Notes from around the Human Experience…

HUT HUT HIKE: Most college football teams – at least those bad enough to consider firing their coaches – have completed their seasons. As we write this ten coaches have been fired, some in season, some after the season.

Dry, Technical Matter: Some coaches were fired because their teams only won one or two games this year. Fair enough. You don’t win, even at Kent State, you are going to be fired. This is hardly a bulletin. Coaches know this when they sign their contract. 

Fly In The Ointment: Some of the 2017 crop of dismissed coaches, however, did win. They not only produced a winning record this year but winning records over their tenure. You may not have seen them playing in January, but they produced winning teams, some of which will be playing in bowl games next month, though it should be noted earning a bowl berth isn’t the accomplishment it used to be. Some were fired despite demonstrably improving a team’s culture and academic performance.

The Good Old Days: You know, it used to be that winning a couple more games than you lost and playing in the Scotch Adhesive Tape Bowl would get you a pat on the back and another year’s job security. Now it has coaches looking over their shoulders.

Yeah, Yeah, Whatever: When the change is announced schools all trot out the same institutional claptrap: they were grateful for their coach’s service. He and Mrs Coach are class acts and the school wishes them the best in their future endeavors. However, the expectations here are high. They expect to contend for conference and national championships, despite the fact they have no history of doing so. In due course they will trot out their new coach, who it turns out, is everything they’ve been looking for all along. It’s what they said when the old coach was hired and what they will say when this new coach’s replacement is hired a few years later.

The coaches have their ritual, too. They were grateful for the opportunity and hope to always consider themselves Sun Devils or Eagles or whatever the hell their mascot happened to be. In truth, U-Haul is on speed dial, waiting to help clear out the house as they move on to the next job.

More Fly In The Ointment: Meanwhile, players watch their coaches move from one million dollar job to another and wonder why they’re not getting any more out of this than college classes and training table meals.

The Bottom Line: The patience required to establish top programs has long vanished from college sports. No American institution – except, perhaps, Congress – does a better job at being pimp, whore and john at the same time better than major division college athletics. We keep tolerating it though. We watch their games and buy their tickets and luxury suites and until their conduct starts hitting them in the TV contract, we will continue to go through this same charade every November. 

SPEAKING OF AMERICAN INSTITUTIONS: The United States Military Academy and the United States Naval Academy meet in football for the first time on this date in 1890. Meeting at West Point, Navy won, of course, beating the Black Knights of Confusion 24-0.

The Postgame Show Is Brought To You By USAA: Interestingly, this was the first football game in Army history. They would play six games the following season, capping off a 4-1-1 campaign with their first win over the Midshipman.

Oh Yeah: Navy had considerably more experience in that first game, having fielded a football team since they tied the dreaded Baltimore Athletic Club 0-0 in 1879. The Midshipmen came into that first Army/Navy game with an all-time record of 18-13-3.

Go Navy, Beat Army…Again And Again: Navy has won 17 of the last 20 meetings – 17 of the last 20! – and leads the series 60-50 with seven ties. This year’s game, the 118th in the series, will be played in Philadelphia for the 87th time on December 9.

3…2…1…Blastoff: Despite the fact the Soviet Union had already sent two humans into Earth orbit without incident, and despite the fact Alan Shepard had survived a sub-orbital flight the previous May, the United States sends a monkey into orbit on this date in 1961.

The Mercury-Atlas 5 mission was not without incident. Enos the Chimp’s’ capsule was overheating. The clock was 18 seconds fast. The attitude control system malfunctioned. Roll thrusters failed. These and other problems were enough to limit the flight to two orbits and the capsule landed 200 miles south of Bermuda three hours and 20 minutes after launch. Enos survived the flight, though he died of an unrelated illness the following November.

Quotebook: A moment’s insight is sometimes worth a life’s experience. – Oliver Wendell Holmes.

Answer To The Last Trivia Question: Margaret Thatcher replaced James Callaghan as prime minister of Great Britian.

Today’s Stumper: How many times has the Army/Navy game been played at either West Point or Annapolis? – Answer next time!

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Notes from around the Human Experience…

THE MORE THINGS CHANGE…: Some readers may or may not be familiar with the comic strip Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau. It’s been around since the early 1970’s and we’ve enjoyed it since we were kids and the Doonesbury website has a feature that lets you enjoy strips from every fifth year from the current date.

25 years ago Doonesbury featured GOP Congresswoman Lacey Davenport chairing a meeting about the future of the Republican Party. The GOP had just punted the 1992 elections having their lunch handed to them by Bill Clinton, who routed President George H.W. Bush in the Electoral College. The Republicans also remained the minority in both the United States Senate and House of Representatives, though they did pick up one seat in the Senate and nine in the House.

…The More They Stay The Same: The future of the GOP should be a timely topic now. This time, however, it’s not because they lost the White House, but because they won it. Not only that, the GOP earned a majority in both houses of Congress to boot. A party armed with this mandate should be able to do whatever it damn well pleases, from passing tax reform legislation to a passing a law mandating a national color of socks.

Fly In The Ointment: But instead, we’ve received nothing but a watch party featuring the GOP showing itself – on a scale that is almost beyond comprehension – utterly unable to govern. Not only do they not have a long-term plan for our country, they have not been able to pass the half-wit, top-of-the-head bills they’ve been able to muster.

Ladies And Gentlemen Of The Jury: Why do we keep them around? It’s a valid question. Not only are they incapable of governing, the GOP hasn’t produced a decent elected president since Eisenhower.

Dry, Technical Matter: Nixon was a crook. Ford, not elected, did good work for us under circumstances the Son of Man would have had a tough time flourishing in. Reagan had his talents but he was the most managed president in history, a precedent whose influence is still felt, to America’s detriment. Bush I meant well but was ineffective, Bush II could not produce a cogent sentence and lied to get us into war. President Trump cares about nothing other than drawing attention to himself, something he is supremely good at.

Shouldn’t There Be A PowerPoint Presentation For This?: Plot the elected GOP presidents since Eisenhower on a graph and you have a line going straight down.

The Bottom Line: As always, we get the government we deserve. We elected, hardly for the first time, lousy leaders and we are getting lousy government. As long as we keep allowing the GOP to stick around, they will.

GENTLEMEN, START YOUR ENGINES…AS SOON AS WE FIND SOME DECENT ROADS: America’s first automobile race, a 54-mile jaunt from Chicago to Evanston and back, is held on this date in 1895. The race is won by Frank Duryea, who the year before had, along with his brother, produced the first gasoline-powered internal combustion engine in America.

FunFact: The car was so new the term automobile had yet to come into common usages and The Chicago Times-Hearld, who sponsored the race, referred to the affair a Moto Cycle race.

Of the 89 entries, only six cars showed up due, in part, to a driving snowstorm, which kept the winning time down to 10 hours and 23 minutes.

And So It Begins: Barn Dance, a live music show, debuts on WSM, Nashville on this date in 1925. Now known as The Grand Ole Oprey, it is the longest continuously airing radio show in America.

Hut, Hut, Hike: Ernie Nevers, a running back with the Chicago Cardinals, establishes an NFL record with 40 points in one game on this date in 1929 as the Cardinals defeated the Chicago Bears 40-6 at Wrigley Field. The record still stands and since running backs no longer kick it will stand until someone scores seven touchdowns or kicks 14 field goals in a game. 

The Postgame Show Is Brought To You By Old Style Beer: Elsewhere in the NFL that Thanksgiving Day, the Green Bay Packers and Frankford Yellow Jackets played to a 0-0 tie while the New York Giants defeated the Staten Island Stapletons 21-7.

Disco Inferno: The Cocoanut Grove nightclub in Boston catches fire on this date in 1942, killing 492 people and injuring hundreds more. The building’s authorized capacity was 460 people. The fire started in a basement lounge when some artificial palm trees caught fire.

FunFact: The death toll remains the second highest for a single building fire in American history.

3…2…1…Blastoff: Mariner 4 lifts off for Mars on this date in 1964. Mariner 4 would conduct mankind’s first flyby of another planet the following July, getting as close as 6,118 miles and sending back about two dozen pictures. Contact with Mariner 4 was lost in December 1967 and no one is entirely sure where it is.

Jolly Good: Margaret Thatcher resigns as Britain’s prime minister on this date in 1990, after eleven years in office. Believing she had been betrayed by her fellow members of the Conservative Party, she left 10 Downing Street in tears. She was replaced by John Major and would continue to serve in the House of Commons until retiring in 1992.

Quotebook: The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool. – Richard P. Feynman (1918-1988), 1965 Nobel Prize Laureate in Physics

Answer To The Last Trivia Question: The US Navy currently has 66 submarines in service.

Today’s Stumper: Who did Margaret Thatcher replace as prime minister of Great Britain? – Answer next time!

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Notes from around the Human Experience…

DIESEL BOATS FOREVER: Sometimes the news hits home.

Not too often. We knew someone shot in the Vegas massacre, but we weren’t BFF’s and she was treated and released for minor injuries. We can’t really think of any recent instances of the news hitting home offhand. 

Aichiwawa: Until the loss of the Argentinian submarine ARA San Juan.  This hit even closer. As long-time readers of this crap may recall we are diesel boat veterans here at The Daily Dose, serving our country honorably and utterly without distinction on the long ago decommissioned USS Blueback (SS 581).  

Dry, Technical Matter: The San Juan was last heard from on Nov. 15 after it had reported a short circuit in its batteries and had been ordered to return home. Within a few hours of its last transmission, a noise consistent with an explosion was detected near San Juan’s last known position.

Dry, Technical Matter II: San Juan was 34-years-old and went through a five-year overhaul starting in 2008. Her disappearance drew international help in trying to find her, with over 4,000 people from 13 nations helping in the rescue efforts.

Fly In The Ointment: As soon as the San Juan was reported lost you suspected the worst. Sure, it was possible the boat and the crew would turn up but it wasn’t likely. You keep hoping, though, until you know for sure because, perhaps, the crew said screw the op-plan, declared radio silence and went fishing for a few days. They’re diesel boat sailors. You never know.

Sigh: But deep down you knew this wouldn’t be the case. It was never particularly reasonable to believe the San Juan would turn up. Submarine accidents are rare, but submarine rescues are even rarer.

Be All That You Can Be: Every job in the service has risks. Helicopters crash. Someone shoots you. Your deep fat fryer explodes. You accept these risks when you sign up or you don’t sign up. Every one of us who rode boats accepted this risk. There but for the grace of God and all that.

And while we didn’t dwell on it – and we don’t think too many of our shipmates did, either – you do think about it from time to time. It’s a hell of a way to go because maybe some of our 44 Argentinian shipmates died quickly but maybe some did not. Maybe some had advance notice of their impending deaths and found themselves waiting to die, not unheard of in lost submarines.

Dry, Technical Matter: Peacetime submarine losses are rare. Four US submarines have been lost since World War II and none since Scorpion in 1968. If you don’t think this is due in large part to the work and camaraderie attendant with riding boats you are deluding yourself.  A submarine is one of the most challenging workplaces there is and their sailors – now that we’re out, of course – are about the best there are in any line of work. 

The Bottom Line: Sometimes, tragically, the number of times a submarine dives is one greater than the number of times it surfaces. DBF.

ON THIS DATE! ON THIS DATE! The National Hockey League (NHL) is formed in Montreal on this date in 1917. Originally, it was intended to be a one-year replacement for the National Hockey Association, which had suspended operations in order to get rid of an owner no one really liked.

The first NHL season would begin on December 19 and Toronto won the first championship and then defeated the Vancouver Millionaires of the Pacific Coast Hockey Association for the Stanley Cup.

Oh Yeah: Of the original five teams, only the Montreal Canadiens and the Toronto Maple Leafs – then known as the Arenas – remain in the league. The Ottawa Senators were an original NHL team, but they were out of the league from 1934-92.

Knives Don’t Kill People, People Kill People: Nine boys are stabbed to death in a dormitory at Chinese high school on this date in 2004. Four others survive their stabbings. The killer, Yan Yanming, entered the dormitory a little after midnight and attacked the boys as they slept.

Family Affair: Yanming would be arrested a few hours later, turned in by his mother after he was unable to kill himself by ODing on drugs.  

Uh, Don’t I Get An Appeal Or Something?: Justice is quick in China. Yanming was executed for this crime the following January.

Please Pass The Dry, Technical Matter: This was the fourth school stabbing in China in as many months, a phenomenon that continues off and on to this day.

Quotebook: One who cannot cast away a treasure at need is in fetters. – J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings

Answer To The Last Trivia Question: There wasn’t a Trivia question last time, silly!

Today’s Stumper: How many submarines does the United States Navy have in its fleet right now? – Answer next time!

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Notes from around the Human Experience…

GREAT MOMENTS IN PRESIDENT TRUMP – PRESIDENT TRUMP!: We caught President Trump telling the truth! We are not making that up!

Yeah, we were shocked, too. The quote was really nothing more than President Trump utilizing his only real talent: drawing attention to himself. The tweet in question was merely a blatherskite’s attempt to drum up interest in an affair few cared about anymore: his efforts while in China to get three members of the UCLA basketball team released from custody after they were detained on suspicion of shoplifting.

Really, though, what stood out was that it was actually a true statement, rare from Trump who lies like you and me breathe. Here’s what he wrote:

It wasn’t the White House, it wasn’t the State Department, it wasn’t father LaVar’s so-called people on the ground in China that got his son out of a long term prison sentence — IT WAS ME. Too bad! LaVar is just a poor man’s version of Don King, but without the hair.

Dry, Technical Matter: The LaVar in question is LaVar Ball, currently one of the most annoying people on the planet. He has three sons who play basketball. Lonzo is in his first year with the Los Angeles Lakers. LiAngelo is the one who, with two UCLA teammates, was detained for shoplifting during the Bruin’s recent trip to China. The incident was serious enough that the three players did not accompany the team home. They were only released after President Trump, who happened to be in town, met with Chinese leaders.

…a poor man’s version of Don King, but without the hair.

Bingo: The comparison to the late boxing promoter is apt. King was always out hustling a buck or two or three million and LaVar is a hustler, too, riding his kids hard to make him a billionaire. In researching this column we held our breath and visited the website of the family’s shoe and clothing company. They have shoes endorsed by each player with prices starting at an inane $393. Click the wrong button and you’re spending $1,195.00 for a pair of sneakers. A pair of slides cost $220. Ball’s efforts to cash in with a real shoe company have, so far, failed. At one time his asking price for a deal was $3 billion (B). We are not making that up.

Oh Yeah: The three players were suspended indefinitely from the team. We heard some say legendary UCLA coach John Wooden would have had them off the team faster than you could say “three-man weave”, but our own opinion is Coach wouldn’t have recruited thieves in the first place.

Thank You For Notifying Us…You Are Gracious: While we were at their site a box popped up informing us that Justin from Los Angeles had just purchased a hoodie. There were a couple of other sales, too, in the short time we were there. None of them were for shoes.

The Bottom Line: Please, for the love of all that is sacred, do not pay any attention to any member of the Ball family. You’re just going to encourage the old man more. If you are not familiar with his antics, you’re lucky. Trust us. Ignore him. Our planet will be better off.

ON THIS DATE! ON THIS DATE!: Three months after the Treaty of Paris ended the American Revolution, the British finally get around to leaving New York City – then only the southern tip of Manhattan – on this date in 1783. The British had controlled New York City since defeating General Washington and the Continental Army in 1776.

The British took so long to evacuate because Loyalist refugees kept entering New York City and it took that long to get all of them out.

Playbill: Agatha Christie’s murder-mystery play The Mousetrap opens at The Ambassadors Theater in London on this date in 1952. It has run continuously since and is now playing at St Martin’s Theater, the longest-running play in history.

Well, Great, An International Incident: Five-year-old Cuban Elian Gonzalez is rescued floating in an inner tube in the Atlantic Ocean by some fisherman on this date in 1999. Gonzalez and his mother, and others, had started their journey fleeing Cuba earlier in the day in a boat with a faulty engine. There was bad weather and the motor died and Gonzalez’s mother is presumed to have drowned and young Elian is only one of three who survived.

Elian was eventually released to the custody of a great-uncle and while relatives of Elian in the United States petitioned for asylum, Elian was returned to Cuba to live with his father, stepmother and brothers. Now 23, Elian graduated from college last year and works as a technology specialist at a company that makes large plastic tanks.

Quotebook: He regarded what had happened as fate, another step on a path long since mapped out. – John Toland, Adolf Hitler

Answer To The Last Trivia Question: The NBA record for most field goal attempts by both teams in a game is 291 by the Philadelphia Warriors and Los Angeles Lakers in three overtime game on 12/8/1961. The regulation game record is 274 by Boston and Detroit on 1/27/61 and Boston and Philadelphia on 3/5/61.

Today’s Stumper: The Trivia feature will return.

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The Daily Dose
By Gaylon Kent
America’s Funniest Guy

Notes from around the Human Experience…

GET OUT YOUR HISTORY BOOKS: One of the more lively arguments sports fans can have is over which records will never be broken. It’s especially fun to chat about it now because today is the 57th anniversary of one of the three we think will never be broken:

Most Rebounds, Player, NBA Game: 55, Wilt Chamberlain, 11/24/60, vs. Boston

Dry, Technical Matter: Now, it’s important to differentiate between records that probably won’t be broken and those that will never be broken. A lot of records fall into the former category. Few fall into the latter.

A good example is Cal Ripken, Jr’s. record of 2,632 consecutive games played. It’s a hell of a record and appears on many lists we have seen of sports unbreakable records. It is certainly an impressive feat but we think someone can do it again. Similarly, Chamberlain’s record of 100 points in an NBA may well be broken one day and, honestly, we’re suprised Michael or Kobe never did it. 

Write This Down: Our theory is if someone did something once, they can do it twice, especially since athletes are bigger and faster than they are now, and our list of records that will never be broken is short. 

Disclaimer:  Now, not every record is in play. Records that can’t be broken because the game is played differently now – like Will White’s 683 innings pitched in 1879 – are not considered. Also, minor league and lower level college records aren’t considered and neither is Tennessee’s football team’s 1938-40 record of 17 consecutive regular-season shutouts because not every game was against major division competition, though it is listed in the NCAA record book.

Get Your Official Daily Dose Policy Right Here: Besides 55 rebounds in an NBA game, we think two other records will never be broken: the 70-68 5th set of the John Isner/Nicolas Mahut’s match at Wimbledon in 2010 and Johnny Vander Meer’s two consecutive no-hitters. It was never reasonable to believe 70-68 would ever happen in the first place, much less again, and while someone might well pitch two consecutive no-hitters again, no one will ever pitch three.  Heck, the way the game’s played today it is unliekly anyone will ever have threee consecutive complete games anymore. 

That’s it. Three. There are a lot of impressive records out there, but we think these are the only ones that are hands down, no debate unbreakable.

The Post Game Show Is Brought To You By Old Style Beer: What’s funny is the Warriors lost that night, beaten by Bill Russell – the man whose record Chamberlain broke – and the Boston Celtics 132-129. Russell had established the previous record of 51 rebounds the prior February. 

There were certainly a lot of rebounds to be had. That night the Celtics and the Warriors combined for 133 missed field goals out of 237 taken, not to mention 29 missed free throws. Numbers like that were par for the course back then, with the NBA averaging almost 220 shot attempts every game in the 1960-61 season. By comparison, the NBA averaged 170 shots per game in 1016-17.

MORE HOT ON THIS DATE ACTION: Two days after he shot and killed President John F Kennedy Lee Harvey Oswald is himself shot by Jack Ruby on this date in 1963. Ruby shot Oswald once in the stomach and Oswald died a couple of hours later. The shooting took place in the parking garage underneath Dallas police headquarters as Oswald was being escorted to a vehicle that was going to take him to the county jail

Ruby was arrested on the spot, was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. The conviction was overturned and Ruby died in January 1967 while awaiting a second trial.

D.B., We Hardly Knew You: A man History refers to as D.B. Cooper hijacks and airplane, receives a ransom of $200,000, jumps out of the plane and is never seen again on this date in 1971.

The man identified himself as Dan Cooper and bought a ticket at the Portland, Oregon airport for a flight to Seattle. While en route he notified a stewardess he had a bomb and the pilot informed officials on the ground Cooper demanded a $200,000 ransom. The ransom was delivered at the Seattle airport, the passengers were told to scoot and the plane took off again with only the flight crew. 20 minutes after takeoff, about 8pm, Cooper stuffed everyone in the cockpit, opened the rear door and jumped out. Cooper was never found. Letters attributed to him were received by authorities after the incident, but they who knows who they were from. Over the years there has been shortage of suspects but no one was ever arrested.

Quotebook: He found he was not all certain he was doing any good, aside from providing the drug of religious hope to timorous folk frightened of hell-fire and afraid to walk alone. – Sinclair Lewis, Elmer Gantry

Answer To The Last Trivia Question: The Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibits cruel and unusual punishment.

Today’s Stumper: Which teams hold the NBA record for most field goal attempts in a game by both teams?- Answer next time!

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