Question Time with The15!

Welcome to a new recurring feature here at The15net dot com! You have questions about local sports and culture, we will try and answer them. Let’s go!
Q: What the hell is the point of winning the NBA’s in-season tournament anyway? – Tony Powers, Brookline
A: It means you qualify for UEFA Europa League.
Q: No, really.
A: That wasn’t phrased as a question. But the answer is, it grants a permission structure for the fans of every other NBA franchise to make unmerciful fun of the team that wins the tournament but doesn’t also win the championship. And rightly so.
Q: In much the same way as the Mass Ave. Bridge is measured out in ‘Smoots’, I think the Ted Williams Tunnel should be measured using the length of the famous Red Seat home run hit by The Splendid Splinter. Who should I bring this up with? The Mass DOT? My state legislator? – Marie Mimieux – Shirley
A: What a great idea. As it stands, the Ted Williams Tunnel, or ‘TWT’ as no one calls it, is 1.6 miles in length. Teddy Ballgame’s epic June 1946 home run off Detroit’s Fred Hutchinson was measured at 502 feet. A mile is 5,280 feet, multiply by 1.6 gets us to 8228 feet, divide that by 502 feet and we determine that the tunnel is 16.83 Red Seat home run lengths long. You should definitely try and get this to happen either as you suggested by contacting your representative, or one of the local knights of the keyboard. Good luck and let us know if we can help get this done.

Q: Could there be a more useless number than cap space three years out? – Pat Staley, Frostbite Falls, MN
A: Yes; Batting Average.

Q: How old was Upton Bell that last time the two other AFC East teams that have won a Super Bowl won one? – Richard Avis, Holden
Upton was 37 when the Dolphins won SBVIIII, the same age as Scarlett Johansson today, and was a spry 32 when the Jets shocked his Colts team in Super Bowl III, so approximately the same age as Steph Curry or Margot Robbie are right now. We do not know if Upton will live long enough to see the Buffalo Bills win a Soupey.

Q: I remember the outfield wall distances at Fenway Park being painted on in both feet and meters. When did the metric distances disappear? – Michael Skellig, Winthrop
A: The metric measurements were added for the 1976 season, during our nation’s brief dalliance with fully converting to the metric system after the passage and signing of the Metric Conversion Act of 1975. Full metrication never occurred, and the metric distances were removed during the 2002 season.

Q: When is the best time to harvest my tomato plants? – Ellis Wheat, Norfolk
A: Pick your tomatoes in the morning, and when they are fully red in color. Note; non-red tomatoes such as the Berkeley Pink Tie-Dye, Black Beauty, Cherokee Purple, Great White, Green Zebra, and Yellow Pear have different harvest dates, varying between 65-80 days after transplant.

Do you have a question you would like The15 to answer? Head over to https://the15net.com/contact/ and drop us a line! Or DM https://twitter.com/the15intern. See you next week!



















