It’s time for us to compare Rob Manfred to men who killed millions upon millions of people.
Rob Manfred’s Purge
MLB Network effectively fired Ken Rosenthal yesterday. I say “effectively” because I don’t know if they technically fired him, or if it was a forced resignation or a layoff or whatever. It doesn’t really matter what it was, though, because what really happened was that Ken Rosenthal, it seems, was purged. He was removed from employment by Major League Baseball for being too critical, reportedly, of commissioner Rob Manfred. It’s unclear what exactly Rosenthal said that led to this, because his public comments on Manfred have been charitable. It’s possible this is a story where speculation became report and the report has gained too many legs to be corrected. But at the same time, Manfred doesn’t deserve the benefit of the doubt on this, so while we’d caution you to take the report with a grain of salt, there is a baseline of truth here in which nobody would be surprised if this was the sole reason for Rosenthal’s removal.
I don’t want to make a martyr of Rosenthal. Firstly, because it’s not like he’s repeatedly been holding Manfred’s feet to the fire, but secondly, because he’s just a human being. Getting purged doesn’t make Rosenthal a saint, just like getting purged didn’t make saints out of all the Soviets who’d carried out purges prior to their own. This isn’t to call Rosenthal a Soviet, either, but the point is, who Major League Baseball purged isn’t the most important thing here. The most important thing, again, is that Rob Manfred appears mad enough with power and out of touch enough with reason that he’d order the firing of one of the best breakers of news in the game. It’s part infuriating, part sad, entirely bizarre, and if it’s true, it might be the most outrageous thing Manfred’s done in his outrageous tenure. What an ass he seems to be. Hopefully owners recognize that if this lockout hurts their bottom line.
Purdue…What Was That?
Purdue lost at home last night to a decent-not-good Wisconsin team, and while part of it was Johnny Davis thrusting his name loudly into national player of the year conversations, Purdue’s inability to win a home conference game after already losing a laugher of an upset in December and nearly losing another laugher of an upset three days later, and while sitting just 1-1 in Big Ten play…I mean, this is one of the best teams in the country on paper, and they’re evidently incapable of taking care of business. They’ve run themselves to the fringes of the conference title race in a league in which they’re clearly the best team. Again, though, that’s on paper. On the court, it seems like there might be a psychological block. Am I overstating things? Perhaps. But for all the excellence they should possess…they’re muddling through. Lot of time left, but it’s hard to count on the Boilermakers to play well consistently enough to hold serve in March, and it’s looking likely that they’ll catch too many losses in conference play for the Big Ten to have a one-seed come tournament time. Looking at Baylor and Kansas, I’d even venture that it’s more likely the Big 12 will have two one-seeds than it is the Big Ten finds a way to have one. That, I should caveat, is without looking at our model, though.
On the other side…Johnny Davis! And Wisconsin! Arguably the best win of the season, at the moment, with the only other one in the picture Alabama’s upset of Gonzaga in Seattle. This is the kind of thing that can make the difference on the bubble, or bump you up a seed line or more above the bubble, where the Badgers are now healthily located. Massive night for the Badgers, who are a few more good games from being as in the Big Ten title race as Purdue is, if not more so.
Oklahoma: Transfer Hub
The college football transfer portal took a twist yesterday when Caleb Williams entered it roughly simultaneously with Dillon Gabriel reversing course and announcing he’d be a Sooner, rather than a UCLA Bruin. Williams, who appeared in eleven games for Oklahoma and famously rescued the team in the Red River Shootout, becomes one of the biggest names on the market, and with three years of eligibility remaining, to boot.
Per Williams’s father, the reason for the transfer is to maximize the quarterback’s NFL preparation, which one would think would put schools like USC (where old friend Lincoln Riley now coaches) and Mississippi (Lane Kiffin’s worked with everyone from Carson Palmer to Tua Tagovailoa) near the top of the list. At the same time, though…what if he went to Texas? It’s a wacky thought, but Steve Sarkisian has some great offensive accomplishments of his own (he also worked with Palmer and Tagovailoa), and while Quinn Ewers is set to be the guy in Austin, Williams has enough eligibility remaining that if he wanted to compete for the job, he probably could and then just transfer again. It’s not a great route, which is why USC remains the simplest expectation, but what drama that would be.
Anyway, Oklahoma, as is so often the case, is in the thick of the quarterback transfer market.
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The Texas Bowl is this evening, so if you adore college football, that’s on ESPN at 9:00 PM EST. In the basketball world, the big one tonight is Kentucky’s trip to Baton Rouge, where two of the SEC’s best (there are five legitimately good teams in the SEC) knock heads. LSU hasn’t played anyone all that strong aside from their SEC opener against Auburn, but they also won every nonconference game but one by nine points or more, and they were at least playing NIT-level competition in some of those. That’s on ESPN at 7:00 PM EST. I’ll watch it and then channel surf, in case you were curious. Thinking about frozen pizza, too. Warm day but getting real cold tonight. Feels like a frozen pizza night.
