40 thoughts on “August 17, 2020: Salon”

  1. Taking a moment to share a proud parent/mad parent weekend of my kid's baseball.

    I'll start with the mad parent portion. My son's team played for his age/level's state championship yesterday and they went into the last inning with a one-run lead. The other team tied it up and with a runner on third the batter hit a fly ball that our CF caught--as with most kids' sports everyone was cheering and it was generally chaos as the ball was caught. The poor kid on third was a deer in the headlights, the 3B coach had to yell and yell and yell for him to get back to 3rd to tag.

    Now, I didn't see this as it happened, but our entire coaching staff and a good chunk of our parents immediately started yelling about the 3B coach physically pushing the kid to get him to run home. He was safe, game over, the ump (understandably) didn't see it. The coach denied it, so what can you do. Just really disappointing if it happened, and I don't see how our coaches/fans would all react instantly if it didn't happen. Be a man, admit a mistake, and the game goes to extra innings, these are just kids.

    But the proud parent part more than makes up for it. Last year my kid was in the "let's just burn some innings to save our best pitchers" group and didn't pitch a single inning in the state tournament. This year something clicked and he figured out how to change speeds without sacrificing accuracy (he's not a hard thrower) and as the year went on the results were impossible to ignore, he just kept efficiently racking up great outings.

    So this weekend, he went out and threw a GD Maddux (only 5 innings due to 10-run rule) to help his team get the top seed. And the next day the coach chose him to start the State Championship game and he gave them 3 good innings and left with a tied game. But even better than that was all of our team parents coming over and telling me how great he's been playing and (more importantly) how amazing his attitude is on the mound and with his other teammates.

    Long post, but had to vent and brag.

  2. I am kind of enjoying the "screw it, I'm gonna let it go" method. I'm starting to develop a nice 'Vid flow.

      1. I definitely said that from a position of privilege of having a very full head of hair. The one thing its done, though, is highlight how gray I'm going, although I really like the streak of gray down the middle of my hobo beard.

    1. I was enjoying it for a while, but it was getting a bit ridiculous. My mother-in-law cut my hair, and while it wasn't a perfect hair cut, it was pretty damn good and I feel a lot better.

    2. Me too. I got a hair cut about March 10 and none since. I'm going for the Barry Melrose with a full (trimmed) beard instead of the goatee. Also, while I'm a graybeard, the top of my head doesn't have much gray.

    3. Man, I had a busy day in quarantine and missed this cup. Bummer. I had my fourth Covid buzz cut yesterday and I’m totally happy. Too hot here to go for the don’t give an eff.

      1. I saw that yesterday.

        You know you f'ed up when your own teammates are openly public with their displeasure for you.

        It's one thing when that is kept inside the clubhouse, but when someone is talking to a reporter going "Yeah, they're dumbasses and I'm hella pissed at them" is a whole nother level.

    1. Plesac seemingly did not help matters Thursday — the day before the team meeting — when he vented about the situation in an Instagram video. In the video he recorded while driving, Plesac confirmed that he broke curfew and also lamented that the media is “terrible” and does “evil things to create stories.” Indians manager Terry Francona told reporters he was “disappointed” with Plesac’s video.

      heh, kids.

      that said, i am still sooooooo thankful handcomputers and all that come with them didn't exist back when.

      1. Heh, yeah, I wish it were only kids playing the snowflake victim these days!

        The Lindor statement is a good one. I've been saying for a couple months now that it is rather hard to teach people empathy. That has been so borne out.

        1. There’s the victim thing too (and certainly it’s not isolated to dem dern millennials or whatever). I was also referring to the attempt to litigate all this on IG Live while driving. About as far from the proper forum as you can get.

      2. that said, i am still sooooooo thankful handcomputers and all that come with them didn't exist back when.

        I think about this a lot, I'm glad there wasn't a way to transmit my stupidity to the world.

  3. I emailed DPWY's commissioner regarding the open teams and found out there were actually four available. So there is at least one more team that does not contain bad Yankees that an interested part could take.

    1. And to answer hj's question, yes you can absolutely make trades. bjhess consistently makes some amazing trades and acquires guys I wish I knew were available.

        1. way back in my wasted youth of the mid-1990s, I was in an NBA fantasy league with a bunch of grad school friends. I was co-manager with two other buddies. We absolutely abused the waiver wire in this league to swap in and out guys based on short-term criteria (numbers of games, etc.) and ran away with the league. Other guys were pissed that we spent so much time on transactions. We specialized in stat-sheet fillers on bad teams.

          my main contribution to that league championship was in picking up Doug Christie when he was with the Raptors. That dude was gold for us.

        1. I'm pretty sure they were supposed to be a giveaway this season, so they probably will be available. AND I WANT ONE.

  4. I know teams have all kinds of endorsement deals with all kinds of companies, but it still struck me as amusing to hear that Hefty is "The official trash bag of the Chicago Cubs."

    Come to think of it, the Twins missed out on a deal back in the Metrodome days.

      1. It was colloquially called The Hefty Bag (might have been a Chris Berman term) I just remember a giant ad for Dodge Ram

Comments are closed.