Mistah Melvin–he dead.
I am currently re-reading Heart of Darkness.
Ezra Pound and TS Eliot fought over it, or something else.
It’s been since 2017 that I’ve had to choose some other playoff rooting interest. Maybe the Mammoths.
"Kraut will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no kraut."
I was given a half-full bottle of Sky vodka by a friend flying out of town. I never drink vodka. Currently having a vodka tonic with lime, refreshing enough on a hot day. I am open for cocktail suggestions.
Vodka tonic is my favorite hot weather drink
No Nick Allen callup, no Bassitt start in the series, no Chapman tonight.
I’ll still take a win against Houston, but it’s hard to find anything to care about in this series.
Kyle Tucker is still a motherfucker though.
indeed
The Original Alfredo’s in Lomita managed to make me drive back since they forgot the eldest Aces burrito. Still worth it though.
I get the HOU doesn’t care, but it can’t be as simple as Irvin fucked us, can it?
obligatory
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There is a copy of this on the wall there. I made sure to point it out to the kids while we were waiting for our food.
It’s nice they’ve remembered how to play good baseball but this team is maddening.
OK, that’s more like it.
Is that Townie with Dallas? Whoever it is, very meh.
Jim Kozimor
Yeah Glen should have to suffer through this with the rest of us.
Agreed. Did they say why he’s out? I like to imagine he was walking to the booth drunk as a skunk and cursing out Fisher for not resigning anyone.
That’s what happens when you decide to have end-of-season drinks with Stomper before the game.
Jerry Blevins replying to FK Twitter may end up being the highlight of the season.
it sure isn’t this inning
Emerson has run out of things to say.
“Uh…try something ok?”
That’s Blevins and Cotroneo this seasOn, can our blue check be far behind?
Maybe we should suggest resigning Marte
Dies Fisher have a Twitter account? Maybe suggest he take up fine art or something first.
Yeah I sure do love old Jim jinxing Lou here.
Good time to remind ourselves that this game is not worth anything.
solidify pick 19
My brain doesn’t work that way. I wish it did.
It’s the most important game in baseball today.
um, uhg?
Does Chafin have a sprained mustache or something?
Lou trying so hard to throw it away but Oly said nope.
1-0 in the Pete Kozma era.
Staving off loss #75 for one more day, I see.
Seattle already choked. I’m fine with that.
yeah, i will root for them unless it’s the jays, but i am happy if the miss
I don’t really have anything against the Mariners. I do find this Mariners team exceptionally boring. A lot of non-descript guys inexplicably kicking our asses over and over again.
was watching their tv feed last night. Blowers is good, but whoever was dong PXP was fosse on every play
I’m just hoping for the 4 way tie.
I like CHW, TB, MIL, and some of the hopeful WC chasers.
So, probably, all the teams I like will be eliminated in the first round to make way for SF/LA and NYY/BOS
we are guaranteed a hou/tb LAD/ATL championship serieses.
Absolute must-win game for Justin Wilcox today. It’s his fifth year, and losing to Wazzu and their asshole unvaccinated coach in Berkeley would be disastrous for Wilcox’ alumni support.
Great job by the colins today to put themselves smack-dab in the middle of the playoff scenario.
Wilcox is down to 30 minutes of football to fix this shit. Apologies to those of you in Berkeley for the horrid odor coming from Memorial Stadium.
Probably not helped by the huge upset that Palo Alto team just pulled off. Nor by that idiotic play call, a four-yard pass when going for 4th and 6.
Wilcox has Holmoed, which is the worst thing that can be said about a Cal coach. I don’t see how he can recover, and the rest of this season is just denouement.
That’s a great win for the batgirls, who seem to pull those off much more often than they should (and way more often than Cal, which, you’re right, suffers badly in that comparison). It’s a terrible outcome for the Pac-12, and an enormous boost for the colins, as the ACC is already out of the playoff and the Pac-12 is pretty close to elimination.
Also the Furdies evidently have the same opinion of Fisher and Kaval as we do.
On the one hand, I ordinarily cheer for Stanford over Oregon. On the other, it would sure have been nice to finally have a Pac 12 team in the playoffs.
Hmmmm…
Draymond wonders why everyone is pressing pressing pressing Wiggins to attend practice.
I just might hate this team. Again I know HOU is just practicing for the playoffs but come the FK on.
Altuve singles on a ball out of the strike zone.
Bregman walks on a ball in the strike zone.
Alvarez homers on a ball out of the strike zone.
What is the point of Blackburn starting? He’s a known below-par pitcher. There are no mysteries. We’re not going to trick another team into acquiring him, and if he’s in the rotation next April we’ve already conceded. I have to wonder if Blackburn is pitching just to prevent Bassitt from reaching marketable achievements.
Next year according to selek, per ken, kozma was the 999th player in Oakland history.
1000th better be Carlos Corea
Ed, they will sign Martin Maldonado as the backup C to hit .145 for 3 months.
I appreciate them starting Blackburn and freeing up my Saturday night plans early.
Wow. What a stupid half inning.
half?
Half season?
Nincompoops.
What a stupid fking ballpark
x2
mother fucker
indeed
Tuckerses, we hates them.
x2
x 100
In 13 seasons of FKing I have made very few comments of a predictive nature that turned out to be accurate, but the bit about finishing fewer than 13 games over .500 is going to be one of the rare ones.
First time since 2005 A’s have been above .500 and missed the playoffs.
Also, my final decision is no season tickets next year. Just don’t see the point (vs. just buying tickets when I want to go) in the post-Access world with a rebuild incoming.
We managed to get 6 tickets for the Saturday game against the *’s, finally using up the last of our credit from 2019 +$2.75. They won’t be getting any more of our $$ until we go to a game next year. So not worried about being able to get tickets.
I like being a season ticket holder (my dad was when I was a kid), and I’m glad to spend the money.
But man do they ever make it unappealing when they scale back core benefits and raise prices.
I said just over 3 weeks ago that 92 wins needed to be the target for a playoff spot (and agreed that we would likely not reach it). That was spot on.
Oh shit. This looks so Mariners, beating the crap out of the A’s to put themselves on the brink and then letting Scioscia crush their souls.
Scioscia gives it right back by putting the annoying Steve Cishek on the mound. Cishek has “core member of Oakland Athletics Team Dynamite 2022” written all over him.
Good, there’s plenty of reason to watch baseball instead of the NFL tomorrow.
they almost sciosciaed that bottom 8. Bunt with a lefty facing cishek?
uhg
Vince replied again. Time to slide into his DMs?
What was the Milwaukee bullpen news?
yes
?
Ken and vince were pondering who was starting for Milwaukee, and moments later vince said “I’ve been informed that it is a bullpen day”
Then we asked to reveal his source. He replied, it was his birthday today”
Start times should be indexed to average game length
Today’s lineup is screaming “YOU REALLY MUST LIKE BASEBALL IN GENERAL TO WATCH THIS!!”.
SF Chron sports section is really bothered by the Brewers pitching decisions
Nationals appear to be giving a major league debut to a guy who started the season in High A and has pitched all of four innings in AAA. Amazing middle finger to the Yankees, Blue Jays, and Mariners.
Adon is kind of poking the Red Sox in the eye with that middle finger so far.
The Blue Jays are going to have an advantage if they get to a play-in tomorrow because they are the only one of these AL teams that isn’t going to burn up its bullpen today.
Gio Urshela caught a foul ball flying down the dugout stairs and Angel Hernandez flipped over the railing making the call.
Red Sox throw door wide open, Mariners peek in nervously and back away.
Rooting for the Mariners must be truly miserable.
Cal football fans can relate to the endless futility.
We could certainly get a three-way tie for two spots, but with the Mariners headed toward dropping out there aren’t any insane travel possibilities. NYY/BOS/TOR in the three-way and then the WC winner to St. Petersburg on Thursday.
This being the complicated one that is still very plausible as of 2:20:
The head-to-heads for Wednesday home field are:
BOS>TOR 10-9
BOS>NYY 10-9
TOR>NYY 11-8
One final teAse for the road?
20 homers for Seth Brown, none more consequential than that.
The Rays are going to have a dogpile of their own players fighting after a fly ball collision sometime before the season ends.
KHRUSHED!
Hooray! One of the highlights of the season, in game 162.
so cool
Wish the salute had been at home, but genuinely happy about this.
naturally
think the third base coach bet the under on wins this year
Bye boys, see you next spring, some of you at least. Best laundry in baseball.
The final 2014 vs. 2021 comparison:
2014 (88-74):
Apex was 72-44.
Finished 16-30.
2021 (86-76):
Apex was 68-49.
Finished 18-27.
Wonder what we get for the Matts this winter.
Surely a can’t-miss prospect like Franklin Barreto will be at the core of one of those deals.
I’ve still barely recovered from witnessing the once-in-a-generation talent of Ynoa (which, IIRC, was the straw that broke my **-participation back)
Combined, my teams still beat the hell out of Houston today.
Yankees win.
Red Sox have tied it up.
It’s up to the Washington Nationals now. I’m not optimistic.
And, ugh.
Boo
this is getting lame
Great move by Servais there, pulling Seager at the moment of elimination.
He is playing second for us next year
Servais?
Now that it doesn’t matter I want Seattle to tie it so those two teams have to play extras.
My last ask of this terrible fking sports year is that we don’t get a Giants – Astros World Series.
After two painful Sundays, I’ll observe that the Trey Lance experience looked… surprisingly intriguing… after he was super obviously overwhelmed on his first couple drives.
As a jumping off point, not considering arb for bassitt and manaea
That’s a list. Most of them should get the offers we gave out last year for our FAs. I saw NBCSN had an article about how we need to resign Marte, Harrison, etc and I laughed and laughed…
We do need to bring the gold tops back. 2 sets of green tops is superfluous and the gold has historical luck built in.
So aside from the games the A’s played against HOU and SEA, they finished 74-50 with a run differential of +99. They needed to go 21-17 to win the division, 18-20 to win the wildcard. They…..did not.
that is crazy
Kleinschmidt was never my favorite, but I thought that is what the kids liked and other than her associating with Luba/Bauer* I found her unobjectionable. This is odd
*I mean it shows poor discriminating skills and that may be illuminating on this story
I’m super lost here.
I’m not a fan, as she seemed to be almost entirely a “personality” rather than an actual journalist. Which I guess is consistent with the claim in the tweet below that one that she was a “world class plagiarist.”
But if the only thing here is a totally generic goodbye message saying she’d dreamed of having the job since age 12, that seems like an awfully weak basis for even a suggestion of plagiarism.
she still has her personal account where she is posting from. I am not sure what is going on, but she is likely not at nbc california. Seems like she wasn’t renewed there.
Pretty standard for those crappy media companies it seems.
City of Berkeley is suddenly claiming 93% of 12+ here are fully vaccinated. Until earlier today it had been sitting at 74%. It’s certainly possible that they fixed some data errors, but that seems too good to be true.
Where are you seeing that? I agree it sounds incorrect (I don’t know anything about Berkeley’s data reporting process).
This tweet and the city dashboard linked therein
Raiders vs Bolts game delayed by lightning, a bit on the nose. The “home” crowd of 90% Raiders fans patiently waits.
Can confirm sky was doing funny things: loud noises, water falling out of it, etc.
Translation: Everyone is gone
olson has value to the yankees and no one else.
chapman has to be at an all time low in value
Murphy is still cheap
Nice to know you Chris and Sean
The thing is, once you start trading some of them, the case for trading the rest only gets stronger, unless you’re somehow getting back major league ready talent. Except maybe for Chapman, if you think his trade value will go back up.
What kind of return will the Mets give us for Beane and Melvin?
Cash, so they are as good as gone
Also accepting casino chips
If you can point him to the redemption store Fisher might even take Green Stamps.
Great moments in newspaper error retractions. Oh my.
If nothing else, Mr. or Ms. Editor, that should have been a giveaway.
The newspaper’s crime reporter posted a Twitter thread which sheds a little more light on it. It sounds like the paper’s editors wanted to sweep the episode under the rug.
Here the original article on the Wayback Machine.
Tonight’s first pitch is scheduled for 8:08 pm Eastern time.
The Yankees and Red Sox played 14 9-inning games this season (plus 2 games in a doubleheader, 1 rain-shortened game and 2 extra-inning games). In those 14 games the mean time of game was 3 hours, 20 minutes.
So that puts the end at 11:28. Now add the extra postseason commercials and the managerial brilliance that comes with a postseason game…how does this end before 12:15?
It seems to me when it was established that the two WC teams were Eastern time zone teams, ESPN and MLB could have done themselves a favor by moving first pitch to 7 or even 6:30. It’s not like there’s any other live event on ESPN that would be cut off (3 hours of programming from 5-8 Eastern: Around the Horn 30 min, Pardon the Interruption 30 min, SportsCenter 60 min and Baseball Tonight 60 min).
Since it’s bound to be interminable, should point out that ESPN2 has a “Statcast” that should be more palatable than A-Rod on the main channel.
I don’t mind A-Rod in the booth, he has some reasonable insights. I’d take him over Ron Darling every time, for comparison.
I’m not paying a whole lot of attention tonight, but think I prefer Darling to ARod.
3:13 tonight, quicker than the regular season average! Largely thanks to Yankees offensive suck.
never mind
AV have you listened to 544 days podcast yet? Really interesting
not really!
have kinda hit a wall on cis/het white US guys talking about themselves.
this absolutely. I can’t take so many men podcasts. 99pi is staying in the rotation because of legacy (although I have not really enjoyed an episode in a while).
I get that. Are there any you can recommend? I’m not listening to a ton of podcasts–I’m more of an Audiobook person, but I like to get recommendations! I like ones that do like a 10 episode series going in-depth on an event, or explaining something I’m not familiar with. Like I loved the one about Theranos, and the one about MLMs.
the city s2, reno
day x (nyt)
detective trapp (feels like a wondery cast, so if you like wondery)
dr death s2
floodlines
the last archive (jill lapore — not so much an event but a specific idea shifting through time )
lolita podcast (a jamie loftus property, see also aack cast, which did not stick with me but i see its value, and my year in mensa)
love is a crime (karina longworth)
once upon a time at bennington college (lili anolik is tops. this is on the same feed as once upon a time in the valley, about traci lords and did she or did she not con the entire porn industry)
one year 1977
the score, bank robber diaries (the main story is good, the extras are thin)
verified, dustup
you must remember this (karina longworth’s main thang of course, the last two seasons are top notch: polly platt, the gossip girls)
Oh great–thank you!
The two we really liked that sound like they fit your taste were Bundyville and Timber Wars. Bundyville digs into the Ammon Bundy story, the takeover of the Malheur wildlife refuge in Oregon and a lot of western anti-government sentiment, and Timber Wars is what it sounds like. This Land is interesting, season one about the supreme court case regarding Oklahoma’s native lands and the second about native adoption.
yeah bundyville is great/frightening.
I only listened to the first season of This Land–I liked it a lot so I’ll check out season 2!
OST i might omit the score from this list. it’s autobio more than event investigation.
only warnings in this college
Bucky Dent is in the Fenway stands? That seems risky.
Are these the A’s wearing the Yankees’ uniforms tonight?
Judge being thrown out by 6 feet at the plate was right out of the A’s WC playbook.
Bob Melvin takes another sip of wine and rubs hands gleefully in anticipation of Yankees vs. Mets bidding war.
Are you sure that he even wants one of those jobs?
The postgame would be quite a culture change from 5 questions from 3 reporters in Oakland to the (presumably in-person rather than Zoom in 2022) mass scrum in New York. Among other differences. “No” is the answer, and I threw San Diego out there the other day with that in mind.
It’s a good question, and Bob keeps his thoughts pretty tightly to himself. On one hand he’s a mellow California guy who seemingly wouldn’t take to that media climate. OTOH he has to wonder how cool it might be to manage a high payroll roster.
Same with Beane. They will never win a World Series in Oakland, almost certainly. Is a real shot worth the cost?
And he wont do it for the money. Brad Pitt told me so!
Also, to take it he would either have to report under Sandy (which feels like a demotion) or be there after they fire Sandy (which isnt impossible but seems like something that might not feel great).
I’m not saying he wouldnt-hell at this point Im not sure it would be that bad of a thing..but it doesnt seem obvious.
The San Diego job is now officially open, to nobody’s surprise. The last couple Padres managers have had no MLB managing experience coming into the job so you’d think that’s something the FO down there might be specifically looking for to change the culture.
Sweet Caroline is a stupid song and I hope all those people get throat lice.
Looks like a County vote on joining the HT infrastructure funding district is scheduled for later this month after the City provided them with a bunch of financial details.
Per those details, the team’s current timeline for ballpark construction (see page 5) is to start in 2025 and finish in 2026. Which I guess means playing there in 2027.
All the fresh season ticket holders are going to be pissed that their Max Muncy Jersey give away will be outdated
The playoffs are just going to bring continued misery, aren’t they?
It will be especially galling when Farhan’s shit works in the playoffs.
They got three fucking titles the old way they goddamn better not get another working our side of the street.
Max Scherzer looks like Frankie Montas on one of his annoying nights.
I have it on in the kitchen while I am lounging in the living room. I cannot see the tv but I check for a minute or two when I go in there.
I only watched an inning last night and turned it off.
But it was cool to see juan soto in a turner nationals jersey with who I now know as boras in a scherzer jersey.
Kevin Long (Nationals batting coach) in the Scherzer jersey, Boras on the other side of Soto.
Scherzer was pretty Montas-ish all night but better at the not giving up runs part.
that makes more sense
If the Dodgers move on, expect a game where Matt Chapman is sitting next to Boras wearing a Treinen A’s jersey.
I assumed the Yankees and Red Sox would play a 4-hour game but it’s looking like this is the one instead. I’m not watching every postseason game, will be in and out, but for example Cal is off this weekend (thank goodness) so that creates a little space for postseason baseball.
i lasted longer in this game. didn’t turn it off until the 6th
Looks like we might see T.J. McFarland, who seems to have decided to be great for the Cardinals.
In the bottom of the ninth of a tie game, no less.
Tough L
No AB for Billy McKinney.
I really wanted Qreinen to fail.