Idle Thoughts, while waiting for New Year's resolutions, the Celtics to realize the season has started and wondering if Santa has the proper launch angle on his sleigh:

• Dr. Idle, Dr. to his close friends, is happy to report that he survived The Ordeal.

He went to a Thanksgiving Day football game and didn't get hypothermia.

This is breaking news, given how many games were moved in advance of Thursday because of cold weather.

No, really. Dr. I used layers, a hat, gloves and a warm coat. Go figure.

• Dr. I, however, pauses to acknowledge Thanksgiving, 2018, as a landmark day in Connecticut sports history.

The first high school football games that weren't played on account of sunny weather.

Next time, try this: Y'all moved games because you were afraid crowds would be better Wednesday and not Thursday. It was about the money, not anybody's safety.

So there.

• So the football playoffs begin Tuesday, meaning that Plainfield has a few days left to opt out against Ansonia.

• Mad props and bon mots to Ledyard High grad and former football player Freddie Hewett, who is officially an officer in the Marines.

Dr. I is proud to have covered his games.

• Note to the folks in Westerly:

If football is truly as important to the town's fabric as you say, then it's time for synthetic turf on Sal Augeri Field.

You know. The turf they have in East Lyme, Waterford, New London, Stonington, Montville and Norwich.

Mr. Augeri means too much to the town for his name to bear a field with such a rotten playing surface.

• Of course, Shohei Ohtani wins the Rookie of the Year over Miguel Andujar.

Look at Ohtani's qualifications:

He had 77 fewer hits than Andujar, five fewer homers, 31 fewer RBI and a batting average 12 points lower.

Ah, but he pitched, too, thus making him what one dope in the New York Post called a "modern day Babe Ruth."

You think of the Babe, and, of course, you think of Ohtani, right? Duh. Kind of like the stars and the stripes, by golly.

His pitching, by the way, amounted to 22.2 innings and a 4.86 ERA against playoff teams.

But his WAR was higher! Spin rate! FIP! Exit velo! Launch angle! BABIP!

Darn tootin.

The new baseball.

• Did you know, by the way, that the new baseball produced World Series ratings down 25 percent from last year?

Think about that one.

The Dodgers and Red Sox occupy two of the nation's top five media markets and are two iconic franchises.

Should have been a ratings bonanza, no?

Instead: 25 percent down from Dodgers/Astros in 2017.

Just keep jamming WAR down our throats, baseball.

It's working beautifully.

• Congrats to colleague Marc Allard, the sports information director at Woodstock Academy (and once the sports editor at the Norwich Bulletin).

Marc is this year's media inductee into the Connecticut High School Coaches Association Hall of Fame. Well deserved.

• You don't suppose the Giants ... nah.

• Tweet of the Century comes from old friend Peter Abraham, who covers the Red Sox for the Boston Globe. Pete wrote the following a few weeks ago:

"Election day, when every sportswriter at a small newspaper who takes 25 high school boxscores over the phone every night rolls their eyes at news reporters getting free pizza to call around for results."

Preach, my friend. Preach.

This is the opinion of Day sports columnist Mike DiMauro