ST. LOUIS — 5 On Your Side sports director Frank Cusumano is dropping by every once in a while to share his quick hits on the St. Louis sports scene, food he's thinking about and shows he's watching. Here's the latest 'Frankly Speaking':
- Besides watching Mare of Easttown, your next best bet Sunday night is Sports Plus. It’s a night of great talkers. We go one-on-one with David Backes. We give you the best of Adam Wainwright. We have wonderful stories about a female wrestler and the St. Louis Blues Warriors team. They are veterans who love to play hockey and the Blues support them.
- The Cardinals have the best record in the National League. Imagine the vibes in this town before the Nolan Arenado trade. Even afterwards, nobody thought this team was on par with the Dodgers or Padres. It’s early but encouraging.
- I don’t know how good Mizzou basketball is going to be. However, like with the Cardinals, as soon as quite announced they were leaving it was doom and gloom. Now it looks like Coach Cuonzo Martin is assembling a fine squad of players. He’s been there four years and been to two NCCA’s.
- We are doing an interview on Monday with former Francis Howell phenom golfer, Adam Long. He has made it on the PGA Tour. He battled for 8 years to get there. Getting your tour card is as difficult to do as anything in sports. One shot at tour qualifying school can keep you from your dream.
- I really want Brad Beal to win a scoring a title, but I am afraid the greatest shooter of all time, Steph Curry, is going to win it. So Brad dropped 50. Steph Curry then dropped 49 in 29 minutes to retain the lead. He played after Brad. He was asked if he knew what Beal did. His response, “Of course I did.”
- However, as great as Curry is, he is not the MVP. Nikola Jokic is. His numbers are arguably the best: 26 pts, 11 rebounds, 8.5 assists and shooting 55 percent from the floor, and almost 90 percent from the line. Denver is 44-24. And here is the big stat, he plays in every game, every game.
- I am really impressed with the Blues down the stretch. 8 games with a point and beating some good teams in the process. However, it’s Las Vegas in the first round. They allow the fewest goals in the league and on Saturday night, the Blues only got off 16 shots. Marc-Andre Fleury is historically good too.
- I sure hope at sports summer camps that they let the kids go without masks. I saw video of a female track star collapse at the finish line with a mask on because she felt she had trouble breathing.
- So bars are coming back which is great, restaurants are back which is great. I wonder about movie theatres. Because of all these other options, will people go back in droves and pay 15 dollars to watch one movie for 2 hours when they can use that to watch a month’s worth of programming on two different outlets?
- Finally on this Mother’s Day a word about the best mom in the world, 94 year old Mary Grace Cusumano. She has lived her life for her husband and her six kids. Egoless and selfless. One time in high school I had a terrible basketball game, I was really down. My mom took me to a sporting goods store. She knew I loved Rocky Balboa. She bought me a speed bag. We hung it in my room. I hit it all the time and felt like Balboa. I tried to do the same with my kids although we could never find a speed bag at The Dollar Store.