5-at-10: Three degrees of celebration

In honor of Babe Ruth's 1920 jersey that drew $4.4 million at auction recently, we're all about the 3s today. Remember Friday's mailbag and if you have a question shoot it to us at jgreeson@timesfreepress.com or leave it in the comments. From the "Talks too much" studios, here we go...

photo B.J. Coleman

Three's company

And with one quick decision, the drama surrounding B.J. Coleman's chance to make the Green Bay Packers' roster became a lot less tense.

Coleman, the former McCallie School star and UTC quarterback, was a seventh-round pick by the Packers in last month's NFL draft. It took Coleman less a month to make the Packers realize that last year's third-string quarterback Nick Hill was expendable.

So the Pack cut ties with Hill, meaning there's currently no denying that Coleman is no worse than the third-string since Green Bay has quarterbacks Aaron Rodgers, Graham Harrell and Coleman on the roster.

The Packers kept three quarterbacks last season, and barring a late addition to the roster or signing a free agent, three looks to be a wonderfully prime number for Coleman.

Go away Donovan McNabb. Keep quiet Jim Sorgi. Chad Pennington look elsewhere.

----

photo I'll Have Another looks back at fans with Barn Foreman Benjamin Perez before the 137th Preakness Stakes horse race at Pimlico Race Course, Saturday, May 19, 2012, in Baltimore.

Contest trifecta

It's in the books. We've been talked into a Belmont contest since I'll Have Another has Triple Crown aspirations. (As for us, we just want to get to the weekend and have Crown Royal aspirations. So it goes.)

But with a motherload of racing on tap for this weekend and next, we thought, "Dude, we should really come up with something... Man, we'd like an Egg McMuffin right now... Where were we... Yeah the contest... Wonder if the gang think "The Contest " was the best "Seinfeld" ever?... It would get a lot of votes... We miss pretend Al Davis... Yahtzee... And sweet buckets of creepy, if Charlie Sheen and Glenn Campbell had a love-child it would look like John Fogerty...Where were we...

OK, the contest - and yes, sometimes the ramblings in the 5-at-10's cabasa can be scary.

Here's the deal: We need an Indy 500 driver, a Coca-Cola 600 driver and a horse in the Belmont. We'll add together each finish and low total wins (perfect score would be 3 - 1 point for first place in each race). Since we have to have the submissions by Sunday morning, if you submit a horse that pulls out next week, you can replace them.

Easy peasy lemon squeezy. And we're thinking about some primo tickets as the prize - made even some NASCAR passes for Atlanta this Labor Day.

----

photo Cincinnati Reds' Drew Stubbs (6) is congratulated by Bronson Arroyo after the Reds defeated the Atlanta Braves 4-1 in a baseball game, Monday, May 21, 2012 in Cincinnati. Stubbs hit two home runs in the game. (AP Photo/Al Behrman)

Triple-up, three-play

We have caught a little bit of the 3-bug and looked around and noticed a world of threes.

There are three NBA series left going into tonight: The Heatles and Pacers play Game 6 tonight (We think Miami finishes it tonight, for what that's worth), the Celtics and Sixers will go to Game 7 and the Thunder and Spurs are getting ready for a old Western Conference shootout.

Your Atlanta Braves have lost three straight to Cincinnati, which is using some high-quality starting pitching and a small bandbox park to a great advantage. The Reds have three wins on 10 runs and 19 hits in the three games - seven of those hits have been homers.

And finally, let's give a trio of shoutouts:

To Rusty Wallace for being tabbed for the NASCAR Hall of Fame;

To Eugene Polley, the man that invented the TV remote control (which we can make a serious argument for as one of the 10 greatest inventions ever, especially for people of our age who served as a TV remote control for most of our childhood - raise your hand if your Pops would say, "go see what's on 3" and you'd go up to the TV turn the knob to 3 and wait for..."What's on 5?" and then you'd scan all of four channels);

To THE Ohio State AD Gene Smith and the Buckeyes coaching staff because it's been at least 15 minutes since their last self-reported NCAA violation. Well-done gang.

----

This and that (times three)

- Speaking of local kids make good, former Baylor star golfer and current Alabama ace Brooke Pancake heads into the third round of the NCAA women's golf tournament with the lead. She is 6 under after 36 holes, two shots clear of the field.

- Spring Fling hits day three of full-speed activities today with individual tennis and girls track being added to the mix. Congrats to all the teams competing.

- Color us tickled that Dr. Shaq O'Neal is among the contenders for the GM job in Orlando. He is a doctor after all.

- Wonder if Roger Goodell gets up every morning, bathes in important French spring water, towels off with $100 bills and then dreads looking at who is suing him or the NFL next. Now the NFLPA is suing the league for collusion, and they may have some semblance of a case considering the NFL found the Redskins and the Cowboys guilty of salary-cap violations during the season in which there was no salary cap. That's the million-dollar inverse to the old if a tree falls in a forrest paradox.

- The Big Orange caravan blew through town Wednesday, and our ace columnist Mark Wiedmer and UT ace Downtown Patrick Brown caught the action. Their stories are http://www.timesfreepress.com/news/2012/may/24/ut-vols-big-orange-brass-filled-hope/, http://www.timesfreepress.com/news/2012/may/24/cameron-clear-suspended-following-arrest-vols/?sports and http://www.timesfreepress.com/news/2012/may/24/ut-basketball-sets-up-camp-volsknoxville/?sportscollege.

- Schedule reminder: We're planning on being on The Show with Chris Goforth today around 2 p.m. on 1370 AM. Swing by, don't cost nothing.

----

Today's question

We're still stunned about the news that any garmet was worth $4.4 million, even the prized 1920 version (that did not have his famed No. 3 on the back, by the way). So in honor of the No. 3 and jerseys everywhere, we offer the following questions:

What's your Mount Rushmore for the No. 3 across all sports? We'll go Ruth, Dale Sr., Allen Iverson and Dwyane Wade. (And we almost went with Kelly Leak from the Chico Bail Bonds Bears.)

Secondly, what famous articles of clothes would you overpay for at auction? Here's a top three: Jim Craig's U.S.A. hockey sweater, Jimmy Chitwood's No. 15 jersey from the barely big enough for three syllables Hickory Huskers, Kirk Gibson's Dodgers No. 23 from Game 1 of the 1998 World Series.

Discuss.

Upcoming Events