DHL Dan CLXXVII - Is This A Jedi Mind Trick?

I think it is - I can't believe what I'm reading!

Here’s a vote of confidence for Bill Belichick, and other hot summer thoughts

Picked-up pieces while waiting to see what Chaim Bloom does between now and Tuesday’s trade deadline . . .

▪ Bill Belichick is still the greatest NFL coach of all time. In my book, he gets the biggest slice of credit pie for those six Patriot Super Bowl trophies. He’s still at the top of his game, fearless, tanned, fit, and ready to lead the Patriots deep into the playoffs.

There. I said it. I am in the Still Bill Club.

It is not easy to reside in this club today. It makes me feel like Japanese intelligence officer Hiroo Onoda, who was found in a jungle in the Philippines in 1974, still fighting World War II, almost 30 years after Japan had surrendered. (One of my readers suggests that Onoda is the ultimate Do Your Job guy.)

Of course this praising of Belichick goes right into the dumpster with the Patriot's first loss.

Sell, Mortimer - Sell!

Shank's not buying the recent hot streak the Red Sox are on:

The Red Sox are the hottest team in baseball, but they still should be sellers at the deadline

The Boston Red Sox, the hottest team in baseball, open a West Coast trip in San Francisco against the Giants Friday night.

Baseball boss Chaim Bloom plans to be back in Boston from now through Tuesday’s trade deadline (when the team will be in Seattle), and he’s in a pretty odd position.

What do you think? Should the Sox be buyers or sellers? Are they contenders or is the recent success fool’s gold?

Beats the heck out of me. I’ve been ready to bury these guys since the first sunflower seed was spit in Fort Myers, but they’ve won 15 of 20 and just swept the best team in baseball, recovering from a 3-0 deficit in the sixth inning Wednesday in a nationally televised 5-3 win over the estimable Braves.

Shank's been buyring this team for a lot longer than that. For years he's complained about ownership's lack of interest in winning and focusing on the bottom line, so if ownership does decide to become sellers at the deadline, it'll be Shank leading the charge against them. That trick never gets old!

A Weekend In Upstate New York

Shank went to Cooperstown over the weekend and he has a few interesting stories to tell, like this one:

Danny Ainge almost returned to baseball after the Celtics traded him, and other discoveries from a weekend at the Hall of Fame

COOPERSTOWN, N.Y. — Lingering thoughts after three days at the Baseball Hall of Fame on induction weekend ...

▪ Danny Ainge considered returning to the Toronto Blue Jays after Red Auerbach traded him from the Celtics to the Sacramento Kings in February of 1989.

Former Blue Jays general manager Pat Gillick broke this news to me at a large reception in the Hall’s sacred Plaque Gallery Saturday evening.

“Bet you didn’t know that Danny Ainge called me about coming back to baseball after Red traded him,” Gillick said. “I thought it was going to happen.”

“I considered it,” Ainge said Sunday over the phone from Utah. “I was intrigued because I really thought I could have succeeded in baseball.”

Read on for a few more tidbits like that one.

DHL Dan CLXXVI - Baseball Hall of Fame Musings

Shank's not too thrilled with the slate of recent inductees into Cooperstown:

Looking forward to voting for some slam-dunk Baseball Hall of Fame candidates in the coming years, and other thoughts

COOPERSTOWN, N.Y. — Picked-up pieces while fondly remembering not-so-long-ago days when Red Sox and Patriots owners seemed to care more about winning than making money . . .

▪ Fred McGriff and Scott Rolen will be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame on Sunday.

These are good dudes with impressive résumés, but theirs are not names that come to mind when fans talk about baseball immortality. Rolen is a career .281 hitter who had only one top-10 MVP season in a 17-year career and went hitless in the 2004 World Series against the Red Sox. He was voted in by the BBWAA in his sixth appearance on the ballot. McGriff was overlooked in 10 tries with the writers, never cracking 40 percent of the ballots (75 percent is required) before gaining admission via the Contemporary Baseball Era Committee.

McGriff and Rolen were very good players but not first-round slam dunks of recent vintage such as Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera, Jim Thome, Chipper Jones, Ken Griffey Jr., Randy Johnson, Pedro Martinez, Greg Maddux, and John Smoltz.

It looks like the attitude was 'well, we have to induct somebody, so here they are.'

This part was amusing, at least for me:

...

▪ When New York Post sports reporter Howie Kussoy sat down to interview Mets outfielder Tommy Pham, the former Red Sox pulled out his cellphone and recorded the interview right along with Kussoy. I’ve had this happen only once. When I interviewed Larry Lucchino and Tom Werner for a book I wrote with Terry Francona, the Sox officials brought Dr. Charles Steinberg so they’d have their own recording of the session. Dueling recordings. It felt like the Nixon White House.

I talked to Shank a few years ago over the phone. The first thing he asked me was whether I was recording the conversation. I told him I was not, but I'm going to take a few notes if he didn't mind, and he didn't. Someone's got the Nixon thing down pat, all right.

DHL Dan CLXXV - Exit Stage Left

Shank wonders aloud who will be the next Boston athlete to be shown the door:

Wondering which Boston athlete will be the next to leave, and other thoughts

Picked-up pieces while wondering which of our local athletes will be next to go . . .

▪ Marcus Smart. Tyler Bertuzzi. Nathan Eovaldi. Devin McCourty. Grant Williams. Taylor Hall. Xander Bogaerts. J.D. Martinez. Jakobi Meyers.

All gone.

Who’s next? Patrice Bergeron? David Krejci? Malcolm Brogdon? Trent Brown? Kendrick Bourne? James Paxton? Lawrence Guy? Kenley Jansen?

RELATED: Chad Finn: I understand trading Marcus Smart and letting Grant Williams get his payday elsewhere. But I cannot bring myself to like it. It’s the circle of life in professional sports. Fans invest their passions and dollars in favorite players, then get stuck with a Celtics No. 36 jersey hanging in their closet.

It’s been an emotional stretch here in the Hub of sports, with several popular players saying goodbye since the beginning of 2023. Bruins fans are upset to see Bertuzzi sign a one-year deal with Toronto, and some Green Teamers love Smart more than they love their own families. The retirement of McCourty hit hard, and hearing All-Star Eovaldi say how much he wanted to stay at Fenway was a gut punch to Red Sox Nation.

He's on the sidelines now, but Shank used to take a much more active interest in the departure of Boston athletes.

DHL Dan CLXXIV - Something To Cheer About

I remember Ted Williams for, among other things, being more than cantankerous, especially towards members of the press. Thus my surprise at reading this headline:

Ted Williams would be rooting for Luis Arraez to hit .400, and other thoughts

Picked-up pieces while waiting for a Fenway official scorer to give somebody an error …

▪ Ted Williams would be rooting for Miami Marlins star Luis Arraez to hit .400. Ted supported Rod Carew when Carew batted .388 in 1977, boosted George Brett when Brett finished at .390 in 1980, and cheered for Tony Gwynn when San Diego’s hit machine closed at .394 in the strike-shortened season of 1994.

Williams had zero old-guy bitterness toward players of any new generation. He once told me, “That [Paul] Molitor kid in Milwaukee reminds me of Joe DiMaggio. He’ll be in the Hall of Fame someday.”

Teddy Ballgame remains the last big leaguer to hit .400 (.406 in 1941), and he’d be encouraging Arraez in 2023.

Arraez was in Boston this past week and I couldn’t resist the opportunity to speak with a kid with a chance to be baseball’s first .400 hitter in 82 years. The Marlins have played more than half their season and Arraez left Fenway batting .392.

And if you think Shank's still ripping off / 'sampling' from Felger & Mazz, you'd be right:

▪ A reader points out that the Boston Red Sox have become the Minnesota Twins. Middle-market team. Middle-market payroll. Little star power. Forever .500 or worse. Chaim Bloom’s anonymous roster didn’t register a blip in All-Star fan voting.