Bottom of the Bird Cage 5/12

It’s day No. 132 on the year. We are now past the one-third mark of the year 2009.

On May 12, 1932, 10 weeks after he was abducted the body of Charles Lindbergh’s infant son was found dead just a few miles from the Lindbergh home in New Jersey. The kidnapping of the Lindbergh Baby was one of the biggest stories of the first half of the 20th Century.

On this day in 1864, Confederate General J.E.B. Stuart died from a wound he suffered at the Battle of the Yellow Tavern, just outside Richmond. Stuart was just 31 years old and considered one of the greatest calvary officers in American history. He was stationed at Ft. Leavenworth and Ft. Riley before he resigned his commission to join the Confederate Army in 1861.

And on May 12, 1925, Yogi Berra was born on the Hill in St. Louis. He would go on to become one of the greatest baseball players in history, appearing in 20 different seasons from 1946 through 1965. He was a three-time American League MVP and a 15-time All-Star. His No. 8 was retired by the Yankees.

Yogiisms have become part of Americana. Here are my favorites:

- 90 percent of putts that fall short don’t go in.

- No one goes there anymore; it’s too crowded.

- A nickel ain’t worth a dime anymore.

- Always go to other peoples’ funerals; otherwise they won’t go to yours.

- Even Napoleon had his Watergate.

- Half the lies they tell about me aren’t true.

- I’m not going to buy my kids an encyclopedia. Let them walk to school like I did!

- I couldn’t tell if the streaker was a man or a woman because it had a bag on its head.

- I usually take a two hour nap from 1 to 4.

- If people don’t want to come out to the ballpark, nobody’s going to stop them.

- It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future.

From the New York Times: As a baby, Rhett Bomar’s first word was “ball.” In grade school, he worked as a water boy and ball boy for his father, a high school football coach in Texas. If ever a man was bred to be a professional quarterback, it was young Rhett. “The N.F.L. has been my goal since I’ve been a little kid,” Bomar said last weekend at Giants Stadium during rookie camp.

Now 23, Bomar has his foot in football’s biggest door, although the path he took there was hardly straight and narrow. As a top high school recruit from suburban Dallas, Bomar chose Oklahoma and was impressive there as a redshirt freshman in 2005.

But he was kicked off the Sooners in 2006 for taking money for hours not worked at a car dealership. He was suspended a year, transferred and played two seasons at Sam Houston State.

Although the Giants already have a star quarterback, Eli Manning, they drafted Bomar last month in the fifth round because they were surprised that a player with Bomar’s skill and potential was still available.

Bomar said he was also surprised. “To be honest, I thought I’d go sooner,” said Bomar, who expected the third round or maybe the fourth. “The whole experience is stressful.”

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Bomar’s story is one that should be told to every incoming freshman at major college football teams. Whether they would listen, is another matter, but the tale should be repeated as a learning lesson. Whether Bomar ever plays a down in the NFL, his history will always have the story of what happened at Oklahoma attached and prominently displayed. That he accepted money for a no-show job was wrong. Why he got punished when hundreds of others over the years have gotten away with the same thing is totally being in the wrong place, at the wrong time. Since it’s impossible to control when the wrong time happens, the only way to make sure that doesn’t happen is to never be in the wrong place.

From St. Louis Post-Dispatch columnist Bernie Miklasz: The Rams release of starting linebacker Pisa Tinoisamoa underscored the dramatic nature of the Rams’ roster shakeup that’s occurred this offseason. Of the players who were listed on the roster or on injured reserve for the 16th and final game of the Rams’ 2008 season, 21 are gone. And the Rams have gotten a lot younger during this weeding process.

Counting those who finished last season on IR, the Rams have subsequently released, traded or declined to re-sign 15 players who were age 30 or older. That’s right, 15 thirtysomethings are gone from 2008. That list includes Torry Holt, Orlando Pace, Drew Bennett, Trent Green, La Roi Glover, Fakhir Brown, Corey Chavous and Jonathan Craft. Several full-time starters were part of that group.

As the 2009 roster sits right now, the Rams have only six players age 30 or over: QB Marc Bulger; DEs James Hall and Leonard Little; LB Chris Draft; S Todd Johnson; and K Josh Brown. Two others — snapper Chris Massey and TE Randy McMichael – will turn 30 during the 2009 season.

That’s why Tinoisamoa was let go. He was decent enough, but wasn’t going to get any better. He was limited by size. GM Billy Devaney and coach Steve Spagnuolo would rather see what some of the young LBs could do, whether it be Larry Grant, Chris Chamberlain or David Vobora.

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This sounds very familiar. Isn’t it amazing that two teams separated by 250 miles would go through the same thing one year after the other. The Rams are going young, young, young. Whether they’ll match up with how young the Chiefs went last year when they had 144 games played by rookies and 70 starts, both numbers were easily tops in the NFL for the 2008 season. That helped produce a 2-14 record. Buckle up Rams fans. It could be a long year.

From the Denver Post: Anyone wanting to talk football, make an appointment with Stan Jones.

Jones has enough good material to fill an afternoon, and there’s nothing more the former University of Maryland and NFL star likes to do than talk about the game. He can’t play anymore, but his memories aren’t on injured reserve. And he enjoys some company in his new retirement-home digs in Westminster.
“I got tired of shoveling the snow up in Fraser,” Jones said, explaining his move down from the mountains. “I wasn’t skiing anymore and was living up there by myself.”

Jones’ wife, Darlis, whom he met when both were in the second grade in Pennsylvania, lost a battle with cancer seven years ago. For a time, Jones kept busy at the Fraser tourist information center and, of all things, performing in a drama group that put on skits about the Old West for tourists during the summer months.

Jones found his mountain retreat when he was an assistant coach for the Broncos at a time that always will be remembered as near the top of the peak of the team’s history.

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Maybe it’s just me, but I can sit around and listen to Hall of Famers tell stories all day. The problem with the squeezing of newspaper space and TV time for sports is that fewer and fewer of those stories pop up along the way. Reporters who know the people and the stories get laid off, the sports section loses half its space and a chance to hear about the past gets shoved into oblivion. Yeah, I know it’s all history, but remember: those that do not study history, are doomed to repeat it.