A sports grab bag

There is a lot to dig into, so let’s do that.

***

Last week I contemplated whether I wanted to watch the Super Bowl or not. Of course I did, but maybe I didn’t watch as intently as I have in the past.

If that was a regular season game, I would have changed the channel at halftime because, at 24-0, it clear it was headed to a blowout.

But I stuck around to see how bad it would truly get and let’s face — like millions of other fans, I enjoyed watching Kansas City quarterback Patrick Mahomes look average.

***

If KC tight end Travis Kelce is going to keep playing like he did in the Super Bowl, maybe it is time for him to hang up his cleats.

He was mostly non-existent and definitely not a factor in a 40-22 loss. There were a couple plays where I watched him exclusively and holy moly, he did not seem to give a rip — just jogging off the line, not really running any planned route.

I get that his relationship with Mahomes is one of freelancing — find an open spot and sit down in it — but he seemed totally uninterested.

***

A lot has been said about Kendrick Lamar’s halftime show. Not a big fan, so I didn’t really watch his performance. I mean, I had it on the television, but wasn’t really paying attention, so all the political symbolism went over my head.

Put it this way: I didn’t even know Serena Williams was part of the show until all I read and watched all the Monday wrapups of Super Bowl Sunday.

***

Sunday was actually a nice day for sports fans, at least for me. I opened Sunday morning by watching a replay of the second half of the France-England rugby game in the Six Nations tournament, a match that saw the “Three Lions” pull out the win over “Les Bleus” right at the end of the match.

That was followed by the Ireland-Scotland match. While not nearly as exciting as England-France, Scotland made a game of it early in the second half before the Irish pulled away for the win.

Rugby was followed by the final round of the Phoenix Open golf tournament, which wrapped up about a half hour before the start of the Super Bowl.

***

It’s a small sample size, but I think the verdict is in on the Luka Doncic-Anthony Davis trade.

Everybody agrees the Dallas Mavericks got fleeced in the deal by the Lakers, but we only needed half of one game of Davis’ Dallas debut to know that the Mavericks screwed this one up, big time. Davis was having a good game before he went down — once again — with an injury that will reportedly keep him out of action for about a month.

Mavericks GM Nico Harrison said he thought Davis’ defensive presence was what the team needed to win a championship. But the biggest ability is availability and that certainly has not been Davis’ MO the last several years.

***

Meanwhile in Golden State, newly-acquired Jimmy Butler has already made an impact for the Warriors. He scored 25 in his debut against Chicago and had 20 against the Milwaukee Bucks — both Warriors’ wins.

Personally, I thought of trading for him would be a mistake because it would cost the Warriors too much. So imagine my surprise when the Warriors got a potential hall of famer for such little in return — an injured D’Anthony Melton, a guy who was eighth or ninth on the bench in Kyle Anderson and the enigma that was Andrew Wiggins.

The fact the Warriors managed to hold on to Jonathan Kuminga might have been the biggest part of the deal.

Whether Butler is the missing piece for another championship run remains to be seen. The best part of the trade was the fact the team didn’t blow up its future.

***

As San Francisco Giants pitchers and catchers began workouts Wednesday, Mike Krukow was still chirping on KNBR about catcher Patrick Bailey being out of shape — last year.

I seem to remember the talk last year was that he came in bulked up, but not necessarily in shape for the rigors of a full season and it cost him in the second half of the season.

That was last year. Time to turn the page.

***

The San Jose Earthquakes don’t get a lot of run in local media. Heck, The Associated Press barely even covers them, so really the only way to know what is going on with the Quakes is to find it on their website and social media.

I have been following their offseason on social media and they have made a lot of interesting moves — the biggest, so far, bringing in American soccer coaching legend Bruce Arena as head coach.

And they’ve also been making a lot of moves, doing a lot of business with the New England Revolution, Arena’s former team, so we’ll see how Revolution West works out this season.

Like the beginning of baseball, the start of the MLS season brings a lot of hope to downtrodden franchises and fans. Hopefully the Earthquakes give us something to write about this year.

Nathan Mollat is in his 24th year covering high school sports in San Mateo County for the San Mateo Daily Journal. He can be reached by email: nathan@smdailyjournal.com.