Cup of Coffee: June 19, 2024

Baseball is mourning the death of a legend today, as Willie Mays passed away at the age of 93 last night.

Today I talk about that, the other major headlines around the game, and I write some stuff about the end of my trip, which I managed to get to during my flight back to the U.S. yesterday. There are not any recaps today, however, as I had very little turnaround time between getting into JFK last night and flying back to Columbus this morning and I wanted to use what little time I had to write about Willie Mays. I hope you understand.

Settling the Scores

Yankees slugger Aaron Judge left last night's game against the Orioles after taking a pitch to his left hand. Judge stayed in to run the bases and played defense in the next half-inning, but he was pinch-hit for the following frame. That’s scary. But the good news is that X-Rays and an MRI at New York-Presbyterian Hospital later in the evening came back negative, so Judge didn’t break anything. He’s still expected to be seen by Yankees team physician Dr. Christopher Ahmad, but Judge said that he hopes to play today and disaster seems to have been averted.

Out west, the Rockies led the Dodgers 9-4 entering the ninth inning in Colorado last night, but then Jason Heyward hit a pinch-hit grand slam and Teoscar Hernández his a three-run homer as the Dodgers’ stunned Colorado with a seven-run ninth inning rally. Damn.

Elsewhere: White Sox starter Jonathan Cannon pitched eight and two-thirds of shutout ball as Chicago beat Houston, Dbacks starter Slade Cecconi blanked the Nats for six as the Dbacks as a whole blanked the Nats overall, and Nick Castellanos — a many who many have memed his good games into being a harbinger of bad baseball news — went 4-for-5 as the Phillies beat the Padres.

The Mets won their seventh straight game and the Twins won their sixth in a row. The Padres and Rangers each dropped their fifth straight.

The scores:

Marlins 9, Cardinals 8
Reds 2, Pirates 1
Phillies 4, Padres 3
Mariners 8, Guardians 5
Diamondbacks 5, Nationals 0
Yankees 4, Orioles 2
Red Sox 4, Blue Jays 3
Atlanta 2, Tigers 1
Twins 7, Rays 6
Mets 7, Rangers 6
Cubs 5, Giants 2
White Sox 2, Astros 0
Dodgers 11, Rockies 9
Brewers 6, Angels 3
Athletics 7, Royals 5

The Daily Briefing

Willie Mays: 1931-2024

Your mileage may vary, but in my view there are probably only four men who have a serious claim to being called the Greatest Baseball Player in Baseball History. One is Babe Ruth. One is Oscar Charleston. One is Ty Cobb. The fourth is Willie Mays and, by my reckoning at least, he was the guy with the best claim. Mays joined the other three in Baseball Valhalla yesterday, after dying peacefully at his home at the age of 93.

My belief that Mays has the strongest claim to title of Greatest of All Time is primarily based on his superior all-around skills. He had tremendous home run power. Incredible fielding ability. A high batting average. A great batter’s eye. Tremendous speed. An extraordinary baseball I.Q. With all due respect to Ruth, Cobb, and Charleston, all of them were lacking, even if only slightly, in at least some given aspects of the game, while Mays had virtually no weaknesses as a player whatsoever.

Beyond that sort of assessment, it cannot be denied that Mays, playing in a fully-integrated league against the top available competition, did what he did in a much tougher environment.

There’s no need to get too hung up on ranking, however, when merely recounting his accomplishments says oh so very much.

Mays, a multi-sport star out of Westfield, Alabama, signed with the Negro League Birmingham Black Barons in 1948 while he was still in high school. He played for the Barons for three seasons before signing with the New York Giants in 1950. He was quickly promoted to the Class AAA Minneapolis Millers in 1951 where he batted .477 and played outstanding defense in his 35 games at which point the Giants brought him to the majors.

Mays would earn Rookie of the Year honors in 1951 and his strong play down the stretch helped the Giants complete a historic comeback from a 13.5 game deficit to defeat the Brooklyn Dodgers for the National League pennant.

Mays spent most of the 1952 season and all of 1953 in the Army, but in 1954, he returned to lead the league with a .345 batting average and 13 triples while blasting 41 homers and knocking in 110 runs. The Giants once again won the NL pennant and faced off in that October’s World Series against the heavily favored Cleveland Indians. With Game 1 tied 2-2 in the top of the eighth inning and with runners on first and second, Indians batter Vic Wertz hit a long drive that would have been a home run in almost every ballpark except New York’s Polo Grounds, which featured the deepest center field in all of baseball. Mays, playing a shallow center, took off and ran with his back to the ball and famously caught it over his shoulder some 460 feet from the plate and then, just as impressively, turned and fired the ball to the infield to keep the runners from advancing:

The Giants went on to win the game and sweep the Series. Mays’ play – known simply as “The Catch” – is widely considered to be the greatest defensive play in baseball history and it instantly made Mays a living legend. We’d still be talking about Mays today even if he had been hit by a crosstown bus after the 1954 World Series ended, but for the next 20 seasons Mays was nothing short of excellent and, by most measures, the greatest player of his era.

Mays led the league in home runs in 1955, 1962, 1964, and 1965. He led the league in stolen bases each season from 1956 through 1959. He was a six-time league leader in OPS+ and a five-time leader in slugging percentage. He was a two-time NL MVP (1954 and 1965), but most modern analysts believe that, objectively speaking, he was the best player in his league at least seven times over the course of his career. He was a 24-time All-Star, winning the All-Star Game MVP Award in 1963 and 1968. He won 12 Gold Glove Awards in center field. He led the Giants to three pennants and that 1954 World Series title and, in his final season, he helped the New York Mets win the 1973 National League pennant.

Mays was third in home runs with 660 when he retired and still ranks sixth. His 2,062 runs scored rank seventh, and his 1,903 RBI rank 12th. His 3,283 hits are the 12th-most of any player and he is likewise baseball's all-time leader in outfield putouts. Mays was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1979.

I was in Willie Mays’ close presence twice, and both of them left me basically speechless.

In 2012 I was in Scottsdale, Arizona to cover spring training. I walked into the Giants clubhouse one morning and sitting at a table were Willie Mays, Ernie Banks and Gaylord Perry. They were there for some sort of pregame ceremony and were just shooting the breeze and telling old baseball stories. That day I spent more time talking to Perry, as I had met him once at his home as a kid and wanted to tell him how much that had meant to me. Mays seemed like such a larger presence than Perry and even Banks, however, and I didn’t dare speak to him because I feared I’d lose my nerve and sound like a complete doof.

Four years later I was back in Scottsdale again. I got to the clubhouse early one morning and only a handful of the current players were out and about. A representative from Major League Baseball was at the same round table just inside the door of the Giants’ clubhouse that Mays, Perry, and Banks had been at four years before. On this morning the MLB rep was putting authentication stickers on baseballs and bats which he was then having players sign.

I walked away to interview a player for a few moments and then walked back to the table, as it was a good place to camp out before deciding who to talk to next. When I got there the MLB rep was gone and sitting there was Willie Mays. He was reading something someone had printed out for him and was alternately checking his phone and his day planner. While he gave off no hostile vibes whatsoever, I had no more nerve to talk to him then than I did four years before. He just seemed too . . . big. I’d have no idea what I’d ask him. What do you say to a god?

Instead, I walked over to the new table the MLB rep was occupying after he had moved his boxes of baseballs and a dozen bats along with him, somewhat hastily. In a sarcastic tone I said “I don’t believe that old guy made you move. You were there first.” He laughed and then in a quiet voice, smiling but serious, said “That’s a man you move for.”

People who work in baseball find themselves in rooms with 25-30 guys who are among the absolute best in the world at what they do nearly every single day. It’s not often that they find themselves in the same room as the absolute best there ever was. A man who was an immortal even while he lived. When they do, it makes them take notice. It changes them.

Rest in peace Willie Mays.

Rob Manfred, Barry Bonds, react to the passing of Willie Mays

Rob Manfred issued the following statement last night on behalf of Major League Baseball:

“All of Major League Baseball is in mourning today as we are gathered at the very ballpark where a career and a legacy like no other began.  Willie Mays took his all-around brilliance from the Birmingham Black Barons of the Negro American League to the historic Giants franchise.  From coast to coast in New York and San Francisco, Willie inspired generations of players and fans as the game grew and truly earned its place as our National Pastime.

“Just as his career was ascending, Willie served his country in the U.S. Army in 1952 and 1953.  As the 1954 NL MVP, he led the Giants to victory in the World Series, in which he made one of the most memorable plays ever with ‘The Catch’ in the deep center field of the Polo Grounds.  All told, Willie was a two-time MVP, a 24-time All-Star, a 12-time Gold Glover, a selection as one of the game’s Greatest Living Players in 2015, and a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom later that year.

“And yet his incredible achievements and statistics do not begin to describe the awe that came with watching Willie Mays dominate the game in every way imaginable.  We will never forget this true Giant on and off the field. On behalf of Major League Baseball, I extend my deepest condolences to Willie’s family, his friends across our game, Giants fans everywhere, and his countless admirers across the world.

“Thursday’s game at historic Rickwood Field was designed to be a celebration of Willie Mays and his peers.  With sadness in our hearts, it will now also serve as a national remembrance of an American who will forever remain on the short list of the most impactful individuals our great game has ever known.”

Also offering a statement was Barry Bonds, Mays' godson, who was close to Mays throughout his life. Bonds said, "I am beyond devastated and overcome with emotion. I have no words to describe what you mean to me -- you helped shape me to be who I am today. Thank you for being my Godfather and always being there. Give my dad a hug for me."

Giants announcer John Miller spent much of last night’s Cubs-Giants game sharing stories about Mays, as did many other broadcasters. Nothing else mattered nearly as much last night.

Willie Mays death announced at Rickwood Field

As Rob Manfred’s statement noted, a special regular season contest between the Cardinals and the Giants will take place at Rickwood Field in Birmingham, Alabama tomorrow. Rickwood Field is the oldest professional ballpark in the United States, was the former home of the Birmingham Black Barons of the Negro Leagues, and it was the park where Willie Mays began his professional career. Mays had originally planned to attend the game at Rickwood Field but his family announced earlier this week that he was too ill to attend.

Last night a minor league game took place at Rickwood, and Mays death was announced during the game.

The timing of all of this is a hell of a thing, but it will certainly add something profoundly moving to tomorrow’s proceedings.

MLB to go with full-time ball-strike challenge system in Triple-A

Jesse Rogers of ESPN reports that Major League Baseball has informed farm-system directors that Triple-A games will begin using the challenge-based Automated Ball Strike (ABS) System in all games beginning June 25. At present Triple-A games use the challenge system for some games and a full ABS, with every ball and strike called by the robot, for others. The full-robot system is now going away.

Rob Manfred recently said that ABS will not be implemented at the big league level until at least next year but maybe not even then. This move, however, suggests that MLB has decided that when it does happen it will be the challenge system as opposed to the fully-automated thing.

As I’ve said in the past when this topic has come up, I’ve watched a lot of Triple-A games in which the challenge system has been in place and it’s totally fine. It moves quickly. From what I’ve seen no one is really abusing it. It just gets calls right without a lot of drama and without long stoppages. It beats bitching about Laz Díaz’s zone or whoever’s zones, that’s for sure.

Kansas legislature passes bill to build stadiums for Kansas City Chiefs and Royals

Yesterday state legislators in Kansas approved a plan to lure both the Kansas City NFL team and the Kansas City Royals away from Missouri and across the border.

The bill authorizes state bonds to be issued to help finance new stadiums and practice facilities for both teams. The plan from the Republican-controlled legislature now goes to Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly who sounds poised to sign it, issuing a statement which says, "Kansas now has the opportunity to become a professional sports powerhouse." Even if she vetos it, however, the bill was passed by bipartisan legislative supermajorities so they’d probably override it anyway.

Which means that, while there are a lot of details to be hammered out and the teams themselves have to agree to move, both teams — which pushed hard but failed to obtain public financing for new stadiums in Kansas City, Missouri — will almost certainly leave their current home in the Truman Sports Complex when their leases are up in 2031, if not before.

It’s been 20 years since historian and journalist Thomas Frank wrote the book What's the Matter with Kansas?, which examined why and how Republicans have successfully espoused and implemented economic policies that do not benefit the majority of their constituents, with Kansas serving as the main example of the phenomenon. In that book, Frank talked about how the political right has managed to shift the political discourse from one about social and economic equality to divisive cultural issues, such as abortion and gay marriage, which redirects the public’s anger toward so-called liberal elites, thereby giving them cover to enact policies which go against the public’s material interests as long as the public is being thrown sufficient cultural red meat.

The subsidization of sports stadiums doesn’t fit perfectly into that paradigm as the promotion of sports is not the same sort of red meat that, say, going after minorities and marginalized communities or promoting religion over secularism is. But sports are a shiny object which can enchant a lot of folks. Enchant them in a way which causes them to ignore how bad for the public good it is to use billions of dollars of public funds to build new stadiums for professional sports teams owned by billionaires. Someone call Thomas Frank’s literary agent and get them to pay for him to write an epilogue for a new edition of the book.

Justin Verlander hits the IL with neck discomfort

Astros starter Justin Verlander has been placed on the 15-day injured list with neck discomfort, retroactive to June 16. Verlander was scratched from his Saturday start due to the ailment. Manager Joe Espada said that Verlander has “been actually dealing with this for like the last two weeks.”

It’s been pretty clear. Verlander, who is 41, has struggled to a 3.95 ERA (97 ERA+) in 10 starts. In his last two starts he’s been particularly bad, allowing eight runs in 10 innings. Some of that may be age finally catching up to Verlander, but it’d also be explained by an injury. And now he’s on the shelf.

Other Stuff

A real life Old Timey guy!

When I got to my gate at Heathrow yesterday I saw this dude sitting there:

I was initially concerned that I had traveled back in time to the Regency Era or, alternatively, that the “old timey guy” character John Mulaney played on an episode of “Difficult People” a few years ago was on my flight. But when I landed, one of you told me that this guy is actually A Guy. This guy, who designs and makes his own clothes and wears them, basically, all the time:

My reader also sent me an article about him in The Guardian from a few years back and sent me his Instagram page, which a number of people I know, including my daughter, follows. I feel like I’ve been living a totally sheltered life not to know who this dude is.

My only other observations: (a) I wish I saw where he was sitting on my plane, because I’d like to know if he wore the top hat for the whole flight or stowed it overhead; (b) I will not judge this fellow for one second because I later stumbled upon a video of a guy who lives his entire life as though he lives in 1946 and, dammit, I would TOTALLY do that if I had the guts because that’s where I am mentally and temperamentally as it is; and (c) I’m glad that there are genuinely unique people like this in the world. Freak Flags Fly Forever, and God bless those who fly them.

The TWA Hotel

We flew out of London late yesterday afternoon. Because we play that whole airline points game we had to take a flight which got us into New York too late to grab a flight to Columbus. On the one hand that pisses me off because it’s just another reminder of how crappily-served America’s 14th largest city is by air carriers. Seriously, it’s a drag trying to anywhere other than Chicago, Atlanta or a couple of other cities from Cbus. On the other hand, (a) flying across the ocean takes a long time and the last thing you want to do after doing that is make a connection to a commuter jet for the final hour and a half; and (b) because we had to split the journey into two days, it gave us an opportunity to stay in the TWA Hotel at JFK Airport.

The hotel is housed in the old TWA Airlines Flight Center terminal, which was designed by the architect Eero Saarinen -- the same guy who did the Gateway Arch in St. Louis -- and opened in 1962. At the time of its opening it was a full-throated announcement of the Jet Age in all of its modernist glory. It ceased being used for active airline operations in 2001 but it has been lovingly and quite thoughtfully restored to its 1960s style and it has been perfectly transformed into a modern hotel.

Here’s the old departures seating area, which is now the hotel bar and lounge. The Lockheed Constellation L-1649 Starliner you see out that window is also a lounge now:

I had actually stayed here once before, two years ago, and I took this photo in the morning before we departed on that occasion. When we checked in the evening before, both last night and in the evening back in 2022, this whole area was full of people having cocktails. There are also a lot of off-duty flight crews hanging around. The TWA is the only hotel on-site at JFK, and it seems like a lot of pilots and crew stay here on their layovers.

Then there’s this:

That’s one of the two original tunnels which led from the head house of the terminal to the gates. Each of them now lead from the lobby area — the check in desks are at the old ticket counters — to the hotel rooms in the newly-built hotel annex behind the old terminal. One of the tunnels also serves as a walkway to the actually-operating Jet Blue Terminal in the new Terminal 5 just beyond the TWA complex. If you get dropped off in a car for your Jet Blue flight you just walk into the new, normal airport building, but if you take the Air Train you can go through the TWA airport lobby and through the tunnels just like it's 1965 again. Except you're about to fly Jet Blue to, like, Ft. Myers instead of TWA to Swinging London or Gay Paree. Sorry.

Inside the lobby/Flight Center area are a number of museum-style exhibits with things like “TWA flight crew uniforms through the ages” and “a typical 1960s living room.” Which isn’t exactly typical but it’s what we have decided was typical through the filter of collective nostalgia:

Stepping outside . . .

I was tired, it was hot, it was getting dark, and there were a lot of people milling about when we got here, so I just snagged this exterior shot of the place from the hotel’s website. This is clearer than anything I could get anyway.

Anyway: this is the outside view of the TWA Flight center, which is pretty much as it has always looked going back to the 1960s. The black glass structures to either side are new. That's where the hotel rooms are actually located. This photo makes them seem tacked on, but that's just the perspective. They sit back from the Flight Center -- separated by those awesome tunnels -- leaving the Flight Center to stand majestically alone.

The rooms in the hotel are fairly straightforward modern business hotel quality rooms. Nice enough, but not the sort of place you’d want to plan a romantic weekend getaway around or anything. Some rooms face the runway, some face the Jet Blue terminal, some face the back of the Flight Center. The windows are hella thick so the sound of air traffic was not distracting, at least to me, but last night there was a lot of police and airport security activity in front of the Jet Blue terminal which we could hear through the windows and that was a drag.

As far as the look, the rooms are basic but they have some fun retro design flourishes:

Yeah, that’s real coffee. Welcome back to America, bitches.

Like I said: unless you or your partner is a serious mid-century modern head, I wouldn’t book a stay at the TWA as a destination situation. Best just take the Air Train out there some afternoon and walk around the common areas, get a drink in the lounge, and gawk for a bit and then go home or back to where you’re staying. If you do have the need to stay in a hotel near JFK either before or after a flight, however, and if you don’t mind paying a bit more than you might for the Hilton Garden Inn on 134th Street, I recommend it.

Oh crap. My trip is over. When can I go back?

Have a great day everyone.

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