Raymond Berry, one of the great wide receivers in NFL history, died May 25 at age 93. He was head coach of the Pats when I came to cover the team for the Herald in 1987. He was a thoroughly decent man, who also taught me just how monomaniacal an NFL coach has to be in his line of work.

I've played golf in all sorts of weather, but today was new. A pollen storm. At Hyannis Golf Course, wind blew the pine pollen around in actual clouds which at first we thought might be wildfires. It didn't affect play, I was as usual mediocre, but my throat now thinks I've eaten a pack of Luckies.

In our visit to the Perigord region of France we stayed at a small, old-fashioned hotel in the town of Ezyries. Comfortable rooms, a fine restaurant, and singular interior decoration. Highlight was a lobby portrait of a woman. It had eyes that lit up and moved. Part of the Scooby-Doo chain I guess.

In three days in France I have seen these sights. Many guys in Yankees caps. An older man in a Blue Jays cap. A little boy in a Charlotte Hornets cap. A man in a Red Sox jersey. A man in a Shaq Orlando Magic jersey. American hard power might wane, but American sports merch power reigns supreme.

Sunday morning at the big downtown market. Moule frites and beer for brunch? Pourquoi pas? We were short hitters compared to the happy middle-aged guys I saw scarfing oysters and white wine at 10:30 a.m.

I have been in France for a little over 24 hours. In that time, I have eaten more bread than I usually consume in a week back in the States, and more pastry than in a US month. To quote a famous native of this country, je ne regrette rien.

When the going is good, the Celtics shoot threes. When the going gets tough, the Celtics shoot more threes. When the going gets tough because they're missing threes, the Celtics shoot the most threes of all.

Mike Vrabel is going to be the first NFL head coach to sleep in his office for non-work related reasons.

Hyperbole surrounds the Celtics like a cloud that hides their excellence. Globe headline: Celtics set up for an historic playoff run. (later toned down). They could win the NBA title, sure enough. But would that be more historic than going 16-3 to win? The Celts did that all of two years ago.

Nothing is more deceiving to the eye than the first month of baseball season. But it's sure hard to escape the idea that the Dodgers are gonna win 120 games and the 20 other teams will win between 75 and 85.

Every new form of mass media advertising becomes more irritating then existing forms. Internet advertising is no exception. I accept that one's Internet use is public record. I get target advertising. What I don't get is target advertising to make the rubble bounce, ads for products I just bought.

CBS Sports Network is broadcasting live from the Masters practice area. 10 minutes of viewing made one thing clear. Watching Rory McIlroy or any other great beat balls is as boring as watching me or any other hacker beat balls.

Every opening week of the baseball season is the same. Some teams start hot, others Kelvin cold, some in-between. And fans, media, and alas, some front offices forget the sport's oldest and most true cliche. Perhaps lost in baeball's forest of number, they won't just say, "it's a long season."

Florida is different than New England. Saw a TV ad on local news last night for an establishment named Shooters. Back home, that'd be a strip joint in Providence engaged in litigation with a wings and beer restaurant chain of almost the same name. Here it was a place that sells firearms.

If games were 30 minutes long instead of 40, there'd be more upsets in the early rounds of the NCAA men's basketball tournament. The overwhelming advantage the big schools have over the "where's that again" schools is depth. No McDonald's All-Americans on the bench at the.Sienas and Furmans.

Used to be a big NCAA brackets contest guy, but not for years now. I don't watch as much college ball as before, and the player turnover due to going pro and NIL (both good for them), make it harder to follo. There are schools in this tourney I didn't know existed until yesterday. How do I bet that?

Winter Olympics, World Baseball Classic, and March Madness are very different events yet similar in one way. Each occurs in a dead zone of the calendar, each is splendid entertainment totally engaging fans. And then most of those fans will forget each event within a month. Perfection in its way.

Calls for the Patriots to trade for A.J. Brown ignore two drawbacks to the deal. Eagles GM Howie Roseman always drives a hard bargain. And while the Pats have plenty of cap space, they have relatively little trade capital. Hard to imagine a swap that at best would leave the Pats running in place.

Boston local TV news is pretty good on average, but when a station runs a feature on Mass. residents stranded in Dubai, why ascribe it to "rising tensions in the Middle East." It's not tension that's stranded them, it's high explosives. It's a war! Say so!

After over 50 years in Massachusetts, I have an almost impossible time trying to wrap my head around the fact that tens of millions of my fellow Americans live in places where March is nice.

Daughter Hope watched the hockey game at her home in France. Her comment on Jack Hughes was better than mine could be. "Losing teeth then scoring the winning goal is complete maximum hockey."

Hockey is an awfully kinetic sport to follow before one's second cup of coffee in the morning.

With deep regret I report I saw ABC-ESPN's first house ad for their broadcast of Super Bowl 61, five days after Super Bowl 60. It's gonna be a long year on the World Wide Leader.

Of the six Super Bowls this decade, three were close. Three were blowouts. Each of the latter, Bucs over Chiefs, Eagles over Chiefs, and Seahawks over Patriots, were essentially the same game. The losers' defensive lines were obliterated by the winners' defenses.

Sometimes the luck runs out when you bet a streak. It did tonight Congratulations, Seahawks.

60 years ago today, mild-mannered jim bowl was bitten by a radioactive spider

So, a pick. On the macro level, the Seahawks have been consistently excellent all season long. The Patriots have been as or a little more excellent the last six weeks. Not much to choose from there. The Seahawks have a stronger roster 1 through 53, but 1 through 22 it's closer.

Nothing is more tiresome than the "disrespect" line of any team in a title game. You think the Seahawks being 4.5 point favorites in the Super Bowl insults the Patriots? Shut up and bet into it. The line exists to make money, it's not an award. IMO the Pats are a modest 1-2 point overlay. So bet.

I am very glad that Adam Vinatieri has been elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Kickers must be historic to even get a sniff at Canton, mere excellence is not enough. Adam was historic. Four last-minute championship-winning field goals in NFL history. He had half of them.

Out in San Francisco, Felger & Mazz are telling their audience the Seahawks face a major Super Bowl "distraction" because offensive coordinator Klint Kubiak has said he'll leave to coach the Raiders next season. Back home, the Globe reports Pats' owner Bob Kraft is mentioned in the Epstein files.

The Pro Football Hall of Fame failing to elect Bill Belichick is the owniest own-goal in sports history. How to urinate all over yourselves, gang. My deepest sympathies to whoever IS elected this year. Men deserving of that honor will endure an induction ceremony weekend where all talk is of Bill.

Boston TV news is in a frenzy. The two stories local TV loves most -- Big Storm and Home Team in Big Game, are happening at the same time! Each is getting more than sufficient coverage. If a gang of crooks pulled off another Brink's job tonight, they'd be hard pressed to get air time.

Jarrett Stidham leading the Broncos to a Super Bowl victory would be the funniest possible outcome of the 2025 NFL season so naturally that's what I'm rooting for. Alas, like most truly funny occurrences in real life, it has about a .0001 percent chance of happening.

In the event, I went 2-2, as the chalk won all four games. On the entertainment scale, Bills-Broncos and Rams-Bears delivered. Pats-Texans great for defense fans. Seahawks-49ers over at the opening kickoff. So let's say that went 2 1/2-1 1/2.

Predictions are useless. Also inevitable. Here goes. Broncos over Bills 49ers over Seahawks Patriots over Texans Bears over Rams I could go 4-0, 0-4 or anything in between. Doesn't matter. No matter how informed the guesses, that's all they are. Just want eight teams to give me 12 hours of fun.

Kyle Tucker is a fine ballplayer. The idea that he's worth $60 million a year is risible. Maybe half that for a team with a need for a more-than-decent outfielder. But the Dodgers felt otherwise, and it's their money. Funny how that team can spend what it wants without damaging its bottom line.

Boston is the only city in America where a TV station could run with a completely straight face a feature "The New Garden at 30." Boston Garden at 30 is at least middle-aged, but not here. In Boston, 30 is always the new yesterday.

Handicapping NFL Divisional Round games is fruitless. Any of the teams still left at that point are good enough to win theirs. And their opponents are good enough to beat them. "Favorite" and "Underdog" are useless words in any analysis.

In re Mike Tomlin: A person on another message website posted the following statistic. Since 1969, there have been six Popes, but only three coaches of the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Three of the four non-streaming NFL broadcasters had their number one announcing teams do the wild card games yesterday. Of the color men, Tom Brady on Fox did by far the best job. Who knows how good he could get if he wasn't running the Raiders in his spare time.

I swear that at this point I'd rather have Kevin Hart removed from television forever than I would Donald Trump.

I hope Mike Reiss, an admirable reporter, didn't write the ESPN headline on his story: "Diggs, Barmore, Decline to Discus Facing Charges." Gang, it is not ducking accountability to shut up when charged with serious criminal offenses. It is common sense. It is what any decent lawyer would advise.

The NFL MVP Award's real name is "QB on a Winning Team Who Had the Best Stats Award." It'll be 13 years and counting since a non-QB won the award when either Drake Maye or Matt Stafford wins it. Good for either one, they've had terrific seasons. But it's become a rote event of painting by numbers.

It would not surprise me if the Patriots go on to win the Super Bowl. It would not surprise me if they got keelhauled in their first playoff game and lost by three touchdowns. The AFC is beyond surprise as an emotion. In a universe where all things are possible, what IS surprise, anyway?

The Patriots are tied for the best record in the NFL. The Raiders have the worst. In their season opener, the Raiders beat the Pats. Single September games offer little predictive value about the season's outcome. Nor do single October, November, nor December games. All Sunday are given ones.

The temperature is around 20 in the NYC area this morning. I wonder how many Jets fans are gonna head over to the Meadowlands for the Pats game? For that matter, I wonder how many Pats fans who came down for the weekend are now seeing if they still score Rockettes tickets for this afternoon.

So many people happy the Chiefs are out of the playoffs. I don't think this historic team would be nearly so unpopular if it wasn't for the State Farm insurance company. It isn't Taylor Swift who drives other teams' fans around the bend. It's Jake.

Drake Maye leads or is near the top of almost every quarterback statistic on pro-football-reference. But way over in the right hand corner of the page, there's one where he's tied for dead last. It's 4QC, fourth quarterbacks. He hasn't led one. And that's not on him. The Pats haven't needed any.

Wjat would've been the August odds for a parlay of the Panthers, Bears, and Patriots all making the playoffs? 500-1, 1000-1, 5000-1? Whatever they were, they sure are lower now.

Committees are a bane of modern life. This is especially true in sports. Think of the events of the past week, the college football playoff, baseball Hall of Fame, World Cup draw. All were the product of committees. All were spectacularly messed up to the point of dark comedy.