Starting the Long Season

 The Golden State Warriors have a hellish schedule to start the season: several back to backs, several three games in four nights, and now a dozen road games more or less in a row.

They were up to the challenge of the first two back to backs, winning four games against competitive Western Conference teams.  Coach Kerr refused to cite fatigue in their first road loss in Portland, but the fatigue was evident in Milwaukee and among the veterans in Indiana.  In Tuesday's home game they righted things against Phoenix, but now the road and Kerr's more careful load management is ahead.  

The early games showed the continuing power of the "uncles," named Steph, Draymond and Jimmy.  The big story was the improved play of Quinton Post and especially Jonathan Kuminga. The new "uncle", former Celtics star Al Horford, showed how quickly he fit in this team's offensive and defensive structures. 

 Moses Moody returned from injury to play well, Brandon Podziemski and Buddy Hield had shining moments, and rookie Pat Spencer was a eye-opening surprise.  Even the sometimes forgotten big, Trace-Jackson Davis, had a strong game against Phoenix, with the returning Gary Payton II always able to affect games.

It's a strong roster, with the injured De Anthony Melton (apparently the linchpin of last season's sizzling start) and sharpshooter Seth Curry still to come.  But it's a long season, and injuries are all but inevitable (in fact, Jimmy Butler had to leave the Phoenix game with a back problem.)  

Meanwhile, defending champs OKC and the San Antonio Spurs, with the blossoming of Wembayama as a dominant superstar, were off to a blistering start, with OKC still undefeated after 8 games. I doubt that the Warriors are even going to try to keep pace early in the season--they will likely prioritize the long run, and the health and energy of their veterans for the late season and the playoffs.

In baseball, the just concluded World Series was judged a classic.  In pure baseball terms I suppose it was, but I came to admire the Blue Jays so much that I couldn't work up much enthusiasm for Goliath winning.  Still it took the mighty wealthy and therefore mighty Dodgers seven games, including a 16 inning contest, and a 7th game that went 11 innings.  The Toronto Blue Jays gave them a run for their money.

 

Ohtani Inflation

 I'm not a Dodgers fan.  When the Pittsburgh Pirates beat them three straight games, shutting them out twice, I was elated.  I made sure to watch the replay of the last inning when Baltimore came back from several runs down to beat them in the ninth.

But there was no way to ignore the magic place they were in for the National League championship series.  Suddenly healthy and focused, with all of their expensive plans and strategies for winning postseason series working like clockwork, they were something to see.  

The Dodgers beat the Brewers, with the most regular season wins, in four games.  They did it mostly with their starting pitching.  And they needed to, because they weren't hitting so much.  In particular, their spark plug Shohei Ohtani was in a conspicuous slump, seemingly flailing away at pitches all over the place.  

That was the first three games.  Being up 3 games to none with Ohtani in a slump is saying something.  What would happen when he broke out of it?

That turned out to be the fourth game, which some are already saying was the best baseball game ever played, and Ohtani the best to ever play the game.

He was amazing.  First of all, because he was the Dodgers' starting pitcher.  Yeah, Ohtani was their fourth starter.  The Dodgers are loaded.

He walked a batter in the first, but he also struck out the side.  After his third strikeout he didn't even sit down for a second--he just exchanged equipment and got in the batter's box.  I've questioned the strategy of having him hit lead-off, but to do it when he is also pitching seemed like managerial madness.

This time it worked.  He hit a long home run and the Dodgers were up a run, and they went on from there.  Ohtani would go on to strike out 10, and give up no runs in 6 plus innings.  He would also hit two more home runs, including one to center that left Dodger stadium completely.

It was an historic performance. Ohtani has been unique in both pitching and hitting at a high level, and in this, the game Friday was a culmination.  But the best to ever play the game?  It's too soon and too easy to make that determination.

He is a hell of a pitcher, but unlike most starters, he had a lot of time off, and hasn't beat himself up pitching much over the past two seasons.  He is a hell of a hitter, and he did hit those three home runs off three different pitches by three different pitchers, to three fields.  That's extraordinarily impressive. 

But he hit all three on pitches thrown exactly into his wheelhouse, low in the strike zone.  He hit at least two of them on a 3-2 count.  And none of them were in crucial situations--there was no pressure.  Except for the first one in the first inning, the Dodgers were ahead and never really threatened (thanks largely of course to Ohtani's pitching).  All three homers came with no one on base.  

Those may be quibbles but baseball is full of subtle differences.  He may be the best contemporary player and may turn out to be the best all time.  But has he truly been tested, as others have been?  Has he repeatedly made the crucial difference?

As for the game--no, it was not the greatest ever played.  There was never any drama, and the stakes were only moderate.  The Dodgers were up 3 games to none, they could have lost this game and still easily won the series.  Compare this to say, the 7th game of the 1960 World Series in Pittsburgh, and there's really no contest.

Heroic Fever, Curry Brothers United and Other News

 

First the Indiana Fever lost their generational star Caitlin Clark to injuries, eventually ruled out for the rest of the season.  But they didn't fold.  Then they lost two starters to injuries in the same game.  But they didn't fold.  Then they lost Sophie Cunningham for the season to an injury.

And others stepped up.  Kelsey Mitchell and Aliyah Boston were already stars, but they took on more responsibilities--and Mitchell was certainly a legitimate candidate for the league MVP.  Natasha Howard, Lexie Hull and others expanded their roles.  With so many injuries, the team brought on new players midstream, with retired star Odyssey Sims a standout.

With at least five major injuries, the Fever wasn't supposed to make the playoffs.  But they did.  They weren't supposed to win the first round, but they did.  Then in the semi-finals they took the defending champion Las Vegas Aces to game 5 in the 5 game series on Tuesday night.  In the third quarter, their scoring star Kelsey Mitchell was lost for the rest of the game with a leg cramp and possibly more.

But the Fever did not fold.  In the final seconds, Odyssey Sims (who led the Fever with 27 points) hit a crucial free throw and a bucket to tie the game.  It took overtime before the Aces could defeat them.  The Fever is one heroic team.

With the heavily favored Minnesota Lynx knocked out of the playoffs, the Aces are probably the favorites now.  But next year?  With Caitlin Clark back, Sophie Cunningham back, with eye-openers like the indomitable Lexie Hull and the resurgent Odyssey Sims (if they can sign her), and with playoff seasoned Mitchell, Boston and Howard--things look very good for the Fever to be dominant.

The Golden State Valkyries are likely to be improved as well, though their historic run to the playoffs in their first year of existence ended quickly in the first round.  They start out with a ton of money, a huge fan base and the league's Coach of the Year.  

The league itself is likely to be in flux.  Coaches and players are now in open rebellion against the league leadership, especially on the issue of the officiating.  Plus players across the league will be negotiating for major upgrades in their contracts.  It's likely to be a very consequential off-season, with major changes likely.

Meanwhile, NBA pre-season camps have started.  The Golden State Warriors finally came to terms with off-season-long holdout Jonathan Kuminga, sweetening their two-year offer but retaining the team option.  During the summer it became obvious that Kuminga doesn't want to be a Warrior, and the Warriors won't want the drama.  Everyone expects the contract is a preliminary to a trade, though there will be a lot of basketball played before that's possible in January, and Coach Kerr seems committed to giving Kuminga his opportunities early in the season.

The Warriors were finally able to round out their roster.  They added veteran center Al Horford and shooting guard De Anthony Melton, re-signed Gary Payton II, and brought on the other Curry brother, sharpshooter Seth Curry.  This could be a fun team, at the very least.

Meanwhile also, the MLB playoffs have begun.  Everyone will be watching the classic Red Sox-Yankees matchup, with the Dodgers well positioned to represented the NL in the World Series.  But there's a lot of baseball before that.  The SF Giants started the second half of the season with a long losing streak, followed by a long winning streak, and alternated the two until losing out on a playoff berth in September.  The Pittsburgh Pirates were an entertaining spoiler in the last several months, but there's no predicting what the team will look like next year.

The Women of September

 The first expansion team I remember was the New York Mets.  I turned 16 the summer they started playing in 1962.  They were terrible. They went 40-120, setting the record for the worst losing season that stood for decades.  Their manager was the famous Yankee skipper, Casey Stengel.  Yogi Berra signed on as a coach.  The great Duke Snyder was on the team.  But their glory days were over. The Mets stayed terrible for most of the 60s.

What I remember most about them was not their losing but their basic incompetence.  Casey Stengel's most famous quote of the time was, "Can't anybody here play this game?"

The WNBA added an expansion team this year, the Golden State Valkyries. They were very much not terrible. They very much could play this game. Now they are the first expansion team in league history--and in many other leagues--to make the playoffs their first year of play.

This was supposed to be the year of Caitlin Clark and the Indiana Fever.  But Clark has been out with injuries most of the season, and the team announced she wasn't coming back this year.  Minneapolis dominated and Las Vegas has a long winning streak to end the season.  But this was the year of the Valkyries, who sold out every home game at the huge Chase Center in San Francisco, where the Golden State Warriors play.  With a roster of mostly unknowns, they've developed a style--like the Warriors, a lot of defense and a lot of three pointers.  In monetary terms they are already the most valuable franchise in the league.

As for the Fever, despite a series of devastating injuries, they've made the playoffs anyway.  They've still got at least two stars on the floor, and they are an heroically cohesive group.  Neither the Fever nor the Valkyries are expected to go very far in the upcoming playoffs, but to me they are the two teams that are the most fun to watch.

Meanwhile, the MLB teams I watch and root for, my old hometown Pittsburgh Pirates and my "new" home team the San Francisco Giants, have had some very entertaining moments the second half of the season.  

After a terrible post-All Star break losing streak that plummeted them out of contention, the Giants came alive, especially in August.  They had the longest streak of the year in consecutive games with at least one home run.  They surprised a lot of teams that thought they'd be an easy victim.

So did the Pirates, in streaks.  For example, the LA Dodgers went into Pittsburgh hoping to get well from a rough patch--playing a weaker team would be just the ticket.  Instead the Pirates beat them three games in a row, blanking them in the middle game--which was one of those pitching by committee games yet.  They had a couple of streaks like this, confounding teams actually in contention, some when they really needed the wins.

But of course by now the Pirates and the Giants have started losing again (though the Giants just won another high scoring game against Arizona.)  But they both certainly had some fun moments to watch this summer. 

Hurting (with update)

 Injuries are part of sports, they always say.  But do injuries have to be such a large part?

In professional basketball, for instance.  In the past season, the NBA was riddled with major injuries to big stars-- the players that fans come to see, the players that people who never get to an NBA game--or even to the USA--follow enthusiastically.  Now at least two teams that were in the championship hunt last year (Boston and Indiana) are drastically changed--to the point of going into rebuilding mode--because of an injury that will keep a star from playing at all next season.

This season the WNBA is experiencing an epidemic of injuries to stars and important players.  Caitlin Clark is the obvious example, but among the better known there's also Angel Reese.  Their teams played two games this season in which neither star played--and let's face it, stars the fans pay to see.

 But their teams--Indiana and Chicago--are beset with other injuries as well.  Indiana lost two key players for the season in one game.  When Chicago played Golden State recently, both teams were down four regulars each. 

Injuries are part of sports, but they don't have to be such a large part.  The culprit in the NBA appears to be scheduling: too many games too close together, especially in the playoffs.  Everyone knows this one factor was chiefly responsible for the injury to Steph Curry that killed the Warriors in the playoffs.  

In the WNBA, the most pronounced ongoing problem is officiating, and the kind of bullying on the court that leads to injury goes on unaddressed.  Nobody is happy with WNBA officiating this year, especially the players.  Caitlin Clark was getting beaten up regularly, leading to retaliation and threatening the game just when it is gaining popularity.  The Golden State Valkyries have sold out all 14 of their home games at Chase Center, where the Warriors play.  And that's an expansion team (that has a shot at the playoffs.)

Regardless of the sport, the injury of stars discourages attendance and enthusiasm, especially among the otherwise casual fan with no betting interest, that just want to see the best do their thing, and marvel.  It seems to be in the interest of the teams and the leagues to do all they can to keep those stars playing, not to mention that the numbers crunchers can look suspiciously like cretins who see players as meat and don't give them the respect they deserve. It happens in a lot of areas--the people who do the work and bring in the money get the least respect.  

When players, especially stars are hurt, the fans and the game are hurting.

Update: As the WNBA season closes in on the playoffs, the league continues to ignore problems with officiating, the loud charges of bullying and what all this is doing to the game.  All the league is doing is fining players for the least criticism of calls and officials.  But the recent season-ending injury to Sophie Cunningham of the Indiana Fever is reigniting the controversy. Though her mother and sister were quick to criticize officials, Sophie herself said in this case it was a basketball play, not targeting or semi-intentional injuring, as some observers have claimed.  But the  Fever, clearly an elite team in the making, has been hit with so many injuries that fans are bound to be both suspicious and discouraged.  

Meanwhile the NBA has announced their next season schedule, and there clearly is no attempt to respond to the danger to players of too many games too close together, or long exhausting road trips--both inviting injuries.  

This is especially true for the Golden State Warriors.  Next year the Warriors will play a mind-boggling 15 back-to-back two-game sets, including five of them in the first 17 games of the season.  They also have two road trips of at least 6 games, one of them being 8.  In sum, it's all about quick money for both leagues, and the players and fans be damned.

RIP Dave Parker, All Hail Bobby Bonilla Day

 Two Pittsburgh Pirates greats who I saw play in their prime were in the news this week.  One of them gave me a memorable baseball thrill, and the other threatened to beat me up.

Dave Parker died on June 28, less than a month before he would belatedly be inducted in the Baseball Hall of Fame.  He was a key player on the Pirates 1979 World Championship team, that won the World Series between two Pittsburgh Steelers Super Bowl championships, inaugurating Pittsburgh as the City of Champions.  

His accomplishments are major: National League Most Valuable Player, two batting championships, seven All Star appearances, including (if I remember correctly) an All Star MVP. He was a complete player: he hit for power as well as average, he fielded well and especially had a rocket arm, something he shared with the right fielder for the Pirates he succeeded, Roberto Clemente.

But he was not altogether a popular player in Pittsburgh.  Pittsburgh has had complicated relationships with its black athletes over the years.  It seemed that for every hero they loved, there was a villain they irrationally hated.  The beloved hero in those days was Willie Stargell.  Not only was he a superstar but he was a warm, magnetic personality, with a big smile and a generous reputation.  He was loveable, especially in these mature years..  

Dave Parker was not so easily loveable.  He was younger and brash, always with something to say. He got called arrogant and ungrateful.  He was the first million dollar a year player in sports and some fans resented him for it. 

In 1980, on Willie Stargell Day, during the eighth inning of the first game of a doubleheader at Three Rivers Stadium, someone in the stands threw a 9 volt battery at him as he stood in right field, almost hitting his head. He took himself out of the game.

 I was there that day, on assignment to the New York Times Magazine for a story on the relationship of Pittsburgh's championship teams to the city, otherwise reeling from the collapse of its steel industry.  I saw him in the locker room afterwards, a sad and sobered man.

Earlier--maybe that day, maybe an earlier game--I was in the locker room before the game.  It was a notoriously raucous scene, loud and a little crazy.  Someone smashed one of the wooden stools they each had in front of their lockers, and someone else picked up the big round seat of it and threw it across the room like a discus or a frisbee.

I was trying to interview players.  I think I only succeeded getting Bill Robinson to talk to me. Dave Parker was loud and rambunctious.  He told me that he was hated, that tires on his Mercedes were slashed and similar acts, but warned me not to print this or "I'll come after you, Big Bill."  The last was an obvious insult--he was clearly much bigger than me.  

But I do recall it was after that double header when in a much softer voice he apologized.  I hadn't taken him seriously, I thought it was funny.  There was something about him--he was exuberant, not a bully--that communicated itself to me. 

About five years later he testified against a local drug dealer, admitting that he had been a cocaine user, and the conduit for coke in the Pirates locker room.  Somehow that wasn't a surprise.  The difference of his affect before the game and after it told the story.  

I still think of him as one of the most dynamic players I saw.  But when he left Pittsburgh as soon as his contract was up also wasn't surprising.  He never got his due there.

That same dynamic, of the beloved black star and the reviled black star on the Pirates, was repeated when Bobby Bonilla and Barry Bonds patrolled the outfield on a 90s team that was always in the playoffs but never quite made it to the Series.  This time it was the glowering Bonds who was the villain, and the sunny, smiling Bonilla the hero.

Just as a fan in the stands, watching Barry Bonds hit was amazing.  I recall a game when I was in the second or third deck looking down at the diamond, watching him spray six scorching hits to all fields.  But on a lucky day I got a special thrill watching Bobby Bonilla hit, entirely because of where I was sitting.

I was living and working in the city of Pittsburgh then, and on impulse I walked over to the ball park one sunny afternoon.  Since I got there after the game started, a scalper outside was desperate to sell his ticket, so I got a very good seat for a pretty good price.  I recall barely sitting down just a couple of rows behind home plate when Bonilla came up.  He was batting left handed which, when I played as a kid, was my side of the plate.  A pitch came screaming in at his head, and he dived and fell in a cloud of dust.  But the next pitch he connected for a line drive home run.  I was so close when he swung and connected, and I could follow the ball all the way to the right field stands--it was the closest I could ever come to feeling what it was like to hit a big league homer.

Bonilla was in the news because July 1 is now famously called Bobby Bonilla Day.  Years ago when he signed a contract with the New York Mets and they mutually agreed to part company, they made an unprecedented deal.  He was owed nearly $6 million.  But he made a deal--he would take exactly nothing.  Nothing at all for ten years.  But after that, he would be paid annually based on the accrued value of what they owed him, a total of over $1 million a year until 2035.  So every July 1, he gets this annuity.  

Deferred payment has since become a thing for sports contracts and contracts in other fields. Today's biggest star, Ohtani, has a deferred contract with the Dodgers--he gets a measly 1 or 2 million a year, but many years for now that balloons to something like $50 million a year. It makes sense for him--he can get all the endorsement money and other fringe benefits from his current fame, but after his playing days, he's got an assured very decent retirement income, even if grocery prices continue to go up at their present pace.

Bonilla, who was a great hitter for the Pirates and even later, is proud of that contract, not only for what it means for his family, but for the example it set and suggests--about the benefits of a guaranteed income, and security later in life.

It's Over, It's Begun

The Golden State Warriors overcame injuries to Gary Payton II and Jimmy Butler to win their first round playoff series against second seed Houston in seven games.  With one day off they went to Minneapolis and won the first game of the second round series, but in the third quarter Steph Curry sustained a hamstring injury, which kept him out of the next four games.  And essentially, that's all she wrote.

The Warriors best chance to extend the series to allow Curry to return for the sixth game was the third game, at home.  Butler had 33 points and Kuminga 30, and the Dubs were leading in the fourth quarter, but the refs decided the game by giving Draymond Green his fifth and sixth fouls in quick succession.  Without his defense the Wolves feasted at the basket.

But even if Curry hadn't gotten hurt, this series too probably would have gone seven games, and the rest that the Wolves got after overpowering the Lakers in five games, which showed up in their first game as rust, might have provided the energy to finally outlast the Dubs.  In any case, MN just got better every game.  The Warriors played well and kept every game close--they won three quarters in game 4 but they lost the third quarter badly and then the game.  Even in the Wolves biggest win in game 5 the Warriors won several stats categories, but the Wolves shot over 60%.

After the game, the Warriors coach and star players congratulated the Timberwolves, and mouthed the cliche that injuries "are part of the game."  But do they have to be as big a part as they have become?  The so-called physical play that some teams use to target opponent stars is starting to determine outcomes.  In other cases it may be hard to tell--was Jimmy Butler's injury that continued to limit him against the Wolves truly incidental and accidental?  Maybe, but maybe not.  And the brutal playoff schedule, when every game is so intense, had to play a role in Steph's injury.  

Other teams, like Boston, maybe had it worse.  But who gains by this, except team investors and owners by the number of games, though game attendance is a small part of their revenue.  But even then, the League and basketball itself does not profit when stars can't play.  And fans certainly don't profit when they are shortchanged by seeing lesser basketball than they would have.  I doubt anybody much agrees with me, but I think the NBA is going down a dark road with too many games and too little protection for players.

As it is now, health, momentum and players rising to the occasion determine playoff outcomes, and the Timberwolves are conspicuously riding high. Peaking at the right time often looks like destiny.  With vaunted OKC having trouble with Denver, the Wolves are the surprise team with the best chance at the championship.  Whoever emerges from the West is likely to win it all.

For the Warriors, the end is also the beginning of shaping next year.  Steph, Draymond and Jimmy Butler are the acknowledged core for the next two years.  As to what the Warriors front office will do this offseason, I saw one prominent story saying they will shop aggressively for players, and another that said they are likely to take a conservative approach. Jonathan Kuminga is said to be on his way out, and a player who is highly valued as the Warriors future.  I guess we'll see.  

The last thing I'll say is how wrong I was about Jimmy Butler.  He was not only the missing piece that made that late season run work, he has shown a devotion to team play and a loyalty to the Warriors, to Steph and to Coach Kerr.  Instead of a negative in the locker room he has proved to be a positive.  It was said that this is in some sense his pattern at first, but he can quickly sour on a team with disastrous results.  Still, this relationship of Butler and the Warriors looks real. 

That's one reason for optimism--the team has the entire offseason to bond more, and the entire early season to experiment without as much pressure.  If JK stays, for example, Kerr intends to play him a lot with his core starters.  Whatever happens, it became clear that Butler was the key to allow Steph to be Steph, and another season of that could be a joy forever.