COHEN'S CORNER SPORTS

This is getting beyond ridiculous. With growing concern over the spread of COVID-19 after 17 members of the Miami Marlins tested positive following their series in Philadelphia, Major League Baseball has postponed the next six games on the Marlins schedule through Sunday. That means their games against the Baltimore Orioles and Washington Nationals will not happen this week, and there is no telling when and if those games will ever be made up. The scheduling issues also affected the Yankees and Phillies, who have seen their entire four-game shuttle series postponed completely. Even though tests on the Phillies came back negative, they will have to test again at somepoint to determine if anyone in the Phillies clubhouse does indeed have the virus. Instead the Yankees will now have to shuttle to Baltimore to play the Orioles -- both teams just trying to make up games that have been removed from their schedule. In a 60-game season under so much uncertainty there is no telling 1) when the...

METS 7 - RED SOX 4  Nothing can cure the Mets ills from the past two losses to the Atlanta Braves then beating up on an injured and rebuilding Boston Red Sox team. After struggling to garner any offense the first three games of the season that saw the Mets score a combined five runs, New York scored seven on Monday night thanks to big home runs by Pete Alonso, Michael Conforto and Dominic Smith. The Mets opened up the scoring in the top of the second inning when Conforto took Boston starter Josh Osich deep for a two-run homer to give the Mets an early 2-0 advantage. An inning later, Alonso, who has really struggled with the bat in the early season, nailed a homer off the top of the Green Monster in left to push the Mets ahead 4-0. And that would not be all. In the top of the fourth with Wilson Ramos and Robinson Cano on base, Dominic Smith went deep for his first homer of the season to right-center to expand the Met lead to 7-0. All the runs went to the good of former C...

He wouldn't call it what it was when asked by MLB Network's Tom Verducci, but for Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred, he truly does have a "nightmare" on his hands. Word came down Monday that the Miami Marlins had as many as 11 players and two coaches test positive for COVID-19 after their final game in Philadelphia, a game that oddly enough was played despite the fact that three Marlins had tested positive before game time, yet Major League Baseball allowed the Marlins decide for themselves whether to play or not. How is that possible in today's day an age? And Manfred had the audacity to tell fans across America that Major League Baseball has protocols to handle the virus. Malarkey. Even Dodgers pitcher David Price said as much in a Twitter post that part of the reason he opted out of the 2020 season was because he felt baseball didn't take the appropriate steps to protect the players. Now the results from a three month battle over money between baseball and...

How much more evidence do the Mets need. Correction, how much more evidence does General Manager Bordie Van Wagenen need so he can allow his puppet manager Luis Rojas make the decision that needs to be made: get Edwin Diaz as far away from the ninth inning as quickly as possible. Diaz once again proved he is incapable of getting the job done in crunch time. With the Mets leading the Atlanta Braves 2-1, needing just one out, hell, one strike, to cement a 2-0 start to a 60-game season, Diaz -- in Diaz fashion -- served up a game-tying homer to Marcel Ozuna to deep right.  The Mets would never lead again as Atlanta, taking full advantage of the international rule with an automatic runner on second in the top of the 10th inning, scored three runs off Hunter Strickland to take a 5-2 lead, en route to a 5-3 victory over the Mets. Instead of being 2-0, a game ahead of Miami, Philly and Washington, and two games ahead of Atlanta, the Mets find themselves once again in the middle of ...

At the end of the day Jamal Adams got exactly what he wanted, and the Jets got exactly what they needed: peace. The Jets traded the disgruntled Pro Bowl safety to the Seattle Seahawks for two first round picks, a third rounder and safety Bradley McDougald while sending Adams and a fourth rounder to Seattle. The first round picks the Jets recieve will cover the 2021 and 2022 drafts, meaning New York will have two first rounders in each of the next two years -- a huge luxury to a franchise that still has plenty of holes to fill. The Jets are big winners here. They get ride of a player who didn't want to be here.  Adams spent a better part of the last year ripping apart the franchise because General Manager Joe Douglas fielded calls about Adams last fall -- calls that Douglas listened to and declined. He did his job. Adams meanwhile pouted and shouted his way out of town. He demanded a contract extension or trade in the spring as the NFL and everyone else struggled with COVID-19. Joe ...

Credit the New York Knicks, they finally have done something right. The Knicks are going to make former Chicago Bulls and Minnesota Timberwolves head coach Tom Thibideau the next head coach of the New York Knicks . Thus ends an extended process where the Knicks interviewed just about everyone, including former Nets head coaches Jason Kidd and Kenny Atkinson. In fact there was even rumors that the Knicks were giving serious consideration to giving Kidd the job, but instead the revert back to the guy who was the clear favorite from the very beginning. The 62-year old Thibideau is a basketball lifer, having grown up in the NBA with the Knicks when he was on Jeff Van Gundy's staff from 1996 to 2004, including serving on Van Gundy's staff during New York's magical run to the Finals in 1999. As a head coach, Thibideau has been a winner. Over seven and a half seasons as a head coach, Thibideau has amassed a .589 winning percentage, including turning around the Bulls back into a p...

METS 1 - BRAVES 0 The last time Mets fans saw Yoenis Cespedes on the field, he had a 2-for-4 night at Yankee Stadium on July 20, 2018. Since that time, heel and ankle injuries, combined with a bizarre incident at Spring Training last year where he was chased down by a wild boar and fell into a hole, and Cespedes' tenure that once started out so promising in New York when he arrived in 2015 had matriculated into a sick joke. But a little over two years and four days since his last appearance in a Mets uniform, Cespedes reminded the Mets and the fanbase that he can still pack quiet a punch with his bat. In the bottom of the seventh inning, in a scoreless game that had been dominated by superlative efforts by Mike Soroka for Atlanta and Jacob deGrom for the Mets, Cespedes got around an 0-1 fastball by reliever Chris Martin and crushed it into the second deck at Citi Field for his first home run in two years. It gave the Mets a 1-0 lead, the only run they would need on the most bizarre...

YANKEES 4 - NATIONALS 1 The raindr ops were not enough to stymie the Yankees who leaned on the power of Giancarlo Stanton and the right arm of new staff ace Gerrit Cole to a rain-shortened 4-1 victory over the defending World Series Champion Washington Nationals, Thursday. Stanton and Aaron Judge accounted for four of the Yankees six hits, and all four RBIs in the evening. Stanton's two-run blast to straight away center field, 459 feet from home plate, was the exclamation point on the night, and it was only the first inning. The Yankees would tack on a run in the third inning on Judge's RBI double that brought home Tyler Wade to make it 3-1 Yankees in the third inning. Stanton capped off the scoring the fourth on a RBI single to right that scored Gio Urshela in the top of the fifth inning. As for Cole, he settled in nicely after serving up a solo shot to Adam Eaton in the bottom of the first. Cole gave up only one hit, the Eaton homer, over five innings of work, while striking...

Get ready for some mediocre teams getting into the Major League Baseball playoffs this season (if the season is completed this year). MLB and the Players Union agreed to expand the playoffs to 16 teams, eight teams in each league as a way to increase financial incentives (a $50 million pool) and competitive incentives for teams that normally would be out of it.  The change guarantees that all second place teams will qualify for the playoffs. A seventh and eighth team will be determined in each league by best remaining record. This will create a crowded and controversial playoff format where the first round will consist of four series that are all a best of three. The winners of the first round will advance to the Division Series, which will remain a best of five. The League Championship Series' and World Series will remain a seven game series. The controversy with the decision means that you could see a team(s) that are hovering around .500 get to the postseason. Moreover that team...

Things are getting dicey for the Mets starting rotation. Projected number two starter Marcus Stroman is on the Injury List with a tear to his left calf, and is considered "week to week" according to manager Luis Rojas.  However the diagnosis of a torn calf muscle sounds a lot worse than the earlier diagnosis of a calf strain. As noted by MLB Trade Rumors dot com, a Grade 1 Calf strain could indicate some tearing and stretching of the muscle that might lead to a lesser IL stint. Still the loss of Stroman is no funny matter for the Mets. There was concern just a week ago about back tightness with ace Jacob deGrom, and with Noah Syndergaard out for the entire season, the Mets were really hoping to get a big year out of Stroman as the team's number 2 starter. Now the pressure is only going to be ratcheted up on the rest of the rotation. Michael Wacha, Rick Porcello and Steven Matz all see their importance to the Mets success in the near and long term future of this 2020 seaso...

Jets owner Robert " Woody" Johnson is in big trouble after multiple reports surfaced Tuesday that the billionaire and Ambassador to the United Kingdom was investigated by the U.S. State Department Inspector General for apparent racist and sexist comments he made to staff. Johnson is also in hot water for trying to push the British Open to move its location to President Trump's Turnberry resort in Scotland at the President's behest. The controversies have now led many to jump on social media demanding that Johnson be reprimanded by the NFL, and possibly sell his ownership stake in the New York Jets. According to CNN, Johnson reportedly "questioned why the Black community celebrates Black History Month" and made some rather "cringeworthy" comments about women's looks. In 2018 at a Black History Month event, Johnson "appeared agitated and asked if the audience would be a whole bunch of black people," according to an unnamed source. CNN ...

There will be no fans at Giants and Jets games this season. The two clubs that share MetLife Stadium came to the decision to keep fans from the stadium for the entire 2020 season after New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy extended the states limits on outdoor public gatherings at a max of 500 people. MefLife, of course seats 82,000-plus, and considering the risks posed by the Coronavirus, it makes no sense to allow only a few hundred people in the building when the safety of all those involved is paramount. Fans will also be barred from attending training camp practices this summer. There is lingering question about whether the season will indeed happen right now. The NFL and NFLPA is taking steps to mollify concerns the players have about safety during the season; there is even a push to cancel the entire preseason slate to limit the potential of exposure. Of all the four major sports, football requires the most contact between large groups of people, meaning that passing the Coronavirus i...

YANKEES 6 - METS 0 If you could sum up these two games in just a few thoughts it is this: the 2020 New York Yankees look primed for a big run in a 60-game season. The 2020 New York Mets look primed for the season to be over before it ever starts. That is what it looked like at Yankee Stadium, Sunday night, as the Bronx Bombers pounded five home runs en route to a 6-0 smackdown of their crosstown rivals, making it quiet apparent that even in a so-called exhibition there is a stark contrast between the two clubs. For the first time this season Yankees fans saw a glimpse of what a healthy Yankees lineup could look this year with Aaron Judge, Giancarlos Stanton, DJ LeMahieu and Aaron Hicks all back in the lineup for the Bombers. The results were incredible. Judge cracked two homers off Mets pitching, including a soft liner to left on an excuse me swing that was a quintessential Yankee Stadium home run in the bottom of the first inning to give the Yankees a 1-0 lead. Judge finished the nigh...

YANKEES 9 - METS 3  They played in total silence. The sounds of a bat hitting a ball, or a glove making a catch thundered through Citi Field in a scene that was best fit for a post-apocalyptic world. And in many ways that is the situation baseball -- and all sports for that matter -- find themselves in. A little less than a week before Major League Baseball dips its big toe into COVID infested waters to start a 60-game season that anyone with any form of reason and integrity believes shouldn't happen, the Mets and Yankees played the first of two meaningless exhibition games on Saturday night, before a crowd of ... wait for it ... zero. (Unless you want to count the cardboard cutouts). They are playing these games, not because they want to, but because after two weeks of playing themselves, the Mets and Yanks needed a little competition before the games get real -- at least on paper. The only highlight of the night of course came in the fourth inning with Yankees right fie...

Baseball's return has not been kind to the Yankees, and the games haven't even started yet. The Bronx Bombers received another blow, Saturday when word came down that closer Aroldis Chapman has been diagnosed with COVID-19 and has mild symptoms. Manager Aaron Boone says that Chapman will be away for the team for an undisclosed period of time.   Chapman is now the third Yankee to test positive for the virus, the others being 2019 team MVP DJ LeMahieu and reliever Luis Cessa. Who knows how many others on the team potentially have been exposed to the virus since Chapman worked out with his teammates just days earlier. Add the COVID issues to the injury concerns such as Aaron Judge returning from rib and shoulder surgery and pitcher Mashairo Tanaka dealing with a concussion after taking a 112 mph lined shot from the bat of Giancarlo Statnton off of his head. The COVID news is both sobering and scary. The Yankees are one of ten teams to have players test positive for the virus, ...

According to multiple reports the name "Warriors" is the leading candidate to replace the name "Redskins" for Washington's NFL franchise. Although there could be a dark horse in the mix with a name such as "Redwolves."   The name "Redskins" has come under fire once again in response to the "social injustice" movement as the cancel culture continues its march to re-brand United States history in the months following the murder of George Floyd at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer.  The "Skins" name has always been a topic of debate going as far back as the 1990s, but the team has maintained the moniker.  Owner Dan Snyder has also maintained for years that the name was not "racist" even though many people and civil rights groups point to the contrary. (There have been plenty of arguments on both sides of the issue.)  However, as we all know, money does talk. And with FedEx threatening to pull out of its $20...

If you have ever seen the Showtime TV series "Billions" you know very well that Bobby Axlerod (Damien Lewis) never gives up on a deal, even if it's going to cost him a lot of money. Well, hudge fund manager Steve Cohen, whose life "loosely" serves as a basis for the character is not giving up in his pursuit of the New York Mets. Quiet the contrary.  Instead, Cohen has put forward a deal that blows the competition right out of the water. Cohen is offering to pay up to $2 billion to buy the baseball team, and an additional $2 billion to buy the Mets television station, SNY, away from the Wilpons. That is $4 billion big ones! How do the Wilpon's not say 'yes' to this? The offer blows away the proposal by Alex Rodriguez and Jennifer Lopez, which around a reported $1.7 billion. Philadelphia 76ers and New Jersey Devils co-owners Josh Harris and David Blitzer are also in the mix for the Mets. According to reports, Mets COO Jeff Wilpon would pref...

Things are not so rosy in the land of Major League Baseball right about now. MLB released its 60-game schedule for all 30 clubs. Every schedule is rationalized based only on divisional match-ups and interleague against the opposite geographic division (i.e. AL East vs. NL East, et al). However, many players and even teams are voicing deep concerns about proceeding with a season. Already Braves outfielder Nick Markakis opted not to play in 2020, joining a long list of players that includes Nationals' Ryan Zimmerman and Rockies' Ian Desmond. Markakis pointed to Freddie Freeman, who was diagnoised with COVID-19 as part of the impetus for him to not play this season. On top of that Cubs third baseman Kris Bryant pointed out baseball's inconsistencies regarding testing, noting that players have shown up to camp who haven't been tested. MLB initially agreed to test every other day. Then there are the lack of results. The Phillies, Nationals and Athletics have had to cancel an...

The Jets and Jamal Adams are in a stalemate over his contract status. Adams wants to be the highest paid safety in the NFL, while the Jets are juggling with salary cap concerns moving forward over the next two years (COVID-19 aside). That and reports this week from the NY Daily News that Adam Gase is a big reason why Adams is requesting a deal. Dan Feuerstein and I debate it. Watch:

In a society that has been juggling with the controversy of race relations of late, the Washington Redskins -- after years upon years of debate -- are now strongly considering removing the name 'Redskins' as the teams identity and branding. The discussion comes up as racial tensions are at its highest peak in the United States in the months since George Floyd's killing in Minneapolis. Since that time not only has the Country seen peaceful protest calling for reforms to policing, but complete and total anarchy in the streets that have bordered on lawlessness, and with it a cancel culture mentality that is leaving nothing and nobody to chance. The 'Redskins' controversy is now front and center. For years there has been outside pressure for the 'Skins to change the teams name to anything that doesn't remind people of the racist sensibilities of the phrase "Redskins." Owner Dan Snyder has been stringent in his resolve to not change the nam...