Last Sunday, after the Kansas City Chiefs’ “ho hum” victory in a game, vs the New York Jets ended, CBS shifted this market to its coverage of an eventual Indianapolis Colts win and cover, vs the San Diego Chargers,
Unfortunately I heard Kevin Harlan (Marty Glickman, who delineated every 3 yards or so, is causing seizmic shock, turning over and over in his grave as Harlan continually does everything, but delineate yardage on his radio calls. In addition to causing the earth to move, Harlan’s failure to provide essential game information in a timely manner, is an affront to listeners, but Westwood One lets him do so!) on the telecast.
On television, Harlan could not, by definition, (he was not) be as offensive as on radio, when the listener is at his mercy, but he came darn close.
First, he blurted out no team had ever started (0-3) and made the NFL playoffs. He was corrected, but he is working NFL games, the one last Sunday involving the (0-2) Colts, could not he have done some research?!!
There were other blunders and analyst Rich Gannon was annoying as well (his talk regarding the last play, an example, as there was no realistic of it working, not the impression he gave, and it was going to be a lateral play (he was way off in his theory), which it was–details on demand, I promise).
The details are saved for Harlan, who took playing it safe, to an absurd level when with the possibility of one more play given to the Chargers down 4 points, from roughly their own 20 yard line, he said T.Y. Hilton’s touchdown catch MAY have given the Colts their first victory.
At worst, say “barring a last play miracle touchdown,” but Harlan used the word “may” as a gauge of the probability of an S.D. win.
Whether he is NOT telling us how many yards were gained, or having a clue regarding probability, Harlan’s performance is disgraceful.
Tonight’s Thursday night NFL tilt matches a pair of (1-2) teams, the Cincinnati Bengals and Miami Dolphins, neither of whom have covered the spread in victory and done so only once in defeat.
Miami covered easily, in defeat, at Seattle(Seahawks), in the first week.
A more pleasant, if not important association between these two AFL expansion teams, in addition to that very fact, is their Slot 3/divisional round clash in the 1973 NFL playoffs.
Miami, under coach Don Shula, won the game and went on to win their second straight Super Bowl, to date, the only two in franchise history.
Cincinnati was coached by Paul Brown, who guided the team into the playoffs for the second time that season.
The great Paul Brown, pictured above.
There were many posts here during the season regarding the A.L. Central Division.
Cleveland (Indians) won it, clinching their eighth, “one eighth” division title, two nights ago.
Few so called baseball sites that I found anyway, gave the tiebreaker scenarios among the three division winners in the A.L. as far as playoffs seeding.
I did research the fact both of the other division winners Texas and Boston won the season series vs the Indians. Thus Cleveland loses in any tiebreaker scenario, including a 3 way one.
I know Boston has not clinched the division yet but I will take the chance and call them “division” winners.
Actually the chances of them (Boston) not winning the division are greater than what was referred to as a “may” by the so annoying CBS announcer, Kevin Harlan at the end of last Sunday’s Colts/Chargers game.
I will cite that and other “horrors/Harlan” I heard in the short time the telecast aired in this market last Sunday, in one of two “attack mode” posts tomorrow.
Have to vent folks, but I will do so with no personal “attacks.”
The best of five, semi-final round of the WNBA playoffs begins tonight with all four remaining teams in action, with both tilts to be televised on ESPN Two.
In the opener the defending champions and top ranked Minnesota Lynx are 6 plus point game, and near 3 to 1 series favorites vs the 8th seed, Phoenix Mercury. These two franchises have combined to win 6 of the last 9 WNBA crowns and are meeting in the ‘offs” for the 4th straight season.
Led by a truly excellent player, Diana Taurasi (apparently, if one trusts what one reads (13-3) in WNBA so called “elimination” games and also unaware her Mercury team were favorites, not underdogs at the New York Liberty, in the Mercury “elimination” game victory last Saturday) the Mercury beat both the Indiana Fever and third seed, Liberty to advance to the semis.
Meanwhile the “Chi” Sky are very high, concerning odds that is, as the second seed L.A. Sparks are huge 10 point game and roughly 12 to 1, (man to man, woman to woman, human to human), “faves” in the series.
The Sky defeated the Atlanta Dream to advance. Atlanta had beaten the Seattle Storm, both in one game entities.
ESPN television and radio announcer, Dan Shulman will be the radio broadcaster of the World Series for the 6th straight season.
Though he has improved from an “impossible to listen” status, he certainly does not belong on a list that includes Mel Allen, Vin Scully and even Jon Miller, the latter whom he replaced as the W.S. broadcaster.
Schulman on the Cubs/Cardinals ESPN telecast last Friday afternoon, near the beginning of the broadcast stated that if the Cards qualified as one of the two wild card teams, that would make it 12 of 16 seasons in which they qualified.
Sorry Dan, but that is the situation right now before the Cards’ 2016 fate is known. Also they have been at least as far as the division series in those 13 seasons (’00- ‘o2, “04-’06, ’09 and ’11-’15) a point Schulman, given a dream job, should have pointed out, but did not, in my opinion compounding his factual error.
A truly good Dick Cavett Show awaits us tonight at 8 p.m. Eastern Time to be shown again at 2 a.m. on Decades.(“Do you know how to watch Decades?”)
It was Cavett’s last show in a summer series granted him by ABC. There are interesting pro and con letters he reads that would be relevant today, concerning the way people writing letters to shows feel.
It is hard to believe I waited to the third paragraph to tell you the sensational guests were Woody Allen and Ruth Gordon. Quick what, more precise who is the link between the two? Note Allen paying attention as Gordon talked. A surprise ends the show.
I knew it was September, 1969 not by checking it anywhere, but by virtue of the fact Allen noted his upcoming Sunday night show coincided with the most holy night of the Jewish Year (Kol Nidre preceding Yom Kippur), which I recall being Sunday September 21st in 1969.
In a win that day, vs the defending Super Bowl champion, New York Jets, I recall the Denver Broncos’ Mike Haffner diving, to make one of the greatest touchdown catches, I have ever seen.
“Andy B” made a similar diving catch to win a game 10 months earlier, the day before Nebraska/Oklahoma, but it was in a touch football game that “my side” (in the often cruel world of choosing sides, I belonged in the middle. I learned a lesson, as so called captain in 5th grade and that is to make yourself and nobody else bat ninth) won 5 touchdowns to 4. (3 complete passes were a first down.)
The Cavett Show airing tonight brings a similar and rare pleasure, true enjoyment!
Tomorrow I reveal “the link.” See if you get the answer while watching the show later today.
Dick Cavett, pictured above.
Below, you did not think I forgot that in that September 21, 1969 Broncos/Jets tilt in Denver that Jets’ punter Steve O’Neal had a record 98 yard punt. Of course unless rules change concerning recording plays or the field gets longer (each extremely unlikely) O’Neal’s record can not be broken. It can be tied, but that also is very unlikely! Click below to see O’Neal’s punt.
Five NFL teams are (3-0) after three weeks of play. Those teams are the New England Patriots, Philadelphia Eagles, Baltimore Ravens and two teams once or still (0-4) in Super Bowls, the defending champion Denver Broncos and Minnesota Vikings respectively.
Denver and Minnesota each scored road victories at Cincinnati and Carolina respectively, vs teams that are (0-2) in their Super Bowl history, each one (Cincy and Carolina) covering the spread, which of course moved many dollars, in one of their two Supe losses.
Both Denver and Minnesota (at Tampa Bay and home vs the New York Giants respectively) face a winner vs loser scenario, as the favorite this week, a situation that does not bode well for the two teams based on results, certainly this season and I believe in other seasons as well.
Perhaps more on this, when I take my (10-1-1) hot streak into the fourth week of NFL play.
There are so many, I will “tone down” my comments and the quantity to I believe three.
Why, Troy Aikman was a 5 yard Eli Manning completed pass without the receiver going out of bounds, “a good start” to the Giants’ final drive in what was eventually a failed drive in a loss. It was not a “good start” with little yardage gained and the clock continuing to run (where does a clock go when it runs?).
In fairness, the Giants overcame that play and a subsequent penalty to get a first down before a “Wash” interception clinched the win for the now (1-2) Redskins, with the Giants dropping to (2-1), with no game in which they clearly covered the spread.
Aikman, who was a great quarterback, but a bit of a robot and certainly one who rarely overcame adversity to win games (again as a “QB” he was a true great, and the Dallas Cowboys’ teams he played on were so great he did not need to come from behind very often), certainly has a penchant toward “robotism” (not a word, but maybe soon to be one, is there a patent needed, as I hear they are taking over soon) as he time and again says the same thing.
Saying “a good start to the drive” is one he says over and again, even when it is not the case as happened on the Giants’ final possession last week.
Again Aikman was a great quarterback, but he is a bit of a robot. Are not those Dallas Cowboys’ colors that adorn the robot pictured above?
I will save my criticism of the broadcasters for another time.
The show “Harry” starring Harry Connick Jr. on which I was in the audience just aired in New York.
The phone rang and I said to a friend “did you see me?” She had seen me.
As the show continued the friend continued to say she saw me. I said come on even with a one minute difference in signal to television time, I did not see myself.
She persisted in saying she saw me, saying what I did and citing the color of my pants.
Then I realized while I have a very small old television, she has a big one that I guess shows a much wider view.
Some light fare and again “Harry” with star Harry Connick Jr. and a great band seems to be a fine show.
“That team (the Mets), which recently lost all three home games to the lowly Atlanta Braves, twice avoided Washington ace Max Scherzer thanks to Dusty Baker’s questionable “good graces” and will not face Miami Marlins’ ace Jose Fernandez, when the teams begin a three game series in Miami next week.”
I am not hiding from the fact, nor am I ashamed that I wrote the above, in one of last week’s posts.
Perhaps as I look at the chilling part of the declarative sentence stating Jose Fernandez, one of three people to die in a boating accident during the past weekEND, would not pitch a baseball game, (apparently that had been changed and he was scheduled to pitch vs “that team”), there is perspective.
However, I am past the point of condoning the actions and sentiment of people, including me, concerned more with outcomes involving their favorite, or more telling, as I alluded to yesterday, their least or close to least, favorite teams in sporting events.
I will not be a hypocrite and say that the tragedy which took the life of a man, who among other things was on a path to “break the bank,” per the agreement this society has “bargained” to reward athletic ability, will change my perspective.
On this point, I praise myself because I know myself. Why don’t most of the rest of you admit the same?
Despite all this, as I did regarding Lyman Bostock, a star baseball player, news of whose death also came on a September Sunday 38 years ago, in even more tragic circumstances, a victim of I believe, an unintentional shooting (at least it was not the result of shots, necessary or not, fired by uniformed people)–I asked God for that reset button he/she/it steadfastly has refused throughout time and bring the three victims back alive.
Though battered from pillar to post, a victim so often of my own wharped thinking, I felt utter misery when I read that Jose Fernandez had died.
Maybe God said in reiterating his no “reset” button that has continued but not enabled human tragedy for all time, (tha)t maybe if we did not “SET” so much tragedy upon ourselves …….
It is hard to follow even a hypothetical God, but in doing so, I evoke George Burns, who not only played “God” but warned not to “fall in love with our beds.”
In other words Mr. Burns said go out and do something. Jose Fernandez, by all accounts certainly did and not just with his pitching prowess.
Alas he did so with good but ultimately tragic result(s)!
Perhaps Jose Fernandez is tuned to my frequency, think of me as a pain in the butt, (repeat without the second “t’) but well meaning emissary.
In my next post I will get out some of what our conversation might consist.
Andy B Sports 