04/23/24
May 18, 2015
SportsFilter: The Monday Huddle:
A place to discuss the sports stories that aren't making news, share links that aren't quite front-page material, and diagram plays on your hand. Remember to count to five Mississippi before commenting in anger.
That's the key item you pulled out of that article?
I though they were suspended at the order of the NFL. In any case, suspended != fired, so it's not even impossible those guys come back, should their names be cleared.
posted by hincandenza at 01:21 PM on May 18, 2015
The NFL said on May 11 that McNally and Jastremski were suspended by the Patriots: "Patriots owner Robert Kraft advised Commissioner Roger Goodell last week that Patriots employees John Jastremski and James McNally have been indefinitely suspended without pay by the club, effective on May 6."
posted by rcade at 03:23 PM on May 18, 2015
Even with a hand-picked interviewer, Kraft can't handle that question.
Pretty much every answer in that piece reads as, "The lawyers say I can't answer that one in advance." I love Peter King; it's like a man-sized child. He's basically Clarence (except not really likable) where he spends a few hundred words telling you how Very Important all this is and then acts like it's a world without lawyers. I feel like his wife must have to remind him when she pulls on his pants each morning not to give out his ATM PIN to strangers.
Also, how long do you think you could spend on the phone with Peter King before you just stop listening to the questions?
Every Monday I mean to post the most treacly bit of King's confectionary output. Maybe that should be a new Spofi competition (and no goddamn cheating and using the haikus-- the haikus feel like a pennance for sins I didn't even know I committed). Here's some beauts you missed in the last few weeks:
I think in the old wild west, Aikman would have been called the hangin' judge . . .
Vomit Clean-up Fee $50.00
The Canadiens-Lightning series is fun.
"That happen much?" I asked the driver.
"Not that much," he said. "But it did happen to me three times in one night once. And of course they don't want to pay."
"What do you do then?" I asked.
"Make 'em pay," he said.
The Bucs hired private investigators to check out Winston, who'd been accused of, but not charged with, sexual assault. Twice he was exonerated by prosecutors, and once by the university after a probe by a Florida state supreme court justice found insufficient evidence to charge Winston with sexual assault. This was a great test of the innocent-till-proven-guilty mantra in the American justice system, and the authorities could not prosecute Winston. So Winston passed the test. "He kept checking every box," Licht said.
Marcus Mariota does not have accounts on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook.
My Chicago hotel Wednesday and Thursday nights, before traveling to Tampa on Friday, was 1.6 miles from the draft site on Michigan Avenue. I walked it three times in the two days I was in town and wouldn't have minded walking it six times.
Three (not sure I can do this one justice):
So I ran . . . for nearly a mile I found myself trailing a woman having a great time running and chatting away on her cell phone. She had one of those earpieces, the kind with two earbuds and then the mike somehow affixed between her lower lip and chin. We were both running about the same pace, about 9.5-minute miles, up and down the slight grades of the beautiful park, and I was interested in her conversation withI believea girlfriend on the other end of the conversation . . . I did find out, though, that this 30ish woman was going to a baby shower later that afternoon, hadn't bought a gift yet but was thinking about a gift card from Bloomingdales, wondered how much would be appropriate, settled on $50, then asked if the person on the other end wanted to meet for a margarita beforehand, and then she drifted behind me on a bit of a decline.
How was he not immediately arrested? "Yes, police? The Kool-Aid Man is chasing me!"
7:46 p.m.: ESPN's Darren Rovell tweets, "98,000 Tweets on Tim Tebow in last hour."
9:02 p.m.: Assistant coach in the NFL who knows Kelly but does not work with him says to me, "This is not a prayer. There's a chance here. If there's one coach in the NFL who could figure a way to use Tebow, it's Chip. Maybe not every week, but in spots."
When I am King (yes), it will be a hanging judge sort of crime to follow Darren Rovell on Twitter. What are you hoping to glean?
Keep in mind this is a man with multiple daughters. He seems amazed by women.
I can see it now: a dedicated camera on [female ref Sarah] Thomas for her first game of the regular season, by whichever network has the game. It's history. A good historyassuming Thomas can handle it. I'm told one of the things that drew the NFL to consider Thomas was her poise and her ability to take the heat on the field.
Maybe I should get into "Game of Thrones."
Man, what got into the Kansas City Royals' Cheerios?
I was waiting for a plane at LAX the other night, and heard "That Smell" by Lynyrd Skynyrd. One of the worst songs ever created.
posted by yerfatma at 07:37 PM on May 18, 2015
I walked it three times in the two days I was in town and wouldn't have minded walking it six times.
This has been bugging me since I posted it. If he loved the walk so much, how did he wind up doing it an odd number of times? Did he take a taxi straight from the draft to the airport? Did he take a taxi the first time he went to the draft only to decide to walk on his way back and fell in love with the walk then? I NEED TO KNOW!
posted by yerfatma at 11:33 AM on May 19, 2015
The fourth time, he was escorted back to his hotel in a champagne limo by three female volunteers from the Tourism Bureau who mistook him for the Governor of New Jersey and were worried he might close two northbound lanes on the Michigan Avenue bridge.
posted by beaverboard at 12:29 PM on May 19, 2015
Starwood Preferred Traveler Note of the Week. The coffee at the Chariot Motor Coach Inn in Toledo is very weak, but those vibrating beds are a nice touch. Unfortunately what could have been a near-perfect stay was ruined by the woman speaking loudly on her cell phone by the pool when I was doing my morning laps. Well, that and the vomit in the pool.
Beer Nerdness. Purple Nurple American Pale Ale is a tasty brew for those who like hops, malt, and water.
Coffee Nerdness. Starbucks could do worse things than hire more employees like Briana, the barista at the Starbucks at the tollway oasis at exit 37 of the New Jersey Turnpike. She makes the perfect white chocolate macchiato. I ordered a macchiato in Italy once and it was an espresso with a little bit of steamed milk in it and all I could think was "boy, do they not know what they are missing."
posted by holden at 01:59 AM on May 20, 2015
Interesting DeflateGate development:
Even with a hand-picked interviewer, Kraft can't handle that question.