Starting Five

1. Defense. Determination. D-Wade.

Whoa.

The Heat led 88-81 early in the fourth quarter. The outcome was still in the balance. Then Dwyane Wade stole a worrisome cross-court pass from Danny Green and took it back the other way for a jam. And suddenly the game was over. Heat, 109-93.

Miami outscored San Antonio 28-17 in the fourth quarter, with their Trio Grande of Wade, LeBron James and Chris Bosh responsible for 25 of the 28. Bosh played his best game of the series, scoring 20 points and outhustling everyone for loose balls and down low. James had 33 and Wade, in vintage ’06 mode, had 32.

The defense was superb and I do believe that right about now Tiago Splitter could use a hug.

Jeff Van Gundy said that Manu Ginobili needs to start playing like Manu Ginobili, but you wonder if that choo choo has left the station. At one point in the second half Ginobili flashed a vision of old, driving to the hoop and then no-look passing to Tim Duncan, who then had his shot blocked by James.

That Heat team, when it shows up and plays like this, cannot be beat. Miami simply has a greater upside than San Antonio. The question is, Can they summon it twice more?

“I guess there’s only one way to find out,” said Wade afterward, smiling. “See you Sunday…well, I’ll see you before Sunday, but you know what I mean.”

2. The National League: No Longer Latos Intolerant

Unbeaten Mat Latos took the hill at Wrigley Field for the Cincinnati Reds yesterday afternoon. The vendors at Wrigley ought to sell Reds gear, since Cincy had won 12 straight there. Latos (6-0), left with a one-run lead in the top of the seventh, but the five-plus hour game was just getting started. Chicago would win in 14 innings, as Red manager Dusty Baker never brought in his closer, Aroldis Chapman, and Joey Votto struck out twice in extra innings, three times overall. Latos is still unbeaten –he got a No Decision –but the Reds bullpen has already blown five saves for him this season…

3. From Mat to Matt…

Continuing on the subject of unbeaten NL pitchers, the Mess’ Matt Harvey (5-0) got the start for a matinee at Citi Field against baseball’s best team, the St. Louis Cardinals. Had it been a night game it would have been torrential downpour-ed out, but instead Harvey had to face the Cardinal lineup well aware that he’d likely get just one run of support. He failed to get even that, leaving after seven innings trailing 1-0 in a contest the abysmal Mess eventually lost, 2-1 (the tying run was on third in the bottom of the ninth when Josh Satin struck out to end the game).

How frustrated must Harvey be? In the 7th inning, with the Mess trailing 1-0, two outs and a runner on second, St. Louis intentionally walked Kirk Niewenhuis, an .083 hitter, to get to Harvey’s spot in the batting order. Met manager Terry Collins lifted Harvey, who actually has a better batting average, .138, for pinch-hitter Josh Turner…who grounded out to end the threat. Next time, Skip, let Harvey hit.

The line on Harvey: It was his first loss in his past 15 starts. In his past 10 starts, Harvey, whose ERA is 2.04, is 1-1 thanks to the Mess scoring a total of 18 runs for him in those 10 starts. The All-Star Game is at Citi Field this July and Harvey will certainly pitch at some point in the contest. It’ll be a strange, new experience for him: pitching for a lineup that can actually hit

4. Opening Today….

Not opening today? This…

…or this…

…or this…

5. Incendiary and Hypocritical Big-Time College Athletics Quote of the Week

University of Pittsburgh Athletic Director Steve Pederson, after Vanderbilt basketball player Sheldon Jeter was denied by Commodore coach Kevin Stallings in his appeal to transfer to Pitt: “There ought to be some rationale for leaving. That’s where we’ve gotten a little tighter in terms of talking about departures. This shouldn’t be just free agency and when you want to leave you just leave.”

Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat?

A) Keep in mind, this was the Pitt A.D., not the Vanderbilt A.D., saying this. The A.D. at the school to which Jeter wants to jump.

B) You can cue up the mental leap of every columnist in the nation faster than Ray Ratto can reach for a chocolate glazed on this one: Student-athletesc cannot play the free agency game but coaches can? What is the rationale for Chip Kelly leaving Oregon for the Philadelphia Eagles? More money and/or greater opportunities. Why can’t student-athletes play that card?

C) Important to remember: Jeter may still transfer to Pitt, no matter what Kevin Stallings decrees. He just may pay his own tuition the first academic year. Either way he was going to have to sit out a year. It’s up to him whether transferring to Pitt is worth one year’s tuition. Of course, he can always ask the students he takes classes with if they think it has a value-add prospect.

Reserves

“The Oakland Athletics are the hottest team in baseball.”

I’m sorry, but don’t we seem to read that headline at some point in the season every year (I’ll check with Aaron Sorkin and Michael Lewis)? Anyway, the A’s really are, as they’ve won 20 of 25 and are coming off a sweep of the New York Yankees in Oakland. Oh, and guess what? They have a bunch of renegades and mavericks with bizarre facial hair and are a loose bunch. Because no one have ever seen that before.

My question: Why do we refer to the Athletics as the “A’s” and the Orioles as the “O’s” but never the Indians as the “I’s? I wondered this on Twitter and someone replied, “I’ve always just referred to the Indians as ‘terrible.’ ”

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Two (more) cents on Eddie Vanderdoes:

Was there ever a single moment in the last month, the last few, where Vanderdoes expressed either remorse or frustration that his “extenuating family health circumstances” were going to prevent him from matriculating at Notre Dame? I’m trying to put myself in this young man’s exceptionally large shoes. Say that you truly wanted to attend the school with which you signed, but a family situation at home was creating a conflict. You think there might be some public expression of being tortured.

Instead, we seem to have a young man who has already located a new haven. And who now wants his school of first choice to accommodate him because that would just be more convenient.

The argument in favor of Vanderdoes from my detractors in Twitter seems to be…

1) Give the kid a break. He’s a kid.

2) Notre Dame sucks. So whatever side Notre Dame is on, I’ll take the other side.

3) In any conflict between student-athlete and major university, I’ll take the former.

4) So it’s okay for a coach to leave a program without consequence, but not a kid?

My points:

— Eddie Vanderdoes, and every other high school football recruit, signs an NLI with a school, not a coach. The coach may be a big reason why he chooses that institution, but the coach is not paying his scholarship. He’d do well to remember that.

–There are terms of a contract. Had Brian Kelly bolted, he would’ve owed Notre Dame a buyout. All Notre Dame –or Florida State, in the case with Matt Thomas — is doing is holding Vanderdoes to the terms with which he agreed, to a contract he signed under no duress.

— Notre Dame has at least the grounds to be skeptical as to why Vanderdoes truly wants out of his contract. And, like Vanderdoes, they have an entity to protect. Just as Vanderdoes has the right to act in his best interests, so do they. Particularly if they followed through with their terms of the agreement.

–We’d all love a break sometimes. Life isn’t kindergarten, though. The sooner you learn that, the better.

–UCLA just offered an 8th-grade quarterback from Texas, Lindell Stone, a scholarship. Of course, it’s meaningless: UCLA can change its mind at any moment and Stone is still four years away from being able to contractually commit. But maybe, just maybe, an argument can be made that Jim Mora is going to hyper-aggressively attempt to out-recruit crosstown rival Lane Kiffin and USC. And maybe, just maybe, if he saw the tiniest aperture of opportunity to keep the top defensive lineman in-state the past few months, well, maybe he jumped at that chance. Just a thought…