PHOTO BY THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Northeastern forward Dylan Sikura celebrates scoring a goal with Ryan Shea, right, against the Boston College at the Beanpot college hockey tournament in Boston.
By STEVE KRAUSE
Idle chatter while anticipating the February thaw we’ve been promised over the weekend and into next week.
The second Monday in February is always the mid-tunnel point of winter. You know … at some point you’re not going into the tunnel, you’re coming out.
Well, as of today, we’re coming out. It doesn’t mean winter’s over. It just means we’re getting closer to the end than the beginning.
That much should be easy enough to understand. The second Monday in February seems so arbitrary. Why pick that as the official turning point?
It goes back to my college days, when, around 5 p.m. every second Monday of February, I, a few other Northeastern faithfuls, and Jack Grinold — the former sports information director — would sit in the cavernous Boston Garden and watch the Huskies lose to whichever team they were playing in the Beanpot consolation game.
That was it. I’d always say that “winter begins its eternal descent into spring the minute Northeastern loses in the Beanpot.”
Well, happy out-of-tunnel day. The only exception to any of this is that the Huskies actually beat BC in the consolation game Monday night.
Go Huskies.
He or she who wants to go to the White House and celebrate a hard-earned victory with a contrived photo op with the president is certainly entitled to go. He or she who wants to stay home is certainly entitled to do that, too.
But you know what? Just do it. Go or don’t go, I don’t care. But please, don’t make it all about you. I might have been curious, a few years ago, as to why Tim Thomas didn’t go to the White House celebration of the Bruins’ Stanley Cup — but not curious enough to have the next week after the ceremony be filled with diatribes about Thomas’ political views. He should have remembered that the only reason anyone cared in the first place was because he could stop pucks.
Similarly, regardless of where I am politically, I’m not interested in all this speculation on why all these Patriots players are staying home. I think I get it. I think most of us do. Can we just leave it at that?
Best wishes to Jerry Remy as he fights cancer yet again. He says he’s going public with his latest diagnosis because he feels if just one person goes the doctor as a result of reading or hearing about what he’s been through, he’ll have done a tremendous service.
Illness — any illness — humbles you. I found that out myself last year. Remy may seem like an amiable chap in the booth, but he wasn’t always the easiest guy to get along with when he was with the Red Sox, nor has he ever been one of the “boys” as the team’s color man.
That’s OK. He is who he is. But the circumstances in his life, coupled with the celebrity he’s attained by doing what he does, has enabled him to serve as kind of a spokesman for what it’s like to live not only with cancer but depression as well. And he’s embraced that willingly, graciously and humbly, as private a person as he is.
Speaking of the Red Sox, it would seem that their biggest question marks coming into the season is whether Pablo Sandoval will be the starting third baseman and who will assume David Ortiz’s prominence in the lineup.
To which I ask, “oh, really? That’s the biggest concern? Did I miss something?”
Sure, they have themselves three all-star starters in David Price, Rick Porcello and Chris Sale. But last time I checked, you need five starters on your staff. The Red Sox some really issues with their other starters. Eduardo Rodriguez seems to have inherited the Clay Buchholz “I- have-no-backbone” award now that crazy-eyes has moved on. Steven Wright and Drew Pomeranz are coming off injuries and we have no idea at all what they’re going to be able to do.
Just like there are only three important things about buying a house: location, location and location; there are three important things about building a baseball team: pitching, pitching and pitching.
Oh, and as for the other two questions: Sandoval will probably at least start the season at third; and no one will ever assume Ortiz’s prominence in the lineup. Which is why the Red Sox will absolutely have to get better pitching this year than they got in 2016.