Blog Archives

Former professional baseball player Doug (Droppin’ Science Like Galileo Dropped an Orange) Glanville has been contributing columns to the Times for some time now. Today, he tackles infidelity in the world of professional sports (thanks to Think Factory for the link):

In an athlete’s environment, money can be its own pollutant; you can become desensitized to the significance of what it can buy. Typically, if a person spends hundreds of dollars on arrangements to pass time with someone, that someone would be important in his life. But when you have extensive financial resources, it’s easy to send similar signals to people who are meaningful only for a moment. Even worse, you might only concern yourself with what it means to you. As the money flows in, so do the toys — cars, clothes, bling — and once in the stratosphere, a la Tiger, it is amazing how easy it is, if you are not careful and grounded, to start seeing women as another accessory in your life.

The pro athlete’s world is self-centered at best. Schedule is fixed, practice a must, travel a given. Anyone choosing to share that has to get on board and fit in. It can get to a point where the relationship is strictly one-way (the athlete’s way), and the other party becomes insignificant, more a prop than a true relationship partner.

If the player dares to take the next step — marriage — there will likely be a legal team at his disposal (via his agent) that can set up a prenuptial agreement. This negotiation is often dragged out for months as a way of seeing whether the future spouse shows an ugly side during the process. But it’s a red flag for your relationship if you have to resort to such tactics to force the worst in someone, and the prenup becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, set up not just to distribute assets but to deal with an inevitable break-up or philandering. In fact, it might as well be seen as a pre-meditated agreement (I may do all of this dirt, so when I do and you want to leave, I still win because instead of half you only get a check for X dollars and one house).

Nice job by Glanville.

In honor of The Third Man–one of my favorite movies of all time–which is playing at the Film Forum through Tuesday. Here’s the theme re-imagined by that stereophonic maestro, Juan Garcia Esquivel:

Aw, hell, let’s cut to the chase. Here’s the star cameo for the ages (If you haven’t seen the movie, skip this…trust me, it’ll be worth it):

There is a new biography out on Herge, the creator of Tintin, Belgium’s most famous cultural creation. Herge’s legacy has come under attack in recent years because of the anti-semetic and racist elements of his early work. And while those criticisms are legitimate and a part of his story that cannot be easily dismissed, they aren’t the entire story.

In an otherwise skeptical and often snotty essay in the New York Times Book Review, Bruce Handy nails Herge’s lasting gift:

I think Hergé’s greatest achievements are formal: his precise yet witty line, like mechanical drawing with the giggles; and especially his gifts for timing, pacing and action, clearly movie-inspired. His best work from the 1950s and early ’60s (when he took on collaborators of an artistic kind) has a wit and sophistication that equals or surpasses anything I’m aware of in the comics of venerated American contemporaries like Harvey Kurtzman (the original Mad) and Will Eisner (“The Spirit”). In some cases, Tintin’s scrapes have more cinematic imagination than most of the era’s actual movies, with bits of funny business that hark back to the great silent comedies and chase scenes that in their “editing” foreshadow Steven Spielberg’s atomized yet fluid style.

Charles McGrath, also writing in the Times, notes, “Hergé here is frequently reminiscent of the Charles Schulz depicted in David Michaelis’s recent biography: an artist far happier and more interesting in his work than he ever was in life.”

Which brings to mind the old dilemma when it comes to artists, writers and athletes–is it better to concentrate on the work or the creator? This question is also raised by the novelist Rick Moody, in his review of a new Led Zeppelin biography:

What you may not get enough of is the astonishment of the music. Because, no matter how horrible they were as people — and, frankly, they do seem as if they were rather unlikable people who wasted immense talent in a spendthrift fashion — the music is still remarkable, even when borrowed.

…Robert Plant muses aloud at one point, despairing of the true story ever getting out: “We thought it was time that people heard something about us other than that we were eating women and throwing the bones out the window.” Indeed! Wall is conflicted enough about the facts that he allows this mythologizing title to be appended to his work: “When Giants Walked the Earth.” But these were no giants, these were just young people, like you, who for a time happened to have more power and influence than was good for them. In the midst of it all, they made extraordinary music.

A Christmas card from my uncle Herve in Belgium…

Yes, indeed. Happy anything and everything. And for those who aren’t celebrating Saint Nick, pass the Moo Shu, bubbie.

I love the sound of footsteps crunching in the snow, especially at night. You can feel the quiet around you, a heightened intimacy. Reminds me of this Al Green song. A music nyerd friend of mine once told me that producer Willie Mitchell achieved the vibe on the record by turning up the volume on all the microphones in the studio. Then Green sang softly and the band played softly, to great effect. They are all up in your ear hole…crunchy.

Dig it:

Christmas in the City

May Your Days Be Bright

Merry Christmas, y’all. (Pictures and words from Walt Kelly.)

There were the Mills Brothers and the Ink Spots and these dudes, the Golden Gate Quartet.

Niz, Briz.

Did you ever order a Coke and get a Diet Coke by accident? I have a sensitive palette and can’t abide diet soda. It tastes all wrong to me. That’s how I felt from the opening credits of Up in the Air, the new George Clooney vehicle. I just didn’t care for the taste. And I wanted to like it.

The movie looks good and features solid acting (Vera Farmiga is especially alluring) and there are a few winning light comedic scenes but I didn’t believe a minute of it, the rhythm, the dialogue, anything. The tone was off–not off-beat, just off. I thought it was cynical, self-satified, and phony. Not clever or funny but sour, a lemon. I know a lot of people have enjoyed it (it really spoke to Joe Pos, for instance). But for me, it simply didn’t taste right.

This one comes from the Mrs…

Hey Yo Tip What’s Wrong With Snails?

Following baseball these days–following anything in pop culture, really–can be dizzying. There is so much analysis and commentary from so many places that it is difficult to keep up with it all. I don’t Tweet which puts me behind the curve. But I read as much as I can, as quickly as I can point and click, so that opinions and facts are coming out of my ears. It is tough to tell the experts from the amateurs and vice versa.

Where do you turn?  Who is reliable? This probably depends on your bent. And while the volume can be overwhelming, the sheer amount of information that is available is impressive and often rewarding. It just requires time and the ability to filter the nuggets from the rubbish, which is easier said than done.

l find that Tyler Kepner is doing a great job of covering the Yankees for the New York Times. He mixes reporting (the quality that is most often missing from the blogosphere) and analysis especially well at the Bats blog. He isn’t the only one thriving these days, but his efforts stand-out. We’re lucky to have him on the beat but his talents have become broader than just a guy who covers the Yankees.

Chalk one up for the good guys.

One year ago today, Todd Drew wrote his final post for Bronx Banter (and for all I know it was the last thing he ever wrote, period). The next day he went into the hospital. He never made it out. We miss him terribly at the Banter though his spirit lives on. I’m sure he’d relish all the Hot Stove activity, all the kibbitzing, all the passion.

So here’s raising a toast in his honor. Spill a little on the ground, and enjoy a moment of silence to remember out dear friend.

Here is his final post, which is grace under pressure if I’ve ever seen it:

SHADOW GAMES: Baseball and Me

By Todd Drew

I went to a baseball game after my father’s funeral. I also went to one after finding out about my mother’s brain cancer.

It was selfish and heartless. I felt guilty before and embarrassed after, but for nine innings I felt only the game. That’s the way it’s always been between baseball and me.

It was my friend when I didn’t have any others. And it has always been there to talk or listen or simply to watch.

Baseball helps me forget and it makes me remember. That’s why it was exactly what I needed on the worst days of my life.

But there were no games when a doctor told me that I had cancer. The neighborhood was out of baseball on that cold November day. No one was playing at Franz Sigel Park or John Mullaly Park. And there wasn’t even a game of catch in Joyce Kilmer Park. The last game at the old Yankee Stadium was long gone and Opening Day at the new Yankee Stadium was long off.

So I went home and wished for one of those summer days when I was a kid and my mother would send me to the ballpark with a paper sack stuffed with her famous tuna-fish sandwiches. That was back when you could slip through a delivery gate with the beer kegs and watch batting practice. And it was always okay to come home late with a beat-up scorecard and popcorn stuck between your teeth.

The doctor told me that tomorrow’s surgery and chemotherapy treatment might keep me in the hospital for 10 days.

“At least it’s December,” I said. “There aren’t any ballgames to miss.”

And I will be ready to slip through a delivery gate with the beer kegs when the new Yankee Stadium opens. I’ll watch batting practice with one of my mother’s famous tuna-fish sandwiches and come home late with a beat-up scorecard and popcorn stuck between my teeth.

Cancer can’t change the way it will always be between baseball and me.

First Nick Johnson. Is Javier Vazquez next?

Update: Yes, with LOOGY Boone Logan for Melky, LHP Michael Dunn, and pitching prospect Arodys Vizcaino. So who goes to the bullpen? Joba or Hughes? And does this mean Granderson’s in left with Gardner in center, or is there one more big move on the way?

Update: With Arodys Vizcaino in the deal, does your opinion of the trade change?

Update: Fangraphs thinks both teams win here.

You won’t get the chance to kick Jason Marquis around, ya snot-nosed punks.

Since we hail from the Bronx, it is high time we served-up some Boogie Down Productions.

Here’s a classic from the second BDP record:

Fresh! For ’88, You Suckas!

Click here for the original sample from Stanley Turrentine.

Dig this terrific Aretha mix by Oliver Wang.

The movie Crazy Heart is dedicated to a musician, the late Stephen Burton. My pal John Schulian, an avid country music fan, e-mailed me this weekend about Burton:

Bruton was one of those classic Texas guys. His daddy, Sumpter Bruton, owned the best jazz record shop in Fort Worth. Bruton himself settled in Austin and played guitar and mandolin in bands that backed Bonnie Raitt, Kris Kristofferson and Billy Joe Shaver. Only late in life did he gain confidence in his own singing and songwriting, and he wrote some great damn songs. I’ll send you my favorite from youtube. Every Sunday night he and a bunch of other great Austin musicians got together at the Saxon Pub and played in a band called the Resentments. Yeah, I’ve got a T-shirt and all the albums they put out as a result of popular demand. Bruton was a good guy. I met him a couple times between sets while he was hanging around outside having a smoke — and there, I suppose, is the bad habit that killed him. But he kept picking until the end, working on Kristofferson’s last album and helping Burnett with the Crazy Heart score.

How about this for a Jeff Bridges Film Festival?

The Last Picture Show
Fat City
The Last American Hero
Thunderbolt and Lightfoot
Cutter’s Way
Starman
Tucker
The Fabulous Baker Boys
The Fisher King
American Heart
The Big Lebowski
Crazy Heart

I love gibberish.

We had a decent snow storm in New York last night, so I was up early this morning digging out Emily’s car. Which felt good because I was looking for a way to make up for being a schmuck about countless other things around the house (can you actually say that your wife is a nag if you are a lazy dope who turns her into one?) My neighbor Louie was out there too. His wife’s car looked ready to run a race. “I was out here at five a.m.,” he said.

Louie worked for an insurance company located in the Twin Towers but was at a doctor’s appointment that fateful Tuesday morning. He lost all of his co-workers, more than 500 in all. He says he hasn’t been the same since. He isn’t as lively as before. But he got married to a nurse, a great gal named Bee (half-Mexican, half Puerto Rican, Louie calls her a “Chicarican”). Louie has had a tough time finding work ever since but his pension kicks in starting in February. He wants to have us over to celebrate.

Meanwhile, he’s a great neighbor, always looking for a way to help, looking to keep useful. He gave me some rock salt this morning as I was digging out my wife’s car and then we went over to the cafe to pick up breakfast.

Uh, this can’t be a comfortable development.