Let the Who's-Better Debate Resume
Burrow or Mahomes? West Side Nick, today's Hemingway, says. . .
A gracious Mobster welcome to Nick Corey, today’s Hemingway. I’ve known Nick forever, to the extent that he excuses my East Side-ness as a tragic accident of geography. Read on, weigh in.
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G'Day, Mobsters! West Side Nick pinch hitting today, hoping to do my best Lenny Harris impression. Thanks for the opportunity, Paul! My first order of business isn't to tick anyone off, however...
On Favorite-Team Bias and Blindness: I’m a Bengals fan. As a result, I dutifully despised Joe Montana during my preteen and teen years. I fought back tears in January, 1982, after the Men - donning helmet and uniform stripes for the first season in team history - lost their first Super Bowl to the Montana-led 49ers. The tears would have flowed more freely if others hadn’t been in the room.
I was 11. I didn’t want to look like a sissy.
I learned about Roman numerals that year by way of that first Super Bowl, specifically that XVI is the number 16. For evermore, the phrase “Sweet 16” was hollow for me, my over the top fandom stirring pangs of painful memory whenever the damned number was mentioned.
“Turn to page 16,” Mrs. Horn told our seventh-grade class only a year later. Ouch. A slight twinge from somewhere in the throes of my interior surfaced. Memories of Jack “Hacksaw” Reynolds stuffing Pete Johnson at the goal line on 4th and inches and Cris Collinsworth dropping a long, needed completion from Ken Anderson were resurrected.
I remember watching the All Star game in Dax Pearson’s basement on Hiddenlake Lane a few years later. The Mets’ Dwight Gooden was the National League starter. He wore 16 on his jersey. I told my friend why I hated the number.
Dax thought I was nuts.
It’s natural, the investment 11 year-olds make in teams and athletic heroes. There’s something innocent and healthy about sports posters adorning bedroom walls and swearing, regardless of evidence to the contrary, that my favorite players/teams are better than yours.
It’s weird as hell when the same behavior is exhibited by grown men.
I have friends in their early 50s who deem it sacrilege that I maintain that Joe Burrow isn’t in the same sphere as Patrick Mahomes.
Unpopular opinion among too many who live in the Tristate: Burrow might be in Mahomes’ class someday. He isn’t yet.
The primary (bad) argument for Burrow is that he has the edge in head to head games. He’s 2-0 against Mahomes in the regular season, 1-1 in the playoffs.
Alas, snapshot statistics have never been dependable barometers - in any sport. Bob Melvin had a career batting average of .233. Against Hall of Famer Randy Johnson, he’s the best hitter in history among batters having 20 or more ABs against the Big Unit.
Melvin went 14 for 31 against Johnson, for a .452 clip. Perennial all-stars David Ortiz, Ivan Rodriguez, and Matt Holliday hit .160, .167 and .150, respectively, against Johnson.
In assembling any Diamond Dream Team, who’s taking Melvin over Ortiz, Rodriguez or Holliday?
The phrase entire body of work comes to mind, trite as it is. It still points to the truth.
If Burrow wins his next 45 consecutive games, his record will reach exactly where Mahomes’ is now (tossing the tie out). Mahomes is 74-22 in his career as a starter. Burrow is 29-22-1.
Read that again.
If Burrow wins his next 45 games in a row, he’ll be where Mahomes is right now, record-wise.
Mahomes has an ungodly 103.5 career QB rating, with three more years in the league than Burrow, who totes a stellar rating of 98.6 in the same category after four years.
In his four seasons in the league, Burrow has thrown for 97 TDs; Mahomes has 219 in seven seasons.
Super Bowl wins? Mahomes 3, Burrow 0.
When it comes to sports and fandom, allegiance too often clouds otherwise sane minds. Objective truth gets thrown to the wind; accusations of treason abound when it’s suggested we pump the brakes, examine facts.
Burrow’s my favorite QB because he’s my favorite team’s QB. He’s the definition of the rarely correct axiom, generational talent. He’s the reason hope springs eternal in the 513/859/937 for the first time in a long time.
But, to keep credibility in any honest discussion, let’s allow sanity to prevail. Burrow isn’t Mahomes. Not yet.
Raise a glass to hoping we can begin making the comparison more reasonable in six months.
The Deads…er…Reds The Reds, someday, will win another World Series. Right?
I hope so. My oldest kid is 23. Nobody under 40 remembers the last time (1990) the locals had that feeling.
On cue, cries for David Bell’s managerial head continue to mount.
Maybe it is time for Bell to go. If it happens, it'll merely be for optics, only to appease the clamoring masses. It’ll allow the front office to say, “Look! We did something!”
In-game football and basketball coaching decisions matter. Plays picked to run, defenses schemed to stop tendencies of opposing offenses, halftime adjustments - all are relevant.
In a 162-game schedule, baseball manager-decisions might be responsible for 5-10 games won or lost. Maybe.
A baseball manager’s influence isn’t close to that of head-guys in other sports. Players win/lose the overwhelming majority of games in baseball. Sparky Anderson won World Series titles with the Reds and Tigers; he’d also finish dead-last in the standings later in his career while managing the Tigers. Did he suddenly forget X’s and O’s? Did he need to know much about the X’s and O’s of the game with the players he had?
When one has players named Bench, Perez, Morgan, Rose, Concepcion, Griffey and Foster (Reds) or Parrish, Gibson, Whitaker, Trammell and Morris (Tigers) in their primes, “managing” consists primarily of filling out a lineup card each day.
Bob Newhart died last week. The greatest deadpanning, master-of-understated comedy in history has left the building. He won’t leave my memory any time soon.
My parents liked Newhart. As a result, I started to appreciate - and even enjoy - his comedy, despite the fact that I’d never admit it to my pals in high school. It was cool to like Eddie Murphy back then, not clean, old comedians. In comedians like Newhart - and in another, certain sense, Garrison Keillor - Mom and Dad gave their kids an appreciation for authentic storytelling. I’m grateful.
My favorite Newhart quip?
“I don’t like country music, but I don’t mean to denigrate those who do. And for the people who like country music, denigrate means ‘put down.’
This was fun. Much appreciated to the Writer in Residence, Mr. Daugherty. Thank you, PD! Inspired by PD himself, I started my own Substack page, ncorey.substack.com. If you’re in the mood, subscribe for free!
Nice take Nick, and the gap is further now…like 50+
Great job of filling in. Enjoyed your thoughts and writing.