Reuniting a wild pair
Puig, Mattingly together in Miami sounds great, if improbable
Don Mattingly didn’t feel appreciated by the Dodgers. Yasiel Puig feels betrayed by them, as they suddenly decided to crack down on his behavior after years of looking the other way.
What if they were to bury the hatchet to take down their common enemy?
It probably won’t happen, but it’s fun to imagine — Dodgers vs. Marlins in the National League wild-card game, with Puig in right field for the Marlins and Mattingly in their dugout. (I know the Dodgers are in first place now, but indulge me for a second.)
From a baseball perspective, the move makes sense for the Marlins, who have lost All-Star outfielder Giancarlo Stanton for the remainder of the season. Stanton’s absence is threatening to derail the team’s surprising run at a postseason berth. The Marlins are desperate to replace Stanton’s power, enough to where they considered making a run at brokendown Alex Rodriguez, according to multiple reports.
In his first eight games for triple-A Oklahoma City following his demotion, Puig batted .500 with three home runs and 11 runs batted in.
Of course, there are factors outside of baseball, the most important being that Mattingly and Puig can’t stand each other. Several months ago, I jokingly asked a Marlins official if his team would consider trading for Puig.
“That’s not happening,” the person said, inserting an expletive in the middle of the sentence to emphasize his point.
That probably hasn’t changed. Even so, that wouldn’t be the only obstacle standing in the way of the greatest wild-card game in the
history of wild-card games. To position themselves to trade for Puig, the Marlins would have to win a waiver claim on him, which would require every NL team with a record worse than theirs to pass on him when he is placed on the wire. There is also the question of whether the Dodgers would send Puig to a potential postseason opponent, especially one led by their former manager.
Is it unlikely? Yes. But would it be spectacular? Absolutely. Carlos Cuadras has a smile and a charm that can light up any room, even the dimly lit Maywood Boxing Club. He cracked joke after joke Thursday as he promoted his defense of his 115-pound championship on Sept. 10 at the Forum.
Is Cuadras always this relaxed?
“Why would I be nervous?” he asked in Spanish.
Because his upcoming fight will be against hardpunching Roman Gonzalez, the consensus No. 1 fighter in the world at any weight class. “It’s still not the day of the fight,” he replied with a laugh.
Cuadras (35-0-1, 27 knockouts) talked some trash about Gonzalez, but did so with a twinkle in his eye, making whatever he said completely inoffensive.
“I’m faster,” he said. “More handsome too.”
Is Cuadras always the more handsome fighter?
“I almost always have ugly opponents,” he said. “I just hope they don’t leave me ugly.”
He explained how he got his nickname, “El Principe” — or “The Prince.”
“When I turned professional, I didn’t have a nickname,” he said. “My extrainer, Jose Luis Bueno, always told me I needed a nickname to be a professional. I didn’t want one. He said I was like a princess because I didn’t want anything. ‘Princess’ stuck and I thought ‘Prince’ would be better.”
These aren’t your father’s Rams — or, more specifically, these aren’t your father’s Rams fans. If you had concerns about the atmosphere at Rams home games, it looks like you had reason to be. A video that was uploaded to YouTube on Sunday shows a violent altercation that involved five fans. The 46-second clip, titled “2016 Rams vs Cowboys Preseason Fight” has already been viewed more than a quarter of a million times.
Lying about a late-night stick-up might not be the dumbest thing Olympic swimmer Ryan Lochte has ever done. Several years ago, Lochte attempted to trademark his catchphrase, “Jeah,” which, I guess, is a variation of “Yeah.” The move angered the selfproclaimed inventor of the term, rapper MC Eiht, who has ties to the Tragniew Park Compton Crips. “He is just disrespectful,” MC Eiht told TMZ at the time.
What was the big deal about Hope Solo’s comments in the wake of the U.S.’s elimination from the Olympic soccer tournament? Sure, it was a bad look for Solo to blast the Swedes after losing to them, but what the goalkeeper said was true. They played like cowards. Her words have to be judged within the context of her sport, where complaints like this are of a garden-variety nature. There’s an entire glossary of words and phrases used to describe the kinds of tactics Sweden used against the U.S. — “anti-football,” “parking the bus,” etc. — and most of them have negative connotations.