I have mixed feelings about JJ Watt’s involvement with Burnley. On the one hand, he’s bringing more attention to my beloved favorite soccer team and I like him. On the other, part of the point of liking that team was that no one else would hop on the bandwagon, and Watt’s dorkiness means not only is the bandwagon filling up, but it’s filling up with some of his dorky friends. Were Burnley still playing Dycheball, this would be funny—nothing screams “children’s YouTube magnates growing the game” like 0–0 draws—but Burnley is no longer playing Dycheball.
Anyway, yesterday JJ Watt celebrated National Milk Day, and he did it in style, and it’s unclear if this was a paid advertisement or if he was just feeling especially jazzed about milk. From his Instagram story:
That is one heck of a spread.
For those wondering, no, I did not celebrate National Milk Day, but that’s because for me, every day is Milk Day. Take today, for example: I just had a turkey sandwich with two slices of provolone cheese and then washed it down with a pint of whole chocolate milk. That was lunch! Dinner will involve cookie dough ice cream. I’m trying to lose 48 more pounds. I think this is working.
So, while I’m very happy for those who did celebrate, including my fellow Burnley supporter JJ Watt, I saw neither peak nor trough in my own dairy consumption yesterday. For those wondering.
#NotAllMinnesotans
Three Minnesota fans were ejected last night for verbal abuse at a WNBA game, allegedly yelling that they were glad Dallas Wings forward Satou Sabally got hurt on a play where Minnesota Lynx forward Bridget Carleton earned an ejection herself by picking up her second flagrant foul. You can watch the video here. Love Sabally blowing the kiss to the crowd.
I used to live in Minneapolis, and let me just say: This is not *not* representative of Minnesotans. A lot of Minnesotans are saying it is. That’s not who we are, they lament. They must be from out of town. Are they? Are you checking ID’s? Or is this like when your governor and the mayors of both the Twin Cities claimed without evidence that the people behind the largest race riots since Rodney King were all coming in from outside the area?
It’s fine to say that fans berating injured players isn’t who you want your cities to be. It’s good to say that! But they’re part of your fanbases. They’re part of your community. They are your people. They are your WNBA fans.
Most cities I’ve encountered don’t have as much of an issue admitting this. Cubs and White Sox fans fought in the bleachers of each team’s ballpark these last few weeks and nobody leapt in to say the instigators were from Hammond and Racine. Philadelphians threw snowballs at Santa Claus, and they’ll admit that. But for some reason, a slice of Minnesotans—and it’s only a slice, but it’s a loud slice—has this insatiable craving for moral high ground their community hasn’t earned. Minnesota has one of the largest racial education gaps in the country, but those people putting up pro-life billboards in Wisconsin? They’re the backwards hicks. More innocently: Minnesota fans try to start the wave during no-hit bids and heckle injured basketball players from the second row, but Philly teenagers putting their middle fingers up at a middle-aged mom in a Vikings jersey? They’re the bad sports fans.
Own it, Minnesota. It’s great that you want to hold yourselves to a high standard. But holding yourselves to a high standard isn’t the same as blindly yelling that you’re already meeting it.
The Bears Rebuild Is Over
We’re going all around the NFC North today, I guess.
(Just kidding, we have nothing bad to say about Detroit.)
In response to Jerry Reinsdorf’s cost-cutting move of cleaning house in his (baseball) front office, consolidating two positions into one and signaling commitment to a new rebuild, at least one Bears blogger (I have neutral to warm feelings about this guy, I’m not naming him because I don’t want to be a dick) suggested today that what the White Sox really need to do is follow the blueprint the Bears have established since the end of 2021, when they fired the flailing Matt Nagy, kicked Ryan Pace out of the front office, and brought in Ryan Poles and Matt Eberflus.
My brother.
You went 3–14 last year.
I don’t know, maybe Justin Fields is really that good. He did make it onto one person’s MVP ballot last year. But the idea that a team Vegas is projecting to go 8–9 is the team in this town to follow is, at the very least, one that’s gotten a little ahead of itself. Give it a little time. Wait and see for once. I remember a certain season when the Khalil Mack trade meant the Bears were going to be perennial contenders. If I recall correctly, that was the year they brought in Nagy.
(Ok, the guy was over at Bleacher Nation, and their Blackhawks blogger did the same thing re: the Blackhawks. The Blackhawks were one point above last place in the entire NHL last year. Lucking into Connor Bedard is not a strategy.)
Don’t Bring Joe Kelly into Your Alex Cora Wars
Justin Verlander told Alex Cora to fuck off last night, and it was really, really funny. I have mostly negative feelings about Verlander, but every now and then I find myself liking the guy a lot, and there’s something so silly about seeing any graying 40-year-old man in a goofy outfit telling his old coworker to fuck off. I think we should all get to do that when we turn 40. Wear a baseball uniform to work, find a guy we used to get tired of, and cuss him out on a hot mic.
A good number of Astros fans don’t seem to like Alex Cora, and I completely get that. With another bench coach, the sign-stealing scheme might have been quashed before it could become a scandal, and you all could still be the little guys who figured it out. But thanks to some of these same Astros fans’ ongoing obsessions with Joe Kelly, a number of them brought Joe Kelly into last night’s spat. The idea? This Alex Cora clown was the guy Joe Kelly was defending when he made that mean face at our shortstop.
I know, I know, there’s a certain level of cognitive and moral dissonance you need these days if you’re still going to be an Astros fan, and I kind of want you all to have that, because it would be sad if you stopped following baseball altogether. But. Joe Kelly was not defending Alex Cora when he made that mean face at your shortstop. Joe Kelly, per his numerous statements over the three years since, was mad that your shortstop and your third baseman and your other little guys didn’t get suspended at all, won a World Series on the back of the scandalous acts, and still somehow managed to paint themselves as victims. Cora only came up in the conversation because he was a guy who did his time. Alex Cora and Carlos Beltran were suspended for their actions, and they owned it, and your guys were not suspended for their actions and still did not own it. It should be a lot easier to own it when you’re the beneficiary of an unfair situation. Not to put words in Joe Kelly’s mouth, but based on the words that have come out of Joe Kelly’s mouth, that’s what the issue for him was with Correa and Bregman and the rest of the sinners on that team. You are doing an admirable job of carrying on the legacy.
