I would hardly be the first person to suggest that Ozzie Guillen, the White Sox raging volcano of a manager, would be absolutely electric on his own reality show. Like the other famous reality Oz, Mr. Osbourne, he'd require the censor button about every 9 words and would reliably say something controversial every 4.5 minutes - and he damn sure wouldn't apologize for it.
Take today's press conference after word leaked out that he and fellow Chicago skipper, the Cubs' Lou Piniella, were at the top of a Sports Illustrated players poll concerning the manager they'd least like the play for. "Sweet Lou" clocked in at #1 with 26% of the vote, followed closely by Guillen at 21%:
It's interesting that the top 4 choices on the s&*t list are among some of the most successful managers in baseball history (Torre & LaRussa) as well as two World Series champions (Guillen & Pinella). It also gives one pause to see that Torre has enough of a duality about him to make both this list and the prior week's poll of the skip you'd most want to play for. (Laymen's terms: most players just picked the guy they'd heard a bunch of rumors about and called it a day.)
If Cubs fans ever envisioned Ozzie Guillen switching sides of town and becoming the manager of their team, well, it would come with a few demands. The Sox manager addressed the topic without pulling any punches today.
''I never be in Wrigley Field [as Cubs manager],'' Guillen said. ''I don't give a [crap]. I can't I say I don't like Wrigley Field? Why can't I express myself? It's like I don't like to eat chicken. Why I should I have to like Wrigley Field? Whoever gets upset about that? [Bleep] them. I don't like Wrigley Field. What's wrong with that? I wish I could do something about it. The governor of Chicago, please, build another one. I don't know why people make such a big deal that I don't like Wrigley field. I don't work for Wrigley Field. I might manage the Cubs. No, not Wrigley Field. I hate that [expletive] place.''
Seriously, if this guy isn't on his own reality program in the next offseason for the MLB Network, a golden opportunity has gone by the boards.
Unfortunately, when taking (and then later stitching) together photos from my "ancient" first-generation iPhone, the resulting magnificent vista can't really be shown in high definition. Click on the photo to get a much better (and larger) appreciation of the sight. This was my vantage point from the bottom of the hill during a late-evening tour of the grounds on Saturday: as you might suspect, this was during the third round match of local favorite Andy Murray, which he won with relative ease in straight sets.
That was not the case tonight as Murray battled it out with Stanislas Wawrinka for close to four hours under the brand-spanking new roof, which when illuminated in the night makes it appear that a gigantic marshmellow spaceship has landed in southwest London - but hopefully has no plans to harm our planet:
While admirers of enthralling tennis (and television bosses, particularly the BBC which airs Wimbledon in primetime and not against Oprah and the afternoon soaps like ESPN) were ecstatic about the roof's deployment, the man who won the five-setter was not a fan:
“Both of us were trying to get white towels from the locker room because your hands were drenched,” Murray told reporters after the match. “When I finished, it was like I’d been in a bath. It was very, very, very humid.”
Sounds like Andy Murray should pay a visit to Finnegan's on a Thursday when school is in session, eh?
Well, the week is wrapped up here at Wimbledon, save one five-set epic going on over at No. 1 court between a pair of swashbucklers, Spain's Juan Carlos Ferrero and Chile's Fernando Gonzalez. You've heard of him, right Thomas?
The big buzz during the first week of play in SW19 (Wimbledon's post code, for those of you in the dark) has been the decisive lack thereof. After the dropping out of defending champ Rafael Nadal due to lingering knee problems, it seems like this particular Wimbledon is missing the traditional simmering of tension, the looming sense of excitement that a clash between the game's two giants, Nadal and Roger Federer, is coming. There are of course great storylines: the resurgence of Andy Roddick, fresh from his best-ever showing at the French Open, seeking to redeem a second-round loss from last year; a potential encore of last year's all-Williams final on the ladies' side; the Cinderella run of the 17-year old American Melanie Oudin; and of course the great British (or is he Scottish only?) hope of Andy Murray, trying to become the first Brit to win the Championships in some 70-odd years. But for all the interesting angles, I kid you not, press conferences have been reduced to quizzing Roddick about a back-and-forth with his wife (Sports Illustrated swimsuit model Brooklyn Decker) on Twitter where he criticized her musical tastes and she his. The exchange, verbatim:
Roddick had written on his Twitter feed that he was going to ban his swimsuit model wife Brooklyn from bringing her iPod into the kitchen.
"Britney Spears, Miley Cyrus, Taylor Swift, I feel like it's a 24-hour loop of the Disney Channel," he wrote.
she retaliated by saying: "One of his favourites is Rick Astley (enough said). He knows a few 'N Sync dances, and he LOVES Kelly Clarkson. I promise he is far worse."
Quizzed on his taste in music, Roddick told reporters: "What do you want me to say? I said I wasn't proud, but I'm not going to lie to anybody. I busted my wife on some of her ... music. She brought up Rick Astley. I can't deny it. It's in my iPod. I bet it's in your iPod, too, so shut up."
I hereby solemnly declare that Rick Astley has not, and never will be, on my iPod. Sorry A-Rod.
If there's one absence which has managed to upstage Nadal's, it's most definitely been the daily disappointment that has come with not being able to utilize the massive, translucent quasi-greenhouse roof installed over Centre Court for the purposes of eliminating the rain delays for which Wimbledon is famous (last year's epic final between Federer and Nadal took almost 9 hours of real-time to complete due to massive showers). But with the exception of some sprinkles this evening, the weather has been nothing short of glamorous all week. Everybody's on a knife's edge wondering when the legendarily tempestous England summer is going to arrive and finally give the All England Club the chance to unveil their shiny new toy. But even in staying put, the roof has already created an unheard-of new species: Englishmen and woman who are royally pissed off at how nice the weather is!
I could flesh out some thoughts on this, but unfortunately I'm still a very young face in the blogging world and I can't do anything but follow the crowd today: the news cycle, the blogosphere, the Twitter-verse, Facebook Nation, and MySpace planet are all communicating on the same wavelength: Michael Jackson has passed away.
This was the final chapter of a long, bizarre descent for "The King of Pop" who had as many awkward "WTF?" moments over the past 15 years as he did hit singles in the previous 15. The guy had a chimpanzee named Bubbles following him around! He was a lot of things to a lot of people, but I choose to recognize what was one of the finest acting performance in the theme park 3-D film history (note: I'm not entirely sure this should be considered a compliment).
Dedicated American sports fans would narrow the list of "the most traditional sports event" to a few choice selections: certain college football programs, venerable baseball/football franchises like the Yankees, Packers, Red Sox, etc. But I'd bet the number one answer in that Family Feud survey would be "The Masters" (Certainly, CBS reminds us about this at every opportunity). But whoever came up with "a tradition unlike any other" has never been to a little strip of houses and lawns in the southwest corner of London known as Wimbledon.
Amidst the majestic trees of Augusta, everybody gets treated like royalty. But what would they say to the grounds of the All England Lawn Tennis Club, where on any given moment the patrons may actually be royalty? Everything at Wimbledon revolves around a tradition so old there's nobody within four or five generation who actually remembers why it got started. It's the ultimate delivery of the classic Fiddler on the Roof line: "How did this tradition get started? I'll tell you....I don't know. It's just tradition!"
The first couple days of the tournament have gone swimmingly, but I'm still in the middle of trying to re-acclimate to Europe. I spent a glorious summer in Dublin back in 2005, but never got a chance to make it to London until now. Certainly I've seen Wimbledon on television dozens of times, but the place has such an intimate, up-close feel. Most of the players rent houses and apartments just a few blocks (at most) from the entrance gates and walk freely among the pubs and shops along High Street in between matches. There's a great story of how, after losing one of the classic finals in all Wimbledon history (a five-setter to wild-card entry Goran Ivanesevic), Patrick Rafter headed down to the Dog & Fox Pub in Wimbledon Village and bought a round for the house. So while a fair comparison in terms of stature and power membership might be a lofty perch like Augusta National, I think a more legit parallel to the AELTC would be Bethpage Black, the municipal course which hosted the just-concluded US Open. Just like there, the locals feel an intense, prideful ownership over the place and welcome the world's best with open arms (not to mention LOTS of strawberries and cream. There is only one item that never leaves the menu down at the media 'canteen', and it unfortunately isn't the prime rib. That's okay, but there's only so much prime rib a man could consume anyway.)
One thing does throw you for the first few days in Europe, and that's the incredible length of the days. It's 9:40 here and the sunlight is just starting to fade, and it'll be up at full blast again before 6 AM. This affords us an opportunity for long, uninterrupted broadcasts that stretch from noon-10pm local time (7am-5pm back in the States). So to close with a perfectly shameless plug, tune in to ESPN2 every day during the week for all your Wimbledon needs.
It could be merely a sign that I have far too much idle time to kill, but I find myself strangely invested in the ongoing late-night "wars", such as they are, with Conan, Dave, Jimmy, Jimmy, Craig, and a soon-to-be-revived Jay doing their subtle back-and-forth from across the airwaves. So this is what all the adults were gabbing about in the summer of '92 like it was some big deal! Here I thought it was just about the Olympics Triple-Cast! (If you have no idea what this is, I suggest you read up here. The OTC was further proof that genius is always one generation ahead of its time, because today we take for granted that any sporting event above junior-college football will be given the full-on treatment by no fewer than five networks. Observe the ongoing US Open - you can watch on ESPN, NBC, the USGA website, ESPN's website, your iPhone, ESPNNews, or any one of several stationary channel cameras on DirecTV. It's enough to make you think you're in the control truck on site at Bethpage! But back in 1992, the concept of extra channels providing exclusive start-to-finish coverage of sports was so revolutionary...they wanted you to pay for it through the nose. As a result, by my count, more people have signed up as followers of this blog - look to the right, we've hit seven! - than did for the OTC. If you couldn't have already guessed, I remember this all vividly because we actually had the Triple-Cast. And at the time, bragging about being able to watch four different channels of Olympics coverage was akin to claiming a Unicorn was on your front lawn. People heard about it but never saw proof it existed. NBC got a few maniacs like us on board, but still wound up $100 million in the red -yet they paved the way for the all-access coverage we demand out of today's sport media.)
But with the long aside about the Triple-Cast out of the way, I turn back to the current state of affairs in late night TV. The numbers keep rolling in, and they keep showing David Letterman and Conan O'Brien jockeying for the pole position in total viewers, with Letterman coming out in front most nights. Conan retains a vice-like grip on the younger audience though, and the younger the age-window, the more lopsided the comparison is. I could do a long-winded exegesis on what these TV preferences say about the gap between generations, but I think the material speaks for itself. Witness Conan's leveraging of his own set for comedy's sake:
NBC is banking getting the best of both worlds - the generation that grew up with Nintendo follows Conan to 11:30. Their grandparents come back to NBC in September to watch Jay Leno at 10pm and tune out David Letterman, just like they did before the Tonight Show transition. Everybody in Universal City goes home a winner. You know what they say about best-laid plans, though...
The results from today's Crosstown game were decidedly less satisfying...Moving on.
I don't know if it has officially entered the dictionary, but if I have to lay bets on what will wind up being the Word of the Year, I'm betting the farm on "twitter". It's a noun, a verb, an adjective, and every so often a complete sentence all on its own. How did we find out Shaquille O'Neal and Paul Pierce's opinions on the NBA Finals? How did we learn that Oprah needs a suggestion on how to get ticks off a dog? The latest news and initiatives from that guy in the White House? Not to mention his loyal opposition? How about the really mundane s&*t like what Ashton Kutcher had for breakfast, USC coach Pete Carroll's choice for Song of the Day, or what Alex Richanbach of the acclaimed short film Stealing Second is up to? (This last one is a personal favorite of mine; I check it every day in the hopes that something useful will pop up. No luck so far, but I have to admit I'm jealous of how he apparently was in the vicinity of Al Pacino at the Denver Airport's Panda Express.) It was all via Twitter. It seems appropriate that this week, as golf's premier national championship is being contested on a true public course (for $50, anybody can play Bethpage Black), we were privy to up-to-the-second updates from numerous journalists and golfers on the playing conditions that ultimately led to a suspension of play. Twitter's become so prevalent in such a short timespan that ESPN's coverage of the rain delay led with Ian Poulter's "tweet" from the practice putting green: a very deadpan "Where's my canoe?"
I can't pin it on any one moment - perhaps it was the cover of Time three weeks ago, or how seemingly every show at ESPN now comes with the "Follow us on Twitter..." bug in the bottom third of the screen, or the inexplicable amount of press coverage devoted to Kutcher's "bet" with CNN over who could reach 1 million followers on Twitter first - but Twitter seems to be rapidly taking over our daily lives. As Conan O'Brien deadpanned last night, "It's tough to believe that only one year ago, man was totally in the dark about what Wilmer Valderamma had for lunch." A couple friends from my previous life out in California circled the rounds on Twitter breaking down all the latest minutiae from Parks & Resorts. My former colleague Allen was particularly amused by one report on the flurry of Twittering caused by a failure of a key Fantasmic show element:
OnFantasmic:"The lack of dragon nearly instntly sent rippls through the Twitterverse as fans sent out dsappontd Tweets" LOLThe twitterverse!
I was laughing too, Allen. But just beneath the laughter was a very serious point, one I think we're taking for granted as too ludicrous to be taken seriously. While it does sound (and on many levels is) very funny and moronic, Twitter has rapidly evolved into precisely what that reporter was talking about - it's own freaking little miniaturized version of the universe, duping us into thinking that Oprah and Obama, Shaq and Kobe, ESPN and CBS are just like the neighbors next door who pop in to borrow a cup of sugar. Is this a good thing or the signal that western civilization as we know it is about to crumble until we cannot fathom a moment when we didn't communicate via 140-character, horrendously grammar-inaccurate internet posts? I'm undecided at this time. Just be warned though, over-indulgence on Twitter can lead to harsh consequences. Observe what happened to ESPN's Kenny Mayne:
Well, the NBA and NHL playoffs are in the books, and as far football it looks like we'll once again have to go through "Football America Held Hostage" starring Brett Favre and the NFC North. Which means that summer has finally been cleared for what it's supposed to be about: the cut of the grass, the crack of the bat, the roar of the crowd. Now that Kobe and Sidney have each taken a victory lap, it's baseball season.
There is one thing about the past weekend that really caught my eye though, something unique and greatly underappreciated in the world of sports. When players in other leagues talk about reaching the top, they refer to it simply as "winning the title" or some variation therein. For hockey, however, success has a clear cut and unyielding definition: the Stanley Cup. Not "a Stanley Cup", as we say when talking about winning "a Super Bowl" or "a pennant" or "a NBA title". In hockey you either have the Stanley Cup or you don't. Most people don't realize this or about the two dozen other cherished traditions that actually make hockey a very exciting and passionate sport.
Which is another sad indictment of how much Gary Bettman has mismanaged his own league - seriously, Gary, no matter how much baseball fans might disapprove of Bud Selig, they're not going to go out of their way to boo him during the presentation of the championship trophy. It's just wrong that such a unique sports tradition go unnoticed, though given the spike in viewership for the seven-game series between Detroit and Pittsburgh that might slowly be changing. In hockey, you don't get a copy of the trophy for every title you win: you get the Stanley Cup, there's only one, and keep it long enough for everybody to have a turn paying homage. Customarily, every member of the team and front office gets to spend one day with it, most with special requests that range from highly emotional (players take it to the cemetery to show deceased loved ones) to the "conquering hero returns" motif (many request using it in a parade or visit the hometown digs) and occasionally rowdy (Mark Messier apparently spent his time with the '94 Cup at a variety of New York's finer gentleman's clubs; legend has it that Mario Lemiuex's day with it ended with the Cup floating to the bottom of his swimming pool.)
Put it this way: no other sports trophy comes close to attaining the aura of the Stanley Cup. I don't see full-time handlers with white gloves escorting the Lombardi Trophy everywhere it goes, particularly since there are 42 of them in various NFL trophy display cases.
For some of the Cup's more eclectic misadventures over the 109 years of its awarding, click here.
It's usually pretty easy for ludicrous and stupid arguments to come off as precisely that - ludicrous and stupid. But the jockeying among late night comics has an element of the surreal to it that's making it quite funny to watch. Letterman continues to "spin" his Palin comments while there's apparently a desire for heads to roll at NBC.
Meanwhile, this is the moment when the sidekicks get into the act, as evidence by Craig Ferguson's grandstanding on Friday night in response to the edict out of Universal City that we shall all bow before King Conan:
He really had it for awhile there...but I don't know, he rode it right off the rails near the end - to his credit, he seemed to know it. That's one of the most interesting things to observe about a comedian, their capacity for self-evaluation in the middle of all the chaos. You can almost see the thought bubble over Ferguson's head spelling out, "I've lost control here and there's no way to recover!" (Not unlike Stan Van Gundy in Game 4 of the NBA Finals, come to think of it.)
And lest you think I'm the only loon paying attention to this, I'm sitting in the diner last night munching on some buffet selection and this octogenarian foursome next to me is in the middle of their own mini-focus group!
Old Lady 1: Who is is that we watch now, that Leno's off the air... Old Man 1: You don't like Conan? Old Lady 1: No, we don't watch him, we don't like Conan. Old Man 2: Nobody does. Old Lady 2: Wow, you're up late.
Really happened. This truly is the hot topic that all of America is buzzing about, from Connecticut to California. I need to focus my energy on what matters...so, how long until football season again?
Now, on the list of things which should be considered important, the recent shake-up in the batting order of America's late night talk show hosts doesn't rank very high. But let's not stop that from huge bold faced headlines in the Hollywood trades and blogs over how dire the situation is!
If you don't really know (or care), NBC's "late" late night host, Conan O'Brien, finally completed the five-year waiting period to move up into the clean-up spot as host of The Tonight Show. This puts him in direct competition with the man he replaced once upon a time, CBS stalwart David Letterman. The man who retired from Tonight only to almost immediately regret it, Jay Leno, entertained a mega-offer from ABC but ultimately took a spot in NBC's primetime lineup at 10 PM. With a more home-spun, drama-free style built on Leno's super nice-guy person, Tonight regularly led the pack in viewership and cache among celebrities looking to plug their latest books and films.
O'Brien, despite being at 46 the oldest man to ever assume host duties on the Tonight show, pulls a much younger audience with his more subdued, almost nerdy style of humor. Perfect for the niche audience of college kids who need a laugh in the middle of an all-nighter, worrisome for a network that still counts on 60-year olds in Missouri to stay tuned after the late local news. O'Brien wisely took a poke at his apparent youth-skewing comedy during his second week on the show:
Now come the super-early returns on the changing of the guard in American TV. As expected, the curiosity factor piqued Conan's ratings to the tune of record levels, but there was sharp decline every day last week and by Tuesday of this week, Letterman was out-drawing the new kid on the block (relatively speaking - O'Brien hosted the Late Night show for 16 years, the same amount of time Letterman has been on CBS) and panic was - or at least should - have hit the streets. The 21st-century's answer to Walter Winchell, Nikki Finke over at Deadline Hollywood Daily, apparently has enough data to render a verdict:
It's the nightmare scenario for GE/NBC Universal that everyone but boss Jeff Zucker thought would happen: the network's cash cow The Tonight Show, once safely No. 1 in the ratings with Jay Leno as host, now can only hope to seesaw in the ratings with Letterman's Late Show. And it's all Zucker's fault. You'd think that NBC would be in a flopsweat over O'Brien's ratings slide during his first and second week as host of The Tonight Show. You'd think that, but you'd be wrong. Now, most network suits would be spending every minute of every hour of every day brainstorming how to make the show more popular. But this is NBC where, when the going gets rough, the executives go golfing. That's right, Conan's longtime executive producer Jeff Ross is getting his money's worth out of his spankin' new membership at Riviera Country Club because he was on the golf course not only two weekends in a row -- but both Saturday and Sunday last weekend even after Conan's ratings began to fall.
I think the first problem here is that Nikki has obviously never played The Riv - neither have I for that matter, but I did get in a good walk there during the '08 Northern Trust Open - because once she's seen the place she'll never hold it against anybody for sneaking in a weekend 36 holes. More to the point, what precisely is somebody supposed to do between Friday and Monday that's gonna solve the problem for a show that runs every night of the week, almost every week of the year? It's this kind of over-the-top reactionism (INSTANT SUCCESS! INSTANT FAIL!) that I miss the least about Los Angeles. Actually, I'd say that comes in third behind the smog and the epic stupidity of the public transit department.
The story here isn't that viewers are deserting NBC in droves for David Letterman (they're deserting NBC for plenty of other reasons), but let's not let that get in the way of a good public dress-down from the relative safety of the internet. The numbers shift with O'Brien is in fact pretty predictable, and it's going to take more than 7 nights of shows to gauge if he's actually squandered the fanbase. Moreover, he brought his own fanbase with him, as the spin doctors were out in force today telling anybody who would listen, "Hey, even if his audience is smaller - and we're not conceding it is - it's far and away the top audience for coveted 18-49 demo!" In normal people terms, that means that more adults from age 18-49 watched Conan than any other late night show (significantly more, as it turns out: 156% more than Letterman. When you narrow the window to viewers 18-34, the margin becomes even more lopsided: 236%.)
How they actually determine this stuff is a process only about 11 people locked away in the Nielsen ratings bunker understand, but the network suits eat it up just the same (or spit it out, depending on the circumstances). The raw audience sizes have tilted to Letterman for the moment, but the key slices of the population advertisers drool over (young urban types with money to spend) have come to the 11:30 hour along with Conan. And in case anybody forgets - he's been on the job for seven days! Can I be the only one who wants to gag when an NBC press release calls him "the new king of late night" at the same time Hollywood's most influential internet honk is tearing his production a new one?
To solve the conundruum, I did something really bold: I actually watched the two main pugilists (Leno's 10 PM presence will make for an interesting wild card come fall) for a segment apiece last night. Conan...let's just say he's done better. It was an uneven monologue trying to mix in jokes about the Fiat purchase of Chrysler, Krispy Kreme, Jamba Juice, and Spencer Pratt (a nightly riff on Pratt has quickly become the signature sign-off move of Conan's monologue). I laughed, but more than a few times it was simply mild amusement at Conan's very breezy brush-off a joke that just couldn't quite connect.
So I switched over to Letterman just in time to catch his apology to Sarah Palin. Given the former VP candidate's appearance in New York, Letterman had (as comics are wont to do) cracked wise at her colorful family history and the governor took offense. Letterman took a moment during his show to clarify and apologize...kinda. As only a superbly skilled, well-timed comic host could possibly do, he seemed to mix genuine empathy over hurt feelings with an all-too-obvious "Are you f&*kin' kidding me?" indignation. It was the kind of brilliant high-wire act that only somebody with 30 years of savvy in the late night game could've produced, simultaneously apologizing while milking the absurdity for all it was worth. Conan's just not there yet - he's the equivalent of a valued baseball prospect, groomed to perfection at Triple-A and finally receiving the call to the big leagues. He's supposed to have the gig down pat after 7 days? Whenever I try to take this seriously, I'm reminded about just how much the dirty business of show business is like nothing else in America.
Thank God.
Note - if you're in the mood for perfectly understated humor, here's the Letterman "apology" in its entirety:
ESPN's Outside the Lineshad an interesting roundtable on the back-and-forth among the press and blogosphere concerning the late-career explosion of Raul Ibanez:
When the coach of the winning team is publicly pointing out to the officials that they've blown a call at the most critical moment of a championship series game, and pretty doing it for no particular reason other than a feeling of, "Hey, somebody should point out that we've got rules", you have a problem. I wouldn't want David Stern's lackies handling my laundry, much less my basketball team's fate.
A freebie to all of you who think that ESPN is actually a vast conspiracy concocted by the shadow governments of New York and Boston to shower East Coast teams with nothing but praise and adulation - I have to say that I sometimes find myself in agreement with you. I mean, how else can you explain the penchant for painting the decade-long incompetency of the Knicks as "brilliantly positioning themselves for LeBron in 2010"? Note to NYK ownership: it worked for the Democrats, who tripped over themselves just often enough for Obama to place himself as the man who would not only save Howard Dean from himself, but America by extension. Do not expect lightning to strike the same place twice.
Anyway, I digress. Today was an opportunity for all employees to show off a little team pride by wearing the attire of their favorite MLB team to work. The occasion was a visit by MLB's Chief Operating Officer Bob DuPuy. The top choice teams, by an overwhelming margin?
Well, it wasn't the Mariners and the Rockies. What does it mean? You be the judge.
Pedroia and Jeter weren't on campus today, but they would've fit right in.
Obama's remarks were televised on all radio and television stations in Israel...
Now, I'm more than willing to chalk this up to a simple miscalculation by the editor: it's basically second nature to say all stations televised the speech without considering the medium. Makes you wonder though: how precisely could a radio station televise something?
The "Huh?" Moment of the Day is brought to you by the man who invented the concept of being "A Legend in His Own Mind", the announcer who loves fewer things more than hearing himself talk, Ken The Hawk Harrelson. Analyzing the swing of one Jack Cust for the Oakland Athletics, the Hawk-aroo sent even his most devout followers in search of a head to scratch when he dropped this line:
If he were about 115 years old, that movie The Natural would've been dedicated to him.
As Harry Doyle would say, "Dynamite drop-in. That broadcasting school has really paid off." You're still my boy Hawk, even if you hear what nobody is saying.
First, updating our top story from yesterday: Hummer's gonna make it after all! Okay, maybe a little bit too excited, but there will be a save of about 3000 jobs for the soon-to-be-ex GM brand, as a Chinese company has agreed to buy the obnoxiously fuel-inefficient minivan on 'roids line. Drinks at the Backer are on Rick Wagoner.
Moving on...a few things happened this weekend that made me feel old. Or more accurately, they made me acutely aware of the fact that I'm getting older, like it or not.
First, my sister got married this weekend in Chicago - gorgeous weather, wonderful ceremony, perfect union, wild and crazy after-party for the reception (and really, would the Heidkamps do it any other way? Of course not). I even tried to add to the specialness of the moment by educating the wedding party on the parallels between the wonderful adventure the happy couple was embarking on and the moving lessons of Up. I'd say the response was mixed between, "That was very sweet" and "pass me another beer."
The specialness of the occasion, and the fact that two more good friends from college are getting married this summer, while a third close buddy from high school is already married (and welcomed his first child) kind of hit me hard with the knowledge that - hey, ready or not, here comes the big stuff. For the longest time, big life-altering stuff like marriage, having kids, moving to far-off places (or better yet, trying to lock down a career) seemed a dozen worlds away. When I was 10, which would place me in the year 1995, maybe I'd think off to life as an adult some twenty years or so from now, but it was a pure fantasy. 2015? Yeah, sure, 2015 will be here one day. We'll all be flying around on HoverBoards, hydrating all our food, and we of course will no longer need roads. If only that were true. Then you turn around one day to find 13 years have passed, and we're probably not gonna be zipping through the sub-stratosphere in our HoverCars (dang!), but all those seminal moments that were out in the distance weren't that far after all. They also tend to pass by pretty quickly, so make sure to pay attention.
Another milestone got touched when Jay Leno signed off of The Tonight Show Friday. Now, since I'm not 63, the evening news and a touch of Jay are not regular appointment viewing for me; I can truthfully say I've never watched a completed episode of any late-night talk show, unless one includes The Daily Show on Comedy Central. But I do remember Johnny Carson and the passing of television's most famous comedy flagship from him to Leno, more vividly because of the Cheers episode that aired right around the transition which featured Cliff Clavin's gloriously stupid attempt to get one his jokes read by Carson on the air. (For those who don't remember, Cliff wound up in jail, and his mother hammed it up on Johnny's couch.) I was a young kid when that happened; now I'm a college graduate watching a gray-haired Jay hand off the show to Conan O'Brien, who's in the process of going bald in front of our eyes. If you think this has me catching myself with the wonder of how fast things recede into the rearview mirror, think of how my parent's generation, which came of age watching Johnny Carson, must feel. Not only is Carson dead, but the guy who replaced him was on the air for nearly two decades before retiring himself!
Time does indeed go by, ladies and gentleman. We've got to make the most of it, and I mean all of it, because it turns out we've got a lot less of it than we think.
A hearty congratulations to all of us, first and foremost. We good, honest, American taxpayers have just bought ourselves an auto manufacturer! (Awkward pause added here) I'm sure it has been a dream of every U.S. citizen to own a slice of General Motors, although we probably didn't imagine having to discontinue the Hummer in order to do it. This is another blow to the area surrounding my adopted college hometown of South Bend, as the central Hummer production plant was located in nearby Mishawaka. Historically the downfall of South Bend as a major industrial city coincided with the demise of the Studebaker in the the late '60s. Hopefully the loss of the international gas guzzler of choice will not produce a deeper sinkhole, because anybody who's been there knows South Bend needs all the help it can get...
With barely 14mpg highway, the Hummer can be green in color only.
It's interesting that the top 4 choices on the s&*t list are among some of the most successful managers in baseball history (Torre & LaRussa) as well as two World Series champions (Guillen & Pinella). It also gives one pause to see that Torre has enough of a duality about him to make both this list and the prior week's poll of the skip you'd most want to play for. (Laymen's terms: most players just picked the guy they'd heard a bunch of rumors about and called it a day.)
