Let me get this straight, because my brain hurts from thinking about it.
The Brooklyn Nets won 49 games last season -- 35 of which came under the leadership of P.J. Carlesimo -- and made the NBA Playoffs for the first time in seven years.
But then the Nets management canned Carlesimo, saying that they wanted to go in a different direction.
And that direction is the recently retired Jason Kidd.
Nothing against Kidd, who was a great player for the Nets, a guy who singlehandedly saved their franchise and without his accomplishments, the Barclays Center would have never been built. I think Kidd is one of the best point guards to ever play the game, a player with great vision, a player who made everyone around him better.
But as a head coach right away? As a head coach instead of Carlesimo?
Are you Kidd-ing me?
Kidd hasn't an ounce of coaching experience. He sure was a genius with the ball on the floor and had great insight in terms of basketball knowledge with the ball in his hand.
But as I remember, coaches don't exactly play the game. Kidd can't make Deron Williams play better because he's standing on the sideline in a suit.
How in the world is a coaching nebish like Kidd better than Carlesimo? He can't be. There's a lot to handle in being an NBA head coach. There are film breakdowns and scouting reports daily. There are the countless demands of facing the media -- something Kidd wasn't overly comfortable with as a player. There is the psychoanalysis of every single player -- and Kidd was just a player a few weeks ago.
The Nets also thought of Pacers assistant Brian Shaw and former Memphis Grizzlies coach Lionel Hollins. They even apparently brought Shaw in for an interview Wednesday after allegedly offering the job to Kidd with a three-year contract.
None of these selections are better than the man who held the position, albeit on an interim basis, for the last five months of the season and into the playoffs. It wasn't a fluke that Carlesimo coached the Nets to a 35-19 regular season record and three wins in the playoffs. He was the perfect elixir for a team in disarray after Avery Johnson's reign.
But now, Nets general manager Billy King is turning the team over to a guy with no coaching experience whatsoever?
Don't forget Kidd's past. He was arrested of domestic violence during his days as a player in Phoenix, an incident that greased the skids out of Arizona and to New Jersey for Stephon Marbury. It did turn out to be the best trade in the Nets' history, but there's no denying that Kidd once beat his wife.
And a year ago, Kidd was arrested for DUI after an accident in the Hamptons. That case has yet to go in front of a judge.
This is the guy you want to be your head coach? Will Deron Williams listen to Kidd? At least the two have something in common. They're both coach killers. Williams got Jerry Sloan out the door in Utah and Kidd stood on his head to get Byron Scott fired in New Jersey.
Make no mistake about it. As a player, Jason Kidd was the best thing to ever happen to the Nets. He led them to two NBA Finals appearances and put life into the Continental Airlines Arena (now IZOD Center) that it never had before. Those were exciting times in the Meadowlands with Kidd leading the fast break. I witnessed hundreds of those games and never once was disappointed about Kidd's play, until he faked a headache in his final days, pushing Rod Thorn to trade Kidd to the Mavericks.
But can this same guy lead the Nets to another level? Who knows? It's a huge gamble for a team that already has a core in place for the next five years at least. There is no wiggle room with the Nets' roster right now. They're pretty much stuck with the top players they have.
Is a rookie head coach the answer for a veteran team? I guess we're going to soon find out.
But the bottom line is this: There is no way on this green earth that Jason Kidd is a better coach than P.J. Carlesimo. It's not even close. I don't care that Kidd hasn't coached a game. I've seen Carlesimo handle every single aspect of the coaching game and done it with a flair, a grace and a dignity.
So Billy King is going to roll the dice and hire Jason Kidd as a head coach. King shouldn't care, because he just got a three-year extension of his own.
The whole thing is beyond ridiculous. If it's a ploy to gain attention away from the Knicks, well, that works for one whole day _ the day that Kidd is announced as head coach. The day after, the proof, as they say, is in the pudding.
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Mets GM Sandy Alderson went on WFAN the other day to talk to Mike Francesa and said that the Mets are in a rebuilding mode.
Well, haven't they been in this same mode since Alderson arrived three years ago?
By now, there should have been some progress made. But in honesty, the team has gone way backward, thanks to the recent implosions of starting players Ike "Let's capitalize the K in his first name, because all he does is strikeout" Davis and Ruben "Never to Be Seen Again" Tejada.
The Mets are headed on a dead impact pace of losing 100 games. You can see it now in their pitching staff, in their anemic starting lineup (batting a team .225), in their inability to make decent plays, in their hideous and disgraceful bullpen.
It's a lousy team, the worst I can remember in more than 25 years. But don't come out and say you're in a rebuilding mode now. You had three years to rebuild. There should have been some progress by now.
No, Alderson has been made a complete stooge by the hideous owners, Freddy Coupon and Coupon Jr., the tight-wads that only care about holding on to imminent domain of the chop shops and car repair facilities directly to the north of CitiField.
The Coupons only want to hold on to the franchise long enough to see a real estate rebirth in Queens, snare the opportunity to re-develop the area round the stadium and turn it into a commercial and residential paradise.
They care nothing of the shamefully disgraceful franchise they put on the field every night and expect the hard working public to spend $75 a ticket to watch such tomfoolery.
If the Mets were honest three years ago and came out and said they were rebuilding, maybe this season wouldn't be as painful. But they tried to sell us that Lucas Duda was potentially a star. Guess what? He's not even close. The rest of the roster is a laughingstock. Anthony Recker would have a tough time cracking a Class AAA roster. There are better catchers on the free agent market than Recker. That's only one position.
They sent down Mike Baxter and brought up Colin Cowgill. For what? They both are awful.
I thought I liked Kirk Niewenhuis when he first came up, but he strikes out all the time and can't make a play in the outfield. Ugh. It's painful to watch. It's like going to the neighborhood bodega to get a root canal. It's like taking the car to the pharmacy for a transmission rebuild.
The Mets are a complete shambles and that really upsets me.
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You can read more of my work at www.hudsonreporter.com, www.theobserver.com and www.dailyrecord.com. The high school scholastic season is just about over. I can take up reading in the coming weeks. On my reading list are New York Post columnist George Willis' book about the Mike Tyson-Evander Holyfield fight and the biography of Earl "The Pearl" Monroe. I received both in the mail in the last few weeks and can't wait to get to both.
Newer head shot
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
Wednesday, June 5, 2013
The gift that keeps on giving: Performance enhancement drugs
So Anthony Bosch, this bastion of wonderment who has been selling his illegal performance-enhancement drugs to big-time athletes, is about to come clean with Major League Baseball officials and will sing like a caged songbird as to who he gave his illegal crap to.
And sure, this will more than likely seal the end of Alex Rodriguez's tenure with the Yankees and probably end his career, because no other team will want to take a gamble on a two-time PED abuser. This time, A-Rod can't blame his cousin or his ignorance that he didn't know the cream he was using was illegal and that he thought all along that he was taking vitamins.
A-Rod's involvement and his identification of being involved with the Bosch group Biogenetics isn't that shocking and isn't that newsworthy, except that it pushes him to the head of the steroid-using class, ahead of Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds, simply because Clemens and Bonds were only implicated once and this is strike two for A-Rod.
Nope, the name that jumps out above the rest this time is another thought-to-be one-time steroid loser Ryan Braun.
If you remember, Braun, the 2011 National League Most Valuable Player, was believed to have tested positive for PEDs before the start of the 2012 season, but had his 50-game suspension rescinded when Braun claimed that the testing procedure was tainted and that it could have been anyone's urine that ended up in a Wisconsin lab, not his.
A federal judge ruled that Braun could not be suspended for the drug charge, simply because the urine taken from Braun sat in a Wisconsin lab for three days and was not properly marked, even though the chemist involved with the testing never had a problem with the thousands of drug tests he did before.
When Braun was thought to be vindicated, he held a press conference in Arizona, ripping the process, throwing the chemist (a diehard Brewer fan, by the way) under the bus, saying that the system was wrong and he was proof that the system didn't work. Instead of being apologetic and contrite, Braun was on the warpath, claiming that he was done wrong and his reputation was forever harmed.
Well, what in the world is Braun's reputation worth this morning?
He's now a two-time loser, like A-Rod. But when A-Rod was first approached about using PEDs, A-Rod admitted his mistake and vowed to never do it again _ a promise he obviously couldn't keep.
In the case of Braun, he lied about using, then got off on a technicality, then ranted and raved that he was unjustly attacked as being a user _ and now has to face the charges again.
What does Braun use as an excuse this time? It was not him who went to the clinic in Miami, that it was some other guy named Ryan Braun who looks like him? That it was his evil clone twin? That excuse might have worked on "The Young and the Restless," but not here.
One of Braun's advisors had the audacity Tuesday night to say that Braun was being targeted by MLB Commissioner Bud Selig to "set an example."
Dummy. Braun plays for the Brewers, a team once owned by Selig himself. A team that Selig still holds with great reverance and love. Selig doesn't want to hurt the Brewers. In fact, I would venture to say that Selig is sick over the fact that a beloved Brewer is involved.
If Braun was just a tad contrite last year when he held that ridiculous press conference, I might be able to feel a little sorry for him today. But right now, after he blasted everyone under the sun for what he thought was injustice and gets caught doing the same crap again, he can go far away. No sorrow here. If he's suspended for 100 games and loses millions in salary, then Braun deserves every single ounce of that penalty.
If this songbird Bosch brings down other ballplayers with his tell-all secrets, then so be it. Maybe this might lift the cloud of uncertainty that has hovered over the game of baseball since 1998. Does he do steroids, doesn't he do steroids? Who's on the Mitchell Report list and who's not? Who's with BALCO and who's with Biogenetics? You have to keep a scorecard, steroid or no steroid.
It's that way with the Hall of Fame. This year alone, Mike Piazza didn't get in because it's believed he used steroids and Bonds and Clemens didn't get in because they did. It's going to get to a point where Cooperstown will need its own wing for steroid users, because you can't tell who did and who didn't.
We know now that A-Rod is a two-time steroid user and that should end his career and all hope of the Hall of Fame. We also know now _ even though he won't admit it _ that Ryan Braun is also a two-time steroid user.
In the case of A-Rod, it was expected and it's not shocking. In the case of Braun, it's downright sickening, because of all the people outside of baseball who he sang botched his urine test and ruined their lives and reputations strictly because he wanted to save face. In this corner, his case is more disgusting than A-Rod's, because you had to figure Braun was innocent the way he was so adamant he did nothing wrong in March of 2012.
Well, guess again. Denial is not just a really long river in Egypt. It's the rally cry, the mojo, the motto of professional athletes who were caught red-handed using PEDs and they still deny they did anything. Lance Armstrong. Marion Jones. Rafael Palmiero. They all denied they ever did it. They're not denying it now.
So, Ryan Braun, don't let the door hit you on the ass as you begin to serve the lengthy suspension you should have received last year. Because if the door hits your rear, it might sting a little from where all the steroid needle marks were.
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You can read more of my work at www.theobserver.com, www.hudsonreporter.com, and www.dailyrecord.com.
And sure, this will more than likely seal the end of Alex Rodriguez's tenure with the Yankees and probably end his career, because no other team will want to take a gamble on a two-time PED abuser. This time, A-Rod can't blame his cousin or his ignorance that he didn't know the cream he was using was illegal and that he thought all along that he was taking vitamins.
A-Rod's involvement and his identification of being involved with the Bosch group Biogenetics isn't that shocking and isn't that newsworthy, except that it pushes him to the head of the steroid-using class, ahead of Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds, simply because Clemens and Bonds were only implicated once and this is strike two for A-Rod.
Nope, the name that jumps out above the rest this time is another thought-to-be one-time steroid loser Ryan Braun.
If you remember, Braun, the 2011 National League Most Valuable Player, was believed to have tested positive for PEDs before the start of the 2012 season, but had his 50-game suspension rescinded when Braun claimed that the testing procedure was tainted and that it could have been anyone's urine that ended up in a Wisconsin lab, not his.
A federal judge ruled that Braun could not be suspended for the drug charge, simply because the urine taken from Braun sat in a Wisconsin lab for three days and was not properly marked, even though the chemist involved with the testing never had a problem with the thousands of drug tests he did before.
When Braun was thought to be vindicated, he held a press conference in Arizona, ripping the process, throwing the chemist (a diehard Brewer fan, by the way) under the bus, saying that the system was wrong and he was proof that the system didn't work. Instead of being apologetic and contrite, Braun was on the warpath, claiming that he was done wrong and his reputation was forever harmed.
Well, what in the world is Braun's reputation worth this morning?
He's now a two-time loser, like A-Rod. But when A-Rod was first approached about using PEDs, A-Rod admitted his mistake and vowed to never do it again _ a promise he obviously couldn't keep.
In the case of Braun, he lied about using, then got off on a technicality, then ranted and raved that he was unjustly attacked as being a user _ and now has to face the charges again.
What does Braun use as an excuse this time? It was not him who went to the clinic in Miami, that it was some other guy named Ryan Braun who looks like him? That it was his evil clone twin? That excuse might have worked on "The Young and the Restless," but not here.
One of Braun's advisors had the audacity Tuesday night to say that Braun was being targeted by MLB Commissioner Bud Selig to "set an example."
Dummy. Braun plays for the Brewers, a team once owned by Selig himself. A team that Selig still holds with great reverance and love. Selig doesn't want to hurt the Brewers. In fact, I would venture to say that Selig is sick over the fact that a beloved Brewer is involved.
If Braun was just a tad contrite last year when he held that ridiculous press conference, I might be able to feel a little sorry for him today. But right now, after he blasted everyone under the sun for what he thought was injustice and gets caught doing the same crap again, he can go far away. No sorrow here. If he's suspended for 100 games and loses millions in salary, then Braun deserves every single ounce of that penalty.
If this songbird Bosch brings down other ballplayers with his tell-all secrets, then so be it. Maybe this might lift the cloud of uncertainty that has hovered over the game of baseball since 1998. Does he do steroids, doesn't he do steroids? Who's on the Mitchell Report list and who's not? Who's with BALCO and who's with Biogenetics? You have to keep a scorecard, steroid or no steroid.
It's that way with the Hall of Fame. This year alone, Mike Piazza didn't get in because it's believed he used steroids and Bonds and Clemens didn't get in because they did. It's going to get to a point where Cooperstown will need its own wing for steroid users, because you can't tell who did and who didn't.
We know now that A-Rod is a two-time steroid user and that should end his career and all hope of the Hall of Fame. We also know now _ even though he won't admit it _ that Ryan Braun is also a two-time steroid user.
In the case of A-Rod, it was expected and it's not shocking. In the case of Braun, it's downright sickening, because of all the people outside of baseball who he sang botched his urine test and ruined their lives and reputations strictly because he wanted to save face. In this corner, his case is more disgusting than A-Rod's, because you had to figure Braun was innocent the way he was so adamant he did nothing wrong in March of 2012.
Well, guess again. Denial is not just a really long river in Egypt. It's the rally cry, the mojo, the motto of professional athletes who were caught red-handed using PEDs and they still deny they did anything. Lance Armstrong. Marion Jones. Rafael Palmiero. They all denied they ever did it. They're not denying it now.
So, Ryan Braun, don't let the door hit you on the ass as you begin to serve the lengthy suspension you should have received last year. Because if the door hits your rear, it might sting a little from where all the steroid needle marks were.
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You can read more of my work at www.theobserver.com, www.hudsonreporter.com, and www.dailyrecord.com.
Monday, May 27, 2013
Rutgers fiasco: "You can't make this up."
If you take a closer look at the Scarlet Knight in the Rutgers University logo these days, he's wearing a blindfold. Not because Mr. Knight is facing a firing squad or being forced to walk the plank, but out of pure embarrassment. He's shielding his eyes because he can't believe what's going on down by the banks of the Old Raritan.
Former New Jersey Gov. Dick Codey said it best yesterday, when he was quoted as saying, "You can't make it up."
Codey is right. You cannot make up the entire scenario involving the beloved State University of New Jersey. Your top comedy writers, like Mel Brooks or the Farrelly Brothers, couldn't dare dream up a more asinine plot. "Me, Myself and Irene" was far more plausible than this hideous charade.
Here's the whole thing in a nutshell. Rutgers fired its men's basketball coach and its athletic director over a string of videotapes portraying the basketball coach as some modern day escapee from Guantanamo Bay, filled with abusive insults at players _ and then the school goes out and hires a new athletic director who is guilty of the same kind of verbal torture?
Are you kidding me? Can that be true?
Well, after reading Craig Wolff's pretty extensive piece in the Newark Star-Ledger on Sunday, it appears to be very true, that newly-hired athletic director Julie Hermann made the same kind of hideous mistakes in terms of abusing her players when she was the volleyball coach at the University of Tennessee 16 years ago.
In the report, Hermann allegedly called her players "drunken whores" and "retarted" on several occasions. She was so abusive that there was a Captain Queeg-like mutiny on the team, that if Hermann stayed on as volleyball coach, the entire team was set to quit and relinquish their scholarships in the process. They all signed a letter validating such abusive behavior. So Hermann was reassigned and later moved on to the adminstrative side at Louisville.
And Hermann allegedly told her assistant coach that if she got married and subsequently got pregnant, she would be fired as an assistant coach. Sure enough, the coach got married (AND HERMANN WAS IN THE WEDDING PARTY) and sure enough, the coach got pregnant and sure enough, she was fired. The coach sued the University of Tennessee over illegal work code violations and the two parties settled for $150,000.
Get this? There's a portion of the assistant coach's wedding video that shows Hermann making such a threat _ and Hermann denied to Wolff that she was even at the wedding. Yet, there's the video on line. You can see it on www.nj.com.
Hermann also denied knowledge of the mutiny letter. But there it was, in print, for all to see.
Now, how in the world could Rutgers go through an "extensive search" to find a replacement for deposed athletic director Tim Pernetti and not know about Hermann's background, about the lawsuit, about the way her volleyball team hated her, about the wedding video and the letter? How could that possibly be?
It's almost too comical that this woman stood just a few weeks ago and vowed that nothing like what former men's basketball coach Mike Rice did would ever happen under her watch, yet she was guilty of doing the same exact thing.
The search committee apparently went through 45 different candidates and came up with Hermann's name after a member of the committee threw her name up at the last minute, that Hermann was not under consideration with the other 45 names during the first go-round. Say what? Someone gets thrown into the mix out of the blue and she gets the job, without the school doing its homework and due diligence? It was bad enough that Hermann had no experience whatsoever working with football _ and Rutgers' main source of revenue in athletics is indeed football.
But considering what happened with Rice and how he and Pernetti lost their jobs over the videos, don't you think Rutgers would have crossed every T and dotted every single last I before giving the job to this woman? How in the world could they overlook what happened in Tennessee?
One member of the search committee said that she didn't know about the letter or the claims of the players or even the blasted lawsuit before the article appeared in the Ledger. Are you kidding me?
And the way Hermann tried to dance around it, like it simply didn't happen? She said she didn't recall ever saying such a thing and didn't remember attending the wedding or in fact, saying those things on tape, even if the tape is now online for all to see. She must have been doing some really horrific hallucination-causing drugs back then.
When the Rice scandal broke in April, I thought that Rutgers President Robert Barchi deserved to lose his job, the way he ignored the videos and threw Pernetti under the bus, after Barchi told Pernetti to handle the whole situation _ and Pernetti did what he thought was the right thing, by suspending Rice at the time.
Pernetti was wrong for simply suspending Rice, because after he saw the tapes, he should have fired Rice immediately and not wait until the story became viral to do so. By then, Pernetti was painted as a bad guy as well _ by Barchi, who had a press conference trying to explain Pernetti's expulsion and came off trying to be Rodney Dangerfield, cracking jokes, instead of a college leader.
A lot of people are up in arms about Eddie Jordan, Rice's replacement, not having a college degree, yet the school's website said that he did. I don't see that as being as horrific as the other things happening in Piscataway. But it is another black eye.
However, this latest debacle just makes Rutgers an absolute laughingstock if it wasn't already. And who's to blame? Barchi, for first not taking the time to watch the Rice videos when they were brought to his attention last November and now for hiring a woman with beyond shady credentials and a tainted resume.
Barchi has to take the hit for turning Rutgers into a complete joke. And lucky for Rutgers, Hermann wasn't supposed to take over until June 17. The school can now cut bait on her before she takes over.
However, there was some statement, albeit a lame and absurd one, that came from Rutgers this afternoon, stating that they still support Hermann. How in the world can they? How can they keep a straight face and ignore all of this further negative publicity? Just shake it off as if it's either not true or it didn't happen? I may not always agree with what Wolff writes _ like calling Eric Murdock a victim in the Rice case, instead of being a felon _ but the evidence is overbearing. It leaps off the page and slaps you in the face. How can it not do that to Barchi and other already disgraced Rutgers officials?
Rutgers has no choice but to rid itself of Barchi and Hermann right now. Somewhere, Pernetti is having a big laugh out of all of this. Some critics even went as far as to saying that the school should bring back Pernetti. Do you think he wants this now? He has a life again and is getting paid nicely for the next 18 months to stay away.
But if Rutgers doesn't give a swift kick in the rear to both Barchi and Hermann and out the door at the same time in the days to come, then the place will have absolutely no credibility whatsoever.
Like it has any credibility left right now. It's like the people in Piscataway have used up all their credibility points already.
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In 1979, I used to love to go to Mets games. Sure the team stunk. They went 63-99 that year, under manager Joe Torre, a world before he would become a World Series championship manager.
The Mets finished dead last in the NL East that year and drew 788,905 fans for the season, 11th out of 12 National League teams. They were an awful baseball team, dreadful in every imagination, but I would love to go the games, because I would buy a general admission ticket for $3 and by the end of the game, I'd sneak down, level by level, until I got behind the Mets dugout.
I even once heard Torre, enraged by a call, go out to big John McSherry and say, "John, are you going to stop making horseshit calls or am I going to have to say something bad about your mother?" McSherry replied, "Joe, I'm only calling them as I see them." To which Torre said, "That's what I thought you'd say. Your mother is a ........" Just add your own expletives for effect. Torre got thrown out and the crowd of a few hundred went nuts.
But as bad as the Mets were that year of 1979, they were far better than the 2013 Mets, who are as bad as the words Torre used to describe McSherry's mommy.
The current Mets could not shine the 1979 Mets' shoes. Not even close.
Need proof? OK, here we go, position by position, 1979 team member listed first.
Catcher: John Stearns vs. John Buck. Stearns played in 155 games that year and had nine homers and 66 RBI, hitting .243. Buck got off to a great start and has now faded fast. Advantage: 1979.
First Base: Willie Montanez vs. Ike Davis. Montanez was in decline in 1979, hitting just .234 with five homers and 47 RBI. But .234 is still 90 points better than the bewildered Davis.
Second Base: Doug Flynn vs. Daniel Murphy. Flynn hit .243 with four homers and 67 RBI, but was the best fielding second baseman in the game then. Murphy is a better hitter, but can't catch a cold.
Shortstop: Frank Taveras vs. Ruben Tejada. Taveras hit .263 with one homer and 33 RBI, horrible numbers for someone who played in 157 games. But Taveras stole 42 bases. Tejada is lucky to steal one or two this year.
Third Base: Richie Hebner vs. David Wright. OK, here's one for the current team. Hebner was a malcontent who dogged it the entire season, batting .268 with 10 homers and 79 RBI. Wright is a legitimate All-Star and plays like one every day. He could have those power numbers by the All-Star break.
Left Field: Steve Henderson vs. Lucas Duda. "Stevie Wonder," the best player the Mets got in the Tom Seaver trade in 1977, batted .306 in 1979. Duda will never hit .300 for as long as he lives.
Centerfield: Lee Mazzilli vs. Rick Ankiel? Mazzilli (.303, 15 HR, 79 RBI) was the Mets' All-Star that year and almost won the All-Star Game MVP if not for Dave Parker's great throws. Rick Ankiel is Rick Ankiel.
Right Field: Joel Youngblood vs. Marlon Byrd. Youngblood hit .275 with 16 HR and 60 RBI. Byrd will not come close to those numbers.
Starting Pitchers: Craig Swan, Dock Ellis, Pete Falcone, Pat Zachry, Andy Hassler vs. Matt Harvey, Jonathan Niese, Shawn Marcum, Jeremy Hefner and Dillon Gee. OK, Swan was the only legitimate starter on that team (14-13, 3.29 ERA), while this year's team has a potential all-time great in Harvey. But Niese and Gee have been god awful, Marcum has been a waste of money and Hefner would be a decent starter in Las Vegas (and lately, he's been better than Niese and Gee). I'd still give the nod to the 2013 Mets.
Bullpen: Although the 1979 Mets had some firestarters in Dale Murray and Wayne Twitchell (ooh, bad memories), it did have Skip Lockwood, a 21-year-old Neil Allen and a 22-year-old Jesse Orosco. The current Met bullpen has Bobby Parnell, an overused Scott Rice and a bunch of shiite after that. Open up the bullpen door and outflows shiite.
Manager: Joe Torre vs. Terry Collins. While Torre was just learning his craft back then, he did go on to win four World Series titles. Terry Collins is a nice man with an inferior team who is about to lose his job soon, because Freddy Coupon, the cheapskate lying owner, is going to give in to fan pressure, believing that Wally Backman could turn things around. I have news for you. Miller Huggins or Joe McCarthy couldn't win with this team. OK, I know they're both long dead, but you get the drift.
Bottom line is this: Both teams suck. The 2013 Mets suck more and the 1979 lost 99 times.
And we're going into the Subway Series tonight? Yankee fans this year can bring a broom to every game, because a sweep is inevitable, even with Harvey pitching Tuesday night.
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You can read more of my work at www.hudsonreporter.com, www.theobserver.com and www.dailyrecord.com.
Former New Jersey Gov. Dick Codey said it best yesterday, when he was quoted as saying, "You can't make it up."
Codey is right. You cannot make up the entire scenario involving the beloved State University of New Jersey. Your top comedy writers, like Mel Brooks or the Farrelly Brothers, couldn't dare dream up a more asinine plot. "Me, Myself and Irene" was far more plausible than this hideous charade.
Here's the whole thing in a nutshell. Rutgers fired its men's basketball coach and its athletic director over a string of videotapes portraying the basketball coach as some modern day escapee from Guantanamo Bay, filled with abusive insults at players _ and then the school goes out and hires a new athletic director who is guilty of the same kind of verbal torture?
Are you kidding me? Can that be true?
Well, after reading Craig Wolff's pretty extensive piece in the Newark Star-Ledger on Sunday, it appears to be very true, that newly-hired athletic director Julie Hermann made the same kind of hideous mistakes in terms of abusing her players when she was the volleyball coach at the University of Tennessee 16 years ago.
In the report, Hermann allegedly called her players "drunken whores" and "retarted" on several occasions. She was so abusive that there was a Captain Queeg-like mutiny on the team, that if Hermann stayed on as volleyball coach, the entire team was set to quit and relinquish their scholarships in the process. They all signed a letter validating such abusive behavior. So Hermann was reassigned and later moved on to the adminstrative side at Louisville.
And Hermann allegedly told her assistant coach that if she got married and subsequently got pregnant, she would be fired as an assistant coach. Sure enough, the coach got married (AND HERMANN WAS IN THE WEDDING PARTY) and sure enough, the coach got pregnant and sure enough, she was fired. The coach sued the University of Tennessee over illegal work code violations and the two parties settled for $150,000.
Get this? There's a portion of the assistant coach's wedding video that shows Hermann making such a threat _ and Hermann denied to Wolff that she was even at the wedding. Yet, there's the video on line. You can see it on www.nj.com.
Hermann also denied knowledge of the mutiny letter. But there it was, in print, for all to see.
Now, how in the world could Rutgers go through an "extensive search" to find a replacement for deposed athletic director Tim Pernetti and not know about Hermann's background, about the lawsuit, about the way her volleyball team hated her, about the wedding video and the letter? How could that possibly be?
It's almost too comical that this woman stood just a few weeks ago and vowed that nothing like what former men's basketball coach Mike Rice did would ever happen under her watch, yet she was guilty of doing the same exact thing.
The search committee apparently went through 45 different candidates and came up with Hermann's name after a member of the committee threw her name up at the last minute, that Hermann was not under consideration with the other 45 names during the first go-round. Say what? Someone gets thrown into the mix out of the blue and she gets the job, without the school doing its homework and due diligence? It was bad enough that Hermann had no experience whatsoever working with football _ and Rutgers' main source of revenue in athletics is indeed football.
But considering what happened with Rice and how he and Pernetti lost their jobs over the videos, don't you think Rutgers would have crossed every T and dotted every single last I before giving the job to this woman? How in the world could they overlook what happened in Tennessee?
One member of the search committee said that she didn't know about the letter or the claims of the players or even the blasted lawsuit before the article appeared in the Ledger. Are you kidding me?
And the way Hermann tried to dance around it, like it simply didn't happen? She said she didn't recall ever saying such a thing and didn't remember attending the wedding or in fact, saying those things on tape, even if the tape is now online for all to see. She must have been doing some really horrific hallucination-causing drugs back then.
When the Rice scandal broke in April, I thought that Rutgers President Robert Barchi deserved to lose his job, the way he ignored the videos and threw Pernetti under the bus, after Barchi told Pernetti to handle the whole situation _ and Pernetti did what he thought was the right thing, by suspending Rice at the time.
Pernetti was wrong for simply suspending Rice, because after he saw the tapes, he should have fired Rice immediately and not wait until the story became viral to do so. By then, Pernetti was painted as a bad guy as well _ by Barchi, who had a press conference trying to explain Pernetti's expulsion and came off trying to be Rodney Dangerfield, cracking jokes, instead of a college leader.
A lot of people are up in arms about Eddie Jordan, Rice's replacement, not having a college degree, yet the school's website said that he did. I don't see that as being as horrific as the other things happening in Piscataway. But it is another black eye.
However, this latest debacle just makes Rutgers an absolute laughingstock if it wasn't already. And who's to blame? Barchi, for first not taking the time to watch the Rice videos when they were brought to his attention last November and now for hiring a woman with beyond shady credentials and a tainted resume.
Barchi has to take the hit for turning Rutgers into a complete joke. And lucky for Rutgers, Hermann wasn't supposed to take over until June 17. The school can now cut bait on her before she takes over.
However, there was some statement, albeit a lame and absurd one, that came from Rutgers this afternoon, stating that they still support Hermann. How in the world can they? How can they keep a straight face and ignore all of this further negative publicity? Just shake it off as if it's either not true or it didn't happen? I may not always agree with what Wolff writes _ like calling Eric Murdock a victim in the Rice case, instead of being a felon _ but the evidence is overbearing. It leaps off the page and slaps you in the face. How can it not do that to Barchi and other already disgraced Rutgers officials?
Rutgers has no choice but to rid itself of Barchi and Hermann right now. Somewhere, Pernetti is having a big laugh out of all of this. Some critics even went as far as to saying that the school should bring back Pernetti. Do you think he wants this now? He has a life again and is getting paid nicely for the next 18 months to stay away.
But if Rutgers doesn't give a swift kick in the rear to both Barchi and Hermann and out the door at the same time in the days to come, then the place will have absolutely no credibility whatsoever.
Like it has any credibility left right now. It's like the people in Piscataway have used up all their credibility points already.
=============================================================================
In 1979, I used to love to go to Mets games. Sure the team stunk. They went 63-99 that year, under manager Joe Torre, a world before he would become a World Series championship manager.
The Mets finished dead last in the NL East that year and drew 788,905 fans for the season, 11th out of 12 National League teams. They were an awful baseball team, dreadful in every imagination, but I would love to go the games, because I would buy a general admission ticket for $3 and by the end of the game, I'd sneak down, level by level, until I got behind the Mets dugout.
I even once heard Torre, enraged by a call, go out to big John McSherry and say, "John, are you going to stop making horseshit calls or am I going to have to say something bad about your mother?" McSherry replied, "Joe, I'm only calling them as I see them." To which Torre said, "That's what I thought you'd say. Your mother is a ........" Just add your own expletives for effect. Torre got thrown out and the crowd of a few hundred went nuts.
But as bad as the Mets were that year of 1979, they were far better than the 2013 Mets, who are as bad as the words Torre used to describe McSherry's mommy.
The current Mets could not shine the 1979 Mets' shoes. Not even close.
Need proof? OK, here we go, position by position, 1979 team member listed first.
Catcher: John Stearns vs. John Buck. Stearns played in 155 games that year and had nine homers and 66 RBI, hitting .243. Buck got off to a great start and has now faded fast. Advantage: 1979.
First Base: Willie Montanez vs. Ike Davis. Montanez was in decline in 1979, hitting just .234 with five homers and 47 RBI. But .234 is still 90 points better than the bewildered Davis.
Second Base: Doug Flynn vs. Daniel Murphy. Flynn hit .243 with four homers and 67 RBI, but was the best fielding second baseman in the game then. Murphy is a better hitter, but can't catch a cold.
Shortstop: Frank Taveras vs. Ruben Tejada. Taveras hit .263 with one homer and 33 RBI, horrible numbers for someone who played in 157 games. But Taveras stole 42 bases. Tejada is lucky to steal one or two this year.
Third Base: Richie Hebner vs. David Wright. OK, here's one for the current team. Hebner was a malcontent who dogged it the entire season, batting .268 with 10 homers and 79 RBI. Wright is a legitimate All-Star and plays like one every day. He could have those power numbers by the All-Star break.
Left Field: Steve Henderson vs. Lucas Duda. "Stevie Wonder," the best player the Mets got in the Tom Seaver trade in 1977, batted .306 in 1979. Duda will never hit .300 for as long as he lives.
Centerfield: Lee Mazzilli vs. Rick Ankiel? Mazzilli (.303, 15 HR, 79 RBI) was the Mets' All-Star that year and almost won the All-Star Game MVP if not for Dave Parker's great throws. Rick Ankiel is Rick Ankiel.
Right Field: Joel Youngblood vs. Marlon Byrd. Youngblood hit .275 with 16 HR and 60 RBI. Byrd will not come close to those numbers.
Starting Pitchers: Craig Swan, Dock Ellis, Pete Falcone, Pat Zachry, Andy Hassler vs. Matt Harvey, Jonathan Niese, Shawn Marcum, Jeremy Hefner and Dillon Gee. OK, Swan was the only legitimate starter on that team (14-13, 3.29 ERA), while this year's team has a potential all-time great in Harvey. But Niese and Gee have been god awful, Marcum has been a waste of money and Hefner would be a decent starter in Las Vegas (and lately, he's been better than Niese and Gee). I'd still give the nod to the 2013 Mets.
Bullpen: Although the 1979 Mets had some firestarters in Dale Murray and Wayne Twitchell (ooh, bad memories), it did have Skip Lockwood, a 21-year-old Neil Allen and a 22-year-old Jesse Orosco. The current Met bullpen has Bobby Parnell, an overused Scott Rice and a bunch of shiite after that. Open up the bullpen door and outflows shiite.
Manager: Joe Torre vs. Terry Collins. While Torre was just learning his craft back then, he did go on to win four World Series titles. Terry Collins is a nice man with an inferior team who is about to lose his job soon, because Freddy Coupon, the cheapskate lying owner, is going to give in to fan pressure, believing that Wally Backman could turn things around. I have news for you. Miller Huggins or Joe McCarthy couldn't win with this team. OK, I know they're both long dead, but you get the drift.
Bottom line is this: Both teams suck. The 2013 Mets suck more and the 1979 lost 99 times.
And we're going into the Subway Series tonight? Yankee fans this year can bring a broom to every game, because a sweep is inevitable, even with Harvey pitching Tuesday night.
=========================================================================
You can read more of my work at www.hudsonreporter.com, www.theobserver.com and www.dailyrecord.com.
Sunday, May 5, 2013
Even with the loss, P.J. deserves to coach Nets
Sure, it was downright disappointing that the Brooklyn Nets lost Game 7 of their series with the Chicago Bulls.
Sure, the Bulls were the walking wounded with players having every malady under the sun except for malaria and Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever and the Nets were the relatively healthier and deeper squad and the Bulls still won.
And yes, Tom Thibodeau proved that he's the best coach in the NBA bar none and willed his team to win the franchise's first-ever Game 7 on the road, punching every single right button along the way. Daequan Cook? Did he really hit two big 3-pointers in the game? I didn't even know he was on the Bulls' roster until that second trey hit the bottom of the twine.
Thibodeau had an answer for every single out-of-bounds possession the Bulls had. Every single one. There wasn't an improvisation to be found. All set plays, all leading to baskets.
So, yes, P.J. Carlesimo was the second best head coach on the floor last night at the Barclays Center. I think even P.J. would reluctantly agree that he played second fiddle to Thibodeau last night. P.J. was not bad, but Thibodeau was just that much better. It happens.
However, getting outcoached by a master isn't reason enough for Carlesimo to receive his walking papers from the Nets' Russian czar Mikhail Prohkorov. Regardless of what you may read in some of the New York tabloids today, calling for P.J.'s carcass, it's not his fault that the Nets didn't move on.
In fact, Carlesimo did a wonderful job coaching the Nets for 57 games. He won 37 of those games. There's no way that if the powers-that-be stuck with the now-forgotten Avery Johnson (well, forgotten by everyone except Avery's own son, who put on Twitter his own version of a 'Ha-Ha, that's what you get for canning my old man), that Johnson would have led the Nets to that point. There's no way. That team was headed for disaster before the team fired him in December.
Carlesimo got the most out of most of his players. He helped to turn Brook Lopez into a star. He got the daily malcontent, Deron Williams, to actually play like himself down the stretch and even helped Williams crack a smile or two along the way. He won games despite the fact that the team got very little offensive production all season from either forward position. Hell, the Nets won 49 regular season games with Reggie Evans as their starting power forward. Reggie Evans can't throw a beach ball into the swimming pool, but the Nets won with him.
It wasn't Carlesimo's fault that Joe Johnson, getting paid $19 million, couldn't make shots in Game 7 or that Thibodeau exposed the defensive weaknesses of Lopez, Evans and Andray Blatche. Carlesimo did what he could with the roster he was handed. It just wasn't good enough against a master like Thibodeau.
My friend Mike Vaccaro, the New York Post columnist, wrote that Carlesimo was playing checkers to Thibodeau's chess or even Chutes and Ladders to Thibodeau. He's right. The intangible of having Thibodeau as the head coach was enough to win Game 7.
But let's look at the whole body of work. Carlesimo handled the media better than any other New York coach outside of Joe Torre. He was brilliant in that respect. He also turned the Nets' season around in a blur and guided the team to the playoffs for the first time in six years. He's a basketball lifer who deserves to coach this team through a full training camp.
The Brooklyn Nets were a major success in Year One, from the arena to the positive vibe the team gave off to their new fan base. A lot of the credit of that success belongs to Carlesimo. He deserves the chance to coach this team next year and into the future.
Carlesimo needs to get more out of a very weird chemistry of this team, because they play weird. They disappear for stretches, usually in the third quarter. They play sometimes with no sense of urgency, like they did last night until they found themselves shockingly down 17 by halftime.
But P.J. deserves to be the head coach, plain and simple. They don't need Phil Jackson, who is going to tell the Nets to go stick it anyway. They don't need either Van Gundy brother. They don't even need Doc Rivers. They need to take the interim tag off Carlesimo's name and throw him a three-year contract.
And after that, they need to put out an APB for Johnson's jump shot, because it went missing at the way wrong time last night.
=========================================================
As everyone knows, I'm a diehard Mets fan. Yeah, I know. It's masochism 101.
And by now, nothing the team does should surprise me.
However, I received a promotional e-mail this morning saying that next Sunday, on Mother's Day, the Mets "will present a special performance from the Wiggles" beginning at 12:30 p.m.
Yes, the Wiggles. First, they had Cirque de Soleil in the parking lot. Now, it's the Wiggles. I Tweeted this morning that if any of the Wiggles can play the outfield or serve as a middle inning closer, then I was all for them.
C'mon now. The Wiggles? Is that what we've become? The freakin' Wiggles?
I can't shake my head enough at this franchise.
We have not a single outfielder worth a spit. Mike Baxter would be a decent fourth outfielder on the Anaheim Angels' Class AAA team. Yet he's playing almost every day for the Mets. I think he went homerless in Little League. Colin Cowgill was supposed to be a great find, until he couldn't find the baseball and couldn't get on base. And neither one has a better arm than my dead mother.
We have a horrific bullpen (thanks Sandy, because he has said for the last two years, it was his priority to build a solid bullpen and we've had nothing but a conglomeration of smelly fish coming from behind the right field wall), yet we have the Wiggles. Hey, if all else fails, we at least have the Wiggles.
It's a sad state when the best relief pitcher is a 31-year-old rookie who spent 16 years in the minors and now pitches every single damn day. Scott Rice pitches every day. His arm will fall off by July. But Terry Collins keeps parading him out there every game because, frankly, no one else can get anyone out.
Incredibly, some asinine Met fans were calling the radio shows this week, saying they wanted Collins fired. Hell, managing this God-awful roster, he should be named Pope rather than get fired. Wait, maybe that is not a step up these days.
It's not Collins' fault that his bosses are lying, tight-wad buffoons who don't spend a dime improving the team or the franchise or the baseball experience at CitiField.
But wait, at least we have the Wiggles. Not many other teams can lay claim to the Wiggles.
Rumor has it that the Tellytubbies are next, as long as Tinky Winky can play centerfield.
========================================================
You can read more of my work at www.hudsonreporter.com, www.theobserver.com and www.dailyrecord.com. I'd say you can read my Nets or Devils coverage as well, but both those teams are on the golf course today as you read this.
Sure, the Bulls were the walking wounded with players having every malady under the sun except for malaria and Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever and the Nets were the relatively healthier and deeper squad and the Bulls still won.
And yes, Tom Thibodeau proved that he's the best coach in the NBA bar none and willed his team to win the franchise's first-ever Game 7 on the road, punching every single right button along the way. Daequan Cook? Did he really hit two big 3-pointers in the game? I didn't even know he was on the Bulls' roster until that second trey hit the bottom of the twine.
Thibodeau had an answer for every single out-of-bounds possession the Bulls had. Every single one. There wasn't an improvisation to be found. All set plays, all leading to baskets.
So, yes, P.J. Carlesimo was the second best head coach on the floor last night at the Barclays Center. I think even P.J. would reluctantly agree that he played second fiddle to Thibodeau last night. P.J. was not bad, but Thibodeau was just that much better. It happens.
However, getting outcoached by a master isn't reason enough for Carlesimo to receive his walking papers from the Nets' Russian czar Mikhail Prohkorov. Regardless of what you may read in some of the New York tabloids today, calling for P.J.'s carcass, it's not his fault that the Nets didn't move on.
In fact, Carlesimo did a wonderful job coaching the Nets for 57 games. He won 37 of those games. There's no way that if the powers-that-be stuck with the now-forgotten Avery Johnson (well, forgotten by everyone except Avery's own son, who put on Twitter his own version of a 'Ha-Ha, that's what you get for canning my old man), that Johnson would have led the Nets to that point. There's no way. That team was headed for disaster before the team fired him in December.
Carlesimo got the most out of most of his players. He helped to turn Brook Lopez into a star. He got the daily malcontent, Deron Williams, to actually play like himself down the stretch and even helped Williams crack a smile or two along the way. He won games despite the fact that the team got very little offensive production all season from either forward position. Hell, the Nets won 49 regular season games with Reggie Evans as their starting power forward. Reggie Evans can't throw a beach ball into the swimming pool, but the Nets won with him.
It wasn't Carlesimo's fault that Joe Johnson, getting paid $19 million, couldn't make shots in Game 7 or that Thibodeau exposed the defensive weaknesses of Lopez, Evans and Andray Blatche. Carlesimo did what he could with the roster he was handed. It just wasn't good enough against a master like Thibodeau.
My friend Mike Vaccaro, the New York Post columnist, wrote that Carlesimo was playing checkers to Thibodeau's chess or even Chutes and Ladders to Thibodeau. He's right. The intangible of having Thibodeau as the head coach was enough to win Game 7.
But let's look at the whole body of work. Carlesimo handled the media better than any other New York coach outside of Joe Torre. He was brilliant in that respect. He also turned the Nets' season around in a blur and guided the team to the playoffs for the first time in six years. He's a basketball lifer who deserves to coach this team through a full training camp.
The Brooklyn Nets were a major success in Year One, from the arena to the positive vibe the team gave off to their new fan base. A lot of the credit of that success belongs to Carlesimo. He deserves the chance to coach this team next year and into the future.
Carlesimo needs to get more out of a very weird chemistry of this team, because they play weird. They disappear for stretches, usually in the third quarter. They play sometimes with no sense of urgency, like they did last night until they found themselves shockingly down 17 by halftime.
But P.J. deserves to be the head coach, plain and simple. They don't need Phil Jackson, who is going to tell the Nets to go stick it anyway. They don't need either Van Gundy brother. They don't even need Doc Rivers. They need to take the interim tag off Carlesimo's name and throw him a three-year contract.
And after that, they need to put out an APB for Johnson's jump shot, because it went missing at the way wrong time last night.
=========================================================
As everyone knows, I'm a diehard Mets fan. Yeah, I know. It's masochism 101.
And by now, nothing the team does should surprise me.
However, I received a promotional e-mail this morning saying that next Sunday, on Mother's Day, the Mets "will present a special performance from the Wiggles" beginning at 12:30 p.m.
Yes, the Wiggles. First, they had Cirque de Soleil in the parking lot. Now, it's the Wiggles. I Tweeted this morning that if any of the Wiggles can play the outfield or serve as a middle inning closer, then I was all for them.
C'mon now. The Wiggles? Is that what we've become? The freakin' Wiggles?
I can't shake my head enough at this franchise.
We have not a single outfielder worth a spit. Mike Baxter would be a decent fourth outfielder on the Anaheim Angels' Class AAA team. Yet he's playing almost every day for the Mets. I think he went homerless in Little League. Colin Cowgill was supposed to be a great find, until he couldn't find the baseball and couldn't get on base. And neither one has a better arm than my dead mother.
We have a horrific bullpen (thanks Sandy, because he has said for the last two years, it was his priority to build a solid bullpen and we've had nothing but a conglomeration of smelly fish coming from behind the right field wall), yet we have the Wiggles. Hey, if all else fails, we at least have the Wiggles.
It's a sad state when the best relief pitcher is a 31-year-old rookie who spent 16 years in the minors and now pitches every single damn day. Scott Rice pitches every day. His arm will fall off by July. But Terry Collins keeps parading him out there every game because, frankly, no one else can get anyone out.
Incredibly, some asinine Met fans were calling the radio shows this week, saying they wanted Collins fired. Hell, managing this God-awful roster, he should be named Pope rather than get fired. Wait, maybe that is not a step up these days.
It's not Collins' fault that his bosses are lying, tight-wad buffoons who don't spend a dime improving the team or the franchise or the baseball experience at CitiField.
But wait, at least we have the Wiggles. Not many other teams can lay claim to the Wiggles.
Rumor has it that the Tellytubbies are next, as long as Tinky Winky can play centerfield.
========================================================
You can read more of my work at www.hudsonreporter.com, www.theobserver.com and www.dailyrecord.com. I'd say you can read my Nets or Devils coverage as well, but both those teams are on the golf course today as you read this.
Monday, April 29, 2013
The man known as "Twin" knows how to win
Jason Collins was a member of the New Jersey Nets for more than six seasons. He was the starting center for the Jason Kidd-led teams that won two straight NBA Eastern Conference titles and went to the NBA Finals.
Collins was affectionately known as "Twin" during his days with the Nets, because he has an identical twin brother, Jarron, who also played in the NBA.
Although he wasn't a star with the Nets, "Twin" was always cordial in terms of offering himself to be interviewed, either at practices or after games. He was always willing to answer the tough questions, standing there, facing the media, every single day of the basketball season.
I always looked forward to the smiling Collins, who would handle jokes about being a classmate of Chelsea Clinton at Stanford and battling with the Secret Service, or having a twin brother and fighting over the remote.
Today, Collins became one of the bravest athletes to ever put on a uniform. He agreed to an interview with Frank Lidz of Sports Illustrated and in the story, Collins admitted that he is gay.
Collins said that he battled with the decision to come out of the closet, to become the first active athlete in any of the four major sports in the United States to admit that he was a homosexual.
Collins is now 34. He's played 11 seasons in the NBA. He's been part of six different teams. The news that Collins is gay isn't shocking or disturbing. In fact, Collins coming out while he's currently a free agent (his contract with the Washington Wizards expired once the NBA Playoffs began) is as courageous of a move that any basketball player has ever made.
Collins' decision to come out was the talk of the pre-game chatter at the Barclays Center, where the Brooklyn Nets were set to face the Chicago Bulls in Game 5 of the NBA Eastern Conference playoffs.
Everyone agreed that Collins was indeed a great guy and that his decision to come out now was indeed as brave as it comes.
"It is an honor for me to call Jason Collins a friend," said Brook Lopez, who also attended Stanford before coming to the Nets. "I admire his dignity as well as his courage to come out. I'll always have his back."
Joe Johnson, who played with Collins last year in Atlanta, also offered his praise of Collins.
"Jason Collins was one of the best teammates I've ever had," Johnson said. "I respect his tremendous courage to come out. I will always support him."
The reaction from the sports world has all been positive. The Twitter posts have all praised Collins for having the fortitude to come to grips with his sexuality.
Should it matter that Collins is gay? If he was an entertainer or an accountant or even a clergyman, the announcement wouldn't have received a peep of attention.
But because Collins plays in the manly NBA, with an image of rugged men sweating and dunking and soaring, the announcement has newsworthy aspects.
It was the lead story on ESPN's SportsCenter. It was the topic of conversation in both locker rooms prior to Game 5 and asked to both head coaches in the pre-game press conference.
Because Collins is an active member of the masculine and manly NBA, his coming out becomes huge news.
When honestly, it shouldn't. In today's day and age, we should be able to respect anyone's sexuality. We should be able to hear such news and let it roll off our backs.
However, you can be rest assured that Collins will be the victim of scorn and verbal abuse wherever he goes from ignorant fans who just simply don't know better.
"Twin" Collins couldn't even tell his twin brother about his sexuality until a year ago. That's how worried he was about telling the truth about the secret he hid for so long until yesterday.
No one should be ashamed for what they are. Gay, straight, bisexual. It's their lives, their priorites. Professional athletes are people like the rest of us. They don't have to have their lives placed under microscopes and scrutinized just because they play pro sports.
So in that respect, Jason Collins was indeed courageous in putting his private life on display for the rest of the world to see. Maybe it will encourage other gay athletes to follow Collins' lead and come out as well. Martina Navratilova has already declared Collins to be a "gay activist."
She's right. By coming out on the cover of SI, Collins became an instant celebrity for gay rights. Not there's anything wrong with that.
I applaud Collins for doing what he did. I wish others would follow suit so being a gay athlete isn't such a negative stigma. We are who we are. Jason Collins just happens to be gay. And that's something he should be proud of.
Everyone should be as accepting.
========================================================
Thirty-one years in the sportswriting business and I had a first happen to me Sunday.
As I awaited to speak to the WINNING team in a local baseball tournament, the team's assistant coach told me to get off the field. And it wasn't in nice terms.
I was at the lip of the infield grass. The team sat on the outfield, so I was about 20 yards away from where they were gathered together.
The assistant coach, mind you, said that I was too close to the group, that I could hear what they were saying.
"Get off the field," the assistant coach said.
So I did. I got in my car and drove back home. I'm not about to get scolded like I'm a 5-year-old in kindergarten by an assistant coach no less. There were better ways to handle the situation. The coach should have come over to me and explained what was going on.
The assistant coach ran to catch me at my car, but kept yelling, "Bob, Bob, Bob." At last check, I'm not Bob.
He got to my car and tried to explain that they were a private team and they were addressing a private matter. I don't care of they were planning the next Brink's Job. I just wanted quotes from the head coach and two players and go home. It was already an exhausting day.
But I couldn't have heard what was happening with a hearing aid. I was that far away. It was ridiculous, embarassing and something that will not happen again.
I've had friends in the business that said I should have told the coach off. I'm better than that. I did what any good baseball player does. I went home.
And as for the rest of the high school season, you can bet your bottom dollar I won't be at that place. Dignity has to be a priority, you know.
========================================================
You can read more of my work at www.hudsonreporter.com (nice feature on the new St. Anthony track program), www.theobserver.com and www.dailyrecord.com.
You can also Google me and read my coverage of the Nets-Bulls for SportsXChange or look for it on Yahoo! Sports.
Collins was affectionately known as "Twin" during his days with the Nets, because he has an identical twin brother, Jarron, who also played in the NBA.
Although he wasn't a star with the Nets, "Twin" was always cordial in terms of offering himself to be interviewed, either at practices or after games. He was always willing to answer the tough questions, standing there, facing the media, every single day of the basketball season.
I always looked forward to the smiling Collins, who would handle jokes about being a classmate of Chelsea Clinton at Stanford and battling with the Secret Service, or having a twin brother and fighting over the remote.
Today, Collins became one of the bravest athletes to ever put on a uniform. He agreed to an interview with Frank Lidz of Sports Illustrated and in the story, Collins admitted that he is gay.
Collins said that he battled with the decision to come out of the closet, to become the first active athlete in any of the four major sports in the United States to admit that he was a homosexual.
Collins is now 34. He's played 11 seasons in the NBA. He's been part of six different teams. The news that Collins is gay isn't shocking or disturbing. In fact, Collins coming out while he's currently a free agent (his contract with the Washington Wizards expired once the NBA Playoffs began) is as courageous of a move that any basketball player has ever made.
Collins' decision to come out was the talk of the pre-game chatter at the Barclays Center, where the Brooklyn Nets were set to face the Chicago Bulls in Game 5 of the NBA Eastern Conference playoffs.
Everyone agreed that Collins was indeed a great guy and that his decision to come out now was indeed as brave as it comes.
"It is an honor for me to call Jason Collins a friend," said Brook Lopez, who also attended Stanford before coming to the Nets. "I admire his dignity as well as his courage to come out. I'll always have his back."
Joe Johnson, who played with Collins last year in Atlanta, also offered his praise of Collins.
"Jason Collins was one of the best teammates I've ever had," Johnson said. "I respect his tremendous courage to come out. I will always support him."
The reaction from the sports world has all been positive. The Twitter posts have all praised Collins for having the fortitude to come to grips with his sexuality.
Should it matter that Collins is gay? If he was an entertainer or an accountant or even a clergyman, the announcement wouldn't have received a peep of attention.
But because Collins plays in the manly NBA, with an image of rugged men sweating and dunking and soaring, the announcement has newsworthy aspects.
It was the lead story on ESPN's SportsCenter. It was the topic of conversation in both locker rooms prior to Game 5 and asked to both head coaches in the pre-game press conference.
Because Collins is an active member of the masculine and manly NBA, his coming out becomes huge news.
When honestly, it shouldn't. In today's day and age, we should be able to respect anyone's sexuality. We should be able to hear such news and let it roll off our backs.
However, you can be rest assured that Collins will be the victim of scorn and verbal abuse wherever he goes from ignorant fans who just simply don't know better.
"Twin" Collins couldn't even tell his twin brother about his sexuality until a year ago. That's how worried he was about telling the truth about the secret he hid for so long until yesterday.
No one should be ashamed for what they are. Gay, straight, bisexual. It's their lives, their priorites. Professional athletes are people like the rest of us. They don't have to have their lives placed under microscopes and scrutinized just because they play pro sports.
So in that respect, Jason Collins was indeed courageous in putting his private life on display for the rest of the world to see. Maybe it will encourage other gay athletes to follow Collins' lead and come out as well. Martina Navratilova has already declared Collins to be a "gay activist."
She's right. By coming out on the cover of SI, Collins became an instant celebrity for gay rights. Not there's anything wrong with that.
I applaud Collins for doing what he did. I wish others would follow suit so being a gay athlete isn't such a negative stigma. We are who we are. Jason Collins just happens to be gay. And that's something he should be proud of.
Everyone should be as accepting.
========================================================
Thirty-one years in the sportswriting business and I had a first happen to me Sunday.
As I awaited to speak to the WINNING team in a local baseball tournament, the team's assistant coach told me to get off the field. And it wasn't in nice terms.
I was at the lip of the infield grass. The team sat on the outfield, so I was about 20 yards away from where they were gathered together.
The assistant coach, mind you, said that I was too close to the group, that I could hear what they were saying.
"Get off the field," the assistant coach said.
So I did. I got in my car and drove back home. I'm not about to get scolded like I'm a 5-year-old in kindergarten by an assistant coach no less. There were better ways to handle the situation. The coach should have come over to me and explained what was going on.
The assistant coach ran to catch me at my car, but kept yelling, "Bob, Bob, Bob." At last check, I'm not Bob.
He got to my car and tried to explain that they were a private team and they were addressing a private matter. I don't care of they were planning the next Brink's Job. I just wanted quotes from the head coach and two players and go home. It was already an exhausting day.
But I couldn't have heard what was happening with a hearing aid. I was that far away. It was ridiculous, embarassing and something that will not happen again.
I've had friends in the business that said I should have told the coach off. I'm better than that. I did what any good baseball player does. I went home.
And as for the rest of the high school season, you can bet your bottom dollar I won't be at that place. Dignity has to be a priority, you know.
========================================================
You can read more of my work at www.hudsonreporter.com (nice feature on the new St. Anthony track program), www.theobserver.com and www.dailyrecord.com.
You can also Google me and read my coverage of the Nets-Bulls for SportsXChange or look for it on Yahoo! Sports.
Saturday, April 6, 2013
Barchi has to go, too
Let's face facts. No one in the sports world knew who Robert Barchi was until a few days ago, when it was revealed that Barchi, the president of Rutgers University, never saw the now-famous tapes of RU basketball practices under the now-deposed head coach Mike Rice.
But after Friday's bizarre press conference that was televised live on the high-and-almighty ESPN, the sports world certainly now knows who Barchi is. One thing is for sure: He's no Jerry Seinfeld, but Barchi certainly tried to be at least light-hearted, if not mistakenly funny, during the whole mess.
While Barchi was trying his best to tap dance around the tough questions, he failed to reveal one important fact.
Why in the world did Barchi wait until Tuesday, a day after everyone saw the shocking videos on ESPN, to view the tapes himself?
Barchi, who took the job as Rutgers president just last November, should have gone out of his way to make sure he knew what was on those tapes when now-former AD Tim Pernetti brought it to his attention that something had to be done to punish Rice back in December.
As soon as Pernetti told Barchi that such horrific videos existed, then the president should have taken the time to view the tapes with Pernetti in attendance. Then they should have both agreed on the right course of action, which of course, should have been Rice's dismissal back then.
But Barchi enabled Pernetti to make the decision to simply suspend and fine Rice on his own. It's your athletic mess, Tim, you take care of it.
Now we all know that it wasn't the most prudent thing to do. Because now Rutgers has a major crisis on its hand and the school continues to suffer daily embarrassments by leading every single sports show imaginable, including ESPN, which is treating the whole thing like they're proud they broke the story.
ESPN has been treating this mess as "Hey, look what we did!"
"As first reported on our Outside the Lines..."
That's just a little sickening for my taste. ESPN is pounding its chest while Rice and Pernetti lost their jobs.
They shouldn't have been the only ones. When he decided not to take the time to watch the tapes in December when Pernetti brought the tapes to his attention, Barchi lost the right to lead the university.
Barchi basically threw Pernetti under the bus Tuesday by saying that he hadn't watched the tapes, watched Pernetti squirm as he had to fire Rice, then drove the bus back over Pernetti by forcing him to resign.
Plain and simple, the new sports icon Barchi should have marched out the door at the same time. He failed to administer any sense of decency by allowing Rice to stay.
Now, he stands before a press conference and tries to crack jokes? What's so funny about this?
No one knew who Barchi was before Monday. It should be that no one knows who he is again by this Monday. He got his 15 minutes _ literally. Now it's time for him to disappear as well.
And as long as he stays around, Rutgers will continue to look like a complete laughingstock _ and do you think that's what the Big 10 wants, as Rutgers comes waltzing through the front door with its collective hand outstretched, looking to claim its first $22 million payday from the Big 10 Network.
No, I think if Big 10 guru Jim Delany had his way, he would reneg on that deal now, because Rutgers' failings in this mess only now makes the Big 10 look silly they accepted Rutgers in the first place.
Barchi can't dance around the fact that he failed to lead Rutgers through this mess. He ignored the warning sign from Pernetti by failing to watch the horror show, then made like a spoiled kid in kindergarten by basically throwing Pernetti to the wolves and stating, "Hey, I didn't do it. He did."
And then, as the so-called leader of the state university, he dances around questions at a press conference and tries to make light of the situation.
It's all part of this embarrassment that won't go away anytime soon _ or at the very least until ESPN stops leading SportsCenter with the daily saga.
========================================================
And here's my last bit on this Rutgers crap: How in the hell is Eric Murdock being treated like a champion in all this?
The former assistant coach, who as the director of basketball operations was in charge of filing the practice tapes and keeping a record of them, tried to extort $950,000 from Pernetti, when he said "Gimme the money and this goes away. And if you don't..."
It's not heroic. It's extortion. Now Murdock is filing a wrongful termination lawsuit against Rutgers. Well, Eric, here's some news for you. You weren't fired or terminated. You just weren't rehired. Your contract expired and that was that. There's no cause for a suit. Wrongful termination, my derriere.
I don't understand how Murdock walks away from this looking like a hero. In my eyes, he walks away smelling like a rat.
=========================================================
From Atlanta and the Final Four, I'm trying to find a way how the Shockers of Wichita State are going to upset Louisville, but I can't. I also remember the former Wichita State head coach Eddie Fogler hanging out in Dohoney's in Jersey City way back when, saying that he was going to get Jerry Walker to go to Wichita. Fogler was certain he had a shot to get Walker, when in reality, he had no shot. Much like the Shockers have no shot today.
The second game will be more interesting. We're hoping that John Beilein and the Wolverines can somehow beat Syracuse. Beilein is a fantastic coach who coached Carlos Cueto at the University of Richmond. I coached Cueto, the current Secaucus High head coach, when he was 14. Is there a parallel? Hardly. But we want Beilein and the sensational Player of the Year Trey Burke to win.
With that, until Rutgers makes news with some other disaster, we will bid farewell and head out to enjoy the sights in Hotlanta.
=======================================================
You can read more of my work at www.hudsonreporter.com, www.theobserver.com, and www.dailyrecord.com
But after Friday's bizarre press conference that was televised live on the high-and-almighty ESPN, the sports world certainly now knows who Barchi is. One thing is for sure: He's no Jerry Seinfeld, but Barchi certainly tried to be at least light-hearted, if not mistakenly funny, during the whole mess.
While Barchi was trying his best to tap dance around the tough questions, he failed to reveal one important fact.
Why in the world did Barchi wait until Tuesday, a day after everyone saw the shocking videos on ESPN, to view the tapes himself?
Barchi, who took the job as Rutgers president just last November, should have gone out of his way to make sure he knew what was on those tapes when now-former AD Tim Pernetti brought it to his attention that something had to be done to punish Rice back in December.
As soon as Pernetti told Barchi that such horrific videos existed, then the president should have taken the time to view the tapes with Pernetti in attendance. Then they should have both agreed on the right course of action, which of course, should have been Rice's dismissal back then.
But Barchi enabled Pernetti to make the decision to simply suspend and fine Rice on his own. It's your athletic mess, Tim, you take care of it.
Now we all know that it wasn't the most prudent thing to do. Because now Rutgers has a major crisis on its hand and the school continues to suffer daily embarrassments by leading every single sports show imaginable, including ESPN, which is treating the whole thing like they're proud they broke the story.
ESPN has been treating this mess as "Hey, look what we did!"
"As first reported on our Outside the Lines..."
That's just a little sickening for my taste. ESPN is pounding its chest while Rice and Pernetti lost their jobs.
They shouldn't have been the only ones. When he decided not to take the time to watch the tapes in December when Pernetti brought the tapes to his attention, Barchi lost the right to lead the university.
Barchi basically threw Pernetti under the bus Tuesday by saying that he hadn't watched the tapes, watched Pernetti squirm as he had to fire Rice, then drove the bus back over Pernetti by forcing him to resign.
Plain and simple, the new sports icon Barchi should have marched out the door at the same time. He failed to administer any sense of decency by allowing Rice to stay.
Now, he stands before a press conference and tries to crack jokes? What's so funny about this?
No one knew who Barchi was before Monday. It should be that no one knows who he is again by this Monday. He got his 15 minutes _ literally. Now it's time for him to disappear as well.
And as long as he stays around, Rutgers will continue to look like a complete laughingstock _ and do you think that's what the Big 10 wants, as Rutgers comes waltzing through the front door with its collective hand outstretched, looking to claim its first $22 million payday from the Big 10 Network.
No, I think if Big 10 guru Jim Delany had his way, he would reneg on that deal now, because Rutgers' failings in this mess only now makes the Big 10 look silly they accepted Rutgers in the first place.
Barchi can't dance around the fact that he failed to lead Rutgers through this mess. He ignored the warning sign from Pernetti by failing to watch the horror show, then made like a spoiled kid in kindergarten by basically throwing Pernetti to the wolves and stating, "Hey, I didn't do it. He did."
And then, as the so-called leader of the state university, he dances around questions at a press conference and tries to make light of the situation.
It's all part of this embarrassment that won't go away anytime soon _ or at the very least until ESPN stops leading SportsCenter with the daily saga.
========================================================
And here's my last bit on this Rutgers crap: How in the hell is Eric Murdock being treated like a champion in all this?
The former assistant coach, who as the director of basketball operations was in charge of filing the practice tapes and keeping a record of them, tried to extort $950,000 from Pernetti, when he said "Gimme the money and this goes away. And if you don't..."
It's not heroic. It's extortion. Now Murdock is filing a wrongful termination lawsuit against Rutgers. Well, Eric, here's some news for you. You weren't fired or terminated. You just weren't rehired. Your contract expired and that was that. There's no cause for a suit. Wrongful termination, my derriere.
I don't understand how Murdock walks away from this looking like a hero. In my eyes, he walks away smelling like a rat.
=========================================================
From Atlanta and the Final Four, I'm trying to find a way how the Shockers of Wichita State are going to upset Louisville, but I can't. I also remember the former Wichita State head coach Eddie Fogler hanging out in Dohoney's in Jersey City way back when, saying that he was going to get Jerry Walker to go to Wichita. Fogler was certain he had a shot to get Walker, when in reality, he had no shot. Much like the Shockers have no shot today.
The second game will be more interesting. We're hoping that John Beilein and the Wolverines can somehow beat Syracuse. Beilein is a fantastic coach who coached Carlos Cueto at the University of Richmond. I coached Cueto, the current Secaucus High head coach, when he was 14. Is there a parallel? Hardly. But we want Beilein and the sensational Player of the Year Trey Burke to win.
With that, until Rutgers makes news with some other disaster, we will bid farewell and head out to enjoy the sights in Hotlanta.
=======================================================
You can read more of my work at www.hudsonreporter.com, www.theobserver.com, and www.dailyrecord.com
Wednesday, April 3, 2013
No question, Rice should have been fired
First, let me start this entry by saying that Mike Rice is a great guy. The now-beleaguered former Rutgers basketball coach is a family man, a devoted husband and father.
I've known Mike since his playing days at Fordham, when he was a tough-as-nails guard who was quick to pick up a charge and not afraid to dive on the floor for a loose ball.
I followed Mike through his days as an assistant coach at my alma mater Marquette, a hard-working, diligent student of the game. I watched him work his way toward becoming the head coach at Robert Morris and witnessed first hand a verbal altercation between Rice and former Seton Hall coach Bobby Gonzalez during a game, where Gonzalez was heard threatening Rice.
"Jimmy, did he just say he wanted to kick my ass?" Rice asked me during that game at the Prudential Center, a game where Robert Morris managed to blow a 22-point lead in the second half. "Did he really just say that?"
I heard Gonzalez's taunt and later told Rice that if a fight was going to take place between the two, I might have been right behind Rice. As everyone knows, there was no love lost between me and Gonzo.
So when Rice got the job at Rutgers, I was generally happy for him. I thought he was an excellent hire and would do a great job in Piscataway.
I was wrong. Dead wrong.
The rest of the universe realizes that as well, after ESPN aired the horrific tapes of the practice antics of Rice _ throwing the ball deliberately at the heads of his players, grabbing and pushing them, calling them derogatory names, even going as far as kicking one.
Watching the tapes were sickening. Everyone had to sit in a state of shock watching them, wondering if they were for real. You almost wanted to turn away, like videos of nannies tormenting babies or sick individuals torturing animals. It was almost too unbelievable for words.
So it wasn't a shock that Rice was relieved of his duties this morning. In fact, it's a wonder why it took so long.
Rutgers thought they did the right thing by suspending Rice in December for three games, docking his pay for about $35,000 and fining him an additional $50,000.
But that was on the suggestion of AD Tim Pernetti after he was given access to the tapes. Pernetti apparently never showed the tapes to his superiors, to the school president, to the chancellor.
The powers-that-be were blind-sided by the extreme violence of the tapes. They didn't realize the brutality until it was too late.
So now Rice is deservedly gone, with the school taking a $1.8 million hit for his firing. Pernetti more than likely will be shown the door as well, because it was his duty to show the tapes to his superiors when he received them.
There are some major problems with this story. Why did Pernetti fail to show the tapes to his bosses? Why did Eric Murdock try to basically extort money from Rutgers, trying to bargaining with Pernetti and school officials, asking for a reported $1 million to keep the tapes private? That's just really sleezy to say the least.
Why didn't Pernetti fire Rice when Pernetti first received word of the tapes in November? Was it done to try to save face because Rutgers was applying for admission to the Big Ten? That news of such horrific actions by their basketball coach might be enough to steer the Big Ten clear of Piscataway?
It's just another chapter of hideous behavior involving the men's basketball coaches at the school. We recall former coach Kevin Bannon forcing his players to strip naked during free throw drills. And then there was former coach Freddie Hill, Jr. going apeshit during a baseball game coached by his father.
Now, this latest episode. Why do these things always happen to Rutgers?
Where do they go for a replacement? Well, it's late in the coach/recruiting game right now and whoever leads the RU athletic program in the weeks and months to come will have to find a suitable leader who will make the school proud in its final season in the American Athletic Conference - WHAT A PINCH OF THE ACC THAT WAS! - and then the Big 10.
But that coach will have to come on the cheap, because any coach will have to make less money than women's coach C. Vivian Stringer. However, Rutgers will most certainly have to overpay to get someone to turn this troubled mess around.
Some of my writing colleagues mentioned Danny Hurley as a possible replacement. Well, why would Danny want this mess, when he's already got a good paying gig in Rhode Island? Maybe they can woo former assistant Darren Savino home from Cincinnati. There were others mentioned like Fran Dunphy of Temple, but he's also getting more than Rutgers will be willing to pay, again less than what Stringer gets.
Whatever happens won't change one thing. Rutgers is once again the laughingstock of college athletics, with these tapes making the lead story on the network news broadcasts. Free publicity? Hardly.
Mike Rice is now gone and will take a long time to get back into any school's graces to even be an assistant, much like the guy he almost locked horns with at the Prudential Center three years ago. But nothing will change my opinion that Rice is basically a good guy who got wound too tight when he coached, made some mistakes and will now pay the ultimate price with his job.
Bad guy? No way, no how. Anyone who has ever met Rice will say the same thing. He was just completely out of control as a coach and never had a chance to harness that intensity in a positive fashion.
And it's safe to say that Pernetti might not be too far behind.
==========================================================
I attended Opening Day at CitiField Monday and once again, I was dismayed with what went on.
First of all, my ticket cost $130 and I was in the left field bleachers. C'mon. Jacking up the prices for Opening Day is like price gouging at a gasoline station. It's wrong. These were $45 seats at best. And the sad thing was that there were several hundred of these $130 tickets in my section.
Secondly, as I pulled up next to the ballpark, I noticed these huge tents in the left field parking lot. I wondered what in the world they were.
As I got closer, I realized that they were the home for the Cirque de Soleil troupe, which is apparently performing in the tents from now until Christmas.
Wait a second! In the parking lot at CitiField on Opening Day? What wizard dreamed up that deal? It was just another sign of the Coupon family trying to nickle and dime their way into our hearts. Can you comprehend putting some circus troupe in the parking lot on Opening Day, forcing fans to park in Astoria?
Now, you get inside and the concession lines were longer than the bread lines in Russia during the Cold War. It took about an hour to buy a beer. Or even fried dough. Yes, that's what they sell. Fried dough.
However, on the beer line, they had one octogenarian who saw Babe Ruth play live trying to operate the beer line ALONE! I've seen dead animals move faster that this senior citizen. When I got to the front of the line after three innings, I said, "Why do they have you working alone?" She replied, "I don't mind." Sure, you don't mind, Lady, but the rest of us thirsty morons do.
It was yet another example of the Coupon organization doing something on the cheap. They couldn't hire additional people to work the stands on Opening Day? Or have additional ticket takers or ushers? Nope. They let us all suffer.
Sure, the Mets won and a lot of people left happy. But I wasn't one of them. The Mets are a second-rate cheap as they come organization. I was embarrassed to be a fan on Monday.
OK, so they're 2-0 now...that's nice. But what about those blasted circus tents???
=======================================================
You can read more of my work at www.hudsonreporter.com, www.theobserver.com and www.dailyrecord.com.
I've known Mike since his playing days at Fordham, when he was a tough-as-nails guard who was quick to pick up a charge and not afraid to dive on the floor for a loose ball.
I followed Mike through his days as an assistant coach at my alma mater Marquette, a hard-working, diligent student of the game. I watched him work his way toward becoming the head coach at Robert Morris and witnessed first hand a verbal altercation between Rice and former Seton Hall coach Bobby Gonzalez during a game, where Gonzalez was heard threatening Rice.
"Jimmy, did he just say he wanted to kick my ass?" Rice asked me during that game at the Prudential Center, a game where Robert Morris managed to blow a 22-point lead in the second half. "Did he really just say that?"
I heard Gonzalez's taunt and later told Rice that if a fight was going to take place between the two, I might have been right behind Rice. As everyone knows, there was no love lost between me and Gonzo.
So when Rice got the job at Rutgers, I was generally happy for him. I thought he was an excellent hire and would do a great job in Piscataway.
I was wrong. Dead wrong.
The rest of the universe realizes that as well, after ESPN aired the horrific tapes of the practice antics of Rice _ throwing the ball deliberately at the heads of his players, grabbing and pushing them, calling them derogatory names, even going as far as kicking one.
Watching the tapes were sickening. Everyone had to sit in a state of shock watching them, wondering if they were for real. You almost wanted to turn away, like videos of nannies tormenting babies or sick individuals torturing animals. It was almost too unbelievable for words.
So it wasn't a shock that Rice was relieved of his duties this morning. In fact, it's a wonder why it took so long.
Rutgers thought they did the right thing by suspending Rice in December for three games, docking his pay for about $35,000 and fining him an additional $50,000.
But that was on the suggestion of AD Tim Pernetti after he was given access to the tapes. Pernetti apparently never showed the tapes to his superiors, to the school president, to the chancellor.
The powers-that-be were blind-sided by the extreme violence of the tapes. They didn't realize the brutality until it was too late.
So now Rice is deservedly gone, with the school taking a $1.8 million hit for his firing. Pernetti more than likely will be shown the door as well, because it was his duty to show the tapes to his superiors when he received them.
There are some major problems with this story. Why did Pernetti fail to show the tapes to his bosses? Why did Eric Murdock try to basically extort money from Rutgers, trying to bargaining with Pernetti and school officials, asking for a reported $1 million to keep the tapes private? That's just really sleezy to say the least.
Why didn't Pernetti fire Rice when Pernetti first received word of the tapes in November? Was it done to try to save face because Rutgers was applying for admission to the Big Ten? That news of such horrific actions by their basketball coach might be enough to steer the Big Ten clear of Piscataway?
It's just another chapter of hideous behavior involving the men's basketball coaches at the school. We recall former coach Kevin Bannon forcing his players to strip naked during free throw drills. And then there was former coach Freddie Hill, Jr. going apeshit during a baseball game coached by his father.
Now, this latest episode. Why do these things always happen to Rutgers?
Where do they go for a replacement? Well, it's late in the coach/recruiting game right now and whoever leads the RU athletic program in the weeks and months to come will have to find a suitable leader who will make the school proud in its final season in the American Athletic Conference - WHAT A PINCH OF THE ACC THAT WAS! - and then the Big 10.
But that coach will have to come on the cheap, because any coach will have to make less money than women's coach C. Vivian Stringer. However, Rutgers will most certainly have to overpay to get someone to turn this troubled mess around.
Some of my writing colleagues mentioned Danny Hurley as a possible replacement. Well, why would Danny want this mess, when he's already got a good paying gig in Rhode Island? Maybe they can woo former assistant Darren Savino home from Cincinnati. There were others mentioned like Fran Dunphy of Temple, but he's also getting more than Rutgers will be willing to pay, again less than what Stringer gets.
Whatever happens won't change one thing. Rutgers is once again the laughingstock of college athletics, with these tapes making the lead story on the network news broadcasts. Free publicity? Hardly.
Mike Rice is now gone and will take a long time to get back into any school's graces to even be an assistant, much like the guy he almost locked horns with at the Prudential Center three years ago. But nothing will change my opinion that Rice is basically a good guy who got wound too tight when he coached, made some mistakes and will now pay the ultimate price with his job.
Bad guy? No way, no how. Anyone who has ever met Rice will say the same thing. He was just completely out of control as a coach and never had a chance to harness that intensity in a positive fashion.
And it's safe to say that Pernetti might not be too far behind.
==========================================================
I attended Opening Day at CitiField Monday and once again, I was dismayed with what went on.
First of all, my ticket cost $130 and I was in the left field bleachers. C'mon. Jacking up the prices for Opening Day is like price gouging at a gasoline station. It's wrong. These were $45 seats at best. And the sad thing was that there were several hundred of these $130 tickets in my section.
Secondly, as I pulled up next to the ballpark, I noticed these huge tents in the left field parking lot. I wondered what in the world they were.
As I got closer, I realized that they were the home for the Cirque de Soleil troupe, which is apparently performing in the tents from now until Christmas.
Wait a second! In the parking lot at CitiField on Opening Day? What wizard dreamed up that deal? It was just another sign of the Coupon family trying to nickle and dime their way into our hearts. Can you comprehend putting some circus troupe in the parking lot on Opening Day, forcing fans to park in Astoria?
Now, you get inside and the concession lines were longer than the bread lines in Russia during the Cold War. It took about an hour to buy a beer. Or even fried dough. Yes, that's what they sell. Fried dough.
However, on the beer line, they had one octogenarian who saw Babe Ruth play live trying to operate the beer line ALONE! I've seen dead animals move faster that this senior citizen. When I got to the front of the line after three innings, I said, "Why do they have you working alone?" She replied, "I don't mind." Sure, you don't mind, Lady, but the rest of us thirsty morons do.
It was yet another example of the Coupon organization doing something on the cheap. They couldn't hire additional people to work the stands on Opening Day? Or have additional ticket takers or ushers? Nope. They let us all suffer.
Sure, the Mets won and a lot of people left happy. But I wasn't one of them. The Mets are a second-rate cheap as they come organization. I was embarrassed to be a fan on Monday.
OK, so they're 2-0 now...that's nice. But what about those blasted circus tents???
=======================================================
You can read more of my work at www.hudsonreporter.com, www.theobserver.com and www.dailyrecord.com.
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