Sources say…

Remember this? Thirty years ago…Thanks to our man Cliff for sending the link.

Happy Thanksgiving you guys!

p.s. Looks as if the Yanks want Fab Five Freddy back in 2012.

[Photo Credit: Vickisee]

When I’m trying to get to sleep, I solve little puzzles to wind down my brain. Lately, I’ve been working on how the Yankees could acquire the best player at every position. Quickly, it becomes logistically impossible. There’s no way to pry Tulowitski or Longoria or Kemp or Braun away from their current teams.

However, changing the criteria slightly to acquiring the best available players at every position, things become doable. Absurdly expensive, but doable.

At first base, Albert Pujols, that’s easy. Keep the rest of the infield. Cano is the best second baseman for me over the last two years anyway, and close enough to the best overall that there’s no reason to upgrade. Jeter is required to maintain the idea that this is indeed the Yankees we’re talking about. And Arod, even that close to dreaming I can’t imagine some other team wanting to deal with him.

In the outfield, Granderson and Gardner might be the best outfielders available for their spots. For the other outfield spot, I’d gamble on the Cuban star, Yoenis Cespedes, though I guess Beltran is the best established player available. For DH, sign Prince Fielder. Note, every acquisition at this point is just a matter of money.

Now the hard part. Catcher. Perhaps this is the result of a midnight haze, but I think the Yankees could get Joe Mauer with Montero and others (Nova, Banuelos, etc). Mauer is now ridiculously expensive, has never been an Iron Horse, and has, for the first, time, turned in a stinker of a season. I think that the Twins could be persuaded that his contract is no longer in their best interests.

So that lineup is now something like Granderson, Mauer, Pujols, Fielder, Arod, Cano, Cespedes, Jeter, Gardner. Teixeira will DH against lefties and have to learn how to play 3B again to back up Arod. Russell Martin will be the back up catcher. Swisher is the fourth outfielder. To back up Jeter and Cano, and eventually replace Jeter, sign Jose Reyes.

The rotation is even easier. Sabathia is back. Send the rest of the Yankees staff to the pen (figure Nova is headed to Minnesota in the Mauer deal) and sign Wilson, Darvish, Buerhle and Oswalt, or the four best pitchers according to you.

We already have the best closer and possibly the best set-up man in Robertson. At times, Soriano is among the top relievers in the game. Add in Heath Bell, I guess, if he’s any good. I am always asleep before I get to the bullpen, so this is not as well considered. The demoted starters will pitch in where they can. Too bad Pabelbon signed elsewhere.

The 2012 Yankees would cost around, what, $350 million? Why not? It’s not my money so I won’t lose any sleep over it.

[Picture via Onion Sports Network]

A new Muppets movie is here. Here’s a scene from their original flick:

And dig this, too:

My grandmother on my mother’s side had dementia and spent the last years of her life in a home. I was told that she liked to bite people. I never saw her during that time–she was in Belgium, I was here in New York–but hers is the only experience I have with Alzheimer’s. I got to thinking about her as I read Charlie Pierce’s beautiful memoir about the disease, his family curse, which claimed his father and four uncles, and which may eventually claim  him, as well.

Here is an excerpt:

The waking dream is of a dead city.

There was a great fire and the city died in it. I am sure of that. I can see the smoldering skyline, smoke rising from faceless buildings, flattening into dark and lowering clouds. I can hear the sharp keening of the scavenger birds. I can smell fire on damp wood, far away. I can feel the gritty wind in my eyes. I can taste the sour rain.

The waking dream comes upon me when I forget where the car is parked, or when I buy milk but forget the bread, or when I call my son by my daughter’s name. Wide awake but dreaming still, I walk through the ruined city.

When it happens, I remember. I remember everything. I remember anything. For years, I have been a walking trove of random knowledge, but I’ve come not to believe in the concept of trivia. I do not believe that anything you remember can be truly useless because I have seen memory go cold and dead.

“Why do you know stuff like that? people ask.

I smile and shrug. I do not tell them about the relief I find in remembering that Leon Czolgosz shot President McKinley. Not to remember Leon Czolgosz is to realize that one day you may not remember your son.  Leon Czolgosz goes first, and then your children. Not to remember is to realize that the day will come when you cannot find your way back home, that the day will come when you cannot find the way back to yourself. Not to remember is to begin to die, piecemeal, one fact at a time. It is to drift, aimlessly, deep into the ruined city, and never return.

…There’s a game I play now, when the waking dream comes. I make a deal with the disease. All right, I say. I will allow you to have some of my memories. You can have my first polio shot, all the lyrics to “American Woman,” two votes for Bill Clinton, and both Reagan administrations.

Leave me my children’s names.

Let me know them, and you can have all four Marx Brothers.

This is not clinical. I know the disease does not work this way. But sometimes, when the waking dream comes and I can feel the wind all gritty on my skin, I play this game anyway, and I am very good at it. I was born to play it. I was raised to believe that truth is malleable, and that you can bend it so that even its darkest part can be shaped into the familiar and the commonplace. I can play this game. I can play it well.

Makes you appreciate the moment, this moment, for what we have.

You can order Hard to Forget: An Alzheimer’s Story, here.

[Photo Credit: Best of Rally Live and  Jason Langer]

It’s Ryan Braun over Matt Kemp for NL MVP. Don’t agree with this one, but there you have it.

Oh, yeah, Craig Calcaterra weighs in on the new CBA.

The Yankees announce ticket plans for 2012.

[Photo Credit: Vernacular Typography]

Check “Address is Approximate,” by The Theory:

Address Is Approximate from The Theory on Vimeo.

[Photo Credit: Mudpig]

Bobby V and the Red Sox? Oh, man, it’s just too good not to happen. Sensitive, bright, smug, insufferable, and just this side of self-parody–they are made for each other. Bobby V will make it even easier to despise the Sox.

Imagine Buck Showalter vs. Bobby? Then add dd Joe Girardi’s tight ass? Never mind Joe Maddon. That’s a lot of gamesmanship from the top step of the dugout in the AL East. Oh, man, for pure entertainment value, this will be rich if it happens. And it looks like it will.

For more on Bobby V, check out Chris Ballard’s 2007 SI profile.

[Photo Credit: Greenwich Time.com]

Why, our old pal Jay Jaffe, of course. Oh yeah, here’s the rest of Baseball Prospectus’ 2011 Internet Baseball Awards.

Over at How To Be a Retronaut, check out this gallery of lesbian pulp fiction (1935-’58):

Justin Verlander is the AL MVP.

No real surprise, here. The two candidates from Boston were sunk when their team choked away a playoff spot; Curtis Granderson didn’t have the numbers to overwhelm the field, and the same goes for Miguel Cabrera; Jose Bautista was the best player in the league but an unpopular pick with many writers because his team wasn’t in the playoff hunt, which left Verlander. It was a pick-’em vote and it went to the pitcher.

He adored New York City. He idolised it all out of proportion.

Great shot of Yankee Stadium in this sequence.

There is a good, long article by Meghan Cox Gurdon in the Wall Street Journal on Tintin:

There are really no humdrum pages in the adventures, which is a reminder of their origin as weekly comic strips. To keep the attention of young readers, Hergé crammed his stories with conflict and sight gags, with explosions and pratfalls and jets and cars and rampaging animals. This energetic pacing, sustained over 60-odd pages in book form, manages to make the experience of reading Tintin both prolonged and quick. It also speaks to the narrative taste of young readers, who love action and do not require the emotional psychodrama or character development adults so enjoy.

There are other reasons that Tintin has resonated with so many readers for so long. Through his international exploits—in pre-revolutionary Shanghai, the jungles of Peru, a faux Eastern European police state, even the surface of the moon 20 years before Neil Armstrong got there—Tintin shows young readers that the world in all its complexity is theirs to bestride.

The resonance with children can’t be exaggerated. When you are young and your hero crash-lands in the Sahara or treks through the snows of Tibet, you do, too. The Himalayas and North Africa then become, in an elusive yet significant way, “yours,” part of your personal geography. When your hero outwits assassins, solves riddles and escapes execution by firing squad, you do, too. And when your hero, in pursuit of a baddie after dark, steps on a rake and knocks himself out (with comical stars circling his head to show it) or finds himself duped into drinking an intoxicating aperitif, you too experience his concussion and befuddlement.

My grandfather loved Tintin and read the books to my mother when she was a kid. My mother read them to us, and I read them with my grandfather, and also my aunts and uncles in Belgium. And now, my mother reads it with my niece and nephew.

The Tintin adventures originally appeared in magazine form, but were later compiled in hardcover editions. I loved those books, they were sturdy, and felt  more important than the flimsy-looking American comics that were printed on cheap paper. These books were made to last, the colors were bright, and of course, Herge’s compositions were formal, meticulous, and strong.

For more on Herge, click here.

The Giants play the Eagles tonight. In honor of this old rivalry, check out our pal John Schulian’s classic portrait of Chuck Bednarik:

He really was the last of a breed. For 58 1/2 minutes in the NFL’s 1960 championship game, he held his ground in the middle of Philly’s Franklin Field, a force of nature determined to postpone the christening of the Green Bay Packers’ dynasty. “I didn’t run down on kickoffs, that’s all,” Bednarik says. The rest of that frosty Dec. 26, on both offense and defense, he played with the passion that crested when he wrestled Packer fullback Jim Taylor to the ground one last time and held him there until the final gun punctuated the Eagles’ 17-13 victory.

Philadelphia hasn’t ruled pro football in the 33 years since then, and pro football hasn’t produced a player with the combination of talent, hunger and opportunity to duplicate what Bednarik did. It is a far different game now, of course, its complexities seeming to increase exponentially every year, but the athletes playing it are so much bigger and faster than Bednarik and his contemporaries that surely someone with the ability to go both ways must dwell among them.

Two-sport athletes are something else again, physical marvels driven by boundless egos. Yet neither Bo Jackson nor Deion Sanders, for all their storied shuttling between football and baseball, ever played what Bednarik calls “the whole schmear.” And don’t try to make a case for Sanders by bringing up the turn he took at wide receiver last season. Bednarik has heard that kind of noise before.

“This writer in St. Louis calls me a few years back and starts talking about some guy out there, some wide receiver,” he says, making no attempt to hide his disdain for both the position and the player. “Yeah, Roy Green, that was his name. This writer’s talking about how the guy would catch passes and then go in on the Cardinals’ umbrella defense, and I tell him, ‘Don’t give me that b.s. You’ve got to play every down.’ “

“Concrete Charlie,” is also featured in Schulian’s recent collection: Sometimes They Even Shook Your Hand.

[Photo Credit: Alexander Burch]

Oh, yeah.

[Photo Via: Soul Hunting]

If you’re a Yankee fan who’s never heard of Mickey Scott, I cannot fault you for that. I remember Mickey Scott, but not as a Yankee. It was only after his death in late October that I realized his connection to the Yankee franchise, not to mention his ties to central New York.

Scott did not follow the traditional path to the major leagues. He was born in Weimar, Germany, to a military family that eventually settled in New York state. Scott grew up in Newburgh, located about 60 miles north of New York City. In 1965, the year of the first amateur draft, the Yankees took Scott on the 17^th round out of Newburgh Free Academy. Given the rough winter weather in much of upstate New York, relatively few major leaguers have come out of the state from locations north of the city. But the Yankees liked Scott’s live left-handed arm enough to counteract any concerns they had about the small sample size of Scott’s work.

The skinny southpaw quickly showed the Yankees that he had enough stuff and experience to pitch professionally. He pitched brilliantly at two stops in 1965, before putting in a full season at Single-A Binghamton in 1966. He won a league-leading 15 of 20 decisions for the Triplets, held NY-Penn League opponents to a 2.75 ERA, and led the league in strikeouts.

With his career on the verge of a breakthrough, the realities of the late-1960s put up a roadblock. Scott missed all of the 1967 season while serving the military during Vietnam. Like most of the Vietnam vets, he didn’t receive much credit or applause when he returned to civilian life.

Undeterred by the setback, Scott came back to pitch in 1968, returning once again to Binghamton. But the Triplets had now moved up to Double-A status as a member of the Eastern League, so Scott’s return to Binghamton actually represented an impressive jump for the 20-year-old lefthander. Scott lowered his ERA to 2.58 while allowing only 83 hits in 115 innings. Though not overpowering, Scott convinced the Yankees he was now a legitimate prospect.

The following summer, the 21-year-old Scott moved up to Triple-A Syracuse, another location in upstate New York. It was an impressive ascension for a 17^th-round draft pick. Like a lot of young lefthanders, Scott struggled with his first taste of Triple-A hitters. Now deeming him expendable, the Yankees traded Scott to the White Sox for Pete Ward, a combination first baseman/third baseman with some lefty power. Ward would last one unproductive season in the Bronx before calling it a career, while Scott would never pitch a game for the ChiSox.

In September of 1970, the Sox traded Scott to the Orioles. The Orioles switched him to the bullpen, where he used a devastating change-up to become the lefty relief ace for the Rochester Red Wings. He also became popular with teammates, who appreciated his upbeat nature and keen sense of humors. In 1972, Scott would finally make his big league debut for the pitching-rich O’s. Scott pitched well in 15 games, kicking off a journeyman career that would last five seasons and include stops in Montreal and California. Used mostly as a relief pitcher, Scott put up a 3.72 ERA in 172 innings.

Scott never pitched a regular season game for the Yankees, but that would not prevent an eventual reunion with the franchise. Appreciating his attitude and work ethic, the Yankees hired Scott to fill a number of duties, including a role throwing batting practice at Yankee Stadium. He threw BP to such notables as Thurman Munson, Reggie Jackson, Roy White and Graig Nettles.

When not in the Bronx, Scott returned to his residence in Binghamton, a place that became so special to him that he settled on it as his permanent home.  He opened up a bar called “Mickey’s Mound,” where the personable and outgoing left-hander often regaled visitors with stories of his life in both the majors and the minors. During the 1980s, Billy Martin moved near the Binghamton area and frequently visited Mickey’s Mound. There Martin and Mickey became good friends.

Though Scott no longer owned the bar, he seemed to be enjoying retirement in Binghamton. He kept himself in good shape, regularly visiting a local gym to keep his weight and conditioning under control. On October 30 of this year, Scott called his mother from his home in Binghamton and told her that he was heading outside to rake some leaves, a common fall chore in upstate New York. Scott never returned to the house. While on his front lawn, he suffered a heart attack. His body was found by two women who happened to be walking by. Scott was 64.

I didn’t know that Mickey Scott lived in Binghamton or had a bar there until I read stories reporting his death. As a resident of Cooperstown, I live only about an hour’s drive from Binghamton. I wish I had known about Mickey’s Mound back in the 1990s; I would have enjoyed saddling up to the bar, ordering a ginger ale, and hearing a few stories from Mickey Scott himself.

Sadly, I never had the chance. But I know that others did. And I would love nothing more than to hear some of those stories about Mickey Scott.

Bruce Markusen writes “Cooperstown Confidential” for The Hardball Times.

Celebrities by Norman Seeff over at Everyday I Show.