Ketchup**
Posted: June 29th, 2009 | Filed under: Baseball, Other Sports, Pop Culture | 42 Comments »
Home. Whew. Well, that was an interesting vacation … I won’t bore you with too many details. I did come up with a couple of new words …
Bumperation: The frustration of being stuck behind the same car for WAY too long. This feeling can be particularly strong when that car has either a notable bumper sticker or an annoying vanity plate.
Coaster fatigue: That deep feeling of exhaustion that hits you at the end of a day at an amusement park. I’ve long felt like there’s nothing quite like the feeling of burnout that hits you about the third or fourth day in Las Vegas, when the slot machine bells are tolling in your head and the casino lights are melting your eyes and all that. Well, having done Cedar Point AND Canada’s Wonderland on this trip, I can safely say that Coaster fatigue is like Vegas sped up … it only takes one day until you feel that kind of “get me out of here” overtiredness. And I don’t even RIDE roller coasters*.
*OK, I will bore you with one detail: They have this roller coaster at Cedar Point called “Top Thrill Dragster” … I despise roller coasters so basically they all look about the same to me. But not this one. No, this one, you are in some kind of dragster roller coaster car … and then it TAKES OFF, I mean, zero to 120 in four seconds. Really. Zero to 120 in four seconds. Then it goes 420 feet in the air, almost straight up, and then goes 420 feet in the air, almost straight down, and then it races to the finish line. I was there with Chardon Jimmy and we were trying to determine how much money it would take for either one of us to ride the Dragster. We never came up with a number.
Incidentally, there are metal stands next to the Top Thrill Dragster … you KNOW a roller coaster is scary when there are stands for people to watch it.
**One more boring detail … to get us through the incredibly boring parts of the drive (all of it except the drive over the Mississippi and the dangerous part near Toronto) we told groaner family riddles. Such as: Why did the cow want to be an astronaut? So he could be the first cow on the mooooon. And: What did the Mommy tomato say to her daughter tomato who was lagging behind? Hey, ketchup. Well, hey, the audience was a 7- and 4-year-old.
Now, I’m home and there are way too many real-life things to do. But, it might be good to do a quick blog ketchup …
– The Michael Jackson death pulled me off my vacation, but there were three other deaths last week that hit me a bit. There were four, actually, if you want to count Farrah Fawcett, though I will admit that I was never a Farrah fan. I mean, she was obviously beautiful, but I never had that poster on my wall that was apparently on every other boy’s wall in America. For some reason, I liked Kate Jackson. In retrospect, that was probably because I was 9 … not to say that Kate Jackson isn’t a lovely woman, but looking back I’d probably say now that Jaclyn Smith was probably the most beautiful of the Angels.
Anyway, Ed McMahon died last Tuesday. I have to say that I’ve always been unreasonably interested in Ed McMahon. I think it’s because of this: I don’t know what his talent was. I mean, this is no knock. He was a fine American — he was a Marine fighter pilot during World War II and he later flew missions in Korea. My point is simply that Ed McMahon became hugely famous — as Johnny Carson’s sidekick, as the pitch-man for American Family Publisher’s, as host of Star Search, as host of some bloopers show, as host of several game shows and so on. And I don’t have any idea what he was good at. He couldn’t sing, couldn’t dance, couldn’t act, couldn’t tell jokes, couldn’t do impressions, couldn’t ad-lib, couldn’t give brilliant soliloquies.
If I had to guess, I would say that Ed McMahon was good at being likable on television … a uniquely modern gift.
Billy Mays died on Sunday, and his talent was even MORE difficult to pinpoint than Ed McMahon. He was a television pitch man. He sold cleaning products, food products, home improvement thingies, car scratch removers whatever … and he did this by appearing preposterously enthusiastic about a product during a commercial. There’s no reason that something like this should work. After all, it was his JOB to sell us the product. Of course he was enthusiastic about it. But, the man had some kind of hard-to-define salesman gift … he was so enthusiastic that it was very difficult not to get soaked up in his enthusiasm, even if you KNEW that what he was selling was likely junk. He was like the person at a party who appears to be having such a good time that you figure, hey, this must be a good party. He is like the person in the audience who is laughing so hard at a joke that, even if you think the joke was lame, you find yourself laughing too.
And finally, Mr. Everybody, Fred Travalena, died on Sunday. I have a strong memory of the very, very briefly lived Fred Travalena Show on television, though I don’t have any idea WHY I remember it. I think it was because even as a child I was not quite sure why Fred Travalena got a show. He was an impressionist, and I suspect he was a good one in those days though I don’t really remember that — Rich Little sort of dominated the 1970s impressionist scene.
What I do remember is many years later, I saw him on Letterman (with Jack Black and Tenacious D … that’s entertainment!), and the thing that struck me was not that Travalena’s impressions were especially good (they weren’t especially good) but that he knew how to put on a show. He was like a professional hitter, the Harold Baines of impersonations, he went out there and gave you a little Nicholson, a little Eastwood, a little De Niro, a little Cary Grant, he smiled at his jokes, seemed to be having a good time, he pulled off a cool voice trick for Donald Rumsfeld and he did the presidential oath in the voices of the last nine presidents. It was a solid performance given by a solid performer who dedicated his life to impersonating other people. It stuck with me … I can’t help but like the old-time show biz people.
– Brilliant reader Paul wonders how Zack Greinke got charged for the second earned run in Sunday’s game. On the play, Andy LaRoche hit a “triple” to right and scored on a groundout (after a rain delay). I put “triple” because the ball was very clearly a double off the wall and then Jose Guillen lost the ball, bobbled it, and that allowed An. LaRoche to go to third (and allowing Adam LaRoche to score*).
*I’m sorry, the Pittsburgh Pirates are simply not good enough to have two players named A. LaRoche in their lineup. They are just not … I say that a league meeting must be held and one of the LaRoches must be traded immediately. If the Pirates insist on keeping both, then one of the LaRoches must change his name — LaCock is a fine new name, LaRue is OK, Rochefort is fine. I don’t care which one … but Pittsburgh very clearly needs a player to be named later.
If the ball had been ruled a double, as it OBVIOUSLY should have been ruled, then Greinke would have allowed only one earned run rather than two. His league leading ERA is 1.95 — it should be 1.87.
– Several brilliant readers disagree with my Gardy love for refusing to cower and instead pitching to Albert Pujols in a key situation in the ninth. The dissent is probably best captured by BR Justin:
Gotta agree with the commenters who disagree with Gardy’s tactics, or at least with his reasoning. I don’t want my team to hire a manager who caters to what the fans want to see. I want them to hire a manager who will win.
This is precisely where I disagree … and I do realize that I’m in the minority here. That’s OK, I’m not trying to convince anyone. I’m just saying that for me, the point is not that Gardy caters to what that fans want to see. To me, he manages the game in the spirit of competition. My point is not that Gardy had Joe Nathan throw to Pujols because it made things more exciting … it’s that Gardy had Nathan pitch to Pujols because he believed that Nathan would get the man out, and his team would win. It’s a philosophy, and one that I agree with wholeheartedly.
Another BR compared what Gardy does (not going for the intentional walk) to what Brandon Phillips does by not walking … but I don’t think that’s right. Brandon Phillips CAN’T walk. This is not a choice he makes. This is an inability of his — it takes a certain kind of talent to walk — and he covers for this by saying he doesn’t WANT to walk. That’s not the same thing at all to me.
Look, there are plenty of people — most people, I’m sure — who want their teams to win any way they can win within the rules, and that’s not wrong. I’m not arguing the point. I’m just saying that in many ways I don’t see sports that way. When the Knicks started mucking up pro basketball by playing rough and keeping scores in the 70s and all that, well, they won but I would not have enjoyed that as a Knicks fan. I just wouldn’t. When the New Jersey Devils won the 1995 Stanley Cup playing that brutally boring neutral zone trap, hey, I’m glad for the Devils fans who had been long-suffering, but it made the game awful to watch. There are countless examples of this in football …
I remember when we used to play the Madden on Sega — can’t remember the year — there was a play that worked EVERY SINGLE TIME, a quick slant pass (there was a similar quirk with the Dolphins on Tecmo Super Bowl). Well, fine, you could run that play over and over and over and over again and beat the computer, beat your friends, win the game every time. But it wasn’t FUN. And I still think that’s the point of sports, no? Fun. Competition. I am better than you.
That’s not to say that managers should NEVER call for the intentional walk. Hey, I hate it, but strategy is strategy and I can’t argue against a manager using it sometimes in the late innings. But I appreciate a manager who doesn’t use it as a crutch, a manager who says, “We don’t need the stupid intentional walk, we can win, I have confidence in my team.” It goes both ways, of course. Terry Francona doesn’t believe in the intentional walk. Bobby Cox uses it all the time. Joe Torre loves the intentional walk in the National League, Tony La Russa barely ever uses it. So it can work, and it can blow up, and there are arguments on all sides. I just think baseball, at its core, is supposed to be about pitchers challenging hitters. And so does Gardy. And it’s just another reason why I love the guy.
– I love, love, love the grunting controversy in women’s tennis. To me THAT is a controversy … and I guess Chris Evert is now involved. She is down on the grunting, she thinks that that players are grunting at opportune times in an effort to distract the other players. Martina Navratilova has already made this point.
I would probably agree. I know it distracted the heck out of me when my young daughters shrieked in the back seat when I was trying to drive through Michigan. I think the chair umpire at every tennis match should have the right, when the grunting gets to loud, to say: “If you don’t stop that, I am stopping the match, driving you out to some spot in Michigan and and putting you out on the side of the highway. And I am NOT kidding around.”
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The Top Thrill Dragster was awesome. I rode it twice on July 6, 2004, and I had front row seats on the second ride.
Oh, and Bert Belongs!
How do you get a handkerchief (Kleenex) to dance? Put a little boogie in it.
I bet that will go over great with a young audience!
There was a 1970’s impressionist scene? Is that anything like the 1980’s ventriloquist scene?
Welcome back, Joe.
Brandon Phillips is walking in over 10% of his plate appearances this year, and has more walks than strikeouts.
Thanks for addressing the Brandon Phillips comp, Joe. Your take is, as always, insightful.
I guess I never considered that Phillips “can’t” walk. He seems to be someone who values a single more than a walk, and I don’t buy the Neyer-Posnanksi claim that players understand how terrible it is to make an out (Andre Dawson for the HOF and all that jazz).
I think Phillips doesn’t believe in walks, in much the same way that Gardenhire doesn’t. I guess we’ll never really know though, considering that you assume we can’t take his word for it (which, by the way, I sort of agree with you on).
Glad to have you back, and I’ll try to be less combative in the future.
Welcome back, Poz.
Do the Pirates need a player to be named later, or a player to be named differently?
(Sorry, that just seemed like a missed opportunity. Love the column, Joe.)
i don’t know what play youre talking about with the dolphins on tecmo super bowl. in my memory it was running the off-tackle with bo jackson or herschel walker, then doing the z pattern all the way to the endzone. my record game score was 212-0
also, i agree that running that play (and the similar madden play) was BORING.
i remember i used to purposely run plays i KNEW wouldn’t work in madden, just so that at the end of the game my stats looked like a realistic game’s stats. i remember trying to actually use the clock like a normal nfl team would (which was virtually impossible with those awful 5 minute timers where waiting 30 seconds lasts for a lifetime).
whenever my qb would throw for 7 touchdowns i’d just be angry because it seemed so fake.
a variation on the “ketchup” joke: did you hear about the race between the lettuce, a faucet, and a tomato?
the lettuce was a head, the faucet was running, and the tomato was trying to ketchup. terrible.
Sorry, Joe…not exactly Fox Force Five material…
Koko Taylor also died recently. I encourage all of you to go talk to Lindsay over at BB’s. I’m sure he has some stories about the now passed Queen of the Blues…
Joe,
1) Yes, it was Jaclyn Smith. It was always Jaclyn Smith. I knew that she was the most beautiful then, and I stand by it now. So, no need for the poster for me, either.
2) Wade Boggs, as I understand it, *could* hit for power. He just chose not to. I think that that is your example.
3) How did you feel about John Stockton. Quietly dirty player in little ways, doing whatever it took to win — but without ever hurting anyone. How do you feel about “If you ain’t cheatin’ you ain’t tryin’”?
The thing that bothered me most about the intentional walk was when adult managers of
sandlot teams would use it. Intentionally walking an eleven/twelve/thirteen-year-old
seemed to violate the spirit of youth league baseball. The intentional walk has a strategic
value, but it should be limited to h.s. and above levels.
Honoured to have earned brilliant reader status, but as a point of clarification, my comments about Gardy were more general.
I’m not opposed to a strategic intentional walk – especially not when your pitcher’s facing the best hitter in the game in a critical situation – but in that case, it would have been a dicey piece of strategy to walk him. Gardy would have been putting the tying run on base (and bringing the winning run to the plate) with none out. Basically, it’s a matter of balancing the 55 per cent chance that Pujols would make an out against the (roughly) nine per cent chance that he’d hit a homer and tie the game. Then, you’d look at Ludwick et al’s numbers to see what their odds would be of scoring Pujols from first (or hitting enough to score three in the inning).
I think in that particular case, pitching to Albert made sense. To say he was doing it to please the fans (and given that the game was in St. Louis, he was pleasing his opponents’ fans) seemed like more of a problem than his actual decision to me.
I guess Ed Sullivan would have fit the Ed McMahon profile. There were probably a lot of guys like that on television at one time, now there are probably very few (not counting reality shows, of course).
If Fred Travalena was the Harold Baines of impressionists, and I love that comparison, then maybe Ed McMahon was the Eddie Stanky of sidekicks (using the well-known Durocher description of “The Brat”). He couldn’t act, couldn’t dance, couldn’t sing … all he could do was entertain you.
How many teams had two guys with the same initials and last name? The Angels had both J. Weavers for a while. The Cardinals used to have Andy and Alan Benes.
Finally, good for you for having your kids look out the window on the trip, instead of watching some Disney movie for the 263rd time.
The Tecmo play I remember was the 49ers and some kind of out pattern. I always played with the Chiefs (Derrick and Christian Okoye were the bomb), but I had a friend who always wanted to play with the 49ers and I had to pick the play every time (and he would still complete the pass about half of the time.
First vacation when I was little – a trip to Bennett Spring – my grandmother bought a kiddie magazine for my sister and I to pass the time with. You can guess my age pretty closely by the jokes it contained.
What’s green and sings?
Elvis Parsley
Why were the Beatles running down the hill?
Because the Rolling Stones were chasing them.
Good times.
You should pay admission to the park JUST to ride the dragster once. All the other rides are free. Been on it twice and both times I have come back unable to fathom why I did it. The best is people who want it to get stuck so it comes back to earth.
It’s hard for me to disagree with Evert, Navratilova (two great, great, players) AND you, but it seems to me that a professional tennis player ought to be able to focus in spite of the grunting, even when strategically done. I mean, even in Little League we were expected to hit while the infield droned at us with chants (“SWING, batter batter).
What did the onlookers see when the chickens began strutting across the road to the other side?…
“Poultry in motion”
A couple of addenda to my previous post…
First, good call on Gardy’s decision not to go for the IBB being dissimilar to Phillips’ not walking. To me, it’s more like an Adam Dunn-type opting not to expand his strike zone to chase borderline pitches. To me, that IS a choice the player’s making – the guy has a batting eye, but he often waits and waits for his pitch, causing frustration among a lot of his team’s fans. The issue, then, becomes whether that choice is helping or hurting the team. Do Gardy’s decisions increase his team’s chances of winning, or do they decrease the odds? If Dunn swung more (within reason,) would he actually improve his numbers or would his OBP drop? For the record, I believe the latter would be the case in the Dunn example but there are plenty out there who seem to think that any time he strikes out looking, if only he’d taken the bat off his shoulder, he’d have gone yard.
Secondly, I’ve never understood the appeal of impressionists. Never found them funny in the least, mostly because their ‘jokes’ consist almost entirely of acting like someone else, as opposed to actually containing lines that are…you know…funny. Not to diminish what they do – it is a talent that some people have and many, many don’t – but it seems strange to me that they’re considered comedians. Add to that the fact that they all seem to touch on the same bases (“hey! I’m Jack Nicholson! Now I’m Robert DeNiro! Now I’m Ronald Reagan!”) and I can’t say I could ever see myself being a fan of anyone who does impersonations as their shtick. I was pretty glad when that Frank Caliendo guy’s show tanked.
It was always Kate Jackson for me. Others were more beautiful and/or glamorous – including, of course, Jaclyn Smith – but there was something just, well, attractive about Kate Jackson. Good looking, but also solid.
Poz, you might be just a little too young for the Farrah poster to have stuck in your psyche. But when I was in college, that was THE poster.
Oh – and welcome back! Reading your stuff is always a highlight for me.
I’ll tell you what Ed McMahon was good at: announcing. You may scoff, but hosting a show is NOT easy, and broadcast hosts are NOT easy to find. McMahon was a master at that. I’ve done some radio, and I was OK, but I knew I wouldn’t be a star, so I got into print. (Smart move, eh?)
Oh, and Farrah was lovely, but Cheryl Ladd was hot.
LaCock? Really?
Joe: I think you will find this very well written post on VEB to be an interesting take on intentionally walking Pujols: http://www.vivaelbirdos.com/2009/6/20/919480/walking-pujols
Here in Pittsburgh, we’ve already got a few alternate names for Adam LaRoche, several of which showed up long before his brother Andy. Probably the most accurate? LaOut.
I don’t see the appeal behind the Farrah poster. I mean, yeah, the nipples, but that facial expression is a dealbreaker. I didn’t grow up with it, so obviously it has less nostalgic meaning for me, but look at it objectively. She’s got a horse face in it.
This isn’t to say that otherwise she wasn’t attractive, but the photographer didn’t do her a favor asking her to smile like that. Her face looks fine in other photos (and of course on screen in Angels).
Sorry if someone has already made this point, but what about the message you’re sending to Nathan if you call for the IBB there? Isn’t there a value in saying: you’re my guy; I trust you to get ANY hitter out, even Albert Pujols; go get him.
And if Pujols hits it 600 feet, well, that happens. But I wouldn’t want Joe Nathan playing the next three months thinking that when push really comes to shove my manager doesn’t trust me to get the tough out.
Sorry for the first person/third person shifts…..
Why is it that people can understand that Duane Kuiper isn’t capable of hitting for power or that Derek Jeter isn’t capable of going to his left, but they fail to get that Brandon Phillips or Miguel Olivo isn’t capable of being a patient hitter?
Admittedly, patience may not be innate like power and quickness, . . . but by the time these players reach the major leagues it is either ingrained into them or it isnt’. And it is very unlikely that they can change.
How are you going to ask brothers to change their names? The LaRoches are from Fort Scott. Show some Southeast Kansas love.
It seems like you’re going all Harold Reynolds on us with this “anti-intentional walk” soapbox. How does this differ from when Trey Hillman decides that career splits don’t matter and puts Jacobs in the lineup against a lefty? Trey says “his guys are his guys.” He believes Jacobs can hit the lefty even when strategy says, don’t let him try. Seems awfully similar to rolling the dice against Pujols to me.
I would like someone’s take on the grunting/shrieking is cheating line that either Martina N. or Chrissie E. posited. If I understand the argument, when a player hits the ball, if they hit it solidly it will make a different sound than if they don’t and the shrieks are masking that sound, preventing the other player from possibly reacting to the sound.
So tennis players out there, does that argument hold water?
The Super Tecmo Bowl play was the 49ers, Joe Montana to Jerry Rice. It was a post pattern and if you threw it right when Rice turned in he would catch it every time. If 3, 4, 5 guys were covering him, it didn’t matter, he’d catch it. The defensive play was Reggie White diving right after the snap and demolishing the QB before he could hand it off or pass it.
I think Ed McMahon was sort of the Matt Suhey to Johnny Carson’s Walter Payton. He was the compliment, the guy who set them up for Carson to knock down.
Billy Martin used to tell his pitchers “Babe Ruth is dead” when they were having control problems. The implication is that you should pitch to the batter because he’s no Babe Ruth. But with Prince Albert, he’s as close to Ruth as we’ve got right now. His OPS+ this year is 207, which is exactly Ruth’s career OPS+. So, you may want to pitch to him, but be aware you’re pitching to the modern-day Babe Ruth.
Joe -
Like the look, miss the “print” link though. Anyone you can get it back?
Thanks, glad your back from vacation, bit rude of you to take time for yourself, but welcome back.
Joe, good point on the “big picture” of sports. I’ve often made a similar argument in the context of college football scheduling. I feel like college football fans, ADs, head coaches, etc. have been missing the point of college football for awhile. Teams now give up exciting September games that could be guaranteed, for a slightly better chance at a perhaps exciting December or January game. If Mizzou scheduled home and homes with, say, Iowa, or Notre Dame, or Florida State, or USC, we KNOW Faurot is going to be rocking come a date certain in September. Yes, it could theoretically cost Mizzou a bowl downgrade. But is that what college football is all about? Wouldn’t an exciting challenge in September against a name team be in the spirit of the competition? Not that I don’t like SEMO…. Wait, yes, in fact, I do not like SEMO.
About Brandon Phillips, it appears he may be learning to walk. In his first three seasons, his K/BB ratio was 2.7, he averaged only 35 walks per year and 96 strikeouts.
Through the first 74 games of the season, he has 28 walks and only 26 strikeouts. It may be a small sample, but he is on pace for 61 walks and 57 strikeouts. Maybe he is choosing to walk more or maybe he is learning how, but he appears to be turning the corner.
This is complete trivia on the women’s tennis grunting issue but I found it interesting. The whole grunting phenomenon gained steam with Monica Seles and her annoying shriek every time she hit the ball. Well, two of my friends who just happened to be racketheads were convinced that Seles was putting words into her grunts, that she was actually saying:
gonnaWEEN. . .gonnaWEEN….gonnaWEEN..with each grunt.
So, every time I watched Seles from then on, I became convinced I was hearing those words. And I have to say, it was even more annoying than just hearing a grunt.
I believe there are times when the IBB is appropriate and times when it isn’t. With a runner on 2nd and a tie game, I’m walking Pujols. With a one run lead, I *may* walk Pujols. With a two run lead or more, pitch to Pujols. Anybody with a smattering of statistics can see that the 55% chance of a valuable out with no chance of losing the game is too much to give up.
As for the actresses who played Charlie’s Angels, nobody really wants to see Tom Bosley in a speedo, or Roseanne Barr in a bikini. Television acting selects for three things: are you attractive, are you likeable, are you funny. It’s rarer to act well on television; smaller screen, no audience feedback, generally small audiences (one family or less) which means viewers have fewer fellow viewers to pick up on stuff. So it’s not that good acting isn’t valued, it’s just diminished by the way TV is watched. In a theater (movie or play), you have lots of other viewers who may catch the subtle nuance and then “ahh” or “sniff” or whatever to turn your light bulb on. So acting talent is more important in those other media. On television, if you’re funny, you’ll get folks to laugh (and yes, for many actors funny represents good acting talent). If you’re likeable, folks care about your character. And if you’re great looking in a bikini you need less likeability, humor, and acting talent, because some men will watch you whether or not you can act.
I think all the actresses on Charlie’s Angels had some acting talent. Kate Jackson was definitely the most likeable. I suspect Farrah Fawcett was (or became) the best actress; she seems to have had the most awards. None of them had a lot of success in theater or movies. But as we used to say back when I was in college, I wouldn’t have kicked any of them out of my bed for eating crackers.
I wish I could specific references to Ed McMahon, who was definitely likeable and once in a rare while funny. But I recall that he could be quick witted on those rare moments when Carson or his guests left him an opening. McMahon was a carnival barker and boardwalk pitchman before going into television, and those guys are never at a loss for words. McMahon worked with Carson for five years before they both went to The Tonight Show so I strongly suspect that they just worked well together.
So, funny story. I’m reading TSN this afternoon, and the Pirates seem to have taken your advice and traded one of the LaRoche’s.
I never knew you were so influential!
It doesn’t yet outline the full details of the trade, but let’s hope his brother was not part of the trade too!