As my pop used to say, “The Invisible Man will not be seen tonight.” We’ll try to have something up for you later today. Duty calls.

—J.W.

by John Walters

Starting Five

Rabbit, Run…For Your Life!*

*The judges will also optimistically accept, “Hare Today, Gone Tomorrow?” and “Eggs? Yes. Travaganza? No.” and “Meh, What’s Up, Don?”

The Mad Hatter’s Tea Party met MAGA on the South Lawn of the White House on Monday. Festivities included a gathering that was much smaller than predicted, a president who told a reporter that North Korea “needs to behave…just like these kids,” a national anthem in which the First Lady needed to nudge her husband to put his hand to his heart, and a president who signed a kid’s hat and then carelessly threw it into the crowd.

The subtle nudge. pic.twitter.com/We2bY09ZM0

— Daniella Diaz (@DaniellaMicaela) April 17, 2017

If there’s a Guinness World Record for one person whom the most other people have encountered and said to themselves, “What an asshole,” Donald Trump is that record-holder.

2. The Yachter They Come

Meanwhile in the South Pacific, last Friday the following assemblage reportedly convened on record mogul David Geffen’s yacht: Bruce Springsteen and Patty Scialfa, Barack and Michelle Obama, Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, and Oprah Winfrey (and Steadman?). Does this mean that the Boss is officially a yacht rocker? And who forgot to invite Bono and Clooney?

That sounds like a cool group, but I think they needed an agitator. Someone to make it even more fun. I’d have invited David Spade along.

3. The Grizzlies are The Clippers and The Clippers Are The Grizzlies 

Jordan is going to have an even better career in the WWE.

The Memphis Grizzlies lost at San Antonio last night to go down 2-0 in their opening round series to the Spurs. Quick: Can you name the Grizzlies’ coach? It’s David Fizdale. Yeah, me neither.

Anyway, it occurred to me that the Grizzlies are the Los Angeles Clippers. This is a team that is very good but not great, that the NBA does very little to promote because their players come off as surly at best but definitely lacking in charisma (I don’t care how many Chris Paul or Blake Griffin ads I see on TV, they just don’t have “IT”), and that will soon be out of our lives because their cores are too old and they’ll never even sniff a Western Conference finals.

Vince Carter is 40 years old…and still dunking

So, enjoy them this last time around. Or, if you’re like me, don’t enjoy them. But these are two franchises that put together high-quality teams the past five years (eight 50-win seasons of a possible 10)but are going to need to scrap their foundation and rebuild if they want to advance any further. It’s over, kids. Move on.

4. Yankees Win…..Again!

Montgomery

George Constanza’s old employer won its 8th in a row last night and the NEW YORK YANKEES are 7-0 at the ballpark in the Bronx to being the season. They’re in the midst of their longest winning streak since 2012 and have done it entirely without their top two hitters of 2016, injured shortstop Didi Gregorius and injured catcher Filthy Sanchez.

What in the name of Suzyn Waldman Mr. Wilhelm is going on in the Bronx?

A) Pitching. The Yankees lead the majors in K/BB ratio (3.90) and, with the exception of the season opener in which Masahiro Tanaka was rocked, have gotten nothing but quality starts….and finishes. Keep an eye on 6’6″ rookie southpaw Jordan Montgomery, who pitched six shutout innings in getting his first career win last night. Middle reliever Adam Warren began the season by retiring the first 22 men he faced.

Judge could be leading a movement of the Yankees now retiring numbers from 99 down instead of 1 up….

B) Aaron Judge. Remember that impressive-looking dude wearing #99 who hit one out into dead center in his first Major League at-bat last August and then seemed to spend the rest of the summer striking out? Judge is seeing the ball better, and last night he hit his fourth home run in the past five games.

Chase Headley’s at bats don’t look like this in 2017….

C) Chase Headley. Really? Really. The insurance veteran 3rd baseman the Yankees acquired two summers ago as part of their keep-bailing-until-this-ship-stops-sinking project is batting .395 and is second in the AL in both batting average and OBP. I don’t expect it to keep up (his OBP is a nutty .509) but for now, it’s way better than expected.

D) Joe G. People don’t give skipper Joe Girardi enough credit, but what he’s fantastic at is, like the Italian-American former catcher named Joe whom he succeeded, is keeping an even keel. The Yankees don’t do stupid stuff and now that A-Rod is gone, there’s no more drama. Going back at least 20 years, this is the LEAST star-studded team the Yankees have opened the season with since 1995. Perhaps 1996. It’s refreshing.

Again, it’s early. But if they’re playing this well without Sanchez and Gregorius, well, they should keep it interesting all summer.

5. The Nigerian Prince!*

We think Stringer Bell is somehow tied up in all of this….

*The judges cannot take credit for this. We give dap to Cecil “For He’s a Jolly Good Follow”

All these years. All those emails and texts. And maybe there really was a Nigerian prince all along. So who sent him the $43 million.

The Prince! https://t.co/VEPWyNKm70

— Cecil Hurt (@CecilHurt) April 17, 2017

Music 101

One Story Town

I doubt many people think of Long After Dark as Tom Petty’s best album, but the first four songs are  “You Got Lucky,” “Deliver Me”, “Change of Heart” and this song. It leads off the 1983 album and if you want to accuse Tom Petty of possibly plagiarizing…Tom Petty on that opening riff, “I Need To Know” why you’d say that.

Remote Patrol

Jazz at Clippers, Game 2

10:30 p.m. TNT

I can’t explain why, but it’s always so much fun for me to watch the Clippers lose. And I really like Jamal Crawford and DeAndre Jordan. Anyway, the Jazz are breathing some fresh life into the Western Conference finals, a new team and new faces with which to contend. Kind of like those early ’00s Sacramento Kings.

by John Walters

Starting Five

Harm, but no foul

Beverley Spills*

*The judges will also accept “The Beverley Center” and “Steven Hawking Rockets’ Guard”

The Thunder only trailed by 5 in the third quarter when Steven Adams laid out Patrick Beverley on a brutal but legal pick. The Rockets went on to win by 31. James Harden simply was not fair, scoring 37.

Wondering….Do NBA players call “pick?” I mean, help a brother out, yo.

2. Is Boston About To Become Rupp Arena?

Later today Galen Rupp could become the first native-born American to win the Boston Marathon since Bill Rodgers did so in 1980. Two other nationalized Americans have done so since then: Rupp’s coach, Alberto Salazar, and his teammate, Meb Keflezighi who will also run today. Rupee took bronze in the Olympic marathon last summer.

Lisa Weienbach was the last American female to win Boston, in 1985, and now that Shalane Flangan has withdrawn with an injury, that record won’t be seriously challenged.

3. Golf Cart Blanche

As obscene as the $23 or so million that has already been spent on Donald Trump’s weekend getaways to south Florida have cost, there’s something particularly wicked about the reported $35,000 the Secret Service has had to spend in golf cart rentals at Mar-A-Lago in order to protect POTUS.

This is not a story from The Onion. The Secret Service, in protecting a prez who has now played 18 rounds of golf in fewer than 100 days in office, has to rent golf carts from his company. That’s an experienced grifter at work. Not only are you, the American people, going to pay for my weekend trips, but I’m going to profit off you having to protect me.

4.That Question The Reporter Asked Doc Rivers Was NOT The Dumbest Thing I Ever Heard

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fu_NTSV1-Q4

You’re down two and you have the ball. Of course you want to score, but here’s the counter-arguments…

1. If you miss, you may get the offensive rebound for a second opportunity, but you may not, which will likely necessitate a foul and falling behind, after free throws, by three points or even two possessions.
2. If you make the two very late, you force overtime. If you make the three late, you win the game.
3. If you take the shot when the Clips did and make it, now you must play defense and there’s an excellent chance that the opposing coach will not call timeout and not allow you to put your top defenders on the floor, which is why Joe Johnson was able to blow past 84-year vet Jamal Crawford on the final iso play, which is also why, given those particulars, the question was pertinent.

We’ve seen Doc Rivers try to belittle reporters before (see: Bill Simmons, 2012, I believe, NBA draft) and we’ve seen that it’s more about his ego than the facts. You can make a strong case for why the Clippers did what they did at the end of Game 1 but, given how the game ended, you can make just as strong a case for asking that question.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxvK3PaE_hc

By the way, when fellow reporters scold a reporter on Twitter for asking a legitimate question, all they do is move the line toward asking questions everyone already knows the answer to. You know why kids ask such great questions? Because those questions are asked out of genuine curiosity. That’s really the only standard for a question.

(Listen to the first question in the presser above. That’s not a question. That’s a “Talk about…” safe conversation starter.)

(By the way, Joe Johnson is in his 16th season; Jamal Crawford is in his 17th.)

Also, here’s a good question for Doc: How did you lose Game 1 at home to a team with no playoff experience as a unit when that team’s most productive player, Rudy Gobert, only played 17 seconds?

5. Farewell, 19th Century

The 19th century, which gave us the discovery of men’s suits, electricity and anesthesia, is finally over. Last weekend Emma Morano, the last person born before 1900 who was still breathing, died at the age of 117. Morano, an Italian woman who loved cookies, credited her longevity to ending her abusive marriage, which she did 79 years ago.

The world’s oldest living man, Israel Kristal, is 113 and is a Holocaust survivor. So take that, Hitler.

Music 101

 Biggest Part of Me

Unapologetic soft rockers Ambrosia scored a No. 3 hit with this tune in the spring of 1980.

Remote Patrol

Better Call Saul

10 p.m. AMC

Last week’s season premier was all exposition. We got a lot of shots of Mike tinkering with gadgets, which shows how much more meticulous and careful he is than Jimmy. Also, it’s going to be his way, I suspect, of showing Gus Fring and his crew that he cannot be outsmarted. Two, we got Chuck hatching a plan to go after Jimmy, with Ernesto in the middles; and we have Jimmy and Kim in an odd place, as she realizes that she has landed her biggest client thanks to Jimmy’s skulduggery. Did she self-sabotage as a way to even the score?

Jackie, 70

by John Walters

Starting Five

This marks the third “mother” Trump has dropped. The other two signed non-disclosure agreements.

Boys And Their Toys

When I was a wee lad on the mean streets of Middletown, N.J., my friends and I would make damns beneath the curb on the street after a rain or some adult had wished his car. We didn’t do it to stop the water. We did it for the visceral thrill of what it would look like when, after we let all that water build up, we destroyed the dam.

Welcome to the geopolitical world of Donald Trump and The Worst Wing. Did the GBU-43/B, the MOAB (“Massive Ordnance Air Blast, a.k.a. Mother Of All Bombs), the largest non-nuclear bomb there is at 21,600 pounds, accomplish anything when it was dropped over Afghanistan?

Bad MOAB….

Or was it simply a weapon of mass distraction? Was it a way to remind North Korea and/or China that MAGA has MOABs? Was it done to curb the nascent discussion about voting machines in Florida and other states possibly being tampered with? Was it because Trump had just been eating “the most beautiful chocolate cake?” Or was it because our very own septuagenarian King Joffrey has access to all these toys, and having never paid any dues or had to be accountable to anyone except dad, he has no appreciation of the consequences to his actions?

….Good Moab

Whatever. ISIS is barely in Afghanistan. And do they really need to use tunnels when they blend in so easily with the population, anyway? This “operation” will come undone soon, too.

Finally, and I was thinking about this a lot yesterday: Trump and many males only know how to exist, or feel comfortable, in an environment of “Dominate Or Be Dominated.” Myself and many females (and a few other sane males, for example, the dude whose death we are commemorating today) try to exist in an environment of harmony with our fellow man. The latter isn’t ALWAYS possible (“Sieg Heil!”) but most of the time it is. But The Worst Wing wouldn’t understand that, which is why trust fund brats such as Donald Jr. and Eric go out and murder wild animals. What a terrible family, first or not.

2. Canada, Try

America’s capital beat Canadia’s capital last night

After all eight opening round Game 1 matches in the Stanley Cup playoffs, my Canadian teams are….0-5. Boston beat Ottawa 2-1, the Rangers beat the Canadiens 2-0, and the Sharks beat Edmonton in overtime 3-2 on Wednesday. Last night Anaheim beat Calgary 3-2 and in the showcase series of the first round, Washington beat Toronto 3-2 in overtime.

Don’t do this to me, Canada.

3. The Bridges of Ingham County

“He HAS to leave!” He don’t, though.

Michigan State finished 20-15 this season, bowing out to Kansas in the second round of the NCAAs. The Spartans’ top player was 6’7″ freshman guard Miles Bridges, who averaged 16.9 points and 8.7 rebounds per game and is considered by many to be an NBA lottery pick. Not a Top 5 pick, mind you, but a lottery pick.

On Thursday Bridges made the apparently controversial decision to return to East Lansing for his sophomore year, detonating a Sportswriter Twitter explosion. On PTI Pablo Torre told Tony Kornheiser, “I loved college, but I love money more. He HAS to go!”

Why? Is there something blasphemous or imbecilic about valuing experiences more than cash? Think of the people you know: Would you rather know someone who was true to his values and lived that way or someone whose only guiding factor was money? And if you’re struggling with that one, allow me to introduce you to a few hedge funders I’ve encountered who are drinking and drugging and whoring their way through their miserable existences.

Miles Bridges did not make the right decision because he chose college over cash. He made the right decision because he listened to himself and not to others. He’s learning to be a man, and he’s on the right track. Maybe, just maybe, that Tom Izzo guy is rubbing off on him a little bit.

4. No Way, Jose Worshippers

Can they build a statue that looks like this?

Former Miami Marlin Jose Fernandez was an outstanding Major League pitcher for fewer than four seasons who won a total of 38 games in his career. He’s also a guy who was high and/or drunk last September when he crashed his boat into a jetty, killing himself and two other passengers. His former team, the Miami Marlins, is planning on erecting a nine-foot statue of him outside their ballpark, which is a horrendous idea.

If the crash were purely an “accident,” then maybe every state would not have laws punishing people who operate vehicles while impaired. Here’s the pro-Jose argument: “He wasn’t a bad buy just because of that crash.” And here’s the rebuttal: “He wasn’t a good guy just because he was a terrific pitcher.” We are all just the sum of our acts on this giant rock. Fernandez soared to higher heights than most people in his short time, but he also sunk to lower depths, his irresponsibility claiming the lives of two others.

This isn’t Roberto Clemente dying in a plane crash while delivering supplies to earthquake victims. This is a dude out on a 2 a.m. joyride on his boat who got three people killed and left the mother of his child to raise the kid without him. Not exactly statue-worthy.

 5. The Hell’s Wrong With Cops?

I get it: it’s a tense job. My dad was in law enforcement. But, I mean, c’mon, the above video was because a dude in Sacramento was jaywalking. Jaywalking! The cop told him to get down on the ground and the man didn’t comply. Then again, when is the last time a cop ordered you to get on the ground for jaywalking? (I once did get a ticket for jaywalking in Tempe, Ariz.; no one made me lay on the ground, though).

And here below, there’s a possibility the dude in cuffs didn’t exactly say, “Thank you, officer” but kicking him in the head when he’s already cuffed and lying face down on the pavement? At a busy intersection?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOrIj0uO7sw

The hell’s wrong with you guys?

Music 101

There’s No Home For You Here

There’s so much meat on the bone of so many White Stripes songs. This is one from Elephant that didn’t get much radio play, nor is it played every fall Saturday afternoon at college football stadiums, but it makes me want to get an electric guitar, then get a garage, and then form a band. I had the good fortune of seeing Jack and Meg White on The Elephant tour in 2003 or ’04. Unforgettable. How did just two people rock out like this?

Yes, this isn’t them doing the video. It’s some nice people lip-synching.

Remote Patrol

Sharks at Oilers, Game 2

10 p.m. NBC Sports Net

If you have yet to see Edmonton’s 2nd-year stud Ian Connor McDavid, who led the NHL in points this season, here’s your chance.