Cup of Coffee: August 30, 2024

Good morning!

Today we roll into the weekend with a story about Chet Lemon, the march of the Cadens begins, I Remembered Some Guys with my Uber driver, scientists have discovered something wonderful, there’s some Cybertruck news, and I talk about the jobs I have left off my resumé.

And That Happened 

Here are the scores. Here are the highlights:

Angels 3, Tigers 0: Jack Kochanowicz tossed six scoreless innings, Ben Joyce got a four-out save, and Zach Neto hit a two-run homer as the Angels snap a seven-game losing streak and avoid being swept by Detroit. Neto’s homer was his 20th on the season which puts him in the 20/20 club. Which, even if it’s been overshadowed by a couple of 40/40 seasons of late — and even if Ohtani might become the charter member of the 50/50 club this year — is still a pretty neat club. It’s like having Priority Pass lounge membership. No, it’s not the Centurion Club or Chase Sapphire Lounge, but there’s still some free food and it beats sitting at the gate, right?

Brewers 6, Giants 0: Aaron Civale was sharp as a tack (7 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 7K) and Aaron Ashby finished it with two innings of no-hit ball. Garrett Mitchell was 2-for-3 with a homer, and Jackson Chourio has a double and knocked in a couple of runs. William Contreras stole home, though it was the front end of a double steal that the Giants defenders botched pretty badly. The Brew Crew take two of three.

Rangers 2, White Sox 1: Nate Eovaldi tossed a one-hitter over seven shutout innings, striking out 10. Corey Seager homered, his 30th on the season and the 200th of his career. The Rangers sweep. That makes seven losses in a row for Chicago, 11 of their last 12 and, screw it, 104 of their last 135. Chicago has to go 11-16 to avoid breaking the 1962 Mets’ dubious record of 120 losses. They have won 11 games total since June 22.

Cardinals 4, Padres 1: Sonny Gray swept the clouds away for six innings and the pen shut the Pads out for the final three. Masyn Winn hit a solo homer. Iván Herrera and rookie Victor Scott II each added two hits for St. Louis who earned the series split.

Marlins 12, Rockies 8: Yesterday the Official Marlins Fan of Cup of Coffee, Lou Schiff, texted me the Marlins lineup as soon as it was released along with a GIF of a literal dumpster fire. Then they went out and scored 12. Sure, they were Denver Runs and the exchange rate on those aren’t great, but we weren’t expecting that. Derek Hill had three hits and two of ‘em were homers. Kyle Stowers had three hits and four RBI. The Fish had 18 hits in all.

Mets 3, Diamondbacks 2: Pete Alonso and Francisco Lindor each hit a solo homer and Randal Grichuk hit a two-run shot for Arizona, leaving it tied at two heading into the ninth. With one out Jesse Winker doubled and his pinch-runner, Tyrone Taylor, scored the go-ahead run off of an up-the-middle José Iglesias single. New York takes two of three. Indeed, they’re 6-4 over their past games, in which they faced three of the best teams in the game in Arizona, San Diego, and Baltimore. Not too shabby. Now they get to have some R&R in the form of a weekend series against the White Sox.

Reds 10, Athletics 9: Oakland’s Lawrence Butler had three homers in this one, but Cincinnati put up a three-run ninth inning capped by a walkoff two-run single from TJ Friedl. Tyler Stephenson and Will Benson homered for the Redlegs, who avoided being swept.

Phillies 5, Atlanta 4: Atlanta was up 4-0 after their half of the sixth when the Phillies finally woke up and plated three in the bottom half on a three-run Bandon Marsh jack and scored two in the seventh on a two-run Nick Castellanos homer. Philly has a six-game lead in the East as these two continue their four-game weekend series.

Blue Jays 2, Red Sox 0: Jays starter Bowden Francis allowed just one his over seven shutout frames as the Red Sox got only two hits all evening and didn’t draw a single walk. Vlad Guerrero Jr. doubled in a run and Ernie Clement doubled in the other. Rich Hill came in for an inning and a third of relief, so everyone born after March 11, 1980 can once again say there is an active major leaguer older than them.

Astros 6, Royals 3: Jason Heyward made his Astros debut and doubled in two runs. The Royals took the lead on a Kyle Isbel three-run double in the seventh but Houston came back in the eighth on a single + throwing error combo, a bases-loaded walk, and then a single + two-run outfield error combo so, yeah, the Royals really shot themselves in the dick here.

Dodgers 6, Orioles 3: Chris Taylor’s early RBI single and a four-run fifth featuring a two-run double from Austin Barnes and RBI singles from Mookie Betts and Miguel Rojas gave the Dodgers a 5-0 cushion that allowed them to withstand Colton Cowser’s three-run homer in the fifth. Shohei Ohtani went 0-for-5. Time to DFA him, I suppose.

The Daily Briefing

Tigers, White Sox great Chet Lemon has had multiple strokes, suffers from aphasia

Outfielder Chet Lemon retired in 1990 after a 16-year career with the Chicago White Sox and Detroit Tigers. He was a three-time All Star, led the league in doubles in 1979, led the league in being hit by pitches four times — when you’re operating on that level that’s a skill, folks — he was a key part of the Tigers’ 1984 championship, and he finished his career with an excellent .273/.355/.442 (121 OPS+) batting line. He was one of my favorites on those early-to-mid 1980s Tigers teams which I idolized.

After he retired, Lemon launched and coached a youth traveling league program which, in terms of producing top talent, was astonishingly successful. Among the alumni of his program are Prince Fielder, Zack Greinke, Billy Butler, Ricky Weeks, Tim Raines Jr., Bobby Wilson, Brady Singer and, Kerry Carpenter.

Over the years, Lemon would make appearances at Tigers playoff gams and at spring training down in Lakeland, Florida, but not recently. A feature about him in the Detroit Free Press yesterday explains why: Lemon has polycyhemia vera, a rare blood disease that causes bone marrow to make too many red blood cells. Treatment involves blood-thinners which have caused him multiple bouts of serious internal bleeding but clots caused by the disease have led to at least 13 strokes — probably way more — which have left him wheelchair-bound, unable to speak more than a couple of simple words, and unable to effectively use the right half of his body. Lemon now lives in a Clermont, Florida rehab center because his needs are more than his wife of 33 years, Gigi Lemon, can provide on her own.

Not many people knew about Lemon’s condition before now, but the Lemon family has decided to go public for a specific reason:

The Lemon family has kept Chet’s condition private for years. But now, they want his story told before the Tigers celebrate the 40th anniversary of the 1984 Tigers — an event set to culminate Saturday. They want his former teammates to know why he can’t speak and fans to understand why he will be in a wheelchair.

Because Chet, 69, will be at that ceremony — Gigi is determined of that.

“I believe Chet being able to see the fans, being able to see his teammates, being back in Detroit, I think it'll bring back a lot of memories for him,” Gigi said. “And I think that it'll be very nostalgic for him. Very emotional, of course.”

Gigi Lemon is pretty clear-eyed about her husband’s condition, however, so she also wanted his story out there so that his teammates and fans will understand why he’s not there in the event Lemon cannot make it. Finally — and perhaps most importantly — the Lemon family wants to use Chet’s story to increase public awareness about aphasia. As the Freep reports, they are in the process of starting The Chet Lemon Foundation, through which they hope to help patients and families who are suffering from it.

The story goes well beyond Lemon’s condition, however, and talks about a key part of his legacy: a massive sports facility north of Orlando Florida which he built, which Gigi Lemon and their son Marcus currently run, and which today invites thousands of youth athletes across multiple sports — baseball, basketball, volleyball, and pickleball among others — every weekend for games, training, and tutoring. In addition to what are described as state-of-the-art sports facilities, the place also has a restaurant, a hair salon, a car detailing operation, an adult fitness center, a day care, and a spa. Why all that stuff? “We thought about all the things that we didn't get done when we were at our kids' sporting events,” Gigi says. “We always said that, ‘Boy, I don't have time to wash my car.’” Which, holy crap, that’s the best idea ever, at least from a parents’ perspective.

If you remember Chet Lemon as a player — or if someone close to you is suffering from aphasia or other related disabilities — this is a must-read article. Gonna warn ya, though. You’ll want a hankie in hand. Not because the story of Chet Lemon’s physical challenges is sad one, necessarily. It’s because the story of his and his family’s journey through those challenges is an absolutely beautiful one about love and perseverance.

It begins

Around five years ago my daughter Anna walked up to me, apropos of nothing, looked me dead in the eye and said "one day will have a president named Caden." And then she walked away. It shook me to my core. In related news: the Los Angeles Angels called up pitching prospect Caden Dana yesterday. He is expected to start on Sunday against the Mariners.

I went to Baseball-Reference.com to investigate matters, and I found 16 players with the first name Caden in their database. None of them, however, have made the big leagues before Dana’s callup. He is the first Caden. The first among many, I presume.

We have had Gen-Z players for some time, including major leaguers, but getting our first Caden feel like a watershed Gen-Z moment, folks.

Remembering Some Guys with the Uber Driver

The windshield on our car got cracked by a rock on the road recently and yesterday morning I dropped it off at the auto glass place. It was done around lunchtime. We’re a one-car family since I let Anna take the Subaru back to college with her so I got an Uber to take me back to pick up the car.

After I got in the Uber I said something like “how are you today,” but the driver, an amiable 50-something man named Jorge, apologized and said he didn’t speak English. I don’t know why, but I just reflexively said “¿cómo estás?” Which, given that I have not taken Spanish since college and most of it has slid out of my brain over the past 30 years, was pretty dumb, as he then assumed I spoke more Spanish than I did and began talking to me. I stopped him and dropped a “solo hablo un poco de Español.” He laughed, but you could tell he at least appreciated the effort.

Then, probably because I was just about to come off the peak of my morning caffeine consumption and was thus a little wired, I managed to put together an extremely broken version of “the only Spanish I speak is about baseball.” Which came out something like “hablo Español pero solo béisbol.” He laughed again. Then it was quiet for a minute.

Then he said, with great vigor, “MIGUEL CABRERA!!!!” and laughed. So I said “JOSE ALTUVE!” At which point we just entered into an impromptu Remembering Some Venezuelan Guys session:

Him: “David Concepción!”

Me: “Bobby Abreu!”

Him: “Marco Scutaro!”

Me: “Andrés Galarraga!”

Him: “Melvin Mora!”

I don’t think I would’ve pulled out Melvin Mora if we had taken 50 turns at this but when I repeated, “Ah, Melvin Mora, sí, sí,” he explained, very slowly and extremely basically for me, that he grew up really close to where Mora is from. At least I’m pretty sure that’s what he said. He said it in the way I sometimes tell people about how I delivered newspapers to Steve Swisher for a summer, so I think I got the gist.

All the guys Jorge mentioned were on the older side. I got the sense that he maybe doesn’t follow baseball as closely as he did when he was younger because when I said “Ronald Acuña!” (I do not know how to say “junior” in Spanish) he was puzzled for a second and said something that ended in “¿Dominicano?” presumably thinking he was from the Dominican Republic. I didn’t know off the top of my head what town Acuña is from so I looked it up on my phone and said “La Guaira?” Jorge nodded and said “ah, sí, sí, sí.”

Jorge dropped me off right after that and as I got out of the car I said “gracias” like your dad does at a Mexican restaurant in a suburban Midwestern strip mall. A man of the world, I am, yes sir.

Best Uber ride ever. And a really good reminder that I was an absolute idiot for not doing a summer Spanish immersion program after my freshman year because I was pretty close to being conversational in Spanish circa 1992 and then I lost almost all of it over the years. Maybe I should do a Duolingo thing or something.

Anyway, gracias, Jorge!

Other Stuff

Something wonderful

From Popular Science:

A team of astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) recently spotted six new rogue worlds in a young nebula. The findings are detailed in a study that has been accepted for publication on August 27 in The Astronomical Journal and indicate that rogue worlds may help create celestial objects that are even bigger than the planet Jupiter. These newly discovered worlds may even be gas giants 5 to 10 times bigger than our solar system’s biggest planet.

ALL THESE WORLDS ARE YOURS, EXCEPT EUROPA. ATTEMPT NO LANDING THERE. USE THEM TOGETHER. USE THEM IN PEACE.

I mean, you guys knew I was gonna go there, right?

Also, no one ever mentions this exchange when quoting “2010”:

Heywood Floyd: I'd love a hot dog.

Walter Curnow: Astrodome. Good hot dogs there.

Heywood Floyd: Astrodome? You can't grow a good hot dog indoors. Yankee Stadium. September. The hot dogs have been boiling since opening day in April. Now that's a hot dog.

Walter Curnow: The yellow mustard or the darker kind?

Heywood Floyd: The darker kind.

Walter Curnow: Very important.

The movie version of “2010” came out in 1984 and, despite that movie painting a pessimistic version of the future in which humanity’s destruction via nuclear holocaust was imminent, they nonetheless assumed that the Astros would still be playing in the Astrodome 26 years later.

Cybertruck Lols 

A Cybertruck caught on fire after crashing in Texas. Which, given that it crashed into a fire hydrant and was soaked in water is a hell of a thing.

Best part: it did so “between Sam’s Club and Bass Pro Shop off Spur 54 and Bass Pro Drive.” I have decided that this whole story is The Official Metaphor of 2024.

What jobs do you leave off your resumé?

The Trump campaign and its vast number of surrogates in the media have had a hard time coming up with any sort of sustained, substantive attack against Kamala Harris. Even more uncharacteristically for them, they can’t even seem to agree on a non-substantive attack on her. As a result, every day there seems to be a new, rather idiotic thing they’re on about.

Yesterday’s thing was some conservative website trying to make a big deal out of the fact that, before her first presidential campaign in 2019, Harris never mentioned that she worked at a McDonald’s during the summer after her freshman year in college. Like, there’s a whole story about it with an ominous deployment of the word “allegedly” and it refers to the McDonald’s thing as “a recent addition to her carefully curated life story.” It’s like they’re accusing her of Stolen McDonald’s Valor or something.

That right wing weirdos think this is a scandal of some sort is not hard to understand. If you spend much time looking at that media ecosystem you tend to find that it’s overwhelmingly populated by privileged rich white people who were privileged rich brats when they were teenagers and college students. Most of them got prime government, think tank, or media placements through their dads or through some crackpot mentor already hooked up with it and they never had to actually work much for a living. In light of that I suppose it’s understandable that they do not appreciate that millions of people work in low-paying, short-term service industry jobs between their high school years and whenever it is they manage to make different kinds of careers for themselves. Good luck to them making Harris’ work history, which up until she got into politics wasn’t that different than a lot of people’s work history, seem scandalous.

This little tempest in a teapot did make me think about my own work history and resumé, such as it is these days, and what I did and did not include on it when I was actually working for a living rather than ranting at the world from my couch.

For years I did include at least one non-career path job I had — DJ at that Beckley, West Virginia top-40 radio station when I was in high school — on resumes. It wasn’t relevant of course but it was a good conversation-starter in interviews and it legit helped me differentiate myself when I was looking for legal jobs. Here, however, are jobs I’ve had that I do not believe I have ever included on my resume:

Little Caesar’s Pizza: My first job. I worked there for two weeks in August 1989, right after I turned 16. I was scheduled a grand total of three shifts. First shift: I scrubbed out used pizza pans. Second shift: I put the little prefabricated dough balls into some dough stretching machine despite the fact that you were supposed to be 18 years-old to operate it. Third shift: cheese and sauce station. The franchise owner/store manager quickly moved me off sauce, however, because he said I was making “race tracks” with the ladle. Then he moved me off cheese because he said I was “gonna put [him] in the poorhouse” because I was too heavy with the cheese. Best part: I’m not entirely sure that in 1989 Little Caesar’s was using real cheese. After the cheese he sent me back to the pans. I quit the next day. Like five years later, after I had moved out of town for school, my dad ordered a pizza from them and the order got messed up badly. When he complained the owner/manager recognized his name and accused my dad of carrying out some vendetta because “I fired your kid.” Never mind that I was not fired. Never mind that I’m pretty sure my dad didn’t even remember that I worked at Little Caesar’s for two weeks.

UPS warehouse: October 1992, sophomore year of college. One of those giant distribution centers next to the freeway where tractor-trailers are loaded and unloaded. They advertised these jobs to college kids because it was super physical work that required young, fit folks to do. It paid a lot of money for the time as well, as it was a union job and you had to join the Teamsters even if you were part time. On my first day there I unloaded boxes from a truck at a pace which I can only describe as “absolutely insane” and I was told that if I fell behind the required pace it would mean BIG TROUBLE. I tried to imagine what the pace would be at a NON-union warehouse and I assumed that, if you didn’t have the Teamsters protecting you, they probably just took you out back and shot you if fell behind. Anyway, I was not cut out for this AT ALL and I quit at the first break, two hours into my first six-hour shift. I still have my Teamsters card in a box somewhere. It’s the only union to which I have ever belonged. If I ever run for political office I’m gonna claim to be “a union man, going way back” and drive the fact-checkers insane.

Saperstein Associates: This was a Columbus, Ohio public opinion polling company a couple miles north of campus. It was a basement call center, but instead of selling things we just did public opinion surveys. I worked there a month during my sophomore year in college. It was fairly easy money and your pay was not based on how many surveys you got through or whatever, so it was low-stress. That said, people hate being called while they’re having dinner or watching “Jeopardy!” and since I worked evenings that was all it was. While I would later make arguing about shit my entire career and my entire lifestyle, I was far less confrontational then, I never reacted well to people yelling at me or hanging up on me, and I found the work to be a drag. I eventually quit without telling anyone. I just stopped showing up. They called me three weeks later to ask me if I would ever be picking up my last paycheck. They were pretty laid back about it all. I figure a lot of people ghost them like that;

Ohio State University Bookstore: I worked at the office supplies counter and stocked spiral notebooks and binders and pens and things. I had this job for the balance of college and I liked it quite a bit. The place was half student employees, half-lifers. A couple of the lifers were a bit scary. One of them was a guy I’ll call “John” who was in his early 40s and lived alone in a studio apartment that did not have a proper kitchen, forcing him to survive on sandwiches and foods he could cook on a hot plate. He said, without a trace of sarcasm, that he loved his apartment because it was easy to keep clean. One day John and I were in the break room and he told me that the worst thing that could ever happen would be for him to win a lottery when the jackpot was below $20 million. Why? “Because there are certain things I’ll need to do if I win, and I’ll need all of that money.” His expression when he said that was serious, approaching dire. I actually liked John, though, even though the manager of the loading dock told me that his whole team was of the opinion that John would eventually come in to work one day and shoot up the place. He never did that, but I did just look him up for the first time in years and found his Facebook page and it’s filled with some pretty extreme right-wing stuff which, in hindsight, is not super surprising.

Limited Credit Services: A second job in the summer between sophomore and junior year of college. I fielded customer service calls from people with Limited, Victoria’s Secret and Express store credit cards. Most of the calls came from clerks at the mall stores when the account holder wanted to buy $250 worth of clothes but only had the credit limit to buy $150. It was up to me (i.e. the computer) to decide whether they’d get a bump. During downtimes my colleagues and I looked up celebrities to see if they owned Limited-affiliated store cards. I’m not sure abut now, but in the the summer of 1993 Hillary Clinton and Oprah Winfrey each had a Victoria’s Secret credit card. I probably just broke a law saying that but information wants to be free and if I get arrested I’ll just say I was lying for clout.

Anyway, lay the hell off Kamala Harris for not making a big thing about working at McDonald’s until relatively recently. Most normal people have worked these kinds of jobs before and most of them are not the stuff of one’s Important Personal Lore. People just need to make a buck, ya know?

Have a great weekend everyone.

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