Every time I hear the name of David Mitchell’s new novel
Perhaps it’s the same demon which drives Terri to sing “If you like Jorge Posada” to the tune of the Pina Colada song every time the Sox play the Yankees. And this season has added “Why do you pull the ball, Toby Hall?” (of the TB Devil Rays) to the tune of… [guess]
How much am I loving my first Red Sox games with Tivo? No Foxwoods commercials, kids! That is fantastic.
I’m also excited because Larry Lucchino mentioned in the pre-game show that this year’s Fenway Park renovations will include two Dunkin’ Donuts in the park. None of the existing concessions really sell any coffee whatsoever, so I’m very excited about this development. Normally, you suck down a couple of beers, and then either need to keep going, which you can’t, because no beer is sold after the 7th inning, or have a little pick me up, which you can’t, because there’s no coffee to be had in the park. I have found it hard to believe in the past that there was no Dunkin’s in the park, and now there is. The ideal coffee option would of course be a Toscanini’s, but this will more than do.
OK, I have to pay attention now, because I still only recognize about 1/3 of the guys on the team this year.
Ok, no surprise that the Dominican Republic whooped Italy in the World Baseball Classic. What surprised me was Italy’s roster. Mike Piazza? Frank Catalanatto? Lenny DiNardo? What did they do, look up every MLB player that had an Italian-sounding name? Pretty much.
Here’s one of the pitfalls of those highly-relevant ads that has made Google a bazillion dollar company.
For those of you who are dying to know whether rock star GM Theo Epstein will get on that plane and regret it soon and for the rest of his life, there is some interesting scoop in Gordon Edes boston.com chat. I guess it’s not scoop so much as it’s inside information into some of the personal things behind the negotiations. As Michael Corleone would say, it’s never “just business”.
I didn’t watch of the World Series except for the last game; it’s just hard to deal with Fox sports when you can’t turn down Joe Buck and Tim McCarver and turn up Jerry and Joe on WEEI. (Digression: speaking of Joe, did you know his son Duke is in the NYY media? We saw him on ESPN, working on the field at the Penn State game the other weekend, which was coincidentally being called by Sean McDonough. Anyway….) I agree with Ed that Lyle Lovett’s version of God Bless America, accompanied by cello, was actually really nice. And, yeah, I’m glad the White Sox won.
But most of all, I was glad to see Roberto Clemente make the Latino Legends team. He died way before his time.
It sucked, but it could have been worse. At least it was short, and they didn’t bother getting our hopes up.
The irony is that the only team still in it that I have any feeling for is the one that just handed us our still-beating hearts, the other Sox.
The Red Sox are going to lose this year, aren’t they? This is going to suck again, isn’t it?
I mean, 2003 sucked. But last year was so good, I just forgot how much this is really going to suck.
Well, the current Boston Phoenix cover story on the Sox-Boston Globe-NESN connection is sort of a non-story. I share their suspicion that there’s something supremely fishy that the town’s biggest newspaper owns a piece of the Red Sox, and the Red Sox own their own cable network. Particularly when there’s something that might not sit well with the fans (e.g. Curt Schilling moving to the bullpen, even temporarily) I feel like the NESN crew try especially hard to look on the sunny side.
But the Phoenix story really fails to dig up any real evidence of chicanery, and their argument is just “you, know, it’s the principle of the thing”:
There would be a hue and cry, critics say, if Globe publisher Gilman served in an investor-management role with an entity such as Raytheon, but it’s deemed less serious because the holding is a sports team — no matter that baseball has long been a big business and that the Red Sox play a multifaceted role as a storied cultural institution with considerable civic influence.
But I am definitely keeping an eye on this story, because I feel like eventually, there’s going to be something shady that actually goes down. The abuse of power comes as no surprise.
How pathetic I am? Actually watching the home run derby.
Bud Selig is currently talking about the plans for a World Cup style baseball classic. I don’t imagine that if George W. Bush were baseball commissioner, he’d be talking about a world cup, yet I certainly wish W. were currently MLB commissioner. (I wish Fidel had found success in Baseball, too, but it turns out that’s an urban legend).
Caught the second run of the Sox episode of Queer Eye tonight. I sort of had perhaps unrealistic expectations that it would be a good episode, but from an entertainment perspective, it was not. First, they filmed during spring training, and as you might expect, central Florida doesn’t exactly offer the usual cultural & commercial facilities of Manhattan. So they were a bit constrained with what they could do. Second, while makeover shows tend to be thin excuses for product placement, this episode really felt like an hour long commercial for Dunkin’ Donuts, BJ’s, and more. Last, they tried to do too many of them at once, and so there wasn’t a whole lot of personality to the whole thing. So, it wasn’t great TV. Still, I think it’s a good episode as a social milestone. I have this perhaps unfounded faith that the whole Queer Eye thing, despite how problemmatic it can be, is a positive cultural force. Sure the whole enterprise is a bit cheesy and trades in stereotypes and sentimentality and promotions for Crest White Strips. But I’m a pragmatist and I believe in baby steps.
For example. We went to the Angels/Sox game on Sunday with Nora. Three of the Queer Eye guys threw out the first pitch, and Jai sang the national anthem. Of course, I don’t like his breathy, Broadway style of singing, but when have anthems ever been sung for their artistic merit? I was a bit moved at the thought that even ten years ago, an openly gay guy singing in a major league sporting event would have been pretty much out of the question. Good for the Sox management for doing it on a Sunday day game. And good for Larry Lucchino for not buckling to those boobs on WEEI.
In a slightly related note, since there is a huge lacuna in my baseball interest, stretching from about 1986 (when the only thing going for the Pirates was the pre-steroids Barry Bonds) through 2002 (when I went to Fenway for the first time), I missed the fact that in 1997, MLB retired Jackie Robinson’s number for every major league team. Terri pointed this out to me at the park on Sunday, hence the 42 in blue rather than red. Part of me thinks it’s a terrific gesture, and another part of me thinks it just calls more attention to how long and how bitterly baseball held out against integration. Baby steps I guess. Maybe we still need the gesture now. But I still have to hope that someday people will wonder what the big deal was.