Vic Sage

all three are capable and enchanting major league-starter level talents, "enchanting"? really? that's not a word scouts use much, i bet. Oddly, despite the lack of enchantment one is likely privvy to in baseball circles, i think "disenchantment" runs rampant.

well, not EXPLICITLY, but i think if you read between the lines, then yeah.

6-2 final. 2 HRs from the Grandy man; good innings from Wheeler.

sure, if the proposal was Duda/Fulmer, I'd consider it. But Flores? Not without a long-term commitment from Cabrera. And maybe not even then.

Looks like I've only seen half of them. Ok, Bucket, but where are your "anytime" and "clockwork orange" lists?

Rian Shunter here. I liked the way Ellen announced Idina's name TWICE after her performance, to try and make up for fucktard Travolta. It's amazing how self-involved these pricks are... if you are a presenter, you have one job, just one; to announce the person's name correctly. If you can't be bothered to do that right, don't show up. Send a native-american woman to give your speech. She'll be much more articulate i'm sure. yeah, Ellen, was amusing enough but there was really very little entertainment value in this year's show. The pizza thing didn't work at all. And i lost the damn pool.

The success rate of Mets 1st round pitching prospects is not something to excite us. About 1 out of 5 became top-of-the-rotation starters in the majors for any sustained period. Of course, the fact that we traded for OTHER teams' top prospects in Wheeler and Syndergaard helps their chances of making it.

i would only trade one of our top prospects (like Flores) for either one of another team's top prospects, or as part of a package for a star player under team control for a few of his prime years at fair market price. Cabrera is still just 28 (so still in his prime), and has had 2 all-star appearances and a silver slugger, and WAR between 3-5 for 4 of his last 6 seasons, with range factor in top 5 for 3 of his last 5 years (so a "star" player, i would think), despite coming off a down year. Guys have bad years. Therefore, I would consider Flores in such a deal, but only if Cabrera was locked up for the next 3-5 seasons or so at an affordable rate. I'm certainly not interested in him for a 1-year rental for the 2014 season; not at that price.

Les Rohr! Geoff Goetz! Billy Traber! Kirk Presley! Dave Proctor! Cliff Speck! Randy Sterling!

Bill Pulsipher!

Paul Wilson!

Tim Leary!

it's always where you least expect it... always.

THE 87 "BEST PICTURE" OSCAR WINNERS TO DATE THE FULL LIST (1927-2013): * = did not see *2013 - "12 Years A Slave" 2012 - "Argo" 2011 - "The Artist" 2010 - "The King's Speech" 2009 - "The Hurt Locker" 2008 - "Slumdog Millionaire" 2007 - "No Country for Old Men" 2006 - "The Departed" 2005 - "Crash" 2004 - "Million Dollar Baby" 2003 - "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" 2002 - "Chicago" 2001 - "A Beautiful Mind" 2000 - "Gladiator" 1999 - "American Beauty" 1998 - "Shakespeare in Love" 1997 - "Titanic" 1996 - "The English Patient" 1995 - "Braveheart" 1994 - "Forrest Gump" 1993 - "Schindler�s List" 1992 - "Unforgiven" 1991 - "The Silence of the Lambs" 1990 - "Dances With Wolves" 1989 - "Driving Miss Daisy" 1988 - "Rain Man" 1987 - "The Last Emperor" 1986 - "Platoon" 1985 - "Out of Africa" 1984 - "Amadeus" 1983 - "Terms of Endearment" 1982 - "Gandhi" 1981 - "Chariots of Fire" 1980 - "Ordinary People" 1979 - "Kramer vs. Kramer" 1978 - "The Deer Hunter" 1977 - "Annie Hall" 1976 - "Rocky" 1975 - "One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest" 1974 - "The Godfather Part II" 1973 - "The Sting" 1972 - "The Godfather" 1971 - "The French Connection" 1970 - "Patton" 1969 - "Midnight Cowboy" 1968 - "Oliver!" 1967 - "In the Heat of the Night" 1966 - "A Man for All Seasons" 1965 - "The Sound of Music" 1964 - "My Fair Lady" *1963 - "Tom Jones" 1962 - "Lawrence of Arabia" 1961 - "West Side Story" 1960 - "The Apartment" 1959 - "Ben-Hur" 1958 - "Gigi" 1957 - "The Bridge on the River Kwai" 1956 - "Around the World in 80 Days" 1955 - "Marty" 1954 - "On the Waterfront" 1953 - "From Here to Eternity" 1952 - "The Greatest Show on Earth" 1951 - "An American in Paris" 1950 - "All About Eve" 1949 - "All the Kings Men" *1948 - "Hamlet" 1947 - "Gentleman's Agreement" 1946 - "The Best Years of Our Lives" *1945 - "The Lost Weekend" 1944 - "Going My Way" 1943 - "Casablanca" *1942 - "Mrs. Miniver" *1941 - "How Green Was My Valley" 1940 - "Rebecca" 1939 - "Gone with the Wind" 1938 - "You Can't Take It with You" 1937 - "The Life of Emile Zola" 1936 - "The Great Ziegfeld" 1935 - "Mutiny on the Bounty" 1934 - "It Happened One Night" *1932/1933 - "Cavalcade" *1931/1932 - "Grand Hotel" *1930/1931 - "Cimarron" *1929/1930 - "All Quiet on the Western Front" *1928/1929 - "The Broadway Melody" *1927/1928 - "Wings" How many have you seen? 75/87 List up to 10 films on the list that, if you got home tonight and it was on, you'd happily watch it again from beginning to end: "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" "Unforgiven" "The Silence of the Lambs" "Annie Hall" "Rocky" "The Godfather Part II" "The Sting" "The Godfather" "The Apartment" "Casablanca" List up to 10 films that you would have to be strapped into a chair with your eyes peeled open, ala CLOCKWORK ORANGE (note: that one didn't win), in order to watch again: "A Beautiful Mind" "The English Patient" "Out of Africa" "Ordinary People" "Kramer vs. Kramer" "In the Heat of the Night" "The Sound of Music" "Gigi" "Gentleman's Agreement" "Gone with the Wind"

Novak's career-defining role was as a woman who submitted herself to artificial transformation, and became a monster for it. You're right, this is not a characterization of the plot; it's your summary of Novak's role in the plot, which i think is inaccurate for the reason I stated.

Non-exclusivity is not a solution because its an economic absurdity right now. The same reason you don't see HBO programs on SHOWTIME, and vice versa, as well as all the other original cable tv programming on other channels (at least for a long while), is that they use theair exclusivity period to draw subscribers to their channels. Independent producers sell them that exclusivity in order to raise the money to make the program in the first place; and studios use it to create cash flow for the same purposes, and/or to establish their own distribution platforms in the new media. So "non-exclusivity" isn't going to happen when "exclusivity" has so much value to them. But the answer to the problem of costly subscriptions isn't to seek a single monolithic corporate entity to take over the business, whether GOOGLE or otherwise... that represents the continued consolidation of media into fewer and fewer hands and a death-knell for democracy just so we can see movies cheaper. At any rate, content moves through windows of exclusivity... feature films go to some theaters in an area, not to EVERY theater (they bid for them), otherwise they'd be cannibalizing themselves. Then, they go to certain PPV/streaming/dvd rental platforms (not all of them), then to a premium cable channel (not all of them), then to a basic channel, then to a network broadcast channel (CBS and ABC don't offer the same movies at the same time to its audiences), then to off-network syndication, at which point every channel and its brother can license the show. Then, it goes into the public domain and anybody that owns a copy can screen it. Now, just as there once was VHS, BETA and Laserdisk formats competing in the marketplace, and HBO and Showtime, and various gaming platforms (all of which often feature exclusive content), we are in a transitional period. There will be winners and losers. There will be formats and providers that succeed and those that fail, and the failures will sell off their rights to the winners. Eventually, we are likely to have a single iCloud where each studio/network/content-owner will have its own digital ppv channel available to consumers, offering some combination of subscription, PPV and ad-based free programming, so you'll be able to access anything at any time. But only those providers with a critical mass of content will be able to get away with a subscriber model; the others will offer more PPV and free ad-based programs. And as pipes get broader, A-V content will face the same issues as music did, in that if they don't offer content for a reasonable price (or what the consumer considers reasonable), the consumer will engage in "self-help" (i.e., piracy, rendering EVERYTHING in the public domain), which will ultimately drive down the consumer price to "itunes" levels. But underlying all these considerations is not public interest; it's private profit. You'll have to pay more than you want for your entertainment, because they know you will. It's our drug. I want my... i want my ... i want my MTV....

There are only 2 decent SNL movies that i've seen: The Blues Brothers (1980) and Wayne's World (1992). Both were big hits, too, and spawned sequels. But the rest of the SNL movies were all flops of varying degrees. I actually liked Coneheads (1993) (its got a sort of quirky off-kilter sweetness] but Wayne's World 2 (1993) and Blues Brothers 2000 (1998) are both crap . I did not see the others, none of which i even liked as sketches: *It's Pat: The Movie (1994) *Stuart Saves His Family (1995) *A Night at the Roxbury (1998) *Superstar (1999) [actually this sketch was pretty funny] *The Ladies Man (2000) *MacGruber (2010) But some folks also include Office Space (1999) as an SNL spinoff movie because one of the characters, Milton, was introduced in Mike Judge's animated shorts for SNL. In that case, it goes to the top of my list. Going further afield, there is also the off-the-wall sketch movie MR. MIKE'S MONDO VIDEO (79) by Michael O'Donaghue, head writer of SNL in its first 5 years, and a running character, Mr. Mike, that featured alot of those early cast members. It's gross/disturbing/funny/weird, and i mean that in a good way. Then, there are movies by SNL cast members, including the entire oeuvre of Belushi & Ackyroyd, Chevy Chase, Bill Murray, Billy Crystal, Eddie Murphy, Martin Short Mike Myers, Chris Rock, Will Farrell, Adam Sandler, Rob Schneider, Farley & Spade, Tina Fey, and Kristin Wiig. �..

i don't know if VERTIGO was career-defining so much as career-capping; she had done PICNIC, MAN WITH THE GOLDEN ARM, PAL JOEY and BELL, BOOK & CANDLE leading up to it, and never really did another successful thing after it. It was pretty much a 5-year career, but the image of her in BELL, BOOK & CANDLE, petting and singing softly to her cat to put a love spell on Jimmy Stewart while staring seductively and hypnotically right at me, is the one that will stay with me forever. VERTIGO is an all-time great movie, but its much less about Novak than it is about Stewart. In VERTIGO she is the object, in BELL she is the subject. And i would disagree somewhat with your characterization of the plot of VERTIGO; she is not turned into a monster by submitting herself to artificial manipulation; it is Stewart who becomes the obsessed monster, and Novak the sacrificial lamb to the power of the male gaze and killed by her inability to escape it. Stewart is the monster; WE as viewers, as voyeurs, are the monster in that story.

Ceetar wrote: RealityChuck wrote: The problem with Netflix (and Amazon Prime and Hulu Plus and HBO Online and everything else) is the fragmentation of the market. Film producers sell streaming rights to the highest bidder (if they're willing to sell them at all) and the highest bidder also insists on exclusive rights. Thus streaming films don't come from multiple sources, and no one source has everything. Each service has plenty of good things to watch, but no one will have everything you want to see. Yeah, this is the main problem. Everyone wants a piece of the action. There are problems like this in a lot of industries. Perhaps it'll take something like NetFlix getting bought by Google and having the wealth to just buy enough that everyone else is forced to go through them. In the meantime, the consumer is stuck with struggling to figure out the best option, which is never good. yes, your right, monopolies give the best deal to the consumer. Lets make sure google owns everything; i'm sure they'll make the price cheaper then. And yes, the problem is the "Fragmentation of the market", allowing a wider range of independent producers to finance a wider range of films then were available when the gatekeepers had a tighter grip on the access to the marketplace. Yes, no matter your niche interest, there is a tv station, podcast, website, youtube channel, or satellite radio program that caters to it and, gosh darn it, that's a big problem for the viewing public. The multi-platform "competition" that you are bemoaning, illusory as it is (lets remember there are like 6 media companies on the planet that own ALL these things), is the only countervaling force in the marketplace to total monopoly control, and drives technological, economic and content competition, to whatever degree those things still have meaning. But lets by all means wish for the day where everything is owned by one entity, and we have to see what they decide we can see, and we pay what they decide what we have to pay. Sounds like heaven, because then it'll be easy to find everything in one place.

Seeing Novak like that was sadder than the IN Memoriam montage and having to listen to Bette Midler sing "Wind beneath my wings". Goldie Hawn is on her way there, too. I hope these women are watching this closely and stop mutilating themselves.

the ones who've already debuted in the majors we have already seen. What i'm interested in is BA's view of the NEXT 10 prospects after those, and how they compare to BP. 1. Noah Syndergaard (21) 2. Rafael Montero (23) 3. Amed Rosario (18) 4. Dominic Smith (18) 5. Cesar Puello (22) ? Plewecki Nimmo M.Molina D.Herrera G.Cecchini S.Matz

i'm just glad it wasn't captain intangibles.

"of all of hte bloggers out there in the blogosphere, greg is the one with the talent to be a columnist" says howie. Greg, that's nice and all, but if i were you, I'd take that as an insult. Many of the bloggers i read (including you) are far superior to most columnists currently in print. The assumption that its the other way around is an ill-informed 20th century notion.

Is your favorite food JERKy? your favorite color Maroon? your favorite medical condition anal leakage? just wondering.

But you voluntarily reached out to them to buy their services. A salesman trying to "upsell" you is just salesmanship 101. Granted, doing that in an emergency context is really stupid, and i'd hate that too, but hearing shit you don't want to hear when you ask somebody for help is the risk you run of asking. But what if you are in your own house, cooking dinner, getting the kids to do homework, checking the score of the game, and the phone starts ringing, the dogs start barking, and its somebody trying to get you to give them money for something you are not interested in and haven't inquired about, by what right have they intruded themselves unasked for into your home? Really this shit should be illegal.