Cup of Coffee: May 6, 2024

Good morning!

Before we get into today’s business, I wanted to let you know that this will be a weird week at Cup of Coffee. The college school year is coming to an end and I will be driving up to Burlington, Vermont later this week to (a) help my daughter move out of her dorm (b) transport a bunch of her stuff into a storage unit; and (c) if she does not annoy me too much, to bring her back home for the summer.

As I have complained about at length, Burlington is an eleven and a half hour drive from Cup of Coffee Headquarters, which means that I’ll be on the road all damn day on Wednesday and contending with the New York Throughway and the beautiful-yet-Trump-sign-and-flag-dominated Adirondack byways. Thursday will entail a lot of moving and logistics, and I’ll be on the road all damn day Friday heading back. Which is to say, it’s unlikely that there will be a proper newsletter on Thursday, though I will likely send out a “hey, hi” missive that morning. Friday is TBD, but I’m guessing it’ll be curtailed at best and there may not be one at all depending on how things go the day before.

For those who are curious, my son is already home from Ohio University. I got him on Friday, but that only requires a 150-mile round trip. Usually, anyway. This time around it was 200 miles because we were 25 miles back toward home when Carlo realized he left his turntable and a box of vinyl back in his dorm and we had to double back to get it. I somehow refrained from murdering him for that but, even then, it was a walk in the park compared to the 1,400+ mile round trip I’ll be undertaking to get Anna this week.

Anyway, just wanted to let you know. Today, as usual, there is baseball stuff and non-baseball stuff, but I’ve spent enough time talking already that I’m not gonna preview it anymore. Let’s just jump on in, shall we?

And That Happened 

Here are the scores. Here are the highlights:

White Sox 5, Cardinals 1: The Cardinals haven’t given their fans all that much to cheer about this year but dropping two of three to the White Sox is something of a low point. Well, that and dropping two of three to Miami last month. And while the A’s have been pretty good of late, I feel like by the time the season is over, their having dropped two of three to Oakland isn’t gonna look all that great either. Anyway, here Garrett Crochet tied up the Cards bats for six innings and they only managed four hits on the afternoon. Eloy Jiménez went deep. Paul DeJong doubled in a run and scored on a Braden Shewmake RBI single. I have lived on this planet for 50 years and I’ve never seen the name “Shewmake” before, so that’s something.

Pirates 5, Rockies 3: Oneil Cruz hit a two-run homer in Pittsburgh’s four-run sixth inning. Jack Suwinski singled in a run and a Ke’Bryan Hayes ground ball plated another. The Pirates take two of three.

Guardians 4, Angels 1: Carlos Carrasco allowed one over six while José Ramírez and Josh Naylor each hit two-run homers, in the sixth and eighth innings, respectively. Ramírez had been hitless in his previous six games before hitting that dinger. He also drew a walk and was the baserunner who scored on Naylor’s blast. The AL Central-leading Guardians take two of three and move 10 games over .500. The Angels dropped 10 games under and have no lost 13 of 16.

Cubs 5, Brewers 0: Javier Assad shut the Brewers out for six and two relievers finished the five-hit, nine-strikeout blanking. Nico Hoerner doubled in two and scored on a wild pitch. Dansby Swanson homered. Chicago takes two of three.

Mariners 5, Astros 4: Seattle had a 3-0 lead by the sixth, trailed 4-3 by the end of the seventh, but Luis Urías tied the game back up with an RBI single in the eighth and Cal Raleigh’s solo homer in the top of the ninth clinched it for the M’s. Luke Raley homered earlier in the game and Seattle got two in the second on a bases-loaded walk to Urías and a Josh Rojas RBI single. The Mariners take two of three.

Red Sox 9, Twins 2: And with that the Twins’ 12-game winning streak comes to an end. Ceddanne Rafaela and Rafael Devers homered. Those were the first two Red Sox homers in seven games. Vaughn Grissom and Dominic Smith had two-run doubles. I don’t know how long they had gone without two-run doubles and I’m to lazy to check, but the offensive outburst was pretty rare of late. Indeed, they had only scored four runs in their previous three games, all losses.

Rays 7, Mets 6: The first four innings were a seesaw affair that put the Mets up 5-4. That held until the bottom of the ninth when Randy Arozarena tied it up with a homer. New York took the lead thanks to an error in the top of the tenth but a two-run triple from Jonny DeLuca gave Tampa Bay the walkoff win.

Yankees 5, Tigers 2: Rain ended this one after eight innings. Which, given how taxed the bullpens were throughout the series was probably the best thing for everyone involved. Aaron Judge homered in the first and a bases-loaded, bases-clearing double from Juan Soto broke a 2-2 tie in the seventh and gave us our final score and gave the Yankees a three-game sweep. Tough luck no-decisions for both Tarik Skubal (6 IP, 6 H, 2 ER , 11K) and Nestor Cortes (6.1 IP, 3 H, 2 ER, 9K).

Dodgers 5, Atlanta 1: Shohei Ohtani homered twice — one of them went 464 damn feet — and Teoscar Hernández homered as well as the Dodgers complete the sweep. And folks, it was a thorough shellacking, as in addition to all of the homers, Dodgers pitchers limited Atlanta to six runs in the 29 innings they played. When Atlanta showed up to Dodger Stadium on Friday they had the best record in the majors. Now they’re in second place in their own division.

Nationals 11, Blue Jays 8: A long rain delay, five lead changes, and not much damn pitching to speak off made for a long afternoon in our nation’s capital, but Eddie Rosario's two-run homer in the seventh broke an 8-8 tie and gave the Nats the series. Luis Garcia, Jr. had four hits including a home run and drove in four while Jesse Winker hit a three-run homer for Washington.

Rangers 3, Royals 2: The Royals took a 2-0 lead into the eighth behind five shutout innings from starter Daniel Lynch IV and two more from Angel Zerpa. Texas scored one on a Corey Seager sac fly in the eighth, Jonah Heim hit a homer in the ninth to force extras, and then Nathaniel Lowe singled in the Manfred Man in the 10th to give Texas the game and the series, two games to three.

Marlins 12, Athletics 3: Miami salvages one in the series thanks to an offensive outburst which included a 4-for-4, three-RBI day from Nick Gordon and a 2-for-3, two-RBI day from Josh Bell. The Miami bullpen gave Skip Schumaker five innings of one-run relief.

Orioles 11, Reds 1: Dean Kremer pitched six innings of one-hit shutout ball but he didn’t need to be anywhere near that good given the run support. Anthony Santander hit a grand slam, Jordan Westburg hit a two-run homer, and Ryan McKenna added a solo shot. The Orioles sweep the series. They have won four straight and six of their last seven.

Diamondbacks 11, Padres 4: Ketel Mate and Joc Pederson each hit two-run homers and Jake McCarthy and Christian Walker each drove in a pair as well. The Dbacks avoid the sweep and end a three-game losing streak.

Phillies 5, Giants 4: A three-run homer from Bryce Harper helped stake Philly to a 5-1 lead. San Francisco would try to come back but despite homers from Thairo Estrada and Jakson Reetz they couldn’t come back all the way. The Phillies win their fifth in a row and their ninth of their last ten. As we wake up this morning they have the best record in baseball.

The Daily Briefing

Marlins trade Luis Arráez and cash to the Padres for prospects

You don’t see a lot of trades in May but on Friday night the Miami Marlins said “screw it, let’s play for 2028” and traded away two-time All-Star and two-time batting champ Luis Arráez to the San Diego Padres. The deal:

• Padres get: Arráez and close to $8 million in cash;
• Marlins get: reliever Woo-Suk Go and minor-league prospects Dillon Head, Nathan Martorella and Jakob Marsee

That cash covers all but the prorated major league minimum left on Arráez’s $10.6 million deal for 2024. He still has one more year of arbitration left and it’ll be up to the Padres to handle that.

At the time of the deal Arráez was hitting .299/.347/.372 (105 OPS+) in 33 games. It’s fairly obvious why the Padres want him. Their offense has not been terrible this year but it has been uneven at times, and adding a guy who gets on base as much as Arráez does represents a boost. That boost came immediately, actually, as he showed up to Phoenix just before the Padres-Diamondbacks game Saturday night, was put in the lineup, and went 4-for-6 with two runs and an RBI as San Diego trounced Arizona 13-1. We’ll forget that he went 1-for-5 as the Padres themselves got trounced yesterday because it makes for a better narrative.

Arráez’ specific role with the Padres is an open question, however, as Xander Bogaerts was just moved to second base before this season and the team will likely want to keep him there. Manny Machado has primarily DH’d this year, so either he’ll resume playing more third base or Arráez will move over to cover. Or they’ll trade off. Or they’ll rotate Machado, Bogaerts, and Arráez through the DH slot to keep everyone’s legs rested. For what it’s worth he was the DH on Saturday and played second base yesterday while Bogaerts DH’d.

As for Miami’s haul:

• Head is a lightning-fast plus-defender in center. He was the 25th overall pick in the 2023 draft. He’s still just 19 but projects as an excellent prospect, especially if he hits even a little bit more than he already has. The Marlins likely see him as their center fielder of the future;
• Marsee, 22, is at Double-A right now and has hit .258/.406/.413 with 73 steals and 20 homers in 182 minor league game. He walks a lot and strikes out a lot;
• Martorella, 23, is a big hoss of a 1B/DH type who has put up an .820 OPS with 24 home runs and 44 doubles in three minor league seasons. He’s also in Double-A;
• Go, 25, was signed out of Korea last winter. He has made 10 relief appearances at Double-A with an ERA of 5.11 and 15 strikeouts and four walks in 12.1 innings. 

That’s a pretty decent haul for a singles hitter who is not a plus-defender and who has one more year of team control. But it also heralds yet another Miami Marlins rebuild. Maybe the fifth or sixth in the 31-year history of the franchise. This despite the fact that the team made the playoffs last year. But of course the Marlins have begun the year horribly, standing at 9-24 and 13 games out in the NL East at the time of the deal, so last year doesn’t really matter all that much I don’t suppose. Add in the fact that they have a new president of baseball operations in Peter Bendix who no doubt wants to cast the team in his image and it wasn’t hard to see this coming once the losses began to pile up. It’s just surprising to see it happen on May 3 as opposed to June or July 3.

And, of course, it’s exhausting for Marlins fans who, despite enjoying two World Series wins over the years, have spent far, far more time watching losing baseball and seeing good players shipped off fairly constantly. Which is to say: don’t get too attached to Jesús Luzardo, Jazz Chisholm Jr., the rehabbing Sandy Alcantara, Josh Bell and maybe some others too. Again, given the quality of this club these aren’t monumental losses, but it’s yet another instance in which Marlins fans are being told “just wait until four years from now!” and that has to get old.

Trea Turner out six weeks with hamstring strain

The Philadelphia Phillies have been riding high of late but they got some bad news when star shortstop Trea Turner strained his left hamstring while scoring on a passed ball against the Giants on Friday night.

Turner told reporters on Saturday that the strain is “significant” and that he's expected to miss at least the next six weeks. If that holds he’ll be out of action until mid-to-late June, though it wouldn’t be a shock to see him held out until the All-Star break out of an abundance of caution.

This is a big blow for Philly, as Turner was off to a fantastic start this season, hitting .343/.392/.460 (145 OPS+) with two home runs and 10 stolen bases on 11 attempts in 33 games. Edmundo Sosa will likely take over at shortstop, though Bryson Stott has played some short as well, giving Rob Thomson some options.

MLB, Nike announce the uniform fixes 

This was reported a week ago via the release of an MLBPA memo, but over the weekend Major League Baseball and Nike released a statement about fixing the farkakte uniforms:

Major League Baseball and NIKE, Inc., the Official Uniform Supplier of MLB, announced today that adjustments will be made to all Club uniforms following conversations with players, Clubs, and their equipment managers.

“Player and Club feedback is extremely important to us,” said Commissioner of Baseball Robert D. Manfred, Jr. “Together with Nike, we listened to our players and as a result, we are addressing their concerns.”

For the 2025 season, Nike-designed MLB uniforms will include larger lettering on the back of jerseys with individual pant customization made available to all players. Nike is also working on a solution to address the slight color differences between the jerseys and pants of some Clubs’ gray road uniforms, as well the discoloration that can occur due to perspiration in certain instances. Once the solution is finalized, adjusted gray uniforms will go on field as soon as the second half of this season.

“We will continue to work with Nike to make adjustments with the goal of delivering a uniform that looks good and helps MLB players perform at their best,” said Manfred.

That’s good I guess. Here’s hoping, though, that they also address the stitching and fabric quality, because this keeps happening:

That, via a subscriber, is Riley Greene of the Detroit Tigers. His pants tore in the third inning of Friday night’s game after he slid into second base. One would think that holding up to sliding would be the first and most important requirement of baseball pants, but I’m sure Nike was more concerned with some sort of PerformanceTechForRealWickActive™ technology or something that no one wants or needs.

Tax-avoiding team owners are going under the microscope 

Back in July 2021 ProPublica published an exposé which explained how owners of professional sports teams took tax breaks which are supposed to apply to depreciating assets like machinery and buildings and stuff and applied them to assets which do not depreciate such as the purchase of their team, broadcast rights, intellectual property, and player contracts. The result: sports owners typically report massive losses despite the fact that said losses are almost wholly imaginary and pocket massive profits which largely go untaxed.

As that story explained, this is nothing new in the sports world. Indeed, the legendary Bill Veeck is typically credited with bringing it to baseball. It was most famously characterized by Paul Beeston, then president of the Toronto Blue Jays, who once said “Under generally accepted accounting principles, I could turn a $4 million profit into a $2 million loss and I could get every national accounting firm to agree with me.” Steve Ballmer, the billionaire owner of the Los Angeles Clippers was the primary case study in the ProPublica story.

As I wrote at the time, even if those tax avoidance strategies seemed sketchy as hell, they were technically legal, which is the best kind of legal. A new ProPublica report, however, reveals that the IRS has launched a new campaign to examine whether owners of sports teams are violating the law when they depreciate things that don’t, you know, depreciate.

Why is the IRS looking at this now? ProPublica:

In an analysis for clients, the law firm Morgan Lewis credited the IRS campaign to several factors: an increased enforcement budget, criticism that wealthy taxpayers are not audited frequently enough and ProPublica’s reporting.

“The IRS may be acting on its promise to restore ‘fairness’ in tax compliance by taking more shots at partnerships and high-wealth individuals, including sports team owners,” the firm wrote. “With the Sports Industry Losses campaign, the sports industry looks to be the next opponent in the IRS arena.”

Clay Hodges, a tax planning specialist at the firm Moss Adams, said in an interview that the IRS usually selects areas to focus enforcement efforts based on evidence that it will find unpaid taxes. While it’s impossible to judge the IRS’ motivation based on its public announcement, he said, he noted the regular headlines of sports team owners selling teams for huge profits.

I realize that I can sound like a broken record when talking about how the rich always seem to get richer and how they generally live under different rules and laws than the rest of us. Thing is, though: if people point that out long enough and loud enough — and if those with the power to combat that (a) are motivated to do so; and (b) are given the resources to do so — change can happen in this regard.

More broadly: this is one of the many super unsexy things that barely get any headlines but which can change significantly based on who holds political power. Sort of like that antitrust stuff I was talking about a couple of weeks ago and any number of other issues and areas of governance. For all of the people who like to claim that there’s no difference between Trump and Biden or Democrats and Republicans, the fact remains that there are huge differences that, while not getting a lot of play on cable news, can mean a hell of a lot for public policy. Scrutiny of the plutocrats is just one of them.

The saga of the “Rooted in Oakland” Truck

A few years ago, when the Oakland Athletics were still, at least theoretically, trying to stay in Oakland, they bought a box truck, painted it Kelly Green, and painted the words “Rooted in Oakland” on the side, rolling it out to games and events as a promotional, um, vehicle. Then John Fisher and Dave Kaval pulled their Crazy Ivan and announced the move to Las Vegas. Now the whole idea of “Rooted in Oakland” is deader than vaudeville and the truck disappeared.

But what happened to it?

A couple of members of the “Last Dive Bar” Oakland A’s/Oakland Coliseum fan group wanted to know. What’s more, they wanted the truck and searched all over the Internet to find it. Which they did:

Then, two weeks ago, pictures of the vehicle, painted in A’s colors and emblazoned with Oakland’s signature oak tree, popped up on social media. The shots depicted the vehicle in what appeared to be a marsh-like area, tucked next to a storage container.

According to Roberts and Hernandez, the Last Dive Bar group was hoping to buy the truck for the independent Oakland Ballers team—soon to be the only quasi-professional baseball squad left in Oakland. They hoped to use it to sell merchandise and food during the Ballers’ upcoming inaugural season at Raimondi Field in West Oakland.

They wanted to buy it, but they were told that it wasn’t for sale. There was some degree of confusion about that, as the guy who had it told the Last Dive Bar people that the truck was being donated to the Make a Wish Foundation. But then it was found on an auto auction website. Initially people believed that John Fisher was lying about the donation — he’s lied about a lot of things! — but it turns out that, like a lot of vehicles “donated” to Make a Wish, it was merely the money from the proceeds of the sale that were to be donated which, honestly, is far more useful than a used box truck.

The auction was on Saturday, but as of this writing I’m not sure what happened to the truck. As noted, the Last Dive Bar people had raised over $5,000 to bid it on it and hoped to use it for Oakland Ballers games. Here’s hoping that worked out.

Other Stuff

Fuck Tom Cotton

I just saw this yesterday, but last week Senator Tom Cotton (R-Dipshitville) took to Twitter to mock the food requests of students protesting at an encampment at UCLA, saying “why do Marxists these days always seem to be vegan and “allergic” to gluten?”

While I get that some people have adopted a gluten-free diet as a trend or in an effort to eat healthier — and while I get that "gluten free" has become some sort of lazy cultural shorthand for “weak” or “sensitive” or something — celiac disease is a real thing. As I’ve no doubt mentioned before, my wife Allison has celiac disease. She’s lived with it — and sometimes suffered with it — for over a decade now. It can cause serious negative health effects such as vitamin and mineral deficiencies, anemia, osteoporosis, nervous system disorders, and cognitive impairment and it has at least been tentatively linked with various forms of lymphoma. Practically speaking it can disrupt one’s life by forcing those who have it to radically change the way they shop, the way they cook, the way they eat, the way they travel, and the way they socialize. All of which, in turn, can seriously impact one’s mental health or exacerbate existing mental health problems. It really sucks and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.

The aggressive and at times willful ignorance people like Tom Cotton have demonstrated in turning “gluten-free” into some sort of catch-all punchline is heinous. The ease and seeming glee with which people like him have demonized people suffering from an autoimmune disease — casting them as weak or characterizing their disease as a political or fashion choice or as evidence as some sort of moral failing — is beyond callous. It speaks of a person with no human empathy. It speaks of a person willing to devalue and dehumanize anyone if it will get him an applause line or some likes on social media. At the absolute best it speaks of person who is profoundly ignorant, but I suspect that the Ivy League-educated Tom Cotton knows better. He just realizes that attacking certain people will play well with certain other people and, hey, who cares if someone has a disease? They're probably liberals anyway.

He’d never do this with someone who has multiple sclerosis, Guillain-Barré syndrome, Graves’ disease or any other autoimmune illness. But it’s apparently fine to attack people with a disease that stupid and cruel people have decided is fun to mock.

Fuck Tom Cotton. Fuck his heartless ass sideways.

Great Moments in LinkedIn Brain 

Once in a great while I think, “should I use LinkedIn for anything?” But, given that I’m not in any real sort of business and that I believe networking is a plot cooked up by the Pod People, I can never think of a real reason to post there. I don’t fret too much about it though because I’ve seen what some people actually do post on there and have come to the conclusion that LinkedIn is mostly for the insane:

For the record, I scoured this dude’s account to see if he was really just doing a bit and I found no reason to think that. He’s a sales guy to the bone and there is no hint that he was joking. You almost gotta respect his commitment to the grind. Thankfully, though, most of the comments beneath the post were mocking, so I still have at least some faith in humanity.

The best of this sociopath’s takeaways was this:

3. 📺 Demo: If you're confident there is a strong fit, showing your product to potential buyers is essential. Don't simply speak to the features or functionality; explain the results the other person can expect. Ideally, include a trial so they can try the product and get a feel for it. "

A free trial, eh? I mean, she’s cute, so why not? Give me her number and we’ll see where this leads, Bry . . .

Old Timey Base Ball

Yesterday I took in a baseball game. It wasn’t the Guardians or the Reds, though, It was the Columbus Buckeyes taking on the German Village Hobnobbers. The game took place in the Hobnobbers’ home venue, Schiller Park, which is just a few blocks from my house:

I’m sure a lot of you have seen this kind of baseball before. They play by 1860s rules, the most notable of which is that if a fielder catches the ball on one hop, the batter is out. Which is for the best given that they don’t wear gloves of any kind (the ball is slightly larger and softer than modern baseballs). Pitchers pitch underhanded. There is no mound. There are no fences. At Schiller Park, all of those trees you can see are in fair territory, and outfielders routinely have to play the ball off of their branches or their trunks.

Some old-timey base ball clubs really lean into an historical re-enactment angle, complete with antiquated nicknames and players and umpires speaking in 19th century vernacular and all of that. The Hobnobbers and Buckeyes, however, approach it like any other sport guys might play in 2021. Yes, the uniforms, equipment, and rules are anachronistic, but the chatter was modern. As was the fact that many of the players were taking swigs of an IPA or a High Noon when they came off the field rather than buttermilk or ginger beer or whatever the hell people drank back in Olden Times.

I chatted with a couple of the players, the oldest of which were in their 60s, the youngest of which were in their late 20s or early 30s with all possible ages in between. A couple were retired lawyers. One guy on the Hobnobbers is a photojournalist who used to shoot sports for the New York Times and Los Angeles Times among a bunch of other things but who has since moved back to his native Ohio. He had his professional photo gear out at the game yesterday and would set it down when it was his turn to bat. He’s working on a project featuring the Hobnobbers which I’ll share when it’s out.

I didn’t stay for the whole game — there was no pitch clock in 1860 and the lack of gloves and trees being in play meant for some long innings — but it was a lot of fun. Later in the season the Hobnobbers will play the Ohio Village Muffins, the Canal Fulton Mules, and the Mansfield Independents. If you’re in central Ohio, mark your calendars.

Have a great day everyone.

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