Lutz

As you know (or perhaps you don’t), Friday is kind of a potpourri day here on the  blog. If I think it, I write it. There’s very little editing process that goes on inside my head.

By the way, I hope you’ll all take time Sunday to fill out my 16th annual Reader Survey when it appears in the newspaper and online at kansas.com. I always have a lot of fun with the survey and it might or might not tell us something about what people are thinking about sports in Wichita and the surrounding communities.

You can do the survey online or be more old-fashioned in your survey-filling-out ways. Whatever works for you.

Now, on to other things.

• I’m going to the West-South game tonight at Northwest as a fan. I’m really proud of my long-time friend, Weston Schartz, for returning to West, where he built one of the City League’s best programs during the late-1980s through the early 2000s. Schartz can coach and he’s decided to helping West, which has been really down for a decade, return to some of its previous glory.
• If South Carolina is the No. 9 college football team in the country, then this country is in real trouble (football-wise, that is).
• Mike Leach’s Washington State team scored six points in the coach’s debut last night against BYU. I watch some of the first half with much anticipation. It turned into a waste of time. Sports can do that to you, sometimes. You’ve got to be careful.
• Is it really the last day of August? That’s a rhetorical question. I’m not losing it. So stop worrying.
• I think we’ll go out to watch the Shocker volleyball team play Tennessee on Sunday afternoon. I used to think watching volleyball games was a waste of time, but I’ve come to enjoy the sport. And I admire what Chris Lamb has been able to do with the Wichita State program. It seems like people are starting to take him a bit for granted and I would advise you not to do that.
• I see where “Paranormal 4″ is coming out on Oct. 19. I’m so, so there.
• I’m looking forward to rolling into Lawrence on Saturday for my first college football game of the season. Even if the Jayhawks are playing the South Dakota State Jackrabbits. Great nickname but not much of a team. If it’s a close game, I’ll be surprised. And dismayed for the Jayhawks, who should win this one by a margin of about four touchdowns.
• What am I going to be looking for from the Jayhawks? Well, new quarterback Dayne Crist will be interesting. He’s going to play one season at Kansas in a season where the Jayhawks are everybody’s pick to finish last in the Big 12. I love that dynamic and I’m sure Crist, a transfer from Notre Dame where he was recruited by KU coach Charlie Weis, thinks he has something to prove.
• KU’s defense, the worst in the country last season (look it up), has to be better. Has to be. Under new defensive coordinator Dave Campo, it will be better. But will it be good enough to keep Big 12 competitors from moving the football up and down the field? We’ll start to find out on Sept. 15 when the Jayhawks are at home against Big 12 newcomer TCU.
• Some other Fall movies I’m looking forward to in the next couple of months: The Words, with Bradley Cooper, Jeremy Irons and Olivia Wilde; The Cold of the Night, with Bruce Willis, Henry Cavill and Sigourney Weaver; End of Watch, with Make Gyllenhaal; Trouble With the Curve, with Clint Eastwood, Amy Adams and John Goodman; Won’t Back Down, with Maggie Gyllenhaal, Viola Davis and Holly Hunter; Butter, with Jennifer Garner and my guy Ty Burrell from Modern Family; The Paperboy, with Zac Efron, Matthew McConaughey and Nicole Kidman; Argo, with Ben Afflect, the great Bryan Cranston and John Goodman; Seven Psychopaths, with Colin Farrell, Christopher Walken, Sam Rockwell and Woody Harrelson (how could this movie not be good?); Smashed, with Mary Elizabeth Winstead and Aaron Paul; Alex Cross, with Tyler Perry, Matthew Fox and Edward Burns; Killing Them Softly, with Brad Pitt, James Gandolfini and Ray Liotta; Cloud Atlas, with Tom Hanks and Halle Berry, directed by the Wachowski siblings; and The Sessions, with John Hawkes, William H. Macy and Helen Hunt.
• This season of St. Louis Cardinals baseball has taken its toll on me. It’s such an up and down team. I’d prefer following a club that wins 100-110 games every season. Is that doable?
• I don’t really have a mood either way on the Penn State football team. I certainly don’t hold any of the current players or coaches accountable for the terrible things that happened in years past. But I’m not quite ready to be a Penn State fan, either. It’s going to take time for me to get the terrible taste of the Jerry Sandusky scandal out of my mouth. Until then, I’m neutral.
• How are the Oakland A’s and Baltimore Orioles doing it? Amazing stuff. And to those people who say it’s always the same teams in baseball, it isn’t.
• Some college football predictions for Week One: Kansas State 45, Missouri State 10; Kansas 47, South Dakota State 14; Michigan State 24, Boise State 21; Notre Dame 35, Navy 20; Iowa State 31, Tulsa 21; Alabama 24, Michigan 13; Clemson 28, Auburn 24.
• I will be shocked if replacement referees are working when the NFL regular season starts next week. Shocked. And disappointed, since the stated goal of NFL commissioner Roger Goodell is to improve safety for players. Putting guys out there who shouldn’t be out there to call these games does not improve safety. It’s kind of like putting a 12-year-old behind the wheel of a Ferrari, isn’t it?
• Thanks for reading. I’m enjoying doing the blog again.

Last night in Pittsburgh, the Pirates’ Josh Harrison knocked the math retention right out of St. Louis Cardinals’ catcher Yadier Molina on a close play at home plate.

Cardinals catcher Yadier Molina tries to remember who he is after being pummeled at home plate Tuesday night by the Pirates' Josh Harrison.

The ball and Harrison arrived at almost the same time and Molina, great defensive catcher he is, scooped up a short hop throw from Cardinals right fielder Carlos Beltran and put the tag on Harrison just as Harrison was putting a major hurt on Molina’s head.

The catcher’s head snapped back and he said after the game that he couldn’t remember much from that moment. He had to leave the game and I’m not sure whether he’s playing tonight in the rubber game of the series, but I doubt it.

Molina is arguably the most important Cardinal. And I’m not even sure it can be argued. He’s been the best defensive catcher in the game for a while now and his hitting has nearly caught up with those catching skills. The Cardinals don’t reach the playoffs this season unless Molina is reasonably healthy down the stretch during the final month.

While the NFL is doing everything it can to eliminate head injuries, or at least dramatically curtail them, Major League Baseball has not adopted a stiff penalty dealing with home plate collisions. And it doesn’t make any sense. There are such rules at most other levels of baseball and with good reason. Nobody wants to see a serious injury on a play at the plate. Yet it’s within the rules to do what Harrison did to Molina last night. And while St. Louis pitcher Jake Westbrook retaliated by hitting Harrison in the leg with a pitch later in the game, that punishment was minor.

MLB  needs to adopt a tougher policy for plays at the plate. As it stands, the catcher is able to block off the plate, leaving the approaching runner with little choice but to bowl over the catcher since it is nearly impossible to get to the plate any other way. Blocking the plate on such plays is one of the most important skills taught to catchers, and the argument has been made that if a catcher can make it impossible for a runner to get to the plate while running inside the base line, then a runner should have the right to go through the catcher.

I’m not sure you can eliminate home plate collisions without also eliminating a catcher’s right to block the plate. It seems to me like if one goes, the other has to go, too.

Is that fair to catchers? I’m sure many in the game would say that it isn’t. But again, we’re working to eliminate these scary and dangerous plays that sometimes result in terrible injuries. Both sides have to give a bit on this one.

As always, let me know your thoughts. And thanks for reading my blog.