Edgy MD

I'm not outright predicting, but don't be shocked if John Franco is asked to ride in on a white horse.

Conscious uncoupling.

Jeff Wilpon is https://www.radio.com/articles/news/jeff-wilpon-shuts-down-beltran-questions-at-piazza-ceremonyhere to talk about Qualcomm."

And that room is The Crane Pool. Pow!

In an un-named town somewhere in the Southwest, an extended drought has gutted the population, and those left behind are stuck in an eroding culture of closed downtown shops, high-attrition schools, and used car lots with only three cars for sale. In a shack that's so ramshackle that it is precariously propped up by a single supporting beam, José y Meyo raise their oddball son Sailboat. As insecurely as the prop holds the house erect, each of the family members are barely sustained by an eccentric fixation José (Noel Guglielmi, who you'll recognize as a convict from 100 prison movies) is fascinated by images horses, which he continuously renders with his paint-by-numbers kits. Meyo is a sociophobe whose main connection with the world is cooking spicey meatballs. (I shit you not.) And young Sailboat, you may have guessed, is obsessed with sailboats, despite living in a town where nobody has even seen the sea. The little boy finds a ukulele and writes an allegedly magical song. An overplayed, stilted Wes Anderson-type style intersects with Southwestern magic realism, and stuff happens. [FIMG=400]https://m.media-amazon.com/images/M/MV5BNGM2NzJlNTMtYjlmMy00ZGM4LTg5ZWMtZWVlM2UyZWJhNDYxXkEyXkFqcGdeQXVyNDA1NDA2NTk@._V1_.jpg[/FIMG]

As a big fan of the Jets' Bill Belichick era, I'm not down with the pretend-it-never-happened strategy. Beltran got to do stuff. He got to use the parking space and cards printed and help recruit Brian Schneider and Dellin Betances and stuff. Tim Tebow spent the whole offseason trying to re-work his whole marketing strategy without the number 15. Hensley Muelens became the Mets bench coach and Eduardo Perez had to take the offer from TCBY, while Tim Bogar bought up tickets to follow the big Third Eye Blind tour through the spring into the summer. These things happened, man. They did.

=G-Fafif post_id=29711 time=1579049097 user_id=55] The only WS-winning mgrs on the scene currently: Davey Martinez (2019; still w/Nats) Joe Maddon (2016; starting new gig in TB) Joe Girardi (2009; starting new gig in Philly) Terry Francona (2007 & 2004; continuing in Cleveland) Martinez is the only champion manager still managing the franchise he led to glory. Gotta be a first since 1979 when other than Lemon/Martin, hands had changed everywhere a ring had been won. OE: In 1980, Chuck Tanner managed the defending champion Bucs, while no WS skipper was at the helm elsewhere. And I forgot Earl Weaver stayed in place through ‘82, so we may be in rarer territory than I initially thought.

Back then, part of me was able to compartmentalize this — to consign it to she-said-he-said territory like a good, little sports fan. I didn't and couldn't know the whole story so my job was mostly to suspend judgment and root. While I'm somewhat happy to say I wasn't all that successful at this, I tried, despite my utter lack of emotional commitment to Darryl Boston and Vince Coleman. The usual media embargo on the name of the accuser was in place. And while the name and biographical details leaked, I recognized the ethic and tried to avoid any information about her, despite it being that spring training period where you accumulate every stupid detail on the team. But one note did sink through — that her likeness was used as the model for a statue of a rock-climber, desplated in the window of a (West Side?) gymnasium. I'd have forgotten or ignored the detail if not for a day or two later, when I just happened to be walking past the gym with my friend Donna. She wondered why I had stopped, and I hopelessly tried to explain, "This is the woman accusing three Mets of rape," (it was gang-rape, actually) as if she was some sort of celebrity. She found my interest to be weird and lurid, but the truth is that the woman was now no longer abstract, but (literally) concrete, and me being forced to say the words out loud, to a womanfriend no less, made me feel deeply complicit and disgusted with myself.

So is José Altuve — who always seems to know what pitch is coming — still one of the best players on the planet?

That was my exact thought. The unspoken message of his contract was Sandy saying, "I can't say this explicitly yet, but I've given up on David Wright and so should you." And yet, his contract was short-term enough, and his attitude professional enough, that his performance was never about being Wright's replacement. There's always a strong argument for interims — as palate cleansers, if nothing else.

If everyone is doing it — and maybe they are — wouldn't this investigation have uncovered evidence to that effect? Dozens of players were interviewed. Wouldn't somebody have said, "And you should see what goes on in Arizona! Holy shit with those guys!"?

The Mets really dodged some bullets in this. Not only has Carlos Beltran (so far) escaped punishment, but they also had long seen Alex Cora as managerial material and interviewed him before the Red Sox hired him. In fact, I think he and Mickey were hired on the same day. Is this going to end up tainting the 2017 Astros championship and the 2018 Sox championship? More importantly, I realize that in the age of President Trump, nobody has more than 10 minutes of foresight, but how do they not expect something like this to get out? Players' loyalties and interests change all the time.

There's a whole subplot of Hitchcock knockoffs and homages. Besides Charade, there's Wait Until Dark, Night Train to Munich, Dressed to Kill*, Twelve Monkeys, Le Boucher, Bell, Book, and Candle (a Hitchcock movie in virtually every way except suspense, so there's that), Les Diaboliques, and I'm sure there are many I'm forgetting. * Is Brian DePalma the auteur of ripping off the style of other auteurs?

How about Mark McGwire falling off the ballot before the shift in attitudes about users while Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens may have stuck around for just long enough?

It was a tradition at the MOFo. People would insist that Alex Escobar or somebody must be the top prospect in the game because he was on the cover of their new prospect guide.

He's still on the payroll.

I'm rusty.

including Tim Tebow I'm the number one fan of the man who takes a knee.

Out with the Hagg, in with the Hag.

I'm not sure why they released the Hagg. He didn't have the juice to demand his release, I don't think.

And that's what we need to agitate against.

I still prefer the outlines, but good for Newsday for introducing a hint of drop shadow. It strengthens both entries but really helps in the bottom. Nonetheless, I prefer lefty swing porn to naked jock porn.

I'm so worried about him going all Wind Machine-Chris Davis that I'll almost be relieved if he goes Hollywood-Harvey

And that's why it's called creep. Drop a half-inch logo onto the side of a cap, where there's nothing, give it some time to get ensconced in the culture, and then POW! — a three-inch logo displayed above the team lettering, where it's unavoidable.

Remember the Mane.