What a loaded weekend. Lordy, I don’t even know where to begin!
America’s 250th. Fourth of July. Trump vs. FIFA. The Marlins did something downright unacceptable yesterday afternoon. NASCAR last night. USA soccer tonight.
Holiday shmoliday! The news-cycle doesn’t sleep just because the calendar says it’s supposed to, and she certainly didn’t sleep this weekend.
Let’s dive in.
Welcome to a Monday Nightcaps — the one where Carrie Underwood shows America she doesn’t skip leg day during a patriotic performance at the John Deere Classic.
What else? I’ve got fallout from Trump’s phone call to FIFA, including why I think the move was such a no-brainer, Sophie Cunningham’s perfect response to the WNBA nonsense, and this Marlins manager should be fired TODAY after what he pulled Sunday afternoon.
Seriously. This got buried in the FIFA news-of-the-day, but it deserves some attention. And now, it’ll get it!
Grab you any beer for tonight’s game (as long as it’s not Anheuser-Busch!) and settle in for a Monday ‘Cap!
Normally, I love AB. Duh. If you’ve been in this class long enough, you know I’m a Busch Light purist.
(Although, I will admit that I bought a sixer of Coors Banquet this weekend because it just felt right).
That being said … all bets are off tonight. It’s USA vs. Belgium. Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB InBev) is headquartered in Leuven, Belgium. True story. Can’t have that tonight. Like Trump, I know nothing about soccer. Nothing. Nada. Don’t pretend to.
But I know our fellas need all the support they can get, and if that means a small, one-day boycott of AB, then I’m happy to do it.
It’s called making sacrifices, Libs. Look it up!
Now, speaking of the Libs and Trump and tonight’s game … let’s check in with Donald J. Trump, who has, amazingly, made himself the center of attention:
Incredible. Just when you start to think he’s lost his fastball, he paints the corners with 99. How does he do it?
“I think the referee’s call was horrible and nobody talks about that. They talk about the red card like it’s fine. The referee’s decision to red card, I didn’t know what the hell a red card was and when I found out I said, ‘You gotta be kidding.’… I said, ‘Wow, that’s a lot of power, that’s terrible.’ And then I looked at his past and it wasn’t so great.”
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Look, this was such a win-win for Trump politically. Let’s just be honest. There really is no bad outcome from him interfering in FIFA and World Cup matters. None.
Scenario A: USA wins tonight, Trump continues to be praised, and probably shows up at the next game and gets a massive standing ovation in what would be the most-watched broadcast of the year. The left implodes.
Scenario B: USA loses tonight, and the fake-Americans on the left show their true colors by cheering on Belgium because they can’t stand the thought of siding with Trump on anything. The Republicans use all the fake-outrage to their advantage leading up to the 2026 midterms.
Scenario C: Trump’s sudden involvement pulls his core fanbase into the World Cup because they don’t care otherwise, and further galvanizes the country.
This one is already happening, by the way, because I’ve spent 500 words writing about SOCCER on a Monday in July.
And for those of you who don’t think a Democrat would ever go against the US of A, buddy, think AGAIN:
Incredible. Just imagine, for a second, waking up in the morning and doing something like that on the weekend of America’s 250th birthday? These people are NUTS. Truly unhinged.
The TDS (Trump Derangement Syndrome) is OFF THE CHARTS right now. Again, it’s a win-win for him. Easiest call ever, frankly. What a birthday weekend!
OK, let’s move it along, because we’ve all got a game to gear up for in a few hours.
I know most of you missed it, but I will not let Marlins manager Clayton McCullough off the hook for this nonsense he pulled yesterday by pulling a pitcher in the middle of a PERFECT GAME:
Just ridiculous. What happened to the game we all loved? Pulling a pitcher in the middle of a perfect game is indefensible. Do you know how rare perfect games are? This wasn’t a no-hitter. Those are a dime a dozen at this point.
But perfect games almost never happen. In fact, there have only been 24 official perfect games in MLB history. Twenty-four! Baseball has been around for a century, give or take. It’s really been around for much longer, but we’ll just go back 100 years to make it a nice, round number.
In that time, we’ve only seen 24 (!!!) perfect games. And Clayton McCullough robbed us of a chance to see No. 25. Fans were furious. Players, I would hope, ARE furious.
And guess what? The Marlins nearly BLEW it! They barely won the game:
Just pathetic. McCullough, by the way, had this to say after the game:
“Going into this game, 90-plus a batter was a pitch count that I felt comfortable with him coming back off the time on the IL, and us looking to play beyond the regular season,” he said. “Eury’s going to be an important part of that.
“There was a part of my heartstrings pulling at his opportunity to keep on going, but I have to think about Eury, one, and our organization, our team, and what’s best moving forward to give us a chance to continue to win games. So I made more of a calculated decision with where he was with the pitch count to take him out.”
Bologna. It wasn’t like he was at 120 pitches! He was at 90. That’s peanuts. This wasn’t his first game back off the IL. This was his third. At the very least, you let him go back out there and take it one batter at a time. What if he gets through the next inning in 10 pitches?
Indefensible. Make Baseball Great Again!
OK, two quickies on the way out. First? You didn’t think we’d go a day without WNBA drama, did you? As per usual, Sophie Cunningham has the correct take on all the whining from Alyssa Thomas about internet trolls:
“At the end of the day, you’re in an entertainment business, that’s when mental toughness comes in. If you’re gonna live by praise, you’re gonna die by the hate. I think that’s on the individual person to have mental toughness.
“Some people can deal with it, some people can’t. And I think you can see the ones who can’t. And unfortunately there are some who can’t, and it’s not beneficial to them.”
Amen. Thank you, Sophie. All this whining about online hate and fans being mean and blah, blah, blah. It’s nonsense. The WNBA isn’t reinventing the wheel here. This isn’t the first time athletes have ever had to deal with mean fans, or online trolls, or idiots behind a keyboard.
This has been happening FOREVER! I’m not saying it’s right. It’s not. I’m saying if you’re really “upset” about it, you need to get thicker skin and toughen up.
That’s what Sophie is saying, too, by the way. Her statement may have been a little more buttoned-up, but we both arrived at the same destination.
Once again, she nailed it.
OK, that’s it for today. What a weekend. What a start to the week! I think we’re in for a special night.
Take us home, Carrie Underwood!
OutKick Nightcaps is a daily column set to run Monday through Friday at 4 p.m. (roughly, we’re not robots).
Any way this turns out bad for Trump? Email me at Zach.Dean@OutKick.com.
