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Friday’s fearless forecast: It will be a wonderful weekend for sports enthusiasts in the Chicago area and/or fans of Chicago teams — as well as at other locations around the sports world (provided that the final results of games are not necessarily the barometer used to measure the precise degree of wonderful).
Belated birthday wises to figure competitor Kay Jordt. Credit: Bersano Photography
* Derrick Rose will make his first appearance in a preseason game for the Chicago Bulls against the Pacers on Saturday in Indianapolis since he suffered the injury in the 2012 NBA playoffs and underwent anterior-cruciate ligament surgery. After the game, he will admit to be slightly sore. Not as sore, of course, as some fans and some media were about Rose sitting out last season.
* Folks attending the Northwestern-Ohio State football game on Saturday night in Evanston will pack Ryan Field. Most of the fans in the stands will be wearing the Wildcats’ purple. The Scarlet-and-grey-clad Buckeyes fans will outnumber NU partisans in pregame alcohol consumption. The site’s crystal ball cannot see clearly which team’s supporters will be drowning their sorrows postgame, but a Northwestern victory is not out of the question.
* New Orleans quarterback Drew Brees will pass for more yards than Bears QB Jay Cutler in Sunday’s contest at Soldier Field. Cutler will outdo Brees in number of passes thrown off his back foot.
* The team with the fewest turnovers — or “takeaways” for those who prefer that terminology — will win the Bears-Saints game. The team with the most kickoff returns will not. You will not get this kind of insight many places.
* Fans in Pittsburgh will show up for Sunday’s game prepared to wave the Steelers’ fabled “terrible towels” only to be told it’s a basbeball game that will be played in October. Many Pittsburghers will be terribly confused. Of course, some will be relieved to know it’s the Pirates and not the winless Steelers that they will be rooting for.
* Recently deposed Cubs manager Dale Sveum will have a better chance at reaching the postseason as a coach for the Kansas City Royals than he would have with the Cubs — even if he had lasted a decade at Wrigley Field.
* St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Carlos Beltran will hit his 16th postseason home run to surpass Babe Ruth. An intelligent broadcaster such as Bob Costas or Len Kasper will render such “postseason” statistics meaningless by noting that all of Ruth’s homers came in the World Series, while Beltran never has played on a team that has reached the World Series.
* From our department of shameless self-promotion (not to be confused with our department of regular self-promotion or our department of shameful self-promotion), may we offer this: “Sports & Torts” — the interview program co-hosts by David Spada and Elliott Harris on Talkzone.com — is urging you and everyone else to voting at podcast.com for for the Peoples Choice, Best Produced, Best Video Podcast and Best Sports Podcast. Go to podcastawards.com and type in our show name and URL. Here is the URL: http://www.talkzone.com/shows/155/1660.html.
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