Lee Lowenfish

During my non-commercial radio days in the 1980s, I made the acquaintance of the memorable publicist Irving Rudd. In his long career, he worked for many sports ventures including the Brooklyn Dodgers, Yonkers Raceway, and at the end for boxing honcho Bob Arum (BTW Arum was a graduate of Harvard Law School in the 1950s along with Dick Moss, a huge Pittsburgh Pirates fan who was the baseball-loving counsel for the nascent MLB Players Association under Marvin Miller.) 

 

Irving Rudd battled throat cancer for years but was always a vital and smiling presence on the sports scene.  When I asked him one day how he was doing, he rasped, "Bobbing and weaving."  It has become my stock answer for the age we are living in and for any baseball season.  . 

 

What a difference a week makes!  In my last blog, I praised Kyle Gibson's insights into starting pitching philosophy and he practiced what he preached in a sterling win against the Yankees.  His mentee Grayson Rodriguez did not listen or couldn't execute when he opened the Friday night home series against the resurgent Texas Rangers who seem for real under new manager Bruce Bochy.  

 

Rodriguez was sent down to Triple A Norfolk after giving up 9 runs in less than 4 innings. He's still only 23 and was drafted by the Dan Duquette regime out of high school in Texas. He joins DL Hall another high school signee from the previous

regime who has also yet to show consistency. 

 

One of the old adages of baseball is that you can't give up on young pitching, but right now the Oriole staff is being saved by the two horses in the bullpen, the Rock, Yennier Cano, a Cuban defector they obtained as a throw-in from the Twins in the Jorge Lopez trade last summer, and the Mountain, Felix Bautista who has emerged after more than a decade of toiling in the lower minors. 

 

The groin injury to Cedric Mullins suffered late in the Memorial Day shutout loss to Cleveland looks serious and he could be out for a considerable amount of time. The Birds' outfield depth in the minors will have to come to the rescue. The loss of Mullins will definitely be felt, but I think the Birds have shown enough resilience to stay in the divisional race. 

 

Youneverknow what will happen in baseball. Look at Wrigley Field in Chicago on Memorial Day.  The high-flying Rays who just had won a hard-fought series at home against the Dodgers - possible World Series preview? - got one-hit by former Met Marcus Stroman WHO THREW A COMPLETE GAME.  It can happen if the analytic-drenched brains controlling so many teams can let go for a while and watch the pitcher show mastery. 

 

Now, it's time for the rundown on what New York City-area and northeastern teams made the 64-team college baseball regionals leading to the 8-team College World Series starting in Omaha on June 16. 

All double elimination regionals will start on Fri June 2 and will be televised on some ESPN platform. 

 

**Army plays top-seeded Virginia at Noon on ESPN+ - E. Carolina and Oklahoma are also in regional.

 

**Ivy League winner Penn plays at Auburn on 7p on ESPN+ with Southern Miss. and Samford also in regional.

 

**Central Conn. St from New Britain plays at South Carolina with Campbell (Cedric Mullins' alma mater) & NC State.

 

**Rider from Trenton NJ plays at Coastal Carolina at 7p on ESPN+ with Duke and UNC-Wilmington in same regional.

 

**UConn, a rare #2 from Northeast, plays #3 Texas Tech at Florida at 1p on ESPNU with #1 Gators playing Florida A & M  Hall of Famer Andre Dawson's alma mater - I tell the story of signing of Dawson by scout Mel Didier in my new book BASEBALL'S ENDANGERED SPECIES. 

 

**In a rare #2=#3 matchup of eastern teams, Maryland, Big Ten champion, and Northeastern, coached by Michael

Glavine, Hall of Famer Tom Glavine's brother, at 1p on ESPN+  Host Wake Forest plays George Mason in other game-

 

**Finally, Maine faces U of Miami at Miami at 7p ESPN+ with Texas and Louisiana (the former Louisiana-Lafayette) also in regional. 

 

Last but not least here is the quarter-final lineup for the PSAL high school playoffs on Tu May 30 at 330p

#1 Luperon from Upper Manhattan hosts South Bronx at Randall's Island Field 20 

#2 Tottenville hosts John Jay at its Staten Island field

#3 Monroe hosts Inwood at Mike Turo Field on the Monroe campus in east Bronx near 177th Street

#4 George Washington hosts #5 Grand Street of Brooklyn (Dellin Betances' alma mater)

 

The semi-finals will be best two out of three at higher seed's field over the weekend of June 2-3-4.

The final will be at Yankee Stadium on Mon June 12.  There will also be the AA final at that time.

 

That's all for now.  One cultural note - the new production of Mozart's last opera "The Magic Flute" can be seen

through June 10.  The music remains sublime and the production is both lively and profound. 

Last performances are W May 31 at 730p,  Sat Jun 3 at 1p (broadcast on national radio),  Tu June 6 at 730p, Th June 8 at 730p, and final performance of season for the Met, Sa Jun 10 at 730p   More info at metopera.org  

 

Always remember:  Take it easy but take it, and these days especially, stay positive test negative.  

 

 

    

I must admit I didn't know what a "libero" was until I got wrapped up in the University of Wisconsin's stirring rise to their first women's volleyball championship last weekend.  I now know that a libero is the rearmost roaming defensive player in both volleyball & soccer. 

 

Undefeated Louisville and perennial contender Nebraska provided stiff competition for my Badgers in the Final Four. But behind a 6' 8" and 6' 9" front line of senior Dana Rettke and first-year Anna Smrek (daughter of a 1980s-backup-LA Laker champion), Wisconsin won the title in a five-set thriller.

 

"We try to practice gratitude," head coach Kelly Sheffield said during the week leading up to the tourney. "And it's really tough when you're in a grind." But he stressed the importance of appreciating the advantages players have -  competing in a sport they love with teammates who may be friends forever for a truly supportive Madison community.

 

Wisconsin has been blessed with a lot of inspirational leaders and well-chosen psychologists. "If consistency were an island, it would be lightly populated," current basketball coach Greg Gard cited one such thinker last year.

 

Nearly ten years ago, Gard's predecessor Bo Ryan explained how the Badgers overcame a late game deficit to win in Columbus:  "You measure people by what it takes to discourage them."

 

BTW So far this season, the Badgers are a pleasant surprise with a 9-2 overall record and 1-1 in the Big Ten.  How Covid affects the rest of the season is still an unknown but I'm looking forward to more great play from sophomore sensation Johnny Davis.  He has to shine for the team to have a chance at contention in the maelstrom/moshpit known as  B1G basketball.

 

A shoutout is also in order for Badger backup center Chris Vogt from Mayfield, Kentucky.

He not only contributed to two recent wins including the erasure of a 22-point deficit

against Indiana.  But more importantly he has spearheaded relief work in his home town that was devastated by the recent tornados.  His GoFundMe page reportedly raised nearly

$200,000. 

 

Today's last word on Badger exploits goes to National Women's Volleyball Player of Year Dana Rettke who explained the team's success this way:  They have learned to live "in the precious present . . . taking one point at a time and being where our feet are."  Reminds me of the old baseball scout who said that 87% of baseball was played beneath the waist. 

 

IN REMEMBRANCE:

ROLAND HEMOND, 92, who passed away in Arizona on Dec 12. From the age of 10 he was steadily employed in baseball and ultimately won three executive of the year awards. Yet Roland never forgot his roots as a hot dog and soda vendor.

 

His first front office job was as a typist for the Boston Braves.  "I always call him Henry Louis Aaron because that is the name I typed on his form," he once quipped.

 

In this age of impersonal uber-analytics, his kind will never be replicated.  But he must be remembered for his kindness and understanding that the human touch is vital in a sport where someone must lose every day.

 

KENNETH MOFFETT, 90, in Alexandria, Virginia, on Nov 19.  He was the federal mediator in baseball's 1981 strike. After that season, he briefly replaced retiring MLB players union leader Marvin Miller but he was considered too accommodating to owners' interests. 

 

In his less than a year of heading the MLBPA, Moffett and Lee MacPhail, his labor relations counterpart on the management side, hoped to work out a joint drug abuse program. It was not to be.   

 

Moffett moved on to work for the NABET union (of broadcast employees and technicians) and stayed with them when they merged with CWA, the Communication Workers of America.)  I'm glad he was remembered well in Wash Post and NY Times obits.

 

He loved the game of baseball and once coached in youth ball former Oriole Baby Bird southpaw Steve Barber.  He was an avid runner. 

 

   

Maybe early in the new year, there will be a breakthrough to end baseball's latest exercise in labor relations brinksmanship.  All the field managerial positions have been filled now that  Buck Showalter, 65, is taking over the Mets, and former MLB outfielder Mark Kotsay, 46, will lead the Oakland Athletics.

 

Being media savvy is essential for high positions in today's sports so I am sure both men will impress in their introduction to the public. 

 

Whether they can lead the players to the playoffs is another question.  The A's might be headed to Las Vegas in the relatively near future and they could be on the verge of a fire

sale.  

 

As the Yankees manager pre-Joe Torre, Showalter, of course, is a known commodity to the New York market. He has been a TV commentator so he will obviously be more fluent than the previous Mets rookie managers Mickey Callaway and Luis Rojas.  (Carlos Beltran never got to manage even one game because of his role as a player in the Houston sign-stealing scandal).

 

It will be very interesting to see who Buck names as his coaches.  He inherits the former Mets journeyman pitcher Jeremy Hefner as his pitching coach.  

 

Sure hope Jeremy and Buck are on the same page. The trend in baseball, however, is for pitching coaches to be hired by front offices not the manager.  

 

And people wonder why games are so long? "See the ball, hit the ball" has been replaced by pumping the latest analytics into pitchers while batters are gearing up for the proper hand position for maximum launch angle and exit velocity.   

 

More Mets questions:  Can the two horses at the top of the rotation, $43 million a year man Max Scherzer and oft-injured Jacob DeGrom, deliver full-seasons? What kind of year will erratic closer Edwin Diaz provide?  Which Francisco Lindor will show up - the Cleveland star or last year's washout?

 

Very interesting questions all and many more. As a fan of the Woerioles, who just before the lockout lavished $7 million a year on Jordan Lyles, one of the most ineffective pitchers in recent history who is penciled in as a number 2 starter, I guess I'd like to have the Mets' problems.

 

That's all for now!  There is reason to believe that if we don't panic, the latest Covid variant, amicron, might not be life-threatening and maybe even short-lived. So again stay positive, test negative, and take it easy but take it! l