Saturday, April 9, 2022

Sports this 'n' that

 Earlier today, Dwayne Haskins, 24, was killed in an auto accident. Haskins was drafted out of Ohio State by Washington in 2018, and spent 2 1/2 seasons in DC before being cut, and landed in Pittsburgh as a backup QB, and was expected to compete for the starting job this season in the wake of Ben Roethlisberger's retirement after the 2021 season.
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Scary moment last night in Washington during Mets-Nationals, the 1st Apple TV+ broadcast of live baseball.

Mets star Francisco Lindor was hit by a pitch by Washington reliever Steve Cishek. Manager Buck Showalter, who'd seen a few dustups between the Nats and Orioles when he was in Baltimore, led the charge out of the dugout. 3 Mets had been hit on Thursday, and Lindor avoided getting a concussion, taking a sidearm fastball in the jaw.

Cishek was ejected, and everything calmed down, as the Mets made it 2 in a row over Washington.

You'll find the incident in this MLB highlight reel:

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As Apple announcer Hannah Keyser suggested, the new balls are a little hard for pitchers to pick up a firm grip on, leading to all the hit batters in the first two games in the series.

Speaking of Apple, they've taken some heat due to some bugs in the system in their initial foray into sports broadcasting. Users complained about losing video and/or audio at different points in the game. They complained about batter odds appearing on the screen, which, of course, is intended for the gamblers watching the game to accommodate sponsors such as Draft Kings.

Here at home, we have it worse. The Mets terminated their radio network a few years ago, so there's no alternative when the SNY broadcast isn't airing.
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Mets slugger Pete Alonso is one of four players appearing in a commercial for BMW, joined by Walker Buehler (Dodgers), Tim Anderson (White Sox), and Ozzie Albies (Atlanta). It'll be in heavy rotation for the first half of the season at least.
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The revived USFL launches next week, just in time for Easter. No word if the Generals' original owner, some deranged ex-president, will be in attendance for the new Generals' opener, airing on Fox.
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It took the Yankees 11 innings to win their opener over Boston on Friday, but someone decided that there was value in a small dispute from starting pitcher Gerrit Cole before the game.

The issue? The pre-game festivities took too long, culminating in one of the Yanks' biggest fans, actor-comedian Billy Crystal, throwing out the first pitch. Cole was seen stewing in the dugout. As it was, Cole was roughed up in four innings of work, but didn't figure into the decision. I guess he won't be seeing Billy's Broadway adaptation of his "Mr. Saturday Night", any time soon.

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