Starting Five

1. Johnny Bye Bye?

Bargain hunters, take note: An autographed Johnny Manziel flipcup can be yours for just $5.

Visit eBay right now and you will espy (the verb, not the noun) more than 200 items signed by Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Johnny Manziel (to be fair, there are nearly as many such trinekts signed by defensive end Jadeveon Clowney of South Carolina). The Texas A&M triggerman put his Johnny Hancock to photos, footballs, a jersey and even an Aggie helmet or two ($1,015). The NCAA is investigating Johnny B. Goodtimes to determine whether or not he personally profited from ever having lent his signature to these trinkets. If he did, Manziel could be ruled ineligible for an undetermined period of time.

The sports books in Las Vegas have taken the September contest in which Alabama visits College Station (only the most anticipated game of the season) off the books. Always listen to the sports books –that’s like, Rule No. 2 after “Gravity always wins.”

The last SEC QB whose extracurricular shenanigans transformed him into an icon. The difference being that he was already in the NFL.

Items:

1) The Joy Behar Response: “So what who cares?” Manziel is clearly a marketable commodity whose value far exceeds his full scholarship et al. at Texas A&M. Even if Manziel made up to $1,00o selling autographs, he’d put more on black at a roulette table. This is a nontroversy. Let the market determine his value, is one school of thought.

2) On the other hand, there are approximately 10,000 young men on scholarship playing FBS football. The moment you allow Johnny Manziel to be paid for his signature is the moment you open a bidding war on all of their services. Again, many fans and observers will say, “Fine. Let that happen.” Obviously, most players will remain more than happy just to be on a full ride. Some schools will happily play the “bag man” role. Many already do. Have you SEEN Oregon’s new facilities? Others may stop and say, “This is where we are jumping off the train.”

3) In order to have a black market, you need high demand + regulations. See: marijuana. Or college football. There’s high demand for players coupled with NCAA rules that unrealistically put a ceiling on their market value. Johnnny Manziel, hence, is nothing more than a symptom.

2. Less Jason Sudeikis, Please

How many wolf packs does Ed Helms belong to, anyway?

You’re supposed to be all agog over this new Mumford & Sons video because in place of Marcus Mumford & The Pips we have the Jasons, Bateman and Sudeikis, Dr. Faggot (Ed Helms), and MacGruber (Will Forte).

Me, I am reminded of a scene from the 1998 HBO film “The Rat Pack”. I believe Sammy Davis, Jr. (Don Cheadle), asks Dean Martin (Joe Montegna), in a candid moment in a Vegas hotel lobby, why they’re so popular. At that moment a woman passes by and Martin simply emotes, “Ha!” The woman laughs hysterically. And Martin just looks at Davis as if to say, “It’s past the point where we actually need to be entertaining. Our celebrity, sadly, is what intoxicates the masses.”

As for Sudeikis, he has crossed over into that dark side where few comedians truly want to tread: being ESPN’s funny guy. But he’s also doing EPL spots for NBCSports (thanks, Gene). And promoting “We’re The Millers”, in which he stars with Jennifer Aniston.

When did “engaged to Olivia Wilde” cease being to be enough?

3. “How do you get to Uganda?” “Practice.”

Alison Pill rocking the “Bonnie Franklin-meets-coke-addled-McKenzie Phillips” look and taking it one day at a time.

Precious few pop culture references in last night’s episode of “The Newsroom”, which was Maggie Jordan’s moment. Not on Maggie’s playlist: “Africa”, by Toto or “Under African Skies” by Paul Simon.

1) “And some walls”

Grace Gummer (Streep 2.0) makes this request as she, Jim and Stillman Frank check into a Radisson and must share a room. Maybe it’s just a line about needing walls, or maybe it’s a reference to “It Happened One Night”, a seminal and classic road film from the 1934 starring Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert in which the two bantering buddies must share a hotel room each night. The pair would erect a sheet to hang from the ceiling to the floor in between their twin beds and refer to it as “The Walls of Jericho,” which itself is an Old Testament reference, which I’m just not up to explaining at the moment.

Also in this scene, Jim delivers the “and Vassar versa” line, which Sorkin just could not resist using. Gummer, by the way, is herself a Vassar alumna.

2) “I can’t just ignore evidence; it’s not like I’m Congress”

McKenzie McHale is directly referring to the unraveling onion that is the Genoa story, but the cultural reference is to pretty much the last five years of our House of Representatives and Senate.

3) “It was good and then I saw ‘Titanic’ for the first time …the title suggested that it wasn’t gonna end well…”

I’m beginning to dig the Macallan 55 level of dryness that Sloan Sabbith applies to her lines. As my friend Mark Beech once intoned, “Ship crashes into world’s largest metaphor.” I believe it was Beech. Anyway, he’s the world’s most ardent defender of “Titanic”, even if a character from 1912 did use the terms “masters of the universe.”

4) “This is the house on East 88th Street…”

Don’t you love how Aaron Sorkin understands that we all have access to Google –even that dude from Pakistan whose village may or may not have been exposed to Sarin gas — and so he does not feel the obligation to spoon-feed us? Maggie reads a children’s book to an African boy at an orphanage –who will later take a bullet for her (it seems a lot of males do that for Maggie) — multiple times, but we never explicitly learn the name of the book.

The book in question is (drumroll, please) “The House on East 88th Street”, a book by Bernard Waber that was written in 1962. It was the first in the “Lyle the Crocodile” series.

4. Suspension. Of Disbelief.

So, within hours Alex Rodriguez will be suspended for the remainder of the 2013 season and then for all of the 2014 season. And only hours after that, he could very well be taking the field for the Yankees for the first time this season when they visit the Chicago White Sox, who have lost 10 in a row. Because baseball will allow A-Rod to appeal the suspension, and he may play pending the outcome of the appeal.

Somehow we think that this being the 34th anniversary of the death of former Yankee captain and catcher Thurman Munson may get overlooked.

5. During the Flood

The Beaverhead River when calm…

Here’s a pretty amazing story of survival out of Montana, where Christi Skelton took on a raging river and lived to tell about it.

…and during July’s flash flood.

XXX

Starting Five

1. “Day After Day, Alone on a Hill….”

Harvey, like other pitchers, wishes he could active a “bat signal” for his teammates on game day.

Yesterday afternoon Matt Harvey of the New York Mess, who has the lowest WHIP (Walks plus Hits divided by Innings Pitched) in the history of Major League Baseball after 31 starts, took the mound in Miami to face the Marlins. Harvey began the game with five scoreless innngs of work, bringing his total to 22 consecutive such innings since the All-Star break.

However, he would lose, 3-0, after one bad inning.

Harvey has the second-best WHIP (0.88) in baseball this season, as well as the second-best ERA (2.21), but the Mess have scored one run or fewer in five of his starts. He has 12 no-decisions in 22 starts, primarily because his teammates think of his starts as the Sabbath. And not the Sloane Sabbith. If Harvey is not the best pitcher in baseball, he certainly is the best pitcher in baseball with an 8-3 record.

Chris Sale: Baseball’s premier pitcher with a 6-11 record.

Misery loves company, and Harvey has plenty of it. Chris Sale of the White Sox who, like Harvey, was an All-Star a few weeks ago, is in the top 20 in both WHIP and ERA. But Chicago has failed to score a single run in three of his past six starts. No pitcher in all of baseball gets less run support (2.55 per game), which may be why Sale is 6-11 while fellow A.L. Central pitcher Max Scherzer of the Detroit Tigers, who has a worse ERA but receives the MOST run support of any pitcher in baseball (6.14), has baseball’s best record (15-1).

Clayton Kershaw, Dodgers. Leads the majors in BOTH ERA (1.87) and WHIP (0.86) but is only 10-6 as only four pitchers — of 92 listed– receive worse run support. Two nights ago Kershaw and Yankee ace Hiroki Kuroda (6th in ERA, 10th in WHIP) threw seven scoreless innings versus one another. Neither got a decision.

Kershaw. Baseball’s top pitcher, period. But only 4 pitchers receive less support. Will win the Sigh Young Award.

And finally, there is Felix Hernandez of Seattle, the Barry Sanders of baseball. Three years ago King Felix, or as a reader of Bill Simmons once dubbed him, “F-Her”, won the Cy Young Award –deservedly so –with a 13-12 record. Last night Hernandez, who has the fourth-best ERA in baseball, allowed one run through seven innings at Fenway Park against the team with the best record in the American League, the Red Sox (66-44). He left with a 7-1 lead, but the Mariners allowed six runs in the ninth to lose, 8-7. And squander what should have been a sure W for Hernandez (11-4).

F-Her? You can imagine that Harvey, Sale, Kershaw and Hernandez, all of whom are stoic in clubhouse interviews afterward but none of whom will come close to sniffing a 20-win season, often think of their teammates and mutter, “F them.”

2. First Date: She Fell, But Not For Him

Rosoff

Comely brunette Jennifer Rosoff, 35, invited Stephen Close back to her 17th-floor apartment after their first date two nights ago. She poured herself a drink and lit a cigarette, then leaned back against the metal railing of her balcony, which alarmed Close, also 35.

“You know, you shouldn’t do that,” Close reportedly told her.

“I do it all the time,” Rosoff, a media ad executive at an internet startup, replied.

Close told police that he then heard two sharp pops. The railing gave way, and Rosoff plummeted 17 stories to her death.

Gravity. Still undefeated.

3. “And Now, For An Incredibly Awkward Segue…”

To speak in terms that our demographic can best understand, the DJIA has a boner.

One thing that is not plummeting (wait? what!?!) is the stock market. The Dow Jones Industrial Average struck an all-time high yesterday, closing at 15,628. The economy may be in disarray –if you watch Fox News –but somehow this major indicator of economic growth has never been more robust.

Then again, when the Fed continues quantitative easing (QE) with no signs of abatement, well, let’s just say the our economy is in its steroid era. The government is literally pumping money into banks. The Fed is Biogenesis.

One example of the Dow’s vitality: Yesterday, Sprouts Farmers Market (SFM), a Phoenix-based natural and organic foods retailer, issued an Initial Public Offering (IPO). The stock opened at $18 per share and closed trading at $40.11 per share, a 123% gain (and I’d like to thank those friends of mine who apprised me of SFM’s IPO after trading began).

Meanwhile, fast-food workers at McDonald’s, Wendy’s and other chains are contemplating a nationwide strike in order to earn more than their $7.25 per hour minimum wage. McDonald’s, for one, made $5.5 BILLION (that’s “b” as in “burger”) in profit last year and saw its stock price soar more than 10%. That’s fantastic news if you’re a millionaire investor looking for a safe haven for your currency stockpile. The bad news is that most people earning $7.25 per hour lack discretionary income to invest in the market.

As John Oliver reports on The Daily Show, there’s a lot of people out there who don’t really care. And most of them appear on air at Fox. Tracy Byrnes, for example, who is shown saying, “The goal in life is not to be on minimum wage forever….this notion that we’re gonna keep raising (the minimum wage) just to share the wealth because, well, we’re almost socialists anyway at this point, is ridiculous…” Kudos to the The Daily Show staff for then plumbing a three year-old on-air comment by Burns who scolds a guest about taxes on the wealthy by saying, “$250,000 is not rich. You’ve lived in this city long enough. It is not rich. It is actually, close to poverty.”

Byrnes: Can likely be heard discussing her apathy toward the middle class over glasses of Prosecco at Cipriani.

So if you’ve dozed off during this item, a recap: A Fox anchor is scolding minimum wage earners on one hand who yearn to earn $10 per hour (that’s $400 per week for a 40-hour week, which is basically what you’d earn via unemployment, so…WHY EVEN WORK!?!?) while attempting to sell the idea that earning $250,000 per year (or, $120 per hour) is “close to poverty” when it comes to asking the wealthiest few percent to pay their share of the tax burden.

It’s a great economy. If you are already wealthy. For the rest of America, it blows.

Oh, and there’s a Wendy’s and a Burger King directly below the NewsCorp Building on 49th St. and Sixth Avenue. If I were Tracy Byrnes I’d avoid those for, like, eternity.

4. “And Now, For a Less Awkward Segue…”

Shanghai Tower: Reportedly both tornado- and Godzilla-proof.

Speaking of things that keep going up (okay, that’s better), how about buildings that aspire for their spires to be the world’s tallest. The Shanghai Tower, which will be the world’s second-tallest building at 632 meters (2,073 feet, or nearly seven football fields tall), topped out today. It still needs to be completed, but the 121-story tower has reached its apex.

Of course, the world’s tallest structure remains the Burj Khalifa Tower in Dubai (for the record, it is not black and yellow), which stands 828 meters (2,716 feet, or about 905 yards, or more than anyone on Notre Dame will rush for this season) and is 124 stories. It opened in 2010.

Burj Khalifa: Man’s greatest monument to overcompensation.

How long will Burj Khalifa be the world’s tallest, though? And will Shanghai Tower even be the tallest edifice in China a year from today? Last week builders broke ground on Sky City, a planned 838-meter (2,749 feet) structure in the central Chinese city of Changha (me neither). The most incredible aspect of this project, perhaps, is that builders expect it to be completed in 10 months, which is less time than it takes most contractors to renovate your kitchen.

Artist’s rendering of Sky City: The Chinese are doing for skyscrapers what they once did for walls.

No shortage of Babel-like structures being erected, and most of them in Asia. So apparently The Fountainhead is available in Farsi and Mandarin?

5. And Now, For a Somewhat Contrived Segue

Nanga Parbat: World’s highest mass murder crime scene.

Speaking of lofty summits in Asia (were we?), earlier this summer –in fact, on the Summer Solstice — the Pakistani peak Nanga Parbat, the western anchor of the Himalayas and the worlds’ ninth-tallest peak at 26,660 feet, was the site of a grisly massacre of climbers. A group of men bearing knives and Russian-made Kafelnikov rifles invaded a base camp and, announcing themselves as Taliban and Al Qaeda, murdered 11 people at the 13,000-foot elevation base camp.

None of the victims were American-born (one was a naturalized citizen from China), which may be why the story escaped your (my) notice. However, Men’s Journal  has an in-depth report in its current issue, thanks in part to the fact that one man from the party survived.

Reserves

There’s not much we’d want to give Aaron Hernandez credit for this summer, but thanks to his jailhouse letter yesterday, let’s credit him with introducing the term “down talkers” into the lexicon. Oh, and please keep this off social media.

Aaron’s spelling is actually quite good (except for “thru” and “through” but we will exonerate him of that).

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Six unknown white guys performing the year’s best song a cappella.

Four unknown black guys performing the year’s best song acoustically.

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The point worth making about Riley Cooper, and I believe my friend Bomani Jones and others may have made it yesterday: A culture that itself uses a term so profligately and ubiquitously, no matter the intention, as African-Americans use “nigger” and “nigga”, begins to forfeit some of its right to be offended when others use it as well. It’s a little like alcohol: If it’s okay for everyone 21 and over to imbibe, just how outraged are we allowed to be at the idea of 20 year-0lds (and Heisman Trophy-winning ones, at that) following suit?

You can argue that Cooper used the epithet in its most disgusting fashion, spoken with malice and hostility and even racism. You may be correct. But in a moment that was likely fueled by both anger and booze, Cooper’s remark was, for me, less scandalous than if a completely sober CEO had used it during a meeting with his Board of Directors.

It was a stupid and vile thing to say. I still find Tracy Byrnes more offensive.

Phil Sheridan of the Philadelphia Inquirer does not agree. He believes that the Eagles would have been justified in going so far as to release Cooper.

One thing I did not know: the other dude in the video is Eagle teammate Jason Kelce, who tries in vain to placate Cooper. Kelce has a beard and can be seen early on, with his left arm on Cooper’s shoulder.

*****

“A Long, Long Time Ago…at Band Camp”

Not particularly tied to this date, but because I heard the song,  not just a classic but arguably one of the top ten pop songs ever written, the other day. Have you ever really listened to the lyrics in Don McLean’s 1971 hit “American Pie” and wondered just how many references were soaring over your head? This site may tell you more than you actually want to know.

Starting Five

1. Bud Selig channels Glenn Shorrock, lead singer for The Little River Band, by telling A-Rod’s peeps, “I want to make you understand/I’m talking about a lifetime ban….”

A-Rod: From “storied” to “steroid”

We’ll go dancing in the dark.

Being banned from parks.

And reminiscing.

You have to be impressed with the work that kitty cat does in this video.

Soooooooo, New York Yankee third baseman Alex Rodriguez is getting a taste of what it’s like to be Texas congresswoman Wendy Davis this week. It’s as if MLB and Bud Selig are telling him, “Pal, THIS is the outcome we want. All that’s left is for us to figure out the most plausible way to manipulate the “rules” (ha ha ha) in order to make that happen.”

Baseball –and George Costanza’s former employers, who are into him for $86 million from 2014-2017 — simply want A-Rod to go away. At the very least, they want to make an example of the three-time AL MVP who once seemed destined to break Barry Bonds’ Hank Aaron’s home run record. To that end, they are threatening him with a lifetime ban unless A-Rod, who turned 38 last Saturday, agrees to a lengthy suspension. Probably more than a year.

Baseball is telling A-Rod: If you want to prolong our drug investigation, then we’ll just invoke Article XII (B) of the Collective Bargaining Agreement, which states: “Players may be disciplined for just cause for conduct that is materially detrimental or materially prejudicial to the best interests of baseball, including, but not limited to, engaging in conduct in violation of federal, state or local law.”

In other words, as the USA Today reports, by not confessing to drug usage A-Rod is guilty of lying to baseball and sabotaging its investigation, which is itself a violation of the CBA.

Bras are optional at Camp Funtime (good news for Shea Allen)

Let’s end this item the same way we commenced it: With a 1978 pop song that aptly describes A-Rod’s plight. Deborah Harry, the floor is yours (was there ever a more beautiful female lead singer, by the way?)

2. Summer of Stupid (cont.): Tough Mudder F*&%$#!!!!!

In the words of Tommy Callahan, “That’s gonna leave a mark.”

Some day we will look back upon the Tough Mudder/Warrior Dash Era of American participatory athletic events and ask ourselves why masochism seemed so cool. Whither our guilt? Until that time, enjoy this video of a Tough Mudder racer in Buffalo, N.Y., (Is there another Buffalo?) being strangled and briefly suspended in mid-air by a wire which might have been carrying up to 10,000 volts of electricity.

What’s next, after physical torture? Emotional torture? How about a race in which midway through you must sit on a chaise and tell a psychologist embarrassing stories about junior high dating and what your uncle did to you when no one was looking? I’d just call it “Anguish.”

And may the odds be ever in your favor.

Anyway, let’s face it: If they actually created a Hunger Games-type event in which the winner earned even as little as $10,000, there’d be a mass wave of entrants. Wait. The CW already has done this, sort of.

3. “I’ll Take ‘2008 University of Florida Receivers’ for $200, Alex.”

Cooper and Tebow, when life was easier.

I recommend you read this item while listening to country recording star Brad Paisley’s “Accidental Racist.”

Former Gator tight end Aaron Hernandez, 34 receptions in 2008, a season in which the Urban Meyer-coached and Tim Tebow-led University of Florida won the national championship, is the most notorious sports story of the summer, if not all of 2013.

Former Gator flanker/all-purpose back Percy Harvin, a team-leading 40 catches in ’08, was the most prized offseason acquisition in the NFL, as the Seattle Seahawks pried him away from Minnesota for three draft picks. They promptly awarded him a five-year contract extension that includes $25 million in guarantees. Former teammate Adrian Peterson, who someday could become the NFL’s all-time leading rusher, called Harvin “the best all around player I ever seen.”

Harvin will likely miss most, if not all, of this season after undergoing hip surgery.

And then there’s Riley Cooper, who tied for fourth on the team in receptions with 18. Cooper was also Tim Tebow’s roommate. Recently, Cooper did at least three stupid things, four if you hate country music:

1) He attended a Kenny Chesney concert clad in a sleeveless flannel shirt (“Sun’s out, guns out”… uh, that’s just a figure of speech, Mr. Hernandez).

2) He uttered a racial slur, using the N-word (“I will jump that fence and fight every nigger here, bro”).

3) He uttered a racial slur while someone was videotaping him with a smart phone.

Fall out?

A) Marcus Vick, younger brother of Philadelphia Eagle QB Michael Vick, offered $1K bounty (money, presumably, that he will borrow from his big brother) on Twitter to any safety who lights up Cooper this season: “Hey I’m putting a bounty on Riley’s head. 1k to the first Free Safety or Strong safety that light his ass up! Wake him up please”

B) Cooper will not host next year’s BET Awards.

C) People may begin to have honest discussions about the N-word. Granted, as the video shows, Cooper utters the term with hostility and hatred on his mind. He is the Paula Dean of the NFL right now. But this is hardly the worst thing a member of the 2008 UF receiver corps has done this summer. Just ask Odin Lloyd.

Sleeveless flannel, shades above forehead, and use of “bro.” There’s just so much shame in one moment.

Enter any NFL locker room, or New York City subway, or hip-hop recording studio, and you will hear the word “nigger” or its variation “nigga”, spoken every day. The difference is that it is mostly uttered by African-Americans, and half the time it is simply a substitute for “dumbass.”

But that’s not how Cooper meant it. He most likely meant it in the way that Chris Rock defined the term in arguably his most brilliant monologue.

D) “Riley Cooper” will be a lyric in a rap or hip-hop song by week’s end.

E) Cooper at least had the good sense to own up to his failure. There was no attempt –Congressmen, please pay attention — to blame his actions on something or someone else. Because if he had attempted that, every fellow NFL player would have stood up and said, “Nigger Child, please.”

4. “Who Can Take a Rainbow/Wrap It In a Sigh…”

Hellooooooo, Newman.

Phoenix police proudly announce the apprehension of Jordan Newman, a.k.a. “The Candy Man” thief, who is accused of stealing more than $2,900 worth of candy bars from area (from “participating”) Circle-K convenience stores in the Valley of the Sun. I’m sure there’s a joke to be made about police searching his cavities for evidence. I’m assuming that bail will be set at $100,000 (please, hold your snickers to a minimum).

Also, this is not Newman’s arrest, but here’s a pic of a Phoenix policeman tackling another area candy burglar. The ACC promptly ejected the officer for the remainder of the game for aiming too high.

Todd Graham has offered this policeman a full ride

5. This is exactly why the Shakespearian line, “First thing we do…let’s kill all the lawyers” has survived nearly five centuries.

San Diego native Stephanie Seymour: Because did anybody really want to see a photo of Bob Filner?

An attorney for San Diego mayor Bob Filner, who was groping for some type of sustainable defense of his groping-addicted client, is blaming the city of San Diego for not providing Filner with adequate sexual harassment training. My suggestion is that Filner be sent directly to a communal prison cell at San Quentin for one week to better understand just what sexual harassment –and worse– really is.

This is the Lance Armstrong defense: It’s not my fault, it’s the fault of the people I work for not stopping me from committing these heinous acts. This is exactly the quality we look for in a leader.

Reserves

Last Friday night the Hudson River, an estuary whose tides run in opposite directions, was the site of a pair of tragedies. If you follow the news at all, you probably heard plenty about one of them. It made the Today show, after all.

Not far from the Tappan Zee Bridge, some 20 miles north of Manhattan, a speed boat filled with a group of friends struck a barge. A 30 year-old bride-to-be and the best man in the wedding were both ejected from the boat and their bodies were later recovered.

It was an unmitigated tragedy and, as the parents of the young woman were quoted as saying in a statement released yesterday, “We are devastated by the irreparable damage that has been done to the lives of so many. None of our lives will ever be the same.”e

God bless those poor people. They described themselves as “shattered”, and I’m sure that they are.

As I said, there were a pair of tragedies on the Hudson last Friday night. Walking along the riverside park on their way home after their shift at a restaurant where I work – situated along the Hudson  — friends enjoyed the great view and the warm night. One of them made a decision that ultimately cost him his life. It was a fateful choice made by a vigorous and strong young man who, like many who fit that description, likely thought of himself as somewhat invincible. He was swept away by the tide. His body was ultimately found three days later.

How we lost our friend, Marco, who received barely a fraction of the press that the aforementioned party did, other than a disdainful item in the New York Post, matters little to us now. All we know is that we miss him. Profoundly. Marco was a tall, handsome 28 year-old Mexican immigrant who always wore a smile. He was one of our food runners, which is arguably the most demanding and stressful job at our high-volume outdoor eatery.

That young people will die suddenly and unexpectedly is a fact of life. That we lost one of our favorite and most beloved co-workers is not simply a banal trope, but the absolute truth. Marco was a lesson for all of us — and not about the effects of just one decision. No, Marco’s lesson was that if you greet everyone with a smile and if you work hard that you will enhance the lives of everyone around you.

We will miss you, Marco. We already do. Thank you for being a part of our lives.