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“Super Bowl Sunday-Football….Checkers…Chess”

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Playing chess…playing checkers….playing football.

In the most simplistic form, that’s what Super Bowl Sunday is all about.

New England meets Philadelphia. Tom Brady faces a fierce Eagles defense. The New England defense will try to slow down the Philadelphia offense.

And you have the Patriots braintrust, the 3-Musketeers, Bill Belicheck-Matt Patricia and Josh O’Brien against the brilliance of the Eagles head coach Doug Pederson and the feistiness of his defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz.

There are lots of moving parts about what will happen starting at 3-30pm on Sunday in Minnesota.

Brady’s offense and Belicheck’s defense have gotten the Patriots 5-Super Bowl rings.

The game is all about matchups and how the players cope with the pressure the opposing coaches will put them under.

Tom Brady will look to play ‘chess’ against the Eagles.

How do you defend Rob Grankowski? Can you defend the deep ball passes going towards wideout Brandon Cooks? What happens when he starts throwing underneath or across the middle to Danny Amendola and Chris Hogan?

And if that’s not enough, Brady threw a ton of completions out on the edge to his three running backs, Dion Lewis, James White and Rex Burkhart.

Across the line of scrimmage, the Patriots will play checkers with its defense. Bluntly, when the Eagles QB-Nick Foles comes to the line of scrimmage, will he believes what he sees?

Belicheck’s people disguise so much you wonder if Foles pre-snap reads of what he sees will be fact or fiction.

Where’s the pressure coming from, what will the coverage be like when Foles drops back, will there be a blitz, or a ton of guys dropping its coverage.

Next thing you know, what you thought was happening, doesn’t. And the Patriots will goad you into mistakes. It always happen on Super Bowl Sunday.

Belicheck is so well known for admonishing the media, that stats don’t matter. It’s not about how many yards to give up in a game, t’s how few points you give up that helps decide the wins.

So the stingy Patriots choke you off inside the 20-yard lines, the red zone, which becomes a black hole. They force teams to kick field goals. Getting lots of 3’s is not the way to beat the Pats.

That’s because New England and Brady go down the field with regularity, and get tons of touchdowns in the red zone. Too many 7’s always win against a team that settle for just 3’s.

This is not to take anything away from what the Eagles have done.

Philadelphia does not out scheme you that much. They just pound you.

Fletcher Cox and friends, especially that tough guy front seven, make plays, get to the QB, slow down the run game.

And yes, the Eagles do have some firepower on offense, but not equal to the big play bullets in the New England gun. Nobody speaks of Zach Ertz, Nelson Agholor, or the two running backs,Jay Ajayi or LaGarrett Blount in the same sentence as to what the Pats run out there.

And yes, coach Doug Pederson dismantled the Vikings very good defense last Sunday in the NFC title game, throwing on the flanks and wearing them out, but Case Keenum is no Tom Brady, and the Vikings in no way have the cross section of skill players the Pats will throw at you.

So what happens?

The Eagles will rejoice if they get a couple of three and outs against Brady, or limit the Pats to a few field goals. Great you slowed him down the first three possessions, what are you going to do with the other 8-series he will get?

The New England game is dictated by geography. Put Philadelphia on a long field, and then make Foles make a mistake to snuff out drives. And if they get into New England territory, good luck finding the end zone.

Again the 3-vs-7 scoreboard debate.

The only way to describe the Patriots, are an evil defense, a ruthless quarterback, and an intelligence not to be matched by other teams, coaches and players.

It’s going to be a chess game….a checkers game…or maybe dominoes, for when they start to fall, New England will win.

They usually do, and always have when Bill Belicheck and Tom Brady are on the field on Super Bowl Sunday.

Patriots 31-Eagles 16, and it won’t be close.

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“QB-Derby-Here Come the Bids”

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The NFL is a quarterback driven league.

If you’ve got a good one, you need to keep him standing. If you don’t have one, you better find a way to get one.

Tom Brady, Andrew Luck, Philip Rivers, Cam Newton, Eli Manning, Russell Wilson and the bunch are among the elite ones in the NFL.

Enter Kirk Cousins, the high priced, big passing star of the Washington Redskins.

The Wednesday trade that saw Kansas City ship star QB-Alex Smith to Washington, cleared the way for the Chiefs to elevate young first round pick Patrick Mahomes to the starter’s job.

The Redskins acquisition, and four yer extension of Smith’s contract, cleared a potential 34M-off the salary cap books in Washington. That was what it would have cost Washington to re-sign Cousins, who had been franchise tagged two years in a row.

Cousins is a big time thrower, having thrown for over 12,000-yards, 81-TDs and 36-picks the last three seasons at Fed Ex Field. But Washington never went anywhere in the playoffs.

So they get Smith, who was just (1-4) in KC in post season under Andy Reid, but they do get cap relief. But Washington gave up top young DB-Kendall Fuller and a 3rd run pick in the trade, so did they really come out the better, by acquiring the 34-year old Smith.

The Chiefs cleared 20-M cap space with the Smith trade, got another young DB to add to the stockpile of young talent on defense, and landed an additional 3rd round pick.

Look around the NFL road map, and you will see red-flags everywhere, teams with QB problems.

Denver has three quarterbacks in Trevor Siemian, Paxton Lynch and Brock Osweiler, plus injured rookie, the untried Chad Kelly. Jon Elway may be the best QB in the building, and he’s the GM. They could be the front runner for Cousins.

Arizona is going thru a coaching change, has lost Carson Palmer to retirement via injuries, and is a seemingly older team.

The Jets are in the media capital of the world, don’t have much skill talent, and must not believe Christian Hackenberg is the future, for Cousins name is being thrown out everywhere.

Jacksonville has a 19M-decision to make on the erratic Blake Bortels, but has skill everywhere and a superb defense, and could be the dark horse in all this.

Minnesota has 3-quarterbacks heading to free agency, two of them coming off serious knee injuries, but they have players, and that defense is superb, and could be a player in all this. Cousins is better than Sam Bradford-Ted Bridgewater and this year’s wonder Case Keenum.

Buffalo has a cap decision on Tyrod Taylor, but does Cousins want to play in the real cold and the wind on the Niagra Frontier on a team with such a poor decade plus of records?

And then there is Cleveland, which has employed 29-different starting QBs since 1999, when the franchise brought back. Cleveland has the first pick in the draft, 5-picks in two rounds, and some 100M in cap space to spend on free agents. But if Cousins had a tough time with losses piling up in Washington, how does he sell himself about the Browns, who are (1-31) the last two years, big payday not withstanding?

Yes the coming month will have lots of dialogue about Baker Mayfield-Oklahoma….Josh Rosen-UCLA….Sam Darnold-USC…Mason Rudolph-Oklahoma State…Luke Falk-Washington State and Lamar Jackson-Louisville, but they are all going to be rookies and unproven.

Kirk Cousins, surrounded by a better team than he had in Washington, has a chance to not just get a big payday, but go play for someone really good.

Let the bidding begin for NFL teams will pay handsomely for the right quarterback in a QB league, and Cousins is the right quarterback.

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“Padres-Cry & Celebrate”
by Lee ‘Hacksaw’ Hamilton.com

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Kevin Towers left us too early.

The longtime General Manager of the Padres, who built 4-division winners, and watched his teams get to the World Series, passed at the age of 56-after a fierce fight with cancer over the last 14-months.

Those of us around the Padres, and who knew Towers well, knew for over a year about his war with thyroid cancer.

His courageous battle with an insidious disease, that took him in and out of the UCSD-Cancer treatment centers, took him to a European treatment program and one Mexico.

Tumors, chemo, experimental drugs. The thyroid issue became complicated when they discovered a tumor near his heart. What was supposed to be weeks left, became 3-months, then six, then a year and beyond. His fortitude to deal with this day in-day out, was amazing.

He loved baseball, so much so, he went to spring training last year to visit with the Padres before becoming ill again and having go return to the hospital.

He came to Petco Park and sat in the dugout before a World Baseball Classic game, and met with us in the media. We turned to him as we left, and I pounded my heart and pointed at him-a sign of respect and affection we all had.

He came to a private media Christmas party a bunch of us attended.

His spirit never wavered, even if his immune system did. A number of us were asked never to discuss his disease in public. And with his strength to fight this horrible fight, we also learned his wife a breast cancer surgery.

Kevin Towers was a bulldog, a scrapper, a fighter. As a pitcher, then a scout, then an execuative.

He worked for good owners, bad owners. He had to find players, survive firesafes, and yet discover talent, lots of talent.

He knew the art of deals.

He inherited Tony Gwynn Under his watch Trevor Hoffman became a Hall of Fame reliever.

Here came Ken Camminiti, Steve Finley, Wally Joiner, Greg Vaughn, Kevin Brown, Phil Nevin, Ryan Klekso, Greg Maddux and Ricky Henderson.

His relationship with baseball lifers like Jack McKeon and Sandy Alderson gave him different insights.

He saw things no one saw in a journeyman catcher Bruce Bochy, likely a Hall of Famer, as a manager.. Ditto for the left-handed pitcher Bud Black.

He was demanding, asking his pitchers to retaliate when this batters were beaned.

He was combative, once confronting me when I asked on the air, ‘what’s the bleeping blueprint’ when he brought in 39-pitchers to a spring training camp, never saying hello to me, just starting the conversation with ‘the bleeping blueprint is ____’, and then started laughing.

He disliked the Dodgers so much, but was so rewarded when the Padres beat the Dodgers three straight to win the division.

There was a warm side too. Forever an old school scout, he started the Scout’s Dinner in Los Angels with other baseball execs, to benefit lifelong scouts, who were left with no pensions or life’s savings after a career on the road.

And he knew our job too, the media, he got it, and he gave us lots of background information and strong opinions too.

Unknown and forgotten by many, Kevin Towers was the first to sound off about steroids and the need for drug testing, back in the early 1990’s, drawing scorn from people like Bud Selig and Donald Fehr.

Years later we had the Mitchell Report, then suspensions, then drug testing, and how the Hall of Fame boycott of PED users..

He was many things to many people. More importantly, he was good and honest and a believer in the Grand Old Game.

Kevin and Kelly Towers would come to spring training with a pet bulldog, allowed to run around camp and in the hallways of the complex upstairs.

His nickname on his Email account was ‘Gunslinger’.

That’s who he was, and he accomplished so much, with suck adversity around him.

It was as if he was a pitcher, fighting thru every inning, with lots of men on base, but always getting out of it.

That till he ran out of gas in the bottom of the ninth battle with cancer.

With tears in our eyes, so many of us feel sad this baseball day. I hope the Padres find way to put a “KT” emblem on their jerseys this year.

And it’s eerie, on a day we all mourn his passing, we get to enjoy and watch the Mr. Padre documentary on the MLB Network.

Kevin Towers, a good baseball guy, and a good man too.

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“Indians Baseball-Was It Offensive?”

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So what’s in a nickname? What should a logo represent?

Where should history come in making a decision to make a change of a team, an identity?

Major League baseball has forced the Cleveland Indians to drop their historical ‘Chief Wahoo’ logo, the one with the smiling Indians, that adorned their caps and their sleeves on their jerseys for decades.

Chief Wahoo was one of the first logos ever presented in public, starting back in 1948, by then owner Bill Vleck, the master marketeer.

The logo has had different faces attached to it, but the current ‘Chief Wahoo’ dates to 1954, when the Indians were in the World Series.

In a society where so many people want the world to be politically correct, even if your President can use vulgar terms like ‘s—hole’ and be linked to steamy affairs with a prositute, let’s make sure we get all the nicknames and logos of teams changed.

So Chief Wahoo goes the way like the Atlanta Braves ‘indian head logo’ disappeared. Of course the Braves tomahawk is still on the front of their jersey.

Syracuse University forfeited its Indians nickname and its warrior logo years ago for adaption of the Orangemen instead.

Marquette’s Warriors went away, as did the Miami of Ohio Redskins, Eastern Michigan Hurons, and North Dakota State Fighting Sioux.

Of course we still have Daniel Snyder’s Washington Redskins, and the logo of the Indian head, similar to the one that used to be on one of our coins.

No one has made a move on the Golden State Warriors name, the Chicago Blackhawks, nor the college basketball Bradley Braves.

And in town,a select few continue to rage on San Diego’s State’s nickname, Warrior mascot and team colors.

I am not sure where you draw the line between ‘offensive’ and being a fad.

Very few of the teams names nor the insignias that were dropped were offensive.

In an era where everyone likes to wear their teams colors or show their sprit, most all the people I cross paths with, are frustrated, and believe this political correctness in sports is overblown. They want it to cease….”PC-is-BS” they say.

In a year in which we had National Anthem protests, Colin Kaeperneck being blackballed, and continued civil unrest, you’d think government would have better things to do than force baseball to force the Indians to say goodbye to Chief Wahoo.

This borders equal to the moves to take down all the monuments in the south to Civil War generals, begging the question about priorities.

Try solving things like immigration, opioid drugs, the flu epidemic.

Chief Wahoo was artistry and history, and it was sports not society.

Offensive? Don’t think so. Not as offensive as your President, what he says, tweets, does. Is it?

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“Best & Worst at Torrey Pines”

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It was a ‘Shootout at Sunset’ on Sunday at Torrey Pines, an hour after it appeared to be ‘Self Destruct Sunday’ nw the course.

Such was the day at the Farmers Insurance Open, a tourney that is not over.

Jason Day tees off at 8am against Swedish star Alex Noren after 5-holes of golf that took us into the darkness in LaJolla. Show me what you can do on the 6th extra hole.

What a day.

As we went to the 13th hole on Sunday…there was a four way tie. What happened on the final 4-holes was like bad theatre.

JB Holmes fell apart, spraying shots here-there and everywhere. He shot himself out of the tourney, and aggravated the gallery in the process. Bogeys as 15-16-17. Shots in the rough, shots out of bounds, and then a near 5-minute delay on the 18th hole, trying to choose a club, for what would wind up being an errant shot. There were boos from the fans and even criticism from the CBS broadcast team.

Ryan Palmer went bogey-bogey at 14 and 15, put a shot into a tree, put another into the rough, but did make enough shots at the end to get into the playoff.

Day, who had an amazing 8-under par day on Friday, started fast on Sunday, reeling off 4-birdies on the front nine. But he could not pull away from the pack late.

Noren was tops all weekend with greens in regulation, and wasn’t bad with the putter either, saving pat at 16-and-17, and then rallying to stay alive after his shot on 18 went over the green into the CBS broadcast location.

In the playoffs, Day ran around the ring of fire. He had 2-shots into bunkers off the tee….he missed an eagle putt on a playoff hole….and then had a long putt get to the lip of the cup on 5th extra hole on that could have won it.

Noren put those sudden death playoff shots into special places, one at the top of the green that rolled back towards the cup….a shot into and out of a bunker….and what seemed tobge pressure putt after pressure putt, that he sank..

Late afternoon brought challenges to the survivors. Gusty winds impacting shots off the tees and across the canyon. Cross winds that rolled putts in different directions.

Day having to take a shot off the tee into a blazing sun glaring in his eyes. And on the final playoff hole, a tee short onto a darkened green, that he could not see nor read.

Oh there were other storylines.

Tiger Woods scrambled all weekend. Bad iron shots, a shaky putter, and then going just 3-for-14 on fairway shots both Saturday and Sunday Yet playing 4-rounds for the first time since 2015, coming off 3-back surgeries in 14-months, he finished even par, very respectable.

Phil Mickelson got hot then went cold. Charley Hoffman could not survive a bad day at the office. Jon Rahm had one round go sideways to take him out of the running.

But it was as wild a Sunday as you could want, and there will be a Monday worth watching.

Sadly, the fans won’t be admitted to watch what happens on Monday. Closed to all but the working media, but it will be on TV, and that was a special Jim Nance-Nick Faldo led telecast.

Don’t know if it will birdies or bogeys at breakfast, but we’ll find out from Jason Day and Alen Noren starting at 8am.

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