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Movie Review: The Platformon March 21, 2020 at 2:37 pm

Hammervision

Movie Review: The Platform

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Cellar Dweller: 2015 Darkhorse Brewing “Maple Bourbon Barrel Black Bier”on March 21, 2020 at 3:16 pm

Cut Out Kid

Cellar Dweller: 2015 Darkhorse Brewing “Maple Bourbon Barrel Black Bier”

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Cellar Dweller: 2015 Darkhorse Brewing “Maple Bourbon Barrel Black Bier”on March 21, 2020 at 3:16 pm Read More »

Chloroquine exposes Trump’s arrogant ignoranceon March 21, 2020 at 3:53 pm

The Quark In The Road

Chloroquine exposes Trump’s arrogant ignorance

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There’s Still Music if You Look for It.on March 21, 2020 at 6:46 pm

Acoustic Music in Chicago

There’s Still Music if You Look for It.

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Spring and All That Ison March 21, 2020 at 9:00 pm

Chicago Weather Watch

Spring and All That Is

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From Where I’m Sitting … What in the RONA has happened here?on March 21, 2020 at 9:46 pm

When All Else Fails . . . Change!

From Where I’m Sitting … What in the RONA has happened here?

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The City of Big Shoulders Gets Tested/Character in the Time of Crisis/Schlepper’s/Preppers/Hoarders/Goofson March 21, 2020 at 10:10 pm

JUST SAYIN

The City of Big Shoulders Gets Tested/Character in the Time of Crisis/Schlepper’s/Preppers/Hoarders/Goofs

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‘Unprecedented’: Coronavirus impacts sports like Spanish flu, 9/11 attacks, 2 world wars did noton March 21, 2020 at 1:00 pm

MESA, Ariz. — Yankees first baseman Tino Martinez and the team’s young bullpen catcher, Mike Borzello, were in the middle of New York City on that sunny Tuesday morning that turned to smoke and horror in an instant.

“In a half-hour, our lives changed,” said Borzello, now the catching and run-prevention strategist on the Cubs’ coaching staff.

“The buildings come down. We’re trapped in Manhattan. We don’t know if we’re getting attacked.”

When baseball shut down last week because of the coronavirus pandemic — along with every other major professional sports league and the NCAA — that was one of the first flashes through Borzello’s emotions: the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

“But that was a different feeling, obviously, than this,” he said as he spoke through a fence one morning this week, standing a safe distance of 8-10 feet away, at an otherwise quiet spring-training facility.

“This is more panic,” he said of the overall public response to the COVID-19 crisis that has shut down schools, businesses and even public beaches across the country in the last 10 days.

“This is more of a gradual understanding of what we’re dealing with — we’re still not sure to an extent. The question about 9/11 at the moment was, ‘Are we being attacked?’ Once we got past that, it was a moment. This is a slow burn right now.”

In fact, the Sept. 11 attacks shut down baseball for only a week, and the season was extended to allow the full schedule to be completed before starting a postseason in which Borzello’s Yankees reached the World Series.

By the time the Yankees played Game 3 in New York, their first home game in that series, president George W. Bush received a deafening ovation as he took the mound for the ceremonial first pitch and delivered a strike in what might have been the emotional peak of a dramatic seven-game series.

Now, only the silence is deafening across spring-training diamonds in Florida and Arizona during what was to be the final weekend of exhibition games before teams broke camp for season openers this week.

“It’s pretty quiet,” said center fielder Ian Happ, one of maybe 20 players still using the Cubs’ facility to work out and stay ready for a season nobody can be sure will be played.

“Has this happened before? Has this ever happened, where the season was about to start and then it gets postponed?” left fielder Kyle Schwarber said during a conversation a few days ago about the “limbo” players and teams are facing.

It hasn’t, other than the labor stoppages Schwarber already knew about.

In fact, since the longest-running major team-sports league in the U.S. began its current American League-National League configuration in 1901, the shortest season played was the strike season of 1981, when three teams played 103 games each (the Giants played 111).

Even the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918-20, which killed more than 600,000 Americans, did not cause a baseball stoppage, although the 1918 and 1919 seasons were shortened after a directive from the U.S. Secretary of War during World War I regarding the activity of would-be soldiers.

Teams lost between 23 and 31 games because of the early end to the 1918 season.

The twice-delayed 2020 season already has wiped out more than 40 games from the front end of the schedule based on the most recent postponement lasting until mid-May.

Locked-down Cubs camp

Nobody seems to expect baseball to resume by then. And even if it did, players say they’ve been told to expect three to four weeks of spring-like prep time to ramp up for rescheduled openers.

That means at least mid-June, maybe July. And making up that much lost time on the back end is impossible without daily doubleheaders and/or a warm-weather (or domed) neutral-site postseason.

“That’s on the table, I’m sure, more doubleheaders,” Cubs reliever Brandon Morrow said. “I’ve heard [a proposal] of just playing a bunch of doubleheaders and expanding the roster so you could carry three or four extra pitchers.”

Of course, nobody can know.

“It’s unprecedented,” infielder David Bote said.

Said Happ, a Cubs union rep who gets regular updates from the union’s constant talks with MLB: “It’s a lot of guesswork right now.”

That’s just the baseball part, the part that involves the eerie silence of the sports world.

“It’s hard to even fast-forward to next week and understand where our country’s going to be at that point,” Borzello said. “It’s hard to even think about a season at all.”

Borzello just moved to Arizona from the Los Angeles area this offseason. He’s showing up at the complex to offer whatever he can, mostly working with pitchers during informal work.

Morrow also lives in Arizona, making the complex an easy commute and a comparative safe zone. Happ is staying with friends and not bound by a lease. Bote just extended his spring rental agreement through April to buy time to learn more before making a longer-term decision.

Anthony Rizzo doesn’t want to fly 5 1/2 hours home to Florida only to find out he has to be back in Arizona in a few weeks. Yu Darvish has a home in the Phoenix area, and his wife and kids are with him.

So they stay. For now.

But top executives have left the complex. Manager David Ross stayed in town with his kids until Thursday, when he stopped by the complex to drop off some equipment before heading to the airport.

Kyle Hendricks and Darvish play catch Tuesday at Cubs’ locked-down complex in Mesa.

“There’s more and more people leaving every day as this evolves,” said Morrow, who estimated 35 of the 39 players still on the big-league spring roster were in camp the first day or two of the shutdown. “But then each day there were two or three guys packing their bags.”

Even inside the recently deep-cleaned workout facility, the few still at work are taking social-distancing precautions and wearing latex gloves under their batting and fielding gloves. There is a 10-person limit in the enormous team weight room.

It’s not lost on Borzello and many of the players that sports often provide an escape for fans’ real-life difficulties and hardships — “even for people who play sports,” Schwarber said.”

“After 9/11, baseball became the campfire everyone got around to get their mind off of all the tragedy and horror that happened,” Borzello said.

Similarly, president Franklin Roosevelt in January 1942 urged MLB to play its season for the morale of a country at war again.

“The good thing about our sport,” Schwarber said, “is it sounds like they’re still going to let us play, eventually.”

Even if the battle lines of this war do not seem as clear.

“This might be the most united that the world’s ever been,” Borzello said. “We all have the same enemy.”

World Series GM3 X
Yankee Stadium during 2001 World Series.

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‘Unprecedented’: Coronavirus impacts sports like Spanish flu, 9/11 attacks, 2 world wars did noton March 21, 2020 at 1:00 pm Read More »

How Simeon’s dominance, led by Jabari Parker and Kendrick Nunn, further solidified Wolverines’ legacy as basketball powerhouseon March 21, 2020 at 1:11 pm

It almost felt like a time warp last month as Kendrick Nunn strolled through Simeon’s locker-lined corridors and past the trophy case, where the nets he helped cut down are draped over the four pieces of hardware he helped win.

He can’t believe how much time has passed.

“It doesn’t even feel like 10 years to be honest,” Nunn told the Sun-Times in a phone interview this week. “Maybe like five, but not 10.”

Nunn, a budding NBA rookie this season, was by no means a star on Simeon’s 2009-10 team, which won the Wolverine’s first of four consecutive Class 4A state titles. He was more so a role player, stepping in when needed. The same goes for his buddy and fellow freshman that season, Jabari Parker.

No, the star of the first team, who might get overlooked now, is Brandon Spearman, who was one of only two seniors at the time.

And Parker made sure to emphasize the impact Spearman had on him and the team that season.

“To be honest with you, Brandon Spearman, he carried us that whole year,” Parker said. “He played the majority of minutes and we were just there just to try to help him because he carried us so much and that trophy definitely go to him.”

In Nunn and Parker’s first season, the two teenagers were still growing into their own. Nunn was as slim as a toothpick, but had already exhibited an elite level of athleticism. Parker was pudgy and tall, but the raw talent was undeniable.

Spearman, who has known the two guys since childhood, took on a leadership role on the team.

Still, Simeon struggled for most of that season. The Wolverines couldn’t find cohesion and lost nine games that season. Coach Rob Smith called it the “was the worst season I’ve ever had record-wise.”

“It didn’t seem like we could do it,” Smith said of winning the state title. “We thought we had the personnel to do it but we just didn’t think Jabari and Kendrick were old enough to help us push over at the time.”

That was until Simeon met up with Benet in super sectionals.

Down three with only seconds remaining, Parker grabbed the rebound and passed it to Spearman who took a deep off-balanced shot at the buzzer. He made it and sent the game into overtime. Then, Spearman hit two free throws to send the game into double overtime.

Brandon Spearman carried Simeon on his back all the way to a state title.
Brandon Spearman carried Simeon on his back all the way to a state title.
Sun-Times Media

Simeon ultimately won, 55-50, in what was arguably the biggest defining moment of the season.

After another close win against O’Fallon in the semifinals, Simeon was set to go against Young, who was arguably the best team in the state all season.

“We knew that Whitney Young was so far ahead of us, they had a great team, they had a group of guys who were returning, they were the defending champs,” Parker said. “[At first, we] were just trying to figure out, ‘OK, how do we play against them?’ But that [Benet] game was really the preparation for that. And as soon as we got to the championship, it was like, ‘OK, it’s a whole different team that they’re going to face and we have the confidence to play them.'”

Simeon knocked off Young 51-36 for the first Class 4A title. From there, the Wolverines went on to be unstoppable over the next three years.

“They were the No. 1 team,” said former Warren coach Chuck Ramsey, whose team lost to Simeon in the 2011 Class 4A title game. “They just kept putting championship teams together.”

Simeon ultimately had the most dominant eight-year run in IHSA basketball history. During that time, the Wolverines won three Public League titles and a record-tying six titles — two of each came in the latter half of Derrick Rose’s tenure.

“They were the gold standard,” Ramsey said. “They were what everyone was aspiring to be and to do what they did.”

That run led by Parker and Nunn only further cemented Simeon’s legacy as a Public League powerhouse.

“It just put a stamp on it,” Nunn said. “No other schools are doing that. It definitely put a stamp on Simeon and let them know what we’re about. And that’s forever.”

“It actually took us to another level,” Smith said. “We were on the map pretty much with Derrick and those guys — and of course Ben [Wilson] — but with Jabari and Kendrick it kind of took us over to make us a national program.”

And that’s not an exaggeration.

Parker and Nunn developed a reputation as Batman and Robin. They were a dual threat in Simeon’s stacked lineup. They were also best friends. During the summer, they could be spotted in Parker’s driveway, matching up one-on-one over and over and over again.

Some New Trier fans get their photo taken with Simeon's Jabari Parker after their team's loss in the IHSA Class 4A super sectional at Chicago State University in 2013.
Some New Trier fans get their photo taken with Simeon’s Jabari Parker after their team’s loss in the IHSA Class 4A super sectional at Chicago State University in 2013.
Sun-Times Media

By the 2012-13 season, Parker was a household name. He was also the consensus No. 1 prep player in the country before a foot injury temporarily sidelined him. Simeon started that season as ESPN’s top high school team in the nation.

The Wolverines were rockstars in the prep world. They traveled more than an AAU basketball team. It wasn’t unusual for fans in the stands to ask players for their autographs. And at the Pontiac Holiday Basketball Tournament, Smith said the demand was so high that his team was set up in an auditorium to meet fans and sign autographs.

“It kind of just came with [the territory],” Nunn said. “It didn’t feel out of the norm, it felt normal for all of us because we were going through it, and it was awesome. We were just having fun and in the moment. So it just felt right, everything felt right.”

Simeon's Kendrick Nunn dunks against 2013 Stevenson in the 4A championship game.
Simeon’s Kendrick Nunn dunks against 2013 Stevenson in the 4A championship game.
Sun-Times Media

Simeon’s program is built on years of tradition and striving for greatness. Still, to this day, Smith shows his players highlights of the late Ben Wilson, a basketball phenom who was shot and killed at age 17 in 1984.

“[Smith] would play these games for us and he would show us the way, how to win, how to play the Simeon way,” Spearman recalled. “He would show us and he would tell us and he would coach us on the court very hard and let us know how he would want us to play and do things and it worked as you see.”

Simeon retired Wilson’s No. 25 jersey in 2009. But players like Nunn and Rose where his number now in honor of him.

After winning their fourth and final title, the group split up to their respective schools. Parker was Duke bound. Nunn and Jaylon Tate went to Illinois. They all embarked on their separate journeys, though they agreed they were forever bonded from their time at Simeon.

We all know the story of what happened next for Parker. After one season at Duke, he declared for the 2014 NBA draft, where he was selected second overall. Parker was destined for greatness and almost became an All-Star one season.

Jabari Parker started his NBA career with the Bucks.AP Photos

But two knee injuries sidelined him and he hasn’t been able to return to the level some believe he could’ve been. He signed a two-year, $40 million deal with his hometown team. However, his Bulls stint lasted only six months before he was traded to the Wizards.

Parker doesn’t have any ill feelings about how things have gone over the last few seasons.

“I don’t think it’s negative,” he said. “The things that happened in my life were meant to happen in my life because life is not about the road being smooth. … Everything that we’re involved with has challenges, I’m grateful for those challenges and most importantly I’m grateful that I overcame those challenges and whatever is in my life, I have to deal with.”

Meanwhile, Nunn took a very different route to the NBA.

Nunn played three seasons at Illinois before he was dismissed after accusations of domestic violence in 2016. (Nunn pleaded guilty to misdemeanor domestic battery in 2016, the Sun-Times reported at the time.) He sat out the following season due to NCAA transfer rules before playing his final year of eligibility at Oakland. He averaged 25.9 points, second in the nation to only Trae Young.

But come draft night in 2018, Nunn didn’t receive a call with good news.

“My dream was to get drafted, but at the time, I knew there was a chance I was not going to get drafted so it was a reality [of the situation],” Nunn said. “I had to accept that. So going undrafted, I just knew I was going to have to take another route.”

He signed a contract with the Warriors and spent the entire season in the G League, where he averaged 23.9 points on 47.3 percent shooting.

Looking back, Nunn believes that season might’ve been the best for the sake of his development.

“It helped my game a lot because I was playing with other professionals and my game developed and the pace of my game changed,” he said. “I kept working and kept working, learning new things.”

When the Heat signed him in April, Nunn knew he had a lot to prove. And in one year, he’s shown tremendous growth on the court. He’s third in the league among rookies in scoring, averaging 15.6 points. And last month, he appeared in the NBA’s Rising Stars game at the United Center.

Kendrick Nunn played in this year's Rising Stars game at the United Center. | Tyler LaRiviere/Sun-Times
Kendrick Nunn played in this year’s Rising Stars game at the United Center. | Tyler LaRiviere/Sun-Times
Tyler LaRiviere/Sun-Times

“My first year, playing back at home in Chicago, that’s huge,” Nunn said. “I mean, that’s when I really noticed how big everything was, that I’m actually here, that’s when it really hit me at All-Star and when I attended that [event].”

“It’s no coincidence,” Parker said. “Kendrick was supposed to be in this situation two years ago, three years ago, but like I say, everybody’s journey is different, it’s a part of life.

“What Kendrick has been able to do so far is the same things he’s been able to do for a long time. Like, he was a top-50 player coming out of high school, and he was one of the top players out of college, he just had some things he had to deal with and I’m just happy that he’s where he’s supposed to be and without him, I wouldn’t have made it this far — as far as like the accomplishments that I’ve gained, along with other guys, but mostly him because we were always together those four years and we played USA together and yeah, he’s definitely a person that I needed.”

They have a saying at Simeon — “FINAO” or “Failure is not an option.” The motto came from former Simeon player Saieed Ivey, who was shot and killed in Los Angeles.

It’s a constant and sometimes painful reminder that many players hold close to their hearts and incorporate into their daily lives. For example, Tate often writes #FINAO in some of his Instagram captions and Donte Ingram wore custom “FINAO” kicks during Loyola’s Final Four run in 2018.

Nunn carried on the tradition of former players making their annual (and sometimes more often than that) trips back to the birthplace of their careers.

Nunn, in town for All-Star weekend, wanted to provide a motivational boost before Simeon competed for this year’s Public League title. He also came bearing gifts: custom white slides that had “FINAO” in blue font and “FAILURE IS NOT AN OPTION” in yellow across the strap.

“It felt good [to be back] because that’s always something that I told myself I was gonna do,” Nunn said. “When I made it to the league, just to come back and have an impact on them.”

Nunn told them to “go on out there” and “come back with a championship.”

And in typical Simeon fashion, that’s just what the Wolverines did. They beat Morgan Park for their 10th city title.

One month later, though, the Mustangs eliminated them from state title contention one day before IHSA canceled the tournaments due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Simeon basketball is a brotherhood. And there’s a sense of pride among those who wear the uniforms and get to carry on the tradition.

“It was everything to me,” Nunn said of his time at Simeon. “We were the best in the city, we knew we were the best, we felt like the best and just representing that Simeon jersey, that felt great along that we knew that there were guys before us that were great as well, so we definitely felt a part of the family.”

Contributing: Michael O’Brien and Annie Costabile

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How Simeon’s dominance, led by Jabari Parker and Kendrick Nunn, further solidified Wolverines’ legacy as basketball powerhouseon March 21, 2020 at 1:11 pm Read More »

Will COVID-19 take our football season, too?on March 21, 2020 at 1:15 pm

I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait to see how the Bears’ quarterback competition between Mitch Trubisky and Nick Foles plays out in 2021.

Sorry, did I say 2021?

I meant 2021.

Oops, there I go again. I meant 2020.

Maybe.

It gets harder by the day to believe that sports — the games, the action, the conversation pieces, the appointment TV around which many of us revolve — will return any time soon. March Madness is dead. The NBA and NHL seasons might soon be beyond the point of return. The baseball season is in grave peril.

Every day — and by that I mean, quite literally, every day — the reports, official pronouncements and speculation from doctors and scientists have gotten worse. More dire. More foreboding. More disquieting and depressing.

The coronavirus pandemic abounds with unsympathetic alacrity. We all know it’s bigger than a sports problem, but what if?

What if all of the above sports are wiped out in 2020, and football is, too?

No less of an authority on pandemics than President Donald Trump says the United States could be wrangling with the outbreak through July or August. And if we can’t trust the word of the all-knowing Donald, whom can we trust?

Dr. Anthony Fauci, a real, live infectious-disease expert, says it will be a year or longer before a vaccine is ready for widespread use in the fight against COVID-19. What does he know, right?

Meanwhile, more broadly speaking, scientists are estimating that between 40 and 80 percent of the global population could become infected. According to my admittedly pedestrian-level math, one year plus 60 percent or so equals no Bears game in Week 1.

But maybe I’m just cynical. Certainly, I’m wary and feeling vulnerable these days. We all are, aren’t we?

I have an elderly parent who is too sick to take on the coronavirus. I have a sibling whose family may be taking it on already but can’t yet be tested. I have a child whose freshman year of college has collapsed in a heap and a high school senior whose prom and graduation — and tours of colleges — probably won’t happen. I have children who had jobs and suddenly don’t. As someone whose livelihood depends upon sports, I sure worry about my job, too. It’s kind of necessary right now that I keep it.

But that’s just me. I’m no more important, no more put-upon, than anyone else.

I’m guessing you — and by that I mean every single one of you — can relate on some level. And the virus hasn’t even knocked on our doors yet. Or has it?

Maybe worrying about football is stupid, or beside the point, but right now it feels like a big deal. We’ll need those slobberknockers, won’t we? We’ll need the games on Sundays and Saturdays to set things right again.

The NFL is going about its business as if nothing is amiss. A new collective-bargaining agreement between players and ownership was approved last weekend. Player movement — hello, Mr. Foles — is afoot.

God bless it all, because the loss of football could be devastating. No, not in a life-or-death sense. We aren’t dummies just

because we love sports, after all. But football, more than any other sport, makes the sports world go round. And we’re absolutely going to need it.

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Will COVID-19 take our football season, too?on March 21, 2020 at 1:15 pm Read More »