We New Englanders have plenty to worry about this weekend.
A bomb cyclone has churned up the East Coast and is burying a lot of us with up to two feet of snow. High winds are producing blizzard conditions and combining with falling temperatures for a wind chill close to 0 degrees. Weather experts have described this as a storm of historical proportions akin to the famous Blizzard of ‘78.
Other developments on our Worry List include 100,000 Russian troops huddling on the line with Ukraine while President Joe Biden rifles through old Pentagon playbooks for an appropriate defense. Continuing Covid confusion. Inflation. Who is running for Jim Langevin’s seat in Congress.
That list could go on, but the real worry, if you listen to sports radio or read what is left of newspaper sports pages, is about David Ortiz getting into the Baseball Hall of Fame and home run king Barry Bonds and pitching phenom Roger Clemens not being elected. Also, the absurdity of the current overtime rules in the NFL that potentially preclude an offense from ever touching the ball. And whether Mac Jones is the answer at quarterback for the Patriots. And whether Tom Brady has played his last game.
Ortiz, the affable slugger who led the Red Sox to three World Series Championships, was elected with 77.9 percent of the vote by the Baseball Writers Association of America. He was the only candidate to clear the 75 percent hurdle.
Bonds, the career home run leader with 762 and single-season leader with 73 in 2001, and Clemens, winner of 354 games, seven Cy Young Awards, and two World Series titles, failed in their 10th and final year on the BBWAA ballot. Bonds received 66 percent of the vote, Clemens 65.2 percent.
Ortiz, Bonds and Clemens are among players linked to the performance enhancing drug scandal of the early 2000s, but Ortiz’s name was connected only to a survey test in 2003, the results of which were supposed to remain anonymous. Ortiz denied steroid use and did not test positive during multiple subsequent tests.
Critics have said that Ortiz’s dynamic personality and popularity with fans certainly made it easy for voters to overlook one PED result. Despite their accomplishments, Bonds and Clemens clearly had fewer admirers in the media. Allegations of PED use by them were rampant, but neither ever tested positive for a banned substance or was disciplined for violation of MLB’s policy.
Ortiz belongs in the Hall of Fame. His lifetime .286 batting average is ho-hum, but he hit 541 home runs, and nobody hit better in the clutch during his career. He had 23 game-ending hits, three in the 2004 post-season, the biggest in Games 4 and 5 of the ALCS, when the Red Sox rallied from three games down to beat the Yankees in seven.
The other knock on Ortiz is that he was a designated hitter most of his career. So what. The DH has a been part of the game since 1973, and Edgar Martinez, Frank Thomas and Harold Baines preceded Ortiz as DHs in the Hall of Fame.
Ortiz belongs. And given that MLB never proved anything against Bonds and Clemens, so do they.
Arguments over the NFL’s sudden death overtime policy raged all week after Kanas City eliminated Buffalo, 42-36 in OT, in the AFC Divisional Round. Patrick Mahomes connected with Travis Kelce for eight yards and a touchdown in overtime. Josh Allen and the Bills never touched the ball. The rule is if the team that wins the coin toss chooses to receive and scores a touchdown, game over. The rule is patently unfair. Each team should have a chance, as in college. Better yet, a 10-minute overtime period was a popular suggestion all week.
The Conference Championships and the Super Bowl can’t match the drama of Divisional Round weekend. All four games were decided on the final play, and the KC-Buffalo game went into overtime only after KC’s Harrison Butker kicked a 49-yard field goal on the last play of the fourth quarter. Here’s a reminder how the others ended: In Nashville, fourth-seeded Cincinnati stunned top-seeded Tennessee, 19-16, on rookie Evan McPherson’s 52-yard field goal, his fourth of the game, as time expired. Not some 22-yard chip shot. A 52-yarder! In Green Bay, Robbie Gould drilled a 45-yard field goal as time expired in the 49ers 13-10 victory over the Packers. And in Tampa Matt Gay’’s 30-yard field-goal as time ran out sent the Rams back to Los Angeles with a 30-27 victory over Tom Brady and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
Brady will be 45 when the 2023 season kicks off. He was one of the best QBs in the game in 2021. But ESPN and other media outlets are reporting that he is retiring after 22 seasons and seven Super Bowl rings. Not bad for a sixth-round draft choice.
Mac Jones will return to the Patriots. They did win 10 games and make the playoffs with him at QB.
As if Covid cancellations weren’t enough, the Blizzard of ’22 forced the postponement of college basketball games around here from Saturday to Sunday.
The blizzard should be great news for Yawgoo Valley, the little ski area in Exeter that continues to defy the odds against running a ski operation in southern Rhode Island.
Farewell to Jacques Faulise of North Kingstown, prominent tennis player, coach and instructor, who died Jan. 25 at the age of 70. Jacques played tennis at Providence College and later coached the Friars men’s and women’s teams. He also coached at North Kingstown High School. Jacques taught tennis, court tennis and paddle tennis at Point Judith Country Club, Nonquitt Casino in South Dartmouth, Mass., and the International Tennis Hall of Fame in Newport. He was president of the USPTA, was the organization’s pro of the year, and is in its hall of fame. Jacque’s wife Lise and children Jacqueline and Jacob survive him. Visiting hours are Monday and his funeral Tuesday. Details are at www.gaffneydolanfuneralhome.com.
