Month: May 2020

Much the Doc On Sports blog over the past few months have been at the very least peripherally about life in the pandemic. In fact, nine blogs have been tagged with pandemic and with five with COVID-19 since February 17. This unwelcome and unsettling version of the new normal is seemingly being thrust upon us whether we’re ready for it or not. 

There are loads of us who are simply in disagreement about what a new standard of life in the time of COVID should be, and the world of sports is no different. How does our relationship with sports change in this new reality? What does it means for sports as a diversion from normal life, when it is swallowed by the pressures and realities of of the pandemic. Is is the same distraction it was or is it something else entirely?

That new reality has already come to K-League soccer as the league has returned to regular action. The first game of the new season, postponed from a February start date, saw Jeonbuk Motors defeat the Suwon Bluewings 1-0 in Jeonju, about an hour’s train ride southwest of Seoul.

The K-League is widely recognized as the top football league in Asia, so its return to action is a pretty big deal. The first game was streamed on YouTube and no fans were in attendance. The league feels comfortable returning to play since all 22 teams were tested for COVID-19 with zero positive results. Every player, coach, and official was had their temperature checked before stepping on the pitch, and the K-League is taking a very proactive approach to continuing play.

For example, there was no pre-match handshake, which of course makes perfect sense. Coaches and players who weren’t on the pitch playing were required to wear face masks. They were even advised against blowing their noses (!) during the game.

With no fans in attendance, recordings of chanting fans and cheering crowds were broadcast over the PA system. (What would Tom Brady think?) There were no hecklers, no high fives, and no raise-the-roofs. I can’t imagine how weird and deafening that silence would be, with no crowd to motivate, positively or negatively, would the game feel like a real game or would it just feel like a scrimmage? Sure, the fact that a score is kept, and the league sanctions it as such is important, but I wonder subconsciously if the player effort is the same. Would you try as hard, or be as competitive, without a rabid fanbase cheering your every move, even simulated ones? 

But what I found more interesting, and what I think is ultimately more prescient for the restart of American sports leagues, (if we get to that) was the rules against spitting and talking. Players were told not to talk and all conversations between players and officials were highly restricted. I can understand how you’d want to limit players unnecessarily haggling with referees, we know how heated these exchanges can be in football as players argue calls vociferously. Why else was the card system instituted, am I right? 

Certainly this would be a novel and rather interesting way to dampen these kinds of interactions, and perhaps lower the temperature. So much so that I wonder how this would work on the court or on the ice. Could this finally be the way to shut Chris Paul up? 

We can only hope.

On Monday, the NFL lost one the greatest coaches of all time in Don Shula at age 90. Best known as the winningest coach in NFL history, Shula was the long time coach of the Miami Dolphins, and led his teams to multiple Super Bowls, winning two back-to-back in 1972 and 1973. His ’72 team remains the lone undefeated champion in the history of the game. He won an NFL Championship with the Baltimore Colts in 1968, and reached Super Bowl III with the Colts and three others with the Dolphins, Super Bowls VI, XVII, and XIX.

I’ve seen Shula’s bust in Canton, and it’s easy to list his accomplishments as I just did. The man took six teams to the Super Bowl, including a stretch of three straight seasons in the early seventies. His 328 wins look insurmountable, but most likely only be surpassed by Bill Belichick (303) in a few years. If there were a Mount Rushmore of NFL coaches, his blocky visage would be there alongside Paul Brown, Bill Walsh, and Belichick, (yeah, I know I left off Lombardi and Landry.). 

But for me, what I find most remarkable about Shula is not the amount of games he won, though staggering, but how he won games with the talent he had. Certain coaches throughout history are well regarded for winning with less superior talent, getting the most out of the teams they had. Guys like Pete Carroll and Tom Coughlin come to mind, though admittedly, their approaches are as different as night and day.

Shula’s Dolphins in the ’70s were a run-first grind it out offense, the classic three yards and a cloud of dust. Names like Larry Csonka and Jim Kiick mowed D-linemen and linebackers down with violent aplomb, while quicksilver Mercury Morris ran around them elusively. This was no-nonsense football, with very little frills and not a lot of thrills, but it was winning football, and win they did — a lot.

But in 1983, a curly haired moptop from Pittsburgh fell remarkably into the Dolphins lap with the 27th pick in draft. Dan Marino wasn’t Shula’s first All-Pro HOF QB, in fact, five different quarterbacks took Shula’s Dolphins to the Super Bowl, but Marino was certainly the cream of the crop. With Dan the Man at the helm, the Dolphins went from a slug-it-out run-first football team, to the finesse, up-and-down the field, slinging the ball around the yard, up-tempo offense that revolutionized the ’80s. I saw it first hand years later as a Colts season ticket holder in 1999. In the midst of a QB Renaissance, with guys like Fouts, Montana, and Elway piling up numbers in the passing game, Shula’s teams were consistently among the best in that regard.

Shula was able to completely change his approach based on the talent he had on his team. He adapted to the roster, not the other way around. Plenty of coaches today are incapable of this flexibility, i.e. Jason Garrett and Jon Gruden, even generally highly regarded coaches like Mike Ditka and Steve Spurrier struggled with adapting their schemes to the talent they had. 

That Shula did, and did it multiple times in multiple eras, is a testament to his skill as a coach. It takes a great leader to change his style to fit those toolkit of those around him. Shula did that, and his approach should be the model for young coaches in the NFL today. 

A few look like they have paid attention; Sean McVeigh, Matt LeFleur, and Brian Flores have already shown a willingness to moderate their style and strategy. Only time will tell if they and the longevity and the success of Shula.

One of my part-time jobs in college was as a waiter in high-end restaurant at harness racing track in Anderson, Indiana. I knew next to nothing about horse racing when I started, but after a few weekends working the harness races, I truly began to appreciate the sport beyond just horses running around a track as a bunch of drunks gambled their children’s college funds away.

That summer, I remember placing my first bet on the Kentucky Derby on a beautiful gray horse out of California, Free House, who paid $5.80 for Show. A month later I hit a boxed exacta with Silver Charm on top that paid $11.20. The endorphin rush of hitting a $10 bet on Free House was exhilarating. It wasn’t a great deal of money, but to a poor college kid, it was quite the kicker. Plus, I’m a sucker for gray horses.

About a decade later when I moved to Louisville, (And yes, I say the correct way, Luhlvul), I fell in love with horse racing all over again. I have a warm spot for Derby Day, and there’s just nothing quite like race day at Churchill Downs. The hats, the sounds, the infield(!), even those disgusting mint juleps, (seriously, they’re not meant for human consumption); all of it is just simply intoxicating.

So when it was announced that the Derby would be postponed this year as all good things are in the pandemic, I felt a pang of regret. One reason was that the event was pushed to — egads, September? It just didn’t sound right.

But then came the news that instead of the time honored Run for the Roses, there would be a virtual derby, yes, a 3D simulation; Baudrillard would be so proud. And while I enjoy the simulacra and computer generated worlds as much as the next guy, yeah, I didn’t get tickets to that sad depressing excuse for a salve of No-Derby Blues. The Virtual Derby promised a dozen Triple Crown winners duking it out for win, place, show, and yes, there were odds.

There’s just something about watching the representation of a real world event presented as if it were truly competitive or, you know, real, that I just can’t quite swallow, but this is where the pandemic has led us. How long before FOXSports starts carrying live game sessions of Madden football games once relegated to Twitch and Mixer on their Sunday afternoon broadcasts? Does anyone really want to hear Joe Buck call that game?

Alas, this is where we’re at. So desperate are we for the Kentucky Derby, that we’ll actually watch a digital version of Secretariat and Affirmed run around a pixelated track of bits of code and programming. Secretariat won the race in case you were wondering. This feels like a weird harbinger of things to come.

In that case, I can’t wait for the puck to drop this fall in the NHL2K broadcasts on NBC.