Good morning!
Boston College announced Wednesday it had hired Pat Kraft to be its new athletic director, replacing Kevin Jarmond who left for UCLA. Kraft’s hire ends speculation that UMass AD Ryan Bamford was in line for the job.
Kraft, who resembles a young Pete Rose, has a better resume than Bamford. The Owls football team went to five straight bowl games and two NCAA basketball tournaments under his watch. He has a keen eye for coaching talent, hiring Matt Rhule who advanced from Temple to Baylor to coaching the Carolina Panthers.
UMass football has been historically bad during Bamford’s five year tenure (14-46), and the basketball team hasn’t had a winning record since the year he arrived. He screwed up the Pat Kelsey hiring three years ago, and has gone through coaches like a mess hall goes through soap pads.
The fact that neither team has a winning record under Bamford’s watch is an inconvenient truth that is largely ignored by the local media, which cares more about the UMass logo design than winning games.
Bamford’s lucky to be where he is and making $428,096 on the taxpayers’ dime in 2019, according to the Boston Globe. During a one-hour video conference last month, his key words about the state of the department were “awesome,” “terrific,” and “stay tuned on that.”
When a reporter asked him about his hair (yes, his hair), Bamford was in his wheelhouse. “Hat off! All right man! This is the mop right here, the lettuce. Have not let my wife touch it yet. I’m gonna let it grow out a little bit.”
Bamford patted his mane and touched it with his fingertips. “It’s not good, not pretty,” he lamented. “I got on the Peloton today and didn’t put any product in it.”
Bamford said he might do his next haircut live on Facebook. Stay tuned on that, you’ll see why BC got its man and UMass is stuck with theirs.
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In March, Sports Illustrated wrote about Michael Crane, a freelance TV editor who robbed a bank in 2007 while he was working at the Masters for CBS. Crane had been partying all night with two drug dealers. He scribbled a holdup note and gave it to the teller. She looked at it and asked, “Are you sure you want to do this?”
Crane nodded yes and left with a stack of bills that exploded in red dye. He turned himself into the police and served 29 months in a federal lockup in Talladega.
Retired bank president Fran Lemay has a holdup story. Lemay attended Deerfield Academy and majored in business at Nichols College in Dudley. He began his banking career in 1955 making $2,600 a year after his mother saw a “Teller Wanted” sign in the window.
In the early 1970s, Lemay was at the Haydenville Savings Bank when it was robbed by two armed men. “Don Packard was the bank president and I was in his office when it happened,” said Lemay.
“They put the teller in the trunk and took off. They’d put the money in a paper bag and threw it in the back seat. Some of it fell out and the cops saw it when they pulled them over. They opened the trunk and got the teller out and she quit on the spot.”
Lemay was a titan of the local banking industry. He bought and sold banks that today belong to People’s United. Happily retired, he drinks beer and reminisces. “It was my only bank robbery,” he said. “I was a nervous wreck over it for years.”
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HORSEPLAY: Horse racing has continued despite the coronavirus pandemic. The stands are empty but online betting is legal and the races are televised on Fox Sports, TVG, YouTube and other streaming services.
Last month Churchill Downs handled $26.6 million on opening weekend, three times what it handled last year. On Wednesday at Belmont Park, the opening day handle was just shy of $10 million.
The Belmont Stakes is two weeks hence, shortened a furlong to a mile-and-an-eighth. Bob Baffert’s speedy 3-year-old Nadal is out. Winner of four straight races, the presumed favorite fractured his right front leg during a workout. Two screws were inserted and he’ll be put out to pasture to breed little Nadals.
NOTES: Jockey Irad Ortiz had five wins on Wednesday’s card. … Maximum Security has been moved to Bob Baffert’s barn after trainer Jason Servis was indicted in an alleged doping scheme. Baffert’s got his own problems. Two of his horses tested positive for lidocaine, including Belmont favorite Charlatan, and consequently he’s facing a 60-day suspension. … Jockey Luis Saez dropped his appeal for careless riding in the Ky. Derby and has begun serving his 15-day suspension. … Mark Casse was elected to the Racing Hall of Fame. Casse got his start saddling horses on the Mass. fair circuit. His nephew Ron Rodak works at the South Deerfield Post Office. … Of steeds and deeds: Hola Chica is stabled at Santa Anita and is owned by 92-year-old composer Burt Bacharach. … Kershaw is racing at Santa Anita and so is RayRay, named for Liev Schreiber’s character on Showtime’s Ray Donovan. … Dean Martini broke his maiden at Churchill last weekend but Don Vito Corleone was pulled up and walked off. “I’m not saying anything bad about Don Vito Corleone,” joked FS1 analyst Richard Migliore, who was raised in Babylon, N.Y., and garnered the bulk of his 4,450 career wins at Aqueduct, Belmont Park and Saratoga.
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SQUIBBERS: WFAN’s Boomer Esiason says New England’s love for Tom Brady has quickly faded. “The way this whole ‘Tompa Bay’ thing has gone down with the Rob Gronkowski reunion and jet skiing at Jeter Mansion, all this happiness is starting to piss off Patriots fans.” … The NFL Network reports that Buffalo quarterback Josh Allen and wideout Stefon Diggs are “developing a relationship” by playing video games. … The Tigers will take 6-foot-1, 220-pound first baseman Spencer Torkelson of ASU with the first pick in Wednesday’s draft. The Red Sox have the 17th pick, which according to mlb.com would be NC State catcher Patrick Bailey. … A 50-game baseball season would be like playing an extended Grapefruit League season. It won’t work. … Another book about Yogi Berra is on the shelves, “Yogi: A Life Behind the Mask” by Jon Pessah. Yogi could’ve been talking about the pandemic when he said, “If you don’t know where you’re going, you might end up someplace else.”
Chip Ainsworth is an award-winning columnist who has penned his observations about sports for four decades in the Pioneer Valley.
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June 06, 2020 at 04:11AM
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