Lee Lowenfish

There are light years of difference between watching a game with emotional involvement for one of your teams and merely being interested in a good World Series game.  With my Woerioles under current management sadly headed nowhere (would love to be proven wrong), I adopted the gritty unheralded Blue Jays in the just-concluded Fall Classic.  By Games 6 and 7, I was really hoping Toronto would win over the Evil Empire West or less pejoratively, the Deferral Dodgers whose management has shrewdly backloaded many contracts to avoid paying luxury taxes to their less-financially-endowed and less-interested-in-winning partners.   

 

I watched Game 7 in a local Upper West Side bar, the Dive 106 on Amsterdam Ave.  It was a lively evening but not too raucous because the local Mets and Yankees were long gone from the playoffs - the Mets never even made them. It says here that having Juan Soto as a third MVP candidate doesn't seem right. My lasting memory of Soto this year was watching him take strike three called to end the penultimate game of the season in Miami and then arguing the call with the ump.  The Mets were still alive in the pennant race and NO WAY an MVP ends a crucial game with the bat on his shoulder.. 

 

There was an intense Dodger fan at the tavern wearing a blue Dodger T-shirt with the names on the front of Clayton Kershaw-Jackie Robinson-Sandy Koufax-and a 4th I can't remember. He told me that earlier in the season when the Dodgers came to New York to play both the Mets and Yankees, he met manager Dave Roberts at a downtown restaurant and he couldn't have been nicer. I thought to myself that the Jays' less-experienced manager John Schneider seemed like a good guy, too. 

 

Dive 106 customers might have been evenly split between Toronto and LAD rooters but when Alejandro Kirk hit into a Series-ending 6-6-3 DP started by Mookie Betts, T-shirted LAD fan erupted in bellicose joy.  Another happy camper was a Yankee fan who booed Blue Jay George Springer every time he came up.  She still held a grudge against any former Astro involved in the sign-stealing scandal that may have cost the Yankees the 2017 ALCS.  She did know the game though, learning it in Texas from her Brooklyn-born father.  She surmised accurately that walking potent Vladimir Guerrero Jr set up a double play trap for Kirk that he soon fell into.  Inning over, game over, World Series over, Dodgers win.

(Without John Sterling's screaming.)

 

The LA Dodgers are now the first back-to-back champions since the 1998-99-2000 Yankees. I don't want to nitpick too much because both teams could have won, but in the cruel crucible of baseball with its immensely long season, there is only one winner.  I did think after Toronto won Games 4 and 5 convincingly at Chavez Ravine they could win it all.  But the Dodgers are battle-tested and at least it was their grinders that made most of the difference. 

 

Not just the well-paid Mookie Betts who broke out of his slump long enough to get the huge hit in Game 6 - the two-run single off Kevin Gausman on an off-speed pitch after a long at-bat. They wouldn't have won without third baseman Max Muncy, a scrap heap pickup years ago, breaking out of his slump to homer in the 8th inning of Game 7 to bring the Dodgers within a run.   And then most improbably Miguel Rojas, 36-year-old former Miami Marlin who late in regular season announced his retirement after playoffs, hit the tying homer off recently-reliable closer Jeff Hoffman to tie the game with one out in the 9th. 

 

In a Series in which each team almost always answered runs quickly, the Blue Jays almost won it all in the bottom of the 9th. Alas, with the bases loaded and two out, defensive substitute Andy Pages made a leaping catch in left center knocking left fielder Kike Hernandez to the ground in the process.  The game was decided in the 11th when catcher Will Smith hit Shane Bieber's 2-0 pitch for a homer to deep left. LAD's young Japanese pitcher Yoshinobu Yamamoto was voted the Series MVP for winning 3 games and saving Game 7 with almost 3 innings of relief after throwing nearly 100 pitches in Game 6. 

 

I think Will Smith could have easily been the co-MVP because he caught every inning of every Series game. I counted at least 3 wild pitches he saved in the early innings of Game 7 when unicorn Shohei Ohtani was ineffective.  Smith reminds me of Yankee catcher Jorge Posada during the Bronx Bombers' most recent dynasty.  You love him if he's on your team and loathe him if he's an opponent.  Smith at least is a home-grown Dodger and came back from injury just in time to make his mark in the post-season. 

 

In many ways, I think Dodger manager Dave Roberts was the MVP. He manipulated his roster brilliantly, moving catcher Smith to second in the batting order to take pressure off Betts who until his big single in Game 6 was not contributing at the plate (but he was a whiz in the field, defying the pundits by playing shortstop for first time in MLB career.)

Roberts also inserted Rojas at second base for the last games and he came through on both sides of the ball.  Inserting rarely-used Justin Dean for defense in Game 6 proved very crucial when he immediately reacted to a line dlrive in the gap stuck in the outfield fence and got the umps to end the play without a run scoring.  

 

There is a revealing chapter on Dave Roberts in Scott Miller's recent book on managers SKIPPER. "I say a prayer every day, don't make it be about me."  More on this indispensable book coming up in Hot Stove League posts of this blog.  It is so sad that veteran sportswriter Scott Miller didn't live to enjoy most of the plaudits for SKIPPER because he died iof cancer n June at age 62.  It is a work that not only brings familiar managerial names back to life - Tom Kelly, Sparky Anderson, Billy Martin, Whitey Herzog, and others.  Miller also tells the stories of less-remembered managers like Cito Gaston, Art Howe, Jim Tracy, among others, who lost their jobs to the inexorable wave of analytics. 

 

Speaking of books, keep your eyes open for Steve Somers, ME HERE, YOU THERE which is available now on pre-order from Triumph Books and officially debuts on November 18. The San Francisco-born Somers made his New York radio debut in 1987 when WFAN went on the air as the first all-sports talk radio station.  Steve brought great knowledge and welcome humor to his overnight broadcasts. His carefully crafted well-written opening monologues were especially delightful after the host and caller screamings that punctuated sports talk radio then and now.   

 

Here's some TCM Turner Classic Movies tips, most notably Claude Rains marathon from 6A until 8P on Mon Nov 10.  I have dreamed of being reincarnated as Rains and (also Robert Preston and James Garner).  Here's the lineup for Rains:

6A "Four Daughters" (1938). Music teacher Rains is wary of his daughters, some of the Lane sisters, getting too friendly with John Garfield.

745A "Adventures of Robin Hood" (1938) Rains contends with Errol Flynn and Olivia DeHavilland

945A "Mr. Skeffington" (1942) Michael Curtiz reunites with Rains after "Casablanca" - Bette Davis has to contend with Rains who is spared her worst side in "Deception"

   which is not shown today.

1215P "Passage to Marseilles" (1944) - Curtiz again this time with Bogart along for a WW II story

215P "The Unsuspected" (1947) another villain role for Claude with Joan Caulfield and Audrey Totter

4P "Casablanca" (1943)

545P "Caesar and Cleopatra" (1945)

This amazing day on TCM opens at 1215A with the silent "Body and Soul" (1925) with Paul Robeson as philandering minister.  ("Ol' Man River" had not yet made its debut) 

And at 8P the oft-shown but always gripping "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" (1966). Mike Nichols directs Liz and Burton in Edward Albee's searing play

 

On the live music front for those in NYC area, Sa Nov 8 10A-10P - "Wall-To-Wall Stevie Wonder" - Symphony Space, Broadway/95th Street Manhattan

 

That's all for now.  Stay strong without baseball until late winter.  And always remember:  Stay Positive, Test Negative & Take It Easy But Take It!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

       

 

    

Happy International Tango Day, December 11 - get out of your chairs, sedentary dear readers, and move those puppies.  How do I know it is International Tango Day? Because I saw it on the internet so it must be true, right? 

 

Humor must be our constant companion these days and weeks and months ahead.  So let me start with the hilarious Onion headline that popped up the other

day on the internet:  MORE PARENTS SAY ALLOWING CHILD TO PLAY FOOTBALL NOT WORTH RISE OF BEING DRAFTED BY JETS. 

 

New York is going through a truly horrible pro football season with the Jets and Giants simply incapable of playing winning football.  The Giants have an injured and thin roster but the Jets were supposed to be a good team.  Owner Woody Johnson forgot or more likely never understood that relying on aging QB Aaron Rodgers wouldn't lead them to the promised land.  

 

So I don't begrudge the excitement of Mets fans who are celebrating the acquisition of Juan Soto as a free agent with the extraordinary amount of money, a reported $765 million spread out over 15 years. If Soto deems it necessary, he can opt out after 5 years. The blow to the crosstown Yankees no doubt felt like an extra bonus. 

 

But as I was finishing this blog on Tues evening Dec 10, the news came that the Yankees' first return salvo has been signing away from the Atlanta Braves, gifted though somewhat fragile southpaw Max Fried to a eight-year contract for reportedly "only" 27 million a year.  There will likely be more big ticket acquisitions by the Bronx Bombers. 

 

Super-agent Scott Boras and most of the local and national media are applauding the high stakes competition between Mets owner Steve Cohen and Hal Steinbrenner. Smooth-talking Boras even lauds the "goliaths" that we either love or hate so everybody's happy. 

 

I beg to differ. I cannot hail the likelihood of big market domination in MLB. Maybe commissioner Rob Manfred and minions yearn for a Yankee-Dodger or Yankee-Met World Series every year but not me.  I can tolerate a Yankee-Dodger World Series, let's say every 43 years.

 

I am not sure that Blake Snell will become a real ace for the Dodgers, but he is certainly an improvement to their oft-injured starting corps.  At a far lower price versatile middle infielder-outfielder Tommy Edman just re-upped for five years.  It is so hard to project the future of a player, which is why I revere the eyes-and-ears scouting profession. But even I could see in the Cape Cod summer league almost 10 years ago when Edman was still a Stanford collegian that he was a future major leaguer.

 

The common wisdom is that Dodgers are acting within the rules to backload most of their contracts - so, for example, Shohei Ohtani is only being paid $2 million a year to minimize the team's luxury tax penalty.  It is still not good that the smaller markets have little chance to bid for the best players. 

 

I think back to the early 1920s when the Yankees and the Giants squared off in three World Series in a row from 1921 through 1923.  In 1922 Branch Rickey in his fourth full year of running the cash-poor St. Louis Cardinals - multi-tasking in the roles of both field manager and top baseball executive - he had the team in the pennant race until late July.  Then the Yankees picked up third baseman Joe Dugan from the Bosox and the Giants pitcher Hugh McQuillan from the Boston Braves and they went on to win the pennants. 

 

Rickey railed to a St. Louis Rotary Club gathering: "How can those teams without unlimited resources in their deposit boxes have a chance to compete fairly?"

(Source:  my biography BRANCH RICKEY: BASEBALL'S FEROCIOUS GENTLEMAN, P. 135). Newly-installed commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis said that nothing could be done about these acquisitions, but soon thereafter MLB implemented the June 15th deadline - only waiver deals and no trades allowed after that date. A few years after free agency came in after the 1976 season, the deadline was pushed back to late August.  Now it is the end of the July with some of the fat cats wanting the chance to get additions as late as early September.  

  

End of history lesson but more to come in future posts.  On the current Orioles front, I am not sure that Tyler O'Neill is an improvement on homegrown Anthony Santander in right field.  I definitely am a little aghast that they signed defensively challenged Gary Sanchez to be the backup catcher replacing the gritty James McCann who is older but certainly a better receiver.  But I guess the Birds seem to be counting on a revival of Adley Rutschman from his very sub-par second half of the season. 

 

AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT!   

On the movie front, those film buffs who envy those of us living in the New York area can drool at this news about a Robert Siodmak Festival at the two theaters at Lincoln Center on W 65th Street west of Broadway, W Dec 11 through Th Dec 19.   Siodmak was a German exile from Nazism in the 1930s who became in the 1940s and early 1950s one of the leading if underappreciated directors of Noir Films.   

 

Here is a partial list. Some films are at Bunin Monroe Center 144 W 65th St, others at bigger Walter Reade Theatre across street. 

For info, contact email.ticketing@filmlc.org or 212/875-5825

W Dec 11 630P & Sa Dec 14 230P  "Phantom Lady" (1944) with Franchot Tone/Ella Raines/Elisha Cook Jr./Thomas Gomez

W Dec 11 845P & Sa Dec 14 830P  "Criss Cross" (1949) perhaps his best Noir with Burt Lancaster/Yvonne DeCarlo/Dan Duryea

Th Dec 12 630P & F Dec 13 830P "The Killers" (1946) based on Hemingway story with Burt Lancaster/Ava Gardner

Th Dec 12 845P & F Dec 13 630P "The Suspect" (1944) Set in 1902 England with Charles Laughton as mousy gent pining for Ella Raines

Sa Dec 14 430P & W Dec 18 645P "The Spiral Staircase" (1946) with Dorothy McGuire/Ethel Barrymore/George Brent/Kent Smith

Su Dec 15 230P "People On Sunday" (1930) filmed in Berlin with directors R. Siodmak, Edgar Ulmer, young Billy Wilder

Su Dec 15 430P & W Dec 18 830P  "Son of Dracula" (1943) with Lon Chaney Jr. in New Orleans trying to act like Dad 

Su Dec 15 630P & Th Dec 19 2P "Strange Affair of Uncle Harry" (1946) with George Sanders pining for Ella Raines    

Su Dec 16 1P & Dec 19 630P (not in 4-K restoration) "File on Thelma Jordan" (1950) with Barbara Stanwyck/Wendell Corey

Tu Dec 18 6P & Dec 19 845P "The Cry of The City" (1948) with Victor Mature trying to go straight and Richard Conte going the other way

 

On TCM, Mickey Rooney Thursdays this month has the following films of interest for boxing and car and horse racing fans:

All on Th Dec 12 2P "Killer McCoy" (1946) with Brian Donlevy/Ann Blyth in presumably less malicious role than as Joan Crawford's daughter in "Mildred Pierce" 

6P "The Big Wheel" (1949) with Thomas Mitchell/Mary Hatcher 

8P "National Velvet" (1945) with Elizabeth Taylor/Donald Crisp, directed by Clarence Brown

 

And here's a music documentary note: 

Wed Dec 11 at 8P on Netflix - "The Only Girl In the Orchestra" 33-minute documentary on Orrin O'Brien,

recently-retired outstanding bassist in the NY Philharmonic and the first woman hired by the orchestra. 

 

That's all for now - stay positive, test negative remains my mantra & as always, Take It Easy But Take It!