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Trash Talk: NBA Finals Games and More

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There’s so much sportsing this week that more Trash Talk posts are needed to prevent other threads from being trashed.

Please confine your sports chatter to these sports-dedicated posts, thanks. You may treat this as an open thread; House J6 Committee hearing discussion should go in those dedicated posts.

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NBA FINALS

The 2022 finals between the Boston Celtics and the Golden State Warriors continues.

Sunday’s game tied up the series at 1-1 with Warriors win over Boston 107-88.

Last night the Warriors met the Celtics at TD Gardens, Boston MA only to lose to the home team, 116-100.

With the Celtics now leading the series 2-1, they’ll meet again in Boston tomorrow Friday, June 10, 9:00 pm ET; the game will be on ABC.

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NFL FOOTBALL

Yuck. By the time this post is published, Walmart scion Rob Walton may have bought the Denver Broncos for a record-breaking $4.65 billion. Denver may now have Walmart marketing plastered all over it to which a local news outlet refers euphemistically as “shaping central Denver.”

Denver would do better buying all Denverites some Spanx shapewear.

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PRO GOLF (PGA and not PGA)

Phil Mickelson did an interview with Sports Illustrated in which he discussed his gambling “habit.” He’s still got a problem if he can’t call it what it is — an addiction.

One might wonder if the addiction is why he’s up to his ears in the Saudi-backed LIV Golf in spite of acknowledging openly the Saudis’ human rights problems.

Knowing about his addiction this mea culpa sounds flat:

Whatev.

Tiger Woods isn’t ready to return to golf just yet; he’s skipping the U.S. Open at The Country Club in Brookline, MA this week. He’s planning to be at the JP McManus Pro-Am in Ireland for July 4-5, and at the 150th British Open at St. Andrew’s, Scotland for July 14-17.

Unlike Mickelson, Woods turned down a massive 9-figure offer to join LIV Golf. I guess Woods doesn’t feel he needs to worry about shaping PGA Golf the way Mickelson does — at least that’s Mickelson’s excuse for being persuaded to participate in LIV.

Speaking of LIV, I went looking for more details about golfers participating in the inaugural LIV Golf Invitational Series. The USA Today article I found did them no favors; they all sound like they could really care less if they were rubbing shoulders with acknowledged killers because golf.

But what really took the cake is the spokesperson for LIV…

wait for it…

guess who it is…

no, really…

Ari fucking Fleischer.

I have to ask why any journalists, particularly American journalists, will cover this and what editors will assign LIV to any journalists’ beat because they also know this entire golf venture is whitewashing the murderers of an American journalist who was chopped up with a bone saw while still alive because the murderer who put out this hit didn’t like the coverage he was getting in American media.

What the hell; is American journalism as soft in the spine as these compromised golfers? Do they think they’re immune if they provide less than happy coverage of this whitewashing effort?

And are they going to be sucked in once again because there’s a familiar face at the podium offering the same smarm circa the Bush administration?

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MISC. SPORTS

Belmont Stakes will be run this Saturday, June 11. Kentucky Derby winner Rich Strike is scheduled to appear after skipping the Preakness; odds, however, favor We the People at 2-to-1 to win the Belmont.

90 U.S. Olympic women gymnasts including Simone Biles have filed a lawsuit under the Federal Tort Claims Act against the FBI for its failure to appropriately investigate and prosecute mass sexual abuser Larry Nassar though the FBI had known about his serial assaults.

I haven’t seen any further details about this suit which is the second filed this year against the FBI with regard to Nassar. On the face of it this looks like a gross violation of women’s civil rights; why were they not afforded equal protection under the law?

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Got some other sports issue you need to air out? Do it in this thread along with any non-hearing related topics, thanks.

Trash Talk: NBA Finals Games 1+2, French Open Tennis, MLB, NFL

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Because there’s just so much bloody sportsing going on right now we’ll have a few more Trash Talk posts over the next week or two to prevent other threads from being trashed.

Please confine your sports chatter to these sports-dedicated posts, thanks.

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NBA FINALS

The 2022 finals are already underway with the Boston Celtics leading the series over Golden State after winning last night’s Game 1, 120 to 108.

The next games in the series:

Sunday evening, June 5 8:00 pm ET at Chase Center in San Francisco, CA.

Wednesday, June 8, 9:00 pm ET at TD Garden, Boston, MA

Friday, June 10, 9:00 pm ET at TD Garden, Boston, MA

The entire series will be carried by ABC.

Thankfully no game is scheduled for June 9 when the House J6 Committee hearings begin, but noted above there’s a game on June 10. A fresh Trash Talk thread will be posted next Friday to prevent finals chatter bleeding into the J6 thread.

If the series isn’t wrapped up on Friday, the next game will be Monday evening and yet another Trash Talk post will be published for sports chatter.

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FRENCH OPEN

On his 36th birthday today, Rafael Nadal (Spain) met 25-year-old Alexander Zverev (Germany) in the semifinals today in Paris, but Zverev was forced to retire after a hideous ankle injury late in the second set.

Nadal will meet the winner of the semi-final between Casper Ruud (Norway) or Marin Cilic (Croatia); the meetup to be held this Sunday will Nadal’s 14th as a French Open finalist.

Iga Swiatek (Poland) and Coco Gauff (U.S.) will meet in the women’s finals tomorrow.

Also in Paris this week is Billie Jean King; she was awarded France’s Legion of Honor:

King, who is in France as the French Open concludes, received the award in recognition of her contributions to women’s sports, gender equality and the rights of LGBTQ people in athletics. She took part in a short ceremony at the presidential Elysee Palace at the invitation of French President Emmanuel Macron.

A perfect way to celebrate this year’s LGBT Pride Month.

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MLB and Other Baseball and Softball

These teams are currently leading their divisions:

AL East: NY Yankees

AL Central: Minnesota Twins

AL West: Houston Astros

NL East: NY Mets

NL Central: Milwaukee Brewers

NL West: LA Dodgers

NY Yankees lead the American League and LA Dodgers lead the National League.

Meh. I can’t get excited about this at all especially since Detroit is third from the bottom of the AL.

However the NCAA DI Baseball Men’s College World Series has started; here’s the schedule:

Regionals: Friday, June 3 through Monday, June 6
Super Regionals: Friday, June 10 through Sunday, June 12 OR Saturday, June 11 through Monday, June 13
First day of CWS games — Friday, June 17
CWS Finals — Start Saturday, June 25 (best out of 3)
Final championship game — Monday, June 27

The NCAA Softball Women’s College World Series began last night with eigth-finals or fourth round in Oklahoma City. I’m going to back Oregon State tonight against Arizona State because I really want to know as others have asked if the Beavers can be stopped or not.

Schedule for the WCWS finals:

Game 1: 8:30 p.m. on Wednesday, June 8
Game 2: 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, June 9
Game 3: 8:30 p.m. (if necessary), on Friday, June 10

It’s a damned shame there’ll be a conflict on Thursday with the House J6 Committee’s first hearing.

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NFL

What the actual fuck, people? There’s an Oversight Committee hearing this month into the NFL?

Why are elected officials who represent the entire country caught up with the Washington Commanders’ football team’s workforce problems instead of the Department of Labor?

From NBC Sports:

The House Committee on Oversight & Reform has announced that it will hold a hearing on June 22. The Committee has requested the attendance and testimony of two key individuals: NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell and Commanders owner Daniel Snyder.

“The hearing is the next step in the Committee’s months-long investigation into the Commanders’ hostile workplace culture and will also examine the NFL’s handling of allegations of workplace misconduct, the NFL’s role in setting and enforcing standards across the League, and legislative reforms needed to address these issues across the NFL and other workplaces,” the Committee said in a press release.

What really annoys me is the breathless manner in which this hearing and the underlying problems are discussed in sports media while far more important hearings about the near-overthrow of U.S. government have been scheduled and precede the Oversight Committee hearing. NFL fans are far more worked up about Roger Goodell’s invitation to appear before Oversight than whether anyone subpoenaed by the House J6 Committee has made any effort to comply.

It’s no wonder this country is in such a fucking mess — just look at its priorities. Entertainment and its corporate masters über alles.

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Got some other sports issue you need to air out? Do it in this thread, thanks.

Impoverished Teachers Or The Rich Bitches Of Professional Sports?

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Which side are you on? I have been an avid, if not rabid, sports fan since I was a little kid. Still am. It would be great to have sports back on a full scale.

But at what cost? How important is it really?

The NFL, MLB, NBA and NHL are all demanding daily testing, even when they are, as Amy Trask has coined it, “enbubbled”.

Not all the athletes are millionaires, many are not paid near that and are just trying to hang on and make a living for themselves and their families. That is a good thing. But even the common professional athlete makes many times more than a teacher.

Who is more important to society in the long run? The league personnel and athletes are getting tested and traced relentlessly in their bubbles and training camps because billionaire owners, TV platforms and gambling lobbyists demand it. They are tired of their gravy train being interrupted. An understandable thing if in their shoes. But 99.9% of the citizenry is not in their shoes.

Teachers and their schools are being ordered to open with nothing in place for their, or their students’, safety. How many teachers in Florida could be tested in Florida if the insane capacity being expended in the Magic Kingdom on the NBA were reallocated to a better benefit? How will that play out with that which is allocated to the NFL, MLB and NHL were reallocated across the country?

Where are the real priorities in a time of pandemic this country, and this world, has not seen in the last 100 years?

I want to reemphasize, would love for all the sports to be back. That would be wonderful. Especially when we all are sequestered unnaturally in our own homes.

But maybe teachers and their students….our children….and the future of all are more important than the current demand for sports.

The Covid danger is real, it is not a joke. It is not partisan politics. Here is a heartbreaking story. This man ran through my neighborhood to a win. The young and strong are in danger, not just the old and infirm.

Maybe, at least temporarily, our priorities ought change. Maybe LeBron James and Tom Brady should give their daily test to a teacher.

Wednesday Morning: Breaking Spring

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In the Spring a livelier iris changes on the burnish’d dove;
In the Spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.

— excerpt, Locksley Hall by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Welcome to spring break. And by break, I mean schedules are broken around here. Nothing like waiting up until the wee hours for a young man whose fancy not-so-lightly turned to love, because spring.

~yawn~

While the teenager lies abed yet, mom here will caffeinate and scratch out a post. It may be early afternoon by the time I get over this spring-induced sleep deprivation and hit the publish button.

Apple blossoms — iPhones and iPads, that is
Not much blooming on the #AppleVsFBI front, where Apple now seeks information about the FBI’s method for breaking into the San Bernardino shooter’s iPhone 5C. The chances are slim to none that the FBI will tell Apple anything. Hackday offers a snappy postmortem about this case with an appropriate amount of skepticism.

I wonder what Apple’s disclosure will look like about this entire situation in its next mandatory filing with the SEC? Will iPhone 5C users upgrade to ditch the undisclosed vulnerability?

What if any effect will the iPhone 5C case have on other criminal cases where iPhones are involved — like the drug case Brooklyn? Apple asked for a delay in that case, to assess its position after the iPhone 5C case. We’ll have to wait until April 11 for the next move in this unfolding crypto-chess match.

In the meantime, spring also means baseball, where new business blossoms for Apple. Major League Baseball has now signed with Apple for iPads in the dugout. Did the snafu with Microsoft’s Surface tablets during the NFL’s AFC championship game persuade the MLB to go with Apple?

Volkswagen coasting
It’s downhill all the way for VW, which missed last week its court-imposed 30-day deadline to offer a technical solution on its emissions standards cheating “clean diesel” passenger vehicles. If there was such a thing as “clean diesel,” VW would have met the deadline; as I said before, there’s no such thing as “clean diesel” technology. The judge allowed a 30-day extension to April 24, but my money is on another missed deadline. Too bad there’s not a diesel engine equivalent of Cellebrite, willing to offer a quick fix to VW or the court, huh?

Of note: former FBI director Robert Mueller has been named “special master” on this case by Judge Charles Breyer; Mueller has been meeting with all the parties involved. What the heck is a “special master”? We may not have a ready answer, but at least there’s a special website set up for this case, In re: Volkswagen “Clean Diesel” MDL.

The cherry on top of this merde sundae is the Federal Trade Commission’s lawsuit filed yesterday against VW for false advertising promoting its “clean diesel” passenger cars.

With no bottom yet in sight, some are wondering if VW will simply exit the U.S. market.

Automotive odd lot

  • Jury says GM’s ignition switch was bad, but not at fault in a 2014 accident in New Orleans (Reuters) — Keep an eye on media representation of this case. Headline on this one focused on the switch, not the jury’s decision.
  • Car-to-car communications will be road tested soon (MIT Technology Review) — This technology might have prevented Google’s self-driving car from getting crunched by a bus recently.
  • Dude demonstrates his hack of Alexa + Raspberry Pi + OBDLink to remote start his car (Gizmodo) — What. even.

    • Did Tennyson write anything about spring spawning naps? Because I feel like I need one. Hope we’re back in the groove soon. See you in the morning.

A Great World Series Arises From The Ashes

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So, I fully apologize for letting one and all down in the heavy Tebow content department last weekend. It was inexcusable, and I do know how important it is to you all to get THE FULL TEBOW. Well, I am here to make amends. There is one hitch in the giddyup though; it turns out the biggest sports story in the land is the World Series, where the St. Louis Cardinals rose uppa from the meek earth last night – like TebowChrist would – and pulled off a miracle. This leaves us with a deciding game 7 tonight.

In all seriousness, the game last night between the Texans and Cardinals was not particularly well played defensively, nor well pitched; however, it is one of the best WS games I’ve ever seen. Wow. And that sets up the last waltz tonight for the crown. Remember when pundits were laughing at MLB and Selig because there was no Yankees, Sawx or Phillies in the Series and how it would be TV ratings scum? I do, and it has turned out quite nicely thank you very much. Best Series in a while actually. But, because Emptywheel is ALL TEBOW ALL THE TIME, when Bob Schacht asked for early WS coverage, I made it conditioned on a Tebow tie-in. Bob really came through too:

Tebow, schmebow. We’re talking about the World Series!

Anyway, if you insist: Didn’t Tebow just lead his team on a series of late game scoring drives to win a game everyone had given up on?

Same deal with the Cardinals. After screwing up for most of the game, and their bullpen giving up 4 runs in the late innings, the Cards kept coming back, tying the game twice in the late innings and then winning in the 11th inning with a walk-off homer by David Freese. Freese has had a great series, and is a young player, like Tebow. I believe Freese also committed a stupid error earlier in the game, dropping an easy fly ball at third base, so we have a redemption theme going, too.

Besides the 3 errors, the Cardinals made some great defensive plays, as well, managing to turn a bunt into a double play.

Series heros so far for the Cards: Youngster Freese, and old guy Lance Berkman, who just happens to be hitting over .400 for the series, and is cavorting around the field like someone 10 years younger.

Well hello, that is Tebow like! Apparently Bill Belichick has been wearing a Tony Larusa Cards jersey around lately. Don’t know what to make of that, but it is powerful stuff.

I find both of these teams kind of compelling and am conflicted as to who I am rooting for; mostly just for more kick ass baseball. Matt Holliday is out for the Cardinals, and the WS MVP up until now, Mike Napoli, has a pretty badly sprained ankle. Napoli played through it last night, but tonight may be a whole nuther matter, although he intends to play. Pitching will be Matt Harrison for the Rangers and Chris Carpenter for the Cards. This should favor Carpenter, but he is coming in off of a goofy schedule and only available because of the rain day interjected into the equation. It may be that both teams use a lot of pitchers.

I have no idea how this game will go, but it is always hard on a team that had it wrapped up like Texas did, twice last night they were one strike away, and who let it slip away. And, of course the game is in St. Louis. You have to think the Cards have the edge here.

Batter Up!