Spring sports at Cape call for Polar Gortex Action Wear

Seeded heat - Cape boys’ team swimmers splashed and stroked through preliminaries Feb. 26 at the University of Delaware. Jack Weeks made it to the championship section for the Saturday, March 1 competition, where he will be seeded fifth in the 100 fly with 54.04 and third in the 100 backstroke with 53.61. Charlie Burton is seeded sixth in the 100 breaststroke. The 200 medley relay team of Weeks, Nate Griffith, Burton and John Dean is seeded seventh with a personal best of 1:46.51.

“If I’m Lion, I’m Dying” - Spring sports roar onto the open plains of Cape sports fields each year like a big old bony lion shivering and cowering inside his pride of flies and spent impala carcasses. The weather promises to get better, but teams must power through six weeks of uncomfortable agony. Hang around and wait for someone to get hit by a pitched ball. It's the worst, and hardball is downright treacherous. Track people have a very narrow temperature band in which they feel comfortable, and it’s hard to hit a tennis ball straight when the wind is howling like a hound named Hambone. Alfred Mitchell owned that dog, or it owned him. The Cape teams that lose no practice time to weather are the ones who will be the most successful. Here is where we miss the Little Big House; it could have been a perfect multipurpose indoor arena.

Shout outs - Grand Mom Rose: “Those who shout out successes are set up for the boomeranging backlash of their own back patting.” “I couldn’t agree more, Grand Mom, if I had the slightest hint what you were talking about.” “I’m talking about dieters and rehabbers and resolution makers and born-again people. Why is any of it of any interest to the rest of us? You don’t drink or eat donuts and have a personal relationship with God; I don’t want to know about it.” “OK, then I’m not telling you I did toe rises to the entire side of a Doors album with 110 pounds on my back.” “You did? Now that is amazingly close to being interesting.”

Gay talk - I have no interest in gay athletes or straight ones or ones in love with themselves or those with intimacy issues who don’t mind breaking your face mask with a hairy forearm.   I don’t care about Arizona, the state or the iced tea. Why is the nation relentlessly talking about these issues in 2014? Are there any peoples that anyone else doesn’t like?  Well, if there are, better not get up off that information, because you will be fleeced for having personal preferences.

Snippets - It’s easy to sign up; showing up is the hard part. I hear about 120 kids signed up for track at Beacon Middle School, and before anyone talks transportation issues, let's see who makes it through two weeks of frigid practices. I always joke that the better the team, the more people who want to coach them, and that includes me. But I’m way too smart to suggest to successful coaches how they might better utilize and manage their personnel, knowing if I really wanted the job I could apply and not get it.

In my sports journalism job, I’m sometimes approached by people who say, “You know what you should do?” I always respond, “Yep, not listen to you.”

Jimmy Allen, who played the national anthem before the Indian River game, is the nephew of Magic Johnson. His mother’s brother was married to Magic’s sister.

The Delaware Basketball Hall of Fame will induct John Irving, Howard High; Jimmy Allen and John Bishop, Cape; Charlie Rayne, Indian River; Gary Lumpkin, William Penn; and Tony Washam, Concord High School, along with coaches James Doody, Newark High, and Len Chasnov, Woodbridge. The ceremony will be held Saturday morning, March 15, at the Embassy Suites in Newark Brian Fahey is the contact person at 302-530-0772. I have been invited to purchase a ticket so I can take photos and write stories on whomever I please.

The Delaware Afro American Sports Hall of Fame class of 2014 includes locals William Coursey, football, and Emory Howell, track and field. My personal hall of fame joke is, “I bet I used to be better than you used to be.”

Could high school basketball officials back off the walking calls? Let them walk a little; if that’s what you think you’re seeing, who is it hurting?  Go on now, git!