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“This-That-Some of Other”

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Time out from talking about local things here in town….

You know the tired topics…..

Hate watching for Chargers games….Philip Rivers interceptions…Padres stuck with Will Myers…Why no one comes to see a good Aztecs football team….USD football-great quarterback-not so great fan turnout.

On to storylines around the nation…

USC…Coach Clay Helton gets the chance to finish the season (8-4) with his 3rd  string  quarterback throwing for 400-yard games and his 4th string tailback piling up 100-yard games.  Not so sure why he has to be fired at this point.

UCLA…Chip Kelly surely has not been what we thought the Bruins would be, after we assumed it would become like the Oregon Duck days…Either he has changed or the academic entrance requirements make it harder to get Oregon type players onto the Westwood campus.

LAKERS…Very impressive start for   Anthony Davis-LeBron James….Do believe Kyle Kozma becomes the legitimate third wheel in the offense…Still waiting to get a feel for the highs and lows of Danny Green shooting the rock…..Dwight Howard, role player, likely a 4th wheel in LA scheme and who would have thought his underachieving career would end up like this.

CLIPPERS…Some real flashes with Kawhi Leonard and Paul George, though they have hardly played together…Worried about the wear and tear factor on Kawhi’s career catching up to him…The quad…the bruised bone in the knee etc….What a bench Doc Rivers has to rely on-very explosive.

RAMS….Jared Goff has come back down to earth, with all the injuries to his skill position players and the fact  his offensive line now is not what his offensive line used to be.

KINGS….Long season coming, stuck with a lot of aging players with big contracts….Interesting to see what they do with this Ilya Kovalchuk contract mess….Still owed 6.2M this year and 6.2M next year, and not suiting up any longer.

DUCKS….Dallas Eakins got them roaring out of the gate, but now they have drifted back to .500 (10-10-2), and scoring goals continues to be the issue….Unless some of the young high draft picks start to score goals, they probably won’t be a playoff team.

HOUSTON ASTROS….Sounds like a death sentence is coming if you read between the lines of the Commissioner’s office about this probe for electronic sign stealing in World Series games….Oh the hour of it all, now that it has leaked out….This is the same MLB office that ignored the steroid issues thinking it was just Mark McGwuire back in the day, till it turned out to  be virtually every big bat in baseball.  To think the Astros are the only ones cheating is absurd, but there could be some real blood-letting on all this.

FREE AGENCY….Agent Scott Boras holds all the cards, and all the big name free agents in baseball….History has him always holding his clients back for a longtime in the winter, but you wonder if Gerritt Cole, Stephen Strasburg, Hyun Jin-Ryu, Anthony Rendon sign contracts early, or if Boras tries to squeeze every last cent out of clubs before his guys ink the deal.  Baseball could generate so much off season Hot Stove interest if there was a specific window for signing, but Boras doesn’t care about the overall health of the game, just dollars for his clients.

CARMELO ANTHONY….Let’s see-his career has careened down from hero worship status in Denver, to going home to the Knicks, to being dealt away to places like Memphis-Atlanta-Oklahoma City…..Now with the battered Trailblazers, interesting to see if he can become a team player this late in his career.

MYLES GARRETT…..Now we see how quickly the NFL responded to the indefinite suspension for the helmet shining fight with Steelers QB-Mason Rudolph….Does he deserve more than the 12-games repeat offender Vontaze Burfict got for violent helmet hits?….I think 6-games is sufficient for now, but if there is ever a repeat offense, then Garrett could be gone a long time.

MASON RUDOLPH….Not sure how the victim, the Steelers QB, deserves a 35,000-fine for getting up off the ground and defending himself after Garrett ripped his helmet off…and all that led to the assault with the helmet on the Steelers QB….Why does he pay?

NFL…The rule says random HGH-testing in season for players, all nearly 1800 of them…anyone care to explain how Jets RB-Le’Veon Bell gets called to give blood 5-times in 10-weeks for HGH?

LOVE ME-LOVE ME NOT….Basket case WR-Antonio Brown now apologizes for the tweet about Pats owner Robert Kraft’s prostitution arrest in the off season….This is the same Brown who said “F” the NFL multiple times…and that he was done with pro football…and that he wanted to play again….and is now suing he woman who sued him for rape, saying it’s her fault he is now out of the NFL…..It goes and on and on and on.

TORONTO….Thought the Maple Leafs had moved beyond ‘stupid’ when Brendan Shanahan took over the franchise and brought in Stanely Cup winning coach Mike Babcock to fix all that ails the iconic franchise….Now Babcock gets fired after 4-winning seasons and 4-playoff appearances, because his team had lost 6-in a row.

BAD DAYS-BAD SEASONS….NBA fans have come to expect this disaster that is the NY Knicks, so the (4-11) ragged start under David Fizdale and the mounting criticism he should be fired seems the norm. …Golden State, (3-14) getting buried by everyone with all their star players either hurt or on other teams…What a quick fall from grace and some payback now around the NBA.

GOOD BYE-GOOD GUY…Jimmie Johnson is leaving NASCAR after a 2020 farewell tour…Great person…great driver…great charitable causes in El Cajon and back in Charlotte…Stunning to see him go 94-races now without a win….Sometimes it’s the team falling apart…sometime its the cars-engines no longer competing…sometimes the driver loses the edge….Hard to see such a classy guy go out this way…But it happens in that sport….remembering Dale Earnhardt, Tony Stewart, Bill Elliott.

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“Aztecs Basketball–Growing-Winning”

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A busy time ahead for an unbeaten Aztecs basketball team.

SDSU is (3-0), coming off a big emotional win over BYU up in a hostile environment in Provo, and now they play 5-games in a10-nights, starting with the cross city rivalry game against outmanned USD.

A lot of history with the Toreros, last year’s USD win on the Viejas Arena floor.  The win in the upset game at Petco Park years ago.

An interesting start to the season for a Brian Dutcher-led team with so many new components.  4-potential new starters and guys off the bench.

Young center Nathan Mensah and senior Matt Mitchell are the returnees.  3-transfer guards, a 6-10 transfer from Vanderbilt, and a gifted freshman.

And yet, the team has come together quite quickly and now the challenge, the 5-games in 10-nites, the 3-non conference games with USD, LIU and Tennessee State, then the games in the Las Vegas tourney against Creighton and Iowa.  All this before conference play gets underway.

Coach Brian Dutcher’s comments:

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Feels like we’ve been off for a month….now we play 5-games in the next 10-days
Players dream-short practices-lots of games

BYU was great win..on the road…gave up lead…got it back
Nothing emulates being on the road in hostile environment
We saw the resolve of our team

USD is a crosstown game..not really a rivalry
Conference games are really our rivalry
USD building empty most of time till we come to town there
With a week off-I watched every game they played

Last year, they had such veterans they could slide players into different roles
They are not as versatile as last year’s team
We cannot be cocky, after losing a game like this last year
Environment will be good and raucous..and we must maintain our poise.
I like playing gym full environment.
No one wants to play in an empty gym.

New faces-new players-new systems on our team
Basketball is basketball…they’ve played a lot of college basketball
They are used to playing in space..used to sacrifice part of your game
We scored 35-baskets…25-assists last game at BYU-coming together

Our tone is defend and rebound first
Tough to get teams to buy into my system on defense
Harder to get them to play Aztecs defense when they are scoring so well
I have to push mindset-not going to score, be that way, all the time..
We must have something to hang out hat on when ball does not fall..it’s defense.

5-games in 10-days….after off week…play..consume next scouting report
We could not find right opponent to come here this past week.
We can’t wear them out in practice…so this team now has to show it can get ready

Schedule USD in future…does our conference go to 20-games…don’t know.

Try to decide if we play UCSD and USD in same season.
Would like home and home with USC or UCLA
UCLA policy won’t play team from California on the road outside conference.
Most of other PAC 12-teams will come play here, but not UCLA.
The Mountain West is considering going to a 20-game conference schedule

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“Chargers Lose Game–Lose Season”

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A bad weekend, a likely bad finish to the season.

Everyone shares a piece of the blame in this one, the Kansas City (24-17) win over the Chargers.  A loss that pretty much ends their playoff hopes.

From start to finish, the Monday Night Football loss, the Chargers loss to the Chiefs in Mexico City, likely sends this team careening into another non playoff season, with growing doubts how much their quarterback has left.

Quarterback Philip Rivers threw 4-interceptions, late with passes, desperation heaves, overthrows.  You name it, it was bad.  When was the last time this QB had a quarterback rating of (49) for the game.  He didn’t play very well.  This bad outing stapled on top of last weekends terrible finish against the Raiders.

His offensive line, the kiddie korp, was awful and that had a bearing on Rivers bad statistical night.  The 4-picks came as part of package in which he was sacked 3-times, took 9-hits and 7-pressures.

The kid offensive tackles, Trent Scott and Trey Pipkens got overwhelmed, 2-sacks, 2-penalties, allowed 3-pressures.  Ditto for veteran tackle Michael Schofield who gave up a sack and took a penalty.

It was a messy night other places.  Michael Davis, the cornerback, gave up a TD on blown coverage, and missed 2-critical tackles in the second half.

Rayshawn Jenkins had an interception, but gave up 2-pass plays.

Desmond King dropped 2-punts and made some horrible decisions, and got benched.

Linebacker Thomas Davis missed a crucial tackle and got beat in coverage twice.  A bad penalty on Jatavis Brown and 2-completions on his coverage watch.

And the offense staggered all night.  They owned the first half, but trailed at halftime.  When was the last time, your team had a (43-23) edge in plays at half, had outgunned the other guy (312-109) and never scored a TD.

When last seen, the Bolts drove to the Chiefs 8-9-22-22-31 and never got to the end zone.  You feared it would be bad math, the Chargers getting 3-points on field goals, knowing full well Patrick Mahomes was going to wind up getting touchdowns before the night was over.

And Mahomes did, breaking the Chargers backs with runs of 15-20-24.  And he figured out how to attack Gus Bradley’s zone defense by throwing underneath to his tight end Travis Kelce all night.

Then came the missed tackles and some bad Bolt penalties that negated a big fumble recovery.

The second half was no better.  In one stretch the Chargers had 5-possessions, 16-plays, and just 48-yards, and all this with Rivers at quarterback.

To add insult to injury, the Chargers were facing a KC team that lost star WR-Tyreek Hill on the first series with a hamstring, and two running backs, LeSean McCoy with a concussion and Damien Williams with injured ribs.

But without the firepower, it didn’t matter, because Mahomes was still out there making play after play.

You can drop all the cliches you want about playing at altitude, playing kids in the offensive line, almost winning again, another loss by a TD or less, or any moral victory in not letting Mahomes score 50-on you.  It doesn’t matter, your playoff hopes are gone.

Two last memories of this Mexico City trip.  Rivers laying on the torn up turf after the 4th and final interception, punching the ground, and knowing he has thrown 7-picks in the last two losses in games they had to win.

And the sight of a pregame get together with football fans, when owner Dean Spanos was introduced and booed at the podium as he tried to address the fans there, some wearing Bolts gear, some in Chiefs colors, and lots of Mexican fans.  They all know what Spanos did to San Diego fans back home.

Lousy loss, lousy game, lousy owner, and now a quarterback that’s playing lousy too.

Now officially too, a lost season.

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“All Things NFL”

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Lots of topics and lots of opinions too.

CHARGERS-CHIEFS….If the Bolts win this Monday night game, they put themselves in the fight for first place in the AFC West.  The Raiders have already moved into a tie for Kansas City, and Oakland has the easier schedule.  A Bolts victory puts them within 1-game of first place, but their schedule is tougher.  The real story, do the Bolts have enough people to defends all the weapons that QB-Patrick Mahomes has at his discretion?  This offense its averaging (404YPG) and what makes KC different than anyone else is that the Chiefs wideouts and tights ends pile up massive yards after catch.  The second biggest question for the Chargers, have Rivers make it a shootout and come out throwing, or try to run the ball with Melvin Gordon-Austin Ekeler, control the clock, shorten the game, and beat up a bad KC defense.  Make Mahomes stand on the sidelines.  You surely do not want him on the field with all that firepower.

RAMS-BEARS….LA is just not the same offensive juggernaut it used to be.  People say Todd Gurley is not the same explosive running back he used to be because of the arthritic knee issue.  Robert Woods big play production has gone away.  Brandin Cooks is out with the lingering concussion issues.  And an offensive line that let Roger Scaffold and John Sullivan go in the offseason, and now they are best with injuries on top of that.  Hard to believe the Rams might not even make the postseason as a wildcard team.

BROWNS-STEELERS….Ugly fight, really dark moment in the NFL.  Now Myles Garrett is going to appeal the suspension that could last from 6-weeks to into next season.  The equally big issue is the culture of football taught by Coach Freddy Kitchens.  ‘Nobody pushes us around etc..etc….  His team has 87-penalites for 822-yards, leads the league in personal fouls and fines.  His team, his players,his philosophy.  This is more than the stupidity of Myles Garrett.

RAIDERS….Virtually all the big names Jon Gruen wanted to bring in are now off the team, from Antonio Brown to Vontaze Burfict, but what has happened is a collection of young players at tight end, wide receiver and the pass rushers are growing, learning, producing..  That and Derek Carr is playing mistake free football under Gruen’s guidance.

CAROLINA…This is a mess.  Two great players left on the roster, the do-everything star running back Christian McCaffrey and great linebacker Luke Kuechly.  After that, not much, surely no longer is there a Cam Newton to bail you out.  Who knows what the outcome of his ongoing health issues with this Lisfranc foot surgery might be.  You always wonder, why not Colin Kaepernick to Carolina on a look-see contract?

NEW ENGLAND..They lost a week ago, struggled all day but put away the Eagles, so we don’t really know yet if the Patriots are a complete team.  They played really hard to hold off Carson Wentz at the end of the game…but a bulk of that Patriots record was built on beating up the Giants-Jets-Miami-Cleveland early on in the schedule.

49ers…They are not sneaking up on anyone anymore, and Jim Garoppolo has lots of challenges but he’s making enough passes to get the ball in the end zone.  The other issue,  you have to play four quarters against that violent San Francisco defensive  front.

BALTIMORE…Lamar Jackson’s numbers are spectacular, maybe as brilliant of Russell Wilson’s production up in Seattle.  The Ravens defense are warriors and they are really hard to drive against each series and points on the board are hard to get.  They really look the ‘Beast in the East’.

BUFFALO…Surprise team of the year, with rock solid defense, young diverse quarterback. Now they won a bunch of games early in the season at home in good weather.  Now a lot of road games, but you cannot take away the 7-wins they have already.

COWBOYS…Dak Prescott putting up spectacular numbers throwing it.  Zeke Elliott looks like he has become an after-thought in the offense.  Dak is piling up 400-yards per Sunday throwing.  Will see if this continues.

MINNESOTA…Kirk Cousins is putting up huge numbers, so is the RB-Dalvin Cook, and that defense is pretty tough.  The Vikings seem to have a lot components to be really good.  Very explosive and very physical on the other side of the ball.

BRONCOS…Who would have thought this group would be (3-7) on the year, and for rumblings of a lot of negative vibes from Coach Vic Fangio, and strife on his staff too.  John Elway hasn’t made a lot of right decisions in recent years, has he?

TAMPA BAY…Bruce Arians thought he had solved all the Bucs woes and they would win this year.  No so, not as long as Jameis Winston makes as many bad players as good plays each weekend.  Interceptions, sacks, fumbles.  Doesn’t matter how many 383-yard games you have, if you keep giving the ball back.  Not sure what this coach is going to do with that quarterback.

WASHINGTON…Next man up, Dwayne Haskins, the rookie QB from Ohio State.  He is playing regardless of whether he’s ready or not.  Weird way to run a franchise, but that’s the Daniel Snyder way of constant change at the most important position in the game.

CINCINNATI…Winless, not competitive, playing a kid at quarterback.  Just not a good atmosphere for a once successful franchise.

BEARS….Let’s see what you solve first.  The ineffective offense, with games like 9-yards at halftime of one game, 115-yards in another game.  Or is the regression of QB-Mitch Trubisky?  Or the ragged field goal kicking over the last year plus.  What a mess.

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“Don Cherry–His Way or the Highway”

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Don Cherry was to Canadian broadcasting and the NHL what Howard Cosell was to all things NFL….a legend….an icon…a trendsetter.

And like Cosell’s ‘tell it like it is lifestyle’, Cherry’s own ‘brash-beliggerant-bully style’ set him aside from everyone.

And like Cosell, who went down in flames of self-glory at the end of his Monday Night Football career, Cherry destroyed his career much the same, with his insensitive, off topic rants, who offended many, in our modern era of political correctness.

Cosell ended his self destructive career with rants about owners, players, drugs and NFL greed.  Cherry hit the finish line with some spillage about immigrants in Canada, not appreciating Canadian heritage of soldiers who gave their lives in the wars.

Cherry, the career minor league player, and former coach of the Boston Bruins, became a legend as a TV analyst with his loudmouth lunch bucket opinions about anything-everything related to hockey.  It began in 1981 on CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada between period shows.

He grew in popularity with his old school theories, about fighting, women in the lockeroom, free agency, rule changes.

But it was his irreverence that struck a chord with everyone, and it was the rationale of the CBC and then Sportsnet to let him get away with things that always seemed to cross the line.

It was a Saturday Night Live version of the NHL on TV.  You never knew what was coming out of his mouth next, like a John Belushi appearance, or like a Dave Schultz cross-check in the head, from back in the day.

He didn’t care about the criticism.  The CBC didn’t care about the outrage, morally, socially, because they were raking in ratings and profits.  I’ll never forget covering the Kings-Maple Leafs playoff series just before the Stanley Cup finals, when the whole Press Box went silent between the first and second period, to see what “Grapes” had to say on Coaches Corner.

The critics were everywhere, that he was appealing to the worst element of Canadian society, the beer drinking, truck driving, blue collar-hardhat workers who followed the NHL.

But Cherry’s power and popularity grew, and so did the controversy.  He attacked the government, the war in Iraq, Afghanistan, social-racial issues, all well beyond the scope of his hockey expertise, and broadcasting leadership did nothing.

I’ll never forget the night he read the poem about Fields of Flanders, written by a dying soldier in World War I.  It was moving, it was honest, it was sincere.  Remembrance Day in Canada is so meaningful, equivalent to our Memorial Day-Veterans Day…maybe even more so, because he wrapped the Canadian flag around the NHL.

He was proud Canadian, and a proud historian, talking about the Eddie Shore days of the NHL and the AHL, the Hockey Hall of Fame, his beloved Bruins and Maple Leafs, the hated Canadiens and all things Oilers-and-Gretzky.

He may have invented ‘branding’, his loud sports jackets, the flowers, the shirts, the ties, and the non-stop noise.  He was is own social media brand.

But for all the spectacular things Don Cherry did, he was reviled for his tirades.  Included in the list were stunning statements that kept coming.

..Called LA Kings winger Tomas Sandstrom a ‘Chicken Bleep-Back Stabbing Swede’.

..Commenting on the arrival of Russian players who changed the NHL…’Should have killed their parents at the Russian front.’

..Called those who wanted to ban fighting because of head injuries ‘Pukes-Turncoats-Bleeding Hearts’.

..Called players from Quebec a ‘Bunch of Whiners and Those Guys’

..Said he was ‘Embarrassed women were allowed in the locker room’

..Called his critics ‘left wing pinkos’.

..Called players who wanted to wear visors ‘Euro-French Guys-Sissies-Wimps’

 

He was beside himself when 2-American teams got to the Stanley Cup Finals for the first time.  He could not believe a hockey team named after a movie “Mighty Ducks” won the Cup.  He hated Francophones, loved Anglophones and was relentless spraying opinions into every corner of the arena, every bar in Canada, and in your living room.

It went on unstopped for years, till this past weekend’s attack on immigrants in Ontario for not buying poppies on Veterans Day.

He never apologized.  Thru his prism, what he was doing on TV was delivering a message.  But he became more polarizing than popular.  His last comment this week, about not becoming some ‘Network Tin Soldier’.  He said if he was leaving, he was going out on his shield.

Hockey has been the unifying element of Canadian society, stretching from Newfoundland to the Yukon Territory….Toronto to White Rock, British Columbia, Ottawa to Saskatchewan.  But Don Cherry had become the divisive part of NHL broadcasting because of his style.

He was brilliant, he was bombastic.  He was from a different era and now out of touch.  He gave the word ‘filibuster’ a Canadian definition.  You knew it would end this way….a race-baiting rant, either on ice or off ice, would lead to his end.

And it’s odd, Don Cherry’s broadcasting life ended on the day that meant so much to him, Remembrance Day, and his love for all the veterans over all the wars, who died with the Maple Leaf flag branded on their soul.

I watched him, I interviewed him, I enjoyed him.  I was sad to see it end the way it did, but that was Grapes, and you lived on his terms, and he died on his terms too.

Don Cherry-Howard Cosell….one and the same…started the same-ended the same….and now likely never to be forgotten.

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