In relentless pursuit of “the thing,” well, here’s the thing:
As sports continue to apply unintended replay rules, episodes in which games are altered radically by the unintended grow. Yet the powers that rule sit and stare, as if in denial, not interested in fixing what so clearly escaped logic and foresight.
I would challenge Gary Bettman to review with us the replay-rule application that totally changed Game 1 of the Stanley Cup finals, then claim that this was what the NHL had in mind when it added more replay. We need him to tell us he is good with what took place.
With the score 0-0 and 13:03 left in the first period, the Predators entered the Penguins’ zone after Filip Forsberg took a pass at the near-boards blue line. Four passes, two puck-scrambles and 16 seconds later, Nashville’s P. K. Subban scored.
“Nashville,” cried Doc Emrick, “strikes first!”
But hold the phone. Pittsburgh challenged, claiming — hoping, wishing — that four passes, 16 seconds, two puck-scrambles and one goal later, Nashville had entered offside.
The game then was unplugged as NBC showed a collection of replays in slow motion and freeze-frame, proving only that this was a very close non-call, the kind that shouldn’t be overturned for absence of overwhelming evidence.
NBC analyst Eddie Olczyk reached the studied conclusion that the goal should stand, though he did not address the part about the play having continued for a significant amount of time, which included significant action, before the score, thus here we were, again, in a Mr. Peabody’s Wayback Machine review.
Well, one man’s guess, in this case, is not as good as another’s. The goal was wiped out and 16 seconds were put back on the clock as if they never had happened.
There is an upside. Had a player broken his leg during those 16 seconds, it would not have counted.
I’m not suggesting the Predators were robbed, though they were. I’m suggesting the game in its broadest sense — this particular game and this Stanley Cup finals — already have been altered by senseless, replay-rule madness.
If Bettman and the NHL disagree — if what happened Monday in Pittsburgh is what they had in mind — they will sustain this nonsense next season. We will know then. They are not going to flat-out admit an error so devoid of foresight.
And to think that the NCAA, its Division I basketball games already grinding to repeated, lengthy stops in the last two minutes of regulation for refs to stare at TV monitors, has added more reasons to use replay in those final two minutes. Yeah! Let’s keep suffocating games with replay!
Nurse!? Nah, it’s more like: Hearse!
Tiger’s spin before arrest doesn’t pass smell test
That mug shot of Tiger Woods is the first time many have seen him without a Nike logo. Nike should get busy prepping Woods to appear in its next, “I am not a role model” campaign.
Woods may previously have beaten a rap for driving while impaired on dangerous, judgment-diminishing prescription drugs.
That 2009 hassle with his wife, when he plowed his Escalade into a fire hydrant then a neighbor’s tree, reportedly was enacted after Woods had taken Ambien, a strong, prescription sleeping pill, and Vicodin, a narcotic painkiller. But police didn’t request his blood; Woods paid a $164 fine.
As for the contradictory nonsense issued by Team Tiger — prior to his arrest this week he had declared that his back, post-surgery, is great, no pain — only adds to the suspicion that Woods is afflicted by an excessively inflated sense of entitlement, the last thing needed by anyone who is attracted to opioids and drives, be it 3 a.m. or high noon.
Recently, Gary Cohen, Ron Darling and Keith Hernandez have begun to question the wisdom of Mets manager Terry Collins depleting his bullpen by replacing effective relievers as per magical-formula, by-the-book managing sorcery.
Of course, many SNY viewers have seen this as nuts since Collins began managing the Mets, in 2011. But Collins is only one of most.
We are told unreliably Roger “Good For The Game” Goodell has sent a memo to teams warning that players who score, then simply flip the ball to the nearest official will be flagged and fined for “sportsmanlike conduct.”
To that end, Hernandez, Wednesday, indelicately spoke for many after SNY aired tape of Brewers center fielder Keon Broxton making hand signs and performing an ain’t-I-great “dab” after catching a deep fly.
“What the hell is that? … It was a routine fly ball! For crying out loud!”
Hernandez might have added Broxton’s immodesty contradicted his status as the batter who leads the majors in strikeouts.
Pinstripe Pride: Yankees partner Steiner Collectibles is auctioning “the jersey worn by rookie phenom Aaron Judge during his first career grand slam.
“This marks the first time an Aaron Judge game-used rookie season jersey has come to public auction, let alone a home run jersey!”
I’ll take two!
Fans get no love from Pill
SNY did well Tuesday night to stay on the Mets’ latest call-up starter, Tyler Pill, until he entered the dugout. Pill had been pulled after pitching well, and SNY apparently wanted to show his response to a standing ovation from the few customers who attended on a cold, misty night after a rainy day.
Pill’s response to the appreciation? Nothing; he didn’t even touch the bill of his cap.
As always, we’re too stupid to know better.
After Monday’s NHL game, Ch. 4 News reported the Tiger Woods bust as “Breaking News,” as if viewers didn’t know about a story that broke 16 hours earlier.
Tuesday’s WFAN Yankees-Orioles game began with Suzyn Waldman complimenting the singer who performed the national anthem for a “wonderful” rendition — as if we had heard more than just its ending.
But she did give, in full, the name of the anthem’s commercial sponsor.
Our readers write: Why the long wait before the start of the Cavaliers-Warriors finals? Sportswriter and pen pal Rick Carpiniello knows: “Both teams had a bye week.”
Two know-it-alls, Mike Francesa and Stephen A. Smith, are experts who specialize in making bad predictions. Smith has been wrong about the NBA Finals’ winner since 2011, though credit him for doing what Francesa never does — admitting when he is wrong.
Reader John Demarchi: “If Smith and Francesa pick opposite teams, the NBA Finals will end in a tie.”
Finally, Mark Morley suggests this headline if Sidney Crosby leads Pittsburgh over Nashville: “Crosby Stills Nash.”