Category Archives: Racing

Sports:  The Acronyms of our times—NCAA, WNIT, WBC, NCAA, NASCAR, F1

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(MIZ)—A historic Missouri Tiger men’s basketball season has come to an end with a disappointing 15-point loss to Princeton in the second round of the NCAA tournament. The Tigers couldn’t threes and couldn’t buy offensive rebounds and the Princeton defense neutralized Kobe Brown and D’Moi Hodge, the Tigers’ one-two punch in their win over Utah State.

Princeton’s 15-point win is the largest win margin for a 15th seed in NCAA Tournament hsitoryl.

Missouri was 6 for 33 from the outside and finished the season at 25-10.

The men’s team will be remembered for over-achieving, predicted in the pre-season conference polls to finish 11th.  But they couldn’t make it to the Sweet Sixteen, something Missouri hasn’t done since 2009.

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Missouri’s women’s team played Kansas in Lawrence’s Allen Field House last night.  The second round game was the first time the two teams had played each other since Missouri won 80-65 in Lawrence in February, 2012 but it hardly provided any great memories for Mizzou fans.

The Jayhawks pounded the Lady Tigers 75-47. Missouri never scored more than 15 points in a quarter and has ony six in the third.  Missouri finishes 18-14.

They’re 54-62 in the last four years. Coach Robin Pingeton, who finished her 13th year as head coach this year,  promises an aggressive recruitment effort through the transfer portal to go with an incoming recruit class she considers solid.

(WBC)—The World Baseball Classic is nearing its end with the United States ready to play for the championship against Japan tonight.  Japan got a walk-off double in the ninth inning to beat Mexico 6-5 last night.

Team USA hammered Cuba Sunday night 14-2 with Cardinals stars, uh, starring.  Paul Goldschmidt’s two-run homer in the first inning put USA in the lead., In the fourth, Nolan Arenado drove in Goldschmidt with a triple and then scored the teams’ seventh run on a wild pitch. He left the game in the fifth inning when a pitch hit him on the right hand but an X-ray showed no fracture. The Royals’ Bobby Witt Jr., took his place in the lineup.

Goldschmidt drove in two more runs in the fifth inning.

Adam Wainwright went four innings, gave up a run in the first inning but shut Cuba down in the other three. Miles Mikolas went the next four and also gave up just one run.

Witt’s appearance last night was only the fourth time he’s been in a game. He’d had only two at-bats before last night. While his lack of playing time might disappoint Royals fans, a look at the roster indicates why he has watched more than he has played.  Treat Turner, who has put on a power show in the last two games in particular, is the top shortstop—which is Witt’s normal position.  Nolan Arenado is anchored at third.  And there are plenty of senior guys for DH.

Royals catcher Salvatore Perez has had a solid tournament for Team Venezuela.  In its win over Puerto Rico, Perez went 4 for 4 with a home run, five runs batted in, and three runs scored. Venezuela won the game 9-6.

(IN THE CAMPS)—The Cardinals go into their last days in Florida with the best record in the Grapefruit League, at 13-6 despite their contributions to the WBC.  They’re a game ahead of Boston.

In the Cactus League, the Royals are 16-9 and have half-game leads on the Dodgers and the Angels who have slightly better winning percentages but have played fewer games.

Opening day is March 30. All teams are scheduled to play that day. It’s the first time every team in both leagues is opening on the same day since 1968.

(NASCAR)—The first 17 cars finished within one-second behind Joey Logano Sunday at Atlanta.   Logano got a big push on the backstretch during the final lap from Christopher Bell that got hm past Brad Keselowski, who had his best finish in a couple of years with his Roush-Fenway-Keselowski Racing. Bell was third.

Logano had dominated the race, starting from pole and leading 140 of the 260 laps but Keselowski had taken the lead on lap 231 and had skillfully blocked all challengers until Logano got the bump from Bell that gave him the lead and his first win of the year.

NASCAR takes to the Circuit of the Americas road course in Texas next week.

(F1)—Red Bull’s Sergio Perez has won the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix but some Formula 1 bureaucratic blundering and some churlishness by Perez’s teammate took some of shine off of things.   Perez finished five seconds ahead of defending F1 champion Max Verstappen, who had little to say about his team’s second straight 1-2 finish to open the season.

“The whole feeling in the team, everyone is happy,” he said afterwards. “But personally, I’m not happy because I’m not here to be second…”  He was still upset because of a drive shaft failure during qualifying that left him 15th on the starting grid.  He passed everybody but his teammate and posted the fastest lap—which gave him an extra point that keeps him ahead of Perez in the standings.

Two-time F1 champion Fernando Alonso thought he had the 100th podium finish of his career until race stewards slapped him after the race with a pit penalty. The penalty later was overturned, she he finished third after all.

Formula One is off next weekend before the Australian Grand Pix on April 2.

(INDYCAR)—INDYCAR is quiet until it races through the streets of Long Beach on April 16.

 

 

Sports:  It’s Not a Dance; Battlehawks Mania; Diamond Fun in the Spring; Two straight at the track.

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By Bob Priddy, Missourinet Contributing Editor

(NCAA)—First, let’s wish that sportscasters (and others, but mostly sportscasters who have a tendency to use worn-out phrases more often than normal people) would quit referring to the NCAA men’s tournament as “The Big Dance.”  It’s not a dance unless you consider bunches of heavily-perspiring big people running, jumping, and banging into each other on a basketball court a weird dance of some kind.

We would say the same thing about the women’s tournament except that our grandmother once told us, “Horses sweat, men perspire, and ladies glow.”

Now, having gotten that off of our chests, we can move along to:

(MIZ)—The Missouri Tigers will beat Utah State in the first round of the NCAA Mens’ Tournament, at 12:40 p.m. Thursday.  If they win, they’ll get either second-seed Arizona or (unlikely but not impossible) Princeton.  It’s a TNT cable game. The Tigers are seeded seventh. Utah State, a Mountain West Conference Team, is 26-8. The Tigers are 24-9.

While the menfolk will be playing in Sacramento, California, the womenfolk will play Illinois State from the Missouri Valley Conference Thursday evening at 7 in the Women’s NIT.  Missouri finished the regular season at 17-13.  Illinois State is 24-8. Missouri will have the home-court advantage, playing in Columbia.  They’ll try to avoid a third straight first-round loss. (ZOU)

(OTHER ROUNDBALL)—The Southeast Missouri State Redhawks will meet Texas A&M-Corpus Christi this evening in the play-i1n game for the NCAA men’s tournament.  The winner becomes the 16th seed, which earns it the honor of playing #1 Alabama. The Red Hawks are 19-16 after winning the Ohio Valley Conference tournament.  A&M-CC is 23-10 and won the Southland Conference tournament. Game time is 5:40.

Missouri State women will go to Omaha to open the Women’s NCAA Tournament at 6 p.m. tomorrow night.  The WNIT does not seed teams.  Missouri State Lady Bears went 20-11 n the regular season, fourth in the Missouri Valley. Nebraska is the Big Ten automatic qualifier because it had the best record of any conference teams not invited to the Women’s NCAA. Nebraska is 16-14.

(FOOTBALL)—Before the first edition of the XFL folded, St. Louis fans had enthusiastically adopted the team.  The new version of the league and the team have picked up right where that left off.  The largest crowd in XFL history—and the largest crowd for any spring pro football game—38,310 fans—watched the Battlehawks whip the Arlington Renegades 24-11, running their record to 3-1.

Quarterback A. J. McCarron was 14 of 27 for 214 yards and a pair of interceptions. Running Back Brian Hill had 115 all-purpose yards.

(BASEBALL)—Both of our teams continue to play strong spring baseball although both are missing some key players who are taking part in the World Baseball Congress championship. Kansas City is 14-2, tops in the Cactus League. Boston leads the Grapefruit League but the Cardinals and the Blue Jays are kind of tied for second.  Toronto is 11-6 and the Cardinals are 9-5. Boston is on top at 9-4.

The Royals’ Bobby Witt Jr., is the youngest player on the USA team, the only one born in the 21st century.  Clubhouse talk is that the Royals phenom is on the road to greatness. Last year as a rookie he became the 5th player in major league history to hit 20 home runs and steal 30 bases in the same season before reaching 22 years old.

High praise has come from none other than the two biggest starts on the St. Louis Cardinals.  Third baseman Nolan Arenado says, “He’s already a star. He’s going to be a great one…He’s going to be a superstart in a matter of time.”

Adam Wainwright started the first game for the USA team, gave up a home run in the first inning against Great Britain that he blamed on “being kind of amped up.”  He says he “just had to get back under control, just a reset of the mind, go out there and make pitches.”  He did and the USA won 6-2, thanks in large part ot a 3-run homer by Kyle Schwarber.

But the USA got hammered by Mexico in the second game to drop to 1-1 in the start of the tournament.

Back in Florida, the Cardinals got a little scare when top prospect Jordan Walker slid awkwardly head-first into second base. He left the game but was examined in the clubhouse and found to be okay. The team said he didn’t need an MRI but was held out of the game on Sunday and should be back in the lineup today.

Now, the Racin’: Byron doubles up

(NASCAR)—William Byron took two tires while his closest competitors took four in the late-race pit stops, then held on to win his second NASCAR Cup race in a row.  Ryan Blaney and Tyler Reddick finished ahead of Kyle Larson and Kevin Harvick.  Larson had led more than two-thirds of the laps before Harvick passed him. Both lost positions during the last pit stop and could never challenge for the final couple of laps.

Harvick’s fifth-place finish marked the twentieth straight time he has finished in the top ten at Phoenix.

NASCAR has wrapped up its early-season west coast tour and heads to Atlanta next weekend.

(FORMULA 1)—Formula 1 circuits sometimes have names and the one chosen for this fall’s race in Las Vegas has a fine double entendre name.  It’s “The Las Vegas Strip Circuit.”

No, not that kind of strip.  It commemorates the famous Las Vegas Strip that has been the citiy’s trademark center of gambling.   The race is November 18, the next-to-last race on the schedule. Ticket prices are for high-rollers.  A three-day standing-room only pass in the cheapest zone costs $500.  Paddock zone tickets sold out quickly at $15,000 a seat.

The Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, event number two on this year’s schedule, is next weekend.

(INDYCAR)—INDYCAR doesn’t race again until April 16 when drivers take to the streets of Long Beach. Scott Dixon, who as third in the first race, tied Mario Andretti for the most top-five finishes in INDYCAR history.  It was his 193rd.  He’s a six-time series champion hoping he can equal A. J. Foyt’s record of seven. His 53 victories put him alone in second place. Only Foyt, with 67, has more.

Also in sight is Tony Kanaan’s consecutive start streak of 318 races.  Dixon stands at 306 with 16 races to go this year.

 

Sports: Who’s Next for Mizzou; Our Boys of Spring; Battlehawks Brawl; and Racin’

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(MIZ)—Missouri’s clutch victory over Ole Miss Saturday has earned the Tigers a double bye, meaning they won’t play until the Quarterfinals Friday afternoon. The opponent?  It might be Tennessee or maybe South Carolina—or maybe Ole Miss again.

Ole Miss, the 13th seed, plays South Carolina Wednesday night. The winner faces a short turn-around before playing Tennessee, the fifth seed, on Thursday afternoon.  The winner of that game plays Missouri.

Missouri has never reached the quarterfinals in the SEC Tournament—but their 11-7 conference record with tiebreakers over other 11-7 teams have put them there.  They have finished the regular season at 23-8 and they have shown they’re dangerous as the clock runs down. They have outscored their opponents through their first 31 games by only 5.3 points a game, a number that might surprise some folks who look at a 23-win team.

The Tigers’ four-game win streak going into the post-season seems not to be as impressive to the coaches who do weekly rankings.  Missouri is not one of their top 25 teams.  The Tigers are 30th.

College Football News, which swings to roundball in the off-season, projects Missouri as a number eight seed in the NCAA tournament.

And the NCAA doesn’t list the Tigers among its top 25 either.

A trio of big questions for Friday:  Will the Tigers come out a little rusty after the “long” layoff?  Can they play hot for both halves?  And will the failure of the coaches and the NCAA to think better of them be a motivator? (ZOU)

(BASEBALL)—The Kansas City Royals are the Cactus League leaders a full week into spring training.  The Royals are 9-2, including all six road games. They’re outscoring opponents 85-61, the largest run margin in the league. The Dodgers were 5-2 after the weekend; the Cubs 6-4; the Angels and White Sox 5-4.

The Cardinals are fourth in the Grapefruit League, trailing Boston, Houston, and Toronto.  St. Louis is 6-4

(BATTLING HAWKS)—Things got a little messy at the end of Sunday’s game between two of the unbeaten XFL teams—the St. Louis Battlehawks and the D. C. Defenders.  It became the highest-scoring game of the three-week old season.

St. Louis trailed 34-20 in the closing minutes but scored a touchdown and a two-point conversion.  That gave them an opportunity to maintain possession instead of trying for an onside kick.  XFL Rules say they have one play from their own 25 to pick up 15 yards and keep playing.  But Quarterback A. J. McCarron was sacked by D. C.’s Dalvin Bellamy, giving the Defenders the ball inside the St. Louis 20 as the clock ran down.

That’s when players from both sides went after each other.  After a few minutes, order was restored and two Defenders were ejected from the last few seconds. D. C. linebacker Francis Bernard and Defensive lineman Rod Taylor were thrown out, as was St. Louis running back Brian Hill.

The Defenders go to 3-0. The Battlehawks now are 2-1.

RACIN’

All three big-time racing series are underway for the 2023 racing season. INDYCAR and Formula 1 got rolling with INDYCAR on the streets of St. Petersburg, Florida and F1 at the Bahrain Grand Prix.  And NASCAR went to the Busch brother’s home town.

(INDYCAR)—Marcus Ericsson, the winner of last year’s Indianapolis 500 stayed out of trouble and, has started 2023 with a win in a wild race on the street course at St. Petersburg.

Ericsson, who started fourth, finished 2.4 seconds ahead of Pato O’Ward. Six-time series champion Scott Dixon took the last podium position. Romain Grosjean, who started on pole, was one of those who dropped out because of what is called “contact” in racing.

A scary crash at the third turn of the race that saw Devlin DeFrancesco’s car airborne in a flat spin about twenty seconds after the first green flag. The crash eliminated DeFrancesco and four other drivers—500 winners Helio Castroneves and Simon Pagenaud, plus Santino Ferrucci and Benjamin Pederson.  The crash took out both Meyer Shank entries and both of A. J. Foyt’s team cars.

After other bumping, banging and visits to tire barriers that brought out four more cautions, Pato O’Ward appeared headed to victory when his engine briefly lost power, letting Ericsson through for the win.

INDYCAR will put the pieces back together to head to the high banks of the Texas Motor Speedway on April 2.

(NASCAR)—A race within the race made William Byron a winner at Las Vegas Sunday.  Byron, who led 176 of the race’s 271 laps, beat teammate Kyle Larson off pit road on the last stop with an overtime restart coming up. He got the jump on the green flag and beat Larson to the finish line by sixth-tenths of a second.  A third Hendrick driver, Alex Bowman, finished third.  Hendrick cars dominated the race, leading 239 of the laps.

Missing out on the fun was the fourth Hendrick driver, Chase Elliott, who’s going to miss out on a lot more fun because he broke a leg bone in a snowboarding incident Friday before the race. He underwent surgery and will start rehab work this week. He is expected to miss several races, however.

NASCAR moves to Phoenix next weekend to wrap up its early-season West Coast tour.

(FORMULA 1)—Already there is some frustration being voiced in F1 circles that Red Bull driver Max Verstappen will so dominate the sport again that fans will become bored and some will turn away.  Verstappen won the Grand Prix of Bahrain to kick off the season in defense of his 2022 championship.  Teammate Sergio Perez finished twelve seconds back. Two-time F1 champion Fernando Alonso was third driving for Aston Martin, a full 38 seconds behind Verstappen.

(photo credit: Bob Priddy at Gateway (WWTR), 2022)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sports: Clocks, Controversy and Records

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The opening contests of the spring sports seasons are being played out; so are the closing games of the regular college basketball season. The Cardinals are involved in problems with a handshake and a clock. The Tigers have a unique piece of Missouri basketball history to make. And history is made in NASCAR.

BASEBALL

(Cardinals, part one)—St. Louis Cardinals manager Oliver Marmol has triggered a controversy right out of the box in spring training by offering to shake hands with an umpire who chased him at the end of the last season.  Umpire C. B. Bucknor refused to shake hands with Marmol during the lineup card exchange before Saturday’s game, prompting Marmol later to accuse Bucknor of having a “lack of class as a man.”

Major League Baseball is looking into the incident.

The pitch clock is in play now and Cardinals reliever Giovanny Gallegos won’t be pitching until he shows he can pitch within the clock.   Gallegos was recognized as one of the slowest pitchers in the game last year and the Cardinals say he won’t pitch until he has the time to learn to pitch on time.  Baseball Savant rated Gallegos as averaging 25.8 seconds between pitches when nobody is on, and 30.6 seconds with runners aboard.  The pitch clock demands pitchers throw the ball within 15 seconds when the bases are empty. They have 20 seconds with runners aboard. A pitcher who fails to deliver will see a all awarded to the bater.

(Cardinals, part two)—The St. Louis Cardinals are 1-1 in the Grapefruit League after outhitting the Marlins 16-6 and outscoring them 8-2.  Hot Rookie Jordan Walker, normally a third baseman, is getting a full spring workout in the outfield because he’s unlikely to dislodge the Cardinals’ incumbent third baseman.  Walker, who starred at Springfield in Double-A last year, ripped a 430-foot home run and made a tough catch against the center field wall.

Brendan Donovan’s two-run homer in the third inning against the Washington Nationals on Saturday gave the Redbirds a 2-1 lead but the Nationals pushed across single runs in the eighth and ninth to win 3-2.

(Royals)—The Kansas City Royals have started the spring season 3-0 in the Cactus League, beatig the Texas Rangers twice and finishing with an 8-7 win against the Seattle Mariners Sunday.  The Royals got the jump with five runs in the first.

Kansas City beat the Rangers 6-5 on Friday with a ninth inning home run by Tucker Bradley, then followed up with a 10-5 win over the Rangers Saturday, scoring seven runs in the fourth inning.

BASKETBALL

(Mizzou)—The Tigers head into the last week of the regular season at 21-8, the most wins in a decade.  They wrap things up at LSU Wednesday and at home against Old Miss on Saturday.  The SEC tournament starts five days later in Nashville.

Dennis Gates has started his Missouri coaching career with nine more wins than his predecessor’s last year. Going back more than sixty years, Mizzou records show only Cuonzo Martin, whose first team finished with 12 more wins than Kim Anderson’s last  team, has had a bigger debut—in terms of wins.  Anderson had nine more wins than Frank Haith’s last team although fans will remember that Haith’s team forfeited all of its wins that year because of NCAA violations and officially ended 0-12.

Gates’ season so far is an unusual one. Unlike his predecessors dating back to Sparky Stalcup, Gates didn’t inherit much from his predecessor (for better or worse).  His team is mostly transfers.

(POST-MIZZOU)—Former Tiger coach Quin Snyder has a new job. He’s been hired as the coach of the Atlanta Hawks.  He’s 56 now, a veteran of the basketball wars, starting at Missouri where he took the Tigers to four NCAA tournaments and led the team to the Great Eight one year, the deepest Missouri has ever gone in the tournament. He was 126-91 at Missouri as Norm Stewart’s successor but he left under a cloud after the NCAA cited several violations.

Since then he has posted a 373-264 record as an NBA coach, all with the Utah Jazz.

RACIN’

(NASCAR)—Kyle Busch has wasted little time hanging up his first win for his new team, and a history-making win it was. Busch, who moved from Joe Gibbs to Richard Chidress Racing in the offseason, roared from the back of the field after an early-race pit road penalty, passed the dominant Ross Chastain late and beat Chase Elliott and Chastain to the line by three seconds. It’s his 61st win, ninth on the all-time list, and marks the 19th straight year he will have had at least one victory—breaking a tie with Richard Petty.

It also is the 95th Cup win for Kyle and Kurt Busch, breaking the record they had shared with Bobby and Donnie Allison for most wins on the Cup circuit by brothers.

Kevin Harvick, running his 750th consecutive Cup race, finished fourth. Only Jeff Gordon (797) and Ricky Rudd (788) have more. It was his 792nd start overall, tenth best. If he runs all of the races this year, and he fully intends to do so, he’ll finish with 826, which would put him eighth.

Busch’s win is the last time NASCAR will run on one of the drivers’ favorite tracks. California Speedway, two miles and wide enough for serious movements during races, is being torn down, perhaps to be replaced by a half-mile track, perhaps, that might not be available until 2025.

(OTHER SERIES)—INDYCAR and Formula 1 open their seasons next weekend.

 

 

 

SPORTS IS BACK. Or is it “ARE?”

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Super Bowl’s done. Players are showing up in Florida.  So are the stock cars.  March Madness is just around the corner.

But first, a literary note:

“I believe in the Church of Baseball.  I’ve worshipped all the major religions nd most of the minor ones. I’ve worshipped Buddha, allah, Vishnu, Siva, trees, mushrooms, and Isadora Duncan. I know things. For instance there are 108 beads in a Catholic rosary and there are 108 stitches in a baseball. When I learned that, I gave Jesus a chance. But it just didn’t work out between us. The Lord laid too much guilt on me. I prefer metaphysics to theology. You see, there’s no guilt in baseball and it’s never boring.”

Fans of the movie Bull Durham will recognize Annie’s soliloquy that opens the film.  The Church of Baseball is Ron Shelton’s biography of the movie and his creation of the characters we will watch anytime we come across the movie while we’re channel surfing.  If you’re a baseball fan or a fan of the movie or both (who couldn’t be?) we recommend getting the book.

Shelton, by the way, is a former minor league pitcher and he admits he was wrong about the rosary but he’s right about the stitches in a baseball.

There are three great film speeches about baseball.  James Earle Jones’ reverential, “The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball” needs a voice like his to avoid sticky sentimentality.  But Susan Sarandon’s reading of the “Church of Baseball” is better.  The third film speech isn’t about baseball exactly or at all about baseball.  But when Kevin Costner as Crash Davis lists “the hangin’ curveball” as one of life’s great pleasures and believes that “there should be a constitutional amendment outlawing astroturf and the designated hitter,” among other things on his list, the viewer is left with the same reaction as Annie, “Oh My.”

Baseball is inching back into our lives and our lives are getting better every day.   Read Shelton’s book.

(CARDINALS)—The Cardinals gained a catcher, lost a Hall of Famer, and said goodbye to one of their voices in the off-season.  They enter the season with a lot of strengths and questions about the pitching staff. Perhaps the best thing to do is recall how many young arms came up for varying stints last year and, having tasted The Show, have a whole season to polish their game.  Former Missourinet Sports Director John Rooney will be glad to keep us up on the latest.

We’ll enjoy watching Wilson Contreras, miss talkative Tim McCarver, and hope that Dan McGlaughlin is getting the help he needs.

(ROYALS)—The Kansas City Royals have a new hall of famer. Of course, it’s their own hall of fame, but the honor is well deserved. Ned Yost has the most wins of any Royals manager (746), was the first team manager to take the team to back-to-back World Series appearances and one world championship. His post season record of 22-9 (.710 winning percentage) is a major league record for managers with at least 20 postseason appearances.

(FL)—The XFL has wasted no time filling the pro football gap after the Super Bowl.  The USFL won’t be along until April. But the opening weekend of the XFL featured a stirring come-from-behind win by our own St. Louis Battlehawks. The win has some NFL fans wondering why their league doesn’t adopt some XFL excitement.

Former Cincinnati Bengals Quarterback A. J. McCarron let the Hawks to two scores in the last two minutes to rally from a 15-3 deficit to an 18-15 win over the San Antonio Brahmas.

McCarron drove his team 71 yards in eight plays to score with 1:25 left to narrow the margin to 15-9.

The XFL does not allow extra point kicks.  It awards one point for a pass or run from two yards out; 2 points from five yards, and three points from the ten yard line. McCarron hit Austin Proehl with a pass to cut the margin to 15-12.

The league also allows teams a chance to keep the ball after touchdowns if they can convert a fourth-and-15 play from their own 25.  Proehl got open for a 22-yard reception to keep the game going, and snagged a 14-yard pass a few plays later for the winning touchdown with sixteen seconds left.

Proehl is the son of former St. Louis Rams player Ricky Proehl.  McCarron hadn’t played pro football since he tore his right knee ACL in a preseason game in August of 2021. The touchdown passes were his first since he threw one for the Bengals in a playoff game against the Pittsburgh Steelers seven years ago.

(TIGERS)—The Missouri Tigers basketball team will try again to notch its 20th win tonight against Mississippi State, a team that beat them by eleven points in Starkville earlier this season. The game is in Columbia and the Tigers haven’t played well since dumping highly-ranked Tennessee two games ago. Missouri is 19-8 and has split 14 SEC games. Mississippi State is 18-9 and 6-8 in a crowded mit-pack of conference teams.

Now for the racin’

(NASCAR)—Ricky Stenhouse Jr., has won the Daytona 530, the longest Daytona 500 in history, surviving a series of crashes that forced two overtimes.  The nose of Stenhouse’s car was inches ahead of the car of Joey Logano when the final caution came out because of a crash.  Its his first win in 199 races since he won the summer race at Daytona six years ago.  It’s the first win for his team, JTG-Daughery Racing since 2014, a string of 266 races.

NASCAR races next weekend at Fontana, California as the series starts its spring West Coast swing.

(INDYCAR)—INDYCAR is two weeks away from its first race of the year, on the streets of St. Petersburg, Florida and has started the countdown to the Indianapolis 500 in May.

2103 winner Tony Kanaan says he will step out of the cockpit for good after this year’s 500, the 390th race he’s driven in the series. He’ll finish his 500 career by driving for McLaren. He told Motorsport.com’s David Malsher-Lopez that he’s at peace with his decision.

Kanaan has no ride for the full season. He has no regrets about his decision but says, “I’m going to miss it every day of my life. I miss it now.”  He’s 48 and says he’ll still drive “everything,” but he has nothing on his schedule for the rest of this year, or 2024.

(FORMULA 1)—Max Verstappen shoots for his third straight F1 championship in two weeks at the Grand Pix of Bahrain.

Sports: Championships come in Twos in 2022

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By Bob Priddy, Missourinet Contributing Editor

Baseball Season’s done. So is NASCAR for the year.  Champions have been crowned. Changes already are coming in the dugouts and the cockpits.  And the Tigers can’t get over the hump.

The Houston Astros brought down the curtain on Major League Baseball’s 2022 season Saturday night winning the World Series from the Phillies four games to two. It is the second time the Astros have won the World Series. The first time was against the Dodgers in 2017.

(CARDINALS)—Most of the speculation focuses on who the Cardinals will pluck from the free agent market or trade for in the offseason. But it’s changes in the dugout that make the first headline.

One-time fan favorite Matt Holiday will be wearing the birds on the bat again. He’s the new bench coach for Oliver Marmol’s second season. Holliday is still young enough to play (in Wainwright years, at least).  He’s been coaching at Oklahoma State University since winding up his playing days with single seasons with the Yankees and a return to the Rockies in 2017-2018.  He spent eight years with the Redbirds during which he hit .293 and was a member of the World Series-winning team in 2011.

Dusty Blake comes aboard as pitching coach and Turner Ward is the new hitting coach. Blake will have help from Julio Rangel, who comes over from the Red Sox, and Holliday will have help from Brandon Allen, who has been a member of the Cardinals Minor League coaching staff.

Ward is a holdover as the hitting assistant. He was the hitting coach for the Dodgers for three years, the Diamondbacks for to, and the Reds for one.  Blake was a pitching strategist for the Cardinals last year after three years as the pitching coach for Duke University. Allen spent four years playing major league ball for Arizona, Oakland, and Tampa Bay before joining the Cardinals minor league staff six years ago.  Rangle was in the Yankees minor league system as a player for seven years, did a couple of years as the pitching coach for the Texas Rangers, and for the last two seasons was the Red Sox Pitching Coordinator.

Several guys are holdovers including Willie McGee and Patrick Elkins along with First Base Coach Stubby Clapp, Third Base coach Ron “Pop” Warner, and bullpen catchers Jamie Pogue and Kleininger Teran.

(ROYALS)—The Royals and new manager Matt Quatraro are waiting for some other shoes to fall before deciding who needs to be replaced on their coaching staff. The White Sox, who have lured Pedro Grifoil away from the Royals bench to be their manager reportedly are talking to some other members of the Royals coaching staff. The Royals, in turn, are thought to be talking to some coaches on the Tampa Bay Rays staff to see if they want to follow Quatraro to KC.

(TIGERS)—It was a winnable game that would have put the Missouri Tigers clearly in the postseason bowl picture.  But things went wrong, again, and they now stand at 4-6 after going their sixth straight game with only two touchdowns.

On the bright side: the defense is averaging 7.1 tackles for loss per game, the best in the conference. The Tigers are 18th nationally in total defense. They have the 11th best pass defense and 13th best third-down defense in the country.

Both sides will be bested next week when Missouri meets Tennessee, ranked fifth in the country. They close out against New Mexico State and Arkansas.  New Mexico is 3-5. Arkansas is 5-4 but plays two tough games before meeting Missouri: seventh-ranked LSU and 11-ranked Mississippi.  Missouri needs to win two of the three games to be bowl-eligible.

(CHIEFS)—Patrick Mahomes’ dash for a two-point conversion kept the Kansas City Chiefs from losing to the Tennessee Titans Monday night.  Harrison Butker, who had missed two kicks (a field goal and an extra point) drilled a field goal home in overtime to give the Chiefs a 20-17 win.

Mahomes scored the touchdown that set up the conversion and lifted his team from an eight-point deficit as the clock was running down.

Mahomes set a personal record in the game.  He needed just 105 yards passing to break Matthew Stafford’s record for the fastest quarterback to 20,000 yards passing.  He finished his 71st game going 43-68 for 446 yards, running his career total to 21,596.  It took Stafford 75 games to reach 20,000 yards.

The Chiefs are tied with the Bills for the best record in the AFC at 6-2.  The NFC has the league’s only undefeated team, the Eagles at 8-0. Minnesota is 7-1.

(NASCAR)—It’s two for the 22 in ’22.   Joey Logano has won his second NASCAR Cup, driving car number 22.  Logano didn’t need to win the last race at Phoenix to become the champion but he did, beating three other drivers who qualified to run for the championship.

Logano and teammate Ryan Blaney finished 1-2.  Logano’s championship means team owner Roger Penske has had a historic year with championships in the two major racing series in this country.  Will Power won the INDYCAR championship a few weeks ago.

Logano, who started from the pole, led 187 of the race’s 312 laps. Blaney led 109. Only three other drivers led laps during the race. Logano the first driver since Kyle Busch in 2019 to achieve multiple NASCAR championships and the first Ford driver to win two of them since David Pearson went back-to-back in 1968 and 1969.

The race was the last for Kyle Busch with Joe Gibbs racing, a sad day that turned into a grieving day when the team learned that co-owner Coy Gibbs had died in his sleep hours after watching his son, Ty, win the Xfinity championship Saturday. He was 49, the same age as his brother J.D., who died three years ago.

The race started with four drivers running for the championship.  Ross Chastain, who started farthest back, in 25th, finished third. Christopher Bell, who was threatening late in the race, was derailed by a too-lengthy pit stop and finished tenth.  Chase Elliott’s car was damaged when he and Chastain went after the same racing area. Repairs to Elliott’s car left him two laps back, in 25th.

NASCAR’s next race will be the second annual pre-season exhibition race in the Los Angeles Coliseum 88 days from today.

(INDYCAR)—RM Sotheby’s, the famous auction house, called it “the largest sale ever of open-wheel race cars ever auctioned,” last week when 237 registered bidders took part in the sale of forty race cars and racing memorabilia left over from Newman-Hass-Lanigan Racing, which competed in INDYCAR and CART from 1983-20011.  The team won eight series championships and 107 races.

The sales totaled about $6.1 million, with the 1993 Ford/Cosworth car driven by former Formula 1 Champion Nigel Mansel the year he won the INDYCAR series championship.  It brought $995,000 from McLaren Racing boss Zak Brown.A helmet worn by Mansel went for $90,000.

The other big-ticket car was a 1984 Lola T800 that Mario Andretti drove to wins at Mid-Ohio and the Meadowlands. It brought $401,000.

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INDYCAR’s most important trophy returns to its Indianapolis Motor Speedway home this week after a tour of Sweden, the home country of this year’s Indianapolis 500 winner, Marcus Ericsson.  The trophy includes the newly-installed carved image of Ericsson’s face.

Ericsson is the second driver from Sweden to win the Greatest Spectacle in Racing. Kenny Brȁck won the 500 in 1999.

The trip to Sweden is only the fourth time the big trophy has left the United States.  It toured Japan in 2017 in honor of Takuma Sato’s first 500 victory.  It was displayed at the Silver Anniversary Goodwood Festival of Speed in England in 2018 and it went to Paris the next year for the unveiling of the likeness of 2019 winner Simon Pagenaud, a native of Montmorillon, France.

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Bryan Herta, whose career was thought at times this year to be headed to Formula 1, has signed a contract extension that will keep him at Andretti Autosports through 2027.  Herta is the youngest driver ever to win an INDYCAR race, at age 18. He becomes the senior driver for Andretti at the age of 22 (that’s from point of service, not age).

(FORMULA 1)—Formula 1 finishes its year next weekend with the Grand Prix of Abu Dhabi.  Max Verstappen wrapped up his second straight championship last month.

(Photo Credits:  Logano—Bob Priddy; Mansell car—R. M. Sotheby’s)

Sports—Doing What You Have to Do

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By Bob Priddy, Missourinet Contributing Editor

(BASEBALL)—The Cardinals and the Royals have taken major steps for 2023, the Cardinals by locking in their All-Star third basemen through 2027 and the Royals hiring a new manager.

Arenado had an opt-out provision in his contract and after a disappointing two-and-out playoff series with the Phillies had said some things that raised doubts in fans minds that he would come back next year.  But the Cardinals sent President John Mozeliak to California for a heart-to-heart discussion and the best third baseman in baseball today.  Teammates Paul Goldschmidt and Adam Wainwright also had been telling him how much they wanted him back.   So he’s staying for the last five years and $144 million of his contract. He’s 31 and playing in his prime. He’s expected to compete with Goldschmidt for MVP honors.

The Royals have picked Tampa Bay bench coach Matt Quatraro as Mike Matheny’s replacement as manager. Quatraro finished his fifth year as bench coach this year. The Rays went 86-76 and lost both games of the wild card playoff to the Guardians. Quatraro got as high as Triple-A as a catcher, outfielder, and first baseman, then managed four years in the Tampa Bay system in Sigle-A and was Cleveland’s hitting coach in 2014.

During his five years on the Rays bench the team went 412-296 (.574), made the playoffs four times, lost the 2020 World Series, lost twice in the Division series and, this year, got knocked out in the wild card games.

Quatroro has his work cut out for him and likely will need some front office help.

He takes over a team that finished 27 games behind the Guardians, lost 97 games, and was under .500 at home. It ranked 24th in runs per game, 26th in run differential with opponents, had the 8th most strikeouts per 9 innings, ranked 27th with a team ERA of 4.70. Pitchers ranked 28th in strikeouts per nine innings and 29th in hits per nine innings.

Both the Cardinals and the Royals have some things to do in the offseason, however.

(CHIEFS)—No game this weekend but the Chiefs picked up some depth at receiver by giving the New York Giants a couple of next year’s low draft picks to get Kadarius Toney, a former number one pick of the Giants (2021). NFL observers say that he might be a significant outside threat for Kansas City—if he can stay healthy.

Now, Racing:

(NASCAR)—-Christopher Bell did what he had to do for the second elimination race in a row and Ross Chastain did what he had to do with an astonishing run through the last half of the last lap.

Bell, far down in the standings after last week’s bad-luck crash, had to win to make the final four for the season’s last race next Sunday at Phoenix. He grabbed the lead during pit stops with about 100 laps left, but dropped to sixth during the final round of stops, coming out sixth with 24 laps left on the short Martinsville track. He got past Ryan Blaney, another contender who had to win to advance to the final four, with four laps to go and held on to edge Kyle Larson at the line.

But behind the finishing gaggle, Chastain had started a desperate dash to the front.  Too far back to pass enough cars to make the playoffs, Chastain floored it, and ran full speed scraping the wall for the last two turns of the race, going 50-70 mph faster than other competitors, and nipped rival Denny Hamlin for fourth place, knocking Hamlin out of the playoffs.

https://www.nascar.com/video/franchise/nascar-cup-highlights/see-multiple-angles-of-chastains-last-lap-move-to-advance-at-martinsville/

Hamlin, who has had several run-ins with Chastain this year, came out of the last turn of the race two points ahead of Chastain in the points standings only to find himself displaced by Chastain’s mad dash.  Hamlin called the tactic “brilliant.”

Bell and Chastain, along with Chase Elliott and Joey Logano will fight for the championship next weekend in Phoenix. Whoever finishes highest gets the NASCAR Cup.  Logano and Ellott will be racing for their second championship.

(FORMULA 1)—Max Verstappen arguably has had the greatest season in Formula 1 history—and there are still two races left. Vertappen’s win in the Mexico City Grand Prix is his 14th win of the year, breaking the record held by Michael Schumacher in 2004 and tied by Sebastien Vettel in 2013.  His win gives Red Bull Racing its ninth victory in a row, tying the team record, and its 16th win in 21 races. Lewis Hamilton finished second for the second race in a row and Sergio Perez, Verstappen’s teammate, finished third, the second year in a row he has run third on his home track.

 

A Haunting Baseball Question—and Racing

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By Bob Priddy, Missourinet Contributing Editor

(BASEBALL)—A lot of stick-and-ball sports fans adopt the attitude that if their team gets knocked out of the playoffs, they’ll hope the team that did it goes on to the championship.

So some Cardinals fans will be rooting for the Phillies in the World Series that starts Friday.  The Phillies, winners of only 87 games in the regular season, have run the table so far against the Cardinals, Braves and the Padres to gain the right to take on the Houston Astros, who swept the Yankees in the American League finals.   Houston won almost 20 more games in the regular season, 106, than the Phillies did.

But Cardinals fans are left to ponder, “If we had beaten the Phillies, would it be our guys in the World Series?”  The Cardinals were one of eleven teams in major league baseball this year with better records than the Phillies.  But if the Phillies need extra inspiration they need only look at the Cardinals of 2006, who finished 83-78 in the regular season and beat the Detroit Tigers in the World Series. Based on winning percentages, the 2006 Cardinals are the worst teams to win it all.

Five teams with fewer than 90 regular season victories have won the World Series including last year’s Atlanta Braves that finished 88-73, one victory more than the Phillies had this year.

(KC Chiefs)—-Sometimes it seems as if the only way the Kansas City Chiefs can lose is if they beat themselves—last week’s game against the Bills, for example.  For a few minutes against the San Francisco 49ers Sunday, the trend was headed in that direction. The Chiefs spotted the 49ers ten points and then outscored them the rest of the way 44-13 with thirty points in the second half.

The Chiefs have survived a tough first half of the season to go into their break week 5-2.

(TIGERS)—After playing just well enough to lose for a month, the Missouri Tigers played just well enough to win against Vanderbilt.  The Tigers went into the game favored by a couple of touchdowns in some forecasts but needed a fourth-down stop of a Vanderbilt running back to stop a drive that appeared destined for a tying field goal attempt or a winning touchdown.

Missouri is now 3-4 and faces another tough test next weekend against 25th ranked South Carolina.

Now, for the non-stick-and-ball stuff:

(NASCAR)—Unlike other sports where playoff losers go home and pack up the gear until next year, those who lose in NASCAR’s playoffs keep playing.  And winning.

Case in point, Kyle Larson, who won both stages and the race at Homestead-Miami Speedway last weekend.  Larson led all but 68 of the 267 laps. Larson was eliminated from the playoffs earlier as the NASCAR season winds down with only two races left.

Playoff contender Ross Chastain trailed Larson across the line by 1.3 seconds followed by A. J. Almendinger, Austin Dillon, and Brad Keselowski.  Chastain was the only playoff driver in the top five. Keselowski’s finish as his first top five of the year, the first top five since becoming part owner of what is now Roush-Fenway-Keselowski racing.

Joey Logano remains the only driver guaranteed a chance at the championship.  Chastain is the second-seed with Chase Elliott and William Byron holding the top four positions. Denny Hamlin is five points below the cutline. Ryan Blaney is eighteen points back.  Christopher Bell and Chase Briscoe need to win next weeks’ race at Martinsville if they are to advance to the final four who will run for the title November 5 at Phoenix.

(INDYCAR)—Two fan favorites have sewn up rides for the 2023 Indianapolis 500.

Sponsorship has been found for a fourth car to be fielded by Andretti Autosport that will give Marco Andretti his eighteenth chance to get his face on the Borg-Warner Trophy.  Andretti was second as a rookie in 2006, sat on the pole in 2020 and has four top-three finishes and eight top tens.

The winner of the 2013 Indianapolis 500, Tony Kanaan, will drive for Arrow McLaren SP team in the 2023 race, which he has said in the past will be his last 500.  He’ll drive the fourth car in the race for AMSP. Kanaan finished third last year for Chip Ganassi Racing. It will be his 22nd 500. He has five top-three finishes including his 2013 win that as the fastest Indianapolis 500 at the time; the record was later broken by Helio Castroneves in 2021.

(FORMULA 1)—Max Verstappen has three races left to set a new Formula 1 record for most victories in one year.  He won his thirteenth race last weekend at the Circuit of the Americas, in the United States Grand Prix, near Austin Texas, passing Lewis Hamilton with just six laps left and won by about five seconds.

Hamilton, a seven-time F1 champion, thought he had a shot at his first win of the year and admits he’s beginning to think this will be the first time in his career that he has gone without a victory all year. He’s been racing in F1 since 2007.

The win also locks up the constructors’ championship for Red Bull Racing. It comes the day after the death of the co-founder of the Red Bull energy drink, Dietrich Mateschitz.

Sports: Chiefs lose, Logano wins, A champion steps away

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By Bob Priddy, Missourinet Contributing editor

(BASEBALL)—The post-season playoffs have developed a big underdog issue.

San Diego, which won 89 games in the regular season, has ousted the Dodgers, who won 111.

The Phillies, winners of 87, have dumped the Braves, winners of 101.

So far only Houston, winners of 106, has played to form, topping Seattle in three straight. Settle won 87 in the regular season.

Cleveland’s Guardians, making the playoffs in the first season with their new name and 92 wins in the regular season, play the deciding game against the Yankees, winners of 99 this afternoon. Their game was rained out last night.

Tonight Philadelphia and San Diego begin the National League Championship Series.

Thursday night, Houston opens the ALCS against the survivor of tonight’s Guardians-Yankees series.

(FOOTBALL—NFL)—For the second weekend in a row, a Kansas City Chiefs placekicker has set a new team record for longest field goal.  But this time, it didn’t lead to a win.

The Buffalo Bills beat the Chiefs 27-24 on a touchdown with about a minute to play,

The game was tied at 10 at halftime thanks to a 62-yard field goal into the wind by Harrison Butker, who had missed the last few games with an ankle sprain.  His kick broke substitute Matthew Wrights record, a 59-yarder a week earlier.

Patrick Mahomes threw an interception in the end zone in the first quarter and threw a second one that ended the game as the Chief tried to recover from the final Buffalo score.

The win lets the Bills stay a game ahead of the Jets in the Eastern Division. The Chiefs drop to 4-2 but still lead the West over the Chargers, who are 3-2.

(FOOTBALL—MISSOURI TIGERS)—Missouri had the weekend off and is spending this week preparing for Vanderbilt. The Commodores have split six games. Missouri is 2-4, winless in the SEC.  Nashville football columnist Aria Gerson says the game “is one of Vanderbilt’s best shots of winning an SEC game.”

(BASKETBALL—MISSOURI TIGERS)—We’re only about three weeks away from the first University of Missouri-Columbia basketball game. Southern Indiana is the first of the warm-up games for the new-look Tigers on November 7 as they work their way through a non-conference schedule and develop as Dennis Gates’ first Missouri team.

Ken Pomeroy, an atmospheric sciences professor at the University of Utah who has made a science of ranking college basketball teams, ranks Missouri 41st in the country in his Kenpom.com rankings.

(NASCAR)—Joey Logano has made the final four.

Logano’s win at Las Vegas guarantees he’ll be one of the four drivers who will compete for the NASCAR  Cup in the last race of the season next month.  Logano had dropped out of the top ten when he pitted for new tires with 26 laps to go. But he caught leader Ross Chastain with three laps left and led him by eight-tenths of a second at the checkered flag.

Logano, who drove his first Cup race fifteen years ago, wrapped up his 30th career victory. He’ll be chasing his second Cup championship in the final race of the year. He won the title in 2018 and went into the Las Vegas race as the second seed and emerged number one.  The previous number one seed, Chase Elliott, struggled all day and finished 21st.  He dropped to third in the standings.

Chastain, who led a race-high 68 laps, is second in the standings with Elliott and Denny Hamlin making up the rest of the top four.  Hamlin started 31st and finished fifth, behind Chase Briscoe.  Kyle Busch became the only non-contending driver to finish in the top five by crossing the line third.

Two races are left to decide who will be the three drivers joining Logano in the final run for the title.

Christopher Bell was collected in a crash involving Bubba Wallace and Kyle Larson and dropped to the eighth and last contender spot.  Another contender, Ryan Blaney, hit the wall and finished 28th. Contender William Byron finished 13th. Byron, Blaney, Brisco, and Bell are below the cutline headed to next weekend’s race at Homestead-Miami.

(NASCAR—KURT BUSCH)—Kurt Busch, the last active NASCAR Cup driver to compete against Dale Earnhardt Sr., says he’s done as a fulltime Cup driver.  He’s 44, a Daytona 500 winner, and NASCAR’s 2004 champion.

The oldest of the Busch brothers has missed thirteen races since backing his car into a wall in July and suffering a concussion.  He says he might do some selected races next year if doctors say he’s recovered from his concussion, but his days as a fulltime driver are finished.

Tyler Reddick will mover over from Childress Racing and will take Busch’s seat in the 45-car, joining Bubba Wallace on the 23XI team.

Busch was hired by 23XI, co-owned by NBA star Michael Jordan (whose jersey was 23 for most of his career) and driver Denny Hamlin (whose car carries the number 11) to drive last year. The team says he was hired to “elevate our organization in many ways.”  He gave the team its first playoff berth by winning at Kansas earlier this year then had to withdraw from the playoffs because of his injury.

A second driver, Alex Bowman, also has been out of his car because of a concussion in a race three weeks ago. He says he won’t be back on the track until the last race of the year, if then.

NASCAR has announced it will have a re-designed rear section of the chassis available next year. NASCAR hopes it will do a better job absorbing energy in a crash, lessening chances for other drivers to incur the kinds of injuries Busch and Bowman have had to deal with this year.

Photo Credits:  Logano at WWTR—Bob Priddy; Busch at Indianapolis—Rick Gevers

 

 

 

Sports: Baseball playoffs; Tigers & Chiefs; NASCAR playoffs

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By Bob Priddy, Missourinet Contributing Editor

(Baseball)—Well, that sure didn’t take very long, did it?  Two and out for the Cardinals whose big bats went one for fifteen and whose most solid relief pitcher’s finger apparently couldn’t last two innings.  Albert and Yadi went out with base hits in their last times at bat—a fitting conclusion to their careers.

In years to come, young men in the grandstands will be telling their grandchildren, “Yes, I saw Albert Pujols and Yadier Molina play baseball,” much as THEIR grandfathers told them, “I saw Mantle and Musial and Williams” or “Gibson and Marichal and Clemens.”

Across the state, the Royals are looking for a new manager and a new pitching coach.  And some better talent.

In the meantime the playoffs continue although a lot of people no longer care.

(Tigers)—The Missouri Tigers are playing just well enough to drive their fans nuts.  They’re off this week after losing three games they could have won.  This is a team that appears capable of winning only if they play mistake-free.  The break comes at a good time.

(Chiefs)—The Oakland/Los Angeles/Oakland/Las Vegas Raiders played the Kansas City Chiefs (ex-Dallas Texans) for the 127th time last night.  The Chiefs spotted the Raiders the first 17 points then worked their way back into the lead thanks to four short-yardage touchdowns by Travis Kelce, tying a team record and a 59-yard franchise-record field goal from substitute kicker Matthew Wright.  The hinge point of the game came when Wright missed a field goal but the Raiders were called for defensive holding, giving Kansas City a first down and keeping a drive alive that turned into a TD.

Both teams failed on two-points-after efforts and the Chiefs with only a 30-29 lead had to turn the ball over with less than three minutes left. Las Vegas couldn’t get close enough for a winning field goal and the Chiefs get away with a 4-1 record to start the season.

The Chiefs are now 71-54-2 against  O/LA/O/LV.

Now, on to another kind of playoffs:

(NASCAR)—The number of drivers who can win the NASCAR championship has been cut to eight after a competitive and contentious race on the Charlotte Roval—the combination oval and road course.

And in a season known for its unlikely turnouts, Christopher Bell’s victory fits right in.  He had to win to make the round of eight—and he did thanks to pit strategy that gave him fresh tires that let him clear Kevin Harvick on a restart and then pull away for the victory.

On-track incidents turned the day around for several contenders, none so much as 2021 champion Kyle Larson who hit the wall and broke a rear suspension piece on his car. The repairs were made but he was unable to regain enough positions to make the semi-final round. He fell two points short of Chase Briscoe, who had his own adventure when he spun with five laps to go but was able to recover to finish 9th, just enough to move into the next round.

Bell went into the race 33 points below the cut line with no chance to advance unless he finished first. “We were just there at the right time,” he said. “We rolled the dice, gambled, and it paid off for us.”

Also not making the cut was rookie Austin Cindric, the winner of the Daytona 500 at the start of the year. Daniel Suarez lost his power steering but muscled the car to the finish. Unfortunately his finish was 36th, knocking him out of the playoffs, too. Alex Bowman missed his second straight race because of a concussion and is the fourth driver eliminated,

Moving ahead are Chase Eliott, Joey Logano, Ross Chastain, Bell, Ryan Blaney, William Byron, Deny Hamlin, and Briscoe.  The field will be cut to four after three more races and the champion will be decided in the last race of the year. Whichever driver in the final four has the best finish in the last race will wear the crown.

(FORMULA 1)—Max Verstappen raced through a deluge that sometimes left visibility on Japan’s Suzuka Circuit to win his twelfth race in eighteen starts this year and wrap up his second F1 championship.  The race was halted after the first two laps because of the downpour.  His championship was clinched because initial runner-up Charles LeClerc was assessed a five-second penalty that dropped him to third place.  The result leaves Verstappen 113 points in the lead with four races to go, a margin impossible for LeClerc to make up.

Verstappen becomes only the third driver in F1 history to lock up a title with four races left.  Michael Schumacher and Sebastien Vettel are the only other drivers to dominate a season as he has done this year.

(Photo Credit: Bob Priddy, Bell at WWTR)