Idle Thoughts, while waiting for Thanksgiving, more RPO (run-pass option) and less RCS (Road Construction Season):

● Dr. Idle, Dr. I to his close friends, has a question. (And thanks to old friend Hank Cormier for bringing this to Dr. I’s attention.)

Has there ever been an amateur athletic program in or out of Connecticut than can trumpet players who have gone on to win the World Series and an Academy Award?

Enter New London Legion. Alum Geoff Fletcher won an Academy Award in 2010 for his screenplay of the movie “Precious,” a story about a family trying to live and survive under the welfare system. Now alum Paul Menhart just won the World Series as the pitching coach for the Washington Nationals.

Dr. I knows program architect Jim O’Neill ran the gifted and talented program at New London High for many years. But that’s taking gifted and talented to historic levels.

● Dr. I cabinet member Tony Cafaro says the middle of the field has been open against the Giants since the Eisenhower Administration.

No arguments from this corner. Dr. I asks: Why, too, is it so hard for the Giants to cover a tight end? Or at least one belonging to the Cowboys? Some guy named Blake Jarwin caught a touchdown pass for Dallas the other night, adding to the pantheon of Wide Open People who have played tight end for the Cowboys against the Giants: Billy Joe DuPree, Jay Novacek, Martellus Bennett, Jason Whitten and the immortal Gavin Escobar.

Sigh.

● Note to the Yankees: Fiscal responsibility is overrated.

Gerrit Cole. Now.

Raise ticket prices, beer prices, parking prices, whatever. You are the New York Yankees. Capeesh?

● Biggie in two weeks: The gutty, gritty BC Eagles travel to South Bend to play icky Notre Dame.

And if AJ Dillon of New London wants to run, for, say 350 yards and six touchdowns, who is Dr. I to discourage him?

● It’s about time Dr. I recognizes true greatness.

So he would like to give Plainfield the Lifetime Achievement Award For Non-Competitive Scheduling.

Example: The Panthers are 7-1 this season. Rather than helping fellow ECC schools fill schedules, they opted to pad their win total with Central Falls, R.I., and Smithfield, R.I.

Here are the scores illustrating how Smithfield has arrived at its winless season so far: 42-0, 48-0, 67-6, 62-0, 39-0, 24-0, 38-0, 34-0 and 35-0.

Nice.

The ECC must not permit this one day longer. Playoff-caliber NFA, down to its third quarterback, won’t be going to the postseason because it is forced to play a brutal schedule of teams downstate. Plainfield ducks everybody and will be in the Class S playoffs.

This is a conference for a reason. More cooperation and less manipulation from the member schools.

● Observation here: No school in the ECC runs a tournament better than Fitch. Shoutout here to athletic director Marc Romano, who ran ECC volleyball beautifully this past week and will do great with ECC wrestling as well.

● Here is why Dr. I hates baseball more every day.

The Yankees just named Matt Blake, 33, their pitching coach a few days ago.

Blake’s credentials: Four years ago, he was a pitching coach at Lincoln-Sudbury Regional High School near Boston. Per the New York Post, “he spent a summer as the pitching coach for the Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox in the Cape Cod League in 2015 but doesn’t have much coaching experience in the dugout.”

But …

“Spin rate, launch angle, he was talking about all that before almost anyone else,’’ Lincoln-Sudbury coach Kirk Fredericks said.

That would sure do it for Dr. I. An endorsement from a high school coach, trumpeting some kid’s ability to identify “spin rate,” which, apparently, must be more important than a lung.

Why would you need dugout experience when you can watch video really excellently, right?

Make it stop. Please. Just make it stop. A 33-year-old egghead is going to educate Masahiro Tanaka … how?

This is the opinion of Day sports columnist Mike DiMauro