It’s Adam Warren with the start tonight against R.A. Dickey.
Brett Gardner DH
Ichiro Suzuki RF
Robinson Cano 2B
Alfonso Soriano LF
Curtis Granderson CF
Eduardo Nunez SS
Lyle Overbay 1B
Jayson Nix 3B
Austin Romine C
Never mind the knuckler:
Let’s Go Yank-ees!
Here’s Bryant Gumbel’s editorial from the latest episode of HBO’s Real Sports:
“Finally tonight, what are we supposed to do with Alex Rodriguez? Embrace him? Pity him? Scorn him? I can easily understand any or all of those reactions because I think he’s a liar and a fraud. But what I don’t understand are the expressions of shock and outrage over his alleged drug use because, frankly, this country’s crazy about drugs. In case of addiction one can go to drug rehab at Muse to get help.
Modern Americans reach for a drug for any and everything – for problems real and imagined. It’s why we consume more pills than any nation on earth and why TV ads are relentlessly selling us Xarelto, Abilify, Stelara, Prodaxa, and dozens of other drugs we never ever guessed we supposedly needed. Many of them who are addicted to these drugs, are often recommend to visit Orlando rehab center for early treatment.
Americans are only about five percent of the world’s population yet we take 80% of the world’s painkillers and a whopping 99% of the world’s Vicodin. We have four million kids on Ritalin, 22-million women on antidepressants, over 30-million adults on sleeping pills, 32 million on Statins, 45 million on another drug I can’t even begin to pronounce. The list goes on and on. There is drug and alcohol treatment in Miami that can help the ones that are addicted to drugs and unwanted medication they use as a temporary escape. The professionals at alcohol detox austin can help victims overcome addiction issues.
So think what you will of Alex Rodriguez but when so many moms and dads are active parts of a national drug epidemic, let’s stop crying that a ballplayer’s the one setting a bad example for kids. And let’s skip the expressions of outrage and shock because however you may choose to view A-Rod’s alleged drugs use, there’s no denying the ugly reality that that’s become the American way.”
“Marie, Daughter of the People,” By Amedeo Modigliani (1918)
Put the needle to the groove.
That’s what the Yanks did yesterday. They trailed in both games and came back to win ’em both. Ivan Nova was roughed-up early and then pitched a solid game; Phil Hughes did well, too. Robbie Cano was the star in the afternoon with Chris Stewart’s 3-run home run the big play, and Jayson Nix was the guy at night, hitting a game-tying homer and then the game-ending base hit in the bottom of the 9th.
According to Chad Jennings, “You guys can feel it,” Austin Romine said. “When you come in here it’s loose; it’s fun. We’re not out of it until we’re out of it, and that’s every game. We’re scrapping. We’re getting big hits from guys when we need it. Case in point tonight with Nixy coming up huge with that line drive to left. It’s fun. We’re having fun.”
Is this the start of a run or just a nice week? Either way, it’s always fun to see your team win both games of a double header.
[Photo Credit: Melissa Ann Pinney via MPD]
Ah, just got Elmore on the brain.
Yanks and Jays play 2 today.
Brett Gardner CF
Ichiro Suzuki RF
Robinson Cano 2B
Alfonso Soriano DH
Alex Rodriguez 3B
Curtis Granderson LF
Lyle Overbay 1B
Jayson Nix SS
Chris Stewart C
Nova goes first; Hughes tonight.
Never mind the nonsense:
Let’s Go Yank-ees!
[Photo Credit: hisaya katagami…man, I just love this picture.]
What the–sure, I’m game. From Food 52.
“Atlantic City, NY” by Lee Friedlander (1972)
The great American writer Elmore Leonard died this morning. He was 87.
He was a constant inspiration, a sharp, no-bullshit storyteller with a fondness for his characters and for the way people–cops and crooks alike–talk. He wrote beautiful, terse, evocative prose. He was not one to waste words.
If you’ve never read Leonard’s essay on writing, do yourself a favor, huh?
3. Never use a verb other than ”said” to carry dialogue.
The line of dialogue belongs to the character; the verb is the writer sticking his nose in. But said is far less intrusive than grumbled, gasped, cautioned, lied. I once noticed Mary McCarthy ending a line of dialogue with ”she asseverated,” and had to stop reading to get the dictionary.
4. Never use an adverb to modify the verb ”said” . . .
. . . he admonished gravely. To use an adverb this way (or almost any way) is a mortal sin. The writer is now exposing himself in earnest, using a word that distracts and can interrupt the rhythm of the exchange. I have a character in one of my books tell how she used to write historical romances ”full of rape and adverbs.”
5. Keep your exclamation points under control.
You are allowed no more than two or three per 100,000 words of prose. If you have the knack of playing with exclaimers the way Tom Wolfe does, you can throw them in by the handful.
Over at the Atlantic dig this from Elmore (and stick around to watch the video):
THE DAY VICTOR turned twenty he rode three bulls, big ones, a good 1,800 pounds each—Cyclone, Spanish Fly, and Bulldozer—rode all their bucks and twists, Victor’s free hand waving the air until the buzzer honked at eight seconds for each ride, not one of the bulls able to throw him. He rolled off their rumps, stumbled, keeping his feet, and walked to the gate not bothering to look at the bulls, see if they still wanted to kill him. He won Top Bull Rider, 4,000 dollars and a new saddle at the All-Indian National Rodeo in Palm Springs. It came to … Jesus, like 200 dollars a second. That afternoon Victorio Colorado, the name he went by in the program, was the man.
He left the rodeo grounds as Victor to celebrate with two Mojave boys, Nachee and Billy Cosa, brought along from Arizona when the boss, Kyle McCoy, moved his business to Indio, near Palm Springs. The Mojave boys handled Kyle’s fighting bulls, bringing them from the pens to the chute where Victor, a Mimbreño Apache, would slip aboard from the fence, wrap his hand in the bull rope tight as he could get it, and believe he was ready to ride. He’d take a breath, say “Let me out of here,” and the gate would swing open and a ton of pissed-off bull would come flying out.
“His mind made up,” he told the Mojave boys at Mi Nidito in Palm Springs, “to kill anybody’s on his back. See, he behaves in the chute. What he’s doing, he’s saving his dirty tricks till he has room to buck you off and stomp you, kick out your teeth.”
Check out this old American Film article on him:
I haven’t seen “Justified,” the TV series based on characters created by the Elmore but from all accounts it is excellent. Over at the Star-Ledger, Alan Sepinwall talks to the Master:
We talk about director Barry Sonnenfeld’s 1995 version of “Get Shorty,” the first truly successful (in both creative and commercial terms) Leonard adaptation after a long fallow period. The conversation quickly turns to how the creative team on the sequel, “Be Cool,” got wrong so much of what Sonnenfeld and writer Scott Frank got right.
“I told Barry Sonnenfeld, ‘When somebody delivers a funny line, don’t cut to someone else laughing or nudging or grinning, because they’re all serious,’” he recalls. “And he knew that. But then when they shot the sequel, they forgot all about that, and everybody’s laughing all the way through. There’s a guy named Cedric the Entertainer (in the cast). Well, I can’t have a guy named Cedric the Entertainer in one of my stories!”
He lived to 87 and never stopped working. I hope he knew how much pleasure he gave so many of us. We can mourn his passing but let’s also celebrate his lasting achievement. I’d like to think he’d want it that way.
Here’s a cool old relic from the last great era of Yankees dysfunction. It’s a clip of Goose Gossage losing his shit in front of the New York media in 1982–the beginning of a miserable, drawn-out decade for the organization, when all that ’70s glory turned to pinstriped shit.
This year has nothing on the Bronx Zoo hangover years.
From Volume 1 of Celebrities at Their Worst.
Nice little piece on Bobbito by David Gonzalez in the Times the other day:
His love of the game has taken him around the world. With Kevin Couliau, he made the documentary “Doin’ It in the Park,” which is a valentine not just to the game, but to the neighborhoods where it is played. He promoted it guerrilla style, through his Open Runs, which is like a pickup basketball flash mob gathered on several hours’ notice through an e-mail blast. This summer he organized in Riverside Park what he said was the first-ever full-court 21 tournament, the ultimate city game.
“You go to any park in New York, and the kids are playing 21,” he said. “Essentially, it’s a game where you have no teammates. You have multiple people guarding whoever has the ball. Every change of possession goes the opposite way. It’s a rough game. There’s no out of bounds and no shooting fouls.”
…“The beauty of outdoor pickup is there is no other environment where you are going to find such a diverse group of people participating in free recreation,” Bobbito said. “You don’t find that at a sports club or a university gym. Those require memberships. The park is free.”
[Photo Via: Life and Times]
When you got nothin’ you got nothin’ to lose.
[Photo Credit: Robert Galbraith/Reuters]
Check out this cool post by Nick Schager over at Esquire.com on Drew Struzan:
Drew Struzan is responsible for some of the most enduring cinematic imagery of the past thirty years, even if few fans recognize his name. That should be partially rectified by this week’s release of Struzan: The Man Behind the Poster, a documentary that pays tribute to the famed movie-poster artist, whose illustrated one-sheets for Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Back to the Future, Harry Potter, and countless other film franchises are both instantly recognizable and beloved. Hand-painted and marked by photorealistic portraits and signature scenes in evocative montages, Struzan’s work remains the standard to which most action, fantasy, and sci-fi posters aspire, conveying emotion and excitement with a compelling style far superior to the modern era’s Photoshopped-to-death posters. In honor of his prolific and peerless career, we present a look back at thirteen of his most compelling creations.
And please dig Struzan’s website.
I contributed a short essay on “Buffalo Gals” to Herc Your Enthusiam, HiLoBrow’s series on old school (pre-1983) rap records:
There wasn’t anything like “Buffalo Gals” before, nor after. Though you could categorize it as an early sample record, in the vein of “Pump Up the Volume,” it’s really a novelty record, the brainchild of British trendsetter and former Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren.
For McLaren, style was substance. After a trip to New York where he saw Afrika Bambaataa spin, McLaren co-opted New York’s hip hop scene for his next record — the dancing, record scratching, the fashion (all of which are on display in the “Buffalo Gals” video). He flew New York DJs The Supreme Team to London to provide scratches, and got Trevor Horn, a successful young British producer — he had been part of The Buggles, whose version of “Video Killed the Radio Star” was in 1981 the first video ever played on MTV — to make the record.
“Buffalo Gals” is a culture clash of stuff — samples of phone calls, breaks, a synth bass and pads, the catchy “duck, duck, duck” refrain, the title chorus taken from a Piute Pete record, the scratching: “Oh, that scratching is making me itch.” It sounds like a bunch of stuff cobbled together but it works — and for DJs it goes with other records, because there’s so much in it.
Check out the rest of the series here.
