Leafs
  4. New Jersey Devils
  5. Tampa Bay Lightning
  6. Dallas Stars
  7. Winnipeg Jets
  8. Seattle Kraken
  9. Vegas Golden Knights
  10. New York Rangers

Look out for those Rangers, while the Kings, Oilers, Caps, Wild, Penguins, Calgary and Avalanche are all within the realm of Stanley Cup Playoffs contenders in 2023.

While We’re Young (Ideas) is a weekly Sunday Sports Notebook & Column, written by Terry Lyons. Each notebook harkens back to the days when you’d walk over to the city newsstand on Saturday night around 10pm to pick-up a copy of the Sunday papers. Inside, just waiting, was a sports-filled compilation of interesting notes, news, quotes and quips. TL’s Sunday Sports Notes – brought to you by Digital Sports Desk.

TL’s Sunday (Mostly) Sports Notes

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While We’re Young (Ideas) Examines “The Garden”

By TERRY LYONS

NEW YORK – Do you have a reuooooommme? (a.k.a. a room or, in German, zimmer).

I have a favorite reuoooooommme in New York City. It’s located atop Pennsylvania Station, 31st-to-33rd Street between Seventh and Eighth Avenue. It comes with a view and memories. More memories than the human mind can hold. It’s the World’s Greatest Arena and that’s no exaggeration. From when we all can remember as a little kids, the boxing publicity and great Public Address man, the late John Condon, reminded me of the fact. Condon was right every time.

Madison Square Garden is my favorite place in the world, edging out Fenway Park in Boston and the towns of Chatham and Osterville, and my home sweet home near Boston, Massachusetts. Fenway Park is a gift, one of only two neighborhood and old-time ballparks remaining with Wrigley Field in Chicago being the other.

Fenway is my happy place, whether the Red Sox are World Series Champions or cellar-dwellers. You can count on Fenway and you can count on baseball every spring and summer. Sometimes Fenway Park switches from baseball to college football or to its Summer Concert Series. If you can see the likes of Paul McCartney on a nice summer night at Fenway, just do it.

The high ratings for the two Cape Cod towns is self explanatory for anyone who has set foot on our sandy jewels, on the coast. The only place that can compete in the Northeast is Ditch Plains in Montauk.

But that brings us back to New York and the Garden. In fact, you can step on a Long Island Rail Road train in the town of Montauk and ride all the way (117 miles) to the engineering wonder of Penn Station and The Garden. Even on the coldest day of winter, if you run from your car to the train, you don’t even need a coat, as you can take a series of escalators and steps right to the ticket windows at MSG. State the same for hundreds of other routes – whether they be Metro North, Subways from the Bronx to the far reaches of Brooklyn or Queens – fans can get to The Garden.

Which brings me to this week’s notes column and Friday night’s Billy Joel Concert. The Garden just announced that this July’s concert by the Bronx-born, Hicksville, Long Island reared Joel is scheduled to be his 92nd monthly and 138th all-time performance at Madison Square Garden. He’s been playing his monthly residence at The Garden since January 2014 – nine years ago – and says he’ll keep playing “as long as the demand continues.” The shows sell out utilizing every inch, never mind seat in the building and come complete with “Garden-sized” ticket prices ($97.00-to-$1,090.60+) and $20.00 a beer pops to the wallet which ring-up more money in one night than Joel made in many of his years climbing to a 1999 Rock Hall of Fame inductee.

He’s won everything from Grammys to TONYs to Kennedy Center honors to American Music Awards, among many others.

So why all the fuss about Billy Joel in a Sports Notes column? Joel has played Citified, Yankees and Shea Stadiums, the latter the venue for a terrific show (and DVD), “The Last Play at Shea.” He’s played Fenway, Wrigley and Camden Yards. He’s even played the Notre Dame Stadium and the Melbourne Cricket Grounds in Australia. You name the ballpark, and he’s sold-it-out and some. Throughout 2023, he’ll play a series of outdoor shows with Fleetwood Mac’s siren and songstress, Stevie Nicks, including a summertime stop at Gillette Stadium in Foxboro. His only European stop this summer will be at Hyde Park in London.

Joel’s Friday night show at MSG joins a long list of personal favorite moments at a personal favorite place.

But, taking it a step further, here’s a couple listings of my personal favorite moments at MSG, a list that might fluctuate, depending on my old but vivid memories “from when I wore a younger man’s clothes.”

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TL’s List of Favorite Madison Square Garden Memories: Yes, I was there!

  • The 1971 National Invitational Tournament is a great way to start my two lists as it was the first time I stepped foot in the “new” Garden which opened in February 1968. St. John’s and 15 other highly ranked college basketball teams played first round, quarter-finals, semi-finals and finals, all at MSG. We attended most sessions, with my oldest brother, the late Timothy Lyons usually driving to Queens Plaza in Elmhurst and then taking the subway (now the “R” train) into the City. We saw a young Julius Erving and UMass, a strong Providence Friars with Coach (the late) Dave Gavitt and Ernie D (DiGregorio), and semi-finalists Duke and St. Bonaventure along with finalists Georgia Tech vs. North Carolina with Coach (the late) Dean Smith with LI Lutheran’s Bill Chamberlaingaining NIT MVP honors for Carolina. (March 1971)
  • A year later, St. John’s reached the semi-finals of the 1972 NIT once again but lost in a two-point heartbreaker to Niagara while Tom McMillen took MVP honors for NIT champion Maryland, 31-point winners over Niagara in the final. (March 1972)
  • The Concert for New York stands out as a tremendous night. The show-stoppers were The Who with Roger Daltry, Pete Townshend, bass John Entwistle, drummer Zak Starkey (Ringo Starr’s son) and pinch-hitting keyboardist Jon Carin performing the greatest rock n’ roll set of the night and maybe a performance that can stand up historically to Freddie Mercury and Queen at Live Aid or Prince practicing at his Paisley Park studios on a Tuesday afternoon, not to mention his work center stage at Royal Albert Hall, playing “While My Guitar Gently Weeps,” in a tribute to The Beatles’ George Harrison. At the 2001 Concert for New York, only a month or so after the attack on the Twin Towers, The Who were forced to play mid-way through the show because Entwistle had previously booked a solo show at B.B. King’s in Times Square. There was no foolin’ around as The Who player four of their best songs, rocking a sold out Garden and providing thousands of Fire Fighters, Cops and other first responders a chance to sing, dance, applaud and smile for the first time since the night of September 10th that year. They played:
    • Who Are You?
    • Baba O’Riley
    • Behind Blue Eyes
    • Won’t Get Fooled Again

John “The Ox” Entwistle passed away suddenly in June 2002.

  • The 1998 NBA All-Star Game at The Garden is mostly remembered for then 19-year old Kobe Bryant (RIP) challenging game MVP Michael Jordan, but it’s on this list for a different reason. At the break, the NBA pulled off one, if not THE greatest sports halftime show of all-time when they shutdown Broadway and had the cast of every theatrical hit musical on hand and in full costume to do an incredible medley of songs. An impossible sound engineering miracle, it will never be repeated and was a “shake your head in disbelief moment” as King Wally, Mike Walczewski introduced The Broadway All-Stars. (MUST visit HERE).
  • A total luck-out delivered my all-time favorite New York Rangersmemory when longtime NYR goalkeeper, Eddie Giacomin, was waived by the team. As fate would have it, Giacomin was picked-up off waivers by the Detroit Red Wings and they were scheduled to play the Rangers at The Garden on Sunday, November 2, 1975 – two days after the waiver claim. Long before that, we had acquired four tickets – in the Greens – to the Red Wings at Rangers game. Giacomin, wearing a red No. 31 instead of his usual home white No. 1 for the Rangers, started in goal and the Rangers’ fans let it be known who they were rooting for that night. Giacomin led the Red Wings to a 6-4 win over the NYR while the MSG crowd rooted for Detroit all night long, even booing the Rangers who scored. As an Islanders fan, it just made my day.
  • St. John’s vs. Duke in a midseason double overtime thriller (January 24, 1999) became the best regular season game many of the players had ever competed in, and both coaches – Mike Krzyzewski of No. 2 Duke and the overmatched Mike Jarvis of the No. 8 Johnnies said the same. St. John’s swingman Bootsy Thornton was unstoppable, totaling 40 points but Duke, with Elton Brand (16-12 and 7) and company taking a 92-88 national televised victory back to Durham.
  • Syracuse defeated UConn (127-117) in a Six Overtime BIG EAST tournament nightcap which took 3 hours and 46 minutes to complete. The quarter-final victory vaulted Syracuse to a win vs. West Virginia on Friday night and to the Big East final when they lost to Louisville. The Orange did make the Sweet 16 of the NCAA’s before losing to Oklahoma. (March 12-13, 2009)
  • St. John’s won the 1983 BIG EAST Conference championship and Madison Square Garden became the home of the BIG EAST forever. The first year, 1980, the BIG East staged its conference tournament in Providence, much to the ease of Commissioner Dave Gavitt’s home office. Syracuse took the honors. The following two years, the season ending tourney was held at the Carrier Dome in Syracuse and the Hartford Civic Center, respectively. When Chris Mullin and the Johnnies won at The Garden, everyone in the conference knew something special was on hand. The BIG EAST tournament has been at MSG ever since and the long list of incredible games and memories is far too long for this column. It is – no doubt – my favorite event of the year.
  • More Concerts than I can even Remember: Yes, I feel both spoiled and fortunate at the same time, but concerts – like the 12-12-12 event for Sandy Hurricane relief, multiple shows featuring Eric Clapton, including a once in a lifetime CREAM show with Ginger Baker and Jack Bruce, both since passed away, tons of Bruce Springsteen, U2, multiple shows by the greatest band, The Rolling Stones (RIP Charlie), The Grateful Dead (once with Bruce Hornsby on the keyboards), R.E.M., Dave Matthews, Phil Collins, and, of course, The Allman Brothers.
  • The show that stands out the most? It’s U2 with a series of shows from October 24-27, 2001, 43 days after the terrorist attacks that took down the World Trade Center, Pentagon and killed good, innocent passengers and crew of Flight 93 in Shanksville, Ohio. When Bono grabbed his guitar, draped his microphone stand so delicately with the USA Flag, we knew it was coming. The simplest gesture of scrolling the name of every person killed by the terrorists on a black screen to the tunes of ONE which led into WALK ON brought us all to tears. U2 repeated the tribute at the 2002 NFL Super Bowl. It was powerful on the global stage, but seemingly intimate at The Garden. The greatest place in the world.

TL’s List of Favorite Madison Square Garden Memories: Seen on TV:

  • New York Knicks team captain Willis Reed limped out to the court to join his teammates in warm-ups, then start Game 7 of the 1970 NBA Championship. Reed hit his first two jumpers against Wilt Chamberlainand the Los Angeles Lakers sending The Garden into a frenzy never seen before or afterwards. Reed led the Knicks to a one-sided 113-99 victory, not scoring again in the game but lifting guard Walt Frazier’s confidence enough for Frazier to score 36 points with 19 assists and seven rebounds. (May 8, 1970)

Twitter avatar for @NBAHistory

@NBAHistory
“I think we see Willis coming out!” On May 8, 1970, Willis Reed fought through injury to start Game 7 in the @nyknicks‘ NBA Finals-clinching win over the Lakers at MSG. #NBAVault
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  • After losing the first game of the 1973 NBA Championship Series to the Los Angeles Lakers, the New York Knicks took four straight games, including two at The Garden. The defensive-minded Knicks with six Hall of Fame players on the roster and Red Holzman as coach, won 87-83 and 103-98 to win the title, the first for Jerry Lucas and Earl “The Pearl” Monroe. (May 6 & 8, 1973)
  • The Knicks scored the final 19 points of the game with a 19-0 run to defeat the Milwaukee Bucks, 87-86. Earl Monroe led New York with 22 points as the Knicks outscored defending champion Bucks with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, 29-to-12 in the final quarter. Afterward, NYK forward Bill Bradley said it was the first and only time in his life he could see “sound” as The Garden crowd rocked and prompted the victory. (November 18, 1972)
  • Smokin’ Joe Frazier defeated Muhammad Ali in “The Fight of the Century” at a jam packed, sold out Garden. (March 8, 1971)
  • New York Islanders forward J.P. Parise scored a goal (4-3) against the favored Rangers 11 seconds into overtime to eliminate the Rangers and advance the Isles in their best of three 1975 NHL Stanley Cup Playoff series. (April 11, 1975)
  • The many tremendous Knicks vs (then) Baltimore Bullets playoff series games, as a whole, stand out amongst my greatest memories of the NBA, and the Garden. Home court advantage mattered.

HERE NOW, THE NOTES: Geez? With the list above, do we even need “Notes” this weekend?

NFL POWER RANKINGS for the PLAYOFFS: Here’s my final list of the season and with it, are predictions for the 2023 Super Bowl participants:

  1. Kansas City Chiefs
  2. San Francisco 49ers
  3. Buffalo Bills
  4. Cincinnati Bengals
  5. Dallas Cowboys
  6. Philadelphia Eagles
  7. LA Chargers

That’s where we’ll draw the line.

PITCHERS & CATCHERS: We can begin the 30-day countdown. A notebook in the next 2-3 weeks will be dedicated to Major League Baseball, the Boston Red Sox, Free Agency thoughts and – maybe, just maybe a VERY early set of predictions.

Parting Words & Music

With the sudden passing of the great guitar legend, Jeff Beck (1944-2023), readers of this column will not be surprised that this week’s Parting Words & Music section of the weekly notes is dedicated to him. Beck died from a fatal case of bacterial meningitis, a dangerous disease which attacked the membranes of his brain and spinal cord. He was 78 years old.

Beck’s guitar influence is far reaching. He was made famous by joining the Yardbirds to replace the current greatest living guitarist and whole package, Eric Clapton and later when he teamed up with Rod Stewart in the Jeff Beck Band.

There were dozens upon dozens of essential Jeff Beck songs to choose from, each with guitar perfection. As you might expect, there’s a connection between the notebook leading this column and the song selected for this segment. “I couldn’t let the night go by without doing something by Jeff, said Joel as he played this gospel induced epic by Curtis Mayfield on Friday night, January 13, 202 at Madison Square Garden, my Roooooommme.

While We’re Young (Ideas) is a weekly Sunday Sports Notebook & Column, written by Terry Lyons. Each notebook harkens back to the days when you’d walk over to the city newsstand on Saturday night around 10pm to pick-up a copy of the Sunday papers. Inside, just waiting, was a sports-filled compilation of interesting notes, news, quotes and quips. TL’s Sunday Sports Notes – brought to you by Digital Sports Desk.

A “reeeuuucooooommme” with a Dog:

Guten Tag

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TL’s Sports Notebook | Jan. 8th

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While We’re Young (Ideas) on NFL, Damar Hamlin and Tons of Notes

By TERRY LYONS

BOSTON – Staying in the moment. It’s the sports equivalent of being cool. Staying cool and calm. The term is usually uttered by coaches who preach to their players to worry about the next play and not to look back at a missed opportunity, a missed shot, a missed field goal from the third quarter. When the game is on the line, stay in the moment.

The Buffalo Bills and the Cincinnati Bengals are the two up & coming, rock solid AFC teams, challenging the proud and proven Kansas City Chiefs. Last Monday night, with the Bengals leading the Bills, 7-3, with about six minutes remaining in the first quarter of an incredibly important NFL game, the world stopped for Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin.

A few of the players on the field panicked and screamed for help. The ESPN Monday Night Football crew froze and did their best to keep an commentary to a minimum and, unfortunately – FILL TIME. To their credit, there was zero speculation.

Truly staying in the moment were the combination of:

  • The Buffalo Bills’ athletic training team
  • The Cincinnati Bengals’ athletic trainers
  • The visiting team Emergency Response Unit

As the unimaginable horror played out from television cameras right into our TV or living rooms, the medial team(s) stayed in the moment and responded in a matter of seconds. Then, they did their jobs. They worked as a cohesive unit, well trained and executing immediate, life-saving mechanisms to quickly revive Damar Hamlin.

Damar Hamlin, Safety, Buffalo Bills

At the time, it was unbeknownst to Hamlin’s teammates and opponents, to a Paycor Stadium crowd of 65,515+ and a MNF record national television audience of 23.8 million, but the medical teams were performing life-saving CPR and utilizing a cardioversion machine (defibrillator) to spark Hamlin’s heart back to rhythm after his cardiac arrest episode.

Although ESPN opted NOT to show a replay, other news outlets (CBS the next morning, CNN and others) showed the brute force of Bengals wide-receiver Tee Higgins (6-4, 219 lbs) out of Clemson barreling through the line. Hamlin made a move, then a football play to make a tackle of the wide-receiving version of NFL freight train Derrick Henry, a running back for the Tennessee Titans. It was a play performed 1,000 times a season but on Monday Night, the timing and positioning of the impact, combined with the milli-second timing of Hamlin’s heartbeat created the catastrophic series of events.

From the field, the transportation to the nearby University of Cincinnati Medical Center where trauma teams were notified and ready to respond. All in a matter of seconds – on the field – and minutes once the Bills-Bengals-and-EMS services stabilized Hamlin. All of that precious speed obviously saved his life. The medical team stayed in their moment, did their jobs and, much to their credit, not a word was uttered to fuel speculation to the national audience.

Hamlin’s immediate family was at the game, so they were getting confidential first-hand information. Media hustled to UC Medical Center but were asked to report from blocks away from the Emergency Room, thoughtfully as no one could predict another trauma situation in progress from another part of town.

The key elements from the night:

  • Everyone, from teammates and opponents to coaches to fans to the NFL kept the life of Damar Hamlin as their first and only priority. Even geeks in Fantasy sports leagues put the player first.
  • That fact resonated everywhere. Everyone did the right thing, especially the medical teams.
  • Cincinnati Bengals ticket holders filed out of the Stadium, many in small prayer vigils – all in full understanding of the severity and importance of the situation.
  • Bills fans filed out as well, in shock and worried. Bengals fans walked with them arm-in-arm, in silence.
  • Almost immediately, a charity Toys for Kids fund that Hamlin had started this winter saw donations flowing in so fast, they brought a $3,900 fund balance to $8,327,000 in a matter of four days. Most of the donations are not rounded to zero, but finish with a three – Hamlin’s uniform number. Some donations are $3,333.

While he remains in critical condition, and that is never to be overlooked, Hamlin’s medical team has been encouraged with day-by-day improvement and medical proof of positive neurology and all movement. The news also included a sign that every competitor in the world related to, right away.

Hamlin’s first question, once heart support and breathing tubes were removed and he could speak free of any medical machinery, was the question that proved why the University of Pittsburgh product from McKees Rocks, PA – a town of 5,920 in Western Pennsylvania – is a coach’s dream.

“Did we win?”

The Red Panda was at Boston College for the BC v Duke game

HERE NOW, THE NOTES: When the Red Panda unpacked her unicycle at Conte Forum in Chestnut Hill, the fans of Boston College basketball knew it was a big game. The Duke Blue Devils were in town and Conte was sold-out, although with the student body home on Christmas break rather than boarding at The Heights, many fans wore Duke blue rather than BC’s maroon and gold.

Saturday, Boston College (8-8, 2-3) had a legitimate chance to beat ACC rival and blue blood Duke (12-4, 3-2), ranked No. 16 in the nation in men’s college basketball. Duke’s Kyle Filipowski made the difference when he drained two free throws for a 65-64 advantage with 0:12 seconds remaining.

BC’s final play ran amok and Makai Ashton-Langford missed a jumper and a scramble and ridiculous and unnecessary Duke inbounds play allowed BC a final desperation heave by BC’s 7-footer Quintin Post which rattled off the backboard.

These are the games a team like Duke wins. Under new coach Jon Scheyer, the Blue Devils shot 89.5% from the free throw line as they shot 17-of-19, indicative of an afternoon of powering it inside to take advantage of mis-matches and height advantages. BC shot a respectable 85.7% from the line but shot only 6-of-7 because of perimeter jump shots rather than any success of working an inside game against their conference opponent.

The color commentator cliches of controlling the boards, limiting turnovers, winning the contest for 50-50 balls and hitting free throws proved correct. In fact, BC forced 15 Duke turnovers while the Eagles kept their TOs to nine.

Duke finds a way to win and winning an ACC game on the road is a major accomplishment. Don’t be surprised if the Blue Devils are in the ACC Tournament finals and play deep into March as they continue to improve throughout January and February.

ALL THE ROWDY FRIENDS ARE HERE FOR MONDAY NIGHT: When Georgia faces upstart TCU on Monday night for the college football national championship, Georgia coach Kirby Smart will be looking at the typical W-L barometers as the difference-makers. What will he he look for in his team in such an important game? “Well, the same thing it does in every football game — who can control the line of scrimmage, who can be explosive, who doesn’t turn the ball over.

“The game never changes. You just have more cameras here. You have more people viewing, bigger stage, a lot further away from home. But football’s football. And our guys prepare for that – really – all year. So we’ve got to go play a really, really good football team and we’ll have to play one of our best games of the year to be able to compete.”

It’s that simple and that difficult to win a national championship.

TO TANK OR NOT TO TANK: While most NFL fans will be scoreboard watching for home field advantages, higher playoff seeds or “win and in” scenarios in the NFL’s final week of play, the fans of the Houston Texans (2-13-1, .156) and the Chicago Bears (3-13-0, .188) will be watching for the position to hold the No. 1 pick in the NFL Draft. … While the NBA and the NHL have moved to Lottery events to include multiple clubs to determine the top pick in their respective drafts, the NFL lets it ride. May the worst team win, tank or no tank. … Chicago hosts NFC North rival Minnesota with the Vikings (-7). … Meanwhile Houston is on the road to a (4-11-1) Indianapolis Colts team, nearly as inept as the Bears/Texans crew. Houston is getting (+2.5) points but the chances of them winning and dropping the No. 1 pick is one in a million.

TL’s New Year’s Sports Notes | Jan. 1 ’23

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By TERRY LYONS

BOSTON – I had a dream. No, I’m not ripping-off the historic civil rights speech of August, 1963 by the late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. because I really had a dream this week. It was nowhere near as visionary as Dr. King’s speech and its plot was not prophetic. In fact, the dream speaks as much of times gone by but it might illustrate hopes for the future.

I rarely remember my dreams. They are always as clear as Cristal Brut Champagne upon my awakening, but then, the scene and story is gone in an instant. Some say it’s what those who suffer from dementia or amnesia experience everyday of their lives. That complex and fragile human brain of ours, it’s as frightening as it is amazing.

Tuesday, I awoken fresh from a scene of a major motion picture being played out with only once screen in the world, in my sleepy but active mind. I was at the airport and ready to board a plane, a connection home from being on Air Force One where I sat with former First Lady Michele Obama. President Joe Biden and President Barack Obama were attending to other things as we (an NBA entourage) returned from staging another international exhibition game and a series of Basketball without Borders clinics.

The location wasn’t clear but from the mood on AF1, it was quite a successful trip.

We were all in the present, but the scene invoked personal memories of days of future past, days that don’t seem possible with recent foreign relations gone so bad between the United States and China and with Russia versus the countries of the free world. Not all that long ago, we experienced great days of government diplomacy side-by-side with sports diplomacy.

Ping pong diplomacy began in the very early 1970s and continued until 1972 when thenUSA President Richard Nixon made a trip to China in an attempt to establish relations and gain leverage toward negotiating a peace settlement in Viet Nam. The NBA joined the effort in 1979 when the then-Washington Bullets – the reigning NBA champions – accepted an invitation from China’s leader Deng Xiaoping to play two summertime exhibition games in Shanghai and Beijing. The trip came just months after then-USA President Jimmy Carter made efforts to ease tension in the region. The Bullets/Wizards celebrated the effort 30 years later with a return to China spearheaded by franchise governor Abe Pollin.
NBA China Games of 2004 (Getty Images)

The NBA continued its efforts for international relations with multiple players association summer trips to conduct clinics and the NBA reciprocating with a full month-long training effort with the 1985 NBA China Friendship Tour, a combination of practices led by Red Auerbach, Pete Newell, Ed Badger and Bill Blair, along with a full schedule of scrimmages featuring the Chinese National Team against NBA clubs,  including an early glimpse of a rookie named Michael Jordan, during training camps.

Now, with Russia at war with Ukraine, it seems impossible and so long ago that the NBA was helping young basketball players representing the then-USSR National Team mature inviting six players to attend the Atlanta and Los Angeles summer leagues to team-up with franchise owner Ted Turner’s Atlanta Hawks in the summer of 1987, a few months before the NBA staged its first McDonald’s Open exhibition in Milwaukee with the same USSR National Team, Tracer of Milan (Italy) and the host Bucks.

In 1988, it was the Hawks, once again, furthering the Glasnost efforts of Russia’s with the late Mikhail Gorbachev a few years before the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union and eventual independence for Lithuania, Estonia, and Latvia in the Baltics, along with dozens of other break-away countries, many with basketball players who once competed for the USSR.

It seemed the NBA’s version of glasnost was paving the way for Soviet glasnost and players such as Arvydas Sabonis, Sarunas Marciulionis, Alexander Volkov, Sergei Bazarevich, Yaroslav Korolev and Andrei Kirilenko found there way to NBA rosters soon after. Volkov, the minister of sport for the Ukraine, is now enlisted in the army and fighting for his country.
When Lithuania gained independence, they fielded a Bronze Medal team at the Olympics Games in Barcelona, Spain (file photo)

By 2001, the NBA and FIBA (the International Federation for Fasketball) worked together to reunite the provinces which made up the former country of Yugoslavia – a national team that played as one in the 1988 McDonald’s Open in Madrid, Spain. During that time, a war tore apart Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Montenegro, Serbia, and Macedonia. The 2001 Basketball without Borders camp reunited the young campers with NBA players who had not competed together since the 1990 FIBA Worlds.

A year later, the same concept worked to bring together players from Greece and Turkey, at a July 4-7, 2002 camp staged in Istanbul.

By 2004, it was back to China for the historic NBA China Games with 7-4, No. 1 draft pick Yao Ming playing for the Houston Rockets. By 2006, the LA Clippers played a pair of games in Moscow, an exhibition now impossible to imagine.

When you total it up, the NBA has played 155 exhibition games against international teams and 33 regular season games outside the US and Canada. There’ll be another this season when the Bulls and Pistons head to Paris on January 19th.

The 188+ games certainly spread the basketball gospel around the world, helped fuel enough talent to make-up 25% of the NBA’s players while driving the league’s television and consumer products to a global audience of fans.

Looking back at Tuesday’s dream, one can only hope it was the return trip of a world peace conference rather than merely a basketball game or clinic. But as Dr. King said in his famous speech, “Let us not wallow in the valley of despair. I say to you, my friends, we have the difficulties of today and tomorrow.”

With just a little help of a bouncing basketball, unrealistic as it is, the wish for 2023 is for WORLD PEACE to ring throughout the Continents this New Year.

HERE NOW, THE NOTES: As WABC-TV great Roger Grimsby might say … some general and sports business notes to bring in the New Year of 2023.

LOOK BACK AT 2022 FROM WWYI: Here’s just a few key things we were writing about in 2022:

January 2022:

  • Jan. 2 – Happy New Year
    • Lucky “7” DIGGIES of Sports
    • Fix/Six for MLB
  • Jan. 9 – Beijing ‘22
    • NBA LaunchPad ‘22
    • Willie O’Ree Jersey Retirement
  • Jan. 16 – FIBA InterContinental Cup
    • NLL Records (Dan Dawson)
    • SONY Open – PGA Tour
  • Jan. 23 – Tribute to NYI No. 9 – Clark Gillies – RIP
  • Jan. 30th – Tom Brady Retired from NFL (only to return)

February 2022

  • Feb. 6 – 10th Year Anniversary of Linsanity
    • Jose Paneda Won National Sports Media (1st ever Hispanic)
  • Feb. 13 – Bruins G Tuukka Rask Retired
    • LA Rams vs Cincy Bengals Super Bowl Preview
  • Feb. 20 – MLB Lockout Becomes Reality – No Spring Training
    • Greatest Voices in Rock History
    • March Madness Preview
  • Feb. 27 – Russia Invaded Ukraine; Ex-ATL Hawks forward Volkov off to War

March 2022

  • March 6 – PGA TOUR Player Impact Program
    • Brittney Griner Detained in Russia
  • March 13 – BIG EAST Tourney at MSG
    • Winningest Coaches (Gregg Popovich Joins List)
  • March 20 – “Winning Time” Loses
    • Jerry West defended from Coast-to-Coast
  • March 27 – March Madness
    • Move4Heather – Efforts to Raise $ for Cs Veep Heather Walker

April 2022

  • April 3 – Baseball is Back
    • *Coach K Retires from Duke
  • April 10 – Red Sox Home Opener/Boston Marathon
    • The Masters
  • April 17 – Sox Fans Hit Panic Button (They were correct!)
    • Kareem Enters Full Time Writing Gig
  • April 24 – Grim Reaper Hits NHL: Gillies, Bossy and LaFleur – RIP
    • Rumble Ponies!

May 2022

  • May 1 – Team Bullpen Perfect Games
    • Lefty vs The PGA Tour
  • May 8 – NBA Playoffs – NO More Bubble
    • Run for the Roses
  • May 15 – Big Bob Lanier – RIP
    • Sox in Basement
  • May 22 – SBJ Sports Business Awards
    • Anniversary of Jeffrey Goldberg’s 2019 Johns Hopkins speech

June 2022

  • June 5 – Boston’s Al Horford leads Celtics; Seeks Ring
    • Pro Sports Franchises = $2-$4 billion+
  • June 12 – Steph Curry/Coach Bob McKillop
    • NHL Stanley Cup to Colorado
  • June 19 – GS Warriors earn 2022 NBA Championship
    • PGA Tour vs. LIV golf rivalry and plot thickens
  • June 26 – 50th Anniversary of Title IX
    • SCOTUS Turn USA sports upside down

July 2022

  • July 3 – NBA Salary Cap – “Damn the Pandemic, Full Speed Ahead”
    • Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest
  • July 10 – Red Sox Season At the Half
    • Greg “The Shark” Norman in Shark-Infested waters with LIV
  • July 17 – MLB All-Star Game
    • The Open
  • July 24 – Baseball Hall of Fame Inductions
    • JJ Reddick Doubles Down on knucklehead viewpoint/ “Plumbers and Firemen” comment
  • July 31 – State of Boston Sports Report
    • MLB Trade Deadline

August 2022

  • August 7 – Bill Russell Passes; NBA Mourns
    • MLB Mourns passing of the great broadcaster Vin Scully
  • August 14 – Serena Williams – The GOAT At the US Open
    • 20 Year Impact of the USA Basketball Dream Team
  • August 21 – NWSL franchises Approach $100m value
    • PGA Tour FedEx Cup Playoffs Come down to the Final
  • August 28 – Red Sox 2022 Season is In the Dumps
    • Russian athletes blocked from Competitions

September 2022

  • September 4 – LIV in Boston
    • Boston College Football Season Lost in Week 1 (Rutgers wins at The Heights)
  • September 11 – Basketball Hall of Fame Inducts Manu Ginobili, others
    • Dick Ebersol Tribute at Basketball Hall of Fame
  • September 18 – Sports for Fun Weekend
    • Suns’ team owner Robert Sarver fined $10m and suspended
  • September 25 – The ‘window” to win a title
    • Robert Sarver of Phoenix meet Ime Udoka of Boston – Bye-bye

October 2022

  • October 2 – Ranking of NFL Fan bases
    • Various Basketball Halls of Fame / FIBA
  • October 9 – BC’s Red Bandana Legacy
    • Sports and Rock’s Most Underrated
  • October 16 – NHL Season Preview
    • Brentford futbol and “Hey Jude”
  • October 23 – Memories from 1969
    • NBA Preview and Predictions (Yes, GS was in there)
  • October 30 – NBA Discipline & Players, Teams
    • Dustin Johnson Pocketed $18m

November 2022

  • November 6 – College Basketball Preview
    • Houston Astros – World Series Champions
  • November 13 – MLB Free Agent Market
    • RIP – Jane Gross/Fred Hickman
  • November 20 – Giving Thanks in Sports
    • Willett’s Point NYFC Project – Good Luck in the Muck
  • November 27 – Sports Acronyms
    • MLB Free Agency Signings Begin

December 2022

  • December 4 – College Football Playoff Set
    • World Cup Preview – Qatar Concerns
  • December 11 – WNBA’s Brittney Griner Return to USA
    • BC vs BU Ice Hockey Rivalry
  • December 18 – Massachusetts Sports Gambling – Lawmakers Keep Waiting
    • Minnesota Vikings Record NFL Comeback
  • December 25 – Merry Christmas | Shelby Strother Message\
    • NBA Franchise Valuations
    • Record cold weather for NFL weekend

*STORY of the YEAR 2022 – The Retirement of Duke Coach Mike Krzyzewski

TL’s Christmas Notes: December 25th

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Longtime readers of my column will remember the reprint of this Christmas Day column by Shelby Strother of the Detroit News. It’s a keeper and really hits home as I remember trading the baseball mitts and pro footballs in for a typewriter and a Mylec Air Flow hockey stick. The column, along with dozens of others, is included in Saddlebags, a collection of Shelby’s favorites and his best from a career that spanned from Satellite Beach, Florida/Florida Today to the Denver Post to the Detroit News.

I’ve read this column at least a thousand times and enjoy it the same each and every time. Here’s hoping you do too.

After all, “Sometimes the gift is simply the freedom to imagine. There may be no greater one.”

Each Christmas Day Contains the Past, Present and Future

By SHELBY STROTHER

It did not matter that the wind-chill was life threatening. It was Christmas morning, and a bright sun stabbed the frozen land. And children were playing.

The decision over which to play with – the official World Cup soccer ball or the Turbo Football – never materialized. With all the snow, a soccer match was out of the question. So spirals of pink and black performed in the most sincere imitations of Rodney Peete and Joe Montana floated back and forth in the yard.

What a nice sight.

The Annual Second Chance is near – it’s called New Year’s Eve. It is the window of opportunity where the hopes and fears of all the year (not to mention the mistakes) can be erased.

But Christmas Day is a time of reinforcement and the essence of tomorrow. And children playing with toys are the finest examples of what that tomorrow looks like.

I look out the window. I’ve been in that yard. All youngsters have. Sports become such a part of childhood. Santa is aware of all of this, naturally.

This particular day is exquisite, I think to myself. I take personal inventory, not only of blessings and personal satisfaction, but of the presents of Christmas past. Still the kid, I suppose.

I got my first basketball when I was six. I made my first basket a year later. There was a tetherball set; I must have been eight. And a football helmet when I was ten. A Carl Furillo model baseball mitt at eleven. There were tennis rackets and fishing poles and boxing gloves and shrimp nets and a Mickey Mantle 32-inch Little League bat and one time, even a badminton set.

Every Christmas, I’d play out my dreams and my mind would fly over the rainbow, imagining my propulsion. Of course, I would become a major-leaguer, an All-Star, an all-time great, a Hall of Famer. We all would. My vision extended well beyond the day.

My athletic ability, alas, never kept stride. It was not the worst realization I would ever make.

But I have noticed a direct correlation between Christmas gifts and sporting dreams. The dreams are for the young. So are the gifts. Usually, the two disappear in unison. The rare few who project into greatness discover they do not need imagination to make those lofty flights of fantasy. Hope is not the co-pilot. Expectation is.

It must be a wonderful view.

I was thinking about all of this when another memory nudged me. My 17th Christmas I got a typewriter.

It was about the same time that I’d maneuvered my fantasy a few extra miles. I’d received a baseball scholarship to pitch at a small school in Florida. There were other opportunities, other colleges available. But none that would allow my athletic vision to continue.

I had expected a Christmas of more games in the yard. More dreams to celebrate. I got a typewriter instead.

“What am I going to do with a typewriter?” I asked.

My mother said I’d need it for college. But she also said, “Sometimes you get too old to play games. But you never get too old that you can’t use your imagination.”

Sometimes Christmas is taken for granted. Almost always, in fact. I think Christmas music, and I hear bells. I turn on the radio and I hear someone named Elmo and Patsy lamenting their grandmother’s head-on collision with a reindeer. I think of the meaning of Christmas, and I think of the most special birthday in the history of the world. But I turn on the TV and there are all these claymation raisins doing Doo-Wop homages to the joys of buying machines wherein a microchip can seize command of entire generations.

Christmas (will soon) be gone, 364 days to go. But children still play. They chase the wonderful image of themselves as they would like to be seen. Christmas is their favorite arena. But they settle for lesser stadia.

But remember this – the present is sometimes confused with the package it comes wrapped in. Sometimes the gift is simply the freedom to imagine. There may be no greater one.

It was a great typewriter. I still play with it.

– A column by Shelby Strother

*This column is, by far, my favorite column of all-time.

Here’s to the late Shelby Strother, his great wife, Kim, and a Merry Christmas to all.

###

Editorial Note: For those of you who did not know Shelby Strother, I pass these little tidbits along:

He was a very good friend. I’ve lost a father and an older brother. I’ve agonized and felt helpless as we’ve since watched close relatives and friends of the family pass away, but Shelby was the first good friend in my life who went and got cancer and then died. Sadly, as the years pass, many others have fallen to cancer and now to this terrible COVID-19 disease. My good buddy, my goalkeeper, Bob Rose, passed away from Prostate cancer few years ago and our dear friend, Mike Shalin, just passed away from brain cancer a year or so ago. The bottom line – CANCER SUCKS.

Back to Shelby… I can remember when we attended the 1991 NBA All-Star Game in Charlotte, NC. That Sunday night, he said that he didn’t feel well and was going to bed early. That was Feb. 10, 1991. The next month was a bad dream, each minute of every day for a solid month. Shelby died in the suburbs of Detroit on March 3, 1991, leaving his wife, Kim and two great little guys, Tommy and Kenny (the latter joined Shelby in heaven a few years back but that is a terrible fact of life to be told another day). Shelby grew up in the great State of Florida and loved it. I met him when he was a writer for the Denver Post. He went on to be a sports columnist for the Detroit News, but when big news – not sporting – was breaking and the News needed a writer, they sent Shelby. When the Berlin Wall was coming down, off went Shelby. … I could go on.

ONE THING LEARNED: It’s pretty tough to follow a column by Shelby Strother, but I’ll try by passing along some recent sports biz news and sports-related notes.

NBA TEAM VALUATIONS: A year ago, the New York Knicks held the top position when Sportico posted its estimated valuations of NBA franchises. This year, the Golden State Warriors have to top designation, although the proposed sale of the Phoenix Suns to Mat Ishbia for a cool $4 billion might up the franchise ante by a cool billion for each club. Here’s the Top Ten NBA Valuations for this year.

  1. Golden State Warriors – $7.56 billion
  2. New York Knickerbockers – $6.58 billion
  3. Los Angeles Lakers – $6.44 billion
  4. Chicago Bulls – $4.09 billion
  5. Boston Celtics – $3.92 billion
  6. Brooklyn Nets – $3.86 billion
  7. Los Angeles Clippers – $3.73 billion
  8. Toronto Raptors – $3.34 billion
  9. Houston Rockets – $3.30 billion
  10. Dallas Mavericks – $3.26 billion

For reference, the Dallas Mavericks entered the NBA as an expansion team in 1980-81 and were valued at $12.5 million by the NBA.

ADDING 1 +1 = $7.0 BILLION: With the Phoenix Suns going for a cool $4 billion, the purchase price of sports franchises around the world continues to surge. Here’s a look at the current market:

  1. Washington Commanders – Expected to fetch north of $7 billion says Dan Snyder
  2. Chelsea FC – Sold for $5.3 billion, highest club price on record as of Dec. 25, 2022
  3. Denver Broncos – Sold for $4.65 billion, highest NFL price tag ever.

WORDS FROM THE CAPT: Former Los Angeles Lakers and Milwaukee Bucks NBA champion Kareem Abdul-Jabbar has some very basic and realistic holiday advice. The retired NBA All-Star turned ace columnists recently posted: “This is the time of year when we all take stock of our lives. We feel grateful for those we love and who love us, yet we also are planning how we might improve. Now, those plans for more exercise and a sensible diet may fade with the melting snow, but that’s less important than the fact that we want to be better, he wrote.

“The holiday season energizes my main resolution—which is the same every year—to be kinder. One act of kindness a day may not change the big, wide world, but it changes me, and it changes my world.”

2022 WORLD CUP in the BOOKS; WHAT WILL HAPPEN TO SOCCER? The crowning of Argentina as the 2022 World Cup champions and the professional staging of the matches by Qatar gave the sport of Futbol a huge boost as the year ends. The momentum should help England’s Premiership with a bump in interest. … The question remains, ‘what will happen in the United States of America and Major League soccer?’

For Soccer Ventures, a media and company attempting to connect brands, players, fans, families and platforms to the diverse American soccer community through experiential events, completed a third consecutive year of record growth, expansion and engagement as 2022 turns to 2023.

For Soccer is planning additional expansion of its properties and partnerships, while the Futbol crowd anticipates the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023.

“While the just completed FIFA Men’s World Cup certainly helped raise awareness and engagement for soccer, it was just the culmination of a year where we saw partnerships soar everywhere from grassroots, to community impact and media, to brand engagement,” said Heath Pearce, President of For Soccer Ventures.

FIFA WOMEN’S NATIONAL TEAM RANKINGS: Heading into 2023, the United States leads all women’s futbol teams in the World Rankings compiled by FIFA. Here’s the Top Five from the list:

  1. United States – 2078.50
  2. Germany – 2073.73
  3. Sweden – 2057.90
  4. England – 2052.90
  5. France – 2025.85

The time zone will be a challenge for fans in the United States when the 2023 Women’s World Cup is staged in Australia and New Zealand but the enthusiasm from the 2022 World Cup will provide positive momentum for the women’s tournament which runs behind tennis, basketball, gymnastics, golf and figure skating in global popularity.

STICKING WITH THE RANKINGS: As long as we’re delving into World Rankings, bet you didn’t know that the United States men are no longer ranked Numero Uno in the sport of basketball. The most recent FIBA rankings are listed and the modus operandi is HERE

  1. Spain – 758.6
  2. USA – 757.5
  3. Australia – 740.3
  4. Argentina – 734.3
  5. France – 715.0

BIG EAST CHRISTMAS: Sure there are plenty of NBA and NFL games on Christmas but the BIG EAST is making a bold statement to compete against the big boys. For the first time in league history, the BIG EAST will play a conference game on Christmas Day. Creighton, the preseason BIG EAST favorite, will host DePaul at the CHI Health Center at 4:30pm ET on FOX. The game will follow FOX’s coverage of the Green Bay Packers at Miami Dolphins game.

Creighton is coming off a 78-56 win against Butler on Thursday. Center Ryan Kalkbrenner returned after a three-game absence and scored a game-high 19 points. All five Bluejays are averaging in double figures led by Kalkbrenner’s 16.2 mark. The Bluejays own a 7-6 overall record and a 1-1 BIG EAST mark. … The Blue Demons are 6-6 overall and 0-1 in the BIG EAST. Forward Javan Johnson ranks fourth in the league with a 16.9 scoring mark. Newcomer guard Umoja Gibson ranks first in steals (2.3), second in free throw shooting (.904) and fourth in assists (5.3). … Both schools are known to have played once previously on Christmas Day. DePaul played in 2014, Creighton in 1953.

IDEAS FOR HOLIDAYS GIFTS: We have two great offerings for your last minute and INSTANT Holiday gift guide.

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  1. NOTES, NOTES, AND MORE NOTES: A year-long subscription to TL’s Sunday Sports Notes – While We’re Young (Ideas) is a perfect way to have the sports fan in your life look forward to an old-fashioned, weekly, notebook full of sports insights. Sign-up for this special offer: HERE
  2. PGA TOUR BRUNCH AS CHAMPIONS RETURN OF THE TOUR: Plans are on-going to re-launch the popular PGA Tour Brunch newsletter when the pros tee-it-up at the Sentry Tournament of Champions (January 4-8, 2023) at The Plantation Course at Kapalua, Maui, Hawaii.

SIGN-UP HERE FOR PGA TOUR BRUNCH.

TIDBITS AND SPORTS BIZ: A company that the late David Stern invested in long before his January 2020 death is a Massachusetts-based health and fitness company – WHOOP. Stern’s partner, John Kosner, continues with his portion of the investment, as the company is now valued at $3.6 billion. Here’s a FOS interview with WHOOP Founder and CEO Will Ahmed. … Boston College is adding a Deputy Director of Athletics to oversee Compliance, Name, Image and Likeness programming and education, HR, Facilities and Operations across many of the department’s sub-divisions. BC AD Blake James is readying for his second year at the school and has been hiring from within and promoting from within often. … The BC Eagles men’s ice hockey team has a pair of games in – get this – Tempe, Arizona – December 30-31 before returning to Boston for a January 7th game vs UMass at “Frozen Fenway.” … The NHL Winter Classic features the Pittsburgh Penguins at Boston Bruins at the Fens on January 2, 2023 at 6pm (ET). The long-term forecast for the day is cloudy and 57-degrees for the Bruins. … If the report is accurate, it’ll be about four or five degrees colder in Boston than Tempe. …

BABY. IT’S COLD OUTSIDE: There are NFL games being played all weekend as the league moved the bulk of its schedule to Saturday, Dec. 24th when 11 of the 14 NFL Week 16 games were played. At kickoff time, the NFL players were greeted with a little (turn) Blue Christmas with unusually cold temps and wind chill throughout the land. Here’s what was going down at kickoff time:

  • Home Team / Temp (F) at Kickoff / Feels Like/Wind Chill
  • at Baltimore / 16-degrees / 2-degrees
  • at Charlotte / 18-degrees / 8-degrees
  • at Chicago / 9-degrees / -10-degrees
  • at Cleveland / 5-degrees / -13-degrees
  • at Kansas City / 9-degrees / -5-degrees
  • at Foxboro (New England) / 15-degrees / 2-degrees
  • at Minneapolis / Dome / Dome but 5-degrees with low of -5

On Christmas Day, the NFL counter-programmed against the traditionally NBA-heavy Christmas sports TV schedule, with football games at 1:00pm (ET), 4:20pm (ET) and 8:20pm (ET) games. The NBA Christmas Day schedule:

  • 12 Noon (ET) – 76ers at Knicks (ABC Sports)
  • 2:30pm (ET) – LA Lakers at Mavericks (ABC Sports)
  • 5:00pm (ET) – Bucks at Celtics (ABC Sports)
  • 8:00pm (ET) – Grizzlies at Warriors (ABC Sports)
  • 10:30pm (ET) – Suns at Nuggets (ABC Sports

It could be trouble for the NBA national network ratings game.

32: The Pittsburgh Steelers and the NFL were planning for a special 50th Anniversary celebration of “The Immaculate Reception” while honoring Hall of Famer and four-time Super Bowl champion Franco Harris this weekend. Harris’ No. 32 is the first offensive side of the ball player to have his number retired by the “Steel Curtain” franchise. So sadly, Harris passed away suddenly this week and has shocked the entire Pittsburgh Steelers fandom and organization. Really, every fan of the NFL had to admire Harris. He was that kind of player.

“We are shocked and saddened to learn of the unexpected passing of Franco Harris,” said NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell in a statement. “He meant so much to Steelers fans as the Hall of Fame running back who helped form the nucleus of the team’s dynasty of the ’70s, but he was much more. He was a gentle soul who touched so many in the Pittsburgh community and throughout the entire NFL. Franco changed the way people thought of the Steelers, of Pittsburgh, and of the NFL.

“He will forever live in the hearts of Steelers fans everywhere, his teammates, and the City of Pittsburgh. Our condolences go out to his wife, Dana, and their son, Dok.”

The only other numbers retired by the Pittsburgh Steelers organization:

  • No. 70 – DT Ernie Stautner
  • No. 75 – DT “Mean” Joe Greene

COLD REMINDER of HOW FRAGILE LIFE CAN BE: Combining with the news of the passing of Franco Harris came the sudden death of NFL producer Michael Antell, 33, who passed away this week in an automobile accident on his way home from work at NFL Films. Antell’s friends have organized a “Go Fund Me” page to assist his family. There’s some work to be done to reach the proper monetary goal. Mike and his wife, Becca, were expecting a son (Samuel) soon to be born and join his sister Caroline. Please consider a donation of any amount.

TL’s Sunday Sports Notes | Dec. 18th

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While We’re Young (Ideas) – Guv’nah Baker’s Gotta Work!

Massachusetts State House in Boston (File Photo)

By TERRY LYONS

BOSTON – The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. That is the short round-up coming from the Massachusetts State House this week just as Christmas Day draws near.

  1. The Good: After an admirable eight-year stint as the Governor of the Commonwealth, Charlie Baker, a former Harvard basketball player, announced during the final days of his lame-duck stretch that he’d be moving on to a very challenging job.
  2. The Bad: In 2018, a full year after the Supreme Court of the United States took-on the 1992 Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act case pitting the State of New Jersey against the NCAA, with support from the major North American professional sports leagues, Governor Baker said he believed the Commonwealth should “look into” the prospects of legalizing sports gambling in Massachusetts. In January 2019, Baker announced that he planned to file legislation to permit Massachusetts residents to wager on professional sports, including online-only sports pool operators, stating “Expanding Massachusetts’ developing gaming industry to include wagering on professional sports is an opportunity for Massachusetts to invest in local aid while remaining competitive with many other states pursuing similar regulations.” … As that statement was made, the popular Fantasy Sports company, Draft Kings, set up shop in Boston and sprinkled large amounts of their shareholders’ money to sponsoring everything from thoroughbred races to luxury golf course hospitality venues at the PGA Tour event at the TPC Boston.By May 14, 2018, the SCOTUS ruled in favor of New Jersey. The high court ruling did not surprise a soul as both the NBA and NHL had completely pivoted on their prior public posture, more of less stating, “if we can’t beat ‘em, we might as well join them,” although an ill-stated “integrity fee” tax was proposed and batted down in public forum. Only a month after the SCOTUS ruling, then Governor Phil Murphy was placing 2018 World Cup wagers at Monmouth Park. Murphy, who succeeded Governor Chris Christie as both wrote legislation and fully supported New Jersey’s legally secure lawsuit against PASPA and the rights of all States to have legal gambling instead of some being left on the outside looking in.A month. It took all of a month for New Jersey to activate and that first to market approach led New Jersey to process $1.1 billion in sports gambling transactions in November 2022, up from $1.06 billion in October, 2022, according to New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement reports.

    Meanwhile Massachusetts remained stalled after the State House and Senate each came up with dueling legislative rulings on how and when to institute the new Laws. It took marathon sessions in July 2022 to finally get a proper law passed and ready for Governor Bakers’ signature.

    In the 2018-2022 span, 33 other States passed laws allowing sports gambling. Massachusetts was still bickering over the legality of placing wagers on in-State collegiate sports (mainly football and basketball) but split the difference by allowing legalized sports gambling on Massachusetts school teams only when they compete in Bowl games, playoffs and national tournaments. That ruling came much to the delight of “Joey the Bookmaker” and “George the off-shore and online bookie” thriving at collegiate dorms and off-campus housing located at every college and university in the Commonwealth.

  1. What could be uglier? Governor Baker, this week, agreed to terms on an employment deal to head the National Collegiate Athletic Association, also known as the NCAA. Baker is scheduled to replace outgoing NCAA President Mark Emmert, who served from November 2010 until Baker takes over on March 1, 2023 – just as March Madness will begin.
  2. Baker’s legislative, management and consensus-building skills will be tested from day one. He will be entering a shark-infested playground where football and basketball generate billions in revenue, but the NCAA must oversee each and every sport for the good of their beloved student-athletes. That is especially so for Baker to oversee equal rulings, funding facilities and eventually equal Name, Image and Likeness deals for NCAA athletes to generate revenue utilizing their own personal assets and interests, benefitting from on and off the playing field interests in their lives and personalties.
  3. A recommendation for the Governor before he sets foot in the NCAA offices is to meet with BIG EAST Commissioner Val Ackerman, the only person in the USA with proper, grounded and legal knowledge of what works in both pro and collegiate sports. After that? I’ll reserve another 10-12 suggestions and meet-ups for a reasonable but well-deserved consulting fee.

HERE NOW, THE NOTES: NFL history was made in the past 24 hours as the Minnesota Vikings came back from a 33-point halftime deficit to defeat the Indianapolis Colts, 39-36, in overtime. The Vikings were kept scoreless until there were only 8:25 left in the third quarter of Saturday’s triple-header on the NFL Network. When Vikings PK Greg Joseph drilled a 40-yard FG in the overtime, it marked a 39-3 scoring run for the NFC North-leading Vikings.

RECORDS MADE TO BE BROKEN: Going into Saturday’s game, THESE great games were the prior greatest NFL comebacks, as chronicled by the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Of course, back on January 3, 1993, Buffalo’s Frank Reich led the Buffalo Bills to a 32-point comeback win over the then-Houston Oilers. The comeback was highlighted by Reich’s four late TD passes, one to WR Don Beebe and three to WR Andre Reed. … New England football fans are fond of a 28-3 mantra taken from the Patriots’ 25-point comeback during Super Bowl LI in Houston back on February 5, 2017. Although the Patriots and Falcons were tied with 104 rushing hards, then-New England QB Tom Brady out-passed ATL’s Matt Ryan 442 yards to 240 yards as the Falcons attempted to stall and protect their 21-3 halftime lead. After letting up the first touchdown of the second half to give ATL their 28-3 lead, Brady and the Patriots went on to out-score the Falcons 19-0 in the fourth quarter to earn the win, 34-28.

GOOD NEWS WHEN THE CAPS GO UP: The Premier Hockey Federation announced a significant salary cap increase for next season, doubling the amount of compensation to players from $750,000 to $1.5 million per team in 2023-24. In the league’s ninth season, the rise in team player salary will be the third salary cap increase and represents a 900% growth since 2021 when the team salary cap was just $150,000 per team.

“This historic salary cap increase reflects the strength of our league and developing business model, and supports an enhanced player experience that over the last year when full healthcare benefits, facility upgrades, league expansion, and a record 84-game schedule, were introduced,” said Reagan Carey, PHF Commissioner.

ARMY vs. NAVY in FOXBORO: The countdown to kickoff for the 2023 Army vs. Navy Game, presented by USAA officially began the day after Army’s 20-17 defeat of Navy in overtime for the 2022 game at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia. In 2023, America’s Game is scheduled for the New England region for the first time in its 124-year history. There are several notable milestones for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the United States leading up to the game, including the 250th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party. … The lead-up and festivities will be plentiful but we’ll opt for a Boston “T-Party,” instead.

A BIG, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD BIG EAST THOUGHT: St. John’s (11-1, 1-0 BIG EAST) defeated Florida State, 93-79, in the Orange Bowl Classic in Sunrise, Florida. For the Johnnies’ who are experiencing their best start, noting the victory marked just the sixth time in the last four decades the Johnnies navigated their out-of-conference play with only one loss. … With the tough BIG EAST schedule ahead, it might be Sunday, January 29th before St. John’s can expect to earn their next victory. That’s when the Georgetown Hoyas visit St. John’s for one of only four regular season appearances at Madison Square Garden. … St. John’s was picked sixth in the BIG EAST preseason poll by the conference’s coaches.

ORR: Sincere condolences to the family of the late Louis Orr, a formidable competitor against St. John’s as a Syracuse player and then as head coach and an assistant with multiple NCAA teams. Orr was 64, and his cause of death was cancer, according to reports.

PARTING WORDS & MUSIC: In the spirit of Christmas and giving, this week’s Words & Music is inspired by Jeff Kazee who held his (hopefully, forever) annual Holiday Concert/Recital this week at the Rockwood Music Center on Allen Street in New York’s East Village.

Kazee will start us off with one of the great Christmas Songs of all-time. In fact, “A Charlie Brown Christmas” was voted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2007. The story of how it came to be is quite legendary, as Producer Lee Mendelson, a fan of jazz music, heard Vince Guaraldi’s work on the radio in San Francisco and asked him to create a song for the animated documentary to be produced for air on CBS on December 9, 1965. The song Christmas Time is Here went from being scribbled words and music on the back on an envelope to worldwide fame. Here it is in honor and memory of Charles Shultz

THE GIFTS OF THE BRUCES: Following Jeff’s lead of covering some of the greats while mixing in some of his original work, this week’s column is recognizing two songs written by superstars but gifted to other for their initial debut.

Without hesitation, I list this epic song as my all-time favorite as a Bruce Springsteen-penned for Patti Smith to make famous. What a gift it was!

This version includes a house band named U2, headed by Bono and joined by Springsteen himself.

Lastly, one of my faves – if not THE FAVE, Bruce Hornsby wrote a song that Don Henley made famous. “The End of the Innocence” is the lead single and title track from Don Henley’s third solo studio album, released in 1989. The song peaked at No. 8 and is performed often by both Henley and Hornsby in concert. They co-produced the sound track and the whole music-loving world can remember the gift. Here’s a 2019 version performed by Hornsby and YMusic in Brooklyn, New York. (I was fortunate enough to see Bruce perform this only a few nights earlier here in Boston. It just might be the greatest-ever performance of this incredible song. Keep in mind, Henley won the 1989 GRAMMY for Best Male Rock Vocal Performance for his rendition. Hornsby took it up a notch in terms of musical arrangement to a degree of difficulty seldom reach by anyone on the face of the Earth.

THIS IS IT, A PERFECT LAST MINUTE CHRISTMAS/HOLIDAY GIFT: Whether it be for your favorite sports fan or a die-hard fan of the PGA Tour: While We’re Young (Ideas) is a weekly Sunday Sports Notebook & Column, written by Terry Lyons. Each notebook harkens back to the days when you’d walk over to the city newsstand on Saturday night around 10pm to pick-up a copy of the Sunday papers. Inside, just waiting, was a sports-filled compilation of interesting notes, news, quotes and quips. TL’s Sunday Sports Notes are brought to you by Digital Sports Desk. Subscriptions to the weekly column and to our six-days-a-week PGA Tour Brunch are the perfect gift for your friends or family members who love pro golf. PGA Tour Brunch was published through the completion of the FedEx Cup Playoffs and will return the first week of January, 2023.

NOTE: Next week, we’ll be celebrating Christmas Eve but at 10pm that night, look for a special edition of While We’re Young (Ideas). After you get it, click the one-year subscription gift bonus offer. HERE

TL’s Sunday Sports Notes | Dec. 11th

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While We’re Young Ideas with the 2022 End of Year “Diggies”

 

By TERRY LYONS

BOSTON – The global pandemic killed 6,649,490 million people and counting. It stopped every sport in nearly every nation. Temporarily it put “Digital Sports Desk” and 147 million either unemployed or out of business, and it ruined great traditions that we celebrate together. Sadly, there will be those 6.649m empty chairs at the Christmas dinner table this year, but thankfully, many of us are settling back to our lives as we knew them in 2018-19.

With that in mind, our popular Digital Sports Desk “DIGGIES” are back and this column will introduce the first of the 2022-23 editions, celebrating what we’ll call the Gems of the sporting calendar. After the first two, the DIGGIES are listed in no particular order. Please note, two of the great 2022-23 DIGGIES occurred this weekend and there’s a bit of a Boston-focus on this year’s winners.

  • No. 1: The Boston College vs Boston University hockey rivalry: As retired BC ice hockey coach said in his “Jerry York Night” speech on Friday, “the BC vs BU rivalry is the best in college hockey. They call it the “Battle of Comm Ave” in Boston and this past Friday night’s 9-6 Boston College Eagles victory took the match-up to new heights. BC’s Freshman forward Cutter Gauthier scored two goals and added two assists in the 288th edition of the rivalry. … The Eagles made their legendary coach proud as he was honored between periods and gifted with two First Class airline tickets and an all-expenses paid vacation trip to the Hawaiian Island of his choice. The potty-mouth BC fans made York cringe as the packed house, and the Conte-Crazy student sections were acting like they’d never been there before. The rivalry deserves some R.E.S.P.E.C.T. The players displayed it with a center-ice handshake line after the brutal battle of BU’s size and strength vs BC’s scoring, speed and agility. It’s a good thing the BC student sections couldn’t skate. 
  • No. 1-A: The annual ARMY vs NAVY game – usually played in Philadelphia – is a bucket list event for every sports fan in America. The patriotic pageantry is on display all day long, starting with a Noon (ET) “March On” ceremony that stops every fan in their tracks, but the stark reality while watching the cadets and midshipmen assemble is that some of the talented football players for both ARMY and NAVY might be laying their lives on the line for their fellow Americans someday all too soon. It is the best college football and it ranks on top of the list of DIGGIES Sports Gems. Please note: Boston fans are on call as the ARMY vs NAVY game will be played at Gillette Stadium in Foxboro on December 9, 2023, the first time the event will be staged in New England. If it weren’t for the need of the extra 20-25,000 seats, the game could’ve been scheduled for Fenway Park.
  • The 2022 ARMY vs NAVY was a classic, a 20-17 double-overtime win for ARMY. Every play mattered. It was and always is stunning!
  • The Army alma mater: “And when our work is done // Our course on earth is run // May it be said, “Well done” // Be thou at peace.// E’er may that line of gray // Increase from day to day // Live, serve, and die, we pray // West Point, for thee.” (It was sung second this year as it has been in five of the last seven years).
  • Continuing in NCAA College Football, the gems are polished every year when the following institutions play each other, usually alternating home field advantage:
    • Harvard vs. Yale – also known as “The Game.”
    • Ohio State vs Michigan
    • Alabama vs Auburn – The “Iron Bowl.”
    • There are plenty of other great college football rivalries, like Notre Dame vs USC or Oklahoma vs Texas, which dates back to 1900. They all receive honorable mentions for a 2022 DIGGIES award.
  • The Travelers at TPC River Highlands in Cromwell, near Hartford, Connecticut. Surely, The Masters and The Players, Pebble Beach and all of the Majors deserve mention, but The Travelers is the hidden gem hiding in plain sight each June. The event falls a week after The U.S. Open, so you might expect a light field, but The Travelers draws all the top-ranked players, largely because of a great golf course, vibrant crowds of spectators and the volunteers who represent The Travelers insurance company and the local Greater Hartford community.
  • The Breeders’ Cup thoroughbred horse races best the Kentucky Derby, The Preakness and The Belmont Stakes. “Seven World Series games in one day,” says sports pundit and enthusiast Chris Brienza who loves to attend the event, no matter where it’s staged. In 2022, it was at Keeneland (Kentucky). As of December 11, 2022, we’ll need to wait 326 days until the Breeders’ Cup runs at Santa Anita in Arcadia, California.
  • The Boston Marathon – Best day of the year in Boston and surrounding suburbs where the Carnegie Hall of road races is held each April. The race also coincides with the traditional 11am Patriots’ Day start for the Boston Red Sox.
  • BIG EAST Friday and Final Four Saturday ranks as the best two dates in NCAA College Basketball. The 30-minutes before the tip of the semifinals of March Madness just might be the best half-hour in sports.
  • Of course, The Super Bowl, NBA Finals, World Series and Stanley Cup Final all rank high in must see events, but the rivalries in the major North American sports have waned. For the DIGGIES, it must be a hidden Gem, so all the majpr sports events are assigned Honorable Mention for this year’s list.
  • In Europe, the super rivalries of Real Madrid vs FC Barcelona, known to all as “El Clasico” futbol is the best of the best. That said, you might want to pack your riot helmet for the Panathinaikos vs Olympiakos games in both soccer and basketball in the Greek League deserve honorable mention. “El Clasico” wins the DIGGIE.
  • Lastly, the college basketball rivalry of Duke vs North Carolina in the Atlantic Coast Conference gets a DIGGIE as the best school vs school rivalry in North American sports. Circle Saturday, February 4th at Duke (Durham, NC) and Saturday, March 4 at Carolina (Chapel Hill, NC) for the 2023 renditions, with only a slight chance they’ll meet again in the ACC Tournament or during March Madness.

WELCOME HOME BRITTANY: How is it possible that a decorated U.S. Olympian, NCAA and WNBA champion’s return to the United States after an unfair, wrongful and excessive detainment in Russia can become a political volleyball? Yet, that’s what’s happened since Brittany Griner was released from a Russian prison. On December 8, in a now highly controversial prisoner swap authorized by the US State Department and the President of the United States, political chess players upped the ante of debate, doing exactly what the Kremlin planned, further dividing the USA voting public.

Here’s some background to consider as you contemplate your own opinion of the story that is quite terrible all-around. For some, you might’ve seen this post on Facebook. If not, please read on:

We must applaud the sentiment of the family of Paul Whelan as they commented this week on the useless and somewhat preposterous – call it – “either/or” commentary on the release of Griner, as though USA diplomats had a choice of whether to trade a known Russian arms dealer for Door No.1 or Door No. 2.

It was NOT a choice of one or the other but is being depicted as such, by those as important in US government as presumed 2023 Speaker of the House, Kevin McCarthy.

Here are the players:

1). Brittany Griner: A two time Olympic gold medalist (4 time gold medalist, if you count World Cup), 3-time Big 12 Player of the Year, 2012 NCAA Champion for Baylor, and 2014 WNBA Champion.

OR

2). Paul Whelan, a Canadian-born citizen who also has citizenship in the UK, Ireland and the USA where he served the USA as a Marine Corps Reserve (1994-2002) and Marine Reserve SGT, (2003-08) until he was discharged after court martial in January 2008 on larceny charges, making false statements, illegal use of another’s social security number and given a bad conduct demerit upon his discharge. … BTW: Regardless of the charges, his service remains admirable.

Let’s underline the point, the USA was not given a choose one or “the other” scenario. Our Diplomats and National Security Council have been negotiating on Whelen’s behalf since he was detained in Russia back in December of 2018. Then-U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said: “We’ve made clear to the Russians our expectation that we will learn more about the charges, come to understand what it is he’s been accused of and if the detention is not appropriate, we will demand his immediate return.” On January 4, 2019, British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt said: “We don’t agree with individuals being used in diplomatic chess games… We are all extremely worried about him and his family.”

In 2019, Konstantin Yaroshenko – who was accused by the USA as a drug-smuggling pilot and jailed – was released to Russia in return for American Trevor Reed, also a Marine who was arrested for getting in a fight with Russian police/military authorities.

The complexity of the situation made me curious about all of the details, so it time to delve into the story after Whelan’s brother, David, said in his family statement: “There is no greater success than for a wrongful detainee to be freed and for them to go home. The Biden administration made the right decision to bring Ms. Griner home, and to make the deal that was possible, rather than waiting for one that wasn’t going to happen.”

Paul Whelan’s sister, Elizabeth, during her appearance on a live interview broadcast Dec. 9 on CBS News from Martha’s Vineyard, explained a lot in her interview transcribed here after the first question probed at the general public commentary, social media postings and mounting controversy surrounding Griner release but Whelan still detained. … “They infuriate me, said Elizabeth. To begin, where have all those people been for the last four years since my brother has been held? Where were their good ideas. I hope they’re sharing them with the National Security Council.

“The way I look at it, once a hostile foreign nation has taken an American citizen as prisoner, we need to do what ever it takes to get them back. Then, we need to use punishments and deterrents to stop it from ever happening again. I welcome anyone to share their ideas. They can send them to me. I’ll pass them on,” she added.

“I can’t tell my brother (Paul) everything that is going on. I can’t tell anyone everything that is going on. This is difficult. It’s not an easy thing to solve. We have a country – Russia – who is trying – purposefully – to cause trouble over here. They weren’t going to send both Paul and Brittany home at the same time and give our President “the win.” We need to figure out a way around that. I don’t know what the solution is.

“The charges against him (her brother) are as ridiculous as it comes. This is a story they (Russian govt) have concocted. They planted the USB drive on Paul and then arrested him five minutes later to gain leverage over the US. They treat Paul’s case differently from that of (former Marine and released detainee) Trevor Reed or Brittany.

“The foreign governments that are taking Americans like this, is that they are not taking them for being the specific persons. They’re taking them because they want to get back in some way at the United States. I do have hope (in US government). The folks that were first working to get Trevor and Paul back, and trying to get Brittany and Paul back, they are going to all lengths to make that happen.

“Any wrongfully detained American that comes back is a win for America.

(On Griner family stating Dec 8th that they would become very involved in Whelan family efforts)

“When I saw Cherrelle (Brittany’s wife) say that their family was going to fight for Paul, and keep the attention on his case, that was the first “emotional crack’ (in Elizabeth’s public posture) to see their support.”

The moral of this post: Read up before tossing shade.

TID-BITS: Rest-in-Peace Grant Wahl, 48, former Sports Illustrated reporter who died suddenly while covering the World Cup. … Busy night for the NHL Deans of Discipline as Seattle Kraken defenseman Jamie Oleksiak was suspended for three games, without pay, for an illegal check to the head of Washington Capitals defenseman Alexander Alexeyev during a game at Washington, D.C., on Friday, Dec. 9. … And, Buffalo Sabres forward Jeff Skinner was suspended for three games, without pay, for cross-checking Pittsburgh Penguins forward Jake Guentzel during their game at Buffalo on Friday, too, … The WSJ is reporting that Venture Capitalists are seeking ownership in the Phoenix Suns, with a $3 billion price tag being floated via financing from Pay Pal founder and tech giant Peter Theil who was the first outside investor in FaceBook. … In FIBA – not FIFA – news: No.1 ranked Strahinja Stojacic was crowned MVP of the FIBA 3×3 World Tour 2022 regular season by a panel of fans and players. The Ub Huishan NE star has had a golden season and led the No.1 ranked team to four straight Masters titles, when he won three of the four tournament MVPs. Stojacic aka ‘Doctor Strange’ dominated the players’ vote with a whopping 32.7% to finish clear of his brother Stefan, who finished second with 15.4%. Next best were Riga superstars Karlis Lasmanis and Nauris Miezis at 11.5% and Antwerp’s Thibaut Vervoort with 9.6%. … The Baseball Winter Meetings ended with a flurry of free agent signings, including former Red Sox SS Xander Bogaerts signing with the San Diego Padres. … We’ll take a look at the old Hot Stove happenings next week.

TD Boston Garden (Photo by T. Peter Lyons)

NHL POWER RANKINGS: As promised from last week’s column, here’s the WWYI Power Rankings for the National Hockey League, as of December 10:

  1. Boston Bruins – 14-0-1 at the TD Garden
  2. New Jersey Devils – Tied with Boston with 43 points.
  3. Las VegasGolden Knights – 20 of 29 in the win column = 41 points
  4. Toronto Maple Leafs – 8-0-2 in their last 10 games
  5. Tampa Bay Lightning – 35 points, and always dangerous as reigning champs
  6. Winnipeg Jets – 8-2-0 over last 10 games, 10-3 at home
  7. Dallas Stars – NHL-Leading 105 goals for, but in second place in West-Central
  8. Log-Jam in the East-Metropolitan – Carolina, Pittsburgh, NYI and NYR

There’s a long, long way to go.

PARTING WORDS & MUSIC: Everyone’s favorite part of this column takes a somber turn as this song is posted in memory of Grant Wahl. It is performed by my NYC music bud Rich Pagano with ultra-music-hoops bud Jeff Kazee on the keys and the talented John Conte on bass. They make up “Early Elton” in between gigs, with Kazee usually backing Southside Johnny and the Jukes.

Kazee will be performing a Christmas-themed SOLD OUT solo act this Wednesday, in New York at the Rockwood Music Hall. It will resemble the Living Room Lounge shows which guided so many of us through the global pandemic when it seemed it would never, ever end.

Last year, his set list included:

THE HOLIDAY SHOW

Christmas Time is Here

The Christmas Song

Go Tell It On The Mountain

Blue Christmas

White Christmas

Feeling Great (Kazee)

Everyday Is Like A Holiday (Jeff & Sophia)

Merry Christmas, Baby/Bells Will Be Ringing

Chinese Food For Christmas

A Cradle in Bethlehem

We Three Kings of Orient Are

Nut Rocker

Grownup Christmas List (Sophia Kazee)

This Christmas

O Holy Night

Run, Run, Rudolph

TL’s Sunday Sports Notebook | Dec 4

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By TERRY LYONS

BOSTON – USC lost and TCU lost!

USC is OUT while TCU is in.

The Georgia Bulldogs smoked LSU, 50- 30, to take the SEC championship and lock the No. 1 seed in the upcoming College Football Playoffs while the Purdue Boilermakers vs. Michigan Wolverines Big Ten Championship game was underway as this missive posted its “Bulldog” edition, the Wolverines with a 14-13 lead at the half.

There will be tons of speculation and reasoning for the CFP committee to toss-around the virtues of Ohio State, Alabama, and TCU to decide the final two teams to qualify. Ohio State and Alabama are probably the best two teams of the five, but TCU’s season-long resume might qualify the Horned Frogs to No. 3 as ‘Bama, Tennessee, Clemson and Penn State seem to blend into one, as in one short. USC finished 11-2 in the Pac-12, but lost to Utah twice in the season, once on October 16th, and again in the conference championship game Friday night, thumped 47-24. That places USC as a solid No. 8 or No. 9 at best.

Taking it all in, it might be easier to assign TCU and USC to the January 2nd Rose Bowl and let Georgia and Michigan play the final on January 9 and call it a season. That would make either the Fiesta Bowl or the Peach Bowl pretty annoyed.

By Sunday morning, the decisions were made:

College Football Playoffs 2022-23:

  1. Georgia
  2. Michigan
  3. TCU
  4. Ohio St.

Outside looking in?

  1. Alabama
  2. Tennessee

On the flip-side, let’s all celebrate the fact Miami (Ohio) and the University ofAlabama-Birmingham – their friends call ‘em UAB – will kick-off Bowl season with berths in the Bahamas Bowl on December 16th – just 12 days away. On Christmas Eve, Middle Tennessee and San Diego State will travel to Honolulu for the annual Hawaii Bowl on December 24th and enjoy a “Mele Kalikimaka” on a bright, Hawaiian Christmas Day, December 25th.

HERE NOW THE NOTES: The Boston Celtics are 18-5 to date, 11-2 at the TD Boston Garden. That amazing start was good enough for the NBA to recognize head coach Joe Mazzulla as the NBA Eastern Conference Coach of the Month for games played in October and November. It marked the Celtics 16th overall NBA Coach of the Month honor since the award’s inception during the 1982-83 season. Boston leads the league in points per game (121.9), field goal percentage (49.8), three-point field goal percentage (40.8), free throw percentage (85.3), while also ranking sixth in assists (27.5). … For the first time in franchise history, the Celtics averaged at least 123.0 points and shot over 50.0 percent from the field during one calendar month (min. 10 games) for games played in November when they posted a 14-2 record.

Not to be forgotten, Celtics forward Jayson Tatum was named the Kia NBA Eastern Conference Player of the Month for October/November. Tatum earned his second career NBA Player of the Month award and now holds the third-most monthly honors in Celtics history behind Larry Bird (7) and Paul Pierce (3). This season, Tatum has appeared in 21 games (all starts) and is averaging career-highs of 31.6 points on 48.8 percent shooting from the field and 87.3 percent from the line, along with 7.8 rebounds, and 4.5 assists in 36.7 minutes per game.

BOSTON BREWIN’ – The Boston Bruins, the Celtics’ neighbors at TD Garden and their respective practice sites, are 20-3 for the season and 14-0 at home after Saturday night’s victory over the highly competitive Colorado Avalanche by the score of 5-1. … The Bruins and the red hot New Jersey Devils are 1 and 1A in the NHL power rankings. This column will delve into that full list in depth next weekend.

KNAPP MEMORIAL FUND: Eight NFL teams and up to 50 NFL coaches will participate in different ways to support the first-ever Coach Knapp fundraiser this December, which will benefit The Coach Knapp Memorial Fund. The fund was created this year to educate drivers on the dangers of distracted driving, reduce the number of distracted driving-related deaths, and promote distracted driving awareness reform in the United States. … Knapp’s wife, Charlotte, and his close friend and agent, Jeff Sperbeck, created the fund to honor the legacy of Greg Knapp who was killed after being hit by a distracted driver while he was bicycling in July 2021. Coach Knapp was known for climbing the stadium stairs before every single NFL game he coached over his 25 season career…. Stadium stair climbs and other fundraising activities will play a part of the tribute. … At the time of his passing, Knapp was previously named Passing Game Coordinator for the New York Jets under head coach Robert Saleh.

PGA TOUR BRUNCH: The six-days a week missive, known to you all as PGA TOURBRUNCH is right around the corner with the first issue of 2023 planned for Wednesday, January 4 with the Sentry Tournament of Champions scheduled to take place January 5-8 in Kapalua, on The Valley Isle of Maui in Hawai‘i. … After a wrap-up column on January 9th, PGA Tour Brunch returns January 11th with a preview of the first full-field event of 2023 when the PGA Tour pros tee-off for the SONY Open in Honolulu. You might’ve read it before, but PGA TOUR BRUNCH is the perfect gift for your favorite golf fan (maybe fans). It’s a gift that keeps on giving all season long, and up to the Tour Championship in late August 2023. … Why Brunch? Well, it is sent in advance of each round of golf and – with the tournaments played in different time zones throughout the season, the time can change a bit. Ideally, it pops-up in your inbox at 12 Noon (ET), at a time when you have a minute – over LUNCH or BRUNCH to relax, grab your mobile device and take-in a screen or two or three of the most important information on the tournament being played each week. Some basic stuff, yes! Tee Times, Leaderboard, what time the TV and Radio broadcasts will be for the day/week and just a few links to surf to get deeper information. … It saves time, as we’ve done the groundwork to put forth what you NEED to read to follow the Tour. For a limited time (Today through Dec 31, 2022), we’re offering a 20% discount as a Special Holiday Greetings and Gift idea. Click HERE

PGA TOUR BRUNCH is the “sister publication” to the missive you’re reading now – While We’re Young (Ideas) aka TL’s Sunday Sports Notes. Both are available for subscription via Substack and both are sent to your device by email and they’re archived on the Substack App and our home sites. Similar to PGA TOUR BRUNCH, you can gift a subscription to WHILE WE’RE YOUNG (Ideas) – before Dec. 31, 2022 by visiting HERE.

WORLD CUP: The hopes of the United States advancing in the 2022 World Cup soccer tournament came to an abrupt end Saturday, much to the 3-1 ear-slapping at the hands of The Netherlands. Although the FOX, USA-loving broadcast teams and studio commentators made excuses of “what an experience” and “too much youth,” stating, “we should be proud” cliches, and emphasizing on the incredibly un-professional use of the word “we,” the truth be told, the USA got their asses kicked.

Maybe some Kipling – from his Poem, “If” might fit the sitch:

“If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;

If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim,

If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster.

And treat those two impostors just the same.”

See you in: (USA sites) – New York/New Jersey, Philadelphia, Boston, Atlanta, Miami, Houston, Dallas, Kansas City, Seattle, San Francisco/Bay Area, Los Angeles; Vancouver and Toronto for Canada and Mexico City, Guadalajara, Monterrey for Mexico in the truly North American World Cup of 2026.

  • The Triumph* clip is NOT for office consumption and it dates back to a Conan show during the Rio World Cup.

WORLD CUP TID-BITS: Jennie Taft made the FOX and FOX Sports 1 studio shows work. Why, oh, why did they mover her to pitch-side reporter? … Has anyone ever seen NBA/ABA great Rick Barry at the same phone booth as former USA soccer player turned broadcaster Alexi Lalas? … Buried in the personal memory bank was a 1990 trip to London to see the likes of Tears for Fears, Elton John, Eric Clapton, a Genesisreunion with Tony Banks (piano), Mike Rutherford (guitar) and Phil Collins (drums, vocals) at Knebworth. The trip coincided with a World Cup quarterfinal win for England over Cameroon (3-2, on the 1st of July) and a (1-1) tie vs Germany which resulted in England losing 4-3 in the shoot-out on the 4th of July. England had several chances to win and a goal recalled for being off-sides to further the disappointment. The image embedded was a gentleman, sitting on the curb just outside an upscale pub near the JW Marriott Grosvenor House. He had his head in his hands for 10+ minutes, not moving a muscle otherwise. It was then, and only then, I could understand the meaning of World Cup soccer to the English, the Europeans and the world as a whole. Of course, I was thinking about MLB scores back home and the fact Pink Floyd headlined Knebworth, a notch above Paul McCartney and Wings. … Sadly, I think the excitement of the USA qualifying and advancing to the Round of 16 in this, the 2022 World Cup, will mean little to NOTHING for the MLS or television coverage for the sport of soccer in the USA. … FOX Sports commentators admitted to the lack of size, strength and depth for the USA team. Excuse the basketball reference, here, but the USA needs to develop a more “Jordan Rules” mentality and to utilize the Chuck Daly/Isiah Thomas invented strategy to bang, crack and hit anything that moved as it made its way in front of the rim (USA goal and especially the goal-keeper). I’m not talking about drawing yellow cards or penalties (allowing shots at point blank range), but I am very much aware of what the Detroit Pistons – via Bill Laimbeer, RickMahorn, Dennis Rodman and the rest of the “Bad Boys” – did to the mighty Chicago Bulls and its stars who took it to the rim. Additionally, the Hall of Fame coach Pat Riley did the same in the 1991-95 era of New York Knicks/NBA basketball. Riley convinced the Knicks that they were capable of winning and advancing in the playoffs if they played rough and tough. He convinced the likes of Charles Oakley, Anthony Mason and John Starks that they could win if they played very physical basketball. Team USA needs to hit the weight room or do some recruiting.

In closing, there’s one other important detail, call it another fact. The Netherlands was a better Futbol team. They out-played the USA, fair and square. In addition to The Netherlands, there are at least xx other teams better than the USA team and they include: Argentina, Brazil, England, France, Spain and Portugal, for sure. Add to the probably better teams of Switzerland, Poland, S. Korea, Japan, and Croatia. In other words, if you ranked the Round of 16, the USA was arguably 16th, maybe 15th or 14th.