Edgy MD

Or you could keep Alonso and McNeil. I'm not really sure why one is particularly relevant to the other.

It's not too cynical, I hope, to suggest that a contract push the day after a dramatic homer is a strategic time to flip that card. I mean, the essay is from two years ago, but The Athletic chose to relaunch it in a timely manner.

Indeed. I had a school bus recklessly tearing ass down my block last week when I was walking the dog. I looked at my phone clock and realized he was a little late — about six minutes later than his usual time passing our house — and I realized that the stuff we do to keep from getting fired is often far more counterproductive than the stuff we do that actually gets us fired.

There's likely got to be a better reason for you. Maybe even for me. But the reason at the studio is that there's a rock-solid business plan. There's no other type of film where you can predict the box office with such certainty. I think 60% of the take from the prior movie is considered the floor for a sequel, with 50-60% outgrossing the original. The previous film is the marketing anchor for the latter, and that saves in marketing costs. The stars of the previous one are not only now more familiar, but you can get past any worry about testing them in the roles, as the audience has already accepted them in the slots, and if you had any foresight, you signed them all to a three-picture deal, with options on the latter two, so you even though they are now more famous due to a successful initial film, they still cost you what they cost you before the first film. If the first film bombs, you don't pick up the option. Usually, there's no buyout fee for that. On top of that, production costs are additionally controlled because the prior production is your blueprint. Lastly, you own the property, so you don't have to pay the rights owner again. If the original screenwriter or director wants mo' $$, you can toss them and hire some hack. The style is already established from the first film. So controlled costs, a mostly guaranteed take, a proven production blueprint, and unlike non-franchise fare, you don't have to worry if the critics think it's derivative, because duh, it's supposed to be. It's certainly a slow-motion race to the bottom artistically, but it's sadly good bidness. Not a lot of execs lose their job for greenlighting Deadpool 3. And when you've got a three-foot pile of cocaine in your rumpus room, and Jennifer Lawrence in your rolodex, you probably make a lot of decisions based on what's not going to get you fired.

Sometimes, that's kind of how I feel about life.

Mary Poppins Returns (2018) sure took its time (52 years) before returning.

Receding hairlines are actually a pretty good indication of excess testosterone, as any casual observation of pro wrestling might indicate. But yes, it goes without saying that, if the Mets don't sign him this offseason, they should probably find somebody that's pretty good. Whether that means a particular goodness in RBI situations is a narrow definition of that, and it certainly doesn't describe late model Pete Alonso.

This was a poorly made film by any measure. But something about it kept me engaged. The lost-souls-making-a-found-family theme is one I usually embrace, as long as there's nothing too forced like bonding-over-booze-and-lipsynching-to-soundtrack-padding. And while this was no Station Agent, John Ratzenberger is always a welcome presence. It had crater-sized holes in the script where something apparently happened offscreen, but it's only passingly referred to, even if it's a major plot turn, like a few pages got lost in the screenplay, or a few dozen feet of footage got clipped off the reel. It isn't clear how much time is passing, even though there's a pregnant character, which should make a perfect device for such a purpose. The film is from 2008, but technologically, we seem closer to 1994. People use payphones, and find jobs in local classified sheets, and go to the casino to place sports bets. All weird. Most made-for-TV or Hallmark films are less sloppily executed. I looked up the writer/director and he has almost no other credits as a writer or as a director. The female lead is now retired. It's a wonder this got made, let alone ended up on some streaming platform 16 years later. And yet, I stuck with it in its blandness and sloppiness and obscure indy Americana soundtrack. Maybe I'm just a sucker for this subgenre, and kind of find it interesting to see a town like Reno as a setting for lost souls doomed to wander. But hey, that's Cliff Clavin up there. He's been in Star Wars and he's been in Toy Story and you want to show a little respect when he's moving across your screen.

Widowed barber, downish and somewhat outish, is forced to take a young woman on as a partner in order to keep his shop open. Despite their odd-couple bickering, they help each other get their respective **** together. [fimg=550]https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/413Cdn5vnKL._AC_UF894,1000_QL80_.jpg[/fimg]

Shut my mouth. Former MLB pitcher T.J. House came out as gay in 2022.

I tend to think that a lack of commitment to accuracy is nothing new for Mr. Russo, sadly. It strikes me that, like our risk of soon having no living persons who walked on the moon, we've suddenly got no living openly gay Major League Baseball vets.

Must be 10 years ago I picked up his memoir, but only just recently decided to read it.

Yes, let us do more than ticking names off.

There's plenty of time for that. But right now, he's the reliever-with-options-who-just-pitched-a-few-innings-of-long-relief guy, and all teams need that guy.

Defense plant worker gets framed in a plot to sabotage the plant, ultimately getting mixed up in a cross-country chase among a highly complex web of saboteurs that are targeting plants, dams, ships ... the very pressure points that could lead to the collapse of the nation! Alfred Hitchcock directs, but leading man Robert Cummings gets to make a Capra-esque stand for the little guy. It's from Hitchcock's early US years, and sort of foreshadows themes and elements more famously developed in later work. [FIMG=350]https://www.benitomovieposter.com/catalog/images/movieposter/141841.jpg[/FIMG]

A sophisticated Jazz-age busybody of a young adult with aspirations of Austenian literary glory suddenly finds herself parentless, and opts to move in with distant relations in their messy and cursed farming household, and insinuates herself into their rustic lives with modernity and pluck. [fimg=350]https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/510DXTBP38L._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_.jpg[/fimg]

Tom Waits, The Ramones, and The Alarm all agreed — it was never a party at The Tropicana until Richard Hell showed up.

Sean Burroughs comes from the Little League World Series to New York and creates a little chaos on 53rd Street. [YOUTUBE]LOBHdtBFJ0o[/YOUTUBE]

Gosh, that raises as many questions as it answers.

The first great home-born San Francisco Giant, arriving the first season after they moved west and a year before McCovey, winning Rookie of the Year. What a heart of the order with him, Mays, and McCovey, but the Giants couldn't make it work because he and McCovey both fit best at first, and even if they did succeed in hiding one in left, they kept producing guys who were really good in the outfield, many of them named Alou. His father was a great player too, but the integration came too late for him to show his stuff in MLB.

Welcome to DC, Steve. No giveways stinks, and I think you should get to take stuff.

Raise a glass to mark the passing of longtime MLB player and coach Mike Brumley who was killed over the weekend in a massive car wreck in Mississippi. Mike was a classic punchless utility infielder but in 1987 hit the first of his three career homers off of Ron Darling.

Whether or not he's guilty, the league is slipping into a whack-a-mole situation. They have to keep the problem at bay as well as the specter contained. If the perception of honest competition is affected, MLB could lose big.

What an out-and-out mess. What a totally predictable out-and-out mess.

If I ran the team, they'd be 185-0, have dozens of hit records from this year alone, and be dressed like The Baseball Furies. The pitchers would bat, the uniform elements would be sewn on, and the manager would be a mute German guy named Ernst. Also, no "Piano Man." I figure fans would be OK with me banning that, because we'd be 185-0, and they'd also be crazy about Ernst.