The Daily E-Mail

Fearless Baseball Predictions -- 2009 Edition

2009-04-05T21:05:00.000-07:00

AL EAST

Boston 94-68
NY Yankees 92-70
Tampa Bay 90-72
Baltimore 74-87*
Toronto 72-90

AL CENTRAL

Chicago White Sox 84-78
Minnesota 83-79
Cleveland 81-81
Kansas City 77-84*
Detroit 77-85

AL WEST

LA Angels 86-76
Oakland 79-83
Texas 73-89
Seattle 70-92

NL EAST

NY Mets 93-69
Philadelphia 89-73
Atlanta 84-78
Florida 79-83
Washington 66-96

NL CENTRAL

Chicago Cubs 94-68
Milwaukee 87-75
St. Louis 83-79
Cincinnati 79-83
Pittsburgh 66-96
Houston 63-99

NL WEST

LA Dodgers 90-72
Arizona 84-78
San Francisco 76-86
Colorado 73-89
San Diego 67-95

Playoffs:

Cubs over Phillies
Mets over Dodgers
Red Sox over White Sox
Yankees over Angels

Mets over Cubs
Red Sox over Yankees

Red Sox win the World Series in 5 games

*KC and Bal will not make up a rained-out game (originally scheduled for May 16 in Baltimore)

The Economy

2009-03-03T20:32:00.000-08:00

Maybe a financial system that bases credit on other credit isn't such a bright idea. Maybe Dow 5,000-8,000 reflects the actual value of our economic output.
Maybe a decade of speculative day-trading and puffing up Enron and the dot-coms had to come to an end.

State Memories Project: Alaska

2009-02-02T20:46:00.000-08:00

I freely admit I'm behind. I have no idea if I'll ever catch up. Of course, I'll have less to say because I have been to fewer than thirty states. Here's my Alaska story:

I was 31 years old when I took my first and only trip to Alaska. I had not been on a plane in 18 months, owing to my long-standing, irrational fear of flying. The flight to Anchorage is almost as long as a New York City-to Portland jaunt, and for the first time I had no medication to help me through a flight of that length.

As the plane reached Alaska, I noticed one thing: the mountains. I had never seen these mountains before -- very few of us have. These were not the Rockies and the Cascades that I had seen in person and in so many photographs. The Alaska mountains, up north in a distant time zone, seemed foreign and un-photographed. They were bigger than the mountains I knew, but I told myself the unfamiliarity made them look more impressive.

With about 40 minutes left in the flight, I started talking to the woman next to me. I explained I had not flown in nearly two years, and it had been at least five since a flight of this length. We talked about the beautiful mountains. I think it was her way of distracting me. She seemed to be 70 years old.

Then she talked about Anchorage. And how she was from Alaska, no place on earth was like it, her husband was picking her up at the airport, and, “Say, do you need a ride to your hotel? We can take you to downtown Anchorage, no problem.” I thanked her, but explained that I was picking up a rental car (the Chrysler 300, Snoop Dogg’s then-car of choice). I was meeting a friend in Anchorage, and then we were heading a hundred miles south for a wedding. But that’s a story for another day.

On Texting

2009-02-02T19:21:00.000-08:00

Sometimes you text a friend, "Not an awesome game in any regard," and then, "Oops. I mean awesome game in every way," a mere ten minutes later.

It's too bad Chris Paul was injured. At the same time, the Hornets need to have some level of offense without him.

All this on the night Kobe scores 61 in New York.

Something fairly amazing and scandalous happened while we were all looking at DC

2009-01-20T19:10:00.001-08:00

Here. My opinion of this? Sam Adams lied, lied, and lied. Even if he didn't sleep with the kid until his 18th birthday, the whole thing smells. The big lies are his public denials and in getting his colleagues to call him a liar. Maybe the guy who threatened to expose the scandal in the first place did not have pure intentions. If so, well, they are both wrong.

2008 Mega-Blogging

2009-01-01T11:18:00.000-08:00

So, the old blog slowed down this year. I even ran out of time to do "Alma Mater Watch" for much of the football season. It has been a wild and wacky year, much of which I have cataloged in a private journal for myself, instead of online. Without further ado, here's my list of highlights from 2008:

1. Food. Brunch Club. Toast, Country Cat, and Gravy.

2. Concerts. Springsteen, the Police, Built to Spill, and the Presidents of the United States of America. (I wish I had gone to Seattle for Radiohead in August.)

3. Sports. Sitting 6 rows behind home plate at Yankee Stadium a week before it hosted its last game. Oregon football (dear ESPN: please use two-man broadcast teams for bowl games, or, better yet, no announcers whatsover). Dodgers-Giants in August. The apparent resurrection of the Trailblazers. Another wacky playoff exit for my beloved Cubbies.

4. Travel. NYC. SF. Frog's Leap winery.

5. Singin' and dacnin'.

6. Life lessons: be yourself. Do the things you love. Don’t always do them in response to a crisis; do them all the time, even when you think you won’t need them.

7. Health. The 11-day migraine, with months of fear about recurrences. Canceling appointments and social obligations because "something's wrong." That horrid knot in my stomach. Listening to your body.

8. Crushing emotional blows. The sad vulnerability of generosity. The sad weakness of trying too hard to help people, to feel their emotions for them, to pull them out of hell when they can’t do so themselves.

9. Making the most of a bad situation, despite #8.

10. Election night and change. Look, I don't know why everyone thinks a US President can govern the country by installing a bunch of Ralph Nader-ites in his cabinet. Here's the change we are getting: a President who won’t hide from us constantly, who won’t lie to us constantly. Someone who will communicate more than once every few months. We should never have allowed the Bush administration's secrecy to go that far. We all learned that process trumps policy in poli sci class, so everyone should just calm down.

11. Committing yourself to goals and meeting them.

12. A video for you, 9.11.08 in NYC ...

Thanks for reading.

Terrible

2008-11-29T16:34:00.000-08:00

My verdict on the first quarter of the Civil War: Versus Gets a D-Plus. The announcers, the sideline reporters, and the camera directors are apparently suprised by how quickly plays happen. Eleven games into the season, anyone covering the Ducks has to know that the plays are called quickly. Even worse, they have nearly missed some of the Beavers' plays as well. Let's hope this gets better.

Here's the thing ...

2008-11-22T12:07:00.000-08:00

The toughest team Oregon has beaten on the road this season is either Arizona State or Purdue.

The toughest team Oregon State has beaten on the road this season is UCLA.

Today, OSU has a chance to change that by beating Arizona on the road.

Next week, Oregon has a chance to change that by beating Oregon State on the road.

It should be interesting.

A brief thought

2008-11-20T22:49:00.000-08:00

Wanting everything now isn't a skill, it's a neurosis. Being paid to want everything to be done right this very second is counterproductive. There's a fine distinction between wanting everything now and getting things done. I'm pretty sure our economy lost sight of that a long time ago ...

Blazers

2008-11-06T22:41:00.001-08:00

Okay, great shot, great play by Yao. Too bad the broadcasters haven't analyzed whether there was (or should have been) a foul on the play.

Then Brandon Roy just sank it. Oh. My. God.

More Election Thoughts

2008-11-05T23:14:00.000-08:00

I love it that a big chunk of "Real America" -- Virginia, Nevada, Florida, Indiana (!) -- went to Obama. "Real America" is everyone in America, not a lame slogan that splits us into fragments.

Did you all catch Rice and Bush (on C-SPAN or elsewhere) giving their statements on the election? Bush struck the right tone, though he was not inspirational. Looking back on the past 93.5 months, that was the problem: Bush did not try to inspire for much of his presidency. With the exception of September 2001, he consistently tried to hide from the press and hide from the people. When he did speak to us, it was too often the dogmatic, "my way or the highway" approach. Meanwhile, Rice seemed proud. Maybe she voted for Obama, maybe she didn't. Either way, she was really happy about seeing an African-American on his way to the White House.

Wednesday's "South Park" was quite clever. It started by incorporating portions of the election night speeches, just to prove that they really had worked on the episode in the past 24 hours. Then, well, it turns out the whole election was a secret ploy ... I won't give it away, except to say that combining "National Treasure," "Mission Impossible," "Ocean's Eleven," and every other caper movie in your mind would come close.

I just want to tune out all the bickering along the lines of, "He won by less than we expected." Oh really, who thought that? Seriously, who predicted more than 340 electoral votes for Obama? Right, the same people who blathered on and on about the sanctity of the electoral college, and the mandate provided by Bush's narrow victory in 2000, now say an electoral college trouncing means nothing? That's the problem right there: always changing the rules, saying A=B on Monday, then saying A=A on Friday. Which one is it? The answer, of course, is whichever one is the most convenient.

For the first time in forever, newspapers sold out their press runs. Somehow, Willamette Week's cover meant more to me than The Oregonian's cover. I did not end up buying the Big O. If I buy a commemorative issue, it will be from a paper that did not distribute the Clarion Fund's DVD the other month. Remember: it isn't "censorship" if a newspaper, a film distributor, or a television station owned by someone other than the government decides not to distribute a movie. I have an absolute free speech right to tell you I won't publish your thoughts in my paper. So don't buy these newspaper publishers' arguments that this is an important DVD that should not be censored. Censorship requires government action. If you don't understand that, you don't understand the First Amendment.

"This brother is not Jesus and Buddha and everything, but he can lead the way."

2008-11-04T22:23:00.000-08:00

That quote from the BET network's re-run of its election coverage kicks off my thoughts on this election. (Right now, the BET re-run has Obama at 207-135 in the electoral vote.)

First I went to the election party at the Greek Cusina for free food. I stood in line for a bit because the upstairs was too crowded for the fire marshal's comfort. After going upstairs, I stood in line for free food. This took nearly 45 minutes. When Pennsylvania went for Obama, I felt relieved and a bit emotional and all of that. When Ohio went his way -- I had food by then, having waited an extra minute or two because they ran out of plates -- I knew it was over, and it was time to go somewhere else.

Two friends said there was some event at Aura, so I met one of them there, had a beer, and had the most significant interaction with a stranger that I had all evening. A woman asked if I thought Anderson Cooper was attractive. She apparently sweats him and is disappointed that I do not. After I noted that Novick would have sailed to victory on Obama's coattails (if you heard/saw any of Merkley's debates with Smith or Novick, you know what I mean), it was time to go.

I headed over to the Doug Fir, but the line was unbelievably long. Again, this was due to the fire marshal, who may rule the world some day if he plays his cards right. So I walked down to Ron Tom's and found myself in a very short line to get in. While standing outside, the big screen inside declared Obama the winner. I went inside, saw the cheering and the crowds, saw the McCain speech and the Obama speech, and saw a few dozen people outside with their faces against the glass, watching Obama's soundless acceptance speech. I pointed out to a friend that, should Obama wish to do so, he could use and abuse all the powers that Bush acquired for the Executive Branch while Congress, the courts, and the entire country stood idly by. I hope that doesn't happen. But, hey, what would you do with that kind of power?

Then I left and waited for the bus. Car after car drove by honking, some with passengers waving "President Obama" signs, some with middle-aged people rolling down windows and yelling. Fireworks went off nearby as I waited for the bus to take me home.

Think about it. In a city full of white people, bars were packed in a way that the Super Bowl cannot pack them, people were lighting fireworks on the darkest, rainiest week of the year so far, and parties were taking place far away from the "official" election night events at hotels. All because an African-American man would become the President of the United States.

Anything can happen, and anything probably will happen. I hope eight years of our government trying to scare us at every turn -- and a month of MSNBC trying to scare Democrats into believing the fear might not end -- have ended with a resounding thud. This country has survived for 232 years. If our government stops using cheap scare tactics, it will endure 232 more.

To steal a line by a certain band I like so much, "No matter what happens now, you shouldn't be afraid, because today is the most perfect day I have ever seen." So stop being afraid. It isn't "hope" or "change" that Obama is really talking about, it's standing tall in the face of fear, no matter what happens. Remember that.

A New Organization

2008-10-30T21:07:00.000-07:00

The American Society for Noseless Pumpkins with Crossed Eyes

Blown Call

2008-10-27T19:22:00.001-07:00

At the latest, they should have suspended play after four. Who cares about the TV/advertising/plane flight/scheduling consequences? The quality of the baseball has suffered and will continue to suffer as a result.

Alma Mater Watch: Costume

2008-10-25T07:03:00.000-07:00

Well, once again I have had very little time to deal with anything this fall, and "AMW" has suffered as a result. To reward my loyal readers -- and because I still don't have a Halloween costume idea -- AMW will be Halloween-themed this week.

1. Ducks

I hope the week off let Oregon work on a few things and get healthy. Speaking of health, ASU's QB, Rudy Carpenter, is likely to play but won't be 100%. I remember the UO-ASU game last year, and I have seen ASU play a game or two this season. Neither version of the ASU offense includes an actual offensive line. If Carpenter plays, he is likely to be knocked around a bit, leading to additional injuries. ASU's backup QB is really tall, and that's about all I know about him. Radio-only, no TV. The Ducks will win, and I may decide to be "The ASU Offensive Line" for Halloween, painting a Swiss cheese costume with the ASU colors.

2. Yeomen

Okay, I missed last week's thrilling come-from-behind victory over Kenyon. This week, Oberlin will throttle the Earlham Quakers at home. Darn hippie Quaker peaceniks! In honor of Oberlin's win over Kenyon, I might simply wear a garbage bag for Halloween. This symbolizes the unbelievable amount of trash I can now lob at Kenyon alum TRP when I see him next week. I mean, when a coach is trying to be bold and daring by running out the clock with the lead, that coach definitely should run the ball up the middle on third and one and fourth and two. Especially at midfield. And especially if the coach wants the other team to come right down the field and win the game. Who's Kenyon's coach now? Lane Kiffin? Barry Switzer? Pete Carroll (NFL Version)?

3. The Pioneers

The Pios get a much-deserved week off, following two terrible weeks against small college powerhouses Willamette and Linfield. Given the program's near-death a few years ago, just being able to play and win at least one game is a great accomplishment for 2008. I'm proud of the Pios for keeping it together. The Pios' colors are, of course, Halloween colors. So I'm dedicating my pumpkin to them this year.

Political Humor

2008-10-25T06:41:00.000-07:00

"If I didn't kill myself when I became impotent for two months in 1979 ... "

Musings on the Economy (It Starts -- But Only Starts -- to Make Sense Now)

2008-10-21T21:39:00.000-07:00

I recently read this.

To oversimplify everything, it sounds like the central tenet of the economic system for years was to spread risk as much as possible, both within countries and internationally. Back in the day, capital reserves, gold reserves, and other things with value backed your risk of financial loss. But the globalized economic system of recent decades has been about spreading risk by (for example) securitizing loans and using credit default swaps. And many of these financial instruments didn't have any reserves backing them up.

Fundamentally, it appears these risky investments were only backed by an uncertain promise to re-pay. That promise was spread across many instruments, individuals, and countries, of course. Maybe the only thing holding it all together has been thinking everyone could make money out of this system (as opposed to thinking, "It's all backed by gold, so I'm fine.") But, with nothing real behind it ... well, what are we supposed to do with nothing?

So spreading risk was, perhaps, a shell game to distract people from the fact that their assets lacked value. Every piece of the economy is so intertwined with everything else in the world that the gradual unraveling of this system will have unforeseeable effects on every major economy in the world.

Whoops.

Why It's Hard to Watch College Football on TV

2008-10-11T09:35:00.000-07:00

In the Oklahoma-Texas game, the ref just flagged Texas for "running into the kicker." This is a five-yard penalty, not a fifteen-yard penalty, so Oklahoma declined the penalty and decided not to re-punt.

ABC just showed the replay. It shows that the Texas defender dove at the Oklahoma punter's leg, landing underneath the punter without contacting either the punter or the football. Then, as the punter's leg came down, it hit the back of the Texas defender, causing the punter to fall over (whether due to a loss of balance or because he was acting does not matter).

The usually-decent Kirk Herbstreit then says, "Wow, that was a close call." No, it wasn't. It wasn't even close to roughing the kicker. Roughing the kicker is when some guy flies in and nails the punter without touching the ball, not when the punter initiates contact by standing on someone's back. Geez, it's even questionable as a "running into the kicker" foul.

This is yet another example of thorough, thoughtful sports commentary from the ABC/ESPN football announcers. These guys spend about 1/4 of their time thinking about what's happening on the field, and the rest of their time spewing the game's pre-scripted story line, anointing superstars before they play a down, and promoting other programming on the ABC/ESPN/Disney mega-network. Just let the players play the game, and let the announcers comment on what actually happens. Please.

Alma Mater Watch: Crime Wave

2008-10-09T20:03:00.001-07:00

Two weeks ago, you couldn't go anywhere in this town without seeing people wearing their Halloween-colored Oregon State gear. One out of every five cars driving around proudly displayed a "Beavers" banner. Then, sadly, a week or so ago, all that paraphernalia seemed to disappear. If you have any information about who stole those items, please call McGruff the Crime Dog.

1. The Yeomen

Fresh off last week's win, Oberlin now tries to avoid becoming Homecoming Fodder for the University of Chicago. The Maroons (whose "C" logo looks like those of the Chicago Bears and the Cincinnati Reds) are 0-3 so far this season. It's time to avenge the 47-0 shutout from 1995. The Yeomen will win.

2. The Pioneers

Civil War? Apple Cup? Nah, Wagon Wheel! LC plays Willamette in Salem this Saturday. Willamette is now #18 in Division III football. My heart tells me the Pios can win, and my brain says there is no way. Sorry guys, the Bearcats will roll to victory.

3. The Ducks

Obviously, the Ducks are in the middle of a rough patch. However, they still seem to believe in themselves. Maybe falling apart against the Trojans was inevitable, but the thing that knocked them out of the game was a two-minute stretch of the second quarter. Can they avoid similar mistakes against UCLA? Probably. Even if they make the same mistakes, will UCLA capitalize? Probably not. I say Ducks over Bruins.

(Um, does anyone want a job entering data for ESPN.com? What's up with that?)

Alma Mater Watch: Baby Alligators in the Sewers

2008-10-06T18:49:00.000-07:00

And so I haven't had time for Alma Mater Watch the past couple of weeks. But the Yeomen won, slaying a 20-year-old demon. And the Pioneers are now struggling after their big win a few weeks ago.

And so the Ducks' secondary has not played up to its potential -- whether it's health, too much hype, or poor communication, I don't know. Colin Cowherd always says the Pac-10 boils down to senior quarterbacks: if you have a good senior QB, you have a shot at the championship (unless you are USC and have a million athletes). The Ducks have played most of this season without a healthy QB who played major college football last year. So, you know, adjust your expectations accordingly. Don't expect road wins against good teams. That's how it goes. Just ask the Beavers, who can clobber USC at home, but don't really show up at Utah or Penn State (and let's just pretend they didn't even play Stanford this year).

Needless to say ...

2008-09-30T19:37:00.001-07:00

... I think the Cubs will win the World Series. I think the Cubs will find a way to win playoff games they aren't even scheduled to play. (Yes, I mean the Cubs will win Rays-White Sox games, Red Sox-Angels games, etc.) I think the Cubs will surprise everyone and do everything this postseason. As corny as this is, I find it exciting.

I think all the matchups are interesting. Cubs-Dodgers is interesting because it features two defensively challenged left fielders who can hit.

Top Three Things that will be exposed in the playoffs:
1. The Brewers' bullpen
2. The White Sox' offense
3. K-Rod's propensity to put guys on base

Time to spend the day outside

2008-09-28T20:43:00.000-07:00

The Strangest Thing

2008-09-26T21:23:00.000-07:00

Tonight a baseball player hit a homer with a guy on first, and he received credit for two runs batted in and no run scored.

I am watching the L.A. Dodgers at the S.F. Giants, a meaningless game on the last Friday of the season. It may be my last chance to hear Vin Scully calling a game late at night this season.

It's the bottom of the 6th, with the Dodgers leading, 2-0. With one out, Pablo Sandoval singles for the Giants. This brings up catcher Bengie Molina, a good hitter who happens to be extremely slow.

Molina rips a pitch from L.A.'s Scott Proctor deep to right field. It hits off the brick/roof transition just below the seats above the right field wall. The umps say it isn't a homer, so Molina stops at first and Sandoval stops at third. Because these runs matter, the much-speedier Emmanuel Burriss replaces Molina as a pinch-runner.

The Giants think it's a home run, not a single, so this becomes another test for baseball's instant replay system on close home run calls. The umps confer and go to the replay "booth" to look at the play. After seven minutes or so, the umps return and signal "home run." Sandoval runs from third to home, and Burriss rounds the bases from first to home with a big grin on his face.

But ... there's another issue. Giants manager Bruce Bochy calls the umps over. Scully picks up on the problem immediately: if Molina hit a homer, it means the play did not end with Molina at first. If Molina was not on first at the end of the play, there could be no pinch-runner for him.

In a just world, Molina would be allowed back in the game, Burriss would return to the bench as a potential pinch-runner for later, and maybe, just maybe, Molina would get to round the bases and receive a full ovation from the fans at AT&T Park. Common sense tells us that Molina can return to the game.

Just as there is no joy in Mudville, apparently there is no justice in baseball after all. Following another seven minutes of discussion, the umps rule against Bochy. Molina cannot return to the game, and Burriss has to stay in the game (or be replaced by someone else). Dodgers manager Joe Torre listens to the umps' explanation and smiles.

The game does not matter: the Giants are nowhere near the playoffs, the Dodgers have clinched their division already, and both teams are playing several minor league call-ups.

The issues do matter, however. Does a rule for this situation even exist? Did the umps have to do their best to interpret gaps in the rule book?

Think about it for a second: what happened on this play? Molina got a homer, but someone else ran for him. The single never happened, but the pinch runner who came into the game due to the "single" had to remain in the game.

I saw this happen in a softball game once. One of the guys on our team had a knee injury. He could not run, but he could still swing a bat. So, we had a pinch-runner standing behind home plate, ready to run to first if the batter hit a fair ball.

Twenty years from now, I'd love to see someone try to reconstruct this situation from a box score. Tonight, I'm just glad Vin Scully is the broadcaster who tried to explain it to me.

Alma Mater Watch

2008-09-20T07:41:00.000-07:00

I'm still trying to catch up from the NYC trip, so this will be a quick post. I'll have more to say next week.

1. Ducks over Boise State, 31-23

2. Yeomen fall to Case Western, 24-21

3. LC wins its home opener over Pomona-Pitzer, 14-9.

DFW

2008-09-18T23:14:00.000-07:00

A few years ago, I, like many others citizens of the world, began but did not finish David Foster Wallace's long, intense, heavily-footnoted classic, "Infinite Jest."

Mr. Wallace recently committed suicide, leading to numerous tributes and remembrances. I recently read his 2005 commencement speech at Kenyon College for the first time. Obviously, it is impossible to thank him for that brilliant speech today. All I can do is appreciate his thoughts on being self-aware while dealing with day-to-day life.