Monthly Archives: March 2020

Earth Day Every Day

The Footprints of the Windigo

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As I mentioned last week, I've been reading Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer. A passage caught my attention as I was riding the bus to work this morning, and I thought it might be an interesting way to approach this month's conversation.

Kimmerer talks about stories about the Windigo--a legendary monster with a heart made of ice that's insatiably hungry and is a cannibal that becomes more ravenous the more it eats. Say says, "It shrieks with its craving, its mind a torture of unmet want. Consumed by consumption, it lays waste to humankind." She doesn't bring this up, but I want to point out that while there are a number of stories about the Windigo in popular culture, they don't stay true to the stories the Anishinaabe people tell. (For more on that, check this out.)

Kimmerer says the following in reference to the footprints of the Windigo:

They're everywhere you look. They stomp in the industrial sludge of Onondaga Lake. And over a savagely clear-cut slope in the Oregon Coast Range where the early is slumping into the river. You can see them where coal mines rip off mountaintops in West Virginia and in oil-slick footprints on the beaches of the Gulf of Mexico. A square mile of industrial soybeans. A diamond mine in Rwanda. A closet stuffed with clothes that forces to read this article. Windigo footprints all, they are the tracks of insatiable consumption. So many have been bitten. You can see them walking the malls, eying your farm for a housing development, running for Congress.

We are all complicit. We've allowed the 'market' to define what we value so that the redefined common good seems to depend on profligate lifestyles that enrich the sellers while impoverishing the soul and the earth.

I'd love thought on this passage as well as thoughts on how you think about consumption in your own life.

Keeping Track

1991 Rewind: Game One Hundred Fifty-four

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MINNESOTA 5, TORONTO 0 IN TORONTO

Date:  Saturday, September 28.

Batting stars:  Gene Larkin was 2-for-3 with a walk and a stolen base, his second.  Kirby Puckett was 2-for-5.  Chili Davis was 1-for-2 with two walks.

Pitching star:  Jack Morris pitched a complete game shutout, giving up six hits and three walks and striking out four.  He threw 121 pitches.

Opposition star:  Roberto Alomar was 2-for-4 with a double.

The game:  There was no score through four.  The Twins had two on with none out in the second, but a double play took them out of the inning.  The Blue Jays had two on with two out in the third and again in the fourth, but could not score.

The Twins broke through in the fifth.  Davis led off with a walk, Shane Mack had a one-out single, and Greg Gagne delivered a two-run double.  The Twins later put men on second and third with two out and Chuck Knoblauch had a two-run single, putting the Twins up 4-0.

That was pretty much it, really.  Toronto drew a couple of walks in the sixth but could do nothing with them.  The Twins added a run in the ninth when Mack was hit by a pitch, was bunted to second, took third on a wild pitch, and scored on Newman's bunt single.

WP:  Morris (18-12).  LP:  Tom Candiotti (13-13).  S:  None.

Notes:  Larkin was in right field, with Mack in left and Dan Gladden on the bench.  Larkin also batted leadoff.  He's obviously not someone you'd think of as a leadoff batter, but in 17 plate appearances there in 1991, he batted .385/.471/.538, and that will certainly work out of the leadoff spot.  For his career, he batted .339/.447/.516 in 76 plate appearances while batting first.  A small sample size, to be sure, but I think I might have put him there more often to see if he could keep it going.

Newman played third base in place of Mike Pagliarulo and Scott Leius.  Jarvis Brown pinch-ran for Larkin in the seventh and stayed in the game in right field.  Pedro Munoz pinch-hit for Kent Hrbek in the ninth.  Paul Sorrento came in to play first base in the ninth.

Puckett raised his average to .322.  Brian Harper was 1-for-4 and was batting .314.  Mack was 1-for-3 and was batting .306.  Morris lowered his ERA to 3.50.

Leading 4-0 in the ninth, the Twins laid down two bunts.  Apparently back in 1991 the unwritten rules allowed this.  I don't know if they allow it today.  I tried to check, but since the unwritten rules are, well, unwritten, I couldn't find anything.

Toronto used seven pitchers in the game, three of them in the ninth inning.

The White Sox beat Seattle 5-2 to keep their slim playoff hopes alive.

Record:  The Twins were 92-62, in first place in the American League West, eight games ahead of Chicago.  They had clinched a tie for the division, and their magic number was now one.

Boston lost, so Toronto continued to lead the East by 3.5 games.

Keeping Track

Happy Birthday–March 9

Billy Southworth (1893)
Myril Hoag (1908)
Phil Seghi (1909)
Joe Paparella (1909)
Arky Vaughan (1912)
Jackie Jensen (1927)
Ron Kline (1932)
Jim Landis (1934)
Bert Campaneris (1942)
John Curtis (1948)
Darrel Chaney (1948)
Wendell Kim (1950)
Terry Mulholland (1963)
Benito Santiago (1965)
Vince Horsman (1967)
Aaron Boone (1973)
C. J. Nitkowski (1973)
Koyie Hill (1979)
Craig Stammen (1984)
Daniel Hudson (1987)

Phil Seghi was in baseball most of his life, serving as Cleveland Indians general manager from 1973-1985.

American League umpire Joe Paparella holds the record for most games umpired in a season, 176 in 1962.

The late Wendell Kim was a major league coach and minor league manager for many years.

Continue reading Happy Birthday–March 9 →

Keeping Track

1991 Rewind: Game One Hundred Fifty-three

TORONTO 7, MINNESOTA 2 IN TORONTO

Date:  Friday, September 27.

Batting star:  Paul Sorrento was 1-for-4 with a home run, his third.

Pitching star:  Kevin Tapani pitched seven innings, giving up three runs on six hits and three walks and striking out five.

Opposition stars:  Juan Guzman struck out nine in eight innings, giving up two runs on three hits and three walks.  Dave Parker was 2-for-2 with two doubles and a walk. Kelly Gruber was 2-for-3 with  a walk, a stolen base (his eleventh), and two runs.

The game:  It was close most of the way.  Devon White led off the bottom of the first with a triple and scored on Roberto Alomar's single to put the Blue Jays up 1-0.  They later had men on first and third, but could not score again.  The Twins tied it in the fourth.  Kirby Puckett and Kent Hrbek drew one-out walks and Brian Harper had an RBI single to make the score 1-1.  The Twins had men on first and second, but could not score again.

Toronto took the lead back in the bottom of the fourth.  Gruber singled, Candy Maldonado walked, and Parker delivered an RBI double to make it 2-1 Blue Jays.  They had men on second and third with one out, but could not score again.  The Twins tied it in the seventh when Sorrento led off with a home run, making it 2-2.

Toronto took the lead back in the bottom of the seventh.  Parker led off with a double, was bunted to third, and scored on a sacrifice fly to make it 3-2 Blue Jays.  Toronto then put the game away in the eighth.  With two out and none on, John Olerud doubled, Gruber was intentionally walked, and Maldonado was accidentally walked, loading the bases.  Mookie Wilson then delivered a bases-clearing double and came around to score on a Pat Borders single, putting the Blue Jays up 7-2.  The Twins went down in order in the ninth.

WP:  Guzman (9-2).  LP:  Tapani (16-9).  S:  None.

Notes:  Randy Bush played right field in place of Shane Mack.  He batted first, with Dan Gladden dropped to the seventh spot.  Sorrento was the DH in place of Chili Davis.  For a change, the Twins did not use their bench at all.

Puckett was 1-for-3 with a walk and was batting .321.  Harper was 1-for-4 and was batting .314.  Tapani's ERA went to 2.90.

I had completely forgotten that Dave Parker ended his career in Toronto.  They signed him as a free agent on September 14 and he played thirteen games for them.

The White Sox lost to Seattle 10-8, so the Twins crept closer to clinching.

Record:  The Twins were 91-62, in first place in the American League West, eight games ahead of Chicago.  The Twins' magic number was two.

Boston lost to Milwaukee, so the Blue Jays now led the East by 3.5 games.

Keeping Track

Happy Birthday–March 8

Harry Lord (1882)
Pat Flaherty (1897)
Bobby Goff (1902)
Pete Fox (1909)
Ray Mueller (1912)
Al Gionfriddo (1922)
Carl Furillo (1922)
Jim Bouton (1939)
Jacques Doucet (1940)
Dick Allen (1942)
Jim Rice (1953)
John Butcher (1957)
Mark Salas (1961)
Lance Barksdale (1967)
Mike Moriarty (1974)
Juan Encarnacion (1976)
Hines Ward (1976)

If you have a few minutes to spare, I would very much recommend reading Harry Lord’s biography at baseball-reference.com.

Pat Flaherty pitched in the minors from 1917-1921.  He also played in the NFL from 1923-1928, was a major in the Air Force, and appeared in about 250 movies from 1934 to the 1950s.

Bobby Goff played in the minor leagues for nineteen years, 1923-1941.  He also was a minor league manager and general manager and a major league scout, remaining in baseball until 1972.

Jacques Doucet was the French-language play-by-play announcer for the Montreal Expos from 1972 until the team left.

Lance Barksdale has been a major league umpire since 2000.

NFL star Hines Ward was drafted by the Florida Marlins in 1994, but did not sign.

Continue reading Happy Birthday–March 8 →