Welcome to the new morning post concept, which I've decided to call "The Cooler." It works on three levels (in my head), but I'm not going to explain them because there's nothing worse than explaining why you think you're clever. Let's just say these are five things you might want to discuss around the water cooler (1) to make you feel cooler (2) even as I act as the cooler-downer of hot takes (3).
1 U.S. Soccer legend Brandi Chastain, a native of San Jose, was inducted into the Bay Area Sports Hall of Fame. That's good! But, um, let's talk about her plaque because everyone else is. It looks, ah, kind of like a middle-aged man wearing a pullover sweatshirt. That is not, in fact, what Chastain looks like. I've seen comparisons to Gary Busey, but for my money it looks like former Gophers football coach Glen Mason.
Whatever the case, Chastain is being a good sport about it, saying "It's not the most flattering, but it's nice."
2 You might have seen Eddie Rosario's run-scoring dash for home plate on a short sacrifice fly in Monday's 4-2 win over the Tigers, but did you see Rosario's game-clinching catch up against the wall? It was all about Eddie, who is emerging as the Twins' best player.
3 Anthony French of the Detroit Free Press reports that Joe Vavra, the former Twins coach now with Ron Gardenhire in Detroit, had a little problem upon his return to Target Field: He forgot where to go.
4 The Cavaliers/Celtics series is tied 2-2 after Cleveland's 111-102 victory Monday. The home team hasn't lost yet, and now the series shifts back to Boston. I will go ahead and say this, though: the NBA conference finals have been a huge letdown so far. None of the seven games have been particularly close in the East or West; in fact, the garbage time bucket last night made the final margin nine points — the first of any of the conference finals games that wasn't decided by double-digits. Houston trails Golden State 2-1 going into tonight's game in the Bay Area. This should be desperation mode for the Rockets, so maybe — maybe — we will have our first truly good game of the conference finals at 8 tonight.
5 The NHL has had a little more drama in the playoffs, and it will reach a peak Wednesday with Washington at Tampa Bay in Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Finals. The Capitals forced Game 7 with a 3-0 home win Monday, and they are 7-2 on the road in this year's playoffs. Is this finally the Caps' year? The winner gets Vegas.
