Cup of Coffee: April 3, 2024

Good morning!

Today, in addition to the recaps, we talk about the Kansas City sales tax referendum failing, the passing of executive Larry Lucchino, some ugliness surrounding sports gambling, a WWII correction and a reflection, some alarming stuff that makes me REALLY happy I’m not on Substack anymore, an article about the extraordinarily lame way I would love to spend my golden years, a farewell to a prime example of tech hucksterism, and I contemplate a new newsletter bit.

Let’s get at ‘er.

And That Happened 

Here are the scores. Here are the highlights:

Brewers 3, Twins 2: Milwaukee scored their three runs early via an RBI from young Jackson Chourio, a homer from Christian Yelich, and a double from Brice Turang, and then they held on. After the game Chourio was asked to talk about his RBI and he said, “I was just looking to make good contact there and bring in the first run of the game.” Guy was born the year “The Bourne Supremacy” came out and he’s whippin’ out cliches like a seasoned vet.

Phillies 9, Reds 4: Bryce Harper went 3-for-4 with three home runs — one was a grand slam — and drove in six. Those were also his first three hits of the year. That alone was more then Spencer Turnbull needed in his Philly debut, but he nonetheless went five, allowing only an unearned run. Brandon Marsh added a homer.

Royals 4, Orioles 1: Maikel García doubled in two in the second and tripled in a run in the fourth while Royals starter Alex Marsh allowed just the one run on two hits over seven innings. It was the first time in his young career he’s gone longer than six.

Angels 3, Marlins 1: Aaron Hicks homered and singled in a run while Tyler Anderson shut the Marlins out over seven. I feel like this was just the Royals-Orioles game with Hicks playing the role of García and Anderson standing in for Marsh, but I don’t think y’all are ready to talk about geographically remote simulacrums. Miami is now 0-6 on the season. Gonna start chalking up their misfortune to The Curse of King Ng.

Rays 5, Rangers 2: Isaac Paredes hit a three-run homer and Zach Eflin took a shutout into the seventh. That’s different enough to where no one is likely to claim it was yet another duplicated cosmic phenomenon, following on the Royals-Orioles and Angels-Marlins games, but I see what you’re doing universe. You can’t get anything by me.

White Sox 3, Atlanta 2: Chicago gets its first win of the year thanks to Garrett Crochet’s seven strong innings and a homer from Paul DeJong and an RBI single from Andrew Vaughn. Marcel Ozuna smacked two homers for Atlanta, but no one was on for either of them and no one else in the lineup did any damages.

Cubs 12, Rockies 4: Home runs from Garret Cooper, Cody Bellinger, Chris Morel, and Seyia Suzuki led the slaughter. Cooper and Nick Madrigal each drove in three, Bellinger and Suzuki a pair a piece. Javier Assad went six scoreless. The Rockies have now given up 49 runs and have scored just 18 in starting 1-5 on the year.

Blue Jays 2, Astros 1: It would’ve been really bad to get no-hit on Monday and shut out on Tuesday, but that almost happened to Toronto here. Indeed, they were dominated by Framber Valdez (7.2 IP, 6 H, 0 ER) and were down 1-0 heading into the top of the ninth, with a fourth inning Jose Altuve dinger in danger of holding up. With two down, however, Justin Turner drew a walk off of closer Josh Hader and then Davis Schneider deposited one 423 feet over the center field fence to put the Jays up 2-1 and that held. The homer came on an offspeed pitch. After the game Schneider said “I’m surprised [Hader] didn’t throw me a fastball. Fastballs up are kind of my Kryptonite. But he just hung a slider in there.” Take notes every other pitcher.

Red Sox 5, Athletics 4: A back and forth game that went into extras where Boston won in the 11th when they scored on a double play. That held up thanks to Ceddanne Rafaela’s great running catch in center in the bottom half, which robbed Shea Langeliers of extra bases. Trevor Story had three hits and drove in two. Five Red Sox relievers allowed two hits in six scoreless innings. On the bright side for the A’s, they now have more runs on the season (15) than errors (14). Not that it should be that close.

Guardians 5, Mariners 2: The G’s — is that a thing? Probably not — built a 5-0 lead before Seattle finally made it on the board in the seventh. Those six scoreless before that came courtesy of Shane Bieber, who scattered six hits and struck out nine while putting up goose eggs. Indeed, no M’s runner got past second base while he was in the game. Will Brennan hit an RBI single in the fourth and Bo Naylor hit a two-run homer in the fifth.

Diamondbacks 7, Yankees 0: Well, they weren’t gonna go 162-0, were they? Wait — don’t answer that, Yankees fans. I’m guessing there’s a non-trivial number among you who, while acknowledging that was unlikely, have some theories on why it was nonetheless a reasonable expectation. Anyway, Zac Gallen was great, giving up only three hits in six scoreless. Arizona scored three in the third off of Nestor Cortes and a three-run homer from Christian Walker in the seventh allowed them to cruise. The other run scored on a late wild pitch.

Cardinals 5, Padres 2: Miles Mikolas bounced back from his season-opening stinker to allow only two runs over six and that held up thanks in part to Willson Contreras hitting a two-run homer off of an otherwise solid Yu Darvish in the sixth. St. Louis tacked on a couple of insurance runs in the eighth.

Dodgers 5, Giants 4: Mookie Betts hit his fifth homer on the young season, which also happened to be his 1,500th career hit. He’s still batting .500 a week and a couple of days in Korea into the season and has reached base in 23 of 38 plate appearances. Freddie Freeman had three hits for the second night in a row because, as I said yesterday, Freddie Freeman always gets three hits. And that’s the case even though he went 0-for-3 on Sunday. Three hits is more of a vibe for him than a literal reality. Kiké Hernández had a two-run single. L.A. wanted to give its rotation an extra day of rest so this was a bullpen game. Everyone pitched well for them except their bulk guy, Ryan Yarbrough, who allowed four in four and a third, but that was jussssst good enough for the Dodgers to hold on.

Tigers vs. Mets — POSTPONED:

April is the cruellest month, breeding

Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing

Memory and desire, stirring

Dull roots with spring rain.

The Daily Briefing

Down goes the Kansas City sales tax extension 

Jackson County, Missouri voters resoundingly rejected the sales tax extension sought by the Kansas City Royals and the city’s NFL team to fund stadium projects. As of around 10:30 last night the “no” vote was pushing 60%. The politcos supporting the stadium funding along with the owners of both teams conceded defeat before even I went to bed.

Royals owner John Sherman issued a statement after the results became clear, saying, “We're deeply disappointed as we are steadfast in our belief that Jackson County is better with the Chiefs and the Royals." So he’s still threatening relocation even though those threats didn’t move the needle with the electorate. I guess now we’ll see how “steadfast” that belief that the Royals belong in Jackson County is. Or if he’ll ever acknowledge that, actually, they have a pretty nice ballpark in Jackson County already, even if it’s not one that allows him to build hotels and bars to further enrich himself on the public’s dime.

Sherman added. “We respect the voters of Jackson County and the Democratic process. We will take some time to reflect on and process the outcome and find a path forward.” Which is billionaire speak for “we’ll pretend to take the L now, but we’ll try to realize some sort of massive transfer of public money to our private enterprises in a different way sometime soon.”

Nothing ever ends. Especially when every singe major league owner has talked themselves into the belief that they are entitled to a “ballpark village” real estate empire and that it’s up to everyday taxpayers to give them one.

Josh Jung has surgery, to miss six weeks

Rangers third baseman Josh Jung suffered a broken wrist when it was hit by a pitch on Monday night. Yesterday he was placed on the injured list. He also underwent surgery to repair the damage. His estimated time on the shelf: six weeks.

That’s a big blow for Texas, who played Josh Smith at third last night. Ezequiel Durán and Justin Foscue will take their turns at third until Jung returns as well.

Larry Lucchino: 1945-2024

Former Boston Red Sox, San Diego Padres, and Baltimore Orioles president Larry Lucchino has died at the age of 78. He had previously been treated for non-Hodgkins lymphoma, but his cause of death was not reported anywhere I saw.

Lucchino was the Orioles’ president from 1988-93, during which time he was credited as the visionary behind the construction of Camden Yards which, quite obviously, changed the stadium game forever. When the club was sold to Peter Angelos he moved on to San Diego, where he was the Padres president and CEO from 1995 through 2001. There, in addition to helping the club win the 1998 NL pennant, he was credited with bringing Petco Park — a truly fantastic ballpark — into existence. The man certainly had a knack.

Lucchino is best known, however, for the 14 years he served as the president and CEO of the Boston Red Sox, during which time the club broke its 86-year World Series title drought by winning the 2004, 2007, and 2013 Fall Classics. They’d add one more, in 2018, after he stepped back from day-to-day operations.

After that step-back Lucchino stayed close to the Red Sox in various roles, including being a partial owner of the club’s Triple-A team in Worcester where, once again, he helped lead the charge for a new ballpark. He also served as president and CEO emeritus of Fenway Sports Group, the holding company which owns the Sox, Liverpool FC, the Pittsburgh Penguins, auto racing concerns, and other sports and entertainment businesses. He was also the chairman of the cancer charity the Jimmy Fund, which has long been associated with Boston sports.

I feel like it’s also worth mentioning that Lucchino was also widely suspected of being the man who most assiduously carried on the long Boston Red Sox tradition of passing along anonymous dirt to the press regarding players, managers, and executives as they were on their way out of the organization. Yes, the practice preceded his tenure, but it reached new heights during the Terry Francona/Theo Epstein years. If you doubt that, just ask Tito and Theo, each of whom were the subject of such stories as they departed the organization. I bet they know who dropped those dimes.

At this point some of you may consider it to be in poor taste for me to engage in that kind of gossip the day after Luchhino passed. I disagree. Dishing anonymous dirt about guys as they walk out the door is not exactly inspiring stuff, but nor is it some sort of mortal sin and my God, does it provide some fun flavor. No Red Sox documentary or book covering the World Series years will ever accuse Lucchino of doing that, but all of them will pass along the substance of those stories, and that makes it a key part of Boston Red Sox culture. You almost wanna tip you cap because otherwise we wouldn’t know what kinds of hot messes baseball people can be.

In the meantime, let’s doff our caps and pay our respects to a baseball giant. Rest in peace, Larry Lucchino.

Meanwhile, in the world of gambling

From The Athletic, a benchwarmer for Purdue’s men’s basketball team named Carson Barrett got into the game in the late minutes of their first round NCAA tournament blowout win against Grambling. Barrett has battled injuries throughout his entire collegiate career and pretty clearly doesn’t have the NBA in his future, so when he got the ball on the baseline and launched and sank a three-pointer, you know he had to feel pretty damn good about it.

And he did. Until he got online and saw the messages from randos who were mad that his three pointer allowed Purdue to cover the spread:

You sure are a son of a b—.
Hope you enjoy selling cars for the rest of your life.

Followed by:

I hope you f-ing die.

And then the kicker:

Kill yourself for taking that 3 you f-ing worthless loser. Slit your f-ing throat you f-ing f– that was completely uncalled for. I hope you f-ing kill yourself.

The Boilermakers were 27-point favorites against Grambling. Barrett’s bucket meant they won by 28. “I had no idea what the line was,” Barrett said. “I’m just out there, making memories with my friends.”

The NCAA has attempted to push reform of state gambling laws and has had at least some success in convincing states to take prop bets involving college athletes off the board. What’s more, the NCAA, as an organization, officially opposes gambling and has imposed strict prohibitions on gambling by its athletes, coaches, and athletic department personnel.

But a great many schools have partnered up with gambling outfits, and broadcasts of college games and college sports shoulder programming are just as laden with gambling promotion as the pro broadcasts are. The wave is just too big and there’s no functional difference in the minds of gamblers — and in the business plans of gambling companies and the states which regulate and profit from gambling — between college athletes and pro athletes. They’re all just fodder for the next bet or the next influx of revenue. And that kind of thing leads to this kind of ugliness.

It’s just gross.

Other Stuff

A correction and a reflection

As many of you pointed out, I totally whiffed on the item in yesterday’s newsletter about surviving World War II vets. The 100K+ number I misread as referring to said survivors in 2036 refers to those alive now. In 12 years that number will be vanishingly small. We all make mistakes, me more than most. At least mine yesterday was attached to a moderately interesting article you all had the chance to read, so it wasn’t a total waste.

It also inspired a couple of you to send me this item about the death of the last surviving member of the crew of the U.S.S. Arizona:

Lou Conter, the last known survivor of the battleship Arizona, which sank with the loss of 1,177 sailors and Marines in Japan’s sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, plunging the United States into World War II, died on Monday at his home in Grass Valley, Calif. He was 102.

Conter, though knocked forward when the first armor-piercing bomb hit the Arizona, was uninjured. He then helped the injured to safety, helped put out fires, and eventually assisted in removing those bodies of the dead which were recoverable. Only 93 of the people who were physically onboard the Arizona at the time that bomb hit survived. 1,177 died.

After Pearl Harbor Conter attended Navy flight school and flew 200 combat missions in the Pacific, getting shot down twice, and winning the Distinguished Flying Cross. After the war he was in the reserves for a time but went back on active duty and remained there until 1967. One presumes that he spent the remaining 56+ years of his life on Earth pissing excellence.

Rest in peace, Lt. Commander Conter.

If you’re not off Substack already . . .

Most of you reading this subscribed to Cup of Coffee back when it was on Substack, prior to the move to Beehiiv in mid-January. You all know why I moved because I talked about it a hell of a lot there for a bit. For those who are new, however, know that I moved off of Substack because Substack has a Nazi/alt-right problem and, when I and other Substack writers asked Substack brass to at least respond to our concerns, we were essentially dismissed. Given that, not long before all of that went down, one of the company’s founders hosted a well-known white supremacist on an official Substack podcast aimed at promoting the writers on the platform, they definitely told me who they were. Leaving was not a difficult choice.

While I really, really hate how bad the commenting sucks on Beehiiv — and while there have been a handful of annoying technical glitches — I have not regretted my move. Having read this post from Andrea Grimes yesterday, I am even happier I moved.

Grimes’ post describes how Substack has increasingly attempted to morph itself into a social media platform as opposed to just a publishing platform. That’s something that had begun long before I left. From what I could see of it then, it seemed rather harmless and, frankly, feckless. But Grimes notes that rather than just incorporating social media functionality, Substack is now actively encouraging readers to “follow” writers via the social functions as opposed to subscribing to the writers’ publications, paid or free. This is a HUGE problem for those who publish on Substack.

If someone subscribes you have them locked in to some degree. Yes, they can always unsubscribe, but as long as they’re interested, you have their email address and their eyeballs and, more importantly, you can pick those email addresses and eyeballs up with you, so to speak, if you decide to change platforms. If, when I changed platforms, you had just been followeing me rather than subscribing, like Substack seems to want readers to do now, Substack would still have your data and your digital footprint, but I wouldn’t have any real way of contacting or retaining you. Far, far fewer of you would’ve come with me to the new platform, that’s for sure. Paid subscribers mostly would have, yes, but there are far more free subscribers who may have been content to merely follow me who would’ve had no idea. Once I was out of sight I would’ve been out of mind and those readers would’ve been lost to me.

If that was going on back in January, it would’ve strongly encouraged me NOT to leave Substack. This despite the fact that subscriber portability was, for years, Substack’s first, middle, and final sales pitch to writers. And yes, that applies to the free subscribers. Especially to them, actually. Paid subscribers have demonstrated both actual and figurative buy-in. Most free subscribers read once a week but it’s not uncommon for them to go paid for a while, to then unsubscribe in the offseason, and then re-subscribe later. And of course, free subscribers are people I actively seek to convert to paid over time. They’re valuable. They’re, to put it crassly, a big part of the business plan.

Now that I’ve seen Grimes mention this, it explains something weird that has been happening. Despite being off of Substack for over two and a half months, my ghost ship of a newsletter over there, with all functionality deactivated, continues to gain followers on Substack’s social media platform. Like, a lot of them. So many that I suspect Substack is so strongly encouraging “follows” that whatever firehose it’s using to do so is not distinguishing between active or inactive publications like my own. Or perhaps it’s welcoming armies of bots in order to make itself look like a more successful social media operation than it actually is.

Gee, what other social media platform is encouraging both right wing dickheads and bots? And how is it faring these days?

My People

That was a lot of words inspired by what I do for a living. But if I ever simply cease publishing this newsletter with no explanation whatsoever, it’s probably because I won the lottery or something. And if I ever do that, my Anglophilia will probably inspire me to pay that obnoxious fee that Russian oligarchs pay in order to bypass the usual immigration barriers to move to the United Kingdom. And, if I do that, I’ll probably spend most of my time over there walking around various places and ending up in a pub at the end of the day. I’ve done that and I like it, so why not do that forever?

A good bit of that walking will be across the countryside. True rambling. I’ve done that too. But some days you just wanna stay in town, in which case you’ll almost certainly find me among these people:

The Inner London Ramblers groups attract all kinds of walkers, but lately, they seem to have become landing strips for people undergoing transitions. Some, like Mr. Bennett, sought out a walking group a few years ago, after moving to London; others joined as a way to endure, and then ease out of, strict pandemic lockdowns; some get involved after they retire . . .

. . . Ramblers like to end their walks with some form of celebration. On that particular day, the Metropolitan Walkers clinked foamy pints at The Boston Arms pub; the London Strollers clapped and cheered as they ended their route by the Thames. Julia Cooke, 70, edged closer to the river, what she called London’s “best asset.” Days like today, she said, made her never want to leave the city. “It does make you feel better,” she said. “Being with people, but also just walking.”

For those who are curious, my Coast-to-Coast hiking injury was fully healed about a month after I got back. I began working out at the gym again in November and have been doing that pretty consistently all winter. While Allison and I now live in a walkable neighborhood and have thus done a lot more daily walking since the move than we ever have before, on Sunday I took my first purposeful, long-distance outside walk since I got home from England. It was only about eight miles, but it felt good.

So [*pulls out his UK maps*]. So.

Farewell to a prime example of tech hucksterism

A couple of months ago, citing a Cory Doctorow post, I wrote about the hucksterism endemic to the modern tech economy. About product claims which will never be fulfilled and seem to exist solely to goose a stock price in the short term or to acquire some dumb money funding. Notable examples of this include Elon Musk’s various business ventures and all manner of AI pitches. I’m sure people inside the tech world could cite scores more.

One of the most-hyped B.S. innovations are the so-called “cashier-free” Amazon Go and Amazon Fresh stores that, in reality, required a lot of people behind the scenes to operate even if Amazon tried to hide that fact. Specifically, it required hundreds or possibly even thousands of workers in India, watching cameras and reviewing recordings of customers leaving stores and then tallying up the bills that Amazon claimed to everyone — reporters, investors, you name it — were being totaled up whiz-bang camera and sensor technology.

Welp, now that’s over. Yesterday it was reported that Amazon is phasing out its experiment with “Just Walk Out” technology. Instead, it is moving to something it calls Dash Carts which are shopping cards that have a scanner and screen embedded, allowing you to checkout as you shop. While Amazon no doubt wants you to think that this is still some sort of revolutionary technology, a bunch of old line grocery stores have offered this for many years. Indeed, the Pittsburgh-based Giant Eagle chain, which has locations in Columbus and where I do a lot of my shopping, has offered little scanners when you walk in the door for years. Though barely anyone uses them because it’s like using a self-checkout without the convenience of a bagging area and you usually end up needing to interact with a store employee anyway.

Amazon owns Whole Foods, of course. I don’t shop there regularly, but I do shop there sometimes. I knew a long time ago that their whole checkout free thing was either trash or a scam when they didn’t start rolling it out to Whole Foods. I suspect we’ll never see the “Dash Carts” there either. At least not any sooner than we’ll see them at any other run-of-the-mill grocery store chain, at which point the claims and implications that Amazon is REVOLUTIONIZING grocery shopping will be, by definition, debunked. It’s just a thing other places could probably do now but aren’t because it doesn’t make a hell of a lot of economic or practical sense for them to do so.

Dieu et mon droit

In yesterday’s newsletter I said that I would not be doing the Dane Dunning bit anymore because it’s played out, but that I might be persuaded to do some “baseball players as Plantagenet monarchs” bit given the books I’ve been reading lately.

That led to subscriber Paul Teague posting this in the comments a little after 8AM

OK, had to do a dive into the rosters to find potential Plantagenet rulers, or those who would be their contemporaries. 
 
There literally is a King John who plays for St. Louis - at least that's how John King has to fill out most forms. Milwaukee's Rhys Hoskins would be a rival baron with a claim to the throne, all while imprisoning twins Taylor and Tyler Rogers of San Francisco, who have the support of other nobles. 
 
Logan O'Hoppe of LA Angels is a leader of the Irish, while Triston McKenzie has molded the Scots into a formidable force. Jordan Weems can't become a parson for a few hundred more years. 
 
Other usurpers include Ryan Mountcastle - the literal Lord of Baltimore - Parker Meadows, the rising insurgent from Detroit, and Emerson Hancock, the well-caffeinated and accomplished Mariner. 
 
Creating chaos within mainland Europe is Holy Roman Emperor Tarik Skubal - who wants to see fellow Detroiter Meadows on the throne and has enlisted the help of Pope Bowden Francis I from Toronto.

I thought I was the biggest dork around here, but I got nothin’ on Paul. And just to be clear: I consider “big dork” to be a high compliment.

Sorry to post that awful song but I got a lot of work to do if I’m to retain my big dork bonafides.

[Editor: I think you’re safe, actually]

Thanks!

Wait.

Have a great day everyone.

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