the_nub_apr2009.html
(Posted: 4/30/09)
What Baseball and the
Bailout Have in Common
Any baseball fan meeting friends from
the other side of the political
field knows how to avoid a verbal brawl: “How about those Mets (Yanks,
Red Sox,
etc.)?” Baseball can bring opponents
together, at least for the moment, providing a common base of interest.
MIT Prof. Simon Johnson says the bank
bailout is playing
like baseball; it has created common ground on which the left and right
can
stand.. Appearing on Bill Moyers Journal
last weekend, Johnson, a former International Monetary Fund executive,
said all
of us bailout-bashers on the third-base side of the diamond have
company:
“Everyone's
worried
about…the
disproportion
of
power
in
the
hands
of
a
relatively
few
financial
big
players…You
can
worry
about
it
from
a
left
point
of
view.
You
say,
‘Well,
this
is
just
unfair
and
it
obviously
affects
distribution
of
power
and
income.’
You can worry about it from a
right point of
view because it leads to corporate welfare. Actually,
I
think
everyone's
opposed
to
corporate
welfare
(for)
these
big
players.”
Johnson says the banking big guys
think they’ve won, and they’re right: “They
got the bailout. They got the money they needed to stay in business.
They got a
vast line of credit from the taxpayer…The banks have (even succeeded in
getting)
control of the state… Not the state control of the banks. If the state had control of the banks, the
banks wouldn't be able to turn around and say, no on your Chrysler deal
and no
way on modifying the rules about mortgages…”
The chances of a public outcry
leading to fairer government measures are not good, says Johnson. Why? “We're
having a moment of relative clarity right now where a lot of people are
agreeing. But these things pass.
“The
baseball
season
is
upon
us.”
Historical note: “(In) the
Depression of 1929-31…Britain’s was the first
major economy to turn the corner…(It) spen(t) on new housing, which
reanimated
the construction industry…In France, by contrast, governments…lent
large sums
to banks…and lost it.”
- From The
Penguin History of the Second World War (reissue 1999)
- -
-
From the e-mailbag, re baseball’s racist history (previous
Nub): “The
disgrace to MLB is the failure to honor Commisioner Albert
("Happy") Chandler's role in causing the color line to be
broken. The vote to dishonor the
Dodgers' contract with Jackie Robinson was 15-to-1 with all owners --
apart
from the Dodgers -- voting against.
Chandler, former Kentucky
senator, overrode the
racists, He was rewarded by having his contract not renewed. (Commisioner
Kenesaw Mountain)
Landis, a devout racist, denied Bill Veeck's effort purchase the
Phillies in
1944 upon learning that Veeck planned to engergize the ‘Phutile’
Phillies by
hiring Negro players.”
David
Schechter, Wilmette,
IL
“Unwatchable,” a word easily associated
with the ’08 Mets,
is fast becoming applicable to the doleful ’09 edition.
Worse, the NY Post’s Kevin Kernan is already saying
the unsayable about Omar Minaya’s Mets:
Kernan suggested the other day that the NY team with the second
highest
mlb payroll could finish the season under-.500.
Tuesday night’s TV lineup offered a
perfect illustration of
the fan-appeal challenge facing the Mets in their competition with the
Yanks. What attentive fan would choose
to watch Livan Hernandez pitch against the Marlins rather than see
young Phil
Hughes take on the Tigers? Another Omar
salvage project on SNY, a prospect on YES.
Multiply that disadvantage four (non-Santana) games out of five
and one
could almost sympathize with the over-hyped, under-clutched Metsies.
- o
-
(The Nub is a team effort
skippered by Dick Starkey. Comments
to dickstar@aol.com
are welcome, as are subscription requests.
Previous Nubs can be found by scrolling below.)
(Posted: 4/28/09)
When Racism, Fascism Went
to Bat
Observance this month of Jackie
Robinson’s breakthrough 52
years ago points to a gap in baseball’s voluminous history: the racist
period. Details of the behind-the-scenes
maneuvering
by the mlb commissioner and owners to keep the pro sport segregated
during its
first half-century have remained unreported.
(Commish
Kenesaw Mountain
Landis was sometimes called the “Great White Father.”) That nothing
useful
could come of compiling such a report - baseball’s implicit stance –
is, we
know, also at the center of a political debate these days:
whether to disclose more detailed information
about torture and those involved.
International Herald Tribune columnist
William Pfaff has
gone to bat forcefully for disclosure. He recalls the 1935 Sinclair
Lewis novel
“It Can't Happen Here” which foresaw “install(ation
of)
an American counterpart to the fascist
dictatorships already in power in Italy
and Germany.” That turned out to be a false alarm, says
Pfaff. But:
“When
‘It’ did happen
was in 2001-2008, in the Bush administration.
There was a takeover of the government by a self-willed
executive power,
unprecedented in American history. The president and vice president
acted on a
novel and legally unsupported claim to unlimited ‘wartime’ presidential
and
executive-branch power. The justification was an illegal, undeclared
war.
”International law and American treaty obligations were defied, as were
established American law on the conduct of war and the treatment of
prisoners, constitutional
protections, and the surveillance of citizens.
All of this occurred without meeting serious, or at least
successful,
Congressional or judicial challenge, with little or no objection from
the
national…media….
“President
Obama’s
unwillingness
to
see
his
first
term
dominated
by
the
crimes
of
the
Bush
administration
is
comprehensible. Yet
there
is
a
limit.
The…moral vacuum
created and encouraged during the Bush years
is so outrageous, perverse, sadistic and nihilistic that it demands
attention…”
It’s a demand that has particular
resonance today, the fifth anniversary of our first seeing photos of
the
horrors fellow Americans perpetrated at Abu Ghraib.
Out
of
the
lost
weekend
at
Fenway
came
a
sense
that
the
Yankees
will
find
themselves
and
be
all
right.
One reason: Hideki Matsui is healthy enough
to have reclaimed his stroke. Another:
the oft-mentioned possibility that Alex Rodriguez will be back in the
lineup
sometime next week. A-Rod-added punch or
not, the Yanks may well have to settle for the wild card.
The Red Sox confirmed that they are extremely
deep, thanks to an impressive farm system that keeps producing young
arms like
Hunter Jones and Michael Bowden (not to mention Jon Lester, Justin
Masterson,
etc.) When Globe reporter Adam Kilgore
suggested to Tito Francona that the farm system might give him the
equivalent
of a 14-man pitching staff, the manager said, “Or 18 or 20.”
Anyone
watching the Phillies sweep
the Marlins over the weekend (on MLB and TBS), coming from behind in
the ninth
twice, could not help but notice the contrast between the defending
champions
and the Mets: the Phils exude energy,
bounce and clutch hitting. The Mets
convey the opposite of resiliency - tightness under pressure. Re: Oliver Perez – one can almost hear Fred
Wilpon saying to Omar Minaya: “$36 million!
What could you have been thinking?”
Mets have
lots of pitching-woes
company, the LA Angels the most striking example. Three LAA starters
are on the
injury shelf: None of the three - John
Lackey, Ervin Santana and Kelvim Escobar – is expected back before the
end of
next month. Meanwhile, the Angels are
looking to sign someone from the independent Atlantic League.
- o -
(The Nub is a team
effort skippered by Dick Starkey.
Comments
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are welcome, as are subscription requests.
Previous Nubs can be found by scrolling below.)
(Posted:
4/25/09)
Political All-Stars
Event – a Scorer’s Notes
On a political playing field the other
night - a Manhattan
Democratic club
- baseball was served up during appearances by four pol all stars. The occasion: an NYC public advocate
candidates forum involving the four – Eric Gioia, Norman Siegel, Mark
Green and
Bill de Blasio. All lefties, they
comprised a formidable pitching rotation.
The night’s starter Gioia, up from the
Council team out of Queens, kept
everybody on his toes with a rapid-fire
delivery. The newest face among the
four, he established himself as a pesky comer by defying those who run
the outfit
in Queens and competing successfully
to make
the Council roster. That was eight years
ago. Since then Gioia has been firing
away on behalf of, among others, people on food stamps and residents of
the
huge Queensbridge Houses project in his Woodside district.
He actually tried playing for a week while
living on food stamps. And he went to
bat successfully to bring services to the project. Gioia’s
energetic
style
has
paid
off
dollar-wise:
he’s
the
most
well-heeled
member
of
the
rotation.
Seconds into his pitching turn, civil
liberties league
veteran Siegel threw a high, hard one at the city and the Yankees. His target: their failure to keep a pledge to
local residents of the area around the new Stadium. “The people in the South Bronx want their parkland back,” he said. Twenty-two acres of public green space was
traded
away as part of the stadium deal. The
community has yet to get the promised compensatory recreational
parcels. Siegel delivered the locals’ case
at a
demonstration protesting against the delay on the new Stadium’s opening
day. He’s also bearing down on Team
Bloomberg’s
plan to turn over 40 percent of playing fields on Randalls Island
to 20 private schools. “This,” the
combative Siegel called out, “is who I am.”
Green, looking to win the
comeback-player-of-the-year award,
pitched with an easy, effortless motion.
He acknowledged the high velocity of the others in the rotation. But, he said, where they are still prospects,
“I’ve shown what I can do.” Back in the
dugout, he reviewed the record book of his stint as top man on the
public
advocate team from 1993 to 2001. The
info accompanying his stats detailed his forcing the tobacco industry
to stop
appealing to young would-be smokers. It
also noted his work in disclosing that the NYPD only penalized one in
20
officers found to have committed “substantive” offenses. Green
indicated
Mayor
Bloomberg
could
expect
brush-backs
from
him. He said he has
many new ideas to let loose if returned to the PA team.
Closer for the night Bill de Blasio,
from the Council team
out of Brooklyn, impressed spectators
with his
confident delivery. Less familiar to Manhattan
spectators than
the others, he pitched the fight he led in the Council against the
extension of
term-limits by legislation instead of referendum. He
said
affordable
housing
would
be
his
focus,
as
it
has
been. He told of getting
buzzed on a plan he had formulated for affordable housing in his Park
Slope
neighborhood. “When I called (deputy
mayor) Dan Doctoroff about it, he said ‘Bill, we’ll fight you to the
death on
this one’.” As the game was wrapping up,
de Blasio was asked if he would support the Democrat in the mayoral
race. He tossed out a spirited “Yes!”
before the
question was even completed.
Scorers’s note: We’ve
worked
in
the
past
with
Siegel
and
Green
and
have
a
high
regard
for
both. But Gioia and de Blasio are superior
candidates as well. This is surely the
season’s
most interesting citywide primary race
- -
-
It seemed to us early on that, from a pitching standpoint,
Omar Minaya was like the man who jumped out the window, hoping he - and
the
Mets -were on the first floor. He took
the chance that his starters after Johan Santana would come around; he
took it
even though Mike Pelfrey, Oliver Perez and John Maine were clearly an
iffy
trio. Now the Mets are plunging toward
the basement, and, although Jerry Manuel says he’s prepared to
“address” his
pitching problem, his implicit message to Minaya (through the media) is:
“Get me help!” Mark
Mulder would surely be worth a shot from Manuel’s standpoint. No Pedro Martinez, thank you.
And, please, no more Nelson Figueroa-types.
The Washington Post’s Tom
Boswell offers some D.C.
perspective on Boston’s
concern
about
David
Ortiz: “The Red Sox better
hope Kevin Youklis can keep tearing it up at No. 4
because Ortiz looks like he may have gotten old fast. Pitchers
are
challenging
him
up
and
in
with
mediocre
fastballs…
and
dominating
him”
And
here
is
Boswell
on
Lastings
Millidge,
newly
dropped
to
triple-A
by
the
Nationals: “Looks
like he's a corner OF with CF power (ie., not quite enough). I
think he still has trade value. That New York Hype machine takes a long
time to wear off…. The
main problem perhaps: Lastings loves being a big leaguer more than he
enjoys
the game itself. If that ever changes, he could be a fine player.”
-
o
-
(The Nub is a team
effort skippered by Dick Starkey. Comments
to dickstar@aol.com are
welcome, as are subscription requests.
Previous Nubs can be found by scrolling below.)
(Posted: 4/23/09)
Baseball and Politics
Differ on Looking Back
We know one reason for baseball’s
popularity is its
preoccupation with the past. Fans take
pride in total recall of the sport’s memorable stats and moments. The common themes are clutch performances,
excellence, even greatness. Politics, by
contrast, avoids dwelling on the - often dubious - past. Policies
and
events
that
are
error-filled,
like
the
yanqui record in Latin
America, is a pertinent example.
Skipper Obama’s polite encounter with
Hugo Chavez in the Trinidad clubhouse
set off a commotion in right field, in
part, because the democratically-elected Venezuelan president is, for
some in
that field, a “dictator”, a “tyrant.” In
a typical accusation, CNN’s senior political analyst Gloria Barger
complained “(Chavez) say(s)
outrageous things about us.”
But
what
really
caused
a
rhubarb
at
the
Summit
was the sudden presence of
another
player: Eduardo Galeano. A Uruguayan who
appeared in name only as the author of a book Chavez gave Obama,
Galeano
treaded where many Americans would prefer not to go: into the
hemispheric
record book. He called his history “The
Open Veins of Latin America.”
Galeano’s accounts of the U.S.
“pillaging” its neighbors to
the south distresses many of our political and media people. Better to pass over purposely - they believe
- names like Arbenz (of Guatemala),
Allende, and even Chavez, whom Team Bush
helped depose briefly in 2002. In a
review of “Open Veins,” Salvador Allende’s cousin Isabel reminded
readers of
the U.S. Latin American record in the late 1900’s alone:
“It
was
the
time
of
the
Cold
war,
and
the
United
States
would
not
allow
a
leftist
experiment
to
succeed
in
what
Henry
Kissinger
called
‘its
backyard.’
The
Cuban
revolution
was enough; no other
socialist project would be tolerated, even if it was the result of a
democratic
election. On September 11, 1973, a
Military Coup ended a century of democratic tradition in Chile
and
started the long reign of General Augusto Pinochet. Similar coups
followed in
other countries, and soon half the continent's population was living in
terror.
This was a strategy designed in Washington and
imposed
upon the Latin American people by the economic and political forces of
the
right. In every instance the military
acted as mercenaries to the privileged groups in power. Repression
was
organized
on
a
large
scale;
torture,
concentration
camps,
censorship,
imprisonment
without
trial,
and
summary
executions
became
common
practices.
Thousands
of
people
‘disappeared,’
masses of exiles
and refugees left their
countries running for their lives…” (Monthly Review, April 1997)
Now
wonder
the
right
attacked
Obama:
he
accepted
a
record
book
few
Americans
knew
existed,
and
fewer
still
want
publicized.
- -
-
If Edgar Allan Poe were alive today, he could entitle a
story about the 2009 Mets “The Tell-Tale Lack of Heart.”
Going into last night’s game in St.Louis, six
of seven Mets defeats occurred in contests in which opponents had
overtaken
them. When a lead evaporates, Jerry
Manuel’s team seems to lose the spunk needed to persevere to victory. It’s a failing the Metsies displayed a year
ago as well, under Willie Randolph.
With two-plus weeks of the season
completed, we have
unlikely first-place teams in three of the six divisions: Florida
in the NL East, and Toronto and Seattle in the
AL East and West. But the Yanks and Red
Sox are already
ruffling the Jays’ feathers, so they may not remain on top much longer. Lots of fun in store this weekend at Fenway Park,
with both teams, the Sox and NYYs, getting their acts together.
The Pirates’ three-game spearing of the
Marlins qualifies as
the biggest early-week surprise. Bucs
starter Paul Maholm is 3-0; closer Matt Capps has five saves and hasn’t
given
up a run.
- o -
(The Nub is a team
effort skippered by Dick Starkey.
Comments
to dickstar@aol.com
are welcome, as are subscription requests.
Previous Nubs can be found by scrolling below.)
(Posted: 4/21/09)
Fans Lament Distancing
of Obama and Baseball
Q - What do many B. Obama and NY
baseball fans have in
common?
A - A sense that all is not as
good as it should be in their
world.
Both feel distanced; the Yankees and
Mets have relegated the
average fan to the far reaches of their new parks, each as much a mall
as a
place to play ball. Early on, skipper
Obama let coaches Tim Geithner and Larry Summers run the team; neither
distinguished himself for fair play.
Barack’s Middle Eastern game plan has been as fuzzy as it is
unpopular. No one sees how competing
both in Afghanistan
and Iraq
can
end in wins.
And, despite the skipper’s smiles and words, two
change-averse Team Bush holdover advisors (Jeffrey Davidow, Thomas
Shannon) are
obstructing the sight of where Obama’s going in Latin
America.
The Nation columnist Naomi Klein sees
the need for a wider,
more realistic perspective:
“A
growing
number
of
Obama
enthusiasts
are
starting
to
entertain
the
possibility
that
their
man
is
not,
in
fact,
going
to
save
the
world
if
we
all
just
hope
really
hard.
“This
is
a
good
thing.
If
the
superfan
culture
that
brought
Obama
to
power
is
going
to
transform
itself
into
an
independent
political
movement,
one
fierce
enough
to
produce
programs
capable
of
meeting
the
current
crises,
we
are
all
going
to
have
to
stop
hoping
and
start
demanding…
“Hope was a fine slogan when rooting
for a long-shot presidential candidate. But
as
a
posture
toward
the
president
of
the
most
powerful
nation
on
earth,
it
is
dangerously
deferential.
The task as we
move forward (as Obama likes to say) is not to abandon hope but to find
more
appropriate homes for it…”
Klein urges
small-ball
activism rather than waiting for the skipper, remote in the stately
white dugout,
to push the buttons that make good things happen.
- -
-
Sunday at the new Stadium, 9,000 no-shows. YES
camera
coverage
showing,
mainly,
on-field
action
and
wide
shots
of
the
43,000
in
attendance.
Then, in the bottom of the seventh, during
the replay interruption of the Yanks-Indians game, viewers were shown a
friendly front-of-dugout chat between Joe Girardi and Derek Jeter. In the background: rows and rows of empty
premium seats. True
fans
could
see
plainly
on
this
perfect
weekend
afternoon
how
little
the
big
spenders
cared
and
how
the
game
had
moved
away
from
what
they
remembered
it
to
be.
Over at Citi Field, “Figgy” (Nelson
Figueroa) - the aptly
nicknamed stopgap starter for the Mets - pitched just badly enough to
give Milwaukee
a win. On Sunday, filling in for Mike
Pelfrey, the
34-year-old journeyman was a familiar sight - a fig leaf covering the
paucity
of promising talent in the Mets’ system. Casey
Fossum,
Figgy’s
replacement,
is
the
latest
wilted
exhibit.
Newsday’s Wallace Matthews noticed
swatches of empty seats
at Citi as well as at the Stadium. Here
was his take in yesterday’s Newsday: “ Both
ballparks
were
built
on
many
of
the
same
principles
that
are
destroying
our
economy.
Both
teams grotesquely, and artificially, inflated the value of their
product, and
did their best to create a false sense of demand by reducing capacity
and
trying to bully longtime fans into paying absurd new prices or risk
being shut
out.”
It’s
early,
but
two-plus
weeks
into
the
season
it
looks
as
though
Joe
Torre’s
Dodgers,
with
a
payroll
half
the
size
of
the
Yankees
($100,000
to
$201,000),
have
as
good
a
chance
as
the
pinstripers
(if
not
better)
to
win
their
division. Prematurely speaking, the
Dodgers may be the only division-winning sure thing in the MLB
-
o
-
(The Nub is a team
effort skippered by Dick Starkey.
Comments
to dickstar@aol.com
are welcome, as are subscription requests.
Previous Nubs can be found by scrolling below.)
Will Obama Change Stance Toward
Team Chavez?
Late last year, a reporter asked White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen who
was the
toughest man he knew. “Fidel Castro,” he
said. “Everybody’s against him, and he
still survives, has power. Still has a country behind him.
Everywhere he goes they roll out the red
carpet. I don’t admire his philosophy. I
admire him.”
Guillen, a proud Venezuelan, has never claimed to be a supporter of
his
country’s president Hugo Chavez. But
Chavez could easily be his choice as second toughest. After all,
Guillen
watched as Chavez led a failed left-wing coup against a rightist Caracas government in 1992. Six
years
later,
soon
after
release
from
jail,
Chavez
won
the
presidency
with
a
campaign
based
on
advocacy
for
the
poor
and
greater
public
control
of
the
country’s
oil
resources.
He survived a U.S.-supported right-wing coup
attempt in 2002 and was re-elected to a third term in 2006, much to the
distress of Team Bush.
The big question at the Latin American Summit in Trinidad/Tobago is
how America’s new
president will get along with
Chavez, who like Castro (far from unpopular with “everybody”), has most
of Latin America behind him.
Skipper Obama has called Chavez an “obstacle to progress” in the
hemisphere. NYU’s Greg Grandin, author of
“Empire’s
Workshop: Latin America, the U.S.
and the Rise of the New Imperialism,” calls that stance a mistake:
“(The) left turn that started with
Chávez's 1998 election as Venezuela's
president…still continues apace. Last year, after all, Paraguay elected a liberation
theologian as
president; and last month… the guerrilla group turned political party
Ronald
Reagan spent six billion dollars and 70,000 Salvadorean lives trying to
defeat
in the 1980s finally came to power in El Salvador…
“Love Chávez or hate him, he is
recognized as a legitimate leader by all Latin American countries
and is a close ally to
many. For eight years, a Bush administration policy of driving a wedge
between
the rest of the region and the Venezuelan proved a dismal failure,
except when
it came to increasing the outflow of Washington's
hemorrhaging power in the hemisphere.” (The Nation)
The wfile:///C:/Users/dickstar/Downloads/Documents/PerfectPitch%20blog/the_nub.htmlelcome
Team
Obama
gave
the
conciliatory
words
of
Raul
Castro
yesterday
might
be
a
sign
the
president
is
in
a
let-bygones-be-bygones
mood
at
the
Latin
American
Summit. But
everyone recognizes that a teaming up of the U.S.
and Chavez is far from a sure
thing.
E-mailbag exchange: “ I agree
with much of what you wrote about Castro in your
latest blog. However, I think your praise
of Castro needs a little tempering.
After all, he did imprison a lot of people who disagreed with
him. The
ACLU probably will not give him any medals for his toleration of dissent.” - D.Bruner, Budapest, Hungary
To:
D.Bruner: “Can't
defend Castro for his imprisonments, especially of gays,
jailed only because of their sexual persuasion.
But, there have been no
documented reports of torture. And many,
if not most, dissidents were found to have been on the CIA payroll. Overriding post-cold-war question: Why should
we be judging - even seeking to subvert - the policies of other
sovereign
states?”
- -
-
With nearly two weeks in the
books, it’s time to take one team seriously: the Florida Marlins. Yes, the Marlins, the team with the lowest
payroll in the majors - $37 million (just $4 million more than Alex
Rodriguez) -
have the best record in either league. Florida’s
rotation,
featuring
Ricky
Nolasco,
Josh
Johnson,
Chris
Volstad
and
Anibal
Sanchez,
strengthens
the
sense
the
Marlins
will
make
the
NL
East
a
four-team
race.
John
Smoltz, Mark Kotsay and
Julio Lugo: that threesome working out
this weekend in Fort Myers
will be reinforcing the hurting Red Sox, one by one, as spring
progresses. Infielder Lugo is expected to be the first, in
a week
or so, outfielder/first baseman Kotsay, shortly thereafter, and pitcher
Smoltz
sometime in June.
The puffery
for eateries at both
new ballparks has been egregious. Yesterday,
it
was
Michael
Kay
and
Paul
O’Neil
on
YES,
ooohing
over
the
Mohegan
Sun
Bar
in
the
new
Stadium. “How about if we go out
there tomorrow?” one asked the other. The
other night, SNY’s Kevin Burkhardt stood on the terrace outside the
Acela, a
high-end place at Citi Field. He
explained the series of seatings, the limitations on who qualified for
admission, etc. All this while the
Mets-Padres game was in progress. On
Wednesday night, when there were patches of empty grandstand seats at
Citi, the
cameras were directed instead at the long lines waiting for service at
Shake
Shack. Looked like a good crowd was on
hand.
Keith
Hernandez is often fun to
listen to on SNY, as well as insightful.
But occasionally he slips into questionable taste, as he did
this week: Fumbling for a name or stat, he
said “I’m
getting Alzheimer’s.”
-
o
-
(The Nub is a team
effort skippered by Dick Starkey.
Comments
to dickstar@aol.com are
welcome, as are subscription requests.
Previous Nubs can be found by scrolling below.)
(Posted: 4/16/09)
Fidel Is Still Faithful
to Baseball
Fifty years ago last January, a former
college baseball
player led the overthrow of a Cuban dictator.
The ex-pitcher took control of the island nation, and soon
turned it
into a feisty Communist and Moscow-protected opponent of Team USA. Since then, while playing David to America’s Goliath, Fidel Castro has
maintained
his love for America’s
national
pastime;
he’s
persisted
in
that
affection
despite
US-linked
terrorist
acts,
a
military
invasion
and
an
economic
embargo
that
has
deprived
his
people
of
all
but
basic
sustenance. American
hostility persisted for no rational foreign-policy reason after the
cold war
ended in 1989.
Not long ago, even the most tenacious
anti-Castro exile
outfit in Florida conceded what had
long since
been acknowledged outside of Miami:
that Fidel
had won the standoff with the U.S.;
or, at least, the effort to bat him away had not worked.
And earlier this week, Team Obama took a
first, tentative step toward normalizing relations with Cuba.
The embargo remains in place and newly permitted
travel on
the island will be restricted to Cuban-Americans. But
it
is
a
start
that
should
be
welcomed
by
the
majority
of
Americans
who
feel
no
animosity
toward
Cuba.
Fidel himself considers the step
“positive” but insufficient.
His only truly negative remark about the U.S. lately had to do with
baseball. The MLB-organized World Baseball
Classic
bracketed the Cuban team early with Japan
and South Korea,
the
two
best
teams
in
the
tournament. He
saw it as a deliberate effort to try to get rid of the Cubans before
the
semi-final round.
It’s doubtful that Skipper Obama will
say anything about
Fidel at the Latin American Summit beginning tomorrow in
Trinidad/Tobago,
although he could acknowledge El Jefe’s
retirement a
little over a year ago. Before he sent
himself to the showers, Castro had successfully played and lasted
against an
impressive 10-man U.S.
lineup: Dwight Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Richard
Nixon, Gerald
Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George W.B. Bush, Bill Clinton and
George W.
Bush. It’s unlikely the retired Fidel,
soon to be 83, will outlast Obama.
-
- -
After winning their opening home game, 15-5, the Rays
brought out the best in the Yankees. Both
A.J. Burnett and Andy Pettitte pitched into the eight inning in 7-2 and
5-4
victories. The Yanks saw Xavier Nady go
down with an injury that may keep him out for a long while. But hot-hitting Nick Swisher is on hand to
take
his place.
Misery-has-company dept:
Red Sox and Yanks are watching to see how serious is the setback
of each
of their Asian starters, Daisuke Matsuzaka and Chien-Ming Wang. Dice-K was put on the DL following Tuesday
night’s game in Oakland,
when
he
left
after
one
inning
complaining
of
shoulder
fatigue.
Chien-Ming could follow him on to the DL,
although his struggle seems more mental than physical.
He has let lack of execution - he can’t get
his sinker to sink - shatter his confidence.
Chien-Ming is scheduled to pitch again this weekend as Joe
Girardi keeps
his fingers crossed.
An E-mailbag message from NYC statman Scott
Swanay, the Fantasy Baseball
Sherpa, that may cheer up Mets fans. He
says when it comes to lack of solid starters, the NYMs have company: “As down
as Mets' fans might be on their team's rotation, I
think they match up well with the Phillies' rotation. Hamels is
more of
an injury risk than Santana, Myers is at
least as inconsistent as Ollie, I'll take Maine or Pelfrey over Moyer or
Blanton…Phillies had the superior bullpen last year, but with their
additions
of Green, Putz, and Francisco (as well as subtractions of Heilman &
Schoeneweis), the Mets have closed the gap significantly.
Phillies
obviously had a big edge on offense last season, and I believe it's
even
greater this season… Both teams are flawed, but that's what will make
for an
entertaining race this summer!”
-
o
-
(The Nub is a team
effort skippered by Dick Starkey.
Comments
to dickstar@aol.com
are welcome, as are subscription requests.
Previous Nubs can be found by scrolling below.)
(Posted: 4/14/09)
Cubs Fans Converting
to Obama?
The polling scoreboard that posts
day-to-day tallies
attracts most attention in the political field.
But more important is the scoreboard that tracks partisan trends
over
the years. Super statman Charlie Cook,
who follows those trends, has issued a report on Congressional scoring
with
baseball-related implications. It
suggests that, although Barack Obama is an avowed White Sox fan, he has
reason
to consider saying nice things about the Cubs.
Cook says a Democratic trend has
developed in the Chicago
suburbs,
traditionally Cubs - and GOP - country.
Suburbanites in six Chi-area districts have moved toward the
Dems in
recent years, and Cook notes that the change corresponds to the
emergence of
Obama as a heavy hitter. The GOP has made
gains in a different ballpark, notably inTennessee, where the Cubs have
their
double-A farm team. Cook says the Dems
lost ground in Tennessee
when native son Al Gore left the presidential field. The
report,
based
on
House
results
collected
over
the
past
five
presidential
election
cycles,
includes,
obviously,
the
Bush-Gore
race
in
2000. It shows where
the Dem-GOP game stands now, in the aftermath of the nationwide 2008
vote.
The scoreboard tracking partisan
rallies gives the Dems a
whopping 34-16 lead in the 50 most competitive House districts. That
reflects a
hint of a trend in 163 minimally competitive races.
As for the rest, Cook notes that Dems and the
GOP usually split 222 “sure” seats of the lower chamber’s 435. In a top-of-the-grandstand view, Cook’s stats
give the Dems a 51.3 - 48.7 edge over the Repubs nationwide. (That
happens to approximate
bookmaking odds the Cubs will make it to the NL championship series.)
Consensus day-to-day polling, by the
way, gives Obama a 60
percent approval, Congress a 58 percent disapproval rating. Still, as we’ve seen, most House incumbents
are safe.
-
- -
Daniel Murphy seems safely ensconced as the Mets’ number two
hitter, despite his Agita-causing on-the-job learning as a leftfielder. His welcome presence in the lineup points up
a glaring Mets absence in recent years – that of other home-grown
position-player prospects. Jose Reyes
broke in six years ago this June, David Wright five years ago this July. The dry spell since then attests to the
oft-noted deficiency in the team’s player-development operation.
On Saturday, fans tuning in the Red
Sox-Angels network TV
game had to make do with the reporting of Fox second-stringers Kenny
(Flat) Albert
and Eric Karros. They transformed a
fairly exciting matchup into a snoozer.
The only enthusiasm exhibited by Albert came when he extolled
the
wonders of the new Yankee Stadium, whence next Saturday’s
Cleveland-Yanks game
will be carried on Fox. He was
especially dynamic in his description of the stadium’s “five-star
restaurant” and
other amenities. A couple of times
Karros had to remind Kenny that his touting of Toronto’s
lead
in
the
AL
East
and
Pittsburgh’s
moving
over
.500
meant
nothing.
“It’s
April,”
Karros
said,
with
an
edge
of
exasperation
many
viewers
shared
-
o
-
(The Nub is a team
effort skippered by Dick Starkey.
Comments
to dickstar@aol.com
are welcome, as are subscription requests.
Previous Nubs can be found by scrolling below.)
(Posted: 4/11/09)
Bats Out for the Boys of Summers
How about that good news for the
economy’s bleacher-seat
people? In advance of today’s anti-bailout rallies in 50 cities, Tim
Geithner
said ordinary fans may get a chance to profit from the government
handouts,
just like Wall Street’s heavy hitters.
The game plan calls for creation of bailout funds - much like
mutual
funds – that would let punch-and-judy swingers invest in the toxic
assets Team
Obama is trying to rescue with taxpayer money.
If the plan works, the Obama-ites are
clearly hopeful that
the resulting positive vibes will take some of the heat off Geithner
and his
bailout double-play partner Larry Summers.
Both are linked in the public’s mind to a program that seems to
be
benefiting only those teams and players who caused the debacle in the
first
place. Geithner, we know, was the
ultimate Wall Street insider as skipper of the Fed Reserve team in New York. He oversaw the trick plays that led to the
subprime
crisis. Summers made those plays
possible, then profited from them, as TruthDig.com’s Robert Scheer
reminds us:
“Summers…(was)
cut
in
on
the
loot
from
the
loopholes
in
the
toxic
derivatives
market
that
he
pushed
into
law
when
he
was
Bill
Clinton's
treasury
secretary…
No
one
has
been
more
persistently
effective
in
paving
the
way
for
the
financial
swindles
that
enriched
the
titans
of
finance
while
impoverishing
the
rest
of
the
world
than
the
man
who
is
now
the
top
economic adviser to President Obama.”
Obama
reportedly
told
a
group
of
Wall
Street
CEOs
last
week
that
“the
public
isn’t
buying”
attempts
to
rationalize
their
privileged
status
in
the
bailout
ballpark. He added -
according to The Politico - “My administration is the only thing
between you
and the pitchforks.” Barack should know
that he, personally, is the only thing between Larry and Tim - his
team’s “Boys
of Summers” - and a grand slam of public bashings.
- -
-
Amid predictable signs that the non-Santana part of the
Mets’ rotation is shaky comes a first-hand report from SI’s Jon Heyman
on
starters for the Braves and Marlins: “Beyond (Derek) Lowe
the Braves
aren't bad… Javier Vazquez wasn’t great for the White Sox, but he's
generally
been better in the National League, and maybe the switch will do him
good. Throw in Jair Jurrjens and the
Braves have the
makings of a very nice rotation…
“The Marlins
are going to be tough
whenever they're throwing their top three pitchers, because Ricky
Nolasco, Josh
Johnson and Chris Volstad give them a great trio.”
Heyman,
like
many
Yankee
fans,
suspects
that
the
team
will
have
to
upgrade
the
middle
of
its
bullpen
-
Jonathan
Albaladejo,
Phil
Coke,
Brian
Bruney
and
Damaso
Marte
-
if
it
is
to
compete
successfully
with
the
Rays
and
Red
Sox
to
make
the
playoffs.
No sooner did Baseball Prospectus’s Joe
Sheehan predict on
the eve of the season that the Texas Rangers would “lead the AL
in runs scored by a good margin,” than the Rangers tallied 29 runs in a
three-game sweep of Cleveland. Texas
tacked on just two more in the blowout yesterday against the Tigers. But that’s still a total of just under eight
runs a game.
- o -
(The Nub is a team
effort skippered by Dick Starkey.
Comments
to dickstar@aol.com
are welcome, as are subscription requests.
Previous Nubs can be found by scrolling below.)
(Posted:
4/9/09)
The Obama-Jeter Connection
“The
iconic
images
many
of
us
have
of
(Derek)
Jeter
on
the
field
are
diving
head
first
into
the
stands
to
catch
a
foul
ball,
running
way
out
of
position
to
make
a
crucial
flip
home,
as
well
as
the
calm,
graceful,
unselfish
style
he
shows on and off
the field. Obama clearly has the calm and
grace (he'd be a great two-strike hitter, too) but I think Obama still
has to
show some of that willingness to get dirty, get a few stitches.”
– J. Mindich, Manhattan
(E-Mailbag, re 4/04 Nub)
The “few stitches” image paints
the black because of Obama’s bruise-free involvement
in
policies
linked
to
torture. In one of his first acts in
January, the new president elected not to outlaw the practice of
rendition –
picking up suspected terrorists and sending them to a third country for
questioning. Although he stipulated that
“harsh interrogation techniques” were not to be used, there have been
numerous
reports of torture in rendition sites in Eastern Europe and the Middle East. To
believe such methods are being
discontinued there because of an executive order in Washington
requires a long leap of
faith.
Why was the
president willing to
“get dirty” on the side of aggressiveness rather than restraint? An unidentified Obama teammate explained the
skipper’s stance this way: "Obviously you need to preserve some
tools -- you still have to go after the bad guys."
Barack has
further disappointed
his fans in left field by refusing to let the law go after Team Bush’s
bad guys
– the ones the International Red Cross says engaged in the brutal
treatment of
suspects. Team Obama’s position on that
– the same as Team Bush’s: Release of
such “information…could
jeopardize national security.”
The
American Civil Liberties Union accuses Obama of reneging - through the
Justice Department - on a stance he took as
a candidate: pledging to reform abuse of the state secrets game. This is far from “change”, says the
ACLU. It’s the same Bush-league style of
play; the skipper keeps his his distance from the field and his uniform
clean.
- -
-
Jeter
may have looked his vintage self, batting leadoff in Baltimore, but
his Yankees seem a little
tentative…at least, compared to the cocky Red Sox.
Kevin Youklis is already bemoaning a lack of
consensus on where the Sox will wind up:
“Man,
how
can
anybody,”
he
says,
“
pick
us
to
lose
to
the
Cubs
in
the
World
Series?"
Baseball Prospectus’s Joe Sheehan is
prematurely bullish on the relief-bolstered
NYMs: “If the
Mets just play as well
as they did through six innings a year ago, they'll win the NL East,
because
they will be much better after that…”
Says
here that’s a big “if” because of the team’s soft starter-rotation
underbelly:
Mike Pelfrey, and Oliver Perez and John Maine, in particular. We know what bookends Johan Santana and Livan
Hernandez can and will do: Santana will win at least as many – 16 – as
he did last
year, and Hernandez will manage at least 12 (and lose almost as many). But games Perez and Maine start will be up for grabs,
and Pelfrey’s
outings only a little less so. Bottom
line: Mets will need a hard, productive-hitting year to compensate for
the
softness elsewhere.
- o -
(The Nub is a team
effort skippered by Dick Starkey.
Comments
to dickstar@aol.com
are welcome, as are subscription requests.
Previous Nubs can be found by scrolling below.)
(Posted: 4/7/09)
Flafile:///C:/Users/dickstar/Downloads/Documents/PerfectPitch%20blog/the_nub.htmlk-file:///C:/Users/dickstar/Downloads/Documents/PerfectPitch%20blog/the_nub.htmlCatching in
Finance and Baseball
Q - What do the new Met, Gary
Sheffield, and Team Obama’s
still-new Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, have in common?
A – They’re both taking flak for
performances – past (in Sheffield’s
case) and past and present (in Geithner’s).
Geithner took a pounding on
Bill
Moyers Journal the other night from William Black, author of “The Best
Way to
Rob a Bank is to Own One.” An economics
and law professor at the University
of Missouri,
Black
supported Barack Obama, but he said Geithner’s – and therefore Obama’s
–
bank-bailout policies are “substantively bad” and “completely lack
integrity.” Why? Because
the
Treasury
Secretary
is
letting
the
banks
play
fast
and
loose
with
taxpayers’
money:
“Geithner
is…covering up. Just like (former Treasury
Secretary Henry) Paulson
did before him. Geithner is publicly saying that it's going to take…$2
trillion
taxpayer dollars to deal with this (financial collapse) problem. But they're allowing all the banks to report
that they're not only solvent, but fully capitalized. Both
statements
can't
be
true.
It can't be that
they need $2 trillion,
because they have massive losses, and that they're fine.
“These
are all people who have failed. Paulson
failed, Geithner failed.
(He)… was one of our nation's top regulators,
during the entire subprime scandal,..He took absolutely no effective
action. He may be right (to claim)that he
never
regulated, but his job was to regulate. That
was
his
mission
statement…as
president
of
the
Federal
Reserve Bank of New York…”
Black says the bank bailouts have
involved
outright lawbreaking; he calls inaction on the part of government a
“scandal.” There’s a reason for the
inaction, says
Nicholas Lemann in the New Yorker:
nationalizing instead of bailing out the banks “would drive the
stock
market down and increase the agita of people with 401(k) plans” plus
“soften
(Congressional Dem) support for (Obama) legislation.”
Therein lies a clue as to why the mainstream
media can’t seem to make a coherent case for outrage over the scandal.
Newsday’s Wallace Matthews sums up the
record book
on Sheffield this way: “In
his
21
major-league
seasons,
Sheffield,
40, has called seven clubhouses his
home, and not one did he leave on friendly terms. At
every
stop,
he
has
clashed
with
managers,
general
managers
and
owners.
He
has
insulted
teammates,
reneged
on
contracts
and,
by
his
own
admission,
deliberately
made
errors
to
force
his
first
team,
Milwaukee
to trade him.
”He has ripped Latin players and players who didn't conform to his
image of
racial purity, such as Derek Jeter He
couldn't get along with Joe Torre, a man
who could find common ground with Mahmoud Ahmadineiad. And
just
about
every
place
Sheff
has
landed,
he
has
found
occasion
to
level
a
charge
of
racism
at
somebody.”
Can Sheff make himself over
for the Mets? The team’s fans - it says
here - should pray
for a miracle, which is what it will take.
Still, the deal so far goes down as a good one.
Reliable NYC
statman Scott Swanay, the Fantasy Baseball
Sherpa, has passed along his annual regular-season predictions as games
are
starting to count
“AL:
Yankees, Indians (barely), and Angels win their respective
divisions. Red
Sox easily secure Wild Card. NL:
Phillies
&
Mets
in
dead
heat
(outcome
will
depend
on
the
teams'
relative
health
-
I
like
the
Mets'
chances
of
staying
healthier
and
winning
the
division).
Cubs
and
Diamondbacks
win
their
respective
divisions.
Phillies-Mets
runner
up
will
get
the
Wild
Card
as
a
consolation
prize,
edging
out
the
Cardinals.”
The Sherpa
knows we all have our own gut-estimates as to
how the season-long games will end.
There will surely be comments from the Nubby cheap seats in due
course.
E-Mailbag re
new ball parks: “Has there
been any talk of an
active organized boycott of games at the new stadiums? I
tried
to
push
my
son
into
leading
the
charge
but
he
doesn't
sense
the
injustice
yet
(he
may
get
a
better
appreciation
as
the
months
go
by).
I
can't
wait
to
see
pictures
of
a
half
filled
stadium
or
for
the
opportunity
to
buy
tickets
at
below
face
value
on
stubhub.” – Jeremy.M., Manhattan
“Your
article, which accurately
focused on all the excesses, left out the most important fact for
Yankee
lovers, the big palace is still in the down home Bronx
neighborhood it has always been. Our team was saved from the West Side! See you
on the #4
train. Play Ball!!!!” – Jim M, Nyack
-
o
-
(The Nub is a team
effort skippered by Dick Starkey.
Comments
to dickstar@aol.com
are welcome, as are subscription requests.
Previous Nubs can be found by scrolling below.)
(Posted 4/4/09)
New Ball Parks Rate as Many Boos as
Cheers
It may be wet-blanket-y to suggest -
even to hope - that the dank and drizzly “opening night” at NYC’s new
stadiums
was an omen of financially dismal days ahead for the Yankees and Mets. Yet, weeks of puffery notwithstanding, the
ballparks have earned at least as many boos as cheers…on merit. The record book, we know, shows hundreds of
millions in public subsidies granted both private ventures, 22 acres of
parkland sacrificed to make room for the stadium in the Bronx,
and the deal whereby bailed-out Citigroup got its disgraced name
emblazoned
over the Mets’ ball yard.
Then there’s the seldom noted
cultural change the new arenas represent.
NY Times columnist George Vecsey addressed it briefly in
yesterday’s
paper when he said the teams’ “main goal became
turning
ballparks into resorts, land cruises, designed for A.I.G.
bonus-recipient
wallets…” Nevertheless, he
added, “real
fans
will
find
a
way
to
the
ball
parks,
pulled
by
the
life-affirming
force
of
baseball
coming
around
again
in
the
spring.”
The latter point may prove
true
while the new playing fields remain an early-season novelty. But just as forced-out residents soon stop
revisiting their gentrified old neighborhoods, so regular fans are
likely to
resist returning to the upscale replacement of their old cheering
grounds.
The days of the spontaneous
“Let’s
go out to the ballgame” are over. The
decision now entails substantial investment and planning, more like
attending
an opera than an athletic event.
Instead, fans will retreat to their TV sets and hope that, as
baseball
tries to mimic pro football’s season-long sellout success, the cost of
watching
games at home doesn’t soar.
Caught up in this
comparatively
benign version of “class warfare”, the best regular-fan strategy – it
says here
– is to put off visits to either ball park until someone offersfile:///C:/Users/dickstar/Downloads/Documents/PerfectPitch%20blog/the_nub.html
a free ticket.
-
- -
This weekend marks The Nub’s second
anniversary. Following a hoary tradition
started a whole year ago, we herewith re-run our first item from 4/5/07:
“If Barack Obama
regains his early campaign momentum, one reason is
likely to be the Derek Jeter factor.
That Barack and Jeter share similar multi-cultural backgrounds
will
surely seep into the broader voter consciousness as the baseball season
unfolds. The racial comparison will
likely lead many even casual observers of the sport to connect Jeter’s
attributes with those of Obama. Jeter has
earned the admiration of fans throughout the country and world for his
skills
and conduct. Obama can benefit from a
transfer of that admiration if he handles himself in the political
field with
the same unruffled assurance that Jeter exhibits when he steps to the
plate or
corrals a difficult ground ball.”
Two years later, Obama has reached the pinnacle of political
power
while Jeter, now nearing 35, is no longer the premier player he was at
33. He remains - it says here - the
athlete with
whom most New Yorkers would like the city to be identified. Why?
Newsday’s Wallace Matthews provided this answer not long ago:
“For
13
years
now,
Jeter
has
navigated
th(e)
(celebrity)
minefield
and
come
through
it
largely
unscathed.
No
former
girlfriend
has
dished
on
him
or
sued
him,
or
so
far
as
we
know,
is
writing
a
book
about
him.
No
one,
publicly,
has
had
a bad word to say
about him. He never has embarrassed
himself or his team. That's not by luck
or accident.”
Nub’s-eye
view
of
the
MLB’s
top
three
rotations: 1) Yankees – CC
Sabathia, Chien-Ming Wang, A.J. Burnett, Andy Pettitte, Joba
Chamberlain. 2) Red Sox – Josh Beckett,
Jon Lester,
Daisuke Matsuzaka, Tim Wakefield, Brad Penny.
3) Reds – Aaron Harang, Edinson
Volquez, Bronson Arroyo, Johnny Cueto, Micah Owings.
What that
listing suggests to us: Cincinnati
could surprise and be a factor in
the NL Central race.
-
o
-
(The Nub is a team
effort skippered by Dick Starkey.
Comments
to dickstar@aol.com
are welcome, as are subscription requests.
Previous Nubs can be found by scrolling below.)
(Posted 4/2/09)
Piling On Popular in
Politics as Well as Baseball
“Dog-piling”, they call it in baseball. It’s when teammates rush to engulf a
game-winning hero after the decisive run has scored.
Political dog-piling – better known as
piling on – has been
under way throughout much of NY state.
The target: the media’s favorite anti-hero, Governor David
Paterson. When what Jimmy Breslin calls
“the Pekinese
of the press” smell blood they can’t resist pouncing over and over on
the
wounded.
Paterson
opened his own wound by mishandling the appointment of someone to fill
the U.S.
Senate seat vacated by Hillary Clinton.
The reaction to that bumble sent him sprawling; state
Republicans,
abetted by right-wing elements of the media, have not let him up. “GOV
CLINCHES
DEAL ON HUGE TAX HIKES” is the way the NY Post headlined the budget
agreement
announced earlier this week. Rush
Limbaugh declared the new taxes and, by implication, Paterson “stupid.” “THE STENCH OF TERRIBLE LEADERSHIP” was the
Daily
News’ headline contribution to the coverage.
Had the dog-piling mindset not taken
hold, the media might
have found cause to congratulate Paterson for a crisis budget that did
not (a)
trim education and health care (as did his Republican predecessor
George Pataki
earlier in the decade, nor did it (b) follow the Republican reflex of
cutting taxes
and spending at a time when people need adequately funded government
services
more than ever.
On NPR Tuesday night, MIT prof and
former IMF economist
Simon Johnson said the US
led the world in entrepreneurial initiative but lacked the “strong
safety net”
that could make it as desirable a place to live for the masses, as are
most
European countries. Paterson, in his budget, recognized
that, now
especially, many New Yorkers relate to the axiom “Government is your
enemy
until you need a friend.”
Paterson
has to play hard, but he could get out from under the dog-pile before
next
year’s gubernatorial campaign and position himself as a feisty
incumbent. Andrew Cuomo would be well
advised not to
challenge him in a primary, given the AG’s record of having taken on
another
African-American, Carl McCall, in 2002.
If Cuomo does run, it will almost certainly be the result of Paterson
stepping aside,
having been buried too long to regain his stride.
-
-
-
Many Mets fans are in their high-flying, pre-season
mode. For them in particular, Newsday’s
Wallace Matthews has these come-back-to-earth questions:
“After
Johan
Santana
and,
hopefully,
Mike
Pelfrey,
which
starting
pitcher
can
you
truly
rely
on
every
five
days
for
a
full
season?
John
Maine?
Oliver
Perez?
Livan
Hernandez?
Pedro
Martinez?
“Or,
do
you
really
expect
that
Daniel
Murphy,
with
all
of
131
major-league
at-bats
to
his
credit
,
can
handle
the
responsibilities
of
an
everyday
leftfielder?
”Same goes for rightfielder Ryan Church, who suffered two serious
concussions
last year and was never the same. Are we
to trust that he is fully recovered now?
”What about Luis Castillo, the subject of this year's spate of
disingenuous ‘rededicated
and in the best shape of his life’' training-camp space-fillers?
”And then there's Brian Schneider, who didn't hit a lick last year but
will
this year, we are assured, because he now is ‘more comfortable’' in New
York. Never having heard this before this
spring, I
wonder: When exactly did his comfort level become a problem?
-
o
-
(The Nub is a team
effort skippered by Dick
Starkey. Comments
to dickstar@aol.com
are welcome, as are subscription requests.
Previous Nubs can be found by scrolling below.)
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