Coughlin, Belichick among the nominated
Stoke up the hot stove. Braves ready to spend
Good morning, all! I hope your Thursday is off to a great start!
The Pro Football Hall of Fame has named nine coaching semifinalists for the class of 2026 and two of them squared off against each other in a couple of Super Bowls: Bill Belichick and Tom Coughlin. Like the baseball Hall of Fame, the process has several steps, before a coach can be enshrined. On Nov. 18 the coach blue-ribbon committee will vote out one winner to be considered by the Hall’s selection committee.
Belichick and Coughlin are not the only ones on the list. Mike Holmgren, Chuck Knox, Buddy Parker, Dan Reeves, Marty Schottenheimer, George Seifert and Mike Shanahan are also on the ballot. Coughlin, Holmgren, Knox, Reeves, Schottenheimer, Seifert and Shanahan advanced to this stage last year, with Holmgren emerging as the finalist, before falling short in the vote by the Hall’s selection committee.
Just as an aside, I was part of a celebrity pro-am golf tournament that included Reeves, when he was the coach of the New York Giants. He could whack a golf ball.
Here are some other thoughts as we approach Week 10 of the NFL season:
Turns out more than 51M watched Game 7 of the World Series, when you combine U.S.A., Canada and Japan numbers. Pretty impressive.
The Raiders are 9.5-point underdogs against the Broncos in tonight’s NFL contest. I will have my Picks for Kicks on Friday. I had four-out-of-five correct with the spread in Week 9, improving to 23-22 on the season.
I don’t know what’s more unnerving, the Black Friday sales already inundating my inbox or these websites “reporting” the latest MLB trade rumors, which are nothing more than stories being made up by the websites to generate clicks.
When I was growing up, The Ed Sullivan Show Sunday nights at 8:00 was appointment watching in our house. We did not need any Apple Reminders to tell us the show was on. Variety shows and westerns on TV were the popular genres. Sullivan, a former sports columnist, who still wrote a celebrity column three times per week in the NY Daily News, hosted the top-rated show, introducing acts from all walks of life. Because of his sports background, he would bring on sports celebrities on occasion. Recently, I came across this nugget, involving Sullivan, baseball broadcasters and three teams. Enjoy:
Ah, yes!. Those were the days.
Word is the Atlanta Braves were not happy missing the playoffs this season and are ready to spend. Team chairman Terry McGurk spoke on a Wednesday earning call stating he expects the Braves to have one of the top five payrolls in baseball next season. Atlanta’s payroll in 2025 was $212M, placing the franchise ninth. The Braves moved out of Atlanta-proper a few years back to build a new stadium, as the anchor to a mixed-used development in the suburbs. Turns out the development generated an additional $100M for the club this season and they are prepared to plow some of that money into the baseball team. Stoke up the hot stove.
By the way, the Braves continue to antagonize their NL East rival Mets. Last month the Mets let pitching coach Jeremy Hefner and first base coach Antoan Richardson go. Wednesday the Braves announced both those coaches will join the staff of newly-named manager Walt Weiss. The Braves also announced they are exercising the club option on pitcher Chris Sale at $18M.
That is going to do it for today’s newsletter. Thank you for subscribing and enjoy the day!
DAN