Most dominant ever? Here's one for the top of the list

When the discussion gets around to the most dominant athletes of our time, there a few names that always come popping up.

We hear about Tiger Woods for those years, Sampras than Federer and then Nadel. There was Jordan and Gretzky and Edwin Moses, who may go down as the single most dominant athlete in his sport of all time.

But sometimes we forget one in the discussion and we shouldn’t.

Mariano Rivera.

Rivera blew out his ACL (I blame the NBA’s shortened season) while shagging BP fly balls last night (and shagging fly balls is a truly a fun thing to do) and the question now is whether he’ll ever come back and what he’ll be like when he does.

He’s 42, there were suggestions this might be his last season anyway but if he’s gone, it ends an era that is truly remarkable and one I cannot imagine we’ll ever see again.

Playing a role often dominated by supernovas rather than long-lasting stars, Rivera was unlike anyone we’ve ever seen.

Six hundred and eight saves in 1,051 appearances over 18 seasons; only 73 blown saves (otherwise known as July for TOD) and an ERA of 2.21.

And it really goes beyond the numbers.

Here was a rather slight man doing unimaginable things with a baseball. I saw him once, years ago when I’d been away from baseball for a little while and he was introduced while sitting courtside at a Nets game and I was stunned by how unimposing he looked, physically. This was a regular-looking fellow who did incredible things.

And to do it in the manner that he did?

The mind reels.

Everyone knew what he was going to throw and where he was going to throw it and hardly anyone could hit it. He perfected one pitch and dined out in for decades; there was no secret to what he did, just an overpowering ability to do it.

It is blatantly unfair to compare golfers and relief pitchers and tennis players and runners and guys from hoops or the pucks. One doesn’t correlate with the others but it does make good chatter around the stools and when we next gather and the discussion comes to who is the GOAT, or at least the Greatest Of Our Time, we have to have Rivera near the top of the list.

Don’t we?

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Digression time.

Super Son has his final school concert of the year last night and the parents among us will know what that’s usually like. A series of oft-unrecognizable tunes or songs that include requiems and the odd hymn and stuff by Mozart and guys and gals of that ilk.

Well, this is why a music program at an arts school is the best; the kids are uber-talented and want to perform and shows actually include stuff you know and can recognize.

And if Cawthra wants to put on shows that begin with a rendition of this Nora Jones ditty (and I can listen to Nora Jones all day if the mood strikes) it’s all right with me.

And if, near the end, they get the jazz kids out there and some young fella warbles this Sinatra classic, well, when’s the next show?

Good job, kids. It makes parents proud to see talent and passion. And I’m not sure of the name of the young woman who ended the show with the first stanza of Amazing Grace but when she makes it big – and I’m pretty sure she will – I can say I saw her when.

Tres cool.

Thus endeth the digression.

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Mail? Please. Still unsure what the weekend plans are but have set aside a chunk of this afternoon to answering questions and need some more.

You know the drill.

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Two things I’m tired of:

Spike Lee.

We get it, Spike, you’re a fan. Be more like Jack, okay?

Reggie Miller.

We get it, Reggie, you used to be a great shooter; as a commentator you make a great shooter.

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So Chris Bosh has nine points and 10 rebounds and helps his Miami Heat team take an insurmountable series lead in the biggest game of the year to date for his team and, frankly, it’s the second most important thing he did yesterday.

The most important – by far – was going to be with his wife for the birth of the couple’s first child and to suggest otherwise is not a point of view I’m at all interested in entertaining.

He did the right thing and should be applauded for it.

End of story.

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Heartfelt congratulations to the CFL for conducting its draft in relative secrecy yesterday and for not having one team draft a guy who is, you know, deceased.

Yes, I did tune in for a little bit – it was one of those Criminal Minds/CSI Wherever/What Else Is On TV As White Noise/Work At Home kind of days – and it was, well, it was something.

How, I’m not a big draft guy but this was odd. Two panels, with the coaches relegated to the background for some odd reason, and the commish standing there by himself with no one to hug or give a hat to.

Odd.

Someone smarter than I can debate the relative merits of the selections but if you’re looking to hype the league, or even cover an event that has some significance in a lot of Canadian cities, surely there has to be a better way to do it, no?

And having the Saskatchewans scoop themselves by announcing the No. 1 overall pick at a breakfast event about six hours before the actual selection was a bit surreal.

Not sure I’ve ever seen a top pick interviewed on TV about 20 minutes before he was actually chosen. Kind of made the debate among the panelists moot, didn’t it?

Look, I’d love for the CFL to be more relevant here and I know how important it is in some cities across the land.

The draft, to true diehards, is a big deal; relegating it to a mid-week afternoon makes no sense. I get that there were live pucks and basketball on the networks at night and that they are money-makers and attention-getters and can’t be displaced.

But a Saturday afternoon? Or a Saturday morning. Or a Sunday mid-day makes far more sense, doesn’t it?

Anyway, they held it, time for others to chat about whether each team made the right pick but, again, glad they actually drafted guys who are ambulatory.

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Comments

[LeeZ]

Rivera blew out his ACL (I blame the NBA’s shortened season)? only 73 blown saves (otherwise known as July for TOD)? Doug, if there is a Viagra pill for comedy, you must have popped one this morning, because you are on FIRE, my friend! But if your comedic powers last for more than four hours, please see a doctor at once!

[sam]

Rivera should go down as the best closer in the history of Baseball. He was pretty much a lock coming on for the 9th. I saw a video of him this morning and it looked as though he was close to tears....To bad his career may end because he landed funny shagging flies.

Good for Super Son and band members. Some of the best friends I have are from my highscholl band days - we were lucky enough to travel and perform/compete in Europe and parts of Canada. To this day I still play in a band with a few of the guys from the old days - - - - 30 odd years later.

[David in Oakville]

Relief pitchers / closers, goalies, drummers.... the odd "men" out and the last line of defense.

A test of how good he is /was... how much we (non-Yankees fans) hated to see him! If only I had a loonie for everytime I yelled at the TV... "dammit, can nobody hit this guy".

But still, for me, how would I spell R-E-L-I-E-F... Rollie Fingers! Maybe it was the moustache.

(Nice work as always Doug!)

[Sam]

Hi Doug: i believe you mentioned in the past that raps are looking at sf and pg. is Nate Robinson an answer for the raps with a cheap price tag? he is undersize but wouldn't be a bad option. your thoughts pls?

Blogger's note: Not in a kabillion years; can't defend, shoots too much, too small. A total failure if they have to settle for him

[Mr. Cook]

On high-school arts: It's all about the dedication of the teacher. I once saw an absolutely remarkable display of Diggin' on James Brown by a group from Lindsay, ON, called the Odyssey Project (highschoolers). I'm sure you can youtube it.
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No commentary on Dallas? Watching a former champ on the cusp of getting swept the next year is usually noteworthy?

Blogger's note: Sort of ran out of words; when they get knocked off

[Dan]

Was Mariano wearing Nike or Addidas?

[Tim]

Don't we usually get a Nothing but Net article on Fridays? Or did I miss something?

Blogger's note: That kind of died with the passing of the regular season

[LeeZ]

Re your comments about Spike Lee. There was this great show about a decade ago called Sports Night. It ran the first or maybe the second year that West Wing ran. Aaron Sorkin wrote every single line of dialogue for both shows at the same time (which is probably why he was ingesting massive amounts of coke at the time, but that's neither here nor there...). Anyway, Felicity Huffman played the producer of the tv sports show from which the title of Sorkin's show is taken, and she's interviewing this guy for a writing job. She asks him to give him three ways the Knicks can return to their glory days. He resists answering, protesting that he knows very little about basketball, but he relents and, in rapid-fire fashion, lists two very relevant things right off the top (can't remember what they were), and then starts stuttering: "and...and..and..." "And WHAT?" says Huffman. "And tell Spike Lee to sit down and shut the hell up!" Huffman: "You're hired." btw, Doug, I didn't watch the Knicks game last night. What did Spike do to incur your wrath?

Blogger's note: Nothing out of the norm; and Sports Night was one of the all-time great under-rated shows. Joshua Molina before West Wing. A classic sitcom that died too young

[jc]

"But sometimes we forget one in the discussion and we shouldn’t.Mariano Rivera."

Could not agree more.

"Rivera blew out his ACL (I blame the NBA’s shortened season)"

Could not laugh more.

[rob.V]

Sadly, I have not seen Rivera throw even one pitch... friends say I've missed out.
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Spike? Yes, a thousand times I agree! Enough already... another reason to hate the Knicks.
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Reggie? Nah, I can't agree on that one. Reggie was one of my first NBA hero's so I am biased. Lebron is a good kid but Reggie's right. You're the most gifted player in the game... go get it done!
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This generation of players are all about the hype and social media BS (Dwight/Lebron/)... maybe a good reason why we should really get behind this young (and classy) OKC team.
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Actually, since we're talking Reggie was there anyone better at hoisting up a (crazy) last second shot to either tie or win a game? You'd be hard pressed to find maybe 3 guys better than him at it. He was Mr. Clutch.
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If you had game 7 of the finals on the line who would you want taking the last shot. What do you guys think?
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Me:
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1. MJ - Can't argue with history
2. Kobe - His shot selection would be better than Reggie's
3. Reggie Miller - I've never seen anyone take (and make) some of the crazy shots he made.

[Lorie]

@LeeZ: Could not agree more; and perhaps that explains that why, after reading Doug's blog today, I was compelled to wrap myself in a sheet, light up a DuMaurier and enjoy a cosmopolitan. However,it being well before noon here, I ever so slightly nudged the ratio of cranberry juice to vodka. Evvver so slightly. :)

[D-Mac Ottawa]

Two proud papas in the Star sports pages this morning. Congratulations, Doug and Mr. Bosh (and how I managed to come up with "CB3" not once, but twice, yesterday is beyond me. CB4 minus CB1 = CP3, or something like that...).
And I'm with @LeeZ (again) – you are definitely on fire, Mr. Grunt Sir, and I'm guessing not on whatever it was Mr. Sorkin was on back when he was cranking out nearly as many words per day as you do...
I look at the photo of the Mavs bench, staring at 0-3 as the clock winds down, and I can't help but focus in on HWSNBN behind his towel and mumble to myself, "Man, you had your chances... and you were so in your prime... and 'prime' is a moment that needs to be grabbed with both hands... but dude, you had your chances...".
As I said the other day, "knees are scary stuff". Godspeed and best of luck, Mariano. How many great careers have come to a sudden crash in a blink like this? And how many people have we known who never got the chance to even embark onto what might have been a great career because that sudden crash came in high school or university or over summer vacation? Quite a few, in my case. "C'est la vie, say the old folks, it goes to show you never can tell...".
Hit it, Emmylou: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dn8OgcCpyWw
Cheers. Keep going, you TOD!

[Camy Wang]

Sampras thEn Federer and then NadAl.

Switched the A and E there, Doug. Brutal.

Blogger's note: You haven't seen brutal yet. Those were keystroke mistakes. Imagine that! Never made one? Or two?

[james]

Rivera: MVP of the Yankees; they may never be the same (Good!).
On another matter, if that was the REAL Brandon Morrow last night, maybe they are the Team of Destiny.
What did you think of "Slap Maxwell"? Not quite the equal of "Buffalo Bill" (a cable comedy before there were cable comedies) but professionally inspirational perhaps?

Blogger's note: Buffalo Bill was awesome!

[JT]

I bet Rivera comes back next season because no one wants their career to end like this.
And I think a lot of people inaccurately mistakes Rivera as a one-pitch pitcher. Yes, he relies on his cutter a lot but he also throws a 2-seamer and variations of both his cutter and 2-seamer which makes them look like a slider and a change-up. His slider looks like his cutter while the change-up looks like the 2-seamer.

[Gord Smith]

You can make a case for Rivera, but you can make an equally strong case for Trevor Hoffman. His lifetime stats are almost identical to Rivera's, and he has a better save percentage, playing on teams that were inferior to the Yankees.

Even more dominating as a reliever was Dennis Eckersley, who had about 400 saves to Rivera's 600, but spent his first 12 years in the majors as a starter. If he had been a reliever his entire career, no one would be close to him in career saves.

Not to take anything away from Rivera's greatness, but he might not be even the most dominating reliever, let alone the most dominating athlete.

Our impression of Rivera might be enhanced because we saw him befuddle the Jays so many times, whereas we could never stay up late enough to see Hoffman. And we remember Eckersley most for giving up Alomar's home run in the playoffs. We conveniently forget what a miracle we thought it was at the time, because we usually never even got a sniff of Eckersley.

[james]

Eckersley also gave up the "most dramatic home run ever" to Kirk Gibson. Along with Alomar's, he surrendered two memorable late inning circuit clouts (always wanted to use that phrase) that destroyed his team's chances in a given playoff. Did Rivera ever give up even one of those? Anybody?

Blogger's note: Don't recall a homer but a Game 7, bottom of the ninth, World Series-winning hit might be close

[Mike kovacs]

I believe that the TOD are blaming the NBA shortened season for the persistent blown saves ( as well as Jose's slow start).

[chili]

Aaron Sorkin created a number of great or potentially great shows that were never really embraced by fans. Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip was another one. The writing was great. Great cast in Matthew Perry and Bradley Whitford. The episode about New Orleans after Katrina was just phenomenal.
But fans don't care for shows that will make them think. They prefer "reality" shows that are really scripted.. Imagine The Bachelor and Survivor surviving this long (pun intended)?

[Grant]

@Camy. Go write a thousand word blog every day for the next ten years and then you will see when words are typos rather than brutal grammatical errors.

[LeeZ]

@RobV: Don't you DARE ever mention Reggie's name again (Doug's allowed; it's his blog, after all). But you? No sir. To borrow from Paul Simon, I spit on the ground every time Reggie's name is mentioned. I shall never forgive him for scoring those, what, 9 points in 6 seconds or whatever crazy thing he did to my beloved Knicks. He is dead to me, I tell you. DEAD!
As for Buffalo Bill, one of the all-time great underrated shows in history (Slap Maxwell was 2nd rate Coleman, which means that it was still heads and shoulders above most other stuff on tv). I know we've done this before, but consider it a summer re-run: The five all-time most underrated (or underappreciated by the public) great shows in history, in no particular order: Sports Night, Buffalo Bill, Freaks and Geeks (of course), Larry Sanders Show and...struggling for a 5th...somebody help me out here...

[Lorie]

You mean Game 1 of the 1995 Eastern Conference Finals when the Knicks had a 105-99 lead over the Pacers with 18.7 seconds left in the game? And lost? That one? Well, it was only 8 points. And I think it took all of 11 seconds for #31 to do it. And another underrated show? Always enjoyed the comic stylings of Barth Gimble and Jerry Hubbard with their backup band of Happy Kyne and His Mirthmakers. But in one memorable episode, Tom Waits provided the music. And to top it off, quotes Dorothy Parker. :)
http://youtu.be/R_0EPa7x3Nqys

[D-Mac Ottawa]

@LeeZ, The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr.? Is that the one you were thinking of?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_DrjjPzDzUE
How's that ginormous tote board for the ponies coming along, Doug? And how do you preferred your mint julep? A little cognac with your whiskey, or rye? Glass or copper?
Giddyup. Go TOD!

Blogger's note: I prefer my mint juleps in a pint glass, actually. But a nice vodka and ice tea in the heat of a summer afternoon is always refreshing.

[sportschick]

A few Aaron Sorkin fans here and no one mentioned that he has a new show coming out (or I missed the comment) called The Newsroom. Looking forward to that one.

Good one about the NBA shortened season. Any idea when/if we'll be getting a playoff IGBT? You've had a whole week of rest! (I keed, I keed)

Blogger's note: Am thinking early games week nights in second round maybe. Still in scheduling mode

[LeeZ]

@D-Mac Ottawa: I've never heard of Brisco County, actually. I'll have to watch a few episodes. @Lorie: Et tu, Brute? I mean, how CRUEL of you! And after all we've meant to each other.
Actually, I just thought of a 5th show: Frank's Place, starring Tim Reid of Venus Flytrap (WKRP) fame. A WONDERFUL, understated, no-laugh-track dramedy set in New Orleans. Ran for one season, I think. Great theme song by Mr. Armstrong: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kpig9t0VdEE