soupcan

cooby wrote: And Munson... Lots of good casting there ...and makeup.

How scary is Turturro's likeness to Martin?

ESPN Revisits Tumultuous Time in and Around Yankee Stadium By RICHARD SANDOMIR October 26, 2006 NORWICH, Conn., Oct. 24 � The clubhouse at Dodd Stadium was full of actors Tuesday. They were portraying the 1977 Yankees, some in uniform, some in paisleys, double-knits and platform shoes, for an ESPN miniseries. They were supposed to be in Milwaukee in mid-July during the season in which Reggie Jackson designated himself the �straw that stirs the drink� on his new team. Out of the manager�s office stepped John Turturro as Billy Martin. Turturro lost weight to look as frail as Martin did. He wore latex ears to approximate Martin�s large, jutting ones. He stood timidly in street clothes and cowboy boots and read a statement in which he denied reports in which a �prominent Yankee� said that George Steinbrenner was dictating his lineup and making him miserable. �I want everyone to know that Mr. Steinbrenner is in no way interferin� with my day-to-day baseball decisions,� Turturro said in a quiet monotone, his voice tinged with the in-and-out Texas accent that Martin affected. He finished, looking abashed at his capitulation to the power of Steinbrenner, who is still the Yankees� principal owner. �Who wrote that for you, Billy?� a reporter said, but Martin ignored him, turned and walked into his office. Down the corridor, visible in silhouette, stood Oliver Platt, who plays Steinbrenner in �The Bronx Is Burning,� an eight-hour adaptation of Jonathan Mahler�s 2005 book, �Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx Is Burning,� an account of the 1977 Yankees. But the book follows several other threads, including a cantankerous brawl of a mayoral race starring the eventual winner, Edward I. Koch; Mario M. Cuomo, a future governor; and a former congresswoman, Bella Abzug; the citywide blackout on July 13 that led to looting in many neighborhoods; and the manhunt for the .44-caliber killer known as the Son of Sam. ESPN will carry the series over eight weeks starting in July. Platt awaited his moment to stalk into the clubhouse. He is taller and heavier than Steinbrenner; at 46, he is a year younger than Steinbrenner was when the story takes place. Platt�s hair, usually parted in the middle, assumes the rigid contour of Steinbrenner�s swept coif. His below-the-earlobe sideburns are flecked with gray at their bottoms He walked slowly out of the shadow. He glowered. Platt raised his voice to a higher pitch and blended it with Steinbrenner�s Midwestern inflections. He seethed about the �prominent Yankee� who had leaked the story. In reality, it was catcher Thurman Munson, who was angry enough at Steinbrenner to approach two reporters, one of them Steve Jacobson of Newsday, who is a consultant to the miniseries. �I don�t know who did this,� Platt said � although Jacobson said that when Steinbrenner addressed the team, he knew it was Munson. Anyone who wears the pinstripes is a �prominent Yankee,� Platt said, and concluded, �This kind of monkey business sullies the character of everyone in this organization.� He tossed a copy of The Daily News on the floor and walked off. On the right side of the clubhouse, Erik Jensen, as Munson, with a droopy mustache and tousled hair, looked pained; he knew that confiding in the reporters had placed Martin in a more precarious position. �Cut,� said the director, Jeremiah S. Chechik. �That�s good.� Like most films based on true events, ESPN took liberties. What Turturro said was not from a verbatim account. And Steinbrenner spoke to the players a few days later in a hotel meeting room in Kansas City, Mo., with no reporters present. Jacobson, who was on the set at Dodd Stadium, said the scene was �true to the essence� of Steinbrenner and Martin, although he believed that Steinbrenner would have been more forceful than Platt was. Ron Semiao, the senior vice president of ESPN Original Entertainment, said, �We wouldn�t have had Steinbrenner address the team if he hadn�t.� One consultant to the project is Graig Nettles, the former third baseman. Another is Fran Healy, the former backup catcher, who recently described to Daniel Sunjata, who plays Jackson, his character�s reaction to his tussle with Martin in the visitors� dugout at Fenway Park. Nettles said he gave a crucial tip to the actor playing Lou Piniella, Mather Zickel. �Lou had this nervous habit of smelling his hair,� Nettles said, smiling with the knowledge that their teammates will chuckle when they see Zickel smell his hair. He told Alex Cranmer, who portrays the young Nettles, �Don�t hurt yourself diving.� Nettles often flung his body left and right to retrieve ground balls and line drives. �I never practiced it,� he said. �It just happened in a game.� Jeffrey Maier, the fan who deflected Derek Jeter�s fly ball into a home run during Game 1 of the Yankees-Orioles American League Championship Series in 1996 and then played for Wesleyan University, is playing third in the baseball sequences. ESPN will not rely only on what it shoots at Dodd Stadium, home of the Connecticut Defenders of the Eastern League; it has a 40-hour archive of game action and news footage from the tumult beyond the House That Ruth Built. Close-ups of actors playing the Yankees will be intercut with video, like that of Jackson hitting three home runs in Game 6 of the 1977 World Series. But the heart of the miniseries will be the power struggles between, and among, Turturro�s Martin, Platt�s Steinbrenner and Sunjata�s Jackson. Turturro and Platt are not impersonating their characters, but Nettles said the actors had captured their personalities. �Oliver�s got George,� Nettles said. �He�s got that blusteriness.� Turturro �is scary,� Nettles added. �Just watching him sit in the dugout � he�s Billy.� Marty Appel, a former Yankees public-relations director and another consultant to the production, said that when he heard Platt, in character, shout, �You!� he jumped with the memory of Steinbrenner�s voice. Turturro has adopted Martin�s style: his leanness, his slouch, his habit of placing one, or both hands, in his uniform back pockets, his pugnacity. On Monday night, he re-enacted the incident when Martin blew up at the umpire Bruce Froemming, and was ejected for throwing baseballs on the field, during Game 4 of the 1976 World Series. The actors danced unhappily around each other and Turturro kicked dirt on the actor playing Froemming, even though Martin did not actually do it. �Billy moved like a cat,� Turturro said. Platt, a Red Sox fan, said he had to purge preconceptions about Steinbrenner. He said he admired Steinbrenner�s accomplishments and was not playing him as a tyrant. �I seriously think he never thought of himself as a tyrant,� he said. �I�m not trying to candy coat the guy, but I need to understand him.� Platt added: �You have to play him small. You can�t do a circus-clown version. You want to give him his dignity.� Turturro views Martin as a street tough from his father�s generation, a tragic, riveting character and societal outsider who never found the love or satisfaction he needed. �He could never love his family like he loved baseball,� he said, adding that �George bought him and he broke him.� Late Tuesday night, Platt was in a luxury box (which doubled as a suite at Royals Stadium) surrounded by well-dressed actors playing Steinbrenner�s friends and associates. Nettles stood among them, pretending to watch the Yankees lose Game 3 of the 1977 A.L.C.S. to the Royals. The intention was to collect an array of Steinbrenner�s frustrated reactions to Yankees failures. As extras on the field below enacted pop-ups and double plays, Chechik, the director, asked Platt to stand grimly with his arms folded, stare balefully, turn from the glass window, or walk away. Finally, Platt offered a signature Steinbrenner gesture: Rankled by a Jackson pop-up, he raised his hands and brought them down in an ultimate act of disgust. Daniel Sunjata as Reggie Jackson in ESPN�s miniseries �The Bronx Is Burning,� an account of the Yankees� 1977 season. John Turturro as Billy Martin. Turturro wore latex ears to approximate Martin�s. A film crew acts as the catcher for Leander Carilli, who portrays pitcher Ed Figueroa. Figueroa went 16-11 for the Yankees in 1977. The rocky relationship among Martin, Reggie Jackson and George Steinbrenner, played by Oliver Platt, left, is a main thread of the show. Right, Platt talking with former third baseman Graig Nettles, a consultant for the project. "Oliver's got George," Nettles said. Erik Jensen plays catcher Thurman Munson, who had told reporters that George Steinbrenner was interfering with Billy Martin's decisions. Henri Stanley portrays outfielder Mickey Rivers in the miniseries, which is an eight-hour adaptation of Jonathan Mahler�s 2005 book, �Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx Is Burning.� The actors get a walk through of the next scene from the producers. ESPN will carry the series over eight weeks starting in July.

JUDGMENT DAI By JOEL SHERMAN October 26, 2006 -- ST. LOUIS - Daisuke Matsuzaka is about to add a big arm, a huge financial commitment and a giant mystery onto the major-league landscape. Matsuzaka, arguably Japan's best starter, is going to be posted by his Japanese team in the next few weeks. Essentially that means, every team will have 72 hours to make a blind bid not to sign the 26-year-old righty, but merely to gain the exclusive rights to negotiate with him for 30 days and have his Japanese team, the Seibu Lions, accept the bid. If Seibu accepts after the U.S. Commissioners Office passes along the high bid, then Scott Boras takes over. And the hard-bargaining agent said yesterday that "Matsuzaka's value is that he is a No. 1-type starter, and that is the basis of negotiations." So the price of doing business for a player who has yet to pitch in the majors could be staggering. The most commonly quoted price you hear for just the posting bid is $20 million. But one NL GM whose team plans to participate said his staff has made the "under-over $33 million." There is a feeling that one rogue owner, a Tom Hicks from Texas, for example, could simply decide he wants the player so much that he bids extravagantly to assure gaining negotiating rights. There also is a school of thought that the team that wins the posting exclusivity gains leverage because either Matsuzaka accepts whatever that club offers or else he has to return to play for Seibu for one more year before he gains complete free agency, and that could be humiliating for the player to return. However, Boras, who does not cede leverage to any adversary, said, "Obviously, you look at pitcher like this, he is very young, he's going to come over on his term or wait. [Playing here] is an option for him, not a necessity." So is Matsuzaka worth this kind of outlay, possibly in the five-year, $75 million range on top of the posting cost if he is really treated as a true ace? Yankees assistant GM Jean Afterman, the executive most versed in the organization on Japanese baseball, has visited the country several times in the last year, including in the last week, to gain as much intelligence as possible. Over the summer, Mets GM Omar Minaya dispatched one of his most trusted aides, Russ Bove, to watch Matsuzaka. Both New York clubs are going to be players, and there is an industry feeling that the Yanks will go hard for this pitcher, as will the Mariners. The Dodgers, Red Sox and Rangers also are expected to be among the many teams that bid for Matsuzaka. Here is why: "He is a world-class pitcher," said Bobby Valentine, manager of the Chiba Lotte Marines. "He has very good off-speed stuff and terrific command. He has a fastball between 90-95 [mph], pitches at about 90. He has a curve, slider, change and split. His change is one of the best in the world. He likes to compete and his only problem would be the number of pitches thrown in his life. This year he was a notch below the past two seasons. He had minor injuries and had more hittable pitches than before, but I think it was because of the [World Baseball Classic]." Valentine's assessment matches that of just about every executive questioned about Matsuzaka's skills. An NL GM described Matsuzaka as "in the discussion about the top 10 pitches in the world." An NL scout said, "He's a no. 1 starter. He has command of five pitches. Across the board he has nasty stuff. If he were here this year for the Yankees, he starts Game 1 of the playoffs." Multiple officials made note of Matsuzaka's "gyro" pitch, a slider-sinker hybrid that baffles hitters. The only doubts on Matsuzaka were expressed by an NL director of international scouting who loves the pitcher, but said, "Can he adjust to pitching in a five-man rotation instead of pitching once a week as he does in Japan? And, despite, his age, he has thrown a lot of innings and pitches in his career."

Yancy Street Gang wrote: Jamming into the subway entrance after a game Not like that's gonna change...

As a kid whenever I went to Shea for Jets games I always thought it was so cool how the field level seats were basically on wheels and they just moved them to create the rectangle where there used to be a 'V'. In centerfield beyond the end zone I remember a stage of some sort being in place for a band or some such thing, but were there also temporary bleacher seats erected as well?

="Yancy Street Gang"]Yes, I knew that. But if I owned a Virginia-based team, I'd name them the Ham Fighters. And the logo would be a ham with a menacing face, wielding a baseball bat. I'm no Zvon but... OE: Forgot the bat.

I'm correct in my recollection that technically the team is simply The Fighters but that they are owned by the company known as Nippon Ham. Thus they are the Nippon Ham Fighters. Right?

'Bang' the game?

Edgy DC wrote: Seems to me a few have unMetly uniform tops also. Not a lot of opportunities to take pictures of guys in Met uniforms and hats in 1961 I'm guessing.

Thanks Dusty.

Yeah, its definitely missing some guys but still - a nice piece.

Couldn't find the original thread... Check this baby out. If you've got a Met fan in your life that you want to spend some do-re-mi on, this is the item to buy... Mets Yearbook Original 1962 & Topps Baseball Cards You can 'Buy It....NOW!!!!!' for the low, low price of $740.00.

cooby wrote: Burgess would be embarrassed to know my memory of him cooby wrote: Ask him if he has any memories of poor Tom Burgess I think cooby's trying to tell us something! What is it cooby? Did Tom fall down the well? Which way girl? Show us...!

I speak and write the word 'principal' about a million times a day during the work week so I'm just conditioned to that spelling. I meant 'principle' in this instance.

="Edgy DC"]Yeah, well, the ticket's memoribilia value --- either to the holder or the e-bay shopper has to cancel out some of the value of five months' interest on $150, no? Granted, the interest isn't much but its the principal of the thing really. If you are a season ticket holder and want to keep your seats and keep your account current I don't believe you have a choice in terms of getting a refund or applying the monies to next season's tix. I think you have to apply it.

Not as 'kool' as you think. Who do you think gets the interest on that money from now until they credit it back? Not the ticket buyer.

Cows get bruised too.

This thread makes me sad.

Ever watch that Chris Isaac Showtime show? It really wasn't half bad and the music was pretty good.

Don't know how you can source it but I completely agree with what you wrote. Can you take an informal poll of Mets fans and use those results?

metirish wrote: ]The first guy who volunteers to shake Alou's hand when he joins the Mets will get my vote for team captain. Is he a dick or what? He pees on his hands to 'toughen them up'.

I tuned in for a second and heard them talking about possibly illegal substances on Kenny Rogers hand that had since been removed. Hmmm, maybe the Gambler's post season renaissance ain't so mysterious after all. Paging Mr. Scott, Mr. Mike Scott.

Valentin's single in the 9th (10th?) to give the Mets a 1-0 win against the Cubs & Prior on a hot Wednesday at Shea.

No black on Johnny D. He's a pure blood.