Idle Thoughts, while waiting for the baseball playoffs, the Giants to force a punt and for the (always awesome) MLK Dinner:

• Dr. Idle, Dr. I to his close friends, often needs a translator to understand baseball lingo these days, what with BABIP, FIP, xFIP, WAR, wRAA, wRC+ and the rest of the box of Alpha Bits.

Now regular old English appears to be an issue.

Like this recent offering in the Globe from Red Sox general manager Craig Breslow: “We have been poor clusterers or sequencers of performance,” he said.

In the old days, this would have translated into “we suck.”

• Quiz: Name the Jets’ leader for most touchdown passes thrown in a season. (Answer below)

• Thanks to Bacon Academy senior lineman (and GameDay social media coordinator) AJ O’Neill for sending along a list of the most entertaining names in college football this year. Among the highlights:

Dude Person (DB, Central Arkansas): Seems to belong in the Dept. of Redundancy Dept.

Major Burns (DB, LSU): His real name is Larry Linville.

King Large (OT, SMU): Dr. I does NOT want to know how this name came about.

Parker Titsworth (OL, Ohio U): Dr. I would like to stay employed. And so we move on …

• So let’s see if Dr. I has this straight:

In apparent retaliation for Gerrit Cole hitting Raffy Devers, Brayan Bello tried to hit Aaron Judge in the sixth inning of a Sox-Yankees game last Saturday. He missed with a 97.4-mile-per-hour fastball.

Boston manager Alex Cora essentially acknowledged a day later the Sox were trying to hit Judge.

“We had our chance, didn’t happen, and we have to move on,” he said.

How was he not suspended for this?

• Dr. I wonders: If Charles Manson ever got his case transferred to lovey dovey New London Superior Court, would he have skated on breach of peace and six hours of community service cleaning up Bank Street after Sailfest?

• Not that Dr. I takes the Mets all that seriously, but can somebody explain how, in a playoff race, they only drew a paltry (announced) home crowd of 21,964 Monday night?

Even the toadies who make up “the best broadcast booth in baseball” seemed aghast.

• Season series over: Yankees 7, Red Sox 6.

• Has anyone ever paused to consider what would happen if one begins a standing ovation in a room where The Clapper is in use?

• Not sure how many of you watched. But UConn football should have won at Duke last week. In this spirit, can Jim Mora knock off all the trick plays and just give the ball to Cam Edwards?

• Dr. I finds it fascinating that there are three places in America campaigning for Bobby Witt to be named MVP over Aaron Judge: Kansas City, Missouri; SNY and NESN.

• Best joke on social media this week:

“My bank called to tell me I have an outstanding balance. I told them, ‘Thanks, it’s the yoga.’”

• Once again, the Montville football concession stand has ascended to the top of the ECC standings. The great Rocky Stone was on his game Friday night with the cheeseburgers and homemade mac & cheese.

• On those idiotic road signs at state borders claiming Connecticut has the best pizza in the country:

Seems a pizzeria ranker based in Italy — and don’t you dare quibble with The Mother Country on the subject of pizza — released its list of the best pizza places in the world. No Connecticut establishment made the top 50.

So there.

• Quiz answer: Ryan Fitzpatrick (31, 2015).

This is the opinion of Day sports columnist Mike DiMauro