Weekly Mail December 1, 2019

Hey:

So here we are the last month of the year. 2019 for better or worse almost in the books.

We survived Black Friday. From what I read it seems like Syracuse NY was the winner in the city with the most Black Friday trouble for 2019. Who says Syracuse can never win the big one?


FOOTBALL: Turkey Day

There are certain things you can always count on Thanksgiving Day. Good food, good company and lousy football.

I consider myself a traditionalist, so I get it that the NFL insists that the first game on Thanksgiving should be hosted by the Detroit Lions. But the fact of the matter is that the Lions are one of the few football franchises more dysfunctional than by beloved Jets. And more often than not, they are playing out the string come Thanksgiving. And if they happen to be playing a team that is also struggling, it makes for a lousy game. Now for the past few years, I've trekked into the Upper East Side for turkey day, so I was usually looking for parking during the Lions game. This year I stayed out on LI, so I got stuck watching the slopfest against the disappointing Chicago Bears.

If I were a Lion fan and especially if I lived in Detroit, I would beg the Lions to at least make an effort on Thanksgiving. It's like with the Mets, even when I know they are going nowhere, I beg them to at least beat the god forsaken Yankees. But the Lions usually poop the bed on Thanksgiving, and they did again this year. At least I know which way to bet.

Now the second game on Thanksgiving is played in Dallas. And while I'm not usually someone who gives Ivy League graduate athletes/coaches a ton of sympathy, I have found myself sympathizing with Cowboys coach Jason Garrett.

I know that's weird right? I never liked the Cowboys, (well I did for a very short time as a kid-when my uncle bought me a Roger Staubach jersey) and Cowboy fans, are usually front runners. You don't hear much from the ones outside of the greater Dallas area when they are not competing for a championship.

But for some reason, I've always had a soft spot for Jason Garrett. I think it stems from a thanksgiving game about 20-25 years ago or so, when Troy Aikman got knocked out of a game and Garrett came in for him. Pat Summerall and John Madden, for my money the best broadcast combo in history, were really giving Garrett a hard time. Till he started zinging TD passes all over Texas Stadium that day. From that day on, I always rooted for him.

The thing is- he's been  the Cowboys coach now for almost 10 years as hasn't come close to being in a Super Bowl, much less winning one. 2 playoff wins in 10 years, again, even my Jets have done better than that, and we've had three coaches in the same span that the Cowboys have had Garrett in charge.

Jerry Jones is nuts. He fired Jimmy Johnson because he essentially bet some reporter that Barry Switzer could come out of retirement and win a Super Bowl with the team that was assembled. He was right, but then he sent Switzer packing when he couldn't win with the players Jones was drafting. (Johnson ran the drafts that built the three Championships the Cowboys won in the 90's) Remember the Cowboys had one coach for 30 years, then they had 5 or 6 in the next 10. How Jones has stuck with Garrett all these years is somewhat puzzling.

But now that appears to be coming to an end. Jones was fuming after Dallas lost to the Pats last week. (By 4 points-which having watched my team lose by 30 to them, didn't seem so bad) Jones pretty much gave Garrett an ultimatum-only to have the team lay an egg against the Bills on Thanksgiving at home. Some folks thought Garrett was a goner right then and there.

But Jones said that Garrett is safe till the end of the season.

There were reports that Garrett would be a candidate here with the Giants if/when they send Pat Schumur packing. The sampling of Giant fans I've spoken to (namely my in-laws) aren't exactly thrilled by this prospect. But me? I'd root him on here. I don't know what it is, he just seems like a hard guy to dislike. 

All I can say about the Jets is, if you didn't think they were going to lose that game to the previously winless Bengals, you obviously haven't been watching them.





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The past couple of years, I have had some guys I used to hang out with in Rockaway pass away too young. Good guys, guys I was friendly with, but maybe not super close. Still when I heard they had died, it stung.

But Billy Dietrich was a different story. This doesn't just sting, this one hurts.

I really can't remember a time in my life when I didn't know the Dietrich family. Rob is a few years older, but Billy and John Thomas (JT), were two years older and two years younger than me respectively. So it was those two I was closest to.

And what times I had with them.

The common theme that came through in all the tributes to Billy I read this week was how he made people happy. He had that big smile and deep laugh. They say happiness is contagious, well if you hung around him enough, you know that was true.

He was a natural comedian, I mean he could do things that if someone else did them, you'd chuckle. He did it and you busted a gut.

One time he and I were sitting on the boardwalk on 112 Street. It was one of those days, not nice enough for the beach, but not raining either. We were sitting there with his radio, he was flipping around the stations trying to find some decent music. At one point he stopped at a station playing classical music.

He put the radio down and found a stick in the shrubs near the nursing home. He broke the stick in half and proceeded to conduct the symphony right there on the boardwalk.

I started laughing, which got him laughing which made me laugh more as he made those faces he used to make, all the while still conducting. We must have been some sight..even the nuts on the boardwalk thought we were nuts!

But every time I thought of him this week, that was the first image that came to my mind. Mr. Bill, with the big smile, waving those sticks on the boardwalk that day.

Years later when Timmy was born, Tara took to calling him Mr. T. She still does.

One day her and Timmy were sitting on the coach when I came home from work. As I came in, Tara said "Look Mr. T it's daddy." Out of nowhere, seeing the two of them together, I belted out "Mr. T and Mrs. T live together, happily!"  Timmy cracked up. The two of us started singing that little tune all the time. "One of these days,  I told Timmy and Tara,  "I'll introduce you to the man who wrote that song." .

But I never got around to it. Billy once showed me a notebook. He had hundreds of those little poems.

I hadn't seen him in a long time, but I shoot the breeze with JT on line every once in a while. I just figured we'd all bump into each other one day and catch up.  If I've learned one thing these past few years, it's that you can't take that for granted.

With everything going on in the world now, with politics as angry as ever, the world could ill afford to lose anyone who can put a smile on people's faces just by being themselves.

The world lost someone this week who could do that as well as anyone I've ever known.

RIP Mr. Bill

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Thank you everybody

and Have a Great Week