Joe Ditzel Has Some Problems

The New York Giants started in 1925 when they and four other teams joined the young National Football League. The Giants are the only surviving team of those five. The four teams that fell by the wayside over the years include the Los Angeles Phonies, the Chicago Coldbones, the Houston Humidities, and the Des Moines Corn Detasslers.

Baseball’s San Francisco Giants were in New York when the New York Giants football team adopted the same moniker. Again, I ask: why do teams take on the names of other sports franchises that already use that name. It’s happened a bunch of times. So, the Giants called their corporation the “New York Football Giants” to distinguish from themselves from the baseball team. What, there were NO OTHER team names available on the entire earth? How about a name like the New York City-That-Never-Sleeps-Because-It-Has-Downed-148-Cups-of-Coffee-And-Smoked-4-Packs-of-Cigarettes. That’s a team I can cheer for.

The Giants have a long-standing rivalry with the Philadelphia Eagles. Apparently, it started in 1933, but has manifested itself many times since, including a brutal hit in the 1960s from the Eagle’s Chuck “Concrete Charlie” Bednarik on the Giants Frank Gifford that sidelined him for 18 months. Years later, Bednarik denied requests to do the same to the person who taught Franks’s wife, Kathie Lee Gifford, how to sing.

People often say, “Well, I only know what I read in the newspapers,” or “I read it in the newspapers.”

No they didn’t. Almost nobody reads actual newspapers.

Now it’s just an expression like, “It’s the greatest thing since sliced bread.”

Sliced bread was invented in 1912 and in common use by 1928. We’ve had WAY better things since sliced bread.

But I guess saying, “I read it in the newspaper” sounds much better than, “I read it on my phone while on the throne.”

The National Hockey League was spawned from its predecessor, the National Hockey Association. See, there were four teams, but they couldn’t get along with Eddie Livingstone, owner of the Toronto Blueshirts, so they formed a whole new league and froze that guy out. A hockey historian explained: “It would be like if the Rolling Stones couldn’t fire Brian Jones, so they started a new group called the Rolling Rocks and left him out.”

In additon to the NHA/NHL, two other professional leagues were running in the early part of the 20th century. The Pacific Coast Hockey Association introduced many innovations, some of which are an integral part of the game today. They came with the blue line, penalty shots, playoffs and numbers on jerseys. Our hockey historian said, “There was a lot of innovation in the early years. Heck, they didn’t even have a penalty box. You had to stand in the corner and think about what you did.”

One of the teams in the Pacific Coast Hockey Association was the Vancouver Millionaires. Their home games were played at Denman Arena, the first rink in Canada with artificial ice. Their official song had these lyrics:

On the ice and in da club

Did you know the Houston Rockets started out in San Diego? The San Diego Rockets were a 1967 NBA expansion team. 1967 was a a crazy year. That year the Rolling Stones released “Let’s Spend the Night Together.” A rock historian said, “Later that year they released, ‘No, I Don’t Have Time for Breakfast With You.'”

Like many new teams, they didn’t fare well, only winning 15 games that first season. Things picked up in 1968 when they drafted Elvin Hayes, who took them to their first playoff appearance. After 16 years in the NBA, Hayes returned to the University of Houston to finish the last few credits he had left for his degree. One professor asked, “Where have you been? You said you were going to make a phone call, and you disappeared for 16 years!”

Things really improved for the Rockets when they picked up Moses Malone in 1976, who took them to the conference finals that season. Malone was first drafted in 1974 with the Utah Stars, the first team in the league to employ the pre-game shootaround. One basketball expert explained: “Before that, the players just sat on lawn chairs on the court, sipping Cokes and watching reruns of “The Courtship of Eddie’s Father.”

The Cavaliers started playing in 1970. That was a crazy year. That same year, the Jackson 5 made their debut on American Bandstand. I remember because I was a kid and I tried to spin like Michael, but I lost my balance and crashed into my dad’s liquor cabinet, breaking $30,000 worth of vodka and Jim Beam.

The Cavaliers finished their first season with a record of 15-67. John Johnson was named an All-Star that year. Did John’s parents have a hard time coming up with his name, John Johnson? But it has character. My parents should have called me Ditz Ditzel. But they saddled me with Joe, and now everybody asks me where I’m going with that gun in my hand. (For the kids, that’s a Jimi Hendrix reference.)

Johnson was drafted by both the Cavs of the NBA and the Dallas Chapparals of the now defunct ABA. The Chapparals later moved to San Antonio and switched to the NBA as the San Antonio Spurs. The Chapparals were lucky to get a few hundred people in the stands. At one game, there were more people selling hot dogs than there were fans.

“Beer here! Hot dogs! Red Hots! Cokes!….Anybody?…Aaannnnnyyyybody?…Beer! Hot dogs! Cokes!….Anyone?….I’m just going to sit down here and watch the game….Maybe I’ll have better luck in San Antonio.”

Well, that seals it.

Tom Brady is the GOAT.

Winning in dramatic fashion once again, Tom Brady and the Patriots beat the Atlanta Falcons 34-28 in a stunning comeback to capture Super Bowl LI yesterday. They were able to erase a 25 point lead with only three minutes left in the third quarter. It is the largest deficit any team has been able to overcome in Super Bowl history.

Oh, and the previous record of 10 points? That was achieved by the Patriots as well when they tied the record in Super Bowl XLIX.

Let’s run down a few of Brady’s achievements for the record:

Not to mention he is third in career passer rating, fourth in career touchdown passes and career passing yards, has won more playoff games than any other pigskin tosser, built a career postseason record of 25 wins and nine losses, and has appeared in more playoff contests than any other player at any position on the field. If that wasn’t enough, his more than 200 regular-season and postseason wins are the most of any player in his position in the history of the NFL.

I think you can safely say that Tom Brady is the GOAT (Greatest of All Time).

So why is he hated so much?

The obvious answer is that people hate winners. Football, and the NFL in particular, is a highly competitive, emotional game. People support their teams to the end of their days.

“US good! THEM bad!”

So when a particular player wins over and over, especially when they come back from a severe point deficit as many times as Brady has, it’s inevitable he will develop haters — simple competitive envy.

It’s painful when your team struggles year after year, only to end up with a losing record every time. Just ask Patriots fans. They sucked for years before they turned it around.

But with Brady and Bill Belichick, it’s more than that. Some people hate them because of their questionable tactics. Deflategate and Spygate stick in the craw.

Everybody like’s a winner, but that shine is lost if you cheated to get there. Like when the DNC conspired against Bernie Sanders to make sure Hillary Clinton got the nomination in the 2016 Presidential election.

You say winners take every advantage they can, and that’s what the Patriots do. You may be right, but the perception that the Patriots bend the rules too much hangs over their legacy.

Either way, you can’t deny Brady’s talent. He’s settled the debate with this Super Bowl win.

Peyton who? Joe who? Aaron who?

Tom Brady is the NFL’s GOAT.

Freshman year in college is a major transition, leaving the cocoon of high school where nasty rumors and gossip rule the day, to the challenges of college where nasty rumors and gossip rule the day. Here are seven things I learned my freshman year.

1. Prepare for eating dining hall food by lining your stomach with three inches of cement.

2. You can meet any college girl you want as long as you agree to carry her books and all her sorority sister’s books as well.

3. To earn money, get a job as a lifeguard at the library. Yes, the library. Set up one of those lifeguard stands in the study area. Blow your whistle every hour and shout, “Who runs the show, now, maggots?”

4. Stay on top of your studying. If you do get behind, stay awake the last two weeks of the quarter, studying around the clock, by filling the school pool with coffee — swim two laps every 5 minutes, swallowing a mouthful of coffee on every third stroke.

5. To keep from getting homesick, put a giant picture of your mom’s meatloaf in the window of your dorm. You always hated that meatloaf.

6. Get out of the dorm! Meet new people! Chess club? Yes, chess club!

7. Stop random students on the quad and say, “Listen, kid, whatever you did, you’ll feel better if you confess!”

The Indians ball club first played in 1894 in Grand Rapids, Michigan as the Grand Rapids Rustlers. They moved to to Cleveland in 1900 and changed their name to the Cleveland Lake Shores. This name didn’t go over big with some local fans. One fan said, “Sure, Lake Shores. Why not? Very threatening. Ooh, I’m shaking in my boots. If we are going geographically-wise, why not call them the creek beds, or the river banks, yeah, the Cleveland Cuyahoga River River Banks. No? Of course not.”

Some newspapers called the Grand Rapids Rustlers the Rippers. One of their opponents was the Kansas City Blues, known by some papers as the Kansas City Cowboys. Did newspapers in the late 1800s and early 1900s make up names for teams willy nilly? A reporter from that era said, “Heck yeah, we tried to make up as crazy names as possible. Before they were called the Yankees, I always called them the Overpaids, and I called Boston the Beans, and referred to Philadelphia’s team as the Waiting Room before Retirements.”

The Indians were one of the first charter franchises of the American League in 1901. The other teams were the Baltimore Orioles, Chicago White Stockings, Detroit Tigers, Washington Senators, Milwaukee Brewers, Philadelphia Athletics and the Boston Americans. A league official said they looked at and rejected a bid from Akron, Ohio. A league official told the newspapers, “We had to reject Akron because they wanted to put bowling lanes for the fans at each level of their stadium. They guaranteed a sellout every home game, but the noise of the balls and the pins would have been too distracting.”