Officials 'Down' Blunder Wrecked Rams Season

The blunder by the NFL's replacement officials in Monday night's game in Seattle, whose call gave the Seahawks a contentious 14-12 win over the Green Bay Packers on a last-play pass into the end zone, brought to mind a  controversial mistake by referees at the L.A. Coliseum in 1968.
In early December, the Los Angeles Rams, who were coached by George Allen and quarterbacked by Roman Gabriel, played the Chicago Bears in a must-win game for the Rams who were battling the Baltimore Colts for the Coastal Division title.
With about a minute left in the game and the Bears ahead,  17-16, the Rams had a first down near the Chicago 20-yard line. On the first play of that series, Los Angeles was called for holding.  The Bears accepted the penalty, which pushed the Rams back. However, instead of it being first and 20, the officials had the down marker reading second down. They took a down away from the Rams, and after Gabriel's next three passes fell incomplete, the Bears had the ball, and the game.
By taking away a down, the officials might have cost the Rams a chance to make the NFC playoffs. Baltimore was awarded the Coastal Division championship and the Rams were out.
The next day, Commissioner Pete Rozelle suspended the entire officiating crew for the rest of the season and the playoffs. The head of the crew was Norm Schacter, the principal of Los Angeles High School and one of the most respected referees in the NFL.
Rozelle's decision is quite a contrast from the NFL's latest reaction to an officiating screw-up, and as it is being reported, the officials that worked that game are expected to be back on the field this Sunday.

USC Can't Break Cardinal Rule

Palo Alto Aftermath
For  USC, first there was the humiliating, 21-14 loss to Stanford last Saturday night, the Trojans fourth-straight loss to the Cardinal, and this week many Trojan rooters will probably not see USC play the California Golden  Bears on television because of the ongoing dispute between the Pac-12 Network and DirecTV.
Last week, the UCLA-Houston game was televised on the Pac-12 Network, but fans with a DirecTV dish could only listen to the game on the radio, or wait for delayed updates on the Internet.
Unless an agreement is reached before Saturday's 3 p.m. kickoff at the Coliseum, Trojan fans will be in the same boat.

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Maybe USC was overrated all along, with the hype overwhelming common sense after Matt Barkley declared that he would return to Troy for his senior season. The instantaneous reaction was euphoric with the media placing the Trojans at the top of the preseason polls, but few took several important facts into consideration.
Although USC had the quarterback, it didn't have much of a running game, an experienced offensive line and, maybe most important of all, a valuable kicking game. The lack of these three items emerged in full view at Stanford, where the Cardinal defense dominated USC, forcing Barkley, who was sacked four time, to throw two interceptions and no touchdowns in the second half.

Tying on the 'Feed' bag

Weekend Notes and Quotes...
The Dodgers opened up their almost do-or-die Wild Card chase series with the St. Louis Cardinals on Thursday night, fielding just four players from the team's opening day lineup: Mark Ellis, A.J. Ellis, Matt Kemp and Andre Either. Gone or benched are Juan Uribe, James Loney, Juan Rivera and Dee Gordon, all replaced by Andre Gonzalez, Hanley Ramirez, Shane Victorino and Luis Cruz.
Clayton Kershaw was the Dodgers' opening day pitcher, and on the mound  Thursday night was Josh Beckett, who was recently acquired from the Boston Red Sox.
Both the Dodgers and the Cardinals came into the game losing six out of their last seven games.
Dodgers announcers have all but abandoned talking about the club's slim chances of  catching  the San Francisco Giants, who had a comfortable seven-game lead in the National League West going into Thursday's schedule All the concentration is on the Cardinals, who were minus two important players--Lance Bergman and Rafael Furcal, both injured.

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The 7:30 p.m. start for the UCLA-Houston football game Saturday night at the Rose bowl will put a lot of pressure on TV and newspaper deadlines. With a high offensive show expected from both teams, the game doesn't figure to end until well after 11:30 p.m., well-past 11 o'clock news broadcasts and sports section off-the-floor times.

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USC, coming off a less-than-impressive performance against Syracuse, heads for Palo Alto to play Stanford in the Pacific 12 opener for both teams. The No. 2 Trojans will be looking for some payback for their loss last year to the Cardinal in triple overtime. Stanford, like USC, is 2-0 with wins over San Jose State and Duke.

Catching Up!

I've been away from the blog scene for some time, so here are some random notes and thoughts, not in any particular order of importance, about things since my last post, which was over eight months ago...

I started playing tennis again, once a week with a member of our golf group, after not playing for almost 12 years...

Encino Mercedes Benz finished construction of its new showroom on Ventura Blvd. While it was being built I thought it was going to be a pretty ugly building but now that's finished it looks pretty cool. Very European, as are the apartments across the street.

I have discovered two or three good places to have lunch or get a drink on Ventura Blvd., including Casa Vegas in Sherman Oaks.

I am working on three book projects at the same time, a children's book about Yo-Yo's, a mystery novel set in L.A., and an L.A. baseball book. Not sure that doing that all at the same time is a good idea.

Our Black Lab Susie is having arthritis problems with her hips, she'll be 13 in September...

I had to give a speech in church recently about volunteering...

Our old 1967 Volkswagen has a new electronic ignition and it is working very well. The car, which isn't driven very much, starts up nicely...

I bid on and won--for not much money--a wrist watch on Ebay, a reconditioned Rolex that was built in the 1970s.

I had our back yard sprinkler system upgraded and now the grapes are growing on the arbor....

The tale of two football programs

How ironic things have turned out for the football teams at USC and UCLA. When USC was slapped with a two-year suspension from going to a bowl game, plus had its number of scholarships reduced by the NCAA, the Trojans' cross-town rivals, the UCLA Bruins, were all set to take advantage of USC's ill fortune, which all came from the NCAA's investigation surrounding Reggie Bush. Newspaper letters columns were filled with gleeful prose from Bruin fans who predicted that UCLA would benefit with great recruiting and winning seasons.
But that hasn't happened and if UCLA had been holding onto a tiny thread of hope that it would over take USC in football, it was all dashed this weekend.
In an early afternoon game at the Rose Bowl, UCLA met Texas in a home-and-home series rematch from last season's whooping that the Bruins put on the Longhorns in Austin. Coach Rich Neuheisel had been touting quarterback Richard Brehaut all week, saying as much that Brehaut was the player to lead the Bruins offense. But, in a surprise change, it was Kevin Prince who Neuheisel started under center, not Brehaut. Prince didn't waste time putting his team in the hole. He threw three interceptions that Texas took advantage of and by the time Neuheisel replaced him with Brehaut, the Longhorns had a 21-0 lead.
Meanwhile at the Coliseum, USC played host to Syracuse in an early evening non-conference game and the Trojans gave their best effortt of the season. After sputtering in two starts against MInnesota and last week against Pac-12 newcomer Utah, quarterback Matt Barkley passed for five touchdowns, all five to a different receiver, and the Trojans sailed to a 38-20 victory.
At the Rose Bowl, the famed stadium was nearly half empty as the official attendance announced was just over 54,000. USC had over 73,000 seats filled. If the Bruins can't draw a big crowd for a team such as Texas, then not only are the fans angry with Neuheisel but also the TV networks, and the visiting team. The Longhorns had to be disappointed in playing in a stadium where plenty of good seats were available. 

Of holidays and baseball

Fireworks Notes & Quotes

It was on the 4th of July, 1962, 49 years ago that the L.A. Angels, just a season and a half into their existence as a franchise in the American League, took possession of first place by sweeping the old Washington Senators in a holiday doubleheader at Griffith Stadium in D.C.

At that time, it was a widely held belief in baseball that the teams that held first place on the Fourth of July would go on to win the pennant and meet in the World Series.

Although the regular season schedule had been expanded from 154 to 162 games the year before, there were no post-season playoffs, so the World Series started almost immediately after the last game was over.

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add Angels: Gene Autry's Cherubs were the toast of L.A. that summer and a headline in the L.A. Times reflected the town's euphoric support. "Heaven Can Wait, Angels in 1st on 4th."

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last add Angels: The club stayed atop the standings just one day, however, as they moved on to New York to play the powerful Yankees, who knocked them out of first place. The Angels battled the Yankees down the stretch into September but New York was too strong, both in pitching and home-run hitting depth, and Los Angeles finished in third place. Not a bad showing for an expansion team just two years old.

U.S. Open preview

Recent stories both in newspaper sports sections and on television have focused on the reported sagging gap that has grown between American pro golfers and their counterparts from around the world. Going into this week's U.S. Open at Congressional Country Club outside Washington, D.C., London bookmakers have made Luke Donald and Lee Westwood, both from England, the favorites to win the tournament.

The bookies' choices lie largely in part on Donald being ranked No. 1 after his win at the BMW Championship in Wentworth, England, two weeks ago, and on Westwood sitting right behind him at No. 2.

The betting choices favor the Europeans because of their victories on the European and Asian tours, and their youthful stars who are in bloom, aided by the sudden fade-out of Tiger Woods. Players such as Charl Schwartzel, Rory McIlroy, Martin Kaymer, Paul Tracy and Louis Oosthuizen have stolen the spotlight from the Americans, at least in the short term.

But a closer look reveals that an argument can be made that the American home-growns are right there on the leader board with their foreign competitors, who seemed to have slipped since their thunderous coming out.

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add American players: Of the 23 PGA tour events so far in 2011, U.S. players have won 18, including Bubba Watson and Mark Wilson, who have each won two tournaments. Phil Mickelson has won one tournament and he won the Masters last year. Dustin Johnson had a chance to win two majors last year, the U.S. Open and the PGA Championship. He went into the final round of the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach with a three-shot lead.

On the globe's side, Donald has won one tournament in the U.S. this year, a match play event in Arizona in Feb., and Westwood is winless on American courses in 2011. In fact, Westwood has won just two U.S. tournaments in his career, in 1998 and last year at the St. Jude Classic.

But, Donald and Westwood have been piling up the points in the world rankings overseas, in far off places such as South Korea, Malaysia, Australia, and stops on the PGA European tour.

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add foreign players: Since Charl Schwartzel won the Masters in April, he has missed cuts and also failed to qualify for the BMW Championship. Rory McIlroy is still trying to find a win after his disastrous blowup in the final round of the Masters when he shot 80. Both Martin Kaymer of Germany and Louis Oosthuizen of South Africa have nearly disappeared off golf's radar after their wins in majors last year, Kaymer at the PGA Championship and Oosthuizen at the British Open.

And Graeme McDowell, who is the defending U.S. Open champion, has not hoisted any trophies on Sunday this year.