STARTING FIVE

 

1 Her Name is Rio…

Neymar is hardly the only Brazilian striker to look out for. Subway employees in Sao Paolo, where today’s opening match will be played, were on strike until just last night. Meanwhile in Rio de Janeiro, airport employees chose to stage a 24-hour work stoppage. The U.S. even canceled a closed-door friendly versus Belgium in Sao Paolo this week simply due to the choking traffic.

Like you, I’m really going to enjoy watching the World Cup from my living room and various bars. It all kicks off with ESPN’s coverage at 3 p.m. (the match starts at 4) of host Brasil, which has won more World Cups than anyone (five) versus Croatia, which has cool kits and an underrated squad.

This paragraph from Paul Heyward in The Telegraph encapsulates Brasil’s history completely and concisely:

Brazil’s leadership of world football is easily expressed. Most participations (19), most goals (210), most consecutive wins (11, from 2002‑2006), most consecutive matches with goals scored (18) and, crucially, most victories in the tournament. Their five triumphs in 1958, 1962, 1970, 1994 and 2002 have just about erased the trauma of 1950, when the Selecao lost 2-1 to Uruguay at the Maracana and Brazilians spent the days and weeks that followed “drenched in pain”.

While you wait, this McDonald’s soccer ad, a marriage of the Dude Perfect style and Brasil, is righteous.

And here, from Fox Soccer, Top 10 World Cup moments.

2. Oops, I Did It Again

Really, Yoenis Cespedes? For the second time in as many nights, the A’s left-fielder misplayed a base hit sprayed in his direction, allowing an Angel to foolishly attempt to extend the fun for an extra base. And for the second night, that didn’t work out so well for the Anaheimians….Anaheimites…Anaeheimers. This time the rube was former National League MVP Albert Pujols, who –WHAT WERE YOU THINKING!?! –yearned for his double to become a triple. Wasn’t even close.

3.  Sweep–and Swede- Relief

Let’s face it: Henrik Lundqvist is a name that befits a king, if not a King. Last night at Madison Square Garden the New York Ranger’s Swedish tender of goals warded off all pretenders to the throne, thwarting 40 shots as the blue shirts staved off (because no one ever staves on) a sweep in the Stanley Cup finals.

New York led 2-0 midway through the second period and then just stopped attacking the net. Even though they’d blown two-goal leads in Games 1 and 2. The Rangers took just one shot –ONE!– on goal in the third period to the Kings’ 15. For the game, L.A. outshot NY 41-19, but Lundqvist, with a little help from some chewed up ice late in the third period, denied them.

The last time a team has rebounded from a 3-0 deficit to win the Stanley Cup? The Toronto Maple Leafs in 1942.

4. Finn-ish Line

The NCAA Track & Field Championships got underway yesterday from Eugene, Ore. The Duck women, by the way, have finished second four times in the past five years. And they might be a favorite this spring if the best high school middle-distance runner anyone had seen in decades, Mary Cain, chosen last spring to attend Oregon.

Instead, Cain, a Bronxville, N.Y., native, turned pro but lives in Oregon.

So the most astounding middle-distance runner at the meet, where the women’s 10,000-meter final will be run tonight, is Michigan frosh Erin Finn (granted, Cain runs shorter distances, such as the 1500). She already holds Wolverine records at 5,000 (15:26)and 10,000 (32:41) in her first season and the West Bloomfield, Mich., native was named the Outstanding Athlete at the Big Ten Championships. Fifteen years from now, Finn is going to own her local 5-K fun runs.

Finn’s main competition will be Elinor Kirk, a 25 year-old Brit who attends UAB and has the best time (32:17) of anyone in this race.

5. Nicole and Ron

Tomorrow marks the 20th anniversary of the (unsolved) murders of Nicole Brown Simpson, the ex-wife of O.J. Simpson, and Ronald Goldman, an ill-fated waiter. I vividly remember sitting in the Sports Illustrated offices as a writer-reporter when the slug came out on the AP Wire (we had no internet then: news traveled fastest by phone, TV/radio, or the AP wire) and when I saw the victims’ names, I thought, This is going to be huge).

No one quite knew how huge at the time, but I recall Richard Hoffer penning an absolutely terrific feature that first weekend, drawing on the superficiality of southern California, of fame and celebrity and darkness. Hoffer penned a line in which someone who knew Nicole said something along the lines of “she didn’t look bad for 35”, at which point a senior editor turned to me and said, “Thirty-five isn’t even that old!” at which point I gave him a look that said, “Yeah, I think that was the point of Richard including the quote.”

SI’s Greg Bishop (a recent hire from the New York Times) and Thayer Evans (a relatively recent hire from the New York Times) examine what has become of the acquitted suspect, Orenthal James Simpson.

Remote Patrol

Croatia vs. Brazil

ESPN 3 p.m.

“Gooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooal!”