Lee Lowenfish

In this tumultuous time of history that fate has consigned us to, following sports seems more than ever a refuge from the torments of the world. I am not a huge football fan - the grisly regularity of that hospital bed on wheels, taking injured warriors from the field to the locker room always jars me. I've always loved the defense of football as "good clean violence", but it's the excess that now seems uncontrollable.

 

Yet I have started the new year watching a lot of college and some pro football playoff action.  Ole Miss captured my attention by their unexpected run to the post-season after their peripatetic coach Lane Kiffin bolted the team to accept more money and ostensibly more talented players at LSU.  He took a lot of his assistants with him, but several stayed including interim head coach Pete Golding who remained as defensive coordinator. 

 

In a quarter-final against perennial contender Georgia, Mississippi won one of the most thrilling games I ever watched, coming from behind in a topsy-turvy fourth quarter to oust the Bulldogs. The Ole Miss Rebels were led by Division II transfer quarterback Trinidad Chambliss and Western Kentucky transfer field goal kicker Lucas Carniero. But in the semis against the U of Miami Hurricanes, Ole Miss fell in another exciting game. Miami will now face unbeaten Indiana in the title game on Mon Jan 19 after 730P.

 

It has been a dream season for the Hoosiers under third-year coach Pittsburgh native Curt Cignetti who went to school at U of West Virginia and one of his prior coaching stops was at Indiana U- Pennsylvania (home town of actor Jimmy Stewart where I hope the museum in his honor is still open). At 64, Cignetti has turned around what has traditionally been a basketball school into a footbal powerhouse through judicious use of the transfer portal and well-organized player development.

 

As you know, dear readers, I bleed the Wisconsin red and white (as well as Columbia light blue and white), and there is a Wisconsin presence on both sides for the upcoming battle.

Riley Nowakowski played at Wisconsin as a rarely used running back before starring as a tight end at Indiana.  Miami first-year defensive back Xavier Lucas was supposed to play at Wisconsin but he transferred to Miami despite signing with the Badgers.  He dropped out of school in Madison and enrolled in Miami. Wisconsin is still pursuing litigation against him, but in the meantime Lucas has become a key defender for his hometown team. 

 

The transfer portal can indeed be chaotic, but I for one am glad that players can get a chance to play at other programs without sitting out a season which the NCAA had mandated under the old system. The NCAA stubbornly refused to make any adjustments to their controls over "student-athletes," a concept that the Supreme Court even in this polarized country rejected by a 9-0 vote. 

The days of NCAA standing for Never Compromise Anything Anytime are over, and I hope that some kind of sensible system allowing for players rights as well as team privileges can be negotiated.   

Although Wisconsin football has been unsuccessful the last three seasons with both transfer portal, especially at quarterback, and with player development, the news is better for Badger basketball. After a couple of blowout losses to Brigham Young and Nebraska that put Wisconsin out of the picture for any bid to March Madness, Wisconsin has won three in a row, the last two particularly memorable. On the road at Michigan on Sat Jan 10, they toppled the Wolverines from the undefeated ranks.  Down by 14 in the first half, they cut the lead to one by halftime and then went on a 3-point scoring binge to take control early in second half. 

 

In sports, there are very few verities, but in basketball nothing quite beats this one:

THE LAST FEW MINUTES OF THE FIRST HALF AND THE FIRST FEW MINUTES OF THE SECOND HALF ARE MOST IMPORTANT - the first tests your fitness near the end of a physically demanding 20 minute half and the second tests how you can recreate intensity after cooling off during a 15 minute intermission.

 

The Badgers' second win was at Minnesota a few days later on Tu Jan 13. Junior star captain John Blackwell hit a three pointer at the buzzer to win a hard-fought battle after poor foul shooting allowed the Gophers to tie the game on Cade Tyson's three-pointer with less than 5 seconds left.  After Blackwell hit the game-winner, he started leading a race with his teammates around the court with his teammates following him. They went at least two laps!  Better the players show their exuberance with a buzzer beater than fans running on the court.  A moot point is whether the Badger fans would have stormed the courts if it had been a home game.

 

Another great human interest Wisconsin story is the play of Nick Boyd, a graduate transfer guard from San Diego State who previously played college ball at Florida Atlantic and was a key member of the team that made the Final Four under coach Dusty May.   May now helms the Wolverines and so Boyd last week was able to beat his former coach. Another fascinating tidbit about Nick Boyd is that he is the nephew of legendary New Jersey baseball legend Fred Hill Sr who among his coaching stops have been both Rutgers and Montclair State.  Hill always encouraged Boyd to follow his dream that has led to his multiple stops that started in New Jersey at Don Bosco Prep and St. Mary's in Rutherford.  With Wisconsin's women basketball finally on the rise and both hockey teams high in national rankings, things are looking up for winter sports in Badger land.

 

I think Wisconsin is still on the bubble for March Madness, but its recent play on defense and offense has revived hope in the heart of this fan/alum/analyst. As for my other basketball passion,

the Columbia women's basketball team, they play two home games within three days:  Sa Jan 17 at 2P against Yale and M Jan 19 at 2P on Martin Luther King Day against improving Brown.

The amazing NYU Violets women's team extended its winning streak to 75 with a 75-54 win over U of Rochester on F Jan 16.

They take on Emory Su Jan 18 at Noon at the Paulson Center on Bleecker Street just a little west of Mercer Street in Greenwich Village.

More info on Columbia sports including the top-notch tennis team already playing home games in a bubble at gocolumbialions.com. 

More info on NYU at nyu.edu/athletics

 

And while I have no emotional involvement in the NFL's march to the Super Bowl, it would be nice for the Buffalo Bills and QB Josh Allen get to and win a Super Bowl.  I like the way Allen's parents

nurtured their son.  He played other sports in high school and didn't just focus on advanced training in football. He went to the University of Wyoming, not a football power to be sure, but he has risen to the highest echelons of his sport now.  Just hope he is healthy enough to make it all the way. Beating Denver in Denver will be a tall order.  In a wide-open race with no clearly dominant teams, I might like to see Bills play the Rams with their great helmet logo. 

 

And here are some TCM tips:

For the avid lover of all things New York:

W Jan 21 830P "The Taking of Pelham One-Two-Three" (1974) about a subway heist with Walter Matthau/Martin Balsam/Robert Shaw

Followed at 11p "Mean Streets" (1973) Martin Scorsese's classic about surviving in a rugged neighborhod with Robert DeNiro, Harvey Keitel

 

Th Jan 22 3A "The American Friend" (1977) Win Wenders' grim portrait of underworld characters with Bruno Ganz/Dennis Hopper/Nicholas Ray in an eyepatch in a cameo on decaying West Side Highway.  I don't usually list early AM films and don't think there is an iota of sports in this film.  But I list here because I saw this film during Game 1 of the 1977 World Series between Yankees and LA Dodgers.  I was so fed up with yet another Yankee-Dodger World Series that spoiled my youth as a New York Giant fan.  I vowed not to watch this damned remake again, but every time I saw

Bruno Ganz, he reminded me of Thurman Munson.  So I said, "What the hell? I'm obsessed with baseball," so I did watch most of the rest of the Series.                                 

 

F Jan 23 8P "A Letter to Three Wives" (1949). Inspired by a story by Stefan Zweig, Joe Mankiewicz directs a superb cast.  Probably the only film in which Kirk Douglas and Paul Douglas, unrelated, appeared together, Jeffrey Lynn is the third husband and the wives are Ann Sothern, Linda Darnell, Jeanne Crain. BTW, this is not the first film from the post World War 2-years in which a reference to baseball on the radio is made.  Just heard one the other night from bored Barbara Stanwyck early on in "Double Indemnity" and even from Joan Crawford in "Sudden Fear". 

 

And finally here's my Noir Alley closing section:

Su Jan 18 12M, repeated 10A, The classic French noir from 1954 "Diabolique" with Simone Signoret

Su Jan 25 1230A "Shield for Murder" (1954) with.the underrated Edmond O'Brien

Su Feb 1 12M "Talk About A Stranger" (1952) get this cast:  George Murphy, Nancy Reagan, Billy Gray (around this time also Robert Young's son Bud in TV's "Father Knows Best")

And last but not least!

Sa Jan 31 8p at 92nd St Y on Lexington Ave NYC - Eddie Muller and Rosie Perez LIVE discuss "Sweet Smell of Success" before the classic with Burt Lancaster/Tony Curtis is shown.

Tickets from $35 - info at 92NY.org

 

That's all for now.  Next time, I return to baseball talk with a plea - which likely won't do any good - to cease the gloom and doom about the Inevitable Baseball Lockout of 2027.

Talk about a "self-fulfilling prophecy".  Not here in these pages even if some kind of shutdown after this season is possible.  Season too long anyway.

 

Stay positive, test negative, and Take It Easy But Take It! 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

   

 

 

 

The Kansas City Chiefs' gripping overtime victory over the Buffalo Bills this past Sunday night Jan 23 kept me from getting too involved with TCM's showing of Joseph Mankiewicz's Oscar-winning "A Letter To Three Wives" (1949).  I had seen it before and will see it again.

More on Douglas and TCM upcoming films in a moment.

 

I felt bad for Buffalo and the ardent fans of western New York State.  They were only 13 seconds from hosting an AFC championship game this coming Sunday against the surprising Cincinnati Bengals and their growing-before-our-very-eyes young quarterback Joe Burrow.  

 

Whatta duel Buffalo's young QB Josh Allen engaged in against Kansas City's equally youthful QB Patrick Mahomes. Time to forget about the forty-something QBs Tom Brady and the insufferable anti-vaxxer Aaron Rodgers. Time to give props to these youngsters still in their mid-twenties.  

 

And let's give a shoutout to the good parenting they received. Patrick Mahomes' father, Pat, pitched for the Mets in 1999 and 2000.  Hard not to believe that Patrick's poise and remarkable calm under pressure had its roots when he was only five years old and he shagged fly balls at Shea Stadium before the 2000 Subway World Series.

 

A quick Wikipedia perusal led me to a nice tidbit from Josh Allen's mother.  "You bloom closest to where you plant," she said in explaining why her son never switched high schools in their small home town 40 miles outside Fresno, Calif.  

 

Neither did Josh go to a fancy QB camp. He played all sports in high school that left him further off the radar of the modish top football recruiters.

 

After a year of junior college, only Eastern Michigan and Wyoming were interested in Allen, and he chose the latter.  Interestingly, EMU beat Allen's Wyoming team twice.  

 

In an interesting side note, now that the transfer portal is brimming with activity, EMU has lost its top two QBs and their ace kicker who helped them beat Illinois and Purdue in 2021. It is the Wild West in college recruiting now on so many levels. 

 

As for the big games this Sunday to decide the Super Bowl contestants on Feb 13, it is a rare if not unprecedented rematch with teams who met on the last day of the regular season.  

 

After all his years toiling for the woebegone Detroit Lions, Matthew Stafford might be a sentimental favorite leading the LA Rams.  I would guess that his Texas high school battery mate Clayton Kershaw will be rooting for him.  Love the story that Stafford not only caught Kershaw in baseball but Kershaw centered the ball for his classmate in football.

 

Stafford must cut down the needless turnovers because the San Francisco 49ers will be ready to capitalize.  As the home team the Rams are slight avorites.

 

In the other matchup, I would think the Chiefs and the magical Mahomes should end Cincinnati's surprise run.  But even in close football, youneverknow, youneverknow.  Just hope the refs don't needlessly decide the outcome.

 

Turning to baseball - and I'll believe spring training starts on time on Valentine's Day when

plaayers and owners truly work out their differences  - I thought David Ortiz's election into the Hall of Fame was a foregone conclusion when he became the powerful voice of Boston Proud after the bombing of the Boston Marathon in 2013.  

 

That Ortiz wrapped up the year with a third World Series triumph cemented his enshrinement in the hearts and minds of the 77% of the 400-plus writers who voted him in.

 

That Ortiz's life in the Dominican Republic has not been exemplary was not a concern to the American voters. He was almost shot to death a couple of years ago in some kind of drug dealing incident.  Only the finest medical treatment here in the States saved hs life.

 

I don't share the indignation that some sportswriters are spewing that Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds were not elected after ten years on the ballot.  Now only a veterans committee can elevate them.

 

Turning to the exciting college basketball season and my two favorite teams, Columbia's women's basketball team improved to 5-0 in the Ivy League and 14-3 overall with a stirring come-from-behind win on Jan 26 over a longtime nemesis Penn.  

 

There will be a rematch on the road against Penn on Sat Feb 5 at 6p preceded on Fri Feb 4 at Princeton at 5p against the other undefeated team in the league.  Both games will be on ESPN+ as will the 2p Sat Jan 29 game at Dartmouth.

 

As for the Wisconsin men's basketball Badgers, they lost at home to Michigan State last Friday.  The absence of junior forward Tyler Wahl really hurt, but there are signs that his injured ankle is healing.  

 

There's a big matchup at Illinois, last year's champion, on Tu Feb 2 at 9p EST, TV on the Big  Ten Network. Their star center Kofi Cockburn has been out for a few games but they

are still formidable.  

 

And Badgers can't overlook a game at Nebraska on Jan 27 at 5p. Then come two home battles - first against Minnesota on Su Jan 30 at 1p and another vs. Penn State on 

Sa Feb 5 at 6p.  Then a visit to Michigan State for a rematch on Tu Feb 8 at 7p.

 

No game in the brutally competitive Big Ten is a gimme and the Badgers are not deep. Johnny Davis, the emergent Player of the Year candidate, has to stay healthy himself.

 

FINALLY here are some TCM tips for the end of the month and into February: 

"Letter to Three Wives," noted earlier, was Paul Douglas's first big role. 1949 was a big year for the former radio announcer and baseball broadcaster who had a worthy run in Hollywood until his death by heart attack in September 1959.  

 

On Tu Feb 8 at 1245p, Douglas stars as a grumpy baseball manager in the original "Angels in the Outfield" (1951), much of it filmed at Pittsburgh's Forbes Field. The always-excellent

 

Janet Leigh plays a manners newspaper reporter who tries to smooth his rough edges. 

BTW Douglas was Ray Milland's catcher in Valentine Davies' marvelous baseball fable, "It  Happens Every Spring" (1949).  A year before, Davies created a classic Christmas fantasy, "Miracle on 34th Street," some of which actually was filmed at Macy's. With Edmund Gwenn as Santa Claus, Maureen O'Hara, and young Natalie Wood.

 

Also on Feb 8 at 6p the 1951 "Show Boat" with Ava Gardner/Joe E Brown as Capn Andy

followed by 8p Leon Gast's doc. "When We Were Kings" (1996) about Ali-Foreman fight in Zaire with a lot of great music

 

945p John Huston's "Fat City" with Jeff Bridges as a mediocre fighter and genuine welterweight Curtis Cokes (1972)

 

1130p "Raging Bull" (1980) - Scorsese directs DeNiro as Jake LaMotta - followed by:

 

115A Robert Rossen's grueling "The Set Up" (1949) with the magnificent Robert Ryan

 

F Feb 11 at 1p "Three Little Words" (1950) about the musical comedy team of Harry Ruby (Red Skelton) and Bert Kalmar (Fred Astaire).  Skelton doesn't do justice to Ruby and his genuine love of baseball.

 

But several ballplayers appear including George Metkovich as onetime pitcher-turned-

comic Al Schacht. Ruby himself makes a cameo as a player as do former Yankee Jerry

Priddy and Pacific Coast League legend Frank Kelleher.

 

On the serious film front on TCM, I'm curious to see the original "Dillinger" (1945)

Fri Jan 27  at 1015a - Mozart's birthday no less - with an all-star cast of gangsters including Lawrence Tierney in the title role and such classic gangsters as Eduardo Ciannelli, Elisha Cook Jr., and Marc Lawrence.

 

Sa Jan 29 245p Burt Lancaster, who did all his own stunts, in "Birdman of Alcatraz" (1962)

 

Tu Feb 1 Henry Fonda night including 8p John Ford's "Young Mr. Lincoln" (1939) 

 

10p William Wyler's "Jezebel" (1938) with Bette Davis

 

F Feb 4 at 6a worth at least taping "The Breaking Point" (1950) John Garfield's last Warner Brothers film and produced by his own company. With Phyllis Thaxter as the solid wife, Patricia Neal as the noirest of women, and the unjustly forgotten Juano Hernandez as Garfield's boat assistant.

 

Sa Feb 5 2p Fritz Lang's "Rancho Notorious" (1952) with Marlene Dietrich, Arthur Kennedy, and Mel Ferrer

 

 

Su Feb 6 12M, 10A "The Turning Point" (1952) - Noir Alley presents William Holden fighting

corruption with or without the help of Edmond O'Brien and Alexis Smith.  Don't get confused. This is the "Turning Point" not the "Breaking Point".

 

12N "Rhapsody" (1954) Elizabeth Taylor must choose between a violinist or a pianist.

Another one of TCM's odd juxtapositions but the classical music is very good in this film.

 

That's all for now.  Always remember:  Take it easy but take it, and stay positive test negative.