By Mark Patterson
MOUNTAINS & MOLEHILLS
- I get it. Napheesa Collier of the Minnesota Lynx currently stands a deserving 3-1 favorite for MVP hardware, while The Las Vegas Ace’s 6’4″ perimeter-dagger A’ja Wilson can be impossible to defend, but if everybody’s favorite logo-queen Caitlin Clark is NOT the best player in that ever-ascending women’s basketball league colloquially referred to as the “W,” then why do opposing teams without exception throw INTENSE double coverage at her the moment she runway swaggers into an arena? Case Closed. For me, at least.
- Give me 90 spare minutes and I’m watching a “B” western. We’re talking, after all, about a guy who’s seen “The Law and Jake Wade” (a formulaic 50’s revenge flick with the laconic Robert Taylor as titular lawman and the great Richard Widmark chewing scenery in the more substantive role of nemesis) perhaps 20 times. I think I turned 50 before figuring out that the whole genre was built on a myth. Spoiler alert: With , maybe, two exceptions, flinty -eyed cowboys did not face down outside saloons and fell each other from 80 feet with super-human one-shot accuracy. Oh well. Point me towards the next Audie Murphy marathon on AMC.
- Relieved of legal requirement to conduct thoroughbred racing , most racinos (that’s a euphemism for slot-subsidized racetracks), cynics suspect, would cancel that day’s card within, oh, about six minutes. Common perception views gaming as an antiseptic, can’t miss means of printing money, while racing can be a messy, high-maintenance, drain on the bottom line. Even now that I’m retired from horseracing, the term “decoupling bill” freezes me in places best unmentioned in polite company.
- Why can’t Planet Fitness prepare me to carry stuff around my yard? Put me on a chest-press machine and I’ll keep up with no-neck dudes perhaps 30 years my junior. But expect me to assist guys (or gals) lugging 50lb bags around back for a shrub project and I either hide or lose face. Gym muscles, quite unfortunately, translate not to real-world strength. Or maybe I’m just working out the wrong way?
- I Have to chuckle at ridiculous speculation about Pirate pitching ace and future immortal Paul Skenes so much as considering an extended contract to remain with the”yinzers.” And not just because team owner Bob Nutting would not spring for lunch at Primanti Brothers (who eats french fries ON a sandwitch?) let alone meet his second- year hurler’s projected market value of (insert Dr. Evil smirk here) one-half BILLION dollars. Have you noticed that attractive, perky blonde shown cheering her favorite flame-thrower on from the stands? That’s Livvy Dunne, former LSU gymnast and Skenes’ significant other. With all respect to my favorite city, think just maybe a gal with 100 million Tik Tok followers aspires to check out the Big Apple, or, let’s say (just spit-balling here, mind you) Los Angeles?
- Given Caitlin Clark’s explosive popularity, an exponentially increasing fame that crosses gender boundaries and will by some projections amount to over one-billion dollars in revenue to the league, how can stockholders not sue the swoosh for an inexplicable failure to roll out a signature shoe? I just don’t get it.
- Elated to read that thoroughbred jockey Tyler Conner continues to make progress from a horrific fall on July 24 at Colonial Downs in New Kent, VA. The veteran winner of some 1,200 races injured two vertebrae and suffered a bruised spinal cord. Obligatory disclaimer: Being known as a blunt critic of strategic decisions made by riders, let me (again) for the record express profound respect for the sheer courage they possess. The one inevitability of that profession is a hard fall. Here’s hoping they all walk away from that fall.
- What’s up with the speeding parade of motorized bicycles along the sidewalks of our beloved county? If it’s legal to scatter pedestrians at 40 mph, what’s next, Harleys tooling through Sparkle Market’s produce section? (“skid mark cleanup on isle 8)”
- My old friend Larry Tornambe, recently in from Phoenix for a class reunion, can speak from tragic experience on the dangers of riding thoroughbred races. Larry’s dad, Mike Tornambe, lost his life some 50 years ago when his mount went down in a race at old Waterford Park (now, of course, known as Mountaineer). An ex- ring announcer whose passion is pugilism, Larry, himself, fought briefly as a professional and fleshes out several scenes in a boxing flick entitled “The Nail.” Check it out. Not saying they kept Larry in the background, but he’s the guy with a face oddly resembling a boxing rope.
- Sports pundit Pat McAfee remarked after visiting for a podcast that Ben Roethlisberger’s (Sewickley Heights?) basement by itself puts entire celebrity domiciles to shame. Good for the steeler great. Could have guessed he’s not spamming it for dinner. But why must such an articulate and outspoken legend, and one with the over-arching expertise of a quarterback, to boot, hold forth from his basement AT ALL? Have no networks come calling? Are you kidding me?
- I can accept college athletes drawing pay. Few will tote degrees from those hallowed halls and “benevolence” from well-heeled boosters is nothing new. I mean, does it really pass the smell test, looking back six decades now, that a shy, awkward teen, then known as Lew Alcindor, would matriculate to UCLA from an eastern inner-city cocoon with ambitions of becoming the world’s first 7’4″ surfing enthusiast? But why must a certain starship engineer bludgeon team identity beyond recognition by scattering player atoms all across the division one universe? Longtime lover of college hoops, but when it comes to reorienting myself every winter to a completely different cast of athletes, not to mention hastily adapted coaching philosophies, beam me out Scottie. And a pox on your transfer “portal.”
- If this avowed film-junkie sees one more “best ever” list citing The Shawshank Redemption as numero uno, I think I will scream-and scream again (notice how smoothly I stayed on theme by working in that obscure drive-in movie title?) Critics plagued with that sort of recency-bias might want to pull up “The Godfather,” or “Casablanca.” Just a suggestion.
- Curmudgeons bemoaning Stephen A. Smith’s (apparently successful) bid to transcend in popularity the athletes he covers should take a breath and remember Howard Cosell. The acerbic 70’s commentator drew constant admonishment for positioning himself as bigger than “the game.” Except, he was. And it seems to me that worked out pretty well for a show called Monday Night Football, and a certain league known as the “NFL.”
- Think those Caitlin-kicks will come in 14 extra-wide?
