Starting Five

1. Black Dog. No, not this Black Dog. This black dog, Banana Joe, a five year-old Affenpinscher (and if you’ve ever had your Affen pinsched, you know how painful it can be), won Best In Show at the Westminter Dog Show last night.

Banana Joe was doggin’ it in Madison Square Garden.

2. “Good, good, good, Good Hydrations/He’s takin’ some good hydration/Wants the GOP nomination/Good, bop-bop…” Florida senator Marco Rubio provides the Republican response to the POTUS SOTU (which, admittedly, sounds like a trendy new sushi kitchen) and all anyone can blather about is that he reached for an off-camera bottle of Poland Spring (which, as Elaine Benes will attest,  is a far better brand name than Moland Spring). As someone on Twitter correctly quipped, “The hysteria over this underscores our ravenous appetite for any moment that is unscripted.”

Agua fria! Muy bueno!

3. Speaking of which, CNN held viewers spellbound yesterday with the last throes of the Christopher Dorner manhunt around Big Bear Lake yesterday afternoon. It was a tragic saga that left four people dead, excluding Dorner, and also leaves us wondering. At one point Dorner car-jacked a vehicle and as the victim, Rick Heltebrake, later described it, told him, “I don’t want to hurt you. Just get out and start walking up the road and take your dog with you.”

Less than an hour or so later, Dorner was in a shootout with two sheriff’s deputies that left one of the officers dead. So he wasn’t a madman bent on killing anyone who got on his path. He had an agenda, and he had a very focused idea of who his enemies were.

Details and facts will later emerge, and there is no good excuse for killing innocent people, which is where Dorner’s spree began. Still, when you see the photos of him in police and military gear, with that cherubic smile, you get a sense that somewhere along the way someone robbed him of something. Robbed him of more than just a job and a career.

In happier days

It’s easy for the media –not all media, mind you — to portray him as a madman, and for some on the far opposite end of the spectrum to portray him as a hero. The truth, I think, lies in between. Somewhere along the way, I bet, he was the victim. Somewhere along the way the system screwed him and his sense of what is fair and what is just was, well, raped. If you have ever been there professionally (raises hand), you understand the rage that wells up inside.

That said, that’s no excuse to take innocent lives. I’ll be curious to see where the LAPD’s internal investigation of Dorner’s dismissal leads.

4. The Olympics plans to cancel wrestling, while the X Games have definitely canceled Snowmobile Freestyle. The former event has been around since the dawn of the Olympics in Greece and the inaugural modern Games in 1896; the latter resulted in the death of Caleb Moore last month. The 2020 Olympics will be the first without wrestling. X Games Tignes, the second of six global X Games events planned this year, will be the first without Snowmobile Freestyle.

5. Dallas Grizzly? James Harden still has the NBA’s most famous beard in the state of Texas, but keep an eye on the Dallas Mavericks. The Mavs, who are currently 22-29 and host Sacramento tonight, have vowed to don beards until they reach .500. That may take awhile. To be accurate, Mav stars such as Dirk Nowitzki, Vince Carter and O.J. Mayo do plan on shaving,  but they will simply trim their beards. Why not just refrain from shaving altogether? Wouldn’t that create a greater sense of urgency?

The Mavs hope to save face by sporting beards

Reserves

Yes, there is a high school baseball player in Florida named Fenway Parks.

Remember two days ago when The Big Lead suggested that Jadeveon Clowney sit out next years before making himself eligible for the NFL Draft (because a rule that should be eradicated compels football players to be three years removed from high school before being eligible for the draft)? Well, last night Kentucky frosh Nerlens Noel, sort of the Clowney of college hoops, suffered a gruesome season-ending knee injury in the Wildcats’ loss at Florida.

LeBron scores 30 and shoots above 60% for the sixth consecutive game last night in the Heat’s 117-104 defeat of Portland. Incredible. For what it’s worth, the game’s high scorer with 33 points was Trail Blazer rookie Damien Lillard.

By the way, Kobe Bryant scored four points in the Lakers’ 91-85 defeat of Phoenix last night. Kobe shot one for eight from the floor and committed eight turnovers.

The Golden State Warriors, who were 30-17 when their cross-bay brethren, the San Francisco 49ers, played Super Bowl XLVII, have lost five straight since. The San Jose Sharks are also 0-5 since Super Bowl Sunday.

You know what profession is in trouble somewhat? Banking. Barclays, whose gleaming post-9/11 headquarters are located on the corner of 50th Street and 7th Ave. in Manhattan, announced yesterday that it will lay off 3,700 staffers. Meanwhile,  Dutch bank ING Groep announced that it will lay off 2,400 employees. That’s a lot of people who are used to earning six-figure salaries, and more. Reality bites.

 Starting Five

1. “These bitches is getting truculent.” Highly recommended reading. Phil Bronstein’s account of the raid on Osama bin Laden through the eyes of the Shooter himself. We learn that the aforementioned sentence were the last words exchanged between the point man on the raid and the Shooter prior to his killing the leader of Al Qaida. The “bitches” in question were bin Laden’s wives. We also learn that Metallica did not appreciate the U.S. military using their music during interrogations because it did not want to be associated with promoting violence. As the Shooter pointed out, “Dude, you guys have an album titled ‘Kill ’em All.‘”

2. And that’s how he earned the nickname Woody. Did former Ohio State coach Woody Hayes really have a turtle clamp down on his B1G  to demonstrated toughness to Earle Bruce’s coaching staff, or is this tale literally an Urban (Meyer) legend? More than once while relating this anecdote, Meyer reiterates that it is a “true story.” Apocryphal or not, the unnamed assistant coach’s retort — “Coach, I’d do this. Just promise to not poke me in the eye” — is classic.

Woody: “Fear the turtle? Never!”

3. Is it just a coincidence that on the same wintry February day in New York City that the Westminster Kennel Club names its Best in Show Sports Illustrated trots out is annual swimsuit issue models? Top-notch breeding is top-notch breeding, after all, no matter the species.

Nina Agdal does not grace this year’s cover, but the feeling here is that some day the Danish valkyrie shall.

4. Four Alabama football players are arrested on charges of second-degree robbery and fraudulent use of a credit card. The big winner in this mess? Stormie Henderson, a former Miss Alabama contestant (are there any women in Alabama who do not compete in beauty pageants?) who just happened to have the great forturne of being arrested in Tuscaloosa on the same night for leaving the scene of an accident. Her photo appeared on the same jail database page and she can expect a phone call to appear in next year’s Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue soon.

5. Will Leitch decides to annihilate Darren Rovell’s professional reputation –without actually calling him a bad guy because, you know, Will Leitch is too nice a guy to say something mean about someone. That this column ran not long after Rovell pointed out –via a tweet from Leitch — that apparently Leitch is both a slow and feckless runner (Will explains the source of the misunderstanding in this story) is certainly just a coincidence.

Our thoughts: Rovell is kind of a tool (kind of?) and everyone knows this. Nice guy, maybe, but kind of a tool. My illuminating Rovell moment took place before last year’s Super Bowl. During a media session Rovell, then with CNBC, went around to different players on the New York Giants and New England Patriots and asked them elementary stock questions, questions such as, “Do you know what a P-to-E is?”

The laugh was supposed to be on the gridders. Nudge, nudge, they may be big, strong, wealthy athletes, but we all know more about the stock market than they do. The rub here, of course, is that Rovell understood/understands less about finance than any of the other CNBC anchors. And so it was “Squawk Box” co-host Joe Kernen who turned the tables on Darren by asking him, on-air and definitely unscripted, more sophisticated equities questions. Kernen may have come right out and said to Rovell (I seem to recall him doing this), “How does it feel?”

Tool Time

There was no amity in Kernen’s comments and you could tell that Kernen, and the rest of the CNBC on-air people, thought of Rovell as, at best, immature. At worst, dumb and insipid. I rather enjoyed the entire exchange.

All of which does not excuse Leitch for his anti-Rovell polemic yesterday. First, because as we can see from reading the two pieces, Leitch’s passion was motivated by vengeance. And, in truth, Rovell was only pointing out to his followers something that Leitch, who is at least as well-known as Rovell is, had foisted upon himself.

Second, because Leitch –and this is his longtime M.O., along with relying on unnamed sources to bolster his argument — does this “I’m a nice guy and I’m not about to say something mean or hurtful about anyone” schtick shortly before writing mean and hurtful things. He’s the Venomous Equivocator (“I can’t find a single person that likes Darren Rovell… that sounds harsh, but I don’t mean it personally”) I’d respect Leitch more if he just went 100% after Rovell without doing the whole, “but you seem like a decent enough guy in person.”

Like you, I enjoy much of Will Leitch’s writing. But I don’t respect him. I do respect Buzz Bissinger. I respect Buzz because he looked Will Leitch dead in the eye and said, “I gotta be honest: I think you’re full of shit.” Buzz said what he meant and meant what he said, directly to his subject. Is Will Leitch capable of that? Or is he guilty of the same thing of which he accused Rovell: “intellectual dishonesty?”

Starting Five

1. Taking care of business (and workin’ overtime). No. 11 Louisville and No. 25 Notre Dame went into overtime for the sixth time in their last eight meetings. As you know, the Fighting Irish prevailed in the fifth OT, 104-101. Notes:

— It marked the second time this academic year that the ranked Irish beat a ranked Cardinal(s) in overtime on campus. See: Stanford, October 13.

— Notre Dame reserve big man Garrick Sherman (who bears an uncanny likeness to the subject of the mosaic on the side of the Hesburgh Library) played 21 minutes and scored 17 points, with all of the latter coming after regulation. Sherman had played a total of 18 minutes in the previous six games.

Sherman resurrected Notre Dame’s hopes in overtime.

— Louisville led by eight points with 47 seconds remaining. Notre Dame guard Jerian Grant then scored 12 points in the final 45 seconds: three threes plus an and-one layup. Until that final minute Grant had not scored a field goal.

–Former Notre Dame coach Digger Phelps, who led the Irish to an upset of No. 1 UCLA back in January of 1974 to end the all-time longest winning streak in major sports history (88 games), was at the Purcell Center for ESPN’s College GameDay. Earlier that day Casey Murdoch, a Notre Dame senior majoring in finance, had made a half-court shot (on his second attempt). Murdoch banked it in and will now bank $18K.

–Referee John Gaffney subbed in for another official who was stranded in Providence due to the storm. Gaffney worked the DePaul-Marquette game in Milwaukee that began at 3 p.m., then made the four-hour trek to South Bend (we’re hoping he stopped at the McDonald’s service island on I-94) for the 9 p.m. start. We are unable to report if Gaffney himself whistled any traveling violations, or if he was cited for any during his commute.

2. LeBron is a Hot Hot Heat (For you crossover NBA/Canadian Indie band fans)

In the past week LeBron James, who already was the best basketball player on the planet, has taken his game to historic levels. King James scored 32 points on 12 of 18 shooting in Miami’s 107-97 defeat of the Kobes yesterday afternoon. It was James’ fifth consecutive game of scoring at least 30 while shooting above 60%, a feat that only two other players (Moses Malone and Adrian Dantley) have ever accomplished. Late in the contest LeBron stole an entry pass into the lane and began dribbling upcourt. By the time he reached midcourt with a full head of steam it was already “Get Outta The Way!” time. Poor Steve Nash. Twice in the fourth quarter he was the lone Laker back to absorb one of James’ dunks.

These are the Heat’s best uniforms, by the way.

3. Australian musician Gotye wins “Record of the Year” at the Grammys for “Somebody I Used To Know“, a song that Rolling Stone’s editors, in their infinite wisdom, failed to include in their “50 Best Songs of 2012.” Our opinion? It definitely falls somewhere in between the two assessments, with its Grammy nod being closer to its true value (even if he may have stolen the signature riff and more from Tom Petty’s “A Woman in Love”). Gotye, with an assist from Kimbra, nailed his performance on Saturday Night Live last spring.

4. The Christopher Dorner manhunt in southern California. In the snowy haven of the San Bernadino mountains, less than a two-hour drive (if there’s no traffic, which means at 4 a.m.) east of Los Angeles, a former LAPD officer is hiding out. Or is he? Dorner, who has already killed three in his rampage to exact vengeance on those who he blames for ending his career, could be anywhere. He has both military and police training and is an expert in survival. Authorities are offering a $1 million reward for information leading to his arrest.

Where will this end?

5. What is Pope Benedict XVI giving up for Lent? Apparently, his job. The last pope to resign, as opposed to dying on the job, was Gregory XII in the year 1415. As of this moment Jon Gruden is the favorite to succeed Benedict.

Reserves

Big Ten hoops: Three points and a cloud of Brust. Nearly as entertaining as Ben Brust’s 40-footer that sent the Michigan-Wisconsin game into overtime was the, ahem, badgering that Dan Dakich gave Bo Ryan about his failure to commit fouls-to-give in the play preceding that shot. Dakich ended his interrogation with a Champ Summers-like “I love you.”

Sunday morning SportsCenter. Bob Ley asks Screamin’ A. Smith, “Do the Knicks have enough to overtake the Heat?” Smith responds in his typical condescending tone, “That’s a simple answer: No.” Which would have been fine with Ley, except that Smith then proceeds to deliver a 90-second polemic on why the Knicks don’t have what it takes. When Screamin’ A finally pauses for air, Ley says with a smile on his face, “You said it was a simple answer, but thanks for the essay.”

Yesterday Michelle Beadle tweeted, “I love New York”, to which Doug Gottlieb replied, “I love lamp.” Brick Tamland and the rest of the Channel 4 Evening News salute you, Doug.

Starting Five

1. We are leaving this spot blank in honor of college basketball, whose No. 1-ranked schools appear only too eager to vacate this position. In the past five weeks Duke, Louisville, Duke again, Michigan and now Indiana have all lost when ranked No. 1 in the nation. The Hoosiers were outscored 13-2 in the final four minutes in Champaign and lost, 74-72, last night to the Illini.

But, to quote Bill Murray in “Meatballs”, “It just doesn’t matter!” Heck, Kansas, another former No. 1 who on Wednesday lost to Big 12 bottom-dweller TCU, could lose to NIU, the Topeka YMCA and to the first team Dr. Naismith (who was not a MEDICAL doctor, but whatevs) ever put on the floor (back in Springfield) and the Jayhawks would still qualify for the NCAA Tournament’s 68-team field.

Tripper Harrison would not be flummoxed by a February loss

2. South Dakota State’s Nate Wolters scores 53 points, the most prolific outburst of the D-I season (in fact, the highest scoring output since 2009), in an 80-74 victory. The performance by the  Jackrabbit guard, who drained nine threes, is even more impressive when you consider that he did it against Indiana Purdue-Fort Wayne, which is like, what, three schools?

Imagine how many more points Wolters might have scored were he not wearing a skirt

3. To paraphrase Stefon, “This New York Post cover story has EVERYTHING: a suicidal George Washington Bridge leaper (making the jump on her 22nd birthday), a villainess with a Van in her surname (Victoria Van Thunen), a nasty Facebook post that may have incited the leap, a boy toy at the center of the love triangle with an Aryan name (Drew Heissenbuttel!), a suicide note in which the victim –Ashley Riggitano — forbids five of her friends to attend her funeral (Snap!) and, of course, a vintage NY Post hed: “Leaping Beauty.”

4. I’ve rarely –okay, I’ve never — sided with the Ku Klux Klan on anything, but I’m with them on this one. Three Memphis parks are being renamed in an effort by the city to distance itself from its Confederate past. The parks’ names are not even racist (e.g., Forrest Park is being renamed Health Sciences Park…yawn), but a nine-member city council voted 9-0 in favor of changing the names.

The Civil War, slavery, racism, etc., all of it is woven into the fabric of the South. You couldn’t have “To Kill A Mockingbird”, for example, without racism.  The names of the parks are not in themselves racist (It’s not as if any of them are named “Fighting Irish” park, after all), so I’m not sure where the pain is coming from.

 The Klan being the Klan, of course, they are planning on staging a rally to protest. Oh, and the “Exalted Cyclops” (wasn’t he in those Sinbad movies I saw as a lad? Or is that someone’s pet name for his…never mind…) is planning to attend. Guys, just make sure that the eye holes in your hoods are properly spaced.

5. So, Sports Illustrated went to Antarctica for its 2013 swimsuit issue. Let the record reflect that your “humble” author was the first SI staffer to set foot on the continent at the bottom of the earth.

My good friend Scott Dvorak, who won the 1997 edition of The Last Marathon in Antarctica.