Starting Five

1. Doug Fister is tougher than we are. The Tiger pitcher was struck near the crown of his cranium by a line drive off the bat of Gregor Blanco (yes, apparently there is a Gregor Blanco in the World Series). The ball then looped up into the air and landed in center field. It all happened so fast that most of us didn’t know if the ball had ricocheted off Fister’s glove, but replays showed it had not. Fister remained in the game, but the Tigers lost to fall behind 2-0 in the World Series. It may be worth mentioning that Fister stands six-foot-eight. Most pitchers would have been able to have ducked beneath that liner.

Fister, a giant, is struck by a Giant

2. Dave owns Donald. Two nights ago, after Donald Trump’s “offer” to donate $5 million to President Obama’s favorite charity, David Letterman referred to Mr. Apprentice as a “racist” on his show. Yesterday, Dave phoned to apologize and ask Trump to appear. Trump, to his credit, assented to the request and explained to Dave that all he was doing was seeking “transparency.” And this is where Letterman sprung his trap. Allowing Trump to promote his line of ties (“the number-one selling tie in the world, available at Macy’s”) after allowing Trump to expound upon how we need more jobs in the U.S., Dave innocently asked Trump where the ties were manufactured (“Where are the ties made?”) Trump initially claimed not to know, until Letterman informed him that they are made in China. Game, set, match, Letterman.

 3. Hey, kids, Sammy Watkins is back! Yayyyy. The Clemson force of nature finally resembled his freshman self with eight catches for 202 yards and one sweet TD in a 42-13 clampdown at Wake Forest (shoulda had two TDs, but one bomb pass was poorly underthrown). We feel for No. 45 of the Demon Deacons, Riley Haynes, on this play (0:11). 

4. Another type of Apple falls victim to gravity, or is it short-sellers, as the world’s wealthiest company sees its stock plunge below $600. Less than two weeks ago it was worth more than $700 (in related news, we don’t plan on quitting our job any time soon). 

 5. Tyrann Mathieu, another first-team All-American from a year ago (as Watkins was) is one of four former LSU players arrested on drug charges. Matt Crossman of The Sporting News has some insightful tweetson the topic.

Reserves

The Big Lead is always your one-stop news source for Heidi Watney, or is it Weidi Hotney, resume updates.

Kobe Bryant does NOT make the cover of SI’s NBA preview issue (ESPN mag’s cover boy? Melo).

The most intrepid NBA reporter of them all, Adrian Wojnarowski, takes down commissioner David Stern.

What happens if you morph New York’s Finest with Fine Young Cannibals? This.

We like Oklahoma at home over the Irish in a game that will be closer than the geniuses in Vegas have it (11.5 points, and we don’t mean “geniuses” sarcastically). One odd thing, though, if the Irish prevail: Notre Dame, a school that does not play in a conference, has eight common opponents between this year’s squad and the one that last won a national title 24 years ago: Navy, Purdue, Michigan, Michigan State, Miami, Stanford, Pittsburgh and USC.

Tomorrow’s sleeper thriller? Texas Tech at Kansas State.

Great catch here by Deadspin. As a writer/media pundit, never take a position simply for the sake of argument or good theater. In related news, we love that Mike Golic’s younger son, Jake, a reserve tight end on the Notre Dame football team, tweeted this earlier today.

Okay, we out.

Editor’s Note: Apologies for the late post. Your craven correspondent had to work a late shift — and it was bug night! — followed by an early shift, followed by a much overdue period of dormancy, a.k.a., Medium Nappy. But we are back. Thank you for your patience.

Starting Five

1. Pablo Honey: Pablo Sandoval, the San Francisco Giants’ DFG (Designated Fat Guy) hits three home runs, two off Justin Verlander, as SFG wins Game One of the World Series against the Detroit Tigers. Worth noting:

A. Sandoval joins Babe Ruth, Reggie Jackson and Albert Pujols as the only players to hit three homers in one World Series game and, statistically speaking, now has a 66.6% chance of having a candy bar named in his honor.

B. Sandoval was benched during the 2010 World Series while the Giants’ winning pitcher, Barry Zito, was left off the roster for that Fall Classic, which the Giants won.

C. A record nine Venezuelan players are on the two teams’ WS rosters. We hereby name the area surrounding AT&T Park Hugo Chavez Ravine.

D. Sandoval got to third base on Verlander in the All-Star Game and last night rounded the bases on him twice. He’s the Kate Upton of hitters.

E. We, too, were going to go with “PANDA-MONIUM” but that became too overused. So we decided to throw a bone to our Thom Yorke and Radiohead fans. Which reminds us of this video (we are TOTALLY that guy, by the way)

F. Sports Illustrated ESPN writer Pablo Torre (which would also be a good name for an album) made his tie-less debut on “Around the Horn” this afternoon. All in all, a good 24 hours for Pablos. (p.s. Nobody moves to ESPN the Magazine to further his or her literary career; they move because they love the idea of being more famous. Godspeed, Pablo, but there’s more to life than being recognized at a Buffalo Wild Wings).

Pablo’s Parobolas…

2. Taylor Swift. She’s been on Good Morning, America and Letterman this week during her Swiftkrieg through Gotham City. We know it can be a little much — someone tweeted that they’d love to date her for a month and then write a song entitled “Maybe You’re the Problem” but then there are moments such as this one with a clearly enchanted Dave, or this one with Dave (“Hang on to your wigs and keys”) (check out the Aqua Net on the lead guitarist, by the way), or this one from earlier this year with Ellen, and well, we know we shouldn’t be sucked in, but we are. This remains our favorite T-Swizzle moment. 

3. And of course, in the time it took us to write that last item, Taylor Swift dumped Conor Kennedy. Ouch.

“It got colder/That’s where it ends/But I told him/We’d still be friends…”

4. David Stern announces that he will step down as NBA commissioner in 2014, on the 30th anniversary of the day in which he took power. First, Fidel Castro. Then Gaddafi. Tony LaRussa. Joe Paterno. Ali Abdullah Saleh. Now Stern. Who’s left? Is it this guy?

5. Even after making the cover of SI in ignominious fashion, the Honey Badger still didn’t give a ____. The cover jinx lives.

The next nationally circulated picture of Tyrann Mathieu you will see will be a mugshot.

Reserves

If you ever want to create a “B-List of American cities”, just find where NBA teams play their preseason games. Last night the Oklahoma City Thunder played in Wichita. When Thunder center Serge Ibaka discovered that the flight home would only take 20 minutes, he suggested, “Why don’t we just walk home?” (Royce White would be down with that).

Lane Kiffin has now coached a game in New Jersey this season and had his players switch to new jerseys in a game this season. Either way, the USC coach has a penchant for being, you know, kind of a d-bag.

Lolo Jones makes the Olympic boblsed team. Cue jealous anonymous bobsled teammates.

Hey, why not?

It’s funny, isn’t it, how often Swedish princesses and wealthy financiers can find each other to be soul mates?

Our man Brian Hamilton, who does an exemplary job of covering the Fighting Irish for the Chicago Tribune, has had a few stories on SI.com in the past week or two. That’s all we’ll say about that.

For the record, here’s the first story we found on SI.com about the Tyrann Mathieu arrest. Notice how the local affiliate that broke the story is credited in the first paragraph. And here’s the first ESPN.com piece on the subject. No mention of WAFB. And suddenly we are the Poynter Institute.

Okay, that’s it for today…it’ll be tomorrow before we know it.

Starting Five

1. Fall Classic: Two franchises that have been around since before manned flight (Detroit Tigers, 1901; New York/San Francisco Giants, 1883) meet in the World Series for the first time, beginning tonight. What this means for the casual sports fans is that blogs will be uploading oodles of Kate Upton pics.

2. Highway 130, a toll road stretching between Austin and San Antonio, opens today. So? It will have the nation’s fastest speed limit, 85 m.p.h. The bad news? The toll is $6.17 and it is only a 40-mile stretch. Still, Sammy Hagar, your prayers have been answered.

3. Surfer Francisco Javier Solorio, Jr., 39, suffers a fatal shark bite near Santa Barbara. As surfers say, the landlord collected his rent. It was the 13th fatal shark attack off the California coast since 1950, an average of one nearly every five years.

4. On a day when there was no NFL, MLB, NBA (only preseason) or NHL, and the best that CFB could offer was a Sun Beast Belt game between Arkansas State and Louisiana-Lafayette, the Champions League came through. Celtic and FC Barcelona played a thriller in which heavily favored Barca (you know, Messi and all that) needed to come from behind. Jordi Alba scored the game-winner for the Spaniards in stoppage time.

55. Afghanistan opens its first national park! Pack up the camper, we’re there.

Reserves

Hedge fund manager John Paulson pledges $100 million to Central Park, saying, “It’s simply impossible to imagine what New York would be without Central Park.” Mr. Paulson, you are instantly inducted into our Hall of Ultra-Cool Hedge Fund Managers (which, admittedly, has lots of vacancy).

A few items here: Central Park was built in 1857 and it costs $37.5 million to maintain annually, so Paulson basically just took care of the budget for the next three years. I’m shaking your hand if I wait on you soon, Mr. P.

MH sets new record for most park photos in one post

Facebook (FB) reverses its Faceplant slide on the stock market, jumping 21% since yesterday’s earnings report. Or was it because F/X aired The Social Network on a continuous loop Sunday night (“Dating you is exhausting. It’s like dating a Stairmaster.”)

A seven year-old girl has written an opera. When we were seven we could recite the alphabet backwards and we were pret-tee satisified with ourselves. We may have been able, at best, to spell “opera”.

The New York Islanders are moving to Brooklyn which, technically, is still part of Long Island. Anyway, our suggested name change is Deckers.

Insert your high-sticking joke here…

Ten World Series items Joe BuckCarver will relate to the fans at home:

1. Justin Verlandest is dating Kate Upton.

2. Tim Lincecum looks like the kid from “Dazed and Confused.”

3. Marco Scutaro is with his eighth MLB team, making him a top candidate for this year’s Edgar Renteria Award.

4. McCovey Cove is shark-free… we think.

5. Brian Wilson is not THAT Brian Wilson.

6. Brandon Belt is the first MLB player named after an article of uniform clothing since Charlie Spikes.

7. Miguel Cabrera = The Clean Cabrera.

8. Prince Fielder is a vegeterian… seriously.

9. The Giants have already staved off elimination six times this postseason. “Stave” is a highly underused verb outside of sports.

10. Jim Leyland is a chain smoker. Bruce Bochy looks like Jeff Daniels in almost every scene from Crazy Heart.

Bruce (Ho)Bochy

Eva Longoria and Mark Sanchez split. Basketball player, football player… what’s next? Please, Eva, satisfy a writer’s craven craving for more word play and date baseball player Evan Longoria.

Alabama’s Aussie nose tackle Jesse Williams, who may be the strongest man in next April’s NFL draft, cuts his mohawk. Didn’t he learn the lesson of Zach Mettenberger, the LSU QB who shaved his mustache just before the Tigers lost at Florida?

Oh, Donald. This is your bombshell?

Donald Trump and his biggest fan

College Football News picks Notre Dame, a 10.5-point underdog in Norman this Saturday, to beat Oklahoma. They must be using that old Notre Dame head coach-in-his-third-season formula (Rockne, Leahy, Parseghian and Holtz all went undefeated in their third year in South Bend).

The Columbus, Ohio, radio host who called for Desmond Howard to “get fired or die” has himself been fired. Good job, good effort, Scott Torgeson. You couldn’t have done it without yourself (psst, 97.1: If you are looking for a radio host with a decent knowledge of college football who is not a COMPLETE and utter jackass, we know some people…)

Syria calls a cease-fire in its war against its own people on account of a holiday. So the key to Middle East peace is more holidays?

We cannot mention Crazy Heart without providing a video for this excellent song (here’s a cover of Falling and Flying).