September 2002 Archives

Peyton's Manning request to wear black hightops may not be just the usual NFL fartiness. It may also be the victim of the tug-of-war between the Baltimore Ravens and the Indianapolis Colts over the corpse of the Baltimore Colts. On the civic level, this may equal the Ohio-North Carolina feud over the Wright Brothers. I know that Unitas personally severed all ties to Indianapolis after the move and if he could have chosen only one team to honor him, that team would be the Ravens.

Some believe that because he wore a Colts jersey, only the Colts can honor Unitas. However, I don't believe a legacy like should be bought and sold like a common commodity. The people of Baltimore who remember him, saw him play, saw him on sidelines at Ravens games, deserve to honor Unitas more than the people of Indianapolis.

September 16

Some perspective from Rob Neyer.

Travels with Brick: Dallas-Fort Worth

Chip first held his National Academic Championships in Dallas. I flew there on a two-stop flight passing through Nashville and Memphis that resulted in American Airlines losing my luggage. In those days, we ran in just one room over the course of a week and each team had only game.

I was always there in May, so it was hot. One year, Chip took us to dinner at Reunion Tower. Every two minutes, we saw Dealey Plaza.

On a Saturday afternoon, we could park a car on the street in front of a department store in Downtown Dallas. I guess the shoppers were all in the suburbs.

The main attraction in Fort Worth they brought us to was the stockyards. FW is still my least favorite city.

September 15

Unfortunately, this was how we were afraid we would hear again from this guy.

Trivia from Saturday's games:

According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Mark Hendrickson joined Danny Ainge, Gene Conley, Dave DeBusschere, Dick Grat, Frankie Baumholtz, Cotton Nash, Ron Reed, Chuck Connors and Steve Hamilton as those who have played in both the NBA and major league baseball.

Are the Blue Jays back to drafting two-sports athletes again? In the 1980s, they were famous for the delusion that Danny Ainge was a major league third baseman. Future Indigenous Persons quarterback Jay Schroeder also spent a few years toiling both ends of the battery in the Toronto farm system. I believe Schroeder led the Carolina League in passed balls in 1983.

September 14

After a morning with a haircut and grocery shopping, Miranda had a playdate, Whitlock went to her office and I edited yet another episode of Silver Screen Test. Episode 7 is finished now.

A bad day for both brands of football in Michigan. I remember Beano Cook saying that State was a national champion candidate because of their easy schedule.

Also a bad day for Maryland, but hey, they're a basketball school.

A worse day for Sunderland. They sit in the drop zone, but least Newcastle is still behind them.

Amazingly, DC United is still in the playoff hunt. If somebody wins the New York/New Jersey-New England game, Kansas City loses, Chicago draws and DC wins, there could be a four way tie for the final play-off spot.

By beating the Metrostars, DC United captured the Atlantic Cup, which goes to the winner of the season series. Maybe lousy teams in all sports should use this alternate championship to increase attendance at the end of the season. Maybe fans will come to see Detroit Tigers-Kansas City Royals, Arizona Cardinals-Seattle Seahawks, Memphis Grizzlies-New Orleans Hornets or Tampa Bay Lightning-Florida Panthers, if there's a trophy at stake.

We tried to get Miranda to watch The Great Mouse Detective, but it got too scary for her. I also think there may too sophisticated humor in it for younger children.

September 13

The Washington City Paper has probably put more contestants in contact with me for Silver Screen Test than any other source. I frequently put a free ad in the Notices section of their classifieds. I picked up a copy today and found a review for Boyz of All Nationz: The Rise and Fall of a Multi-Ethnic Boy Band, a play by Prince Gomolvilas.

In the familiar Behind the Music format, it tells the story of Bob (the European-American), Ray-Ray (the African-American), Jace (the Hispanic-American) and Brick (the Asian-American).

Their hit singles included "Put Your Eggs In My Basket" and "Oh Let Me Lay You Down (I Wanna Lick You Up)". They staged their world debut in the Pentagon City food court. Reviews here from the Washington Post and the City Paper.

I came home to Comcast sub-contractors in my driveway. Apparently the previous job of digging a few inches of road near the curb was declared illegal by the county. Instead, the contractor had to dig up a few inches of my driveway by the sidewalk as well as the grass by the sidewalk. Supposedly, another Comcast contractor will come by the resurface the entire driveway. The work resulted in brief interruptions, but long enough to interrupt tonight's episode of Monk.

September 12

Johnny Unitas died yesterday. He was like Mickey Mantle to me, an icon of the recent past whose greatest years I never saw. Not that the only Johnny U I remember toiled in a San Diego Chargers jersey. It's just that he played in my time along with Bart Starr, Joe Namath and Fran Tarkenton in their prime. I wonder if the Ravens will wear a royal blue 19 the rest of the season.

Tuesday Morning Quarterback makes a cyberpunk and bimbo reference noting that Raiderette Maria Wintermute shares her last name with the artificial intelligence in Neuromancer.

September 11

My thoughts return today to two acquaintances who had trouble getting home last year. One was a daughter of our middle management. She was stranded in Hawaii on her honeymoon. My cousin went to San Diego with a bunch of friends to watch the Indigenous Persons get stomped in person. His group returned home in a rented van.

The Washington Post is pessimistic about the Expos playing in DC in 2003. The Washington Times on the other hand sounds an optimistic tone. This reflects their attitudes all along.

The Post gets their information from the Warehouse and major Democratic contributor. The Times advocates as potential owner a former partner to the current President. But if MLB is willing to lose money yet again in Montreal, rather than rake in the jackpot in Washington, the Lords of the Sport give a whole new meaning to the term no-brainer.

Finished editing Episode 8 of Silver Screen Test. Also learned a whole lot about working the newfangled character generator.

September 10

Farscape is going off the air. Just when I started watching it for Water Rats veteran Raelee Hill.

These people don't have lives so that we can have them. A discussion of the sleeve stripe on Aaron Taylor's uniform when none of the rest of the Mariners have them.

An eloquent defense of baseball from Jayson Stark.

Tonight SportsCenter ranked the shortstops and put Millennium Trammell in the top 10. No mention of Arky Vaughn, Joe Cronin or the original Trammell.

September 9

Travels with Brick: Atlanta

On our way home from Disney World, we rode an L-1011 into Atlanta that went on to Los Angeles without us. We rode a DC-9 back to Washington.

As the Maryland College Bowl coach, I chaperoned the team down to Atlanta on the Crescent, or as more romantically characterized, a Midnight Train to Georgia. A train seat is certainly more comfortable than an airline seat, but sleeping on one is still no picnic. I felt the difference the night of our hotel stay, sleeping in a motionless bed.

Emory hosted the tournament where we got our first taste of the format most commonly used on the circuit today: untimed 20 toss-ups. Bonuses still had variable values. It was also my last competition for more than a decade. Peach Tree Street on a Saturday morning doesn't really tell you much about Atlanta.

We played Illuminati in the dining car on the way back. In the morning we took the Maryland shuttle back to campus. We put a smug guy who thought he knew a lot about films in his place.

A few years later I intended to fly out of Miami directly back to Washington. However, somewhere between checking in my bags and the gate, my flight was cancelled. They didn't even bother to indicate that the flight was cancelled on the board at the gate.

I asked what happened to my flight and they put me on another flight to Atlanta. From Hartsfield, I took the last flight of the night in National Airport. Of course, my bags weren't there in Washington when I arrived. At least I was home where clothes weren't a problem.

September 8

Some AM thoughts on the MVP. Rob Neyer argues for Alex Rodriguez. Should A-Rod be penalized because his team is mediocre? Would he suddenly become more valuable if he played for Minnesota? But the Twins are leading the Central Division by 14 games without him right now. Does A-Rod suddenly become more valuable because of better teammates and worse opponents? I'm of the school that a players is valuable regardless of where his team finishes.

Meanwhile, the greatest active player thinks starting pitchers should not get MVP consideration because they're not out there everyday. Well what does Bonds in his team's 32 other plate appearances? For four of them, he's usually standing near first base, but what about other 28? Bonds can be found sitting on his butt on the bench. How is he contributing then? What about when the Giants are in the field? I would guess that at least 20 times a game, San Francisco could have made the play without a left fielder. Although I generally look at hitters before pitchers for the MVP, not to consider pitchers is ludicrous. Even if pitchers are not there four out of five days, the candidate batters can't help their team the majority of the time either.

Went to see the Anaheim vs. Baltimore with David Bykowski. For no particular reason, I've added a picture of svelte Tony Siragusa fan.

The ball coach sneaked out a victory today. I think with Spurrier's penchant for running up the score, the Indigenous Persons will not lose to lesser teams, as commonly happened in the Norv Turner era.

As I heard the recaps on the drive home, the game of the day had to be Kansas City at Cleveland. Once Michael Westbrook cost Washington a big gain by ripping his helmet off. Now, Dwayne Rudd costs his team the game with an unsportsmanlike conduct call.

I write this as the Houston Texans take a half-time lead. Finally, some Joss Whedon news out of Pittsburgh.

September 7

I got a Spy vs. Spy t-shirt from Whitlock this morning and I gave her a Tara and Willow t-shirt.

Took Miranda to Amanda Pierce's birthday party. That's the birthday girl in the background of the picture with Miranda. As you can see, the party was at a bowling alley. During the party, I bought new stamps of Teddy Bears, Andy Warhol, Ogden Nash, and Harry Houdini. Although he's been played by Tony Curtis, Harvey Keitel and Wil Wheaton, the stamps make him look more like Tony Shalhoub.

September 6

Craig Barker notes that Slate has been stealing my ideas. Actually my idea of teams moving around also involves competing leagues. A single monopolistic entity has some incentive to carve up the territory to the benefit of the league as a whole.

Given that Bud Lite prefers public, rather than private financing of new stadiums, MLB loses by not moving teams. Look at the stadiums built for NFL teams once they started moving franchises around. And since a baseball teams hasn't moved in 31 years, the threat of leaving loses its power. That's why Bud had to invent the contraction ploy.

I tried to sleep after Kauai was let out of his laundry room, but I couldn't while he had the evening crazies in our bedroom. So I did some computer stuff that may end up on the web site. I also saw the end of the Athletics' streak on SportsCenter.

September 5

I disagree with the title, but he makes some good points about declining NFL television ratings. At least the NFL does something about their problems.

Travels with Brick: Northern California

My father had a conference in Palo Alto, but he sent me ahead a few days early and stay with my cousins. It was the first time I traveled by air all by myself.

I went into San Francisco alone the first day, traveling by bus and BART. A woman on the bus in front of me was dressed in a down vest. The temperatures in the area range quite a bit. You listen to the radio and the DJ says,"It's 100 in Sacramento, 89 in Oakland, 87 in Fremont and in down San Francisco, it's 68 degrees."

BART is just like Metro in Washington except for the fewer stops, longer range and bathrooms in the stations. They both use the same farecard system, although DC nomenclature is invariably more complex. The Bay Area just calls their farecard a "ticket". Someone wrote in the Post about trying to get a Metro farecard through BART and vice-versa. Both generated error messages, but the Washington one was two words longer.

In the city I walked through Golden Gate Park and saw the Steinhart Aquarium. The aquarium has the fish roundabout where you can see ocean fish swimming around you. There's always one fish swimming against the flow.

On one of the days, my cousin Chris went with me to the Exploratorium. I fell in love with the Berkeley campus, which I actually think is prettier than Stanford. While in Berkeley, I supposedly experienced an earthquake registering 4 on the Richter Scale while in music store. I bought a copy of Life, the Universe and Everything.

One of the nights, I stayed at Stanford with my father. We went to visit one of his friends who he claims looked like Elvis when he was young. By that time, the friend looked like Martin Sheen.

September 4

Stayed home today to get our garage doors installed. Then went to MCT to edit the most recent episode of Silver Screen Test.

September 3

I'm not usually a fan of Peter Gammons, but give Andrew Jackson credit where credit is due:

What was striking about the press conference is that not once did Selig mention the word "fans." To many fans, this could be taken as Selig essentially saying, "We've been telling you the players are greedy, mercenary and overrated for two years, and now we're putting millions more into the pockets of certain billionaires without asking them to invest in the game, but owners and players alike expect you to come back, bring your family of four to our games and spend the expected $150. I am the owners' commissioner and you're lucky."

...In all this revenue-sharing, there should be incentives for owners to build ballparks with as little public funding as possible. There should be rewards for Peter Magowan for not only saving a great franchise, but for building a ballpark with his own money, just as there should be revenue-sharing penalties for owners who get their ballparks from taxpayers. If this were about people and fans and not just about owners, then the commissioner would take the lead in this field, because there is no moral way that the San Francisco Giants should have to transfer money to teams like the Brewers and White Sox who were given taxpayer dollars to finance their ballparks and teams.

...When ESPN approached MLB about televising games from 1 p.m. until 1 a.m. on September 11 to celebrate baseball's dedication to the healing process, the network was told that it would have to be put out for bid and that it was all about money. Not conscience ... money.

Saw most of the Texas-Baltimore game, except for the exciting beginning. I did see Hairston break-up the no-hitter with his triple. We were that close to repeat of Ernie Shore's feat - following a starter who got himself thrown out before even retiring an opponent - with a no-hit performance. Of course, Shore is credited with a perfect game and I don't think we'll ever look back at Aaron Mayette as the greatest baseball player ever.

In addition, Joaquin Benoit was credited with the longest save in history -seven innings. In that same season as his perfect game, Bill James notes that Ernie Shore also pitched a save of five innings.

September 2

Another quiet day. We took Miranda up to Sally Ride for a picnic. Then she was supposed to ride her bicycle. Instead, she quickly got frustrated and we took a walk in the swamp.

September 1

For her homework this weekend, Miranda had to find five things to put in a paper bag to describe herself. She's putting in pictures of her family and her cat as well as buttons and magnifying glass.

Whitlock and I finally saw Chicken Run. I liked the way certain naturalistic movie conventions were incorporated into stop-action, such as the spoon in the rain. Also, that's the best American accent I've ever heard Mel Gibson do.