Blog Archives

My five-year-old nephew made it through half the game on Sunday, ate a hot dog, ice cream and cotton candy before he over-heated and crashed. When he got home he got to drawing. My brother sent me these two pictures last night with the following note:

“These were rendered after a great deal of crying. I told him that comics are always drawn in pencil first, so they can erase their mistakes. That seems to have made an impression.”

From my nephew: “The first is just Ny yankees. A fan cheering.” 

Here is a picture of Derek Jeter: “I tride to dro yankees. I could not dro it but then aftr a litul while. I could draw it if you ceep pprac tising you will get beter.”

Man, I was supposed to go to the game today an everything. In Todd Drew’s seats too. But my head weighs 250 lbs and I’m down for the count with a head cold so I’ll have to catch the festivities from the couch. But I was able to give the two tickets to my brother who is taking his son. It’s the first time either of them have been to the new Yankee Stadium. It’s only my nephews second trip to a big league game ever–he went to Citifield last year. I can’t tell you how happy it makes me to give them the seats.

They came by my place in the mini-van to pick up the tickets and my nephew, five years old, is wearing a Yankee cap and a Yankee t-shirt. The Mariano Rivera t-shirt that I bought for him when he was born. I wanted it to be the first shirt or jersey that he ever had but had no idea what size to buy  so I got him one that only fits him now. And he looks good in it too. The Great Mariano. We joked around and I told him to yell loud enough so I can hear him on TV and then we started calling each other names. Reminded my bro, rockin’ the well-worn, well-fitting Yankee cap, to point out the roll call schtick.

First game for the kid today. Todd’s seats. Legacy. Good show, boys, good show.

It’s soupy in the Bronx with thundershowers on the way this afternoon. No reason to think why they won’t get the game in but it could be a long afternoon. Dag, I feel for Javy Vazquez, ditto for Curtis Granderson but for different reasons. Poor rich kids…

Welp, time for Mr. Teixeira Alex Rodriguez (who has the day off) to get hot. Lil’ something from ol’ Nick Johnson wouldn’t hoit either.

Stay cool and let’s Go Yan-Kees.

Detail from The Rape of Proserpina, By Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1621-22)

Crew.

Howard Bryant’s first book Shut Out was a crisply-reported history of racism in Boston sports that suffered from, among other things, poor editing. Bryant made a huge leap forward as a writer with his second book, Juicing the Game. The prose was cleaner, more confident, the narrative structure, sound, the reporting still sharp. It was a real page-turner and a worthy sequel to John Helyar’s Lords of the Realm (full-disclosure–this book was edited by Cliff Corcoran).

Now, comes Bryant’s most ambitious project to date, the one where he aims to hang with the big boys, The Last Hero: A Life of Henry Aaron. I give Bryant credit for his reach–he’s read all the right guys (Halberstam, Cramer, Montville, Haygood)–and has a compelling subject in Aaron. Bryant is Reggie here, it’s October, there are men on base, game is on the line, and all eyes are on him.

I just got my copy in the mail and am eager to tear into it. It is “of weight,” an exceedingly handsome-looking book.

In the meantime, dig this excerpt:

In 1959, the writer Roger Kahn would attempt to profile Henry for Sport magazine. He encountered the same frustration that sports editors of the Mobile newspapers had: Depending on the day, Henry would tell a different story about his origins, and, when placed side by side, no two stories ever exactly meshed.

Kahn was never quite sure if he found himself more frustrated by Henry’s early story or by Henry’s unwillingness to tell it. “I did not find him to be forthcoming,” Kahn recalled. “He wasn’t polished and really did not have the educational background at that time to deal with all of the things he was encountering in so short a time. If there was a word I would use to describe him then, it would be unsophisticated.”

Even as a teenager, Henry was expressing his lack of comfort with public life. On subjects both complex and innocuous, he would not easily divulge information, and he developed an early suspicion of anyone who took an interest in him. The reason, he would later say, was not the result of any personal trauma, but, rather, that of growing up in Mobile, where the black credo of survival was to focus on the work and let it speak for itself. It was a trait that was equal parts Her­bert and Stella. Not only did Stella remind him never to be ostentatious but Herbert and all black males in Mobile knew what could happen to a black man who drew too much attention to himself. “My grandfather used to say all the time, ‘They don’t want you to get too high. Know your place,’ ” recalled Henry’s nephew, Tommie Aaron, Jr. “I think a lot of that rubbed off on all of us.”

In fact, Henry would employ the recipe for star power best articu­lated in the old Western The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance: “When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.” That, too, was fitting, because as a movie fan, Henry fell in love with Westerns. He did not volunteer much truth, so the scribes printed the legend. There was more than one drawback to Henry’s approach, however: As difficult as it was to piece together his early years, writers—virtually all of them white, carrying the prejudices against blacks that were common at the time—filled in the blanks for him, defined him, creating a cari­cature, from which he would not easily escape.

Yes, please.

From Joe Sheehan at SI.com:

[Mark] Teixeira is, in some ways, lucky. Whether it’s the afterglow of a championship, a bigger target in Javier Vazquez or the team’s 12-7 mark, his brutal April has escaped the tabloids’ spotlight. Perhaps this is progress, because in every measurable way, Teixeira, 30, is the same hitter he was a year ago. There are some fluctuations in his contact numbers — not quite as many line drives, a few more ground balls — but nothing that indicates a change in talent level given the limited number of plate appearances. No, Teixeira is mostly hitting in bad luck; he has an absurd .137 batting average on balls in play, the second-lowest mark in the game to Travis Snider, who has just been sent back to Triple-A. Also, just 9.5% of his fly balls have left the yard, about half of his career rate. Teixeira is doing what he does, just not getting the same results; his slow start in 2009 featured similar, if less extreme characteristics. There’s nothing to worry about here.

Be nice to see Teix break out tonight. Here’s hoping AJ Burnett is strong–but not too strong–and that the Yanks take the series before they return to the Bronx for the weekend.

Ya hoid?

[Photo Credit: Ken Aviation]

Supper at Emmaus, By Caravaggio (1610)

The b-side wins again:

On a more distressing note, here are more details on a sad story that just keeps getting sadder.

Okay, I know it’s early for blueberries but this just looks so damned tasty I couldn’t resist:

The Wall Street Journal ranks the the greatest Yankees by their stats, economic impact and cultural relevance. No surprise at number one.

If you didn’t see this story by Jason Fry, do yourself a favor, it’s a gem.

I also really dug this piece by King Kaufman about playing catch with his seven-year-old son:

It is fun. I’d forgotten that. It’s been coming back to me as we toss the ball back and forth, usually from only 40 feet or so. I just love playing catch. I always have.

…I’ve never really felt that some great mystical communication was going on when I was playing with a friend, or with my dad. It’s fun to play catch with someone I hardly know too. I love the rhythm of it. The simplicity. I love the sound, the pop of the glove when there’s a little mustard on the throw and it’s caught square in the pocket. Catch is a little hypnotizing. It ought to be the most boring thing in the world, but I’ve never ended a game out of boredom. I’ve worn out my arm a few times, though.

I love playing catch with my son not because some magical, wordless discourse travels between us but because I love playing catch and I love that he enjoys playing it with me.

I don’t know about anything mystical but having a catch is one of the great pleasures in this life, at least when you’ve got the right partner. My brother is one of those guys (Jon DeRosa is one of those guys, Glenn Stout is too). Can’t think of many things better, really. My bro knows how to throw, how to pitch, how to toss pop flys and grounders, just the way I like. We have fun with it, and have a lot of laughs.

Don’t even have to talk. I like that. The satisfying pop of the glove when the ball hits the pocket just right, the appealing sensation of hitting the target dead-on. I like the feeling of knowing how to throw and catch, knowing that I’ve got good mechanics and that I look good doing it. My vanity about it cracks me up. In my mind’s eye it makes me feel competent and good, the realization that I could have a catch with a big leaguer and not humiliate myself. I may not have been any good as a player but I’m certain that I can at least imitate one.

[photo credit: Weblog of the Turner Family]

Judith Beheading Holofernes, By Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (1599)

Cool and gray in Gotham. Time to cool out…

Meanwhile, dig this dope mix, A Downtown Affair by Osita and Osore.

The good folks at SNY are running a fun kidcaster contest, for kids ages 7-15. The winner gets a half-an-inning in the SNY booth at a Mets game. If only I was still a kid…

The best pizza jernts in the country according to gayot.com (via MSN).

Jay Jaffe hipped me to this from Miller Park Drunk: 10 Reasons Bob Uecker is better than whoever your announcer is.

Most tremendously excellent.

Ted Berg talks with Donnie Baseball. What fresh hell is this?

[Editor’s Note: Here’s another one from the Pat Jordan vaults, a short, cutting profile of Burt Reynolds, from the late Eighties. While Pat reserves his harshest criticism for himself, but he’s especially hard on jockish, so-called tough guy actors like Reynolds and Tom Selleck. He thought Reynolds wasted his talent and was willfully lazy for easy money and fame.

When this story was published Reyonlds’ publicist called Pat and called him the “evilest man in the world, the anti-christ.” Pat said, “Then I’ll see you in Hell.”

No business like show business. Enjoy.]

By Pat Jordan

It was just a wink. But it defined the rest of his career.

“They told me I couldn’t do it,” he says. “It would break down the wall between the actor and his audience. But the movie was just a cartoon. Smokey and the Bandit. Cotton Candy. I just wanted to say to the audience, I hope you’re having as much fun as I am. So I looked in the camera, and winked.”

Audiences loved it. That conspiratorial wink united them with the actor in his inside joke. This movie was just a lark. He didn’t take it seriously. He wasn’t really acting. He was just partying with friends in front of a camera, and he invited the audience to join in. His fans were so grateful they made his movie one of the biggest grosser of the year, 1977, and they made him a No 1 Box Office Attraction. A Star. But more than that. Their favorite actor. The actor they liked the most. Which was his problem.

“I thought acting was synonymous with being liked,” he says. “I courted my fans. I passionately wanted them to like me. I thought being liked meant I was a good actor.”

The critics weren’t so accepting as his fans. That wink didn’t play well with them. They read into it, not the actor’s good-spirits toward his fans, but his contempt for them, and his craft. It wasn’t an actor’s role to be liked by his fans. It was to entertain them. Just because he was having fun with his friends – Jackie Gleason, Dom DeLuise, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, etc. – in a host of Sophomoric movies (Smokey and the Bandit, Iⅈ Cannonball Run, I&II) that actually did seem to be filmed parties of actors acting silly, that didn’t mean his audiences were having fun. They would have fun only as long as that wink deceived them into believing they were inside those parties. That they were getting drunk, cracking inside jokes, oogling beautiful girls, and crashing expensive cars with the actor and his friends. But the truth was, they weren’t and never would be. They were irrelevant to those parties, except that they made them possible by the vast sums of money they paid to see them on screen. When, and if, they woke to the deceit of that wink, how it made the actor rich at their expense, they’d stop paying to see such movies. Which they did. But not until after they made him a No 1 Box Office Attraction for five consecutive years.

(more…)

Our thoughts and prayers are with Steven Goldman, whose father has been ill. Steve is a friend. Hang in there, old chum.