Cup of Coffee: August 20, 2024

Good morning!

There was news about injuries to a couple of important players yesterday, one important player is about to come back from injury, and we see one good reason why it’s bad that baseball writers vote on postseason awards.

In Other Stuff: I’m going to be appearing at an event about white supremacy and right wing hate on Thursday, J.D. Vance doesn’t know how to pander, Our Dumb Century is online, and I talk a lot more about the greatest New York movies.

And That Happened 

Here are the scores. Here are the highlights:

Diamondbacks 9, Marlins 6: Rookie Adrian Del Castillo, who was just brought up two weeks ago, hit a grand slam and drove in six in all. He has driven in 14 runs in the nine games he’s played. Someone should tell him that the Marlins are the kind of shop where it makes everyone look bad if the new guy starts working harder than everyone else, so expect him to be given a talking to in the break room before long.

Reds 6, Blue Jays 3: Spencer Steer hit a tie-breaking RBI double in Cincinnati’s four-run sixth and TJ Friedl homered and finished with three hits. Ty France had two hits and two RBI. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Ernie Clement went deep for the Jays in a losing cause.

Mets 4, Orioles 3: New York went up 3-0 early thanks in part to a two-run shot from J.D. Martinez in the first, but Baltimore got on the board in the middle innings and tied it by the seventh. Francisco Alvarez walked it off, howeverm with a solo shot in the ninth. The Mets moved within 1.5 games of idle Atlanta for the last National League Wild Card. The Orioles dropped a half-game behind the Yankees for first place in the AL East.

Rangers 4, Pirates 3: Corey Seager provided all the pop with a solo homer in the first and a three-run homer in the third After that Texas hung on the rest of the way, with four meh innings from The Dane and four shutout innings from José Urena. Texas has won back-to-back games for the first time since winning four in a row against the White Sox about a month ago and I’m not sure wins against the White Sox even count.

Royals 5, Angels 3: Five straight wins for the Royals, this one coming behind a strong outing from Seth Lugo (7 IP, 4 H, 2 ER, 8K) and a two-run homer from Paul DeJong and three RBI from Sal Perez, via a two-run double and an RBI single.

Astros 5, Red Sox 4: Yainer Diaz hit a tie-breaking walkoff solo homer off Kenley Jansen to secure the come-from behind win for Houston. An inning before that Mauricio Dubón had tied it up at four with an RBI single. Houston committed four errors in this game but they still won it. They’ve won 11 of 12, in fact.

Padres 5, Twins 3: Jackson Merrill’s three-run double in the third — prefaced by one guy reaching on an error and the other two getting walked — broke a 2-2 tie and nobody scored anything else until the ninth and that was too little too late. Michael King allowed two runs in the first two innings but settled down after that to give up just those two over six.

Athletics 3, Rays 0: A’s starter Joe Boyle allowed two hits over six shutout innings and three relievers allowed bupkis over the final three, with A’s pitchers punching out 11 Rays batters in all. JJ Bleday hit a two-run homer in the first and Lawrence Butler hit a sac fly.

Giants 5, White Sox 3: Kyle Harrison allowed one run on five hits over six while a four-run fifth and a Matt Chapman homer in the sixth took care of the scoring. San Francisco moved to 3.5 games of the final NL Wild Card spot, which matters if you think they have another gear and can get over that hump, but I haven’t seen evidence of them having another gear this year. The White Sox lost for the 29th time in their last 32 games and it’s just getting sad at this point.

Dodgers 3, Mariners 0: Gavin Stone was fantastics, striking out ten over seven shutout frames while allowing just two hits. Bryan Woo matched him for six innings but, unfortunately for him, he ran out of gas in the seventh and gave up a solo shot to Gavin Lux and a two-run shot to Max Muncy and that was that. Justin Turner came back to Dodger Stadium for the first time since he was a Dodger and went 1-for-3.

The Daily Briefing

Austin Riley has a fractured hand

Austin Riley was hit by a pitch on his hand on Sunday. Yesterday he underwent an MRI that revealed a right hand fracture. He is expected to miss approximately six to eight weeks, which covers the remainder of the regular season and likely then some.

Not that Atlanta is guaranteed any “and then some” this year. Between a rash of injuries to their best players — most notably Ronald Acuña Jr. and Spencer Strider but also Ozzie Albies and a bunch more on top of that — and healthy players all seeming to regress to the mean this year, it’s been a profoundly challenging season for the club.

As play begins today they’re seven games back of the Phillies in the NL East and are currently in third place for the Wild Card. They could very well hold on to that third slot and play games in October, but with Riley now gone the chances of that are less than they were before.

Ketel Marte hits the injured list

The Arizona Diamondbacks announced that second baseman Ketel Marte has been placed on the 10-day injured list with a sprained left ankle.

It was already sprained, actually. He did that a week ago Saturday in a game against the Phillies. Rather than place him on the injured list then, however, Arizona kept him active, though they sat him in four of the next five games. He played Saturday, no problem, and then pinch hit yesterday only to go down to the ground in pain on a check swing after which he needed assistance to walk off the field.

Marte has been one of the best players in the National League this year. He’s hitting .298/.370/.560 (157 OPS+) with 30 homers, but he can’t help you if he’s hurt and he can’t get better if, when he’s hurt, he’s not placed on the IL. Seems like a major unforced error by the Dbacks.

Justin Verlander to pitch tomorrow 

The Houston Astros announced that Justin Verlander is scheduled to come off the injured list and start against the Red Sox tomorrow.

Verlander hasn't pitched since June 9 because of stiffness in his neck. He’s made only made ten starts this year and is 3-2 with a 3.95 ERA (102 ERA+). If he’s the Verlander of old — hell, if he’s the Verlander of 2023 — it’ll be a big boost for Houston.

A good reason why baseball writers shouldn’t be voting on awards

Ken Rosenthal has a story at The Athletic about how the Pittsburgh Pirates might consider shutting down Paul Skenes now that the club is out of contention. To be sure, the clubs says it’s not thinking of doing that. Rather, they are instead talking about maybe limiting his pitches and innings per outing as opposed to shutting him down completely. Rosenthal obviously talks about how doing so might be wise for his health because you don’t wanna overwork a guy who is barely a year removed from college. And, in the abstract, it is wise.

But Rosenthal also mentions another incentive in play: per the 2022 CBA, players who finish first or second in the Rookie of the Year balloting get a full year’s service time for that season even if they did not meet the usual service time requirements for a full year otherwise. Which is the case with Skenes, who was not on the roster until May 11 and would still have six seasons of being under team control unless he finishes in the top two of the Rookie of the Year voting. Rosenthal:

The new rule effectively puts voting members of the Baseball Writers Association of America in position to deprive a low-revenue team such as the Pirates an extra year of a superstar player — a far more consequential outcome than the individual cash bonuses that are frequently tied to the awards.

For the Pirates, the difference between keeping Skenes for five more years and six would be enormous . . . Thus, the temptation for the Pirates to shut down Skenes — and effectively damage his Rookie of the Year chances — is not insignificant. A sixth consecutive losing season would sting even more if the Pirates also lost a year of club control over their young ace.

I said this when the service time rules changed, but putting a guy’s service time and the chance for him to earn millions more dollars in the hands of BBWAA voters is crazy. The BBWAA saw fit to not let me become a member many years ago but, even if they had let me in, I do not believe I could vote on an award whose results are so directly tied to a player’s service time and thus his earning potential. It just seems like an ethical nightmare that I’d want no part of.

Other Stuff

I’ll be talking about hate and white supremacy at an event in Columbus on Thursday

If you’re in central Ohio and you’re interested in coming to see me talk about hate and white supremacy, well, you’re in luck. Because I’ll be doing so this Thursday evening as a part of Matter News Community Conversations at Two Dollar Radio Headquarters here in Columbus.

The Community Conversations series is produced by Matter News, an independent, nonprofit local news outlet. The series takes up a new topic each month in a panel/group discussion format at the HQ of independent publisher Two Dollar Radio, just around the corner from Chez Cup of Coffee. It’s free of charge.

On Thursday night Matter News’ director and editor Andy Downing, Columbus Monthly magazine’s senior editor Joel Oliphint, and I will lead a conversation centered on the story of Christopher Cook, a local man who was recently sentenced in a white supremacist plot to attack the power grid. We will also discuss some of my and Matter’s past coverage of the hate beat, including my run-ins with the Proud Boys and Andy and Joel’s coverage of the neo-Nazi website The Daily Stormer, which is tied to the otherwise pleasant and prosperous Columbus suburb of Worthington, Ohio.

Here’s a link to the Facebook Event, though you can just show up, of course. If you’re around I hope to see you there!

Oh, J.D.

So this happened yesterday:

It takes a LOT to fail at pandering to Philadelphia. It’s the easiest thing in the world! Like, all you gotta do is say "Go Birds" and not actively insult the place and Philly people go nuts for you. Ask Bryce Harper how that works.

So the fact that J.D. Vance can't even do the obligatory cheesesteak photo-op, which politicians have been doing for years and years — some of them unsuccessful ones who made the same mistake! — without making it weird is a hell of a thing. It’s not a surprising thing but it’s a hell of a thing.

All of The Onion’s Our Dumb Century is online

In 1999 satirical newspaper/website The Onion came out with a book called Our Dumb Century. It featured mocked-up newspaper front pages from the entire 20th century, as if The Onion had been continuously in print since the year 1900 and, actually, even longer. I have owned Our Dumb Century since it came out and I am not exaggerating when I say it is the funniest book I have ever read. And re-read, dozens if not hundreds of times over.

The historical deep cuts are insanely impressive. The back-and-forth between the driest of the dry (March 16, 1923: “Lost? Be an American expatriate in Paris”) to crazy over-the-top (July 21, 1969: “HOLY SHIT: MAN WALKS ON FUCKING MOON”) and everything in between (November 18, 1920: “Fixed World Series heralds first-ever moment of excitement in baseball”). The key to it is that not only is it really, really funny, but that it deeply, deeply understands and deftly skewers American history, American media, and the changing lexicon of the 20th century. Nearly every story and every joke works on multiple levels and makes the book insanely smart and insanely re-readable.

It’s always been possible to find screencaps of the Our Dumb Century Pages online and, for many years, The Onion website itself had most of the pages archived, though very difficult to find. Now, however, they’re all available in chronological order at The Onion’s Front Page Archive. I still recommend you get the book because (a) the book employs the actual printing styles newspapers employed over the years, so some of the early 20th century stuff can be hard to read online; and (b) it’s, let’s be honest, the single-best bathroom reader of all time.

But if you don’t know Our Dumb Century and want a taste of what you’ll be getting, just peruse the archive for a few minutes and you’ll either be immediately hooked or you’ll know it’s not for you. And if it’s not for you, honestly, I’m not sure I wanna know ya.

Phil Donahue: 1935-2024

Talk show host Phil Donahue died yesterday after a long illness. He was 88.

I feel like the demographics of this newsletter are such that I don’t really have to explain the significance of Phil Donahue, but just in case there are some youngins here, know that Donahue invented the syndicated daytime studio audience talk show format in which the host works the crowd, holding the mic and the big blue notecards, and the guests sit on the stage. He did it before Oprah, before Sally, before Montel, before Maury, before Springer, before Ricki, and all of the other imitators. From the 1960s through the 1990s, starting in Dayton, Ohio, moving to Chicago, and then on to New York, Donahue was a staple of daytime television.

The thing about Donahue was that, while he was often accused of trafficking in salaciousness in the 1970s and into the 1980s, he was profoundly tame and notably cerebral compared to what came after him. Sure, one day he might feature topics or guests that were envelope-pushing for the time, but he’d address those guests and those topics with seriousness and maturity and he was just as likely to follow it up the next day with legitimate, intelligent talk about important issues of the day. It was only after he was largely supplanted by the true “You are not the father!”-style sleaze-peddlers and the multimedia empire that Oprah Winfrey created that casual observers truly understood that Donahue was on another, higher level.

What’s more, a close look at his career makes it pretty clear that he was every bit as much if not more of a journalist than a simple talk show host. His side projects — news specials, guest appearances, and his stints hosting TV and radio political shows — showed that he had actual newsman chops and was more than capable of holding his own with world leaders and common people alike. And he had principles, too.

After his eponymous talk show left the air, Donahue had a short-lived MSNBC primetime show in 2002 and 2003, opposite Fox News’ juggernaut “The O’Reilly Factor.” The idea was, obviously, to counter the conservative talker with someone as capable of holding court on the issues of the day. In 2002-03 the biggest issue of the day was the run-up to the Iraq war. Donahue unashamedly challenged what was then the largely-accepted pundit wisdom that we must go to war in Iraq and brought on guests who opposed the war. His doing so led Bush Administration officials to lean on NBC and MSNBC executives about it who, in turn, caved to the pressure. Later a leaked internal memo said that Donahue represented “a difficult public face for NBC at a time of war,” and he was subsequently fired. Shame on NBC for being spineless. Kudos to Donahue for sticking to his guns.

Everyone around my age talks about spending their days home sick from school watching The Price is Right. I did that like everyone else, but I remember a lot of mornings watching Donahue too. Later, when I learned more about him, I was glad that I had.

Rest in peace to a real one.

The best New York movies

Yesterday I referred to “The Taking of Pelham One Two Three” as the best New York movie of all time. A number of you agreed with this, some took issue with this, and many on both sides added other potential candidates for consideration. I figured I’d expand things a bit today and offer up what I think to be the best New York movies.

A couple of caveats:

• Just because a great movie takes place in New York does not, to me at least, make it a Great New York Movie. There are some great movies which take place in New York but in which the city is not itself a character as it is in the ones I list below. If I left your favorite out it’s either because (a) I haven’t seen it; or (b) it doesn’t utilize New York as well as others do;
• I didn’t include “The Warriors” or “Escape from New York” which are movies people always include in these things. Those movies are quite obviously a reflection of the grim state of New York at the time they were conceived of and made, and they thus have genuine cinematic merit, but they’re heightened or abstract reflections. I’d rather see something a little closer to realism for these admittedly narrow purposes. Same goes for “Ghostbusters” now that I think about it;
• Finally, because rankings can be so artificial and contentious, I’m just going to list a bunch of my top candidates in no hard-and-fast order. Hell, even if I was ordering them I’d probably change where each one fell based on my mood the last time I saw each film.

Anyway:

“The Taking of Pelham One Two Three”: A lot of movies on this list capture the gritty, down-at-the-heels New York that all but disappeared in by the late 1980s or early 1990s or so, but this one probably does it better than all of the others. It also seemed to go out of its way to cast dyed-in-the wool New Yorkers as opposed to Hollywood types, which made the thing absolutely crackle. The fact that it also anticipated a completely feckless and inept New York mayor — who was a dead-ringer for Ed Koch even though Koch would not be mayor until several years after this movie came out — is an added bonus;

“The French Connection”: It does the same thing as Pelham One Two Three as far as portraying 1970s New York but it does it in service of an obviously bigger and objectively better movie overall. I think that’s the reason I always cite “Pelham” above it as a New York movie. “The French Connection” is steeped in New York, sure, but it aims at something more and could still be a good movie — albeit a radically different movie — if you were dumb enough to try to set it in another city. Like, you could make a Chicago or even a Los Angeles version of “French Connection” with great car chases and tough cops. And, indeed, many have tried to do so, more or less, since.

“Do The Right Thing”: Probably the best movie, overall, on this list and obviously the most though-provoking and important movie, culturally and socially speaking. Separate and apart from the story and themes which are the obvious reasons it’s so notable, you can smell the sweat and the asphalt and the pizza. You can feel the heat. Spike Lee created an absolute masterwork while also providing a perfect snapshot of Brooklyn of a now-bygone era. That he did this despite consciously adding a layer of hyperrealism to the proceedings — not everyone on a given block in Bed-Stuy was so over the top even in 1989 — is absolutely astounding. Oh, and it’s also worth noting that Lee’s “25th Hour” could easily appear on this list if I wanted to go longer.

“25th Hour”: OK, let’s actually put this on there. Many people have written about it as the best post-9/11 movie ever made, and that’s probably right.

“Taxi Driver”: It’s almost too obvious I suppose. It’s a great film, of course, and does just as much if not more for the gritty 1970s New York thing I love than any other film. That said, it’s far less re-watchable to me than the others on this list. Probably because it has lent itself to cliche and derivative work and people doing bad impressions and stuff that it has lost its freshness and thus its impact to some degree. The next time you’re inspired to watch “Taxi Driver” to get a taste of New York in this era, you should change things up a bit and go with, say, “Dog Day Afternoon” or the far less well-known “The Anderson Tapes.” Oh, man, definitely see “The Anderson Tapes.” Young Christopher Walken! Sean Connery! Landlines playing an important part of the proceedings! What’s not to love?

“After Hours”: Actually, rather than “Taxi Driver” you should watch this far less-heralded Scorsese New York gem. Most of us reading this are far closer to being Paul Hackett than we are to being Travis Bickle anyway, so it’s more relatable. Well, mostly more relatable.

Sweet Smell of Success: A lot of movies show 70s Grit and a lot of earlier New York movies show Big Apple Glamor. This one, however, reminds us that even when the dominant conception of New York was glamor there was always a lot of grit and downright ugliness underneath. From the sidewalks of Times Square to the swank interior of 21 Club, everything touched by Burt Lancaster’s J.J. Hunsecker is covered with grime.

“The Godfather” and “Goodfellas”: There are a lot of good mob movies and most good mob movies are set in New York. These two are pretty obviously the best and most effectively use New York as their setting. Like “Taxi Driver,” however, it almost feels too obvious to mention them. These movies belong to the world, even if they’re set in New York.

Breakfast at Tiffany’s: It’s not all grit. Though, if Blake Edwards had been truer to Capote’s story there’d be more of it. Mickey Rooney’s racist character is jarring and almost deal-breaking these days, but “The Taking of Pelham One Two Three” had a bunch of superfluous racism and misogyny in it too. You can’t watch old movies without finding a lot of that stuff obviously. And you can’t think of “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” without thinking, at least a little bit, of the New York of the early 60s.

“On the Town”: I bet a lot of you are like me and your first introduction to New York and the mid-century tropes which surround it were Looney Tunes shorts. Bugs Bunny bouncing around Times Square, an aggressive version “42nd Street” playing, etc. Well, if you want a live-action version of that whole vibe you could do worse than this. And remember: the Bronx is up, but the Battery’s down. Keep that in mind and you’re never get lost.

“Annie Hall”: I realize no one really wants to subject themselves to icky Woody Allen anymore, but whatever we think of him, this movie is a masterwork. The best part: if you watch “Annie Hall” you really don’t need to watch any other Woody Allen movies.

“Wall Street” and/or “Working Girl”: Four or so hours of these two movies and you’ll have had your fill of the 1980s Yuppie striving and greed that had New York as its ground zero. The best part: while “Wall Street” is famous for the line “Greed is good,” and while many people have wrongheadedly viewed Michael Douglas’ Gordon Gekko character as some sort of inspiration as a opposed to the bad guy in a cautionary tale, no movie in the entire 1980s leaned in to, embraced, and even glorified the Yuppie ideal as much as “Working Girl” did. And that’s the case even if Mike Nichols told people otherwise after the fact.

“The Naked City” and “The Lost Weekend”: There are tons of movies that take place in New York but a LOT of them are shot on Hollywood backlots. Hell, even one of the movies mentioned above, “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” was largely shot at a studio. More recently, to save money, a lot of productions have tried to make Toronto or Vancouver or sometimes Cleveland play New York on the screen. It can be done well but it’s usually not done well. Both of these movies, however, pioneered shooting New York on the actual streets of New York and portrayed the city in a way that, these days it seems, only Scorsese and Lee are truly committed to.

“Midnight Cowboy”: “I’M WALKIN’ HERE!”

“The Muppets Take Manhattan”: Yes, I’m 100% serious. It’s more New York realistic than any gauzy Nora Ephron-style rom-com in which it’s always fall in the city, everyone is taking long, contemplative walks through Central Park, and no one ever has trouble getting a cab or a seat in a restaurant.

I’m pretty sure I ate at that place on Saturday.

Have a great day everyone.

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