It’s a classic “morning after.” My computer’s on the fritz and I need the previous day’s sports scores but I can’t find my phone, which usually brings them up quicker anyway, because of this thick T. S. Eliot-ish “yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window panes” that pervades the room.
I’m not sure I really want to know anyway, what with most all of my teams either wallowing near the bottom of their respective standings, on probation for innumerable infractions, or under investigation for everything from providing swimsuit models for recruits to hockey-stick “whacking” by football coaches.
So, once I finally locate the phone and unsuccessfully attempt to access the USC Trojan score, I text Smokey: “did the trojans have a bye week?” Without missing a beat, my glib and cynical offspring texts back: “thank god!” I’m not sure where he acquired such an attitude.
The Trojans, of course, really are quite pathetic. They have a second-half defense not unlike the one employed by Custer at the Little Big Horn. Hopefully, once their NCAA probation is lifted and they are allowed a normal number of scholarships, they might expend a few of them on what normal teams refer to as “pass coverage.”
And then there are the Utes, my other PAC-12 team. They are performing at a level similar to USC. Once the new conference alignment positioned them in the Southern Division, the lesser of the two, most of us thought they had an extremely good chance of sneaking up on their rivals and winning the thing. Alas, by turning the ball over at an unprecedented rate in the last two games, the Utes currently find themselves winless in conference play at 0-3 and, unless they can turn things around in a hurry, even becoming “bowl eligible” at 6-6 will take some doing. Things have indeed “gone south,” as it were.
With my Dodgers once again standing on the outside looking in, post-season baseball hasn’t been much of an issue. In case you aren’t into soap operas of this magnitude, a divorce between the club’s owners, Frank and Jamie McCourt, and their proclivity to turn the organization into their personal ATM, resulted in MLB taking over ball-club operations.
However, our star southpaw, Clayton Kershaw, has a great shot at the Cy Young Award, and there’s even talk of Matt Kemp as league MVP. But, of course, as is always the case with Dodger fans who have been on the bandwagon since Brooklyn, our mantra remains, with or without an official owner, “Wait ’til next year!”
My two clubs in Rugby World Cup 2011 are also out of the tournament as the semifinals are set to get underway this weekend. With the USA Eagles actually winning one of their pool matches (against Russia) and giving Ireland a good run for its money, the RWC has to be viewed as a positive step forward for the lower-tiered Americans, even though they didn’t advance.
My Irish, however, did reach the quarterfinals, but came up short against Wales in the Knockout Stage, 10-22. Joining Wales in the northern hemisphere bracket of Saturday’s semifinals is France, with the much-anticipated match between longtime world powers Australia (Wallabies) and host-country New Zealand (All Blacks) set for Sunday.
Then there’s Real Salt Lake, who, on the cusp of the MLS playoffs, decided to cap off a recent five-game winning streak by losing four in a row a stretch within which they allowed 12 goals against.
There are still two remaining games, however, for them to right the ship and regain lost momentum. Some missing cogs will be returning, as they’ve been playing shorthanded recently, and that’s a good thing. But their team captain, midfielder Kyle Beckerman, will miss the rest of the season, serving out as suspension for head-butting, and that bodes ill for turning things around quickly.
Actually, there are a couple of bright spots in my current sporting life. First of all, the NBA continues to remain out on strike a state of affairs that can’t continue long enough for me. I’m a Lakers and Jazz kind of guy and they do nothing but cause me pain.
And then, a week from tomorrow, my favorite annual prep football rivalry will unfold over in Hebertown as Park City journeys to Wasatch with neither team having stellar seasons. As if that mattered. But we’ll deal with those issues in next week’s column.
Jay Meehan is a culture junkie and an observer, participant, and chronicler of the Park City and Wasatch County social scenes for the past 40 years.