Cup of Coffee

August 9, 2012: Half Mast

141 Comments

Sad news yesterday, as we learned that Tim Allen, one of the lead bloggers over at Canis Hoopus, took his own life. This CoC is dedicated to our friends over there at Canis Hoopus. May they find some peace in this trying time.

141 thoughts on “August 9, 2012: Half Mast”

  1. One of the things I love about listening to local morning radio is when the guy who does the sports report isn't really a sports guy and mispronounces the names. The losing pitcher for the Twins yesterday was apparently "Brian Doonsing."

    1. Then you'd love the local jazz station KBEM. They have high school students read both the news and sports. Rare is occasion when a public figure has their name pronounced correctly.

      1. Heh - you reminded my of the college-run station here at Lindenwood. Great entertainment value when the DJ tries to read "pedestrian" like "presbyterian"

      2. ahh, i loved KBEM. i considered going to north and entering into that program (i always thought the minneapolis high school magnet programs were a great idea, though i have nothing to compare them to). of course, that would mean that i had to go to north, which had less desirable aspects.

      3. One of my all-time favorites was when I heard former NFL coach Lindy Infante referred to as "Lindy Infant".

  2. This from Reusse today:

    Before Wednesday's first pitch, I sent an e-mail to General Manager Terry Ryan asking for the official version of why Gardenhire had said of Nishioka, "He's here to play.''

    Ryan's response was: "I am not sure what you are looking for. It is up to Gardy to make out the lineup with the 25 players available.''

    I know the Nishi thing has been beaten to death here and elsewhere on teh webz but no bertin' way is Gardy putting Nishi in the line-up under his own accord. For TR to suggest otherwise is just laughable.

    2. Fangraphs has Nishioka at -0.3 WAR through three games and that doesn't include his fielding "contribution" (he's at -14.9 UZR/150). SSST, but at -0.1 per game, if he plays the rest of the Twins schedule, his *on pace* for -5.4 WAR. Add in another, say -2.5 WAR for his fielding and I'm pretty sure he'd set some sort of record. Part of me that I wish I could suppress wants to see that train wreck.

      1. I'm not letting three games change my opinion of Nishi, just like I wouldn't if he went 6-for-12 with no errors or misplays. Of course, my opinion of him wasn't very high before he got here.

    3. SSS fun fact: Nishi has a -78 OPS+ despite the fact he has a 25 percent line-drive rate and a 7 percent K rate. He is 0-for-11 on bass in play with no IF popups. There's no "luck" involved with his defense, but he's been extremely unlucky in his first three games on offense.

            2. with such a shrimpy WAR, that urchin might soon find himself roeing back to japan.

                    3. seriously, quit carping on. someone filled with so much irrational hate probably has a mullet. just look into your sole and you will find tolerance.

                    9. I'd jump into this thread but I'm afraid of ending up with a shiner. I mean, some of those puns really smelt. Still, I am going to take credit for getting this whole ball rolling with my "Nishi sucks like a carp" comment.

                    10. If we're not careful, MagUidhir may leave us. After all, there are plenty more fish in the sea.

                    13. Mags, only a sucker would egg on a grouper like this by complaining. We are willing to sit on our collective perch and clown around just for the halibut. We're certainly no angels.

      2. I keep seeing tweets and comments etc that imply Nishi's been DFA'd or returned to Rochester.
        But it hasn't happened. I keep holding on for Sunday...

        Did Charlie Brown's dad ever take him to see Joe Shlabotnik play? Did he ever have tickets and have to worry that Shlabotnik wouldn't be around for the game?

        When is Plouffe! coming off the DL? Who's going back to Rochester to make room?
        The answers are Sunday and Nishi, aren't they?

        It's not like I want Nishi to play Friday or Saturday, but, ugggh... CER mentioned yesterday that Nishi wasn't with the team anymore to HPR, and I had to correct her that, he had just been called up, but had played very poorly in three games. So the seed's been planted that Nishi might be there, but also that he might be back in the minors "to learn to play better".

          1. I saw a rack full of Nishi shirseys when I went to a game last week, but they weren't marked down or anything.

            1. what are they waiting for?
              They're about three months from being sent to third-world countries with all those "World Champion Texas Rangers" shirts.

            2. I was at the State Fair and the Twins were trying to sell the recently departed _elm_n jerseys at $50 a pop. Good luck with that.

        2. According to Gleeman, it appears that Nishi is safe until Plouffe! comes off the DL, at least.

          1. Best news I've heard all day!
            (Don't come back on Sunday, Plouffe!.
            I think for once Phil and I want the same thing for Plouffe!.)

    4. I'm not so sure. After all, Gardy has done some strange things with the lineup before.

    5. Ryan reiterated today that it is Gardy's decision to play him or not. No word if that is a policy change since the Nishibacle in Cleveland or not.

    6. “He had one game where he played reasonably well, and the other two were a disaster,” Ryan said. “OK, so now it’s up to me and [Manager Ron Gardenhire]. We’ve got to decide what to do, and we’ll make that decision, and we’ve got to first figure out what’s going on with [Trevor] Plouffe, and then we’ll go from there.”

            1. What was your process for getting the mugshots? I have the feeling it would be easy to automate parts of it.

              1. Go to the 40-man roster page on mlb.com, click on each player, save mugshot with new filename.
                Search milb.com for same players, see if I can find any minor-league mugs.
                I had a few sites I used for one or two year-old mugshots, but I can't recall what they were. I know that the two-year-old mugs came from a Japanese or Korean site.

                Google image search for the more interesting players, see what else I could find...

                Then, scan through them, decide which players I wanted to look at, bulk upload them, copy the URL of the files and fix them (wordpress bulk uploader was very wonky then), then edit the whole thing in a text file, carefully arranging the files, adding spaces and resizing nonstandardly sized files, trying not to make the same joke for each player with bloodshot eyes and vacant expression, etc, etc.

                I really wished someone else, like a pro columnist, would have had a similar idea. I did as good as I could, and burned myself out a bit.

    2. I was reading an article about his "bad attitude" or whatever and the writer brought up Visa problems that had delayed his arrival at spring training more than once. Well, maybe, but one late report was because his brother had died in a car accident right before he was about to return to the US.

    2. I am so happy my dog can't text. I don't need hundreds of "BACON!" and "Bird?" texts every day.

  7. Have any of you conny-sewers had a taste of this stuff from Summit? I'd like to get something special for the weekend and I think this could be worth the extra calories. I had an actual Trappist ale from Belgium many years ago that was delicious (albeit spendy) but I don't recall the name. That was the only time I can remember having to decant a beer.

    1. You should buy it even though your link doesn't work.

      I assume you're talking about the belgian abby style in the unchained series. The boys at summit have really delievered with the unchained series, and I have it on good authority that they out did themselves on this one, but my friend has lied to me several times in the past.

        1. if it's the abbey, then, yeah, i grabbed a sixer when i was in winona recently. i thought it was quite tasty. i think i like ommegang's version better, but it was a masterful brew nonetheless.

          1. I'm guessing that they'd have to really, really try to beat Ommegang. I mean, I love me some summit, but I loves me some ommegang.

            1. yeah, their abbey is fabulous. there was a TJ's by my house that was selling the big bottles for about $4.50. unfortunately they caught wise after a few months and bumped it up to $8.

    2. Twayn, if you are decanting a beer you are doing it wrong. Unless there is something seriously wrong with the beer, that yeast in the bottom is flavor.

      1. Well, it was many years ago (Cedar Rapids days, right after college) and I remember the waiter telling me to pour it slow, so I assumed that was a thing with that kind of beer. Always happy to have more expert guidance, though.

  8. Mo chailín and I are still looking for jobs. So far we've been looking all over the place at jobs we're really interested in. We're thinking of changing tack and just picking a city and finding OKish jobs there. The Twin Cities are high on the list. The question I have is 1) how is the job market generally up there and 2) are there any good local job sites that are TC-centric to look at?

      1. I haven't heard yet. Both I and my parents have been out of town since I sent in the app. They got home today, so hopefully there's something on the answering machine or in the mail for me.

        Thanks for putting in a good word with your friend for me. I appreciate the help.

    2. My experience with the Twin Cities job market has been that I'm able to find decent temp jobs that pay the bills, but am unable to find any permanent positions in my field. But I am generally applying to writing/editing jobs that are highly competitive even in the best of times, so you might have better luck than I do.

      The sites that I use most often:
      indeed.com
      jobsinminneapolis.com
      minnesotanonprofits.org/jobs

    3. I know you can feel the current of the mighty mississippi pulling you to New Orleans. If I take the offer in LA Dr. Chop may need a roomate....

      1. I did apply to a job with the Louisiana state museum in New Orleans. As long as there's room for me and the lady, we might be on to something.

        1. Well, the house is pretty sweet, but we have a vicious (toothless and declawed) house cat.

  9. Great, everyone and their brother must be trying to access the Women's gold medal soccer game from their computer. 10 minutes to game time and it's a lot of buffering.

      2. I watched a highlight clip of the semi-final match with Canada and for every single goal, all Brandi said was "oohhh".

  10. Souhan: after watching Kevin Love play in the Olympics, he's better than I thought.

    Now, I don't know what Souhan thought, but I'm pretty sure he's a top ten player in the NBA.

    2. well, that answers the question 'do sports opinion writers watch the teams they are giving opinions about?'

  11. Well, I did call to inquire about the job. Philosofette is currently scheduled to begin classes in a master program in a few weeks. I explained that having more information about the position would be important for our ability to plan out the next several months, given the schooling thing. They seemed to understand, and passed on word to the person who would know about such things, along with my phone number, which would be a pretty strong indication that a call is appreciated. We'll see what happens I guess.

        1. Did you see his semi-final run? High-larious. Well ahead of everyone after the turn and then jogged to a first place finish. I'm looking forward to the final that NBC will surely wait until midnight to air.

            1. Wonder if it's the same one. I thought it was a semi-final, but honestly don't remember. It's so much fun watching him run.

                1. are you sure? I could have sworn that there were at least two rounds prior to today.

        2. OK, now aired in US. Heck, I'll spoiler it anyways,

          Spoiler SelectShow

  13. Holy cow Hope Solo! Does anyone else wish the U.S. lead was 2 goals and not 1 right now? Yikes!

      2. someone else can do some work with this: Pia Sundhage!!! (credit to mrsS for the concept)

    1. It seems reasonable. However, the third baseman seems a bit far from the bag when he would have clearly seen Collier running to third. Also, why try to get Collier at third instead of Womack running to first? B-R lists the play in question as "Groundout: SS-2B/Forceout at 2B; Collier to 3B; Womack to 1B". Shortstop to second baseman... to third baseman? Okay, this isn't looking so reasonable.

    2. I don't see any record of the Mets having worn blue jerseys with white & black piping. Could this be a Spring Training? They both are Grapefruit League.

    3. To add to Sean & Magoo's complaints.
      The alleged 6-28-97 game started at 7:05 PM in Pittsburgh and the alleged play was in the 8th inning.
      Yet the photo has bright sun and near-noon shadows.

      Dressed to the nines isn't perfect, but it doesn't show a black alternate for 1997.

      The game was spring training.

      1. SportsLogos.net shows the alternate uni's and practice jerseys. They're all variations of black. Unfortunately, there's no practice jersey listed for the late 90s.

    4. That is not the plate umpire. Where is his mask/helmet? It would be in his left hand if it were.

      1. Out of curiosity - is holding it in your left hand something they teach you at ump school? I would think a righty would hold it in his/her right hand.

        1. Yeah. Indicator and mask are both in your left hand, leaving your right hand free. I suppose it's possible a veteran holds it in his right in that situation, but its unlikely.

  15. do you ever wonder if sometimes fountain drinks are mislabeled? I went to Subway for lunch and poured a Coke. When I took a drink, it tasted like Diet Coke.

    3. They probably hooked it up wrong when the machine ran out of Coke. It probably happens quite often.

    4. I switched out the drinks at my old restaurant. It just takes one unobservant kid to make the mistake, so there you go. Once a machine runs out of a certain drink, it's on the present staff to set up a new box in the back. Mistakes probably happen a lot.

  16. it's usually a lot of nondescript hoses going to sparsely labeled cardboard boxes. if things aren't designated properly, it could be pretty easy to mix up.

  17. 800M won by a Masai tribesman with a world record speed. In post-race interview, somehow manages to say "Coming in, I expected to win"* with tons of humility.

    *Paraphrase.

  18. I wonder how the Triple Jump came about. Was a single jump to easy? Were the jumpers flying out of the sand pit, so organizers told the people you need to jump three times?

    2. I dunno. I completely see it in the whole long-jump, kids betting over who can jump further thing.

    3. There's gotta bet a better way to televise jumping events though...
      Seems more like late-season sportscenter recaps of Royals or Pirates games.

      1. I think there was full coverage earlier in the day on one of the KableTown properties

  19. So apparently the Dwightmare is over? Why do teams take crap deals from the Lakers for excellent players?

    I hope Pekovic eats Dwight alive on the court.

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