Day 384

• This DeShaun Watson situation is exploding by the day -- more lawsuits filed today, but at least 18 women have now come out in his defense!
• Obviously, the NFL and the NFLPA are monitoring the situation.
• In a result which I can only think of as either the greatest upset in the history of men's soccer or a blatant fix which could have devastating effects on the Qatar World Cup:  North Macedonia, a country only recognized by the European governing body since 1994, won a 2-1 World Cup Qualifier AT GERMANY.  Stay tuned.  This is United States vs. ...  who was it when it was clear that the team was throwing the match to get Klinsmann fired -- which eventually led them not to make the Russian World Cup? ... writ FAR LARGER!
• Calgary vs. Vancouver has been called off for tonight's NHL schedule due to COVID concerns...
• ... and there is word that tomorrow's baseball opener between the Mets and the Nationals could be called off with a positive COVID case on the Nationals team.
• Not everyone is believing we are out of the woods yet...  Doug Ford, the Premier of Ontario in Canada, is reinstituting shutdown procedures for a month.
• The next -- and probably last!!! -- MLB mega-contract went through today -- Francisco Lindor, 10 years, $341 million for the Mets.
• Scary moment for the Utah Jazz -- plane got hit by a flock of birds and things got pretty touch and go there for a little bit.  Everyone's shaken, but fine.

Day 383

• Oregon State, just after losing to Houston in the Elite Eight, was told to pack and leave for Oregon at 1:15 Central this morning and will arrive at 4 AM PDT.  That's "boot in the ass and don't let the door hit you where the Lord split you..."   
• Did I say yet that the NCAA is an obsolete joke??   
• There is now yet another DeShaun Watson lawsuit -- this one for destroying evidence of Instagram messages to massage therapists.
• Two long-awaited announcements today:  The first is the NFL...  Starting this season, 17 games in the regular season, cutting the preseason to three.  17th game is interconference, with it being, three years out of four, the corresponding division and place (the champion of the NFC North, for example, would face the AFC North champion).  In years where the interconference normally plays the other corresponding conference, another division is selected (the Wests and the Norths do that in 2021 -- they will swap the 17th game.  For example, this gives us the State Farm Game a lot of people thought would be the Super Bowl the last two years:  Packers/Chiefs.)
• Super Bowl LVI is in LA, now scheduled for February 13, 2022.  And Goodell expects full stadiums by the Fall.
• The second announcement is, to my memory, the first real defeat of Vince McMahon since the national expansion of the WW(W)F/E in 1983:  The Wednesday Night Wars are over and AEW has won -- NXT is officially moving to Tuesdays after Wrestlemania 37.
  
• Scary scene in the Elite Eight tonight as one of the officials collapsed in the Gonzaga-USC game -- latest report appears to be that he is OK.
• The men's Final Four is Houston, Baylor, Gonzaha, and 11-seed UCLA -- the first Final Four in history to be west of the Mississippi
• The second Final Four with a First Four entrant
• There are more than a few who have the entire Final Four in the NCAA ESPN Tournament Challenge.  Don't have an exact number yet.

I want you to tell me in what other universe, rather than a "Let's Get Baylor Out Of Here NOW" motif, this isn't a foul!!!

Refs ruled no foul on DiJonai Carrington's potential game-winner. #ncaaW pic.twitter.com/amSH91IEQV

— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) March 30, 2021

No one's going to give a shit the Baylor women got screwed.  (Hell, knowing Emmert, this is probably telling the women to shut the fuck up next time!!!)

Now, if the MEN get screwed...

Day 379

• Marshawn Lattimore was arrested last night in Cleveland.  The Saints player is accused of receiving and possession of a stolen handgun.
• Theirry Henry has quit social media due to all the toxicity.
• The LSU situation continues:  Now the current head coach is under fire, as a woman testified in front of a Louisiana state legislature panel that current head coach Ed Orgeron knew that Derrius Guice had sexually harassed her -- a 70 year-old security guard at the Superdome, basically as a clear power-over...  Tick tock, toxic masculinity...   
• To no one's surprise, the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament has double the current budget of the women's...
• A panel has, apparently, been convened to try to cover up the mishandling of the women's tournament.
• There is the beginning of talk that the players may try to force Major League Baseball to move the 2021 All-Star Game from Atlanta/Cobb County due to the anti-Black voting law just signed into effect.  Someone has forgotten to tell these people WHY this team moved it's stadium to Cobb County...   
• A new policy may force every NFL team (not just those really unfit to continue) to move one of it's home games to an international venue every eight years, in rotation.
• In another example of the true costs of the NFL, Brett Favre finally opened up in the last couple of days to alcohol and painkiller addiction, which led to suicidal ideations during Green Bay's second Super Bowl season with Favre in 1997 -- and that he had at least one seizure just before a game and another while he was having ankle surgery.  He made public that the pain was so bad, he was taking a month's worth of prescribed painkillers in two days...  in 1994!!!!
• Last week, Oscar Freyer of Grand Canyon University played in the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament -- to be killed in a traffic accident three days after the game in Northern California.
• The ESPN schedule for most sports has, as the end of each line, the secondary-market ticket demand for that game, through a place called VividSeats.  Checked out Opening Day for a lot of the teams -- many above $100, Washington in some demand over $300.
• The defending World Champion Dodgers have two road series to start the season -- and the 1:10 Pacific start of their opening day:  "Tickets as low as $1,184"!!!

Day 377

• We MAY have a "live one" brewing in the National Hockey League.  Referee Tim Peel was fired today from the NHL after an investigation into a live-mic comment he was found to have made during Nashville's game with Detroit last night, where he said that he somehow, and for some reason, wanted a penalty on Nashville.

Wow.  "It's close, but I really wanted to fucking give a penalty to Nashville early in this period."

Here's the worse part of it:  It took the NHL less than EIGHTEEN HOURS to fire Peel for the comment.  I've heard some definite hot-mic comments that I think the league needed to take action on (mostly for rude language, etc. and so forth).  But for the NHL to have to investigate and then fire Peel for this comment within 24 hours indicates to me they may have found something here!!  Stay tuned.

Peel was a 22 year veteran in the league with over 1300 games.  Let that all process.   

• And now it appears that Dan Snyder...  is going to be the essential sole owner of the Washington Football Team -- and, it was announced yesterday, that "Washington Football Team" MAY, in fact, be the long-term name of the team.  Oh...  My...   Dear....  LORD....   
• Duxbury High School in Massachusetts has rightly fired it's head football coach Dave Maimaron and forfeited their next game for using anti-Semitic slurs in it's playcalling in a spring football game.
• EDIT TO ADD A LITTLE FURTHER COMMENTARY ON PEEL:  I had a discussion on Discord with one of the Botball people about all this -- and he did make a good point as to how anyone could trust Peel going forward.  The problem is:  I think that's only half the battle -- you now would have to also question 22 years of games where there could've been similar "make-up calls", etc. and so forth.  As Deadspin said:  This guy could spill a lot of beans about the NHL if he chose to.

Day 376

• Starting with this gem.  Fuck FIFA.

Interesting tidbit: Of the 22 people voted to award the 2018 and 2022 World Cups to Russia & Qatar, 15 are now either banned from FIFA for life, suspended, imprisoned, or fighting extradition to the USA to face federal charges. Only one still actually works for FIFA.

— Brian Tuohy (@TheFixIsInTuohy) March 22, 2021

• And shut up Deadspin about the Dodger fan buying a Boston billboard to troll the Red Sox and their fans about Mookie Betts.  Boston earned every bit of that bullshit. 
• The ratings numbers for the NCAA Tournament are in, and they're SHOCKINGLY GOOD.  -3% vs. two years ago, for numbers many attributed to Zion Williamson.  +3% from three years ago.
• The Les Miles saga continues to take victims -- the President of Oregon State, J. King Alexander, resigned under fire for HIS role in keeping Miles at LSU.  Alexander was at LSU until 2019 and lasted a year at Oregon State before effectively being fired.

One Year Retrospective Part Two: Karl, I said "ALL IN"

This one's a little more pseudo-personal, etc. and so forth and so on, but it's a post I was meaning to do about 10 days or so ago, and am finally getting around to it.

I read, probably to much of my own chagrin, the economic/libertarian blog The Market Ticker, with it's head, Karl Denninger.

... a man who wants, and NEEDS, me deceased.

You see, this is a guy who makes no secret of the fact the useless need to be killed and eaten, cannibal-style.  That the non-personally responsible need to be shunned out of society -- and, if that doesn't give them the hint, then they and their entire families need to be erased from the genetic tree violently.

But, more specifically, this is about the coronavirus vaccines.

Now, I will make no secret that no vaccine is 100% safe, that there are people with allergic reactions, etc. and so forth.  To say otherwise would be folly.

But there's a problem:  Denninger is not only a virulent anti-vaxxer, but that he and his little cult over on his website actually are trying to purport that a very high number of people that the media will never report are actually being exterminated by the vaccine itself.

Karl, let me make several things clear.

First, if you are right that this entire mechanism is a scam - that the entire COVID-19 situation is a worldwide fraud - then I can assure you, sir, that the population of this country will be sheaved by a factor of at least two-thirds, if not much HIGHER.

And it's not without some degree of merit.  Military expenditures tracker Deagel has come out, now two years running, with the ominous projection that the United States, as we know it, is finished -- and within four years.

Both last and this year, it has projected the population of what is now the USA to be 95-100 million by 2025.

I said, on another conservative website from which I am now banned, back in January of 2020 that, if the Chinese actually were creating some degree of this scam, masquerading as a pandemic virus, that, then, that scam would be used as a cover for the elimination of those with low social credit scores and those refusing to comply with anything.

Same principle applies here, and it would stand to reason that the irresponsible, frail, and otherwise useless would die under such a scenario.

But, and this is a second point:  Isn't this what Denninger and other libertarians not only want, but DEMAND?

You cannot enforce personal responsibility on anyone sans violence.  It cannot be done.

And you are seeing the offshoots of this now.  Many cities and suburbs are effectively becoming drug lounge-spots -- and, when the government decides it wants to retain hands-off the entire mess, personal responsibility goes straight out the damn door.

But there's a problem that Denninger will not tell you, but I will:  He and his want CONTROL of the 50-60-odd percent of people who will die, and, even under the current (as he believes) "scam", that control will not be theirs.

You see, I do believe this virus is real, and I DO believe this virus was God-allowed, because we are so out of control that a final all-stop condition had to be hit.  I am not, in any way, going to dissuade myself that this might not even be one of God's Plagues out of The Book of Revelation!  (I'm not saying it is -- in the same motion, I also believe the virus was, in fact, a created biological weapon in a Chinese lab.  It just got out because someone got careless, and all it took was one Patient Zero.)

Why?  Epstein, Weinstein, Cosby, etc. etc. etc. etc.  That we have made that degree of violence (and by the "chosen") the sole means of societal success in the world.

And for not only criminal but life-choice reasons, I am a POSTER CHILD for the kind of person Denninger wants and NEEDS eliminated -- but he wants, as I said, control of the process.  He wants societal Darwinism through personal responsibility and the elimination of those who won't comply.

Bring it.  Boy.

Because you have a daughter.  And by the assumptions of the law, you'd have to think she's a target -- even if I believe otherwise.

You see, you forget something:  If you are right, or even if the vaccines don't work, it's over.

And I mean it's ALL over.

Even under the old paradigm, before the coronavirus, you have believed there would be sufficient economic collapse that I would die by 2024.

That we've sunk probably $6 trillion or so to try to keep the situation going and HOPE we emerge the other side has probably accelerated that date.

Karl, I have sufficiently little to lose as it is, but there are two things that are keeping me from doing exactly what everyone has probably felt I would do since I stepped on the University of Wisconsin-River Falls campus on September 1, 1987:  One never wants to see me again and probably will see me shot should I attempt otherwise (see previous criminal reference).  The other is someone I am beholden to assist and I made the promise to that I would.  (And, for those who might believe otherwise:  I do believe I was asked to go there by God -- and directed in that direction.)

In short, my home state is planning to have the vaccine available to the general adult public by about May 1st.  When schedule allows, I'm taking it.

I don't believe I'm going to be around in three years in any event -- but that could be for quite another reason (see the unrest we've been having the last 12 months).

I'm ALL IN that you are wrong, Karl Denninger.

If you're right, you need me deceased anyway.  And, at that point, I will be in no position to do further harm to those whom it is believed I have done so, in the name of "caring".

Day 375

• Anybody else thinking we may be hitting a time in college sports where the refereeing, etc. might actually force separation of these meat-grinder conferences like what the Big Ten was this year?  Only one meaningful team left in the tournament, and we're barely into Day Three.
• Six more DeShaun Watson lawsuits filed so far today (that's 18 now), and word having it there could be another six at least!
• And 2021 has to 2020 some more -- we just lost Elgin Baylor today.
• There are plans being made for a live NFL Draft in Cleveland this year -- but all parties who attend, including fans, will have to be pre-selected by their teams, and vaccinated.  I'm STILL planning those two posts, for the record, I was talking about earlier.
• And the social media again:  Fred from Manchester United has reported racist abuse online after Man U was ousted from this year's FA Cup.
• And the undefeated season is over for the Cal Baptist women:  Blown out in the Women's NIT Regional Final by Rice.
• Controversy in the WWE tonight, as Andrade WAS, in fact, granted his release after the Fastlane PPV last night.  The controversy is that at least one rumor, probably false, has said they would only grant the release if fiance Charlotte Flair decided to sit out Mania -- thinking she would choose Wrestlemania over her future husband.
• She didn't -- and one reason why, at least by her actual report:  She has tested positive for the coronavirus.

Day 373 Part 2: The carnage and the undefeated

• The women's basketball team of California Baptist University remains undefeated, and will play Rice in the regional final in Fort Worth, TX of the Women's NIT -- after defeating the University of San Francisco in the second round 90-82.
• You want to see the carnage of the First Round of the NCAA Tournament on the brackets?  Here ya go!

I'm not sure if this isn't historic (redoing from deleted previous due to created megathread):

ESPN has an outright leader at 31-1. Only ONE bracket pulled that off. Too bad she picked Ohio State to go to the Final Four!!

Congrats to Katie C. Crouse, though, for the only 31-1 in the entire 14.7 million brackets: https://fantasy.espn.com/tournament-challenge-bracket/2021/en/entry?entryID=47221764

Yahoo: 2 lead at 29-3, both with significant damage.

"Tiffany" got bit with Missouri: https://tournament.fantasysports.yahoo.com/t1/1307600

"Mary" got nailed with both Ohio State AND Texas:
https://tournament.fantasysports.yahoo.com/t1/672369

Sports Illustrated: 27-5 was enough for two brackets to lead!!

Luke5308: https://bracket.si.com/madness/si/cget.php?getting=contestprintbracket&tournum=&dr=99124X15814G20425SG8K2N3SJ37D0

And Marzy 13: https://bracket.si.com/madness/si/cget.php?getting=contestprintbracket&tournum=&dr=0611994923436Y584R11Q4DQVZ117Q

Sounds like both CBS and the official NCAA group require you to actually be playing them to access leaderboard.

Day 373 -- Day Two of the Tournament

• And let the threats begin:  The police have been called for online threats against Ohio State's E.J. Liddell after Ohio State's shock NCAA Tournament elimination.
• Isaiah Wilson is probably done in the NFL, waived by the Dolphins after the trade.
• At least two low-round draft picks have been stripped by the NFL:  The Saints lose a 6th for COVID violations, and another team loses a 7th for a minor salary-cap violation with respect to a practice-squad player.
• It's official:  No foreign fans at the Tokyo Olympics.  Probably the last real gasp at holding them at all.   
• And speaking of Japan:  A 7.0 earthquake was felt off the northeast coast of the country, briefly disrupting many events, including New Japan Pro Wrestling's New Japan Cup semifinals.
• There is apparently only ONE perfect CBS Bracket Challenge which survived Day One -- he has been located by friends on Reddit.
• And it looks like Georgetown completely laying an egg in the 12-5 against Colorado will take care of that.
• And apparently, on top of the only about 100 perfect ESPN brackets, only about another 4,000 went 15-1 -- out of 14.7 million!
• And now, after the first two Saturday results, we have only 66 perfect brackets among the top three bracket games -- 63 ESPN, 2 Yahoo, 1 NCAA.
• You can follow along at this spreadsheet.
• 23 after the first four games today -- 20 ESPN, 2 Yahoo, 1 NCAA -- and I don't hold much hope out for at least one of them.  One of the 23 has picked Texas Southern as a 16!
• And now remove that Texas Southern bracket from the list.  Now, if Iona upsets Alabama (and that 15 is down 1 at the half), that's it.
• And Creighton survives a LAST-SECOND MISSED LAYUP by UCSB, or we'd only have four perfect brackets left.  As it is, those four ESPN brackets fall, and we're down to 18 -- 15 ESPN, etc.
• Iona scared Alabama for a while, and all of the remaining perfects, but they stand.
• And now halfway through Day Two, Drake losing to USC has felled the last NCAA bracket and one of the last two Yahoo brackets.  Down to 12 perfects, 11 of them on ESPN.
• And we have our first cancellation.  The final game of the day, Oregon vs. Virginia Commonwealth, has been called off due to COVID protocols in the VCU program.  Oregon advances.
• And now later word that there are at least three positives in the VCU program -- one was found Wednesday, two more last night.
• And there is now unconfirmed thought that the VCU program may have gotten the virus from one of the officials of their conference championship game, who tested positive earlier in the week.
• That busts four of the remaining 12 brackets.  Eight remain.  (I am assuming the rules basically work that way.)  (Those four brackets would've busted with Virginia's loss anyway.)
• A perfect first-round bracket is, in fact, quite rare!  The record, before "Center Road"'s making it to the Sweet 16 (for which he was sent to Anaheim for one of the four 2019 Regionals as a special prize), was the last game of Day Three -- 39 correct, according to the NCAA.  And in 2016 AND 2018, no brackets survived the first two days.  And in 2015, Yahoo reported it's first perfect First Round bracket ever -- and then two years later, reported over three dozen.
• Two years ago, we had 15 make it through the First Round.  Someone has computed that the only three possibilities left after tonight (through Game 28*) are three perfect brackets, one perfect bracket, or no perfect brackets.
• Barring a large-scale Connecticut comeback, we could be down to one bracket perfect at the end of the 3rd set of games (Ohio would finish the job completely if they win, and they're up 5 late).  One ESPN and one Yahoo bracket picked Maryland, who is up double-digits at halftime.  They split on Oklahoma-Missouri, and also on Texas-Abiliene Christian.
• Sounds like the NBA is going to have to make a decision soon on whether it wants to direct this season to a given champion:  LeBron James is out 3-8 weeks with a high ankle sprain.
• A 13-4 upset by Ohio over Virginia took out the remaining Maryland perfects, so now Connecticut has to make up a 7-point deficit or we hit no perfect brackets at about 30 games.  That would take us down to 3, all on ESPN...
• And Maryland has beaten Connecticut -- AND THAT IS ALL.  The 3 remaining ESPN brackets all had UConn, and for the third time in five tournaments, no bracket (ESPN, NCAA, CBS, SI, Yahoo) makes it through the first round perfect.

Day 372 -- Day one of the tournament...

• And the Perfect Bracket Watch may not even make it out of Day One.  After 15 seed Oral Roberts downed #2 Ohio State, only 2 brackets out of every 500 submitted to the NCAA pool remained perfect -- through six games.
• In the ESPN bracket, 95.2% picked Ohio State.
• 3.5% picked them to win the whole thing.
• As of the end of the afternoon (seven games), only about 91000 perfect brackets remained.
• There were a total of about 14.7 million ESPN brackets this year.  That is about a 15% reduction, even with the extra day, of the number of brackets in that pool from two years ago.  Still don't want to believe there is a boycott of Black Sports??
• And not helping matters in this regard...  The lawyer collating sexual assault lawsuits against DeShaun Watson now says the number of women involved is up to 12!!!  Someone...  PLEASE...  Get this to trial and get people like Roger Goodell on the stand.  Yes, Watson is responsible for his own conduct, but it is FAR PAST TIME that the entire toxic male sports culture of this country is put on legal trial.   
• There has actually been a serious discussion in the British House of Lords that violence toward women is so prevalent in British society that a blanket 6 PM male curfew may be proposed in the British Parliament.  Let THAT process...   
• And with #12 Oregon State downing #5 Tennessee, the number of perfect brackets which made it eight games is down to just 13,232 -- less than one-tenth of one percent.  One or two more upsets tonight may take out the rest!!   
• According to Jay Bilas, it appears one of the six referees who were removed from the tournament earlier in the week to be quarantined now has a rather severe case of COVID-19.
• And down goes #4 Purdue -- and with four games to go on Day One, only 1039 perfect brackets remain.
• By contrast:  Two years ago, over 42,000 perfect brackets made it through Day One.
• One of those final 1,039 brackets was a dog.  Seriously!!

Every year I fill out a bracket for Satchel, the family dog, based on mascots (dogs first, and then other animals.)

It's always funny if he beats someone in our pool.

Anyway, here's the face of someone with one of the 1039 remaining perfect brackets on ESPN: pic.twitter.com/TgBaMu0NCN

— Jay Rigdon (@jayrigdon5) March 20, 2021

• Regrettably, the dog's bracket took it's first error when Rutgers defeated Clemson.
• After that game, we are now down to just 466 perfect brackets with three games to go in Day One.  (Contrast that with the saga of "Center Road" at the last tournament.  Made it to the second game of Day Five before getting eliminated, and that's the longest verified perfect bracket in the history of the major online tournament bracket challenges.)
• And with another upset, #11 Syracuse destroying #6 San Diego State, 205 remain.
• Cal Baptist's perfect D1 women's season continues:  90-85 winners over New Mexico in the first round of the Women's NIT.  They will play the University of San Francisco tomorrow night in Fort Worth, TX.
• Down to 140 as Villanova avoided the 12-5 upset.
• And the final number for Day One is only 108 perfect brackets.  We'll see how many survive Day Two...

Day 371

• And now DeShaun Watson has two three lawsuits from masseusses who claim he went too far with them...  You got some 'splainin' to do, DeShaun.   
• Especially because, according to Yardbarker, the lawyer has six more women prepared to come forward to add to the list.
• EDIT TO ADD 6:45 PM PDT:  It's official.  The NFL is now investigating this as a Personal Conduct situation.
• First Four is tonight -- all four games. The 16's face off at Assembly Hall at Indiana University on TruTV.  The 11's face off at Mackey Arena at Purdue University on TBS.  Round One Proper is Friday and Saturday.
• It appears as if this is the group of teams we're stuck with for the tournament.
• And Moses Wright, the ACC Player of the Year from Georgia Tech will be out for at least the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament.  Indications appear that it is COVID, not sure if a positive or contact tracing.
• Tragic news regarding former NBA star Shawn Bradley.  Paralyzed following a January accident where he was riding a bicycle near his home in Utah and was struck by a car.
• Meyers Leonard is done in Miami after his anti-Jewish slur on a gaming stream -- after his suspension, he's been traded to Oklahoma City.
• Over 9100 tests before the NCAA Tournament, only 8 positives in three tiers of personnel.  The bubble appears to be holding, especially if six of them were among the referees' list.  The teams are effectively quarantined to their hotels if not practicing or playing -- but NCAA partners are helping to ensure the teams, etc. are well-fed.
• The Bruins and Sabres might be the next two NHL COVID-19 delay teams.
• The NFL has it's US network TV deals through 2023, which include exclusive games on ESPN+ and that Amazon is taking over Thursday nights completely (with the home markets getting the games on their TV).  Be VERY interested in the money numbers, especially with ratings cratering.   

And here are the numbers:

• Amazon:  $1B a year just for the Thursday night exclusives.
• Viacom/CBS:  $2.1B a year, adds Paramount+ to the list, keeps the AFC games and gets Super Bowls LVII, LXI, and LXV.
• Disney/ABC/ESPN:  $2.7B a year to keep Monday Night Football.  Three games a year will go back to ABC exclusively.  And ESPN/ABC get a Week 17 Saturday doubleheader -- will be interesting to see what games they get for it, though, given playoff implications.  They also get Super Bowls LX and LXIV.  ESPN+ is also part of the deal, and will get one international exclusive game per season.
• FOX:  Keeps the NFC for $2.2B, and Tubi will get that streaming deal.  Super Bowls LVIII, LXII, and LXVI are included.
• And NBC:  $2B for Sunday Night Football and some exclusive games on Peacock, as well as the remaining Super Bowls in the deal:  LIX, LXIII, and LXVII.

Anyone, and I do mean ANYONE, who believes the NFL does not rig their games nor pre-determine their champions...  That's TEN BILLION A YEAR...   

• And already one nailbiter in the First Four...
• And today, the rest of the truth comes out:  Even had Duke been selected for the Tournament, they would've been unable to play in it.  Now ten positive tests in the Duke program.
• And make that TWO one-pointers on the First Four night.
• The college basketball Reddit is doing an interesting charity event.  For the fans of the teams who have just completed a game:  The winning team's fans are asked to donate the margin of victory, in dollars, to a food bank of the losing side.  The losing team's fans are also asked to donate to their local food bank.
• GenCon 2021 will be scheduled, now, for September, and incorporate both in-person Indianapolis events and an online portion.  We'll see about that...   

Day 370

• DeShaun Watson has a sexual assault lawsuit on against him, according to a Houston attorney.  Why announce it on your Instagram, though??  
• It really does appear that there is the POSSIBILITY of a "Brady vs. Belichick" angle, if free agency's early days have any indication.
• Half a dozen prospective NCAA Tournament referees will not be making the tournament, due to positive tests.
• Because of the previous problems, Virginia won't even be able to practice until less than 24 hours before their Saturday tipoff.

Day 368

• Indiana has already fired it's men's basketball coach...
• Minnesota is about to follow suit.
• Penn State previously let their coach go, and they're bringing in someone new.
• There are two Michigan NCAA Tournament bets at William Hill sportsbook of $30,000, taken last month.  A month before that, Michigan was 125-1 to win the national championship.  Michigan is, by far, the most "exposed" team for the William Hill, even though 20% of all the money is on 2-1 favorite Gonzaga.  And I really get the feeling the Zags are gonna get it without lube.   
• I had planned at least one additional post for the weekend, possibly two -- as well as a post regarding a pressing sports issue that the American Taliban needs to be shut the fuck up about in an awful damn hurry.  They'll come as time, energy, etc. allows.
• And in what might be the BIGGEST UH OH for the women's tournament:  Gino Auriemma, the dominant Connecticut coach, has tested positive for the virus and will be out for this weekend's opening round at minimum.

Day 367

• Drew Brees finally made it official.  He's retired.
• In the "Oh My God, You CANNOT Be Serious" Department:  As of a soon date, Idaho is ceasing participation in the national Powerball lottery, after three decades of involvement.
• The reason:  The game is being expanded internationally!  Australia this year, England next.  And they believe that Australian Powerball money will be used to take guns away from Right-fearing Good Australians...
• Interesting Statistic for the Tournament this year, if it's held as scheduled and currently-bracketed:  First tournament without Duke in 25 years.  First tournament without either Xavier or Cincinnati in 35 years.

Day 366

• Now OFFICIALLY into Year Two.
• Johnny Damon's narrative just fell apart.  Police records show Damon blew a .30 BAC two hours after the arrest for DUI.  Meaning he was at least a .33 when he was arrested and maybe worse where he drank!  .30 is usually the low end of LETHALITY!!!  .40 or .50 is more likely, but there is a low lethal chance where Damon was.   
• The NCAA has already announced that Virginia and Kansas are basically at-large locks for the field and will be chosen if done so, under the conditions the NCAA has set for teams to play in the tournament.  Now word that Duke, far less than a lock, probably would get the same consideration if chosen.
• When are people going to learn...  You want to make a racist comment?  Good, Chris Harrison.  You're fired too!
• You won't hear anything about it, but California Baptist University has completed an undefeated Division I women's basketball regular season and a Western Athletic Conference championship.  Grand Canyon University Utah Valley (correction:  The conference awards the berth to the second place team in the regular season) wins the berth to the NCAA tournament -- this is CBU's first fourth (correction)year in Division I and there is a transition period before any school entering D1 can be eligible for the tournament -- which, for CBU, will end after next school year.
• Since the NCAA does NOT administer the women's NIT (it DOES administer the men's), Cal Baptist will get to try it's luck against those teams.
• At 66, we lost Marvelous Marvin Hagler today.
• The Oklahoma girls' basketball team in the center of the controversy regarding the racist announcer, won the state championship today.
• No teams have opted out of the NCAA tournament selection process as of an 11 Eastern deadline tonight -- so it appears Virginia and Kansas are in and Duke will at least be in consideration.

Day 365, Part One

• Thanks to my anonymous friend for picking up the resolution to this:  Tucker Patz has pled guilty to wanting to kill members of at least seven MLB teams, the New England Patriots after they beat the LA Rams in Super Bowl LIII, and at least foreign women's soccer player.  (Yahoo)  Watch this guy get less jail time than I did.   
• Cam Newton will be back with the Patriots next year.
• Tom Brady just upped his extension to FOUR YEARS with the Bucs.  OK, is anyone gonna test this fucker for steroids and PEDs and whatever other illegal substances the TB12 program has?  Anytime soon???   
• Virginia is now out of the ACC tournament due to a positive COVID test.  Georgia Tech will play the North Carolina-Florida State winner, pending no more positive tests.  That is now not only two ACC teams to bow out, but at least two conference #1s, if not three.  Still think it's possible to hold an NCAA Tournament this year?  REALLY???   
• Kansas has become the next high-profile team to drop out of it's conference tournament.  Texas will now play Baylor or Oklahoma State for that conference title.  This makes three positive tests in the program just recent to the conference tournament -- two players were kept home due to the virus.  Just in the last 24ish hours:  Duke, Virginia, Kansas...  Does ANYONE actually still believe that the NCAA Men's Tournament can be safely held?   
• Now, that said, at this moment, about 48 hours before Selection Sunday, I do believe that a cancellation of a second consecutive March Madness tournament would be catastrophic to the NCAA -- in fact, I believe March Madness is probably the last real vestige left of an archaic and harboring institution which should be left to the dustbin of history!  
• That said, I will openly disagree with Brad Evans on Twitter:  I do not believe the tournament will happen in full, nor do I believe the championship will be decided on the court.
• Two announcers in Oklahoma have been removed from high school basketball duty after at least one of them cursed and gave a racial slur at the opponents for kneeling during the National Anthem.
• And the fucker blames diabetes for it.  I really wish they'd start rioting, but I think that's what the backwater types in Okie WANT.
• And this out of Michigan State:  Admitting that their "corporate champions" are the only prayer they have left, the Michigan State men's basketball team will now be known as...  "The Michigan State Spartans, presented by Rocket Mortgage".  The next phase of second-level professional sports has begun.   

Day 364 Part Two

• March 11th has become an ominous day on the calendar.  Not only is today the anniversary of Rudy Gobert's crashing positive which basically felled American sports for over two months...
• It is also the 10th anniversary of the 9.0 earthquake in Japan which took out the Fukushima power plant and literally rewrote the coastline of Japan.
• Latest word on Broadway is the end of May for New York shows -- with touring productions, for now, planned to restart in the Fall.
• And now the first major casualty due to COVID-19 -- Duke University has ended their basketball season, positive COVID test after a second ACC Tournament win in a year that they probably needed FIVE to actually make the NCAA tournament.  It will be the first time since 1996-97 that the Duke program is not in the tournament.
• Miami Heat:  Myles Leonard:  Suspended 1 week, fined $50,000, and the dreaded "sensitivity training".  Not Enough. -- But, on later edit, my anonymous friend points out that was the maximum the league could do under such an offense.  Flame the CBA.
• Sounds like I might be getting a chance to get an appointment for my vaccine somewhere around late April or early May -- President Biden is calling on all states to get full adult eligibility together by May 1.
• The signing of the third stimulus check, etc., was moved up to today, so the clock starts on that.  And there's word the first checks could start hitting as early as TOMORROW.  (MSN and White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki)
• But a reason that I think it will take a form of military force to get it done.  Half of Republican men polled by PBS will not get the vaccine.
• North Carolina A&T was the favorite to win the MEAC automatic berth.  They're done for the same reason Duke is.  Positive test in the program.
• Patrick Ewing is the latest Knick legend to be accosted by the idiot owning MSG and their security.  Ewing now coaches Georgetown, who upset top-seeded Villanova in the Big East tournament.  Though, to be fair, said "idiot" and Ewing have had a productive conversation on the subject.
  
• Sexual assault allegations against Yasiel Puig.  MLB is investigating and has interviewed the woman involved, and Puig will not be playing, apparently, in Major League Baseball until the allegations are resolved.
• Rule experiments will be in what is left of the minor leagues this year.  In AA, all four infielders must be on the dirt (to reduce The Shift).  A pitch clock is being enforced.  The bases will be larger to prevent some injuries, not unlike high school did at one time.  And some robot umpiring will be experimented with as well.

One Year Anniversary: Part One: Day 364 Part One

And so, for better or worse, today (as long as I don't post this til midnight) is March 11, 2021 -- one year after the sports world crapped itself when Rudy Gobert was found, minutes before tipoff, to have tested positive for the novel coronavirus, COVID-19.

The world is not the same place it was then, it still isn't "normal", and there (especially because of the malfeasance of many here in the United States) may never be truly normal again.

I mean, yes -- as of today, we are going to have a 2021 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament -- but it will be held in one state, with limited fans, and with the shadow of COVID-19 over the entire enterprise.

We have idiocies like the Texas Rangers with full fans being planned for Opening Day in three weeks and Baltimore planning half capacity and the like.

Here's a fucking clue-by-four for all the Republicans, Libertarians, and YOLO druggies who want it all open:  We are past the point this country should well have been destroyed by this (we hit at least two of the three All Stops I talked about a year ago (general loss of order being one)), and the fact is, because of both your malfeasance and your cowardice, we are probably ANOTHER SIX MONTHS from where we should be doing all this shit that we are proposing now.

Schools should NOT be reopening til the Fall now anyway.  By my rememberance of the calendar, if you reopen schools in a month, you'd be closing them for the summer anyway in 4-8 further weeks.

Theme parks such as Disneyland should not be reopening until a significant amount of the general public has both doses of the vaccine.  I know why Gavin Newsom is caving on this (Recall!!!), but the fact remains that it is clear (as I will rant on a later post here this weekend to a certain Libertarian economist I know who wants the irresponsible killed and butchered for food!) that many in the "OPEN EVERYTHING!" crowd want the rest of us GONE.

And they're too cowardly just to shoot us and be done with it.

So they're basically trying to throw banana peels and anchors on the progress which people have made over the course of the last year to force a Culling/Purge situation...

The fact is, though, is that because of our misshapen belief in "freedom", we aren't ready and aren't close.

Frankly, we should not be allowed to participate in the Tokyo Olympics (and that's even if they are held, which I still doubt) -- there should not be fans in MLB for a good part of this season (under the thought process we have that the reason that Justin Turner ended up positive was probably because of fans who entered the games and were infected) -- and I'm not sure that the very fabric of sports is going to survive this.

I still don't think the NCAA SHOULD survive (for reasons far beyond COVID-19), but the entire structure of sports as they were known one short year ago in this country is going to be forever altered.

There is now a significant movement of White people in this country who will not watch sports anymore -- of any kind.  Significant ratings drops across the board indicate that people have tired of both professional and college sports.

And then there's the complete losses of order both last summer across the country and in January in Washington.

And in the next 2 weeks, stimulus check NUMBER THREE starts hitting people - with a fourth all-but-certainly needed as time goes on.

I could go on, and will, over the course of the next few days...

But we aren't ready yet.  If there's a take-home point of this, it's clear that there are parties attempting to PROVOKE Wave 1D being the worst yet, because it will force the issue that those they deem unfit should get this virus and be expired by it.

Some of us aren't buying what you're selling.  Get with the program or else.

Day 363 Part 2

• Thomas Bach is the IOC President until at least 2025, should the Olympic movement survive the coronavirus and the corruption on all sides.  Including and ESPECIALLY the United States...   
• Maya Moore, who spent the last season and a half away from the WNBA to champion an innocent man's release, will spend another year away this season.
• The Rock and the other parties behind XFL V. 2.1 are talking to the CFL right now (probably making sure things don't conflict), and are putting 2022 plans on hold until that situation is taken care of.
• Congress has passed the $1.9 trillion stimulus bill -- the third stimulus checks probably start going out late next week or early the week following.
• Lou Ottens has passed at the age of 94.  You don't know his name -- you know his invention.  The cassette tape, which revolutioned portability of music and data.
• An interesting story out of the Western Athletic Conference this season.  Cal Baptist of Riverside, CA has joined Division I.  Like one other school I've already mentioned, however, they are ineligible for the major men's and women's tournaments due to a transition period under NCAA rules.  The men still start their conference tournament tomorrow, and are 13-9, 6-6 in a very evenly-matched conference.  The women?  Quite an anomaly.  22-0, undefeated, and they start play Friday.
• This...  is officially gonna be a disaster.  The Texas Rangers, with only mask requirements, are going to allow FULL ATTENDANCE at their games starting Opening Day this season.
• The Orioles at half capacity.
• Oops.  For some reason, I must've split the two.
• And I figured out I am correct.  "Day 1" was the 13th, the day after the rest of the sports which tried to go on (PGA, NASCAR, etc.) also shut down.
• And as largely predicted, the Kansas athletic director fell on his sword:  Jeff Long was fired today.

Day 363

• Yesterday was "Rudy Gobert Day", the one year anniversary of the infamous press conference where Gobert, mocking the coronavirus, touched all the microphones in a Jazz presser.
• Meyers Leonard has been suspended from the Miami Heat for now admitting his anti-Semitic slur.  If a lot of these pro leagues were smart, they'd get these players off of Twitch, etc. right now.   
• Gonzaga was down by 16 points in their conference championship game to BYU -- came back to win by 10.  The importance?  They become the first team in six years, and the 16th overall, to enter the NCAA tournament undefeated.  No one has run the table to the title in 45 years -- 1976 Indiana was the last to pull off the feat.
• The Kansas AD all but assures his firing:  He states the school vetted Les Miles and found nothing.

Day 362

• In the latest indication sports as we knew them are probably going away:  The NBA All-Star Game had a record low viewership of just under six million viewers.
• There is the beginnings of a movement in some Republicans and some human-rights groups to pressure the United States to boycott the Winter Olympic Games scheduled for Beijing next year.
• Meyers Leonard is in serious NBA trouble -- they're investigating he may have used an anti-Semitic slur on a video-game livestream.  Sigh.  Again...   

Day 361

• Isaiah Wilson is now a Miami Dolphin.  Last year, he was a first-round draft pick.  This year, he's so disinterested in the game, the Dolphins gave the Titans two SEVENTH-ROUND draft picks for him.
• Dak Prescott, on the other hand, is staying in Dallas, 4 years, $40 million per.  If you want the power of the wrongly-placed "It's all about the quarterback!" meme, here you go. Cowboys have accomplished NOTHING, and now they're dumping this kind of money on their one marketable player.  
• King Assad and his wife, the heads of state of Syria, have tested positive for the virus.
• Greg McDermott has been reinstated as the head coach at Creighton.  We'll see how well that works out.   
• In a move which will surprise NOBODY, Les Miles has been fired from Kansas for his sexual misconduct at LSU.

Day 360

• Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons are disqualified from playing in today's All-Star Game (and probably for some time into the second half of the season) for contact tracing purposes -- a barber they used has tested positive for the virus.
• Tonight, for the first time in major American professional wrestling history, two major wrestlers are taking a page from the Japanese deathmatch annals:  Jon Moxley and Kenny Omega will contest the AEW World Championship in a no-rope barbed-wire explosive time-bomb deathmatch.  The ropes are replaced with barbed wire on three sides.  The barbed-wire is laced with triggers which, when the storyline is proper that a wrestler contacts it, will trigger a simulated explosion.  Three beds of barbed wire will surround the ring, similarly rigged to "explode".  And if the match does not end in 30 minutes, all the remaining "explosives" trigger.  Fucking scary match, and I'm not sure it has any place in American professional wrestling at all!!    
• Wayne Gretzky's father, seen as the Father of Hockey in Canada, was laid to rest on Saturday.
• Jose Ramirez and Franmil Reyes have broken Cleveland Indians COVID-19 protocols and will have to be quarantined for a time.  It's been a fucking year, idiots!  You'd THINK, by now, you'd get it.   
• As has Pedro Strop of the Cubs, seen out with Reyes.  ... who is a repeat COVID-19 protocol offender.  Cut.  His.  Ass.
• Jeremy Jeffress has been cut by the Washington Nationals, two weeks after signing with them -- and it doesn't sound pretty.  It appears that a major tiff with his former agent, Joshua Kusnick (who appears to go to the Michael Falkner School of Tact and Agreeability -- if his banishment from MLB Network and several social-media outlets is any indication!!), may be to blame here.  His first statement after Jeffress basically threw him under the bus:  "Just landed in Texas.  Did I miss anything?"  There is a BIG Red Flag which has happened here.  There is a domestic violence past with Jeffress, and he was released for "personnel reasons", but he basically has said his former agent Kusnick has ruined his life and career.  Stay tuned!
• The University of Colorado had to call the police to shut down a major party on their University Hill on Saturday -- several hundred students decided to get drunk and fucking stupid.  I hope names are taken and students sent home -- after a couple weeks in a secured quarantine.   
• Adam Silver, in comments taken on All-Star Weekend, hopes and is optimistic that the 2021-22 season will begin on time and with fans.
• In the culmination of a story which led to their folding and a new club made in their place to progress from the bottom of the Scottish pyramid 10 years ago (and a move I felt would kill professional Scottish football -- a one-team league has no real point of surviving!), (the new) Rangers FC have won the Scottish Premiership -- WITH SIX ROUNDS TO GO.

Day 359

• Tom Wilson of the Capitals is going to be sitting a while.  He's probably going to be suspended five or more games -- and it would be his fifth suspension since Fall 2017.  But the problem is, he got a 20-gamer on his fourth in early season 2018-19, but nothing since -- and, hence, this is going to be a very interesting story to follow.  He gets the COVID equivalent of an "in-person meeting", so he's gonna get a long suspension.  This one is for boarding Brandon Carlo of Boston with a shot to the head.

I think how I'll put this is...  Suspend him for as long as the hit and the CBA allows -- but I can't say how long this is, because of the provision that "repeat offender" status leaves after 18 months.   

• SI headline:  "When Will College Sports Start Holding People Accountable?"  Answer:  When there are no more college sports.  Pedophilia, rape, sexual assault, sexual harassment...  All baked into college sports and features, not bugs, of the entire system.  Abolish the NCAA and get some real investigations into these schools.   
• At least four teams have already forfeited out of the conference tournaments due to COVID...
• And, on the day the first bids come down, we already have one.  Liberty University is the first team to clinch an NCAA men's berth -- by virtue of being conference regular-season champions and their opponent in the tournament final (North Alabama) in transition to Division I and ineligible for the Tournament until that completes.
• Early indications are that the one-year losses for the four major sports and the NCAA exceed $14,000,000,000.  Frankly, World's Smallest Violin.   
• CONMEBOL has called off the latest set of World Cup qualifiers because they can't get the European players to and back from South America.
• The Fairmont Hotel (which I've been in for several Fanimes) in San Jose has gone bankrupt and will close for at least 2-3 months.  This also means any visiting NHL teams have to find a new arrangement.
• And the word from the NHL IS A COMPLETE FUCKING JOKE.  Wilson got SEVEN GAMES for that.
• They play four times in twelve days April 8th-20th.  You made this bed, Player Safety.  Get ready for a war.   The last two, in Boston, are nationally televised.
• And we have a DQ in one of the three title fights in the UFC PPV -- and it may not cost the champion his belt.  Deliberate illegal knee in the fourth round of a fight by Aljamain Sterling to Petr Yan -- word was Yan was winning the title fight handily.  And, rightly, Yan is the new champion as a result.

Day 358

• Sam Dyson will be spending a second consecutive season out of the majors, banned for all of 2021 due to domestic violence.  (CORRECTION, thanks to my anonymous friend...)
• Recent furor in Ireland with racer Gordon Elliott for a picture of him sitting on a dead horse.  Banned for a year (must serve at least six months now) for bringing the sport into disrepute, fined 15,000 Euros.
• In another step toward his leaving Kansas, the investigation at LSU being revealed about Les Miles actually DID suggest him being fired from LSU in 2013.  So why was he allowed four more seasons?   
• And it looks like he IS gone.  Didn't come to work today, and Yahoo's Pete Thamel believes it would be an upset the level of Alabama losing to Kansas that he stays to make the season.
• Thamel asks the same question I do -- see italicized above.
• And there he goes.  As of about 8 Central, Les Miles was officially put on leave by the University of Kansas.
• To show how much the lessers are really worth in the NFL, the Washington Football Team released Alex Smith today.
• Five more COVID positives in MLB...
• ... and the Astros have eight pitchers now in the COVID protocols.  You REALLY THINK there's going to be a full season...  
• Part two, same thought:  California has set out the guidelines under which outdoor sporting events can have fans and theme parks can reopen -- all subject to the present "tier" of the state.
• Some NBA fans do not understand it's All Star Weekend this weekend.  Hilarity ensues.
• And two examples that it looks like the party may be over in Utah, for whatever reason.  First, the Jazz All-Stars were some of the last players picked by the two captains for the All-Star Game on Sunday.  Second, some significant chirping in Salt Lake City about the officials the last several games.  27-9, but have lost 3 of 4 and 4 of 7 into the break.
• Another sex predator in the pro wrestling indie scene -- looks like Synergy Pro Wrestling in New Jersey is done because of a sex offender in the ranks.
• Mark Pavelich has passed away at 63 -- he was on the gold-medal winning Miracle On Ice team in Lake Placid in 1980 -- assisted on the famous Eruzione goal.
• Eighteen women (16 former employees and 2 current) have detailed a toxic culture of sexual harassment at the Golf Channel.

Day 357

• Les Miles does not appear long for LSU.  (CORRECTION:  Miles now coaches Kansas, but with this reveal, THAT might not last long.)  Sounds like he, not unlike Governor Cuomo of New York, is in serious sexual harassment trouble...  2013, he was banned from associating with female students after inappropriate remarks toward female staffers.  I know from my own college experience -- that is NOT a penalty to be taken lightly.  That is usually The End for anyone but THE most important people.  That he's still been a football coach 7-8 succeeding seasons speaks volumes...
• And early word is that if Miles IS fired, the Kansas AD goes with him.
• In another signal the numbered Day posts may be about to end, UFC wants to do an event in Texas in front of a full crowd after their foolish idiocracy.
• And, by my count, I think we are now up to FIVE such states (Texas, Iowa, Georgia, Mississippi, and one other I need to look up again)...
• Creighton has now suspended it's men's basketball coach Greg McDermott for racist comments.
• One of the interesting Rules Committee discussions in the NFL has been started by the Baltimore Ravens, and it concerns overtime.  I would believe this would remove the "field goal allows the other team to get the ball" scenario.  It's called "spot and choose".  The winner of the coin toss would have the ability to decide:  Place the ball wherever you want it on the field, but let the other team decide who gets the ball first - or reverse the process, let them place, and you choose.  That may be one of the most interesting things I've seen yet!   

Day 356

• And now add Georgia to the list of states who are going to try to fool people to their deaths.
• Latest word is that if the Tokyo Olympics are to be held, they will be held with no foreign fans.
• Appears Creighton's head coach is headed out due to insensitive racial comments.
• Alexander Overeem and Junior dos Santos have been removed from UFC.
• We are 100 days from scheduled to start Euro 2021.
• Anyone who has followed wrestling back to my day will recall this name:  Promoter Jim Crockett Jr., who consolidated the NWA under the WTBS Superstation banner, passed away tonight after an illness.  He was 76.

Day 355

• Texas has officially thrown in the towel on trying to stop a mass coronavirus kill-off.  No more masks and all businesses 100% capacity as of March 10th.
• And now, apparently, Mississippi has joined Texas.
• The SEC tournament will have 3,500 fans a session.
• The Oklahoma City Thunder are the first NBA team to tell it's fans there will be no fans in the stands this season.
• A few days after San Diego Comic-Con cancelled it's sister WonderCon event this year, they -- for the second year in a row -- have called off their main event.  They are, however, hopeful they can hold an event in San Diego in November.
• Several of the major anime cons are cancelled or virtual this year, including MomoCon, Katsucon and A-Kon (cancelled) and Fanime (virtual).  Ironic, because A-Kon cancelled only about 2-3 days before the idiot Governor down there did the above.
• Though there has been no formal announcement yet, Los Angeles tourism authorities are saying Anime Expo, the largest anime convention in North America, is also pushed virtual this year.
• Joey Ryan has officially been cancelled.  With the increasing probability he, too, is a sex predator (after #SpeakingOut last summer), his efforts for a women's charity show have been scrapped, especially after Tony Khan pulled all AEW talent from the event!  Go...  away.  NOW.   
• There is rumor on the wrestling sheets the Wednesday Night War is over and AEW has won.  Fightful.com's Sean Ross Sapp is wanting a new writer who's available Tuesdays, and has listed NXT as one of the Tuesday companies.  No confirmation at this time, but the rumor is it will happen right after Wrestlemania 37.

Day 354

• I think "Day 1" last year was actually the 12th or so...
• I think this was the first day I really began to look at the coronavirus situation on the blog as a true TSHTF moment, with Inter Milan postponing a second match and France banning all public gatherings of over 5000.
• NIT will be 16 teams, in a bubble in Texas.
• Down to one major undefeated now, as Baylor lost this weekend after a long COVID layoff.
• More trouble for Barca FC in Spain.  In Spain, unlike the US, libel and slander are criminal offenses.  They are under criminal investigation in the country for using a third-party company to smear any former player or official who disparaged the club.  Now, the ex-President, Josep Bartomeu, has been arrested, along with others -- and it is now believed that Lionel Messi is all but gone this summer.  The question Barca fans may need to ask is, with all the trouble, on and off the pitch, Barca has gotten into...  One may have to question a forced relegation, or would that kill Spanish top-flight soccer for good?   
• Seth Jahn has been expelled from the US Soccer Federation Athlete's Council for a racist National Anthem rant.