I Hope Every Adult Missourian Has Seen or Sees This Video

I saw this on social media in the last week and was thrilled the man was out there, testifying for his daughter but ecstatic that he was also from Missouri. Mr. Brandon Boulware was testifying why transgender people should be allowed to be themselves in our state including playing in sports. Kudos, Mr. Boulware and thank you for this, your testimony. You spoke perfectly and very eloquently on the subject. I'm sure it wasn't easy and hasn't been easy. Now here's hoping we can get beyond the narrow and narrow-minded Right Wingers and Republicans and not have anyone put into law that transgender citizens can't be themselves and play sports.

Ink On Our Own "Magic Patrick" Mahomes

Our own Chiefs’ Patrick Mahomes is getting lots of great press after that come-from-behind, overtime win last weekend against the Ravens.

First this one from no less than Sports Illustrated.

Patrick Mahomes History of No-Look Passes

You certainly have seen the play by now—you would have had to go out of your way to avoid seeing it. It was late in the first half of Sunday’s Chiefs-Ravens game, a second-and-1. Patrick Mahomes zigged to the left, then zagged back to the right, evading the rush as he scanned the field. Then, with his head pointed squarely downfield, he slung the ball across his body, firing it diagonally across the hash marks and painted field numbers to his left. Receiver Demarcus Robinson, crossing the field, made the catch at a spot where Mahomes had given zero outward indication he was going to throw.

“Look at the magic of the quarterback,” Tony Romo said on the CBS broadcast while watching the replay of the 17-yard pass to Robinson. “Moving around, dancing, then throws it—like, almost, no look. That’s incredible.”

Not done there:

Where Patrick Mahomes Gets His Cool

What can a person say except...

GO CHIEFS!!

Patrick Mahomes & Our Chiefs Get More Great Press

Yessir and ma’am, our Chiefs are getting yet more great press, what with being led by the magic and strength that is and that we get from and with Patrick Mahomes.

Top storyline for each Week 10 NFL game | Yardbarker.com

What they have to say:

Arizona Cardinals at Kansas City Chiefs: Patrick Mahomes, NFL MVP?

The answer is a resounding yes. It’s also highly unlikely that this second-year quarterback will somehow take a step back in the MVP race Week 10 against a two-win Arizona Cardinals team. We’re honestly just running out of expletives to define what Mahomes has done for the 8-1 Chiefs on the season.

In addition to already breaking multiple records, Mahomes is completing 66 percent of his passes while leading this offense to an average of 36.3 points per game. He’s on pace for 5,400 total yards and 55 total touchdowns. It’s now up to Patrick Peterson and the Cardinals to somehow slow him down at Arrowhead come Sunday. Good luck with that.

GO CHIEFS!!

The Wonderful Irony of Kansas City Trying to Get Soccer's World Cup

So it's big local news yesterday. This, from the Star.

Arrowhead Stadium could host a 2026 World Cup match. What's that worth to KC?

Leaders in Kansas City want to have the soccer World Cup come to Kansas City.

Terrific.

By 2020, we'll have our new downtown hotel, right?

And our new, single terminal airport?  So what if it costs us more than 1 billion dollars--and far, far higher prices to fly in and out of town. Right?

The irony, of course, is that, to do so, to get this World Cup Soccer and all the attention and recognition it would bring us, the city? The irony is, we need to have more mass transit, they make clear.

And there's the rub.

Kansas Citians have been ignoring or even out and out fighting against mass transit----but this would require it.

Fantastic.

Maybe we'll get it yet.

Rather Monumental Question For A Sunday Morning

"Who'd have thought that in our lifetime we'd see the first black president, the first woman president, and the Cubs in the World Series?"

--Linda Tilsen, FB friend, to her husband.

An Open Letter To White America

Dear White America,

Don't like the silent protests during the National Anthem at NFL games?

Fight for justice. Fight for more equity for all. Fight for fairness.

Do something. Do something about it. Stand up for what's right.

Sincerely,

The rest of America

News Flash to City Fathers

This, breaking today from the NCAA to all city leaders across the nation:

NCAA vote: No Final Fours in cities 

without anti-discrimination laws

The NCAA's Board of Governors implemented a new requirement Wednesday in the bidding process.

After months of hinting that it would use its athletic power to take a stand against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, the NCAA on Wednesday made it official.

The organization's Board of Governors, at its quarterly meeting in Indianapolis, adopted a new requirement for sites hosting or bidding on NCAA events in all divisions -- from Final Fours to educational conferences.

Those host cities must "demonstrate how they will provide an environment that is safe, healthy and free of discrimination, plus safeguards the dignity of everyone involved in the event," the NCAA said.
So there you are, folks.  If you like discriminating against yet one more group---it used to be Jews, then the Irish, then blacks, now it's the LGBTQ community--the tide, the world, is turning against you.

It reminds me of the quote from Martin Luther King, Jr.

"The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice."

A Pretty Terrific Kansas City Sports Year

ROYALS WIN THE 2015 WORLD SERIES!!!

To any and all Kansas City bloggers--and anyone else--who didn't believe and who thought we couldn't and/or wouldn't take it all.

On This Day, September 2

For whatever reason, I thought September 2nd to be a day of significance. With that in mind, I thought I'd put together a few highlights from the date, down through the ages. Partly fun, partly educational, partly historical significance. Hopefully enjoy.

490 BC - Pheidippides, Greek hero and inspiration for the modern marathon, dies

44 BC - Queen Cleopatra VII of Egypt declares her son co-ruler as Ptolemy XV Caesarion.

- The first of Cicero's Philippics (oratorical attacks) on Mark Antony. He will make 14 of them over the next several months.

1649 - The Italian city of Castro is completely destroyed by the forces of Pope Innocent X, ending the Wars of Castro. (I love that. Pope Innocent)

1666 - Great Fire of London begins at 2am in Pudding Lane, 80% of London is destroyed

1732 - Pope Clement XII renews anti-Jewish laws of Rome. (Don'tcha' just love those oh-so-innocent Catholics?)

1864 - Union General William T. Sherman captures and burns Atlanta during US Civil War

1894 - Forest fires destroy Hinckley Minnesota: about 600 die (I can't even fathom that one)

1901 - VP Theodore Roosevelt advises "Speak softly & carry a big stick"

1902 - "A Trip To The Moon", the first science fiction film, by film great Georges Méliès released

1919 - Communist Party of America organizes in Chicago (It didn't really catch on. Not permanently, anyway)

1936 - 1st transatlantic round-trip air flight

1942 - German troops enter Stalingrad

1944 - During WW II, George H W Bush ejects from a burning plane

1944 - Holocaust diarist Anne Frank was sent to Auschwitz

1945 - Ho Chi Minh declares Vietnam independence from France (National Day) (Years later, Americans would learn nothing whatever from France's loss and exit from Vietnam and instead, attack the country)

1946 - Nehru forms government in India

1957 - US performs nuclear test at Nevada Test Site

1962 - Stan Musial's 3,516th hit moves over Tris Speaker into 2nd place

1962 - USSR performs nuclear test at Novaya Zemlya USSR

1963 - Alabama Gov George C Wallace prevents integration of Tuskegee HS

1963 - CBS & NBC expand network news from 15 to 30 minutes

1964 - Keanu Reeves birthday, Beirut, "actor"

1969 - Ralph Houk signs 3-year contract to manage Yankees at $65,000 a season (think things haven't changed a lot?)
        - The first automatic teller machine (ATM) in the United States is installed in Rockville Center, New York.

1971 - Chris Evert & Jimmy Connors win their 1st US Open tennis matches (Chris who? Jimmy who?)
         - Also his, Jimmy Connors', birthday, 1952

1972 - Rod Stewart's 1st #1 hit (You Wear it Well)

1973 - J. R. R. Tolkien, British author (The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings)--as if you had to ask--dies of an ulcer at 81

1982 - Rolling Stone Keith Richard's house burns down

1987 - Donald Trump takes out a full page NY Times ad lambasting Japan

1997 - Howard Stern Radio Show premieres in Montreal Canada on CHOM 97.7 FM (and we still haven't gotten rid of him)

2005 - Bob Denver, American actor (Gilligan of "Gilligan's Island"), dies of complications from treatment for cancer at 70
So now, get out there, kids, and enjoy your September 2nd.

10,001 Reasons St. Louis and All Other Cities and States Should No Longer Pay for Sports Stadiums

John Oliver says it---all of it---so well.

On the Chiefs, Looking to August

MSN News ran this today under the headline

32 players whose NFL careers can either flourish or falter

Kansas City Chiefs – OT Eric Fisher

The No. 1 overall pick from 2013 looks to build off of his first season as Alex Smith’s blindside protector. In 2014, Fisher allowed seven sacks and 24 hurries. Kansas City’s

offensive line needs to be anchored by Fisher as they allowed overachieving center Rodney Hudson to depart in free agency.

 

 

 

 

The Baltimore Orioles Huge Screw-Up

The topsy-turvy world that is Baltimore right now.

It's bad enough the police force there has a bad reputation for roughing up and/or killing anyone, let alone one certain group of people, in this case, blacks. Heaven knows that's bad enough.

Then, one more time, a black man is taken into custody and ends up dead. It doesn't look good. It looks beyond bad.

So the man does die and lots of other black Americans are outraged and protest, not surprisingly. Riots break out, stores are burned, looting takes place.  It's not good. It's beyond not good.

Reacting to that, the city's baseball team cancels 2 baseball games but finally figures they need to go ahead and play a game.

But instead of going ahead and playing the game and calling it out publicly so they could pull the city together, they go forward with the game WITHOUT FANS. They shut out the fans, shut out the public:

Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/sports/mlb/article19876623.html#storylink=cpy

Orioles Play in Eerily Empty Stadium

No cheers for Baltimore Orioles during win

And it's not like other organizations in the city didn't try to pull the people together. The libraries got it:

Baltimore libraries stay open to provide community support

And the symphony orchestra, for crying out loud, got it:


The Baltimore Orioles and Major League Baseball could have seized this moment, thrown open the doors to their game and given everyone memories for years to come but a great afternoon they need and needed now.

And sure, it would have needed police and security there when they're also needed across town but call out more National Guard. Put them on the scene. Then have the game and have everyone revel in everything Baltimore and Baltimore pride. Pull everyone together---black, white, poor, wealthy, middle and working class, everyone.

Instead, they lock everyone, all the fans out and play to an open stadium, instead. What a huge, important, possibly transformative situation. Lost.

Bloody brilliant.

EXCELLENT NEWS FROM THE NFL!!!

EXCELLENT!!!  Right prevailed!!!

NFL gives up tax exempt status

It was insane and even shameful they ever had it. I'm thrilled they did the right thing without the people having to scream bloody murder and fight to get this overturned.

Chris Rock on Baseball

He makes some good, even interesting and very legitimate points here:



They'd better listen.

On David Glass and his/our Kansas City Royals

Here's hoping Kansas City Royals owner David Glass has gotten spoiled this year by having his/our team go first into the playoffs and then the actual Series.


Hoping he got addicted to all that extra money so he'll do all he can---including spending money--to make sure we get back there again.

And again.

And again.

Go Royals!

Kansas City isn't on this list???

I'm shocked.

10 Worst Sports Cities in America
Stunned.

All these suck worse than us and our teams.

Problems with soccer

For Americans, anyway (with tongue firmly and deeply in cheek):

1)  The field is the size of a runway for a Boeing 747

2)  Having the game last--what?--8 hours each, with no breaks, commercials, half-times, songs or anything

3) Who knows WHEN the match will actually end because at any time, they may well add ADDITIONAL minutes to the time clock

4) Then there's the fairly old problem Americans have with soccer that--gasp--IT CAN END IN A DRAW.

No one wins, no one loses.

Oh, yeah. That's Socialism or Communism or some dang thing right there.  That just isn't right.

5) Finally, when does this thing end, this World Cup?  September?  November?

Kansas' WuShock and WSU in today's NYT

Big sports article:

The Pride of Wichita State, Whatever It May Actually Be

Kansas City Chiefs History: On this day

On Jan. 15, 1967, the first Super Bowl was played as the Green Bay Packers of the National Football League defeated the Kansas City Chiefs of the American Football League, 35-10.