Hoops
Our thoughts are with the family and friends of UMass’s Jack Leaman. Always a gentleman, always good for a pre-Calipari Minuteman story, Jack was a living legend in Amherst and one of the old-timers we were privileged enough to get to know throughout our UMass run. Hit ‘em straight in Heaven, Coach and tell Tommy Bishko, “That’s Right!”. . . That was indeed Charlie Pierce you heard erupting with glee at 4:06 Saturday afternoon. It sounded an awful lot like “Marquette WINS! Marquette WINS!” It doesn’t, however, sound like the Big Dance. Yet. We wish you luck, Sir Golden Eagle full of grace. . . Kenny Mayne’s plunge into the land of the Cameron Crazies didn’t get enough time to breath. Still, Mayne proved his worth yet again. . . Dr. Jerry Punch is following me. What are the chances of mentioning the Doc twice in one month for any non-NASCAR writer in the Northeast? Here it goes: Doc JP actually did a nice job alongside versatile Nancy Lieberman-Cline working Saturday’s SoCon Championship and nary a pit stop reference. . . Mike Gminski – a poor man’s Jeff Ruland, you’ll surely agree – had a solid outing with CBS stalwart, Gus Johnson in smooth prep game for two weeks hence, when the Tourney starts in Dayton and points beyond. . . In the spirit of Bravo’s Friday night airing of John Cusack in “High Fidelity,” here are the Top Five Games We’d Like to See the Committee “set up”: 5. Stanford-Princeton, 4. Syracuse-Manhattan, 3. St. Joseph’s-Arizona, 2. Kansas-North Carolina, 1. Texas-Providence.. . So, CBS4 ran a crawl throughout the weekend. It would seem Echostar and Dish Network are planning to drop CBS4, Nickelodeon and Comedy Central. The crawl urged those affected to call their provider. And what do you suggest they say? WE WANT OUR BOB LOBEL? I’m thinking of subscribing to Dish just to get rid of the Rambling Wreck (and those brainwashing Nickelodeon mind-warpers). If Dish promises to take away CN8 and Oxygen, you’ve got a new customer in Hull. . .How many Tommy Points do I get for smashing the Tommy Heinsohn Bobblehead into 17 equal pieces?

Better than Goode
Thanks Jon Goode for the Connor Henry update. I think we’ve started something here – I dig for names, you do the work, the reader is served. That’s old school journalism. So how about Darrens Tillis and Daye, Mark Acres and Brad Lohaus? Sorry, pal. Now, go get ‘em.

Baseball
Boy, Bill Griffith really went out on some limbs in Friday’s Globe - narrowing the field for Red Sox Baseball studio host to an unwieldy 95 or so. If I’m NESN – and I realize the short time frame and the need for a local fix – my first call would be to old staffer, Wendi Nix. And my second would be to under-valued Jimmy Roberts. . . It was discovered this weekend that Percy the new Blunder Dog is a big baseball fan. So big, in fact, he managed to eat the 3/4 of the rawhide off a stray ball before his attentive master could warn him of the potential digestive complications. Good doggie, Percy. (Positive reinforcement, just like we learned at obedience school in the Quincy Armory.). . .Friday night’s Red Sox presentation on NESN was helped along by in-game, in-dugout, interviews with Kevin Millar and Jason Varitek. RemDog offered up a new motto for Millar’s approval, but “Curse This” was wisely taken under advisement until a full meeting of the Cowboy Up (with) People can be arranged. Curse This sounds a bit too WWE for our tastes. I’m willing to give a Cowboy Up variation a shot when Millar feels the time is right. . . That silly 7-Up dude just called in with Cowboy Up Yours, Yankees! . . . A couple of shots of the “Yankees Suck” banner snuck into the NESN telecast late in the game, but it was negated by creative camerawork until the authorities could remove the WOMEN with the sign. Not the type of girls you bring home to The Shirl, I assure you. . . Of course, at this point, any girl would be a Mitzvah in The Shirl’s eyes. But I regress. . . Didn’t Joe and Jerry sound ready for Opening Day during the Yankees game on Sunday? They were even subdued enough to constantly remind us how meaningless Spring games are. . . Crespo: More fun than Espo and a capable Nomar fill-in, if I can be so bold.

Shaughnasty
Is it just me, or is the infrequency of Danny Boy making him more tolerable? DB didn’t break new ground with his steroid piece last week, but it was serviceable just the same. It was also a perfect display (left side/right side) of why Basketball Bob Ryan is the best writer in town and how many spots back DB has fallen. . . Top Five daily columnists in New England: 5. Gerry Callahan (when he tries), 4. Jeff Jacobs (Aunt Esta in W. Hartford always raves about him), 3. Bill Simmons (he might as well be based here), 2. Bob Ryan, 1. Bill Reynolds

Sunday Night Shows
We still can’t figure out why NBC7’s Sports Xtra with the still too stiff Joe Amorosino continues to have the background noise of Terminal A at Logan. Can’t they afford one of those “On-Air” lights to let the people off-stage know to quiet the heck down. . . Not that we wouldn’t rather listen to a cute, young BU PA talk about her piercings, than hear Danny Boy drone on, but it is quite distracting. . . NECN’s Chris Collins – a fellow Peabodian (immediately qualifying Collins for semi-limited bashing in this space) – nabbed David Givens for Sunday night’s Sports Late Night, but Givens wasn’t giving up much and Chris isn’t exactly your probing host. Which is fine – Peabody’s all about mellow. . . Steve Burton’s good get of Detroit Lion, Damien Woody was similar to Collins’s dilemma – nice guest, no good banter. . . Lobel, who earlier in the week was sprawled on top of the Red Sox dugout (as it was painted by the Cranky Guy), said good bye to The Fort from near the dugout Sunday evening, after cozying up along side the dugout with Gordon Edes in a pre-taped segment that started. The poor guy’s going to have dugout separation anxiety on the flight back to Boston. . . There was hockey talk on both 4 and 7 and it seemed to center on Gunther. Or Gonchar. Or Gonzaga. It was all Canadian to me.

Rants and Raves
We’re giving high marks to the re-designed, re-focused Boston Globe Magazine. It’s still going to have to find its “voice” and stride for the Boston Uncommon front-of-book section, but the bold changes and (belated) entrance to Century 21 are commendable. The Shirl likened its look and feel to the New York Times Magazine, but we pointed out the Globe’s version isn’t quite as pretentious. Let’s hope it stays that way. . . Oh yeah, also a nice move on separating the Crossword and its answers by a week, as well. And one more thing – just throw Dave Barry on the end page or better yet, give Charlie P his own column there. He’s Boston’s best writer but so under-utilized. . Hey HBO – was part of AJ Soprano’s real-life probation the requirement that he scream like a little boy during the first bear scene last night? Mommie, Mommie. What a wuss . . .It sure was nice to see someone get whacked again, wasn’t it? Can’t wait for Steve Buscemi next week – he’s king of the creepy guys. . . It’s not often we are capable of critiquing 60 Minutes, so when the chance arises we’re going to have to let ‘er rip: The Geno Auriemma segment by Morley Safer missed two whole angles that would have made the piece semi-worthwhile: Geno’s on-going rift with Jim Calhoun and Geno’s temptation to see if he can conquer the men’s game, the way good friend Phil Martelli has with St. Joseph’s. We even heard Geno’s name for the Miami Hurricanes’ men’s job if it opens up – all those old south FLA Huskie Blue Hairs would love that. . . The Billy Packer/Papa John spot is a sad attempt at outdoing the Dick Vitale/Bill Raftery ad for DiGiorno frozen pizza. Maybe the funniest part is that Vitale once raved to us about the Papa John founder who had taken Vitale on his private jet years ago. Does this mean Packer is getting Vitale’s sloppy seconds? . . . If you leave ESPN’s “Dream Job” on as background noise, it immediately begins to sound strikingly similar to ESPNEWS during the midday. Which is to say, quite bad. . .Check out these two bitter, Anti Tito letters that good friend, Dan Wetzel, included in his Yahoo Sports Mailbag last week: “Not only do the Sox have the Curse of the Bambino on them, now they have the curse of the Totally Clueless. Grady Little is going to look like Einstein compared to Francona. I’m pretty sure that the Sox won’t even sniff the playoffs as long as Bozo the Manager is running the show. If the Sox wanted to drive a stake in the heart of the Yanks, they should have talked George into hiring Francona,” written by Vince DiVincenzo, Philadelphia, Pa.; and “Terry Francona is the same stiff that did nothing in Philadelphia. He will be very cordial at his firing, too. You get the feeling he says all this positive stuff because he has no clue about what really needs to be done. He is not full of sound and fury but he still signifies nothing,” written by Seth M. Fisher, Thousand Oaks, Calif. Now that’s some different perspective, wouldn’t you say?

David Scott is a freelance sports writer based in Hull, MA and can be reached at dscott33@comcast.net