Just to put it out there, Melky Cabrera did not launch this site…

College football fans, and that’s us, please bookmark pollspeak.com for its “Poll Stalker” link all season. After the initial Associated Press (AP) preseason poll was released Saturday, no shortage of hateboys condemned Bob Asmussen of the Champaign News-Gazette for voting Meeshagin No. 1 (you cannot spell Asmussen without “UM” and, well, I’ll leave it to you to find the other joke). Asmussen’s vote was fairly radical, but was it any more bizarre than the San Jose Mercury News’ Jon Wilner voting defending national champion Alabama 9th, behind four other SEC schools (Georgia, LSU, Arkansas and South Carolina?) Or Cecil Hurt of the Tuscaloosa News being the only one of the 60 voters who did not have Clemson in his Top 25? If you’re curious, Hurt, a terrific Twitter follow (and I never say that lightly) has the Tide No. 3.

Michigan, which will open versus No. 2 Alabama on September 1 at Jerry World, is 12-0 in September since Denard “Shoelace” Robinson joined the team (we know, Tate Forcier was the starter in ’09).

This is so Larry Crowne of Michael Beasley… The irony is that Beasley’s new team, the Phoenix Suns, had an estate sale of sorts themselves earlier this summer.

For the love of God, Tom, untuck!

He’s wearing matching Ole Miss shirt and shorts, so let’s not call Mitt Rommey a front-runner (“S-E-C!”) in the apolitical sense. Photo taken on lovely Lake Winnipesaukee in New Hampshire, which was also the setting for “What About Bob?”, one of those funnier-than-you’d-think Bill Murray films from the early 1990s (“Baby steppin’ to the bus…”)

David Freese was named the World Series Most Valuable Player award last October, and deservedly so. Yesterday the St. Louis Cardinals’ third baseman goes 0-8 with three strikeouts in the Cards’ 19-inning loss to Pittsburgh. That’s baseball.  In case you were wondering, Charlie Pick of the Boston Braves went 0-11 in a 26-inning marathon on May 1, 1920 versus the Brooklyn Dodgers. The game ended in a 1-1 tie.

Greg Stanton, the mayor of Phoenix, had been lobbying to practice with the Valley of the Sun’s WNBA franchise, the Mercury. Last week Stanton got his wish… and then he had his nose broken during a scrimmage in a collision with forward Nakia Sanford. What’s worse is that Mayor Stanton had a date for Saturday with star football player Doug Simpson, but now he’ll just have to tell him that “something suddenly came up.”

Uganda has Little League baseball?!?!? You knew this? Look at the fine print. The Ugandans have roughly one baseball glove for every 20 kids who play Little League ball. The Ugandans, who were eliminated from the Little League World Series yesterday, became the first squad from Africa to advance to Williamsport, Pa.

Wondering: Will Tampa have an Opening Ceremony for the GOP convention later this month and will Bush 41 skydive in from a helicopter?

Kobe Bryant scores 68 points in one half in a charity basketball game in China. A wire story says that Kobe’s opponents “featured a mix of Chinese pop singers, actors, and TV personalities, all of them possessing limited basketball ability.” Ladies and gentlemen, your 2013 Phoenix Suns!

Jeremy Guthrie of the Kansas City Royals flirted with a no-hitter into the 7th inning, but then she left with her friends after she noticed the tan line on his ring finger. If Guthrie had closed the deal, it would have been the 7th no-hitter this season, tying the MLB record set in 1990 and ’91.

The college football season will begin in less than two weeks and for the first time since 1945, Joe Paterno will not be playing or coaching.

Did Will McAvoy really emerge from behind a cloud of manhole cover steam in the dark of night as if this were an ’80s video, and where was the saxaphone solo? Did I see that? Did McKenzie McHale really deliver a 21st-century version of Mickey Rooney’s “We’ll stage the play in our barn!” speech in the opening scene? Has any woman ever sent a man flowers at work? Does this happen?

The power went out at the end of Tragedy Porn/Part I and the power left Aaron Sorkin’s pen for the entire second half of what had been an ambitious two-part episode. To quote Slumdog (Dev Patel, whom I really like in the series, by the way… your days are numbered, Sasquatch!) from an earlier episode, “No words. I have no words.”

And there were precious few pop culture references in the 8/19 episode. Outside of Apollo 13 and Helen Hunt in “Castaway”, nothing immediately comes to mind.

So, instead of a rundown (“Throw out the rundown!”) I’m going to provide a little pop quiz. Name the cast member who earned the award or nomination and, for extra credit, the film or play in which he/she appeared (answers below):

1. Starrring role in film that won Oscar for Best Picture
2. Supporting role in film that won Oscar for Best Picture
3. Starring role in film that was nominated for Oscar for Best Picture
4. Won Oscar for Best Actress in a film
5. Had supporting role in film that won Oscar for Best Original Screenplay
6. Has twice appeared on the cover of a popular five-word title men’s magazine
7. Won Tony Award for best actor in a musical production

A Case of the Munn Daze

Answers: 1. Dev Patel (Slumdog Millionaire) 2. Jeff Daniels (Terms of Endearment) 3. Sam Waterston (The Killing Fields) 4. Jane Fonda (Coming Home) 5. Allison Pill (Milk) 6. Olivia Munn (Maxim) 7. John Gallagher, Jr. (Spring Awakening)

Mike Trout is on the verge of bumping Vida Blue from the record books as the youngest MVP in baseball history. Trout leads the AL in batting, runs scored and WAR. He’s 20 years old. (And congrats to the 24 teams who took players before Trout in the 2009 MLB draft, well done! Ok, we’ll forgive the Nationals who took Stephen Strasburg, and I guess we can forgive the Angels, who took another high school outfielder the pick before taking Trout.)

Bryce Harper, he of the SI cover at 16 years old, the youngest to ever play in the All-Star game, the hitter of Ruthian batting practice home runs, is just 19. He is also the orator of the most viral locker room clip of 2012.

Baseball may have never seen the arrival of two such precocious stars in the same summer before. Are they both bound for superstardom? Of course not. Baseball, more than any other major sport, has seen meteors flash across it’s sky  only to flame out. For every Derek Jeter and Chipper Jones there are dozens of Joe Charboneau’s, Mark Fydrich’s and B.J. Upton’s (too soon?).

However, there have been very few meteors that have shown as brightly as Trout and Harper at such a young age. Baseball is just too hard. Trout and Harper’s teammates in the 2017 All-Star game are currently toiling under the sun in places like Hagerstown and Modesto.

There have indeed been others though, who made it this far, this fast. Of those, none has a more heartbreaking story than Tony Conigliaro, the home town hero who was to be the second coming of Ted Williams in Boston. Signed by the Red Sox at just 17 years old and just out of high school in nearby Revere MA, Conigliaro tore through the New York Penn League as an 18 year old, batting .363 with 24 home runs.

No more learning was necessary and it was off to the show for the 19 year old Tony C in 1964. The hometown kid didn’t disappoint, batting .290 with 24 dingers in just over 100 games before being sidelined with an injury. Year two was even better as the 20 year old became the youngest player to ever lead the league in homers, with 32. Pop culture may not have been as all consuming in 1965 as it is now, but that didn’t stop the good looking, charismatic Conigliaro from singing his pop hit on the Merv Griffin show.

It seemed nothing was going to stop Tony Conigliaro from becoming one of the game’s all time greats. But then…. 45 years ago today, August 18, 1967, Tony C was hit just under his left eye by a fastball from Angels pitcher Jack Hamilton and carried from the field on a stretcher. The fractured cheekbone and broken jaw were nothing compared to the damage done to his left retina.

Conigliaro would improbably enjoy more successful days in the major leagues, hitting career highs in 1970 with 36 HRs and 116 RBI. What he never became was the next Ted Williams. It was a career that started with infinite possibility that was derailed by a devastating injury. When his baseball career was cut short, Conigliaro became a sports anchor in San Francisco and was on his way to interview for a job back home in Boston when he suffered a heart attack.  He went into a coma a few days later after having a stroke and lived the last eight years of his life in a vegetative state.

The great Tony Conigliaro, everything that was young, indestructible and living out the American dream, died at just 45 years old.

Enjoy Trout and Harper and wish them the best. Tomorrow never knows.

–Bill Hubbell

If Samantha Steele does not find you attractive, then by definition you are no chick magnet.

Having covered this story from the beginning, we are beginning to wonder just where Michael LeMaitre’s body could be. And by that we mean, Is he even on Mount Marathon? Guarantee this will be an Outside magazine cover story within the next 12 months.

Mount Marathon, Seward, Alaska

How awful was Jered Weaver last night? The Angels’ ace, who took the mound leading baseball in both ERA and WHIP, allowed seven runs in the fourth inning although his official line will say he pitched three innings (you’re intelligent, you’ll figure it out). Weaver allowed nine earned runs before being yanked in the fourth inning in the Angels’ loss to the Tampa Bay Rays of St. Petersburg. In the past week Weaver has tripled his loss total this season, from one to three, and gone from leading baseball in ERA (2.30) to being in ninth place (2.74).

Dash Sandecki, a Gilbert (Ariz) Higley High School linebacker, leads the state in tackles a full two weeks before the season begins.

America’s shortest “tallest building”, Decker Towers in Burlington, Vt. At 124 feet, 23 of which are an antenna spire, no state’s tallest building rises to a lesser height.

Decker Towers: Feel free to put the latter word in quotes

It was only a matter of time before all the defections out of Happy Valley led to other players gleaning an opportunity to play for a bigger-name program than, say, the Akron Zips. The “We Are” gang welcomes wide receiver Jared Fagnano, whose brother Jake is already a safety for the Nittany Lions. This isn’t just a football story. It’s an osmosis story.

These dudes eventually got their man, but why did it need to be more arduous than a Reno 911 arrest? They could stand to take a lesson from Dash Sandecki.

Acceptable topless magazine cover model. Unacceptable topless magazine cover model. Go ahead and make the “Who has bigger jugs?” joke.

“Compliance”, starring no one we’ve ever heard of, has the top rating (91%) on Rotten Tomatoes of any film opening this weekend. How long has John Infante been rating films for Rotten Tomatoes?

Anchor Steam

We love local news anchors & reporters, i.e. “the talent”. The only thing we love more than local news talent is the obligatory bios that appear on their station’s websites. Years of thorough research has taught us, for example, that female anchors are either married with two children or single with a beloved pet named Taffy. Because it is our duty and honor to serve you, the reader who pays nothing, we hope to feature one anchor each week or, more likely, whenever the mood strikes us. Today’s anchor (drumroll)…

Name: Kellie MacMullan

Market (rank): Sacramento (20th)

Married or Pet? Single, Annabelle, a basset hound

Kellie Kellie Kellie Kellie Kellie Kellie  K-E-L-L-I-E Kellie

 Joe Po on Joe Pa

If you are keeping track of the excerpts from Joe Posnanski’s biography, “Paterno” which, unlike Jerry Sandusky, is soon to be released, you can answer us this. How is it that the former Penn State football coach knew the meaning of “omniscient” (“I’m not omniscient!”) but not the meaning of “sodomy” (“What does ‘sodomy’ mean?”).  In Paterno’s defense, the first declarative statement is a sound argument for the latter interrogative statement.

Musing: Last night I thought I was watching the Little League World Series but then I realized it was just the right-field porch at Yankee Stadium.