We may not care, but somebody does. I really don’t know who I’m rooting for, and may not until there’s a key moment and I realize that I was pulling one way or the other. On the one hand, I usually pick the American League team by default. On the other hand, Verlander, FK that guy. Plus, I still have a hard time thinking of the Astros as an American League team. Back when I was a boy I had Joe Morgan’s Colt 45’s card – hey you kids, get off my lawn!
On the other hand, ex-A’s Suzuki and Doolittle are good guys to root for. But if I see one shot of Brett Cavanaugh in the stands…even just knowing that he’s cheering in front of his tv may be enough to derail that. I’m just hoping to see some great pitching and just enough timely offense to make it entertaining.
In the meantime, some good news from the AFL to get us excited for next year.
Which team has the fewer rapists/abusers?
This whole story about the Astro’s assistant GM going all Men’s Rights in the locker room is tipping me further to the Nats. The whole story is just a clusterFK for now good reason that I can see.
Wow, I hadn’t seen anything about that. It may not exactly answer ptbnl’s question regarding the total number of them, but if Houston is celebrating that they have even one, that’s a whole new level of disgusting.
this guy works at (owns?) 1234 go records, likes the a’s, and is astute.
but somehow isn’t on FK. i don’t get it.
Wow
I am genuinely interested in how they are going to make it worse
Domestic violence conviction survivors’ night.
Maybe he should join his coworker on the unemployment line.
So what you’re saying is he definitely should join his coworker on the unemployment line.
Some people never need a good reason to demonstrate that they are assholes. Go Not Astros.
If they win game 3 we will now have a new legend of the Taubman curse.
I’m excited that our system includes a guy named Jhenderson.
I semi-inadvertantly have $20 on the Astros to win the series, but I’m still rooting for the Nats.
Lol Douche
can you keep your glove on a runner if you don’t have the ball?
Yes unless it’s Adrian Beltre’s head.
Dooooo!
Oh.
What a MORAN.
Ha ha ha ha ha … FK Verlander.
The sheer effrontery to not give him two extra inches off the black.
Sadly didn’t last beyond the 1st.
I swear FOX must have a mic inside of the home plate ump’s mask.
Kurt!
Kurt!
Followed by the complementary strike-out-of-the-zone call.
Bregman for Nats MVP.
this dude’s honestly my decent follow of the week:
I just got to see the Charlize Theron Tricky commercial. Ive missed seeing it every 10 minutes or so daily.
Charlize could probably get me to quit my job, abandon my family and friends, and do almost anything for her. Except drink Bud Copper Lager.
Are we talking once or are we talking about drinking it often?
I would say often as I did have half a bottle of it once while they were doing a test. It was free and I am still alive-that is literally all I can say about it.
This is an excellent, damning take placing the Taubmann grossness squarely in the culture of the Astros front office.
https://deadspin.com/the-astros-are-not-in-the-apology-business-1839306352
I love Roth.
The most obnoxious thing to me is that the Astros obviously decided that getting Osuna was a good move because his domestic violence issues made him undervalued in baseball terms. They decided to take on the negative aspects of Osuna in order to get Osuna the baseball player at a reduced price, making what I’m sure people of Taubman’s ilk think is an unimpeachably rational decision to maximize shareholder value.
But they obviously also feel as though it is illegitimate or unfair to criticize them for making that decision so long as the baseball is working out reasonably well. (Also, it is bizarre that the moment Taubman chose to lash out in defense of the move to get Osuna was immediately following Osuna choking and getting bailed out by his teammates.)
That last part has been the one that really has not made sense to me. In my more trollish moments I could see me yelling out about some decision that was criticized but worked out. But Osuna has had issues a lot and had literally just blown the save. That was not the time or place to be singing his praises, however small they may be.
Not counting on much more good stuff coming out of Deadspin.
Yeah, Ratto got snarky about that too. I glance at Deadspin once in a while, mostly following links from here, but I certainly don’t read it avidly.
I’ve been an avid reader, the only non-news website I check more than once a day. Don’t know what will fill the huge “sports funnies” void Deadspin’s impending collapse will bring.
No “I’m out” post yet from Roth, but it sounds like he’s gone too.
Having been part of a few blogpocalypses in my day, this sucks big daddy balls. But I’ll get over it. Most lasting harm for me will be having to join Twitter so I can follow wherever Magary and Burneko and Moskovitz wind up.
And there it is
“In order to run a journalistic outfit, you need to care about journalism, because journalists are annoying as hell.
https://slate.com/business/2019/11/deadspin-roundtable-barry-petchesky-megan-greenwell-tom-ley.html
Also Drew popped up on Vice today.
OK Leicester City. We get it. You’re good.
First ever premier league game where both keepers are sons of premier league keepers.
Can’t go wrong with the Schmeichel brand name. Gunn I’m not so sure about.
This is a savage beating.
Father-and-son keepers who have both conceded 7 in a premier league match is rarefied company.
Gotta love his team conceding a penalty in the 93rd minute down 0-8.
Vardy and Perez get to fight for the ball.
One more and we’re in Ipswich Town territory.
Really good. Extremely impressive team.
Ah, that slooooow Greinke curveball is a thing of beauty.
Feels like an A’s game: lots of baserunners, 0-fer-w/RISP.
1 – 3:43
2 – 4:01
3 – 4:03
If it’s the A’s I can handle that, but don’t ask me to devote that kind of time to Astros vs. Senators Games 1-3. Games 6 and 7 if it goes that far, yeah I’ll probably watch.
4 – 3:48
Though Rodney’s appearance undoubtedly spared many from sitting through the whole thing.
Watching that would have been preferable to staring at the bloody shredded unrecognizable chunk of roadkill that serves as Cal’s offense.
I looked up A’s vs. Reds in 1972. Game 7 was by far the longest at 2:50. That pushed the average up to 2:24, because every other game was between 2:06 and 2:26.
I was interested to learn that this excellent New Yorker cover on the topic was created by an Englishman.
Argh. No. The games used to, in my lifetime, be almost twice as fast, for the same amount of baseball. There is no reason for a 9 inning game to take 4 hours. Signed, guy who likes baseball.
Go back to 90 second between inning break. More than half the ad space is geared to sell other shows (and future games) and their ad space. Then other half is largely repetitive. And you can get more attention by staying with the game with showing the ads on screen so that people stay in their seats rather than run off to the bathroom. Doing that will easily eliminate a good half hour of time from the clock.
A Game 7 would bail Fox out a little bit, but man has the World Series lost a lot of eyeballs in the last couple of decades. The 1989 World Series was a ratings bomb, being considered of local interest only and completely overshadowed of course, yet about twice as many viewers watched those four games as have watched the first four games of the current Series.
Comparing the World Series to the Super Bowl is apples and oranges, about 4 hours in one day vs. maybe 14-25 hours over 4-7 days, but Super Bowl viewership generally climbed slowly but steadily for the first 50 years. There’s been some dropoff the last few years, possibly due to negative publicity around the NFL with certain politicians piling on, but that audience is still somewhat larger than it was 20 or 30 years ago.
The break times between action hurt sports.
This is just FKing sad.
Also, proof that the Nationals still haven’t gained much of a foothold in the D.C. area:
Well this certainly won’t help ratings.
no more catcher signs. earpieces
I’m done for that. I don’t even mind all players and coaches being able to utilize it. No more signs to steal. Everyone on the same page. Expedite pretty much everything. Then you could enforce a rule where the pitcher needed to be replaced if a coach came to the mound, period.
Sam Miller broke down why the games were so long.
Most of it is game-related (more mid-inning pitching changes, more deliberate pitchers, deeper counts), but 17 minutes of it is from longer ad breaks.
If all he’s getting is 17 minutes, then he’s not accounting for what’s truly necessary. Because they could easily save 30 minutes from that. But 17 minutes is an exceptionally long time that should be addressed before any in game changes.
17 minutes is based on each break being 50 seconds longer than during the regular season.
Gotcha. Imagine if they stuck to 90 seconds between innings. Fewer ads for other shows and few ads for future games. Then they can get far more creative by having ads between pitches when nothing is going on and you have dedicated eyes. Then you can add an additional 30 seconds to that post season or network/premium games. You’d save a huge chunk of time there. More sub 3hr games. Adding in the robo ump with the original strike zone would gain you fewer deeper counts, more swings, more action, and a faster paced game. Even if they keep these shitty balls for more homers.
“The car wash came about because I’m a larger-than-life character and entertainer, so people are always interested in anything and everything I do. Why not make a tourist attraction that also offers a service?” . (Note: link goes to Adelson News)
“Canseco will occupy a dunk tank.” Career arc checks out.
Rodney…
And now starring in the role of Rocky Balboa, Tyson Ross’s little brother Joe.
He may not go the full 15 rounds.
O’Dowd class of ’11
i was doing some webarcheology and found some astroarchelogy.
http://www.siloam.net
Farhan, if you are not going to hire Geren, you should absolutely hire Gabe Kapler.
They passed on Kotsay, according to John Shea.
I am totally psyched for the cognitive dissonance Giants fans are about to experience.
They mostly seem pretty pissed about this.
The NBA has replay challenges now. Yuck.
Outfielders, get ‘yer red hot outfielders here!
Score one for California.
That came to bipartisan unanimity with shocking speed. Even this bozo joined in.
He had a quote the other day along the lines of “I don’t ordinarily look to California for smart public policy ideas but this is one they’re right about for a change.”
…
Christ, what an asshole.
I was going to make a Tar Heels joke here to provoke FSU, but it turns out Sen. Burr is a Demon Deacon (from “R.J. Reynolds High School”!)
Wake Forest, proudly representing amateurishness since 1834.
For some reason, I just wouldn’t expect a baseball player, like Mike Young, to speak out like this. He pretty much nailed it.
Please please please don’t let Verlander win another series clinching postseason game. Really any outcome besides that would be ok.
Hopefully there will be more pressure tonight to have a fair and appropriate strike zone after this nonsense. That improves the odds of a Verlander failure.
It’s remarkable that he still hasn’t won a WS game.
Doing live interviews with managers during game action in the World Series is absurd. Treating it like it’s a spring training game.
Chris Singleton wanted Strasburg to stick one in Bregman’s ribs in that last inning. I’d guess Smoltsie wasn’t quite as emphatic about it but felt the same way. Even Nolan Ryan probably wouldn’t have objected.
Soto with the better solution.
Neither of the first base coaches wanted anything to do with that stuff.
These two teams open the Grapefruit League against each other, if you’re wondering.
I don’t know about that call.
I remember looking up all the rules on the Benintendi baserunning call during Manaea’s no-hitter and would have to refresh my memory, but I don’t agree with an interference call on that.
This replay review is…extensive.
I think they iced the field goal kicker.
So supposedly that play is not reviewable but the headsets were used to let New York read the rule to the umps. And only because the Nats were protesting the game? That doesn’t add up. And then Martinez got hot because they said it wasn’t protestable because it was an ump’s judgement…but his protest, per Buck, was because the rule was mis-applied. Hmm…
Apparently the italicized part is what they are relying on to back up the umpires.
It conflicts somewhat with the immediately-subsequent comment in the rule book, and the physics of the base being in fair territory.
How about just letting them run a straight line between where they leave the box and the base? Like that’s hard?
This just makes no sense. By the time the ball got there, Turner was square with the base and his foot was almost on it. The route he took to get there had no apparent effect on the play, and he did nothing unnatural to interfere with Gurriel.
“In the umpire’s mistaken judgment…”
Let’s get one final opinion and call it a night.
Ball don’t lie
Chip Hale needed all his strength to keep Martinez from committing umpicide there.
That was as angry as I’ve seen anyone on a ballfield since George Brett.
Milton Bradley is offended by your casual dismissal.
I forgot to add Chip Hale to the ex-A’s equation.
If nothing else, no W for Verlander.
What baseball really really does not need to end this clusterfuck of a postseason is some Astro hitting a grand slam in the bottom of the ninth for a 6-5 win.
If I was a batter, I’d be annoyed by that long lace off the pitcher’s glove.
guys, guys. trumpires.
amirite???
Anyone interested in meeting up for game 7 – Triple Rock?
October has seen too much of Brandon Taubman and CIVAL WAR, and even today when I looked at something on Twitter and saw “Josh Hamilton” trending I cringed. Yay for Game 7, and Baseball, please don’t embarrass yourself tonight.
Hmm, Trump-Pence 2020 sprung for an anti-impeachment ad during Game 7.
Reno just got a second one during the local break (“Donald Trump is MY PRESIDENT!”). Tom Steyer has been advertising in Nevada for a while but I haven’t noticed much if anything from any other Democrats.
Those Ukrainian campaign contributions aren’t going to spend themselves.
Giving Greinke the Verlander zone I see
He got jobbed on ball 3 to Soto, though, I have to admit.
Routine play for Matt Chapman.
Wowie Kendrick!
That dugout celebration was pretty epic.
He said something to get a seven-second delay bleep as he crossed the plate, probably not “Wowie!”
howie kendrick doesn’t appear to know how to drive a stick
Mixed feelings about that. Is there a 5-year statute of limitations on being an Angel?
Depends. Were they an asshole before, during, or after being an Angel? If yes, 5 years is more than enough. If not, never.
I don’t recall anything assholish about him as an Angel or otherwise. His .665 career OPS vs. the A’s is one of his lowest against any team, and he only has a .599 OPS in 257 career PA at the Coliseum. Overall career OPS is .768.
Yes, sucking against the A’s is a plus in Howie’s column.
Agreed.
It may not work but I find no fault in Hinch’s strategy to use Cole early if needed or late to close.
The biggest win this postseason has delivered to me is introducing Juan Soto, what a fun guy to watch.
Astros bullpen had the 2nd best ERA, and 3rd best WPA this year.
Nats bullpen had the 2nd worst ERA, worst WPA.
He gave postgame interviews wearing a hat with the Boras logo on it. Incredible.
The visitors-win-seven-straight angle is memorably quirky, but the really remarkable feat is the Nationals’ 5-0 record in elimination games despite trailing in each one. That’s the drama that made this otherwise mediocre postseason great.
Wait…you can win in an elimination game? Has anyone told Billy?
When someone tells him, also tell him it involves signing guys like Max Scherzer and Patrick Corbin and extending guys like Stephen Strasburg.
Now what are we supposed to do?
Watch the WarriorsActually I got nuthin.
And the Sharks look awful too.
Great card in the Breeders Cup Saturday, which I recognize is especially retrograde these days.
Got beat all day long until Vino Rosso came thru in the last to make it a wash.
114 days until the first spring training game.
college basketball — go Bearcats!
You spelled “Tar Heels” wrong.
Monster debut for our frosh guard Cole Anthony.
yeah, that was a lot of points
Not an awesome start of the season for Cincinnati against Ohio State and neither team could shoot at all. OSU doesn’t look like a team with a #18 ranking.
We will pay you all the fermented cabbage you can eat.
https://mobile.twitter.com/drewmagary/status/1189871566655504389
Yikes
Curious to see what Doolittle will do vis Nationals visit to White House
I saw he already declined.
The last of the two-way
playersgroundskeepers.“Wood says he’s so attuned to the sea level that he can tell whether it’s high tide by the moisture on the field.”
I say bring the mound with him. It’s a good mound and I’m sure there will be cause to remove it from time to time for other events.
no Kurt , no
God damn it.
So sad.
That photo is beyond disturbing. On way too many levels for my brain to comprehend.
i didn’t want to post it.
I don’t even get what “joke” Trump is going for. Other than “ha ha, I get to treat other people’s bodies like objects for my amusement and no one can do anything about it.”
did you watch the video or just see the still? what trump is doing is different in the two versions.
HOWEVER
the hat was premeditated. and getting the mic was prearranged so he could put it on (obviated by the follow-up from the person occupying the job of president, who says exactly the opposite of what’s true in situations like this). and kurt followed through.
so that’s that (as far as my regarding him with any nostalgic warmth goes).
the intercept in a nugget: “Moro secretly and unethically collaborated with the Car Wash prosecutors to help design the case against Lula despite serious internal doubts about the evidence supporting the accusations, only for him to then pretend to be its neutral adjudicator.”
yikes…
they gave him a Nationals jersey, a WHITE nationals jersey
re sign anderson
He probably will (and should) be 3rd of the 3, but that’s still much better than I was expecting.
What do we think a Semien extension looks like, assuming it buys out the last arbitration year?
I will not be offended by a bregman win
Both Kevin Kouzmanoff and Adam Rosales are coaches with the Arizona Rookie League teams. Kouz is specifically a “hitting coach”, while Rosie, who tweeted his retirement today in connection with this announcement, is just listed as a “coach”.
They have also hired an organizational “throwing performance coach”, Casey Upperman of Rotational Athlete Solutions, which “(provides) athletes the training that covers skill, biomechanics, strength and conditioning, nutrition and mental emotional strength through the use of state of the art technology and methods.” RAS works with golfers as well as baseball players, so even if all the pitchers get hurt again maybe he can at least help Ken and Vince with their golf games.
Wild one going on right now between Chelsea and Ajax in the Champions League. Ajax up 4-2 in London, but just took two simultaneous red cards plus a penalty.
4-3 now, and playing 9 on 11 for 20 minutes.
That was an amazing triple jeopardy.
– Foul, advantage played.
– Handball in the area, penalty given.
– Booking for the original foul, 2nd yellow so player sent off
– Booking for the handball, 2nd yellow and off.
Very harsh, but I do like seeing them punished for some really egregious tactical fouling they did in the first half. You just can’t play like that once you take yellows.
is it me, or are a lot of people deliberately misreading bill gates’ interview?
Not sure what led up to this, but Greenwald calls this guy a “coward” five times and the guy attacks him on live tv.
the translation there is Nunes used Glenn’s kids to attack him about the Vaza Jato story.
i’m not up to date on all that.
I wasn’t up on “Vaza Jato,” but I guess it is the name being used for Greenwald’s publication of leaks calling into question the fairness of the Lava Jato (“car wash”) investigation that brought down Lula and a bunch of others.
lemme put together some vague pod memories…
candidate bolsonaro: judges, if you’re listening…
judge moro: i’m investigating lula for corruption
lula: but now that means i can’t run for president
brazil: which sucks, because we’d prolly elect you
president bolsonaro: yo moro, how’d you like to be minister of justice?
minister moro: thanks boss!
(unrelatedly, Greenwald’s gringo accent is pretty funny, not that I’m one to talk)
i can’t fathom outputting portugese. it’s so slidey slippery. i fall all over the place inventing sounds that don’t belong.
i can only receive it.
Schiff is good.
only the worst people
Being aggressively dumb and willing to humiliate yourself is now the most reliable path to advancement in Republican politics. It’s not great.
the dutch people went full prince.
they now live in the country formerly known as holland. and they got a flourishy new logo to mark themselves by.
i guess logo is the new standard. rimshot.
not yet clear if they’re keeping the The tho. title suggests no. usage below suggests otherwise.
guess we’ll find out when some younger person is yelling at an older person in the current ukraine fashion.
Losing $500K on one day between games of a playoff series in Vegas is a really bad look. Not to mention stiffing the casino for it. Looking back I’m reminded that the Sharks got totally crushed in Games 3 and 4, en route to ultimately winning the series.
Apparently every time he went on the ice last night the Vegas fans chanted “PAY YOUR MARKER.”
Heh heh. Per Hunter Thompson the only real rule in Vegas is don’t burn the locals
Filed for bankruptcy, liabilities including $1.5 million gambling losses in last twelve months.
Threatening not to play so there would be no salary to garnish next season is a nice touch.
He was bad news off the ice in (spooky) Buffalo as alluded to here
and I think also before that in Winnipeg.
$1.88M in battery liabilities in the bankruptcy listings.
This sounds bad. Also not surprising.
So Ole thinks the premier league title might already be out of Manchester United’s reach this season.
No shit, Sherlock.
there is apparently some bullshit going on with city council vis a vis coliseum. FYI if you’re into that kind of thing.
https://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2019/11/08/oakland-files-injunction-alameda-coliseum-sale/
The City thinks its negotiating position with the A’s is stronger while the County in enjoined from selling the A’s its half. Which is probably true but mostly in the small ways the City might grind out a few more concessions/bribes. The City’s legal case feels specious, and Oakland is roughly 0-fer-infinity in sports litigation. Call it overplaying a bad hand, yet again,
They’ve got a team willing to build in the city and yet they can’t help themselves and want to take one last stab at trying to make them leave.
I don’t understand this. Why are the city attorneys filing this when the city council claims to be shocked by this action? Are the attorneys acting of their own accord or are council members like Kaplan and Reid lying when they say they have nothing to do with this.
Remember that Oakland’s City Attorney is elected not appointed, and thus has both a lot of independent authority and acts in her political interests as much as the City’s legal ones.
However, the announcement tonight says “the City Council directed the City Attorney to immediately drop Oakland’s lawsuit against Alameda County re: the sale of the Coliseum”. I’m confused as to whether this “directive” has any legal authority, and being confused is something I evidently have in common with a number of the inhabitants of City Hall.
Especially if it’s an elected attorney. Kind of a flawed setup, but one that’s fairly understandable and not exactly atypical. Knowing it’s an entirely separate elected official simply looking out for the city against potential legal action certainly makes the situation more understandable.
The Attorney has follow direction from a majority vote of the Council (usually in closed session) which is what happened yesterday. Last week, since the Council hadn’t formally taken such an action, the City Attorney took it on herself to keep filing motions to continue the lawsuit, even though the COuncil’s informal desire to back down was clear. That was the political part.
And now the CA is in a win win. I was looking out for you poor citizens when the council wasnt and whatnot.
Is it just me that is totally creeped out by the way Sanders treats AOC?
Not a good night in Berkeley for the Palouse’s most prominent MAGA man.
It looked like the Bears were going to turn their 4-0 start into a 4-8 season. They need one more win out of three games for Cheez-It Bowl eligibility, and dammit this is a year when we really need to bring the Axe back to Berkeley.
Sounds like Leach is a true educator and mentor.
Holy mother of god but SF gate is unreadable on mobile devices.
Also, Mike Leach is a dickhead.
sfgate is unreadable anywhere without some kind of extension to block their autoplay videos.
In Chrome on the iMac, I use an unmaintained one called “Disable HTML5 Autoplay” which seems to work most of the time. If there’s a better one, please recommend. The now apparently deceased Deadspin was as bad as or worse than SF Gate for this.
The sports media loves Leach because he’s quotable and says things no other coach says, e.g. FSU’s linked story. He has a lot of baggage going back to Texas Tech, plus the Trump stuff which pissed off some of the donors at Wazzu. He’s had enough success in Pullman to have the Cougs in the national discussion at times and that’s not easy in that remote outpost. At some point, though, that type puts his foot in his mouth once too often or says or does something so offensive that’s he’s gone, which was the case at Texas Tech.
USA please throw all the money at Pep when he gets fired.
KC seems to want the Raiders to have a chance at one last Oakland playoff game. Serious choke job.