The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Frazier gives Yankees a walk-off win vs. Brewers
At the halfway point of the baseball season, Boston appears to be the favorite to win the AL East and the Yankees are in contention to win a wild-card, though sinking quickly.
As a change of pace, I headed over to my local library to write this week’s column. Bad idea. Some guy chose to use the study carrel behind me to clip his fingernails. At the slowest most agonizing pace possible. It was excruciating. The sound is now permanently etched into the otherwise empty void that is my brain.
Later a couple of older men in the reading area, who apparently thought they were at the barber shop, began loudly discussing the best ways to relieve sciatic nerve pain. They concluded heating pads are mildly effective, but only when preceded by a few Advil, if you’re curious. I wasn’t. The lesson? Never go to the library.
• As we head into the All-Star break, Boston holds a comfortable lead over the Yankees in the AL East. That in itself isn’t a surprise. When spring training broke most expected the Sox to be the class of the division.
Through it all, Boston has mostly underachieved in the first half, a hot-and-cold team that seems capable of so much more. There’s reason for optimism. David Price is getting back into form, Mookie Betts and Hanley Ramirez were a second-half monsters last season and Rick Porcello has to turn it around at some point, right?
But there’s not much in the way of serious challengers in the division. The Yankees are spiraling, the Rays have decent pitching but are limited with the bats and the Blue Jays and Orioles aren’t very good at all.
So at the halfway point, Boston appears to be the favorite to win the division and the Yankees are in contention to win a wild-card, though sinking quickly. One thing is clear. Neither has what it takes to beat Houston in a seven-game series. At least not right now.
• Exit velocity might be the most useless new statistic in baseball. So Aaron Judge hits the ball hard? You don’t say!
• Judge is getting plenty of MVP buzz, and rightfully so. But New Britain’s George Springer is making quite a case for himself. The ex-UConn star is hitting .307 with 27 home runs and 61 RBIs — out of the leadoff spot. We’re predicting Springer hits a leadoff homer and wins MVP honors at the AllStar Game.
• Serena Williams is American tennis. Without her in the field, Wimbledon is a hopeless endeavor for a U.S. tennis fan, on the men’s and women’s side.
• LaVar Ball reportedly told Magic Johnson that his boorish persona is simply a “marketing tool.” He’s certainly got the “tool” part of that phrase perfected.
• The Houston Rockets signed James Harden to a contract extension that will pay him an average of $38 million through 2023. That comes out to $755,681 every week — or $107,000 a day — for the next six years.
The Knicks will reportedly sign Tim Hardaway Jr. to a four-year, $71 million contract, more than $35 million more than his father made in his 13-year career. Tim Hardaway Sr. was a five-time all-star. Tim Hardaway Jr. has appeared in 258 games, but only started 62.
Kevin Durant’s recent contract, two years and $53 million, is considered a cut in pay.
Think NBA salaries are getting a bit out of control?
• From the ECAC Hockey rumor mill: St. Lawrence’s Kyle Hayton, the Ken Dryden Award winner as the league’s top goalie and an All-American, is finalizing plans to transfer to Wisconsin. Hayton could be eligible immediately as a graduate transfer, but hasn’t completed work for his undergraduate degree, according to the Wisconsin State Journal.
If true, the ECAC might breathe a sigh of relief. Over his three years Hayton has 13 shutouts and a .934 save percentage. He’s been especially tough on Quinnipiac, posting three straight shutouts last winter until the Bobcats broke through to win the final two games of the ECAC quarterfinal series.
• Jared Hughes pitched an inning of relief for Milwaukee on Friday night against the Yankees. According to Tyler Kepner of the New York Times, Hughes is the first major leaguer born in Stamford since Bobby Valentine. Unlike Bobby V, Hughes only spent a small amount of time in Stamford. He moved at a young age and was raised in California.
• Farewell to Gene Conley, a star two-way athlete who won a World Series pitching for the Milwaukee Braves in 1957 and won three straight NBA titles for the Celtics in 1959, 1960 and 1961. After finishing college at Washington State, his professional career began with the old Hartford Chiefs of the Eastern League, where he went 20-9 with a 2.16 ERA in 1951. Conley, 86, passed away on Tuesday in Foxborough, Massachusetts.
• It’s not an official Yankees radio broadcast until John Sterling mistakenly calls a home run on a ball that’s been caught.
• And it’s not a real fireworks show unless they play Neil Diamond’s “Coming to America.”
• The best part of the annual Nathan’s hot dog eating contest, by a wide margin, are the competitor introductions. They are hilariously written and recited by a man wearing a straw boater hat — Major League Eating cofounder and carnival barker George Shea.
My personal favorite from Tuesday’s broadcast:
“It is said that he was born under the open sky at the base of the glacier where the great river begins and the sands leap from cold, pure water. That is not true. He was born in Western Mass, in the pediatric wing of Mercy Medical in Springfield. Darron Breeden!”
If it’s not too much trouble, I’d like this guy to give my eulogy.