Cup of Coffee: May 19, 2022

Improbable comebacks, deez nuts, Joanna the Mad, Philip the Handsome, Dane Dunning, She-Hulk, and Great Moments with the Heroes of the Intellectual Dark Web

Good morning! And welcome to Free Thursday!

Lots to get to today, so let’s get-getting, shall we?

---

And That Happened

Here are the scores. Here are the highlights:

Rays 6, Tigers 1: Isaac Paredes used to play for the Tigers but was traded to the Rays on April 5. I don’t know if he left Detroit on bad terms or anything, but if he did his two-homer performance against his old team yesterday would totally justify him coming up with some sort of “Para-deez nuts” joke for the postgame interview. He did not do that, though, which is a credit to his maturity and professionalism. Seriously, pay no mind to people who would even think of such crass things.

Brewers 7, Atlanta 6: It’s not every day that a team leads heading into the bottom of the ninth, bottom of the tenth, and the bottom of the eleventh and still loses, but Atlanta found a way. They led after the top of the ninth but Kolten Wong tripled in a run in the bottom half to force extras, Atlanta took a tenth inning lead but Hunter Renfroe hit a sac fly in the bottom half to force an eleventh, and then they took an eleventh inning lead before Keston Hiura hit a two-run shot to walk if off. By the way, whoever runs MLB’s Twitter account tweeted “That ball is out of Hiura!” which, frankly, I find to be WAY worse than “Para-deez nutz” but no one asks me these things.

Indeed, I’d say such a thing ought to be a war crime, but the worst thing that ever happens to war criminals these days is that they are allowed to mildly embarrass themselves in public, many years after the fact, as they live a life of quiet, private luxury and peace which they in no way deserve.

Rangers 6, Angels 5: Sort of a mini-Brewers thing here as Texas blew the lead in the ninth and fell behind in the top of the 10th before Nathaniel Lowe hit a two-run homer on the first pitch in the bottom of the 10th inning to give the Rangers the walkoff win and the series sweep. All three of the Angels losses in this series featured blown leads.

Dane Dunning got the start in this one and allowed two runs over six innings, giving him the no-decision. The last time Dunning put in so much work for so little personal reward was when he was cast in the 1941 George Cukor comedy “Two-Faced Woman,” starring Greta Garbo in her last film role. Dunning played a song and dance man in a wild nightclub scene in which Garbo, in the guise of “Katherine” the fictitious twin sister of Karin, whose identity she assumes, dances seductively in order to win back the husband who left her. Not surprisingly, the National Legion of Decency objected to a plot in which a man considers having an affair with his sister-in-law, even if it was really his wife in thin disguise, so they reshot it all, adding a scene in which star Melvyn Douglas discovers that “Katherine” is actually his estranged wife Karin pretending to be her twin sister and chooses to play along with her pretense. Just like that a sexy premise is rendered screwball comedy, and the seemingly always overlooked Dane Dunning’s best scenes are left on the cutting room floor.

Mariners 5, Blue Jays 1: Marco Gonzales allowed one over six while Ty France, Cal Raleigh and Abraham Toro homered. The important part of that is that all three last names of the guys who went deep are also geographic locations. Yeah, I’m reaching for Toro a bit here but it’s a legit place. When you read the Wikipedia page for Toro, it tells of medieval Spanish throne intrigue, containing a reference to Joanna the Mad and her husband Philip the Handsome, daughter and son-in-law, respectively, of Queen Isabella. Joanna was literally insane and was institutionalized for much of her life so I suppose the name, however insensitive by today’s more enlightened standards with respect to mental health, was warranted. This, however, was Philip the Handsome:

That portrait was created during his lifetime and. If it was not flattering it likely would’ve gotten the painter thrown in a dungeon, ergo, this is likely the best case scenario for our friend Phil here. Which, Christ on a cracker, imagine what people in 16th Century Spain considered ugly. Woof.

Rockies 5, Giants 3: The Giants 12-game winning streak against the Rockies had been so strong that it took a guy walking onto the field with bolt cutters to break it, but it’s finally over. Well, the RBI single from Yonathan Daza and the two-run homer from C.J. Cron in the eighth helped a bit more, but symbolism can be powerful, man.

Twins 14, Athletics 4: Gary Sánchez went 2-for-4 with a double and three RBI, Luis Arráez, Ryan Jeffers and Gilberto Celestino each drove in two runs, and Carlos Correa went 2-for-4 with an RBI double upon his return from the injured list. The A’s drop the series, have lost 11 of their last 13 home games, and have lost 15 of 21 overall.

Dodgers 5, Diamondbacks 3: The Dodgers played come-from-behind again but it was only a 2-1 deficit this time before they put up a four-run fourth inning featuring a Justin Turner three-run homer. L.A. sweeps the four-game series and has won five in a row overall. The Dbacks, in contrast, have lost five straight.

Red Sox 5, Astros 1: One day a Red Sox starter gives up five homers in an inning, the next day a Red Sox starter tosses a complete game two-hitter. The only blemish on Nick Pivetta’s ledger was a first inning gopher ball to José Altuve. It was the first complete game from a Boston hurler in nearly three years. Xander Bogaerts hit a solo home run and Rafael Devers knocked an RBI double in support.

Nationals 5, Marlins 4: Keibert Ruiz’s RBI double in the top of the tenth was the winner. He also doubled earlier and had a single and two walks to his credit. Otherwise César Hernández tripled and doubled and Juan Soto had three walks to help the Nats avoid a sweep.

Phillies 3, Padres 0: On Tuesday the Padres won 3-0. On Wednesday the Phillies return the favor. Zack Wheeler struck out nine while authoring seven shutout innings and two relievers finished the four-hitter. Rhys Hoskins homered while Odúbel Herrera and J.T. Realmuto each added RBI base hits. Padres starter Blake Snell, meanwhile, lasted only three and two-thirds, giving up three hits, three runs and struck out five in his first appearance of 2022.

Yankees 3, Orioles 2: Gleyber Torres doubled in a run in the first and later came home to score, along with Josh Donaldson, on a wild pitch/catcher throwing error combo. Otherwise it was Gerrit Cole pitching well and the New York defense catching well. You know, the classic Yankees approach of pitching, defense, and baserunning clawing out close victories. Always been their signature, ya know.

Mets 11, Cardinals 4: Pete Alonso homered and drove in four and a four-run fifth put this one away for the Mets who went on to win this laugher. Except no one was laughing because ace Max Scherzer pulled himself out of this one in the sixth with some sort of injury to his side. Which, after the game he said he believed to be a “mild strain.” Given that Scherzer, generally, won’t leave games unless someone drags him out kicking and screaming forgive me if I choose to wait for the MRI results before downplaying this. Here’s hoping Scherzer is alright.

Pirates 3, Cubs 2: Michael Chavis hit an RBI single in the third that snapped the Pirates' 20-inning scoreless streak and rookie Jack Suwinski hit a tie-breaking two-run homer in the fifth. After that the Buccos bullpen took over.

Royals 6, White Sox 2: Bobby Witt Jr. and MJ Melendez homered while Emmanuel Rivera hit a go-ahead triple in the sixth. That was too late for Zack Greinke who got another no-decision. Dude doesn’t have a W all year.

Reds vs. Guardians — POSTPONED:

🎶You shatter me your grip on me a hold on me
So dull it kills
You stifle me
Infectious sense of
Hopelessness and prayers for rain
I suffocate
I breathe in dirt
And nowhere shines but desolate
And drab the hours all spent on killing time
Again all waiting for the rain🎶

---

The Daily Briefing

Rubin Rivera Redux

Back in 2001 Ruben Rivera, who was for a time a top Yankees prospect, was released by the New York Yankees after he was accused of taking a bat and glove from teammate Derek Jeter's locker and selling it to a sports memorabilia dealer.

There is, apparently, nothing new under the sun. From Brendan Kuty of NJ.com:

The Yankees considered Jake Sanford a legitimate hitting prospect who could hit with power and play both corner outfield positions. Among his teammates, however, he was known for stealing.

The Yankees cut Sanford over allegations that he repeatedly hounded teammates for their equipment to sell online, while also occasionally swiping it from their lockers, a person with knowledge of the situation told NJ Advance Media on Wednesday. The person spoke on the condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak publicly.

Kuty also reported that a number of fans claimed that he accepted money in advance for autographed equipment that he was not able to provide and that he deactivated his Twitter account when fans accused him of defrauding them. Major League Baseball officials were aware of the situation and were apparently investigating.

Sanford, 24, was a third-round pick of the Yankees out of Western Kentucky University, played in 101 games between the Single-A and High-A clubs last year, hitting .285/.356/.467 with 16 home runs, 61 RBI, 56 runs and four steals. He had yet to appear in any games in 2022, having been assigned to the Yankees' Florida Complex League at the start of season.

Sanford, who hails from Ontario, signed with the Ottawa Titans of the independent Frontier League soon after being cut by New York.

Bryce Harper will be DH’ing longer than first thought

Bryce Harper missed his third straight game yesterday due to getting a platelet-rich plasma injection in his bum elbow, but that time off was expected and he may play today. Also expected: that he would be shut down from throwing for four weeks while his elbow, hopefully, rehabs, forcing him to DH. Which is fine as far as his hitting goes — he’s been raking despite the bad elbow — but is kind of a disaster defensively as it’s forced Nick Castellanos and Kyle Schwarber into regular outfield duty and that’s no one’s idea of fun or effective player deployment.

But surprise! Harper’s elbow-enforced DH duty is now gonna be longer, as Joe Girardi told the press yesterday that he’ll be off throwing for at least six weeks, not four. Which moves his return-to-the-outfield timeline until early July. Which, at that point, may as well last to the All-Star break. And again, that’s the minimum.

Schwarber and Castellanos are gonna be in great shape by then, what with all of the chasing balls which roll to the all and stuff.

Aaron Judge slams Camden Yards

On Tuesday night Aaron Judge hit two home runs against the Orioles in Baltimore. He also hit a double that, as I mentioned in yesterday’s recaps, would’ve flown out of the park before this season. The O’s, however, moved back the left field wall by 30 feet and raised it by five, keeping Judge’s dinger in play.

Judge and his manager, Aaron Boone, didn’t like that. First Judge, hating on the dimensions:

"It's a travesty, man. I'm pretty upset. It just looks like a Create-A-Park now."

Then Boone:

“He almost had three (homers), but Build Your Own Park got him.”

I hope those comments were said in jest — and they may have been; I only saw them in print — because it was only a week ago when Rangers manager Chris Woodward got a lot of quite justifiable flak for complaining about the short porch in right field in Yankee Stadium. I fail to see how this is any different. You play in the parks you’re given and both teams play in them.

And no, it doesn’t matter if the dimensions were different last year. There have been three different versions of Yankee Stadium over the years with multiple different sets of dimensions. Every franchise can tell a similar story. Sometimes things just change.

The Royals will, inevitably, be leaving Kauffman Stadium

I love Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City. During the 2014 World Series I wrote this about it:

I can’t put my finger on what I like about this place so much . . . What I think I like so much about it is that it’s not a ballpark. It’s a stadium. It is not trying to evoke the past. It is not trying to blend in with surrounding warehouses. It is unapologetically a building in which sports are supposed to be played. And it’s of a time — the 1970s — when no one shied away from poured concrete and modernism. That approach often resulted in ugly, messed up places in the form of bad multi-purpose stadiums. But with Kauffman, they just looked into what they thought was the future and forged ahead . . . It still has big tall light towers that aren’t supposed to look like smokestacks or something. It has blue seats because, dammit, that’s the team color, and why should they have green anyway? It’s sleek and swooping and, for the most part, no one has tried to hide all of the poured concrete . . . Kauffman Stadium opened in 1973. By 1974 the country was fully in the grips of nostalgia and would not look so steadfastly forward again for a long time. If it ever would.

But despite that beauty its days are probably numbered.

Back in January I wrote about the Kansas City Downtown Council — a group which represents residents and businesses in and around downtown Kansas City — which wants to remake the entire core of the city. To that end it has unveiled a 10-year plan for the area with recommendations about how to make downtown more livable, connected and prosperous. If you know how these things tend to go, you know that, over time, “livable, connected, and prosperous” will eventually be whittled down to just “prosperous” and that the “prosperous” will apply primarily to real estate developers. Such is the way of America.

As is often the case with these prosperity plans, part of this project calls for a new downtown ballpark. This would be for the Royals, of course, despite the fact that they already play in one of the most gorgeous, wonderful, and — at least for a city without great public transportation — accessible places around.

What Kauffman does not have, however, is a bunch of privately-owned land around it which will allow the team’s owner and other real estate goons to get even more super rich than they already are. Given that we are now in an age in which sports owners expect secondary and tertiary income streams with their teams as mere anchor tenants in such enterprises, be they physical or virtual, it was only a matter of time before someone started the business of moving the Royals off of the purpose-built, government-built and government-owned sports complex and onto some downtown parcel next to which someone can build a bunch of sports bars, condos, and expensive, revenue-creating parking garages. All they’ll want from the government then are the subsidies.

To that end, earlier this week the Kansas City Star profiled two sites which are being discussed for a new Royals ballpark. One is in the East Village at the I-29/I-70 interchange. The other is west of the 18th and Vine Historic Jazz District. The team prefers the former locations, city leaders prefer the latter location. Whatever happens, I presume we’ll soon be able to count down the years, then months, then days until Kauffman Stadium, a truly great ballpark that still has decades of life in it, is no more.

Check out Down on the Farm

I don’t do minor league stuff here, basically at all. I simply don’t have the bandwidth. But a former major league front office analyst — and, I suspect, a future major league front office analyst — with whom I am acquainted has a new Substack newsletter called “Down on the Farm” which contains daily news, notes, and analysis of, as they put it, “(almost) everything that happened in Minor League Baseball.”

If you like what I do here — a rundown of news and the spotlighting of whatever it is I am obsessed with at a given time — you’ll like Down on the Farm. The other day, for example, they talked about a thing we all talk about from time to time — hitting philosophies of major league organizations — and debunked the notion that there, actually, are coherent hitting philosophies in the way we typically think of them:

I think fans probably assume that each organization has a well thought-out, detailed, hitting manual that outlines their beliefs, approach, and philosophy on hitting. They would be correct, but it usually is something that comes in the form of a binder adorned with a random cliché on the front and titled “The (insert team name) Way: Core Hitting Philosophies & Instructional Guide”. This binder usually contains way too many pages describing well known baseball truisms like having a two-strike approach and moving the runner over. Most people look at these one time, except for the guy (and intern) who made it, and then put it in a desk drawer where it will stay forever.

From there they explain what actually does happen in organizations that are thinking hard about player development these days, and it’s not top-down philosophizing. As you can see from the excerpt, it’s pretty pithy and accessible writing, which is not always easy to find in the technical and often granular world of baseball ops and player development.

Best part: Down on the Farm is free. For now at least. You should check it out.

---

Other Stuff

I was on the Prognosis Ohio podcast

I was the guest on the latest Prognosis Ohio podcast, talking about my book (duh), sports and social justice, women's sports, sports betting, healthy fandom, and more. You know me: I play the hits.

Prognosis Ohio is hosted by Dan Skinner, a political scientist, health policy researcher and professor at Ohio University. The podcast tends to deal with public health issues, but hey, racism is a public health issue. And a great deal of what I talk about in the book reflects on people’s mental health, so we make it work!

Oh, Elon

Tell me you just got a target letter in a securities fraud investigation without telling me you just got a target letter in a securities fraud investigation

Elon Musk @elonmusk

In the past I voted Democrat, because they were (mostly) the kindness party. But they have become the party of division & hate, so I can no longer support them and will vote Republican. Now, watch their dirty tricks campaign against me unfold … 🍿

Even if he’s not doing this out spite and fear, I’m not exactly gonna get shook by a billionaire saying he’s gonna vote for Republicans. It ain’t exactly a bold stance for that lot.

Great Moments From the Intellectual Dark Web

Bret Weinstein is a commentator who is associated with the so-called “Intellectual Dark Web.” Among the many beliefs of those associated with the Intellectual Dark Web is that bold thinkers should not be silenced just because their views may upset people and that people who may, in fact, be upset should just friggin’ grow a pair and deal with it.

Bret Weinstein is also the author of this tweet:

Bret Weinstein @BretWeinstein

We’re being denied nuts on this flight because we have a passenger onboard with a nut allergy. Also, we’re asked not to consume any nuts we may have brought on board and not to force anyone else to consume nuts, even if we believe they’re capable of digesting them safely. 🔩

I’m not sure where “whining like a toddler because you are denied nuts on a flight” falls into that whole “grow a pair and deal with it” thing but I’m sure there will soon be some open letter onto which a dozen or two of these sociopaths sign in which they argue that refraining from literally killing someone via anaphylactic shock is a violation of their free speech rights and a capitulation to cancel culture. Can’t wait to read it.

“She-Hulk: Attorney at Law”

The trailer dropped for the latest Marvel/Disney+ series, “She-Hulk: Attorney at Law.” it simultaneously looks funny, entertaining, and as corny as hell. And yeah, it’s hard to get around the fact that the concept sounds a lot like what “Saturday Night Live” might come up with to satirize Marvel movies. Even if, actually, this is a title/property that has existed for over 40 years.

But like I said a couple of weeks ago, the longer we go into the Marvel Era of Entertainment, the more important it is to recognize that, whatever prestige some of the films in first few phases of the MCU carried with them, earned or otherwise, comic books have ALWAYS trafficked in weird, corny, and often contrived crap and comics have, historically, had more creative misses than hits. It’s part of what makes comics comics, to be honest. And while I get that the economics and cultural impact of movies are different than pulp-based periodicals sold down at The Laughing Ogre comics store, if that’s what your base of inspiration is, you’re eventually gonna follow that pattern too.

So, yeah, this could suck. It could be corny as hell. It could also, I imagine, become the subject of some positively tedious thinkpieces about feminism, misogyny, and all manner of other things that tend to be brought up in sci-fi/comic/fantasy properties featuring female leads.

But it could also be OK. And if it’s not, hey, it’s not like it’s my money paying for the production (at least not much of it) so bring it on. The World’s Biggest Marvel Mark™ can take it.

Guest Post: William Akers

As you may know, I sell Cup of Coffee coffee mugs here. The deal: if you buy one, and send me a photo, you can write a guest post about anything you want.

Today’s guest post comes from William Akers. Take it away William!

When my first child was born, I expected late nights, dirty diapers, tantrums, picky eating, puke and pee and shit in all the colors of the baby poop rainbow.

I didn’t expect to be bored.

Nobody tells expecting parents how tedious children can be, how mind- and soul-numbing it can be to spend a 12 hour stretch caring for a little person whose spectacular disregard for danger requires complete attention but who never has anything interesting to say. With my son, Dash, the toughest period was from about 18 months, when his opinions kicked in, to three years, when he learned how to express them. (Most of the time, anyway.) Our days were marathons, interminable kid meals followed by hours at the playground or the park; fitful naps chased by aimless play sessions around the apartment. Dash needed my body to entertain him, to keep him safe. He did not need my brain—and man, my brain got bored.

So I made up a game.

It was the spring of 2017, during that awkward part of spring training before the games start, when fans remember that pictures of pitcher fielding practice won’t slake their thirst for the game. I was missing baseball badly. I wanted to feel the breeze of the upper deck, to smell that heady mix of sausages and sunscreen that drifts across Citi Field on hot days. I’d started keeping score a couple of years prior, and I was particularly yearning for the satisfaction of filling out those numbers and squiggles that somehow capture the perfect beauty of the sport.

My game was the next best thing: a pen-and-paper baseball sim that used back-of-the-baseball card stats and some of the RPG dice I had scattered around my house to recreate an entire game at-bat by at-bat. 

I called it Deadball. 

I hacked together the entire thing over 48 feverish hours—if this makes you think of The Universal Baseball Association, well, yeah—and soon I was playing games between the ‘28 Yankees and the ‘35 Pittsburgh Crawfords, between the ‘86 Mets and the legends of ‘69, and between randomly generated teams whose stars had names like Mayrbeck Marinov and Lado Van Rompay. I even recreated Monty Python’s Philospher’s World Cup, pitting Leibniz and Nietzsche against Socrates and Plato. (Consulting my old scorebook, I find that Germany won on an Immanuel Kant home run.)

It was silly and it was fun and it was fast—allowing me to resolve an at-bat and record the result on my scoresheet in the time it took Dash to eat a fistful of Cheerios. Most importantly, it felt like baseball. I cheered when my team got a hit and cursed when they lost and when I looked at the scoresheet afterwards, I felt like I’d watched the game. Boredom vanquished, I started playing constantly, and I might have gone the way of good old J. Henry Waugh if my wife hadn’t politely said, “You’re spending a lot of time on this. You need to find a way to monetize it.”

So I did! I ran a Kickstarter campaign to make a print and digital copy of the rulebook, taught myself InDesign and Photoshop so I could do the layout, and published it on DriveThruRPG. It found fans, got some press attention—most incredibly landing me in the pages of Sports Illustrated Kids—and it made enough money for me to justify tweaking it, polishing it, and releasing expansions like Deadball: 1909, which reworked the games for the actual dead ball era, and Deadball: Year III, which included rules for attempting to throw the World Series without getting caught. It was lots of work! It was also lots and lots of fun!

I’m currently running a Kickstarter campaign for the game’s Second Edition, a full revamp that makes it easier and more straightforward for anybody to pick up and play, either with real players or with a Mayrbeck Marinov all their own. If you think any of this nonsense sounds fun, it would mean a massive amount if you would check out the campaign and consider grabbing a copy. If you have any questions, prod me on Twitter and I will answer them in full. 

It was putting together the Second Edition that got me thinking about the origins of the game, when I was slapping together rules as quick as I could think of them, no idea that I’d spend the next five years tweaking them until they were perfect. Deadball has come a long way since I was scratching out lineups and stats on scrap paper at my dining room table, but I don’t think I will ever be happier than I was then—my dice in my hand, my son at my elbow, and the game about to start.

Thanks so much William!

And have a great day, everyone.