March 1, 2023 News and Notes

• Hadn't done this in a few days, so I missed doing this note...  A full house in Melbourne honored Olivia Newton-John with a memorial service on Sunday.  The state memorial event featured several aboriginal guests (not surprising, given Olivia's environmental advocacy), eulogies from her widower John Easterling and daughter Chloe Lattanzi, several songs, several picture tributes spanning both career and family/friends, and honors from the Olivia Newton-John Cancer Treatment and Wellness Center.
• For a few days, the government of Victoria had provided a place to rewatch a stream of the service.  It was taken down, as scheduled, March 6th morning.
• It appears a major draft prospect is about to either go to prison or have major questions to avoid it.  The deaths of two University of Georgia football "family members" has apparently been put on the back of star defensive player Jalen Carter -- and racing appears to be involved in the January 15 crash!  An arrest warrant (reckless driving) has been put out for Smart today.  Start the bidding at two counts of second-degree murder on top of it, and we may talk!   
• Carter was supposedly to go to the Bears, and the Bears trading the #1 pick down because teams are lining up for quarterbacks.
• Speaking of criminal college athletes, the next Alabama game, the basketball rivalry game with Auburn, is today.
• Kobe Bryant's wife has settled the lawsuit surrounding improper taking and usage of photos of her husband's fatal helicopter crash by the LA Sherriff's Department for almost $29 million.
• Interesting incident in Spring Training yesterday.  Kinda the opposite of what you see sometimes with the Spring Training ties.  After yesterday's game between the Orioles and Pirates was decided with the home team winning, the two managers got together and played the bottom of the ninth anyway to get some more pitching work in.
• In Spring Training, this would make sense -- except for one thing.  The umpires had none of it and left!!  So the teams had to improvise doing a half-inning of work without them!
• Umpire-school YouTube channel Close Call Sports and Lindsay are correct, though:  One word answers why:  Liability.  Of course, if it's that much a problem, then maybe MLB should prohibit it outright -- even though it has no problem with nine-inning ties in Spring Training.
• An NCAA panel is looking into shortening college football games -- many of the clock stoppages now have games with about 20% more plays than their NFL counterparts.