Weekly Mail March 22, 2020

Hi Everyone:

I hope all of you are getting through this OK. It has definitely become the fight of our lives.

I have been tempted to be one of those folks who say that the world is overreacting as I'm seeing sporting events canceled, schools closed and martial law being effectively (if not technically) declared. But then I read that Italy reported that almost 800 of its citizens died in one day because of this, and I wonder how anyone can think this is overreacting?


Also, while I'm on the subject, I want to say that although I've had my differences with the man over the years, I have to give props to our governor Andrew Cuomo, who has been tough when he needs to be and compassionate when he can be, and as much as anyone, has been level-headed and smart about this whole thing.  I'm going to refrain from criticizing my other two favorite targets, Captain Orange and the Dope from Park Slope, because quite frankly, I'm sick of talking about them. But fear not, they have both lived down to their reputations.

Anyway, lets discuss some other topics shall we?

FOOTBALL: Bye Bye Brady

Nothing is sports shocks me anymore. Two things happened in my teens that cured me of that.

The first was on August 9, 1988. I was coming off the Q53 from basketball camp and my dad was coming off the train from work.  He showed me the back of the NY Post which read: REPORT: GRETZKY TRADED TO LA FOR $10 MILLION. It ended up being $15 million and a slew of draft picks but that's not the point. At 27, the most dominant athlete in his sport was being traded, to a division rival nonetheless.

The second thing occured on February 10, 1990. I was Razor Ray McGarvey's house watching Dominique Wilkins win the NBA Slam Dunk Contest. When I got home, once again my dad had shocking sports news. Mike Tyson had just gotten knocked out by a tomato can named Buster Douglas in Tokyo. If you are under the age of 35 and reading this, Google up Mike Tyson's knockouts, especially prior to his 90 second KO of Michael Spinks, and you'll maybe understand why this was such a shocker.

Combine that with the fact that Tom Brady had been rumoured to be considering leaving the New England Patriots almost since the day after the Pats were knocked out of the playoffs, and it seems there would be no way you could be surprised that Brady bolted New England for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers this week. Shocked? Never. But I was surprised. I have to admit.

Maybe I've gotten so used to be tortured by him all these years, that I just figured it would never end. Maybe I just thought he would want to finish his career in a city where he is an icon.*

One thing I can tell you is that this was not about money, I don't give a $h-t what anybody says.

Someone on the fan this week said that we have no right to say whether Brady has enough money or not. That's a bunch of baloney. How many times in his career did Brady take less money from the Patriots so that they could sign another player? Brady has made a ton of money in his career. What's more his wife the supermodel makes much more money than even he does.

No folks, from where I'm sitting this is the ultimate chicken versus the egg argument. Was Tom Brady a great player because Bill Belichick was his coach, or was Bill Belichick a genius because he had Tom Brady as his quarterback?

We will find out next season. That's if we have a next season.

I am writing this on Sunday afternoon right around the time in normal years I'd be looking at my NCAA tournament bracket and wondering if there was still a shot that I would have to win. Of course most used that answer would be a resounding no. My goal was always to win at least 25 games in the first two days, and have at least 12 of my team still alive in the sweet 16. This year is particularly Bitter Sweet because one of the number one seeds going into the tournament with certain to be my adopted team the Dayton Flyers.

Now those bums from the sports Department in the post had a mock NCAA tournament, and they had the gall to have Dayton get knocked out in the first round becoming only the second number one seed to be eliminated in the first game of the tournament. I sincerely doubt that would have happened in real life but really you never know by No Doubt would have would have put them in the championship game at the very least. I'm not really sure how the brackets would have broken down but my initial thought was if it worked out that way. My final two teams would be Dayton and Seton Hall. It's all moot now anyway but it's just another victim of this terrible virus.



I hope everybody is hanging in there and keeping their spirits up. It's important to stay positive in times like these. And believe me, I'm saying that as much to myself as I am saying it to all of you. I am by no means trying to preach or anything here. With everything going on there are days where is really hard really hard to stay positive. I'm sure I'm not the only one struggling with that. But I still believe tell if we stick together and try to keep each other laughing that we will come out of this stronger. To that end if you are a Facebook user, I recommend that you search, find, and join the Coronavirus Virtual bar. The administrators provide nightly musical entertainment and the members are all vying to see who can post the funniest memes concerning the Coronavirus. The one hard fast rule that they have is absolutely no politics of to be discussed in the bar. You'll get bounced out of there faster than a wild night at the Irish Circle.



Also, I want to thank all of you who sent me such positive feedback last week. I can't tell you what that meant to me. The best part was that it was people from both sides of the political spectrum, and people who live in other parts of the country that wrote to me.  99% of the people who are reading this every week are people who I have crossed paths with at some point in my life. So please know this..whether or not you agree with what I write, if you are reading this tonight, you are a part of me, and for that I will always be grateful.


Please take care

and Have a Great Week

Weekly Mail March 15, 2020

Hey Everyone:

Thank you to all who read, reacted and/or responded to my coronavirus special on Friday. As I watched the world shut down on Wednesday and Thursday, I knew I couldn't wait till Sunday to express how I think many of us were feeling about this whole thing.  I have a hard time explaining to young people (like my kid's age) how scary 9/11 was, I wanted to write something while that feeling of dread was still fresh.

Now that we are coming to grips with the new reality, maybe we can take a few minutes and have a chuckle or two. So I'm posting here some of the things I found amusing during this tough time. Hey, if we don't laugh, we might all go crae-crae.



This one is from my old Baskin-Robbins/Mercy Medical Center co-worker Cindy....

My Aunt Eileen had invited me on Facebook to follow Clones Notice Boards, my uncle is a Clones native, along with former featherweight champion Barry (the Clones Cyclone) McGuigan*.   They posted this the other day....

When they suspended the NBA season, I didn't bat an eyelash, the Knicks have been so bad, I thought they were given a favor. Losing the NHL was bad, losing March Madness was worse, but the icing on the cake was when Clones canceled Bingo at St. Joseph's Hall. That's when I said "Well now we're screwed."


This is from my neighbor Christine, I would totally do this....

MORE ON THE CORONAVIRUS:

Asia has Wuhan, China. Europe has Milan. The winner of the city in North America with the highest percentage of coronavirus cases is  (drum roll please)

Our very own New Rochelle, NY!!

Governor Cuomo was forced to deploy the National Guard to New Roc this week to set up one mile containment zone. People are allowed to come and go, provided they are not under quarantine, but the Guard will enforce the strict limitations on crowd gathering.

I had some really good times up there, and I hated to see that city dragged through the mud like that. That all happened on Tuesday. By Friday, the virus had shut down most of the civilized world.


Speaking of New Rochelle...

BASKETBALL: The Proof is in the People at Iona...


I didn't think there would be any sports stories to write about this week. But lo and behold we got this whopper on Saturday.

Former Providence, Knicks, Kentucky, Celtics and Louisville coach Rick Pitino agreed to take over as coach of Iona Gaels, replacing the great Tim Cluess, who stepped down due to an undisclosed health issue.

Pitino at one time was considered one of the best coaches in the country. He led Providence to the Final Four in 1987, and then was hired to coach the Knicks at the age of 35. He helped get them turned around too. And now Pitino, who gave new meaning to the term sausage and peppers while coaching at Louisville, returns to the New York area 31 years after he f-cked the Knicks over by leaving them to coach Kentucky. At the time, I didn't understand why you would leave a pro job to coach a college team. That would be like quitting the Yankees to go manage in Columbus**.

I realize now how prestigious the Kentucky coaching job is, notwithstanding the fact that the job has been held by bigots like Adolph Rupp, sleazebags like John Calipari***, and the aforementioned Pitino. But I've spent the last 30 years rooting against the creep anyway. Now I guess I'll have to pull for him.  Now offense to my Iona alumni friends, including Patti-Ann, Joann, Mathis and Ellen (amongst many others) but New Rochelle was the last place I thought Ricky P would end up coaching. Despite Cluess success there (6 trips to the NCAA Tournament in his 10 seasons there) Iona isn't a basketball hotbed, but more importantly, why would the Congregation of Christian Brothers hire a guy who knocked somebody up on a restaurant table?  Kind of like Evangelicals supporting a twice divorced, porn star banging miscreant for President..

But I digress...

Speaking of politics

2020 ELECTION

Another big night for Joe Biden, as he won Michigan fairly decisively as well as Idaho, Mississippi and Missouri. Bernie Sanders won the North Dakota Caucus. Washington State, the second biggest pie of delegates from Tuesday still hasn't decalred a winner, but the fact that Bernie didn't win that state going away means it's pretty much another one in the W column for Biden.

I'm not ready to declare the race over yet, but it's getting late awfully early for Bernie. Florida and Ohio are the two biggies coming up on St. Patrick's Day. The polls aren't in his favor, but if he can somehow pull off an upset or two, he could get himself back in the race. Losing Michigan last Tuesday was a huge blow. We'll see if he can recover.
*****************************************************************************

The Diocese of Rockville Centre announced on Friday that us Catholics don't have to go to Mass for the next three weeks due to the virus. This is a prudent rational decision that any Catholic over the age of 35 realizes wouldn't have flown back in the day. I remember schlepping to Mass one Saturday night when there was 2 feet on snow on the ground and my Mom was pregnant. Stay home? Never! You gotta go to Mass and ask Jesus to get rid of the virus. (Believe me, I'm praying as hard as anybody, but I'm doing it from my couch.)

Also, they are talking about doing the Late Night TV shows sans an audience. How the hell is THAT going to work? Poor Jimmy Fallon. At least Carson had Ed McMahon to laugh if nobody else did. Letterman laughed at his own jokes, so he didn't need an audience.

Ok, please everyone stay safe, wash your hands and stay vigilant

and try to Have a Great Week

**********************************************************************************************

*McGuigan got screwed out of his title too.  On June 23, 1986. He was supposed to fight a guy named Fernando Sosa, who was hurt in training. Sosa was replaced by Stevie Cruz from Texas. The fight took place at Las Vegas' Caesars Palace in 110 degree heat. An Irishman has no shot against a Texan when it's that hot, and Cruz won the title. I also remember Cruz's wife was 15 years old at the time of the fight, which I thought was weird, being I was 12 years old myself at the time. How I remember this shit I don't know. Thankfully I went to the Sports Illustrated Archives and confirmed my memories.Here is a pic of Stevie Cruz and his 15 year old wife. 

**The Yankees Triple A team at the time. Now they are in Scranton/Wilkes Barre.

*** Don't get me wrong, I like John Calipari. he's a great coach and funny as hell, but he's a snake oil salesman if there ever was one. And he doesn't even pretend to have any interest in graduating his players. 

Weekly Mail Special: The Coronavirus

        Regular readers of this post know that I don't like to compare bad things that happen to 9/11, and I am loathe to say that something is worse than 9/11. A couple years ago, I wrote my 9/11 special about those of us who would take difficult situations that arose and say “This is as bad as 9/11"

The closest I've ever come to that horrible helpless feeling I had that day was the day after Superstorm Sandy, seeing my town in ruin. Then a few days later, seeing Rockaway 10 times worse. That period of my life was rough. And I thought or maybe just hoped, that it would be as close to that 9/11 feeling as I would ever come to again.

Until these past few days.

In my entire 46.5 years on earth, I have never seen the world in general, or our country in particular brought to it's knees the way we all have due to the coronavirus. We have almost literally come to a halt here, the likes of which I could never fathom.

Thursday was apparently the worst day that the stock market had since the October 1987 crash. Twice this week, they had to stop trading. Twice so far this week, literally stop the stock ticker. The stock market is not my area of expertise, but last week all I heard was that this was the worst since 2008, now this week we are talking about 1987. How soon are we going to be talking about 1929?

Scary.

They had been talking about playing sporting events in empty arenas and stadiums. Then Utah Jazz center Rudy Gobert tested positive for the virus, and the NBA suspended their season. Thursday afternoon, the NHL did the same. One by one NCAA conference tournaments were being canceled, and now perhaps the most exciting three weeks in sports, the NCAA Tournament has been canceled. Forget about the billions of dollars in revenue that is going to be lost, just the spirit of fun that is now gone is so deflating.

Speaking of fun, St. Patrick's Day Parades all over the world have been cancelled, including the grandaddy of them all, here in NYC.  I'm not saying these weren't the right measures to take, I'm sure they were. I know we have to protect our bodies, I just hope we don't lose our spirit.

Because that's where I am right now.  This is as on edge as I have ever been. I feel like I'm in one of those futuristic movies.

It's surreal.

I'm not going to lay all of this at the feet of President Trump. I'm not going to blame him for the virus itself, the way that idiot Robert F. Kennedy Jr. tried to blame President Bush for Hurricane Katrina (not the poor relief effort, the hurricane itself)

But as usual, he's not helping any. He tried to downplay this whole thing, tried to say it was a hoax perpetrated by the Democrats as another way of getting him ousted from office. It wasn't until the stock market starting diving that he took notice and then he lied about how many testing kits we had on hand, among other things.

But again, to me this isn't about Trump and his perpetual bull$hit. This is bigger than the president, this is bigger than the entire federal government. This is bigger than any world leader.


But that's not what scares me.

Not getting to watch my wife as her beloved Dayton Flyers enter the NCAA tournament as a number 1 seed, saddens me, but doesn't scare me.

Watching the Dow Jones Industrial Average lose points like the Knicks scares me, but it's not the scariest thing.

I went to Costco tonight. The shelves were empty and the lines were long. On social media, there are those who are mocking folks who are stocking up. Really? They have cancelled all these events and several school districts here on LI are closed. You don't think there is any possibility they might declare martial law around here and we are all confined to our homes? And that scares me, but still not the scariest thing.

No, the scariest thing is I worry about our soul.

As bad as 9/11 was, there was also those blood banks with lines around the corner. There was the Shea Stadium parking lot, collecting and sending out supplies to the workers at Ground Zero, much of that donated by local businesses, and loaded onto trucks by volunteers. There were the cheers for the first responders.

We were shaken, but our spirit was intact.

Now I'm not so sure.

There were no fights in Costco tonight but there was definitely an edginess. An uncertainty. And what I'm not seeing is that spirit of "Let's stick together and get through this."

Maybe these are the times we are living in now. Maybe we've all been through too much these past 20 years. Terror attacks, war, about 19 different storms of the century. Now this. Maybe we're just too beat up right now.

But maybe, and it's a definite maybe, this is a sign. Whether you believe in God, or some other higher power. Maybe this is a sign from somewhere that the only way we are going to get through this thing is to somehow come together.  I'm not optimistic that people are going to see it that way, but maybe I’ll be wrong about that.


What I do know is that I have never seen time stand still like this. And I just hope we can get back to some semblance of normal really really soon.

Weekly Mail March 8, 2020

Hi:

So its that first day after daylight savings time and of course I'm walking around like a zombie. That's going to be the case for the next few days. Still, it's nice having daylight at 7 PM. I still like that better than that day in November when it's 5 PM and pitch black out.

Onto the week that was...


POLITICS: And then there were 2 (sort of)

When I first started doing this, (and I'm talking the pre Facebook reboot), my style was kind of shoot first, ask questions later. Especially when it came it politics. I still do it with sports, but with politics I've tried to reign it in a bit.

I was all set to write up a Weekly Mail Special about Super Tuesday, but as I was letting my typing fingers run free, I realized I was heading in a direction I wasn't sure I wanted to go.

So let me cut to it...


Last Saturday was the South Carolina Primary, won by Joe Biden in a landslide. Not totally unexpected either. Biden had banked on a big win there, what with their large African American community to propel him into Super Tuesday. This strategy led him to sub-par finishes in Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada. Be that as it may, he got the big W in South Carolina he was looking for.

Sunday evening, the alerts starting coming in that Pete Buttigieg, who had been en-route to Texas for a campaign rally, was heading back to South Bend, IN, where he was expected to announce he was dropping out of the race and endorsing Biden.

Buttigieg had been one of the candidates I was really rooting for, and I was sorry that he was dropping out. I was also puzzled that he was dropping out so close to Super Tuesday.

Around lunchtime on Monday, another candidate I really liked, Amy Klobuchar also announced she too was dropping out and endorsing the former VP.  Again I wondered why? You've come this far, worked this hard, at least roll the dice and see how you do.

Super Tuesday came and of the 14 states, Biden ended up winning 10 of them, Bernie Sanders won 4, including California, the biggest delegate pool in the country.


 Mike Bloomberg won American Samoa, and finished out of the money in almost every other state, so on Wednesday he backed out and endorsed Joe Biden.

And then it started to occur to me......

I didn't catch it at first, I mean, I was happy Biden had done so well, so I didn't give it much thought. But as I started recapping everything that had happened since Saturday night, the whole Buttigieg/Klobuchar thing started to nag at me. I couldn't get past the question of why they would drop out before Super Tuesday.

I couldn't get past the feeling that they were pressured to drop out by the DNC. Especially Buttigieg. On a plane halfway to Texas, he all of the sudden figures out he can't win? So he pulls a Han Solo and turns this bucket around?

I'm a Joe Biden guy, so maybe it shouldn't matter to me? But 4 years ago, they did the same thing to the guy they are doing it to now, Bernie Sanders (and to a lesser degree, Elizabeth Warren).

If I was a Bernie supporter, I wouldn't be happy right now. And I feel like I'd by a hypocrite if I just looked the other way on this.

One of the reasons many of us are anxious to see a Democrat take back the White House in November is that we feel the creep who is in there now got there with help from a foreign government. While I'm not comparing what Trump did with the DNC shenanigans, I still believe it should be up to the voters.

If Bernie is who the people want, then he should be the guy. Why put pressure on others to get out? After Super Tuesday, if you see you have no clear shot? Sure, then it's time to fold the tent, like Bloomberg and Warren.

Let the voters decide. I think that's only fair.

Speaking of which, I found out this week that my plan to try to thwart Captain Orange from within has also gone down the proverbial toilet.

The April 28 NY Republican Primary has been cancelled and all the delegates given to Trump. Of course I called bollcks on this, but apparently this has nothing to do with the Russians.

According to Politico, in addition to filing the proper paperwork, candidates had to submit a list of 3 delegates and 3 alternates per election district. Since there are 27 election districts in New York, that 27 times 6 for a total of 162. Joe (f-cking) Walsh didn't have any. so he would have been booted even if he didn't drop out. Bill Weld on the other hand, had about half the names he needed, and was given an extension to come up with them. He did not.

And now I'm pissed, because even though it probably wouldn't have mattered, I would have liked the chance to tell Captain Orange what I think of him and his crap. I know I will get to do it in November, but a double shot would have been nice. Again I realize there are rules, but I hate the idea of not letting the voters vote.

So on Tuesday we have primaries in Idaho, Michigan Mississippi, Missouri, and Washington State and a Caucus in North Dakota. Michigan and Washington have the largest amount of delegates up for grabs. We'll see if Bernie can catch up with Biden or if Uncle Joe starts to run away with it.

OK enough of that..


HOCKEY; Mika times 5

Friday morning, CBS This Morning did their 90 second "Eye Opener" a quick look through the previous day's headlines, complete with clips from the late night talk show monologues and sometimes sporting events. On Friday they showed Ranger Mika Zibanejad.

When I got in the car and put on Boomer and Gio on the FAN, Boomer Esiason did his Radio.Com sports minute all about Mika Zibanejad.

When I went out for lunch, Mark Malusis and Maggie Gray were talking about why the Rangers are so good and the Knicks are so lousy.

When I was on my way home, Joe Beningo was comparing Mika Zibanejad and Arteri Panarin to Rod Gilbert and Jean Ratelle.

Both the Post and News had Mika as their back page wood. What brought this all on?

Mika scored 5 (count 'em) 5 of the Rangers 6 goals Thursday night, including the game winner in OT.

BTW as I'm writing this, he just scored again against the Devils.

To see his performance celebrated on a national news network was really cool, but just that it created such buzz on the FAN and in the papers was a treat as well. He is a ton of fun to watch

When the Rangers traded Marian Gaborik for Derrick Brassard, I was pissed, but I grew to really like Brass, he always seemed to come up big in the big games. When they traded Brass to Ottawa for Zibanejad, I was sorry to see him go, But now that looks like the steal of the decade. Brass is now out here with the Ice-landers, (who are his 7th NHL team-he's the Glen Rice/Bruce Chen of hockey apparently) and Mika has become a legitinmate star. Had he not missed 13 games earlier in the season, they might be talking about him for the Hart trophy. As it is, he might be the 4th Ranger to score 50 goals in a season, joining Vic Hadfield, Adam Graves and Jaromir Jagr.

And he's only 26.

With Chris Kreider out of action, it's going to be hard to make the playoffs. But this might be one of those years where the journey is most of the fun. Nights like the other night will make that so.


CORONA VIRUS

I know I said this last week, but really this virus and everything involved in it is like nothing I have ever seen. I've seen more things get canceled/postponed because of it than for any other scare we have ever had.

Last week, they announced that a movie I've been waiting 5 years to see, the newest James Bond flick, is being postponed till November. It was supposed to open April 8. if this keeps up, they are going to start canceling sporting events.

Crazy.


Ok, everyone be safe

and Have a Great Week