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Tag Archives: Domination
Numbers behind the Toronto Blue Jays’ domination of the Boston Red Sox
The Toronto Blue Jays didn’t wait long to find their groove after the All-Star break. They put on an offensive clinic Friday night, defeating the Boston Red Sox 28-5.
Left fielder Raimel Tapia put on a show, finishing 3-for-7 at the plate with six RBIs and a grand slam. That homer was an inside-the-park job — the second in Blue Jays franchise history. It’s the first inside-the-park grand slam in MLB since Michael A. Taylor did it for the Washington Nationals in 2017.
The fifth inning was where the Jays did most of their damage, scoring 11 runs in that frame. Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Tom Brady, who played his first 20 seasons for the New England Patriots, took note of Boston’s rough night. Brady, of course, has a history of epic comebacks, notably coming back from 25 points down to beat the Atlanta Falcons in Super Bowl LI. Unlike Brady, however, the Red Sox did not have such magic Friday night.
Gonna be a hell of a story @Edelman11! https://t.co/2hQfw6ns5l
— Tom Brady (@TomBrady) July 23, 2022
History, both good and bad, was made in this game for both Boston and Toronto.
The Blue Jays scored the most runs against the Red Sox in nearly 100 years. Here’s a look at some of the other numbers:
28: The 28 runs scored by Toronto on Friday were the most in franchise history. It eclipsed the previous mark of 24 on June 26, 1978, against the Baltimore Orioles. For the Red Sox, it set the mark for the most runs allowed in any game in franchise history. That record had stood for nearly a century — the Cleveland Guardians scored 27 against Boston on July 17, 1923.
To put this offensive onslaught into perspective, Friday was the 8,744th game at Fenway Park. The Blue Jays scored more runs there than any visiting team before them.
11: The 11 runs Toronto scored in the fifth tied a franchise record for most in a single inning. The Blue Jays have done that four other times, most recently in 2021 against the Orioles.
25: On Friday, the Jays exited the fifth inning with 25 total runs, tied for the most by an MLB team through five innings since 1900 (1922 Cubs).
5: For the first time in Blue Jays history, three different players had at least five RBIs (Tapia, Lourdes Gurriel Jr. and Danny Jansen).
29: Toronto notched 29 hits against Boston, the most in a game in team history. It surpassed a 25-hit performance in a 19-4 victory against the Texas Rangers on August 9, 1999. All nine starters logged at least two hits and two runs scored each, as the Jays became the second team since 1900 to do so (1979 Los Angeles Angels).
19: In two-out scenarios, the Blue Jays still found ways to put runs on the board — 19 of the 28 Toronto runs came with two outs. That’s the most two-out runs a team has scored since the Red Sox scored 22 such runs on August 21, 1986.
6: Gurriel had himself a game, going 6-for-7 with five RBIs and three runs. His six hits tied Frank Catalanotto (2004) for the most in team history.
ESPN Stats & Information research contributed to this story.
Lionel Messi: Paris Saint-Germain now has ‘no excuses’ in quest for Champions League domination
But can this squad deliver Qatar Sports Investments (QSI), who bought PSG in 2011, the Champions League — the trophy the owners crave the most, but has so far eluded them?
The signings of highly-rated goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma, Messi’s long-time adversary Sergio Ramos, Georginio Wijnaldum and Achraf Hakimi — added to an already stacked squad that includes Neymar and Kylian Mbappé — mean PSG will unquestionably be the overwhelming favorite to lift this season’s Champions League.
“QSI bought PSG in 2011 because they wanted increased exposure for the country ahead of an eventual World Cup,” Christian Nourry, founder of Get French Football News, told CNN Sport.
“That World Cup is now coming, it’s only next year, but what’s happened over the course of this decade is that we’ve seen Al Thani, the owner, fall in love with this club, really taking a lot of interest in this,” added Nourry, referring to the Emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani.
“[It’s] far more than a pet project for him and he’s seen this opportunity to create potentially the greatest attacking troika we’ve seen in modern football in Mbappé, Neymar and Messi, but also there are no excuses now.”
At PSG, Messi will work under coach Mauricio Pochettino, a former player of the Parisian club and a fellow Argentine.
“Mauricio Pochettino must win absolutely everything, that includes the Champions League, and he must do so in style, because in style has been something that Paris Saint-Germain have really struggled to do, with a largely counterattacking style of play over the course of the last two or three seasons,” added Nourry.
No pressure, then, Mauricio.
READ: Lionel Messi tells CNN he believes PSG is the best place for him to win UCL again
READ: 20 moments that defined Barcelona maestro Lionel Messi
PSG ‘ideal’ for Messi
But it’s a sentiment that Messi appears to agree with.
In an interview with CNN after his arrival in Paris, the Argentine said he believes PSG is the “ideal” place for him to finally win another Champions League title.
Despite Messi’s consistently superlative individual performances over the years, the one blemish on his record in recent seasons has been his inability to again lead Barcelona to European football’s most coveted prize — although it is widely argued that the Catalan club’s ineptitude in building a suitable squad around him was the root cause of this.
That, however, will not be the case at PSG, a club now stacked with an eye-watering amount of talent and a visceral desire to win a first Champions League in its history.
“For me on a personal level, I would love to win another Champions League, like I’ve said in previous years, and I think I’ve come to the ideal place that’s ready for that,” Messi told CNN.
“We have the same goals. It’s got impressive players, one of the best squads in the world and, hopefully, we can achieve that goal which Paris wants so much, I want so much and hopefully we can enjoy it with the people of Paris too.”
PSG’s new front three of Messi, Neymar and Mbappé is unquestionably the most talented attack in world football and will give opposition defenders and managers nightmares trying to conjure up ways to stop them.
“It’s all just going to be about how many goals and assists is he [Messi] getting compared to Kylian Mbappé and Neymar,” Nourry says. “Who is going to be taking the majority of that responsibility on? I can’t wait to find out.”
Off the pitch, though, questions have already been asked about PSG’s finances and how the club has been able to get around the Financial Fair Play (FFP) regulations.
“We’re always attentive to Financial Fair Play. It’s the first thing we check with the commercial, financial and legal people before signing someone,” PSG chairman and CEO Nasser Al-Khelaifi told reporters on Wednesday when Messi was officially unveiled.
When rumors of Messi’s arrival began circulating, it was suggested that PSG would have to offload Mbappé — reportedly to Real Madrid — in order to balance the books. The French club, however, has been adamant that is far from the case.
“The message is clear from Paris Saint-Germain around Kylian Mbappé: the two situations are not linked,” Nourry says. “Mbappé has 12 months left on his contract. In fact, Paris Saint-Germain are confident this signing will encourage him more to sign a new extension.
“The argument that we hear a lot in the capital of France at the moment is: why would you go this summer or next to Real Madrid to play alongside Karim Benzema and Vinícius Júnior, when you could spend the next three seasons alongside Neymar and Lionel Messi for your development. I think that’s a pretty strong argument.”
French football rules allow clubs to operate with a wage bill that is almost 100% of its annual income, a far cry from the strict Spanish rules that ultimately forced Messi’s departure from Barcelona.
UEFA, European football’s governing body, has also relaxed its FFP regulations since the Covid-19 outbreak, allowing clubs to operate with annual losses of more than $35 million as long as they can prove these were due to the pandemic.
“Having said that, Paris Saint-Germain have promised to make €180 million ($211M) worth of player sales this summer to the French football financial watchdog, the DNCG,” Nourry explains.
“They’ve only done about €8 million of that, so it’s going to be a very busy four weeks if they are to fulfill that and because the transfer market has moved very, very slowly for the majority of clubs, I think that’s going to be tricky.
“But Paris Saint-Germain are looking to sell — or being open to sell — 12-14 players, those include lesser stars like Mauro Icardi and Pablo Sarabia, but [there is] no intention to sell a key player this summer in Paris.”
Boost for French football?
Perhaps the only people licking their lips at Messi’s arrival as much as PSG fans are those in charge of France’s top division, Ligue 1, and Amazon.
“The arrival of Lionel Messi will increase the attractiveness and visibility of our championship on all continents,” said Ligue 1 President Vincent Labrune in a statement on Wednesday.
“This unique event is the result of the strategy of the Paris Saint-Germain management, which has enabled the Parisian club to become one of the biggest franchises in world sport in 10 years.
“On behalf of French professional football, I want to thank PSG Chairman and CEO Nasser Al-Khelaïfi for making this dream possible,” added Lebrune, who ended his statement with three words: “Messi is magic!”
Nourry calls the signing a “huge surprise” for French football, but it is certainly a welcome one given the financial struggles the league has faced over the past 18 months.
Ligue 1 not only had to deal with the implications of being the only one of Europe’s top five leagues not able to finish the 2019/20 season due to Covid, but also with the collapse of broadcast partner Mediapro, which had been paying almost $1 billion per year for broadcast rights.
Amazon has since come in to pick up the majority of broadcasting rights, around eight matches per week, in a deal reported by the Financial Times to be worth $323 million per season, with French broadcaster Canal+ paying $390 million per season for two matches per week.
“[It’s] a great opportunity taken by Paris Saint-Germain and will hopefully result in lots of exposure for Ligue 1,” Nourry says. “Because we’re about 50% down on the TV rights deal this year compared to last year, with the collapse of Mediapro.
“So there’s lots of excitement in France, but it’s probably not going to stop about seven or eight clubs in the division this season from being unable to pay back loans they took out during Covid-19.”
However, Kieran Maguire, author of “The Price of Football,” believes that while PSG will certainly receive a financial boost from Messi’s signing, that won’t necessarily be the case for Ligue 1.
Maguire says the increased lack of competitiveness at the top of the league, created by PSG’s financial outlay this summer, will cause broadcaster interest to “wane quite quickly” and remains unconvinced Messi’s signing will “create a long queue” of suitors desperate to pay for TV rights.
“PSG will benefit because we already saw last night — 150,000 shirts sold within seven minutes was the claim — so they will benefit from being able to generate more money on match days,” he told CNN. “Even if they don’t put up the price of regular tickets, the commercial department will effectively be able to name their own price for hospitality packages.
“If you want to go in this box — if you’re a big firm of lawyers or accountants or you’re an investment banker and you want to entertain a client — we’ve got Lionel Messi, Kylian Mbappé and Neymar leading the line. How much are you willing to pay for that? So I think they’ll be able to to increase their revenues.”
Given Messi’s considerable talents and PSG now boasting arguably the greatest attacking trio in history, Maguire says it also seems likely that the club will earn more prize money for reaching the latter stages of the Champions League.
“So I think there’s lots of benefits for the club,” he explains. “But for French football as a whole, yes, there will be an initial media interest and a curiosity value attached to his recruitment, [but] whether that will convert into significant increases in the value of a broadcast deal … I’m not so certain.”
Lack Of Diversity, Streamer Domination, ‘Music’ – Deadline
The Golden Globes last year was blasted for completely ignoring women in its Director category, and this year they made up for that with a record-breaking three of five nominees (Emerald Fennell, Chloé Zhao, Regina King), and on top of that it nominated Sia’s weird directorial debut Music for Best Picture – Musical/Comedy, but more on that curio below.
Still, the Hollywood Foreign Press Association’s track record towards diversity in other areas, like representation of the Black filmmaking community, did nothing to improve itself with both Best Picture -Drama and Best Picture – Comedy/Musical categories including not a single film from a Black filmmaker this year despite a more bountiful list of possibilities than ever. The prestigious AFI Top 10 Movies list for instance included four: Spike Lee’s Da 5 Bloods, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, One Night In Miami and Judas and the Black Messiah. None of those made the cut in the two marquee Globes categories this morning, even after Lee’s Da 5 Bloods dominated the National Board of Review’s winners for Best Picture and Director. It was completely ignored by the HFPA, including Delroy Lindo and the late Chadwick Boseman in acting categories. All the Best Picture nominees in both categories came from white directors with the exception of Chinese-born Zhao’s Nomadland. King, for her behind-the-camera debut with One Night In Miami and better known as an award-winning actress, was the only Black filmmaker named individually in either directing or writing categories.
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Golden Globes Nominations: Netflix Dominates With 42 Film & TV Noms, Led By ‘Mank’ And ‘The Crown’ – The Full List
It was a little better in the film acting categories with Viola Davis and Boseman named for Ma Rainey, Andra Day taking two nods for Actress (Drama) and Song for United States Vs Billie Holiday, and Daniel Kaluuya and Leslie Odom Jr. landing nods in Supporting Actor out of the overall 30 acting nominees. It was even worse on the television side with only Don Cheadle in TV Comedy Actor for Black Monday and John Boyega in Supporting Actor for Television for Small Axe landing any of the 40 TV Globes acting nods.
This being the Hollywood Foreign Press there was better international representation on the film side with the likes of Zhao, Riz Ahmed (Sound of Metal), Bulgaria’s Maria Bakalova (Borat Subsequent Moviefilm) and Dev Patel (The Personal History of David Copperfield) winning recognition, but this is an overwhelmingly white list in a year in which the movies presented ample opportunities for a diverse group to come to the “party of the year” as the NBC likes to advertise its Globes telecast.
For this 2021 edition airing on February 28 that party atmosphere is being deeply affected by the continuing coronavirus pandemic with NBC announcing the show will be split on both coasts with Amy Poehler hosting in L.A. and Tina Fey in New York. What it is going to look like is anyone’s guess because one of the key things the Globes has going for it is all that star power packed in the Beverly Hilton hotel ballroom. With potential nominees like George Clooney, Tom Hanks, Sophia Loren, Meryl Streep and the like snubbed this year, even that component seems problematic for the show. This is likely to be the weirdest Golden Globes since 2008 when the writers strike turned it into basically a press conference revealing winners in an empty Hilton ballroom.
Netflix
As for what they did nominate, this year’s list has to be a first as the names of major studios Warner Bros, Universal, Paramount and Sony don’t rep any of the Best Picture nominees in Drama, and only Disney gets a mention in Comedy/Musical for its filmed Broadway play Hamilton. The latter, not eligible for Oscars and qualifying as a TV entry at other awards shows, needs a big asterisk since it was really a Disney+ streaming attraction, so you might as well chalk it also up for the overwhelming success of the streamers this year. The traditional major studios are really only represented in these much-desired Best Pic categories by their specialty divisions (Sony Pictures Classics for The Father, Searchlight for Nomadland, Focus Features for Promising Young Woman). Otherwise the glory today belongs to names like Amazon, Hulu, Apple and particularly Netflix, blowing away the rest of the field with 22 nominations on the film side, followed by Amazon’s seven. But you knew this was going to be a season that turned conventional thinking upside down, didn’t you?
Ever the case in the history of the Globes there can be a real head-scratcher among the nominees (remember The Tourist?), but with two key nominations for Sia’s about-to-be-unleashed directorial debut Music you have to wonder what they are smoking. This movie managed to get one of those coveted Best Picture nominations (Comedy/Musical) as well as for lead acting for Kate Hudson (who tries her best to lend credibility), her hair completely cut for the role. The film was privately shown to me in early December in hopes I would interview Sia and say nice things about her movie; I politely declined after seeing it, finding it lacking in just about every area. I did look it up online where it was being roundly blasted by the autism community and a petition was circulated to get the film’s release canceled, thus the concern from its handlers about its ultimate reception.
The title role is a character named Music, an autistic woman who endlessly listens to tunes on her headphones. She is played by Maddie Ziegler, an actress-dancer whose credits are almost all for Sia music videos. The film was actually made four years ago as a drama, but Warner Music offered Sia about $10 million more for her production budget if she would put new songs in it so they could get an album out of it; these musical sequences are dropped in like disconnected, if colorful, videos that look like they are out of Willy Wonka, completely stopping the film in its tracks. I have to hand it to the PR team for this movie in somehow getting this nominated over the likes of much much worthier contenders like Sofia Coppola’s On the Rocks and for Hudson over Rocks star Rashida Jones or The Prom’s Meryl Streep. Lordy. It will play for one night on Imax screens next Wednesday and then goes VOD on February 12. Watch it at your own peril, but mysteriously they got Globes voters on their side. This movie wasn’t screened or pitched at all for Critics Choice Awards, whose nominations come on Monday, so it appears as far as I can see to be that odd-duck outlier strictly campaigned to the Hollywood Foreign Press.
Focus Features
As for Netflix, if ever it had a chance to dominate Oscar season this is it, and the Globes clearly and correctly warmed to David Fincher’s terrific Mank with six nominations (including a posthumous one for his dad Jack Fincher’s script) and Aaron Sorkin’s ever-relevant and sensational The Trial of the Chicago 7 which grabbed five. Critics groups favorites like First Cow and Never Rarely Sometimes Always were shut out. I was also happy to see the unfairly critically maligned Hillbilly Elegy still recognized for Glenn Close’s magnificent performance. Critics be damned on that one. Good going, Globes.
Amazon Studios
And also there is joy in Mudville for the across-the-board love for Sacha Baron Cohen in both Borat Subsequent Moviefilm and Trial of the Chicago 7, personally nabbing three nominations. Both these films had something important to say for these times and the Globe voters rightly heard it. Its love for the fantastic Promising Young Woman is also promising, as are noms for Bill Murray in On the Rocks and Jared Leto in The Little Things, two great performances I was hoping would not be overlooked, and for Michelle Pfeiffer, so good in French Exit, landing her a nom in the Best Actress Comedy/Musical category. And also for Leslie Odom Jr.’s brilliant Sam Cooke in One Night In Miami, which garnered him two nominations (he’s also regrettably in the Sia movie too). In the Best Motion Picture – Foreign Language category I was happy to see Edoardo Ponti’s The Life Ahead from Italy nominated (and for Diane Warren’s song “Seen” too) but sad that his mother, the great Sophia Loren, was overlooked. That Best Actress Drama category is a killer this year.
Sony Pictures Classics
Whether this morning’s Globes nominations mean anything for Oscar this year remains to be seen, as without the usual buzzing awards party and screening circuit in action, it is hard to get a real beat on things. All five of the Best Picture Drama nominees look to be locks for corresponding Oscar Best Pic nominations with only Borat in the Globes Comedy category probably making it also with the Academy. That leaves up to four more films jockeying for those slots and likely giving a more diverse picture to Oscar. Tomorrow’s SAG Awards announcement will bring further clarity, or maybe confusion, into the contest as this most bizarre of awards seasons continues to heat up. Stay tuned.